If you hadn’t heard, Richard Carrier is suing FreeThought Blogs, Skepticon, The Orbit, and several individuals for two million dollars. To learn more, I recommend an episode on the Atheistically Speaking Podcast [eta: correction] about it. If you are interested in helping the defendants, you may contribute to the defense fund here. (Note that I am not personally liable since FreeThought Blogs is incorporated as an LLC.)
The primary subject of the lawsuit is defamation. Since I do not want to repeat any remarks that would risk me getting sued (and apparently merely referring to accusations against Carrier is sufficient), I will simply quote Richard Carrier himself.
In June of 2016, Amy Frank accused me of sexual assault and sexual harassment at a house party the morning after I spoke for her campus organization in Arizona last year.
Skepticon Inc. published an announcement that I was dangerous because of multiple claims against me and that I was therefore banned from their conference.
Stephanie Zvan of The Orbit and PZ Myers of Freethought Blogs both claim they have spoken to “two other women” who have made claims against me. They released no details about those claims, just conclusory statements whose truth cannot be assessed.
(Source: “The Details of my Defamation Case” by Richard Carrier. I won’t link.)
Contrary to what Carrier says, it is not clear to me that Amy Frank or anyone else accused him of sexual assault. Carrier’s lawsuit makes the tenuous argument that Amy Frank implied sexual assault by using the hashtag #sexualassault. Note that sexual harassment and sexual assault are offenses of very different orders of magnitude. In the US, sexual harassment is illegal only when it is frequent or severe. Small isolated incidents of sexual harassment are not illegal.
To be honest, the incident that disgusted me most about Richard Carrier was not in any of the accusations, and not in the lawsuit. I was disgusted by what Richard Carrier himself admitted in the process of defending himself.
I merely sent [redacted] one letter expressing my interest in them. […]
[redacted] was bothered by my query because it occurred soon after they had joined the same blog network I was then part of, and because they had past grievances against me, which [redacted] listed (none pertaining to [redacted], nor harassment, nor anything I’d heard from them before).
(Source: “The Details of my Defamation Case” by Richard Carrier. Emphasis mine, and redactions made to obscure identity.)
Here, Carrier admits expressing interest to a newly accepted member of FreeThought Blogs. You know, it was less than a year ago that I was a newly accepted member of FreeThought Blogs. I also have reason to believe that Carrier was part of the reason I was admitted onto the network. Imagine that you just got a job, and then someone on the hiring committee asked you on a date. That’s how I feel about this.
Richard Carrier is of course very sorry for the incident, as well as several other incidents he has admitted, but apparently not sorry enough to call off his lawyer. Asshole.
Richard Carrier used to live in Northern California, near where I live. I’ve met him before. I saw him give a talk related to his book Hitler Homer Bible Christ. I found the talk very entertaining and enlightening. I even recommended him to my local atheist student group as a potential speaker.
Over the years, I have heard many grievances against Richard Carrier, most of which I dismiss. Carrier argued extensively that Jesus did not exist; I am not inclined to agree with Jesus mythicism, but I definitely think it is a worthwhile scholarly project. I’ve been told that Carrier had some misguided ideas about physics; I have seen his ideas and agree they are terribly misguided, but I don’t believe that being wrong about physics makes someone a terrible human being. I know that Carrier has asked, on his blog, whether anyone is interested in a date; I find this strange but not wrong.
Nonetheless, because of the recent accusations against Carrier, and Carrier’s responses to those accusations, I am disgusted with him. I don’t believe he is really sorry for what he did if he continues to sue critics.
Richard Carrier replied to most comments left at his blog, which I liked, but many of those replies betrayed a smugness and arrogance out of tune with Carrier’s modest intellectual achievements to date.
Also, sadly, another male “feminist” who appears to have used this as a cover for dodgy behaviour.
“Nonetheless, because of the recent accusations against Carrier, and Carrier’s responses to those accusations, I am disgusted with him.”
Well done on providing Carrier with evidence of reputational damage. Brilliantly played!
Arrogance and smugness are *much* more forgivable than asking out someone who you’ve just hired.
@Leo Bloom,
Evidence of reputational damage really isn’t the thing that Carrier is lacking from his case.
@Leo Bloom
If this is evidence of damage to Carrier’s reputation, then it is by his own idiocy. Siggy was quoting Carrier directly. That isn’t fucking “defamation,” it’s drawing reasonable conclusions from statements he made about himself.
For anyone interested in a legal analysis of this case, I highly recommend this episode of Atheistically Speaking:
http://atheisticallyspeaking.com/as280-richard-carriers-lawsuit-andrew-torrez/
Based on this, I think it’s going to be exceedingly hard for Richard to prove his case.
This whole thing really makes me sad, because he has done amazing work in the field of history and I think his actions may end up destroying his career, which would be a loss to historical research and analysis, in some small part. Ironically perhaps, I think his career might have been better served by not filing this lawsuit. But maybe he sees his career as ruined already and this is the only way for him to have a shot at financial independence.
It’s so mystifying. He’s likely already detested by SJW-hating atheists, theists, and the apparent bulk of academia that reject his hypothesis. And now he’s ostracized himself from a community of allies. He must be lonely. It would be sad if he wasn’t a fucking arrogant creep.
The damage to Carrier’s reputation is from Carrier filing suit, and not from the allegations against Carrier, and therefore what you wrote is very wrong.
Carrier’s lawsuit baffles me. I thought he knew and was better.
Also thought he’d have heard of the Streisland effect?
Seems not. But .. really? WTF Carrier, really?
Super-Intelligent men have always been attractive to smart women…but a certain type of woman, the smart and attractive young woman , usually hasn’t experienced the hard realities of rejection that men endure as a right of passage to maturity.
I see nasty comments directed at our hero from behind the veil of the anonymity that the web provides…with no consequence such as Carrier is subjected to by these self righteous ‘innocents’ who would ruin a man’s career over an admission of attraction for young woman parading as a worldly wise intellectual!
Poor Richard. I hope he finds support from the legal fraternity to deal with those who would destroy him over a hurt ego, or that he teach himself enough Law to bring these people to justice for financial loss.
Unbelievable that Carrier be hauled through the mud by his own people!
The only winners are the religious zealots and political conservatives…
@Peter Swidler,
LOL. Those who would destroy him? Richard Carrier is the one suing. And by all accounts his patreon is doing better now than it was before.
Siggy says
May 23, 2019 at 10:16 am
@Peter Swidler,
LOL. Those who would destroy him? Richard Carrier is the one suing. And by all accounts his patreon is doing better now than it was before.
Hmmm…Obviously it is Carrier who needs to sue after having his life, reputation and consequently his livelihood ruined by those I referred to above as being ‘smart, attractive young women’ who have at worst had their ego sustain a slight bruising…but responded in such a heavy handed manner that Carrier now is forced into protecting his reputation.
Not so hard to understand…
@Peter Swidler,
Richard Carrier’s livelihood? I guess you’re not even going to acknowledge my claim about Carrier’s Patreon.
In the OP, I talk about a case of Carrier harassing an FTB writer. You know, I didn’t hear about that from anyone Carrier is suing. I heard about it from Carrier’s legal filings. If you read the e-mails Carrier submitted as evidence, he admits that he did wrong, and apologizes profusely for it. In fact, he apologizes at such length to someone who seemed to want the conversation to end, that one might say the apology was part of the problem. But the moment anyone else says he did wrong, it’s defamation, and he did nothing wrong.
I’m also mystified as to why it is relevant to say that the women are smart, attractive, or young. I guess you just like to pepper your arguments with irrelevancies.