.. – zimnica przynagli go ry.

Mike, I understand your argument, but it misses the point. It’s true that creationism is demonstrably and scientifically false, but that observation is irrelevant to my point above. The comparison I’m making to “Teach the Controversy” concerns the way creationist attempt to present their theories as having equal merit as evolutionary science. Creationists like teaching the controversy because they believe that evolution can only be taught at the exclusion of creationism. By leveling the playing field, they make every argument appear to have equal footing.

Concerning Teach the Controversy, does it really matter if creationism is false whereas some arguments (like that men have experience sexism in this world) have some factual basis behind them? No: that’s ridiculous. Some creationist theories actually do have a shred of scientific truth to them, but that doesn’t mean we should teach them. A very small number of smart climatologist do not believe global climate change to be caused by humans (and they have arguments based in fact), but are you suggesting that because their arguments aren’t “flat-out provably not true” that presenting them with same urgency as climate change evidence is warranted? God (if he exists), I hope not.

Listen, “I’m not in favor of women’s rights or men’s rights…I’m in favor of human rights.” is teaching the controversy. Perhaps it’s not your intention, but that’s what you’re doing. Your pretending that sexism against women as presented by Watson et al. can only be argued at the expense and exclusion of a push toward a universal end to sexism. I don’t know why you think this, but you do (and so does tf00t apparently). How does admitting that women (not just Watson in particular) receive worse sexual harassment than men hurt the expansion of Human rights? Explain it to me. How do Watson’s actions in any way, shape, or form show she does not favor human rights? Are you really suggesting that Women shouldn’t talk about harassment unless it also includes a conversation about harassment toward men? Teaching the controversy.

Seriously, you talk of facts, so here they are: Women have had it way worse than man, historically, especially when it comes to religion. That’s a fact. As an atheist you should know this first hand. So, when you peanut-butter spread harassment over all of Humanity, you systematically deny the factual basis upon which we can rightly claim that Women receive more frequent and severe harassment than men. That’s teaching the controversy, dude.

I have always disliked the idea because of the expenses.
But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using Movable-type on various websites for about a year and am
nervous about switching to another platform. I have heard fantastic things
about blogengine.net. Is there a way I can import
all my wordpress posts into it? Any kind of help would be really appreciated!

The two are not the same, nor even similar. There is sexism against men and women, whereas the theory of creationism is provably false. Not just a little bit, or open to interpretation, but flat-out provably not true.

However, there IS sexism perpetrated against men (not just women), and this is fact, not theory.

So why wouldn’t any human being, regardless of gender, want to eliminate sexism, not just against women but against men too?

Why not? Why is the idea of eliminating sexism regardless of gender a reasonable idea?

I’m not in favor of women’s rights or men’s rights…I’m in favor of human rights.

And yet I still can’t help but be disappointed in your behavior Thunderf00t and the community’s response to Watson and others. Tf00t, I came to your videos at a point in my life when I started thinking about things differently. I realized, among other things, I didn’t have a good reason to feel homosexuals shouldn’t marry; that woman were unclean during certain times of the month (a teaching of orthodox Judaism); that people were predestined to being poor; that an almighty dictator chooses winners and losers in life. Throwing off religion was a liberating experience, and I understood, for the first time in my life how religion–my own beliefs in particular–were used as a means to tell undermine groups of people–women in particular.

So, your argument above is flimsy. Whether Watson, Skepchick, or any other person for that matter frames this discussion in broad language and loaded questions is incredibly irrelevant. Watson and others have real examples of incredibly vitriolic and horrible things said to them; not from trolls, but from people who go to conferences with them; not from creationists, but from…you. Is she taking these comments too seriously? Maybe, but why does that matter? Does her overreaction really warrant people release her docs? sending her messages about what they would do to her? In your videos, as I recall, you’ve talked about the nasty things sent to your inbox. I’ve seen the awful stuff said in your comments. The community’s response (at least, for my own part on YouTube) was to rally in support of you, to show that these threats won’t stop your videos. But when Watson exposes literally the same types of terrible things sent to her, your response is….this blog post? That she’s making a big deal out of nothing? Weren’t you also making a big deal out of nothing then?

I don’t think you were. But hey, that’s the internet, right? People say mean things all the time, don’t they? I guess. But why then go after VFX for his comments on DPRJones? You guys literally laid down the law on him. And, in Watson’s case, at least some of the unwanted comments sent Watson’s way probably do break some state laws on cyber-bullying (in case you think your experience is different because VFX allegedly did something illegal). I’m wondering at the end of the day your cause is more righteous, more serious, more truthful than hers. Do you see where I’m going with this? Please: why is it when mistreatment toward Watson is exposed do you compare her to creationists? Why don’t you consider your reactions to VFX, to YouTube’s censoring your videos, to SkepChick (as in this blog post) a butthurt overreaction? I’m seriously interested in why you feel your reactions are somehow different than hers.

Finally, I don’t really love using the actions of creationists as exemplars of everything I don’t like (other atheists apparently love this), but you did it so what the heck. The response, “hey if you’re really against sexism why just focus on women, why not speak out for all genders” is an argument similar to “creationism is just a theory like evolution, so why not teach both?” Creationism isn’t on par with evolution the same way that sexism toward women is not the same as what is experienced toward men. And your response to this point, “Shouldn’t we be against all hate, irrespective of gender?” is truly reminiscent of your own argument against SkepChick. Most everyone will, of course, agree with the sorta broad language you’ve presented, that all genders should be treated equally. But that entirely misses a very real point: sexism directed toward woman is often worse (you know this, as explained below), and the Atheist community, which should be first and foremost leading the charge to expose it has decided to do what everyone else does: blame the victim.

And the real problem with all of this is that you actually know, for a very real fact, that sexism toward woman is much worse. You know this because you’ve spoken out against religion for a significant portion of your life, so you know how religion has been used as a way to control people, women very much included. So, I think, what bothers me most is that this blog article is something you actually very much disagree with. The problem is you’re wrong, and you actually know it.

FTB & the skepchick blog are not places of reason, for that they deserve to be forced into confronting that. Good on you Thunderfoot.