SIO287: AHA Revokes Dawkins Award, Atheists Lose Minds

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:28 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Serious Inquiries Only. This is episode 287. I'm Thomas. I am here by myself because I have opinions and I know next up on the docket is the part 2 on criminal justice and racism, and that's still, of course, on the docket. I've been on editing it, but a thing kind of happened and has picked up steam within atheism that's classically the kind of thing I would have come on here and commented on through the years. I've been doing less of that lately, but I don't know. I'm not sure what it is. I just can't stop thinking about this and arguing about it and identifying terrible arguments. So I just wanted to do a kind of good old fashioned commentary on what I think about it.

0:01:13 Thomas: So anyway, first things first, Lindsay and I are doing a Q&A. We're going to start doing a monthly Q&A like I do with some of my other shows, and the idea will be that patrons get to pose the questions on patreon.com/seriouspod. The question thread is up if you're a patron and you haven't gotten a chance to check that out, please do. But we'll make sure to release it for everybody, so patrons get to ask the questions but the audio will go out for everybody, and that's going to be our plan, and that is coming up real soon. So hop on that Patreon and ask some Qs for us to A. I'm looking forward to it, and maybe this episode will add some fuel to that fire. I don't know. Okay, so the inter-atheism, whatever, humanism, skeptic circles kind of news involves Richard Dawkins, and it's about the American Humanist Association.

0:02:06 Thomas: Gosh, I always don't know how far to go back with this stuff. I don't know what history anybody knows. I don't know, by the way, sometimes I forget a lot of this history. I have to like refresh myself on it. But anyway, if you're listening, the odds are you also listened to the excellent breakdown of the transphobic, dangerous, harmful garbage that was Debra Soh's book, The End of Gender. Richard Dawkins tweeted out an endorsement of that. I mean, we mentioned it on that show. This isn't news. This happened before that show that he said, if even half of this is true, we better fight back. Real skeptical stuff. Real, real, real great work there. So Debra Soh's book is Unscientific Dangerous Garbage. That is a conclusion that I came to after the breakdown on the show and hearing the examples from an actual scientist in Dr.

0:02:59 Thomas: Lindsay Osterman, co-host. So that's a view I highlight that because it's important to the conversation, because this turns into a giant meta argument about like, well, what views are acceptable and is debate okay anymore, blah, blah, blah. So anyway, that's an important piece of information to the puzzle. So Dawkins has tweeted that, he's also tweeted, uh, really stupid thing here, let me, let me read this. Listen to how badly worded this is in so many ways. Oh, also, content note, very transphobic language here. And that's going to have to apply for probably this episode because I'm going to be talking about some transphobic people and some bad arguments and so forth. So content note there, content warning.

0:03:46 Thomas: Okay, he tweeted in 2015, "Rachel Dolezal, a white chapter president of NAACP, was vilified for identifying as black. Some men choose to identify as women, and some women choose to identify as men. You will be vilified if you deny that they are literally are what they identify as. Discuss." So, right away, when you're saying "some men choose to identify as," you're already giving away the game there. You're already doing the thing. You're saying they're not women. You called them men, men, you said some men choose to identify as women, you've already, you've given up the game there. And if you wanted to say, "Hey, oh, whoops, apologies," I'm a really old man whose apparently brain doesn't work anymore, has constantly the excuse about Dawkins.

0:04:36 Thomas: Which is interesting, but anyway, what I meant to say is some women are trans and some women are cis, you know, that'd be a way of putting it, but you didn't do that. So, I, I think it's fair to conclude that he stands by this language. And And I got to tell you, there's interesting conversation to be had here by good faith people, something we've talked a little bit about on Philosophers in Space. I think it may be true that in a different world, you know, in a world that didn't have a lot of our horrible racist history, you know, specifically in this country, I don't speak for anyone, but, you know, I'll talk about the U.S. In the U.S., if they pretend we lived in a world, in a country where there's just no racial problems whatsoever, it may be the case that how you identify racially may be different in that world.

0:05:27 Thomas: It would be a less fraught discussion, but we don't live in that world. I mean, in this world, what happened was an opportunistic white person tried to gain social currency by posing as something she wasn't. And it's, it's really not that hard to see the obvious difference there. Again, I mean, I mean, you can, you can, there are, there are interesting and difficult philosophical problems here, you know. I think to say it's simply that people say, well, if gender is a social construct, and if, if, you know, some people view race as a social contract, then why can't there just be, as, why can't be the same thing, that you're transracial as your transgender, why can it be the thing. Well, I mean, they aren't really the same. I mean, I also, I, it would be interesting, as Lindsay talked about here on the show.

0:06:17 Thomas: Some of the brain science is showing us that, you know, scientifically, there do seem to be commonalities in trans women and cis women in ways that they identify at the brain level that may show some of what's going on here. Um, whereas I, I don't believe you would find any of that for, like, Rachel Dolezal, it wouldn't make any sense. Also, you know, there are actually cases of people who have, like, maybe more ambiguous skin tone who genuinely aren't sure what their racial bracket, there are cases of people who are thought they were black or thought they were white, and then genetic tests, which, by the way, aren't, aren't entirely accurate. There's another whole conversation to be had there.

0:07:02 Thomas: But there are ambiguous cases where it may actually kind of be more about where they identify. But the important part is, in a racist society like ours, certainly historically very racist, what has mattered is what society perceives you as. And when you are in 2015 trying to take advantage and rise to positions of prominence in the black community as somebody who isn't actually black and is just pretending, that's a fraudulent, disgusting thing to do. I, you know, I often think of this. People don't, I, I can't remember if I brought up this argument or if I just think of it every time and don't say it, but a lot of the conservative arguments against, I don't know, treating trans people with dignity, or just treating trans women as women, for example, or trans men as men, a lot of it comes down to, like, "but people might be pretending a thing," you know, like there's always is like, well, they might pretend to get in a bathroom or whatever, which there's no evidence of that.

0:08:00 Thomas: There's all the evidence in the world that bathrooms are dangerous because of cis men, you know, like that's the actual danger. But I often think, too, it is a fact that many people pose and pretend to be, pose as and pretend to be veterans to gain certain status. It happens. I read a whole article about it, actually, because it's a kind of fraud that's difficult to suss out. Oftentimes, people pretend to have medals they didn't actually get. The argument wouldn't be, well, people are pretending to be a veteran, so therefore, veterans should not get any benefits. That would be the equivalent argument when you talk about a lot of these anti-trans arguments.

Because there could be bad faith actors pretending to be something they're not, that therefore there can't, we just can't recognize trans rights, that wouldn't make any sense. Would you say the same thing of veterans? Would you say, well, because people can pretend to be veterans, they shouldn't get any, like, you know, veteran special health care mental status? Uh, and set aside the fact that, you know, I know a lot of this audience, including me, is anti-military, but arguing with people on the right, they would certainly say that, that uh, veterans should, should get certain social status, for example, or certain benefits that maybe non-veterans shouldn't get. And you wouldn't say because people pretend to be the thing that therefore you can't give veterans benefits. They would say, oh, no, well, those people are frauds. And it's the same thing here.

0:09:34 Thomas: If someone were pretending to be trans or pretending to be a different race when they're not, that's a different thing. That's fraudulent behavior. Anyway, the point of all this is that there could be a nuanced discussion to be had about this. And I want to say that I'm not confident that I have all the right answers on this, on how, you know, the racial intersection. I mean, I've given you some thoughts and I think that the important part is when you are a fraud of a person trying to capitalize and gain certain status by pretending to be black, that's obviously terrible behavior. But, you know, I can't pretend I have a perfect handle on philosophically everything that's going on here. I just think these are different things in a key way. But remember, though, that there was this whole debate about how Kamala Harris isn't actually black.

0:10:24 Thomas: You know, that was like a bad faith argument made on the right. And hypothetically, if you were somebody, maybe not Kamala Harris, maybe whoever, if you're somebody whose skin was darker, whatever reason, I don't know, and people perceived you to be African-American and treated you as though you were African-American, you know, and so perhaps discriminated against you as such or whatever. And then like genetically, let's say hypothetically, you found out, oh, I actually don't have any African heritage of any kind. Well, it'd be pretty weird for me or anybody to come say, well, you can't, you can't be black, you can't identify as black. Because I don't know, like if society has, you know, has treated you as such and you, you are unable to like shed your skin, uh, then I don't know.

0:11:15 Thomas: I think it might be reasonable to still identify as Black, but I don't know, this seems like tough questions. What's not a tough question is that trans women are women. And when you tweet, some men choose to identify as women, then you are giving up the game that you are not treating trans women as women and you don't think of them as such. And so you've given it up. You don't get to say we were just having a discussion because, you know, you said what you meant there. So anyway, in response to this tweet and other stuff, not just this tweet, the American Humanist Association put out a release. And this is actually, it's only been a week. I thought it had been longer. I guess it's been a long week, but okay, here we go. April 19th. I'll just read it. April 19th. Established in 1953, the Humanist of the Year Award is conferred annually by the American Humanist Association, recognizing the awardee as an exemplar of humanist values.

0:12:08 Thomas: Communication of scientific concepts to the public is an important aspect of advancing the cause of humanism. Richard Dawkins was honored in 1996 by the AHA as the Humanists of the Year for his significant contributions in this area. Regrettably, Richard Dawkins has over the past several years accumulated a history of making statements that use the guise of scientific discourse to demean marginalized groups, and approach antithetical to humanist values. His latest statement implies that the identities of transgender individuals are fraudulent, while also simultaneously attacking black identity as one that can be assumed when convenient. That's good language there, good way to put it. Anyway, his subsequent attempts at clarification are inadequate and convey neither sensitivity nor sincerity. Consequently, the AHA board has concluded that Richard Dawkins is no longer deserving of being honored by the AHA and has voted to withdraw, effective immediately, the 1996 Humanist of the Year Award. And so now we've got all kinds of fallout from this. We've gotten, and because people don't want to be called transphobic, they like to find a lot of ways to say the thing without saying the thing, you know?

So we've gotten a lot about, like, the bylaws of humanist awards, there's lot, but it's so long ago, how can you take away a thing? Like a whole lot of spent ink or whatever, or bits and boops, whatever computer code, whatever, a whole lot of time talking about, but it's so long ago.

0:13:47 Thomas: Why? Okay. I get, you know, I'm not going to defend Dawkins. It's, it's a way of, well, almost virtue signaling to like, to somebody that you want, you're not going fully, you don't want to fully come out and defend these terrible statements by Dawkins, this is some people, by the way, it is a different category. Some people will just defend the statements by dawkins. Uh, well I'll get to those examples too. But some people are like, well, yeah, I don't defend it, but isn't it kind of stupid that they took away an award? And some people Are getting really bent out of shape about this. Oh, can you believe it says here in the Humanist Association bylaws that, you know, people can change and that he, blah, blah. It's very silly. It is very silly, and I feel like it is obvious to me what is going on there, but I do not know that it is obviously to them.

0:14:35 Thomas: I think they think they're getting away with it. But yeah, if your biggest complaint is the organization that has their own award, that's not a real thing, but this isn't, I say not a real thing. It's not like, this isn't like by statute, by the 1867 established law of award giving in the constitution or something. This isn't like a legal thing. It's up to them. It's up to the Humanist Association what their awards mean, because I could make an organization tomorrow called the Thomas Bullshit Thing Award for people who don't suck. And I could give an award 25 years ago and I could be like, man, this person really sucks. I sure wish I could signal to the people that follow me, maybe maybe try to exert some influence and say, I want to recognize how bad this person sucks.

0:15:29 Thomas: I'm going to take away this award I gave 25 years ago for this piece person being cool. Like there's no, it doesn't matter that I gave an, this is all pretend. It's, I mean, not to get nihilistic, I guess everything's kind of pretend, but like, this is really pretend. This is an award from an organization, by the way, a good organization that I like. And I think their awards mean something. And, uh, I don't have one. So, so that's how, you know, they mean something, uh. I mean that's cool. Like I would be, I'd be happy to get one. That'd be awesome or something. And I mean something to humanists, I think, and perhaps taking away an award from a long time ago, maybe, maybe that does do something to the credibility of the, but I don't know, like I don't, who cares?

0:16:17 Thomas: I'm not really, you know, if anything, maybe it means it's better. Like if you still have your humanist award, maybe it means more, you know, that's like an ongoing endorsement from the American Humanist Association. You know, that that feels like it hasn't diminished the value of their words. I feel like that is increased the value. But I guess what's got me so agitated lately is that we have to see the same, like, two or three stupid fucking arguments. Apologies, this could be could get yelly, be forewarned, here, from the people who brand themselves as the smartest people on the internet.

Yeah, so, i.e. skeptic dudes, basically, like, not, you know, obviously it's not entirely white dudes, but it's disproportionately. Anyway, but but people who brand themselves as skeptic, god, they're able to, you know, just reach pure reason, it's not a lot of emotion. We get the same stupid over, I, I cannot tell you how many replies to all the stuff I've said online line here involve the words thought police, thought police, dot police, dot police. It's like, seriously, I could just do a Twitter search for thought police, like, involving my account or whatever, and I would find, I don't know, hundreds of it.

Like, I just, it just occurred to me the other day, hey, you know how I know I'm not the thought police? I am unable to read thoughts. That is not a power I, I possess. So you would think that would be pretty mandatory in order to police thoughts.

0:17:49 Thomas: I would have to be able to read thoughts. But no, you are reacting to me expressing my opinion about your opinion. Things that both happened not in your brain. Neither of those things was your thoughts in your head. I, I would agree if someone was somehow policing your thoughts, that would would be rough. I would not want anyone policing my thoughts because I think lots of dumb things a lot. And then I have to have other thoughts that are like, hey, that was a dumb thought. You dummy. Good thing no one can hear that. And I have try to unthink them. Yeah, I'm glad. Well, actually, I guess I'm my own thought police, really. Maybe I'm changing my mind on it. Actually, maybe I'm pro-thought self-policing. You know, Nothing wrong with a bad thought that comes along, happens all the time to me. Anyway, I won't speak for anybody else, but yeah, no, I, I'm not the thought police because I can't read your fucking mind, you idiot. I'm reacting to a thing you said online and I'm replying to the thing you said. That that can't be thought police.

It's this weird victim culture, that and it's, it's so, I think why I get so bent out of shape about it is because of the years and years of the other side of this exactly accusing us of doing the thing they're constantly doing.

They're constantly doing the victim culture, this is the IGW, cultural conservative types in the skeptic circles, they are constantly railing about victimhood culture, even though they are the biggest whiny baby victims of all, the minute somebody expresses a negative, like, moral, moral opinion about something they've said,

0:19:31 Thomas: They whine and cry about it and say it's not fair and you're the thought police, which just seems very victim-y to me. But also, if I'm the thought police for expressing a negative opinion of your opinion, then aren't you the thought police for calling me the thought please for doing that? Like, isn't that policing my thoughts then? Aren't I? So then that means I'm not allowed to have that particular opinion. So then by by your definition, you are also the thought police. It's so amazing. It constantly comes down to if you express an opinion and I say I don't like it, your opinion was fine, but my opinion saying I don'T like it was not fine. That was out of bounds. My opinion calling your character into question is somehow out of bounds.

0:20:19 Thomas: But your opinion that might be, you know, transphobic or bigoted, that's not out of bound. That's fine. I just am not allowed to say, hey, hey, fuck you, buddy. Like, what are you talking about? That's not, that's not free speech. I don't get how that works. My speech doesn't count as free speech sometimes, apparently, even though I'm not the government. I'm in charge of anybody's reactions to anything, by the way. That's another part of this. I've gotten called the moral police who, oh, we're tired of self-appointed moral police telling us who we can and can't listen to. It's like, I'm just another person with an opinion that people are free to not listen to. I can't single-handedly do anything. I can't, can't like when I express an opinion about something or I say like, oh my God, fuck Richard Dawkins.

0:21:07 Thomas: He's an asshole who shouldn't be listened to for endorsing Deborah So's book and saying, if even half of this is true, I, if I say he's an ass hole, I have no power over anybody. I'm making an argument, you know, and we make arguments about it. And if people are persuaded by my arguments, or by the way, they're probably persuaded by their own opinions on it, you know, mostly, I'm obviously mainly learning from other people around here.

But if I express an opinion to, say, someone who, you knows, is persuaded by it, maybe I persuade a person or two, I still can't, I haven't made anyone do anything. I'm putting out there that I think Richard Dawkins sucks and shouldn't be listened to. That's just another opinion. How do they not see this? Like, somehow if I say the magical words like cancel, like if I type in the like the sequel code, canceled Richard Dawkins, no, you've just canceled him, you single-handedly have the power to do that. Somehow it's like, no, I've expressed an opinion about the guy, which is speech, that is also speech. I can't, I cannot even tell you how many times I've been called the moral thought police, the self-appointed moral thought police. And it's so weird.

It is so weird, there's a sense in which it's not true, but there's a sense in which those people are describing something. And I think what they're describing is that what maybe a lot of people do in these movements and have done historically, certainly, is never go out on a limb to alienate somebody who might have money or power, if I'm being honest.

0:22:53 Thomas: A lot of people don't want to alienate, not so much anymore in atheism, but certainly, let's say in 2010 or whatever, pick the year. People don't want to alienate Richard Dawkins.

They don't wanna come out strong until they, you know, know some people obviously did, and for a good reason, there's not a lot of incentive, certainly for, like, establishment people within the movement, you know, heads of organizations, organizations that rely on Dawkins's name to get funding or to get viewership or listenership, whatever you name it, you know, there's a lot, there's... there's every incentive, and that's what's frustrating me lately. I'm going to give a specific example of it, too.

Like, there's so much working against progress in this way, you know, and that's why I'm so glad that some somebody like the American Humanist is going out on a limb here, because what happened was some, some asshole in response to this, I think his name is like Todd Stifel or something, I've never heard of him, but he's apparently some rich guy, and he wrote a Facebook that was like, well, I'll be pulling my funding from the AHA, which, which apparently somebody looked up the documents, you know, cause that's all public stuff, cause I guess it was a, it's a nonprofit that this person donates through.

So I think you can see, see all that stuff. And they said that this person donates like a half a million dollars a year to different organizations. And I think they donate 25,000 to the American Humanist, just not an insignificant amount of money, but like it could have easily been more, you know, like, what, let's say like actually a decent chunk of the funding came from this asshole.

0:24:38 Thomas: Think about what that does. Think about how long that has made a difference in social progress in these ways. I mean, these wealthier types have been able to essentially enforce their moral views on the movement by being the people with the money and the power. And maybe some of them are cool. I don't know. Again, I don't really know much about this world. I'm kind of on the outside of the movement world, you know, as covered. I don't have any awards. Maybe I don't know what goes into that. More prominence, you know, more prominence and or more influence and money. I don't know. Whatever it is, I don't have it. But picture like with this example, how forceful that like how much trouble that is. Because like, honestly, what if AHA kind of shit their pants as a result of this? What if they're like, oh, my God, how much money did we just lose because this asshole is mad that we were mean to Dawkins?

0:25:38 Thomas: And think about how much like impact that has had. And so I guess what I'm saying is like there's every all the forces are going toward protecting people like Dawkins over the years. And I'm glad that it's maybe less that way now. But also there's less of a movement now. So that could be part of it, too. But then I also look at somebody like Seth Andrews, who wrote a very long kind of pointless screed on this. I have my differences with Seth. I think he's a good guy, but it's stuff like this that I can't help but feel like when it comes to certain actors within this movement that it seems to be the people who have a lot of influence or a big name or whatever are the ones who get infinite redos, you know?

0:26:26 Thomas: Like, ah, why doesn't, if only we could reach out to Richard Dawkins, extend an olive branch. And in fairness to uh Seth, I think he said that Dawkins, I think he first said that Dawkins should have reached out to, you know, trans people and educated himself. And okay, fair enough, I respect that he said that. But he also said like, well, first off, he, you could find this on his Facebook if you want, it's very long, I'm not going to read the whole thing, but like there's so much of this weird, weird conversation Seth has with himself about how, well, already I can hear the keyboard warriors saying that I'm central. And actually, if you got rid of all of that, the statement wouldn't be that bad. It's weird that he has to include that. I don't know who he's signaling to or what.

0:27:13 Thomas: It's like he wants to make extra sure that he pisses off people who want him to make some sort of choice here, which is made more weird by the fact that he did, that Seth did kind of condemn Dawkins in pretty solid words here. So you just do that. Just do that thing. Why not just do that? Why do you do the thing where you're like, I can already hear everybody mad at me for being too centrist. Anyway, yeah, Dawkins did say some rants. Just do that part. It's the weirdest thing. Anyway, listen to the end of this. I'll just read the last couple paragraphs. "I imagine what some kindness language might accomplish today across the board. Not the tweets, not cold text in a two-dimensional space, but a phone call, a coffee, a forum, an encounter, eye to eye, voice to voice, listening ear to ear. Call me naive, but in regard to Richard Dawkins and many others, imagine the transformative power of an olive branch. Maybe just maybe we can recover from these wounds and draw each other forward into the inclusive, loving, humanistic space we so desperately crave."

0:28:13 Thomas: Yeah, like I think that could be true with, you know, like your family or your friends. I don't know if this is just like a Seth Andrews privilege thing, but I don't have Richard Dawkins's phone number. I doubt most of you do either. This idea that like we need to extend an olive branch to the millionaire who just sits and tweets shit for the past 10 years. Do you think people haven't tried? Do you really think that nobody has tried to reach Richard Dawkins in 10 years? They tried. Richard Dawkins was a fucking asshole starting at Elevator Gate. That's the first time I know. I'm sure his assholery dates back before that, you know, but like that's the 1st time that I ever knew.

0:28:59 Thomas: Uh, and looking back, it was just like, I don't want to re-litigate that, but it is so awful. I actually, I'm not going to relitigate it, but I will restate it just in case people don't know this. There was the whole Rebecca Watson. She merely wrote either in a blog or said in a video. I can't remember which cause I've read it, you know, like read the quote so many times. I think it was in a video and she said, you know a guy followed her into the elevator late at night, 3 a.m. and said, Hey, let's go get coffee. And she was made very uncomfortable by that. Justifiably, in my opinion, uh, it seems like I, don't think I understood it at the time as a dude in 2013 or whatever. It was a little clueless at that time, or I can't remember what it was. But anyway, but now I get it, you know, like don't follow a woman at 3am into a closed enclosed space and then ask her out or whatever, ask her to go up to a room or that's just not a cool thing.

0:29:49 Thomas: And here's what she said. The entire quote, I remember because I've gone through this so many times, the quote was, guys, don't do that. Guys, don't do that, that's all, that's all it was, like you could even have have interpreted that as like, don't do that to her even. Like, I'm just saying in the realm of interpretations, you could have been like, oh, okay, she doesn't like that. So I better not do that to Rebecca Watson. I mean, I think it's very good advice to not do that. But I'm saying like, you could've even taken it like that very easily. And yet, this created outrage. I know, sorry, this is old news. It's an old thing. But the part that maybe I think people forget is that not only did Richard Dawkins write a weird bullshit thing saying like, oh, I'm sorry, Muslima, you Muslim woman with a forced into a burqa.

0:30:42 Thomas: This is, I am not exaggerating. This is what he wrote. He wrote this. Richard Dawkins, millionaire, established celebrity of atheism, wrote this because of a blogger or whatever, like whatever Rebecca Watson At the time, like a pretty small, no insult to her, but a pretty small time in comparison person with a, with a YouTube channel or whatever, and just viciously mocked her for what she said. I'm sorry, Muslima. We can't help you out of your burqa because American women are being asked to coffee. Are you fucking kidding me, dude? That was, I mean, that was like the first thing that I know of. And I, again, that I'm sure there's other examples.

0:31:27 Thomas: Maybe, but like the dude's a fucking asshole and it doesn't end there, it doesn't end there. There was a conference that they were both gonna be at or something and he said, I'm not coming if Rebecca Watson, this person, is also invited. Severely damaged Rebecca Watson's, you know, career, um, like certainly at that time if you were trying to make your mark in atheism or whatever and get out there, and captain fucking mr atheist Richard Dawkins is like, I'm not gonna go to the conference if she's invited. That's a big fucking deal. All because she said guys don't do that. So this is an asshole, this is a somebody who like, do you think in 10 years since then, which is, I think it's been like whatever, eight, nine, ten years, do you thinking all that time no one's tried to quote, quote unquote, reach out?

0:32:25 Thomas: How many olive branches does this person deserve? How many fucking discarded, not unused, unaccepted olive branches are just littering this guy's yard. You know, just, just a wasteland of olive branches that people held out to him and he decided not to take. How, how many times are we going to do? How much empathy, how much, how Many chances, how many redos does the rich, well-off scientist guy who claims to be super reasonable? How many chances do we give these people? It's so weird. And then at the same time, if you're somebody coming from a different direction, then Seth Andrews will say you're the outrage brigade and blah, blah, I shouldn't listen to you.

0:33:17 Thomas: I can't help but think it correlates a little bit with, with which audiences you are trying to piss off or not piss off. A little bit of a detour there, sorry, but I, I, it, not enough people remember how fucking shitty Richard Dawkins was in that instance. It's funny because there are things that Dawkins tweeted that I actually kind of defended, and I still would, like, I still think there's times when he was just being clumsy versus whatever. And I actually, this is a good chance to bring up the other thing I keep hearing, which is this weird like infantilizing of Dawkins that they've done, like some people have been like, oh, he's had a stroke, don't take away his award, he's at a stroke, it's like, I don't know, I think he thinks he's got a good handle on things. And there's, I keep, this is another one, and not to, sorry if this person listens to the show, but someone was just tweeting at me, it's, it's not just this one person, I've heard this a lot, yeah, he needs to put down Twitter, man, get off Twitter.

0:34:14 Thomas: And I don't know, I can't help but think like, isn't that a weird way of kind of avoiding the thing? Like, people, here's what I feel like, either for hero worship reasons or whatever reasons, I see people going through an awful lot of stages of the grief thingy with Dawkins, like, they're fine, they try to find all these other things, oh, the award, it's 25 years, why, blah blah, all these things, and this is one of those things, yeah, he's got to get off Twitter, man. Man. He should just get off Twitter. It's like, yeah, I'm on Twitter, I don't seem to tweet out transphobic stuff. Or if I accidentally did, I could, I think, deliver an apology that would make up for like making a genuine mistake on something, you know, like, so why is he too dumb to be on Twitter? What do you mean he's got to get off? The thing he has to do is not be a a fucking asshole.

0:35:02 Thomas: You know, like it's not, that may have applied to some of the controversies in Dawkins' history. And I'll give it, like, honestly, I'll give them just for fun, I'll give them the benefit of doubt of the doubt on a few of those things. Like, oh, it was a quick, you know, didn't have time to frame it in the proper context. Yeah, we've all been there, okay, that's the like, get off Twitter thing, but the, wow, just read Deborah So's book, The End of Gender.

If even half of it is true, we gotta fucking do something, but that's not get off Twitter, he just said all that, there wasn't a length problem, you know, like he just said, I endorse this absolutely horrible transphobic bigoted thing that's gonna get trans kids killed, that's the problem, the problem is that the problem is not Twitter, it's like, if so, it's not like if you told a KKK guy like, you need to get a different outfit or something, You know, like don't see, don't wear the hood because then people see that you're in the Clan. And like, that was what you said. You know, it doesn't feel a little like a weird response. I was like, "God damn, that fucking guy shouldn't be a Klansman. Fuck that guy." Like he shouldn't been. And then you're like, "Yeah, he's got to get different outfit." You're like, "Well, no, that's not really the issue. The issue isn't the outfit. It's the reason he's wearing the outfit.

The issue is Twitter. It is the things he is saying on Twitter. The things he believes. Those are the issues." But in fairness, I get the impulse. I think for some people, and I get this impulse, I totally do. I know I've been bashing it a little bit, but I get it, because I think for some, they think, "I want to remember Richard Dawkins as this guy who wrote these books that I really liked, and I wish that he would just

0:36:48 Thomas: Get off Twitter so that no one knew how shitty he was." Like, that might be the good place this is coming from, like, "I just really wish he could just still be an unambiguous hero to me." And I get that, like, I've I think I felt that way for a certain period of time, but that's not happening. He should just change his mind, is what he should do. That would be the better, that's the more direct thing to do. And that's what gets me about this, because I got I haven't even yet gotten to Steven Pinker. And I swear to God, everybody, you might not believe me, I think I'm literally going to do an episode called "Steven Pinkor Fucking Sucks." He sucks. It's unbelievable. I've been doing a little research in preparation for my forthcoming episode, "Steven Pinko Fucking Sucks." I've unbelievable how many shitty things that guy has done and said that somehow fly under the radar.

0:37:37 Thomas: I Think if you ask the average person, they'd be like, Like, oh yeah, he's a brilliant, uh, cognizant linguist or whatever the fuck, but like he's, he sucks and he's used his like science guy, obviously white male, you know, nerd type. Like I'm a scientist. You better listen to me. Cause I'm rational about everything. He's used that persona to, to like defend really shitty things too. Sort of like not actually, I was going to say like, but I think he literally did this. It's sort of like when Lawrence Krauss defended Jeffrey Epstein. Yes, this happened. This is real, everybody. Lawrence Krauss defended Jeffrey Epstein by saying, I'm a scientist. And as a scientist, I look at the evidence and the evidence. I've never seen an underage girl with Jeffrey Epsteen.

0:38:24 Thomas: I've seen some young looking girls. I've never seen an underaged girl with Jeff Epstein, I must say. And that's using science to defend Jeffrey Epstein. This is really, you can look it up if you want. I brought it up before and posted the link at some point, but you can find it. Just look for, look for "Krauss defends Epstein" if you don't remember what I'm talking about. It's stuff like that. And I actually think Pinker did the same thing, and it's awful. He fucking sucks.

And I love this because Steven Pinker put out a big statement that I kept seeing referenced, and I kept clicking on it, and then I would go to something that said, like, "This person is limited, who could view their tweets." And I was like, what the fuck? And it turns out that I've been blocked by Steven Pinker. And apparently a lot of people have, and it's funny because I don't think it's any like direct thing. I don't, I don't think I've talked to the person. Maybe I've tweeted at him, but I'm pretty sure he uses one of those block list thingies, there's just probably anyone he doesn't want to deal with, which I think is just so funny coming from somebody who's frequently talking about free speech and debate and argument and all that. But anyway, that aside, that's whatever, people can block who they want. I just think it's particularly funny when people are all about like free speech and argument, do it? I'm not. I will gladly block people.

I make no bones about it. Best day of my life was when I blocked Godless Spellchecker. Fuck that guy. I'm going to talk about him later too. But anyway, here's Steven Pinker's big statement. Do I have to read this whole thing? Let's see. Okay. "Dawkins did not call for discrimination against or marginalization of any individual or group. He explicitly denied any intention to disparage or lend support, "Now, it would still be completely appropriate for those of you who objected to the substance of his tweets to criticize them in the Humanist or other forums, explaining the nature of their objections, but to seek to punish, dishonor, or humiliate a writer rather than engage with his words is a betrayal of humanism. The Humanist Manifesto 3, I don't know what that is, but whatever, declares that the life stance of Humanist is a guided by reason. Since no one is infallible, reason requires that a diverse range of ideas be expressed and debated openly, including ones that some people find unfamiliar or uncomfortable. To demonize a writer rather than address the writer's arguments is a confession that one has no rational response to them." Stepping out.

0:40:43 Thomas: Yeah, or you already did that part multiple times. You've already defended them. Like, if you demonize a racist, does that mean you're confessing you have no rational response to their arguments? Like, the only really, like, does that follow, Mr. Smart Fucking Guy, super scientist man, Pinker, just brilliant guy, like everything about you is science and reason, does that fall out follow? Asshole. "To demonize a writer rather than address the writer's arguments is a confession that one has no rational response to them" is the quote. No, that's, that's, doesn't follow, idiot. It. That doesn't follow. Maybe you already have addressed their arguments a lot of times, and then after a while you're like, "Well, fuck this guy." Oh, I see.

0:41:28 Thomas: You're confessing. You have no rational response. No, I already did that a lot. A people are We've already all done that. Fucking guy. Anyway, this illiberal response is all the more damaging to an organization that claims to repudiate the repressive practices of religion. It has not been lost on commentators that an association with freethinkers has deemed certain thoughts unthinkable.

0:41:54 Thomas: Nor that it is enforcing dogmas and catechisms by excommunicating a heretic, the AHA is turning itself into a laughingstock. This will only intensify when critics discover that past humanists of the year whose awards have not been withdrawn include Margaret Sanger, a proponent of eugenics. Okay, pausing there. This is a right-wing bullshit talking point. This, would it surprise you? I already posted about this, but perhaps this is a signal, folks. Perhaps when Steven, this is not the first time, by the way, and maybe when I do my forthcoming episode, Steven Pinker's fucking sucks. I'll highlight at other times that he has parroted right-wing propaganda as though it were true.

0:42:40 Thomas: And this is a thing that I've noticed has been a problem among the horsemen, the IDW, like the Sam Harris's. Margaret Sanger was not a proponent of eugenics. This is a common right-wing talking point. While I absolutely will believe that Margaret Sanger, somebody who was alive a bajillion years ago, had a bunch of problematic views, because people who were alive 10 years ago had problematic views, like I'm not, this is not a blanket defense of Margaret Sanger, but the, the, this story that's a frequently cited, that I am 100% confident Pinker is, is thinking of here, is that she wanted, she supported abortion because she wanted to abort black people and just do a eugenics on them.

0:43:26 Thomas: And it's absolutely right-wing propaganda that is not true. I just posted a fact check of this when Herman fucking Cain made the statement 10 years ago that she supported abortion because of racial eugenics. She has a lot of really, obviously, again, problematic quotes, because she was alive 100 years ago or whatever. But she did say, and this is actually just a true statement, that black people would be better off if they had access to reproductive choices like abortion. That's true of any population of people. People. The problem was black people, poor people couldn't get access to reproductive health care because it costs money. So it's not a racial eugenics statement to say people will be better off if they can get access to reproductive health.

0:44:13 Thomas: That's just a true statement about any humans. And then the right likes to make a thing because they hate abortion. They hate Planned Parenthood. The right has tried to twist that into like, yeah, she wanted abortion because she wants more black babies to be killed. And if you support Planned Parenthood, it has a Hitlerian eugenics origin. And this is a mainstream conservative belief, by the way. I've had my own family told me this one.

0:44:42 Thomas: Anyway, again, this is not, again not to make a blanket defense of somebody who lived a hundred years ago. Basically, everybody who lived 100 years ago who was white probably had some shitty views. Like, that's just a fact. But then we get to the other one. And I'll go back to Pinker's statement. And this also comes from the Godless Spellchecker. I'll read his statement on this, too. Going back to the statement. And Alice Walker, who advances lunatic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. Many other awardees have aroused controversy in this day or ours. By the way, those are the only two examples he brings up. I don't know many others. Do we have any other examples? Like, if we do, feel free to name them. Anyway, sometimes endorsing positions we now recognize as pseudoscientific. If every humanist of the year could be canceled by someone who took exception to a sentence in their work, we would have a new inquisition that would earn the mockery of every defender of traditional religion.

0:45:37 Thomas: Oh my God, that's a doozy. Sorry, I don't think I'd processed how fucking stupid this one is. I just, I know, look, I'm a little angry and I'm speaking freely, but it's because, because I'm so fucking sick of having to make the same arguments over and over and over, and it never ends, these people still have their positions, these people are still a prominent Harvard fucking scientist, of whatever, Steven Pinker never catches up with them. And it doesn't matter that they make the same bullshit cancel culture arguments over and over that are the same as the PC craze in the 90s or whatever, you know, it somehow, somehow never matters. And I admit it wears on me a bit. And I think if more of us started talking about these people and these arguments with the disdain that I think they warrant, I think it would start to make a difference.

0:46:28 Thomas: You know, like the, the, the idea that we all have to be very like cautious. Oh, um, let me, uh, let me look, let's discuss Richard Dawkins is a tweet in a very calm, rational way and make sure not to say anything that would be insulting to him. I think that, well, look, there may be a case that that could reach certain people. Maybe that could reach his supporters better, maybe.

But I think there's also a case to be made, and it's hard to know which is the right answer here, that that language also perpetuates a system where they still get to be like moral authorities, and they still get to scientific and rational authorities. You know, like if you never, if you're continually giving them deference and just trying to downplay these very significant stupid fucking opinions they have that are anti-scientific and dangerous, if you keep trying to downplay that in an effort to make nice all the time, I think that keeps them with more power and influence, not less. I honestly do. That's how I feel. But now let me, let me get back to the sentence because this is really a doozy. I must have, maybe my eyes glazed over the first time I read this. I didn't process it. Listen to this. If every humanist of the year could be canceled by someone who took exception to a sentence in their work, we would have a new inquisition that would earn the mockery of every defender of traditional medicine.

0:47:58 Thomas: Sorry, does he think that the American Humanist Association is now being run by like one person who looked at Dawkins's tweets and like, oh shit, why did we give the cancel humanist of the year button to that one person over there. Shit. Oh, well they have the button and now they can cancel anyone who is humanist to the year. If they take exception to one sentence in their work, what the fuck are you talking about, dude? Nobody in these people's lives. Look, I yell at them. A couple other people yell at him.

Nobody else in these these people's lives says, hey, um, Steve, what the fuck are you talking about? Like, just literally, what the f**k is this hyperbolic nonsense? If every humanist of the year could be cancelled by someone who took exception to a sentence in their, that's not what happened. The American Humanist Association themselves, the people who gave the award, now I get maybe it's different people now or whatever, but like they are in control. The people who are in control of the entity, the name, the organization, they have legal control of that organization. They are making the decision to revoke their award.

And it is not based on taking an exception to a sentence in Dawkins's work. What a, what a bullshit, weak ass way to put this. Oh, I'm sorry. Now, if I say anything wrong than anybody like that, come on, that's a toddler thing. That's a toddler thing. That's my, Phoebe is this close to making those arguments.

0:49:33 Thomas: She's not quite there yet, you know, because mostly because she's just so good. So we haven't, we haven't had those kinds of arguments yet, but she's getting there. She'll get to the, oh, I'm sorry for breathing level of arguing. That's like, essentially he might as well have said, I'm sorry for breathing. That should have been the end of this fucking stupid statement. Steven Pinker, you fucking suck. You know what? I'm, I may have to do a part two. I'm out of time.

I thought I was going to be able to finish this before the kids got home, but I realize I have a lot to say. I guess I've been holding it in for a while, everybody. So like, honestly, I think I have to do a part two of this when I have him in it, because there's so much more to say, there's such a lot more. So I guess for the, let it suffice to say that I see it as a very valid exercise of inhumanism to say hey, we should signal to the humanist community and to the world that that we really strongly, uh, disapprove of the bigotry, anti-trans bigotery coming out of this man's Twitter account. And here's what we're going to do. This will make a splash, make an impact. There you go. I think that's a valid, there's a lot of argument about like, well, the humanist bylaws say that they're, they have to allow for people to change.

And so therefore it's unhumanist for them to have like taken away an old award. Okay. All right. Yeah, sure. Like I have a hard time believing that's what you really care about is the fucking humanist bylaws. I got to say, I feel like maybe you've got something else on your mind that you're trying to defend is what I think.

0:51:07 Thomas: All right. Well, I've got more to say. I'll see you for part two. Sorry. You know, if you're just here to hear expert scientific breakdowns by Lindsay Osterman, join the club. I am too. Sorry, but maybe, but you know, I can't help but think this might be helpful to some people because I'm sure a lot of people are frustrated with this crap and maybe giving them the emotional outlet. That's what I think I can provide sometimes is being that emotional outlet and also I think I'm making good arguments here. I stand by my arguments. I don't believe my arguments are diminished by me yelling them. I think that if you are so irrational that that you can't parse out an argument because I'm mad about it, that, like, that's on you. That doesn't change my argument, you know?

0:51:53 Thomas: Like, if I yell trans lives are lives, like trans people are people, it's not made less true by me being a little agitated about it. You know? So that's what I have to say. All right. I'll see you hopefully very soon for part two.

0:52:17 Clip: Thank you so much for listening to Serious Inquiries Only. If you like the show, the absolute best thing you can do is support us at patreon.com slash SeriousPod. The second best thing you can do, is please share it on social media or by word of mouth. Speaking of social media, follow me on Twitter at Serious Pod. If would like to be Facebook friends, send me a request at facebook.com Thomas podcast. If not up for that level of intimacy, that's fine. Maybe you want to join the discussion at facebook.com/groups/SIO members. Thank you again for listening. We'll see you next time.