What skeptoid drama-scandal is that you may ask? The disgusting and bizarrely over-the-top-can't-shut-the-fuck-up-about-it reaction uber-athesist Richard Dawkins had to skeptic Rebecca Watson's personal and subjective experience on an elevator while in Ireland attending a skeptic conference. This is part of what she posted about that experience:
"All of you except for the one man who didn’t really grasp, I think, what I was saying on the panel, because at the bar later that night, actually at four in the morning, we were at the hotel bar. Four am, I said, ‘I’ve had enough guys, I’m exhausted, going to bed.’Richard Dawkins protested. A lot. Snarkily, sarcastically, rudely, smugly and yep, I'll pull the sexist card. For why else would someone, anyone, particularly a man, rant, rave and protest so damn much about one woman's personal experience? After a whole bunch of revolting responses from Dawkins, he then ups the "Wow, really???!!! Really????!!" factor with the following comment. Puzzled by the criticism he's received -- and using uber-skeptid tactic #205 (insisting he hasn't yet received a reasonable response on why his rantings are so noxious; until he does, he'll rant on) -- he utterly dismisses Watson's feelings on her experience:
“So I walked to the elevator, and a man got on the elevator with me and said, ‘Don’t take this the wrong way, but I find you very interesting and I would like to talk more. Would you like to come to by hotel room for coffee?’
“Just a word to the wise here, guys, don’t do that. I don’t really know how else to explain how this makes me incredibly uncomfortable. But I’ll just sort of lay it out that I was a single woman in a foreign country at four am in a hotel elevator with you, just you. Don’t invite my back to your hotel room right after I finish talking about how it creeps me out and makes me uncomfortable when men sexualize me in that manner. But everyone else seemed to really get it, and thank you for getting it.”
"But my point is that the ‘slightly bad thing’ suffered by Rebecca was not even slightly bad, it was zero bad."On the one hand, I don't care much because they're all, well, you know... skeptics. On the other, it's a disgusting mess and a sad disgusting mess that reeks of misogyny.
But the post on the Ryawesome blog is terrific in pointing out the sheer hyperbole of so many uber-skeptoids.
And yes, I do find the whole thing ironic, given that all of the above individuals are skeptics.
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