Hey! It’s Everybody Draw Mohammed Day! I’ve been been engaged in this meeting all day, so I haven’t had time to do anything — although, I think I should get a pass since I spent an hour listening to Maryam Namazie giving a ferociously anti-Islamist talk, which I’m sure was far more offensive to the fanatics than any doodle I could possibly scribble up.
But OK, I’ll just steal something someone else drew: here’s a picture of Mohammed by Rashid al-Din, a 14th century Persian. That should do the job.
Or you could just read Jesus and Mo for a while.
…….0
……- –
…….|
……/ \
Hmmmm, this should do.
More feathery than I’d expected.
Or was it the other person?
Glen Davidson
“I, Mohammed, sacred Prophet of Islam, am a poopyhead.”
☻/
/█
/ \
No, because as documented last year, the day is dominated by racists.
I don’t think those wings are large enough to be functional.
8=D}
If people feel that they need to draw Muhammad for their artistic reasons, I’m not saying it’s always a problem. As I just said above, the Jesus and Mo comics, while they are criminally unfunny, are at least not centered around this day of vengeance.
Picking out one day of the year and asking people to target Islam specifically, as a response to an event several years ago, brings out the xenophobes. The xenophobes in the DMD Facebook comments demonstrate that.
What you’re doing is setting aside a day for vengeance, in which people primarily of the dominant racial group in the West get to feel aggrieved, over old news.
The assholes at revolutionmuslim.com started this a long time ago, and you got your kicks in last year, and the year before. You got your vengeance. Making it a tradition now, that just invites dominant groups’ grievances, like continually obsessing over the death of Virginia Dare.
Anybody who wants to draw Muhammad can do so, and 364 days out of the year it’s not automatically inviting the xenophobes to join you. But don’t make a holiday of targeting only Islam; this only gives cover to the anti-immigrant movements.
http://www.andcabbagesandkings.com/2011/05/08/draw-muhammad-day-is-a-stupid-and-destructive-stunt/
I just scratched out a quick sketch of a beardy bloke in a robe looking leeringly at a small, slightly worried looking, figure in a burqa.
Unfortunately I have no means of sharing this with the internetz, so I’ll leave it to your imagination.
I can reasonably assume that Mohammed made sure that al-Din’s head rolled all lickety split?
No. He fell victim to court intrigues at the age of seventy five. Before that he lead quite an interesing life.
He was also born into a Jewish family, go figure.
Molly Norris doesn’t want this.
Molly Norris understood that this is collective punishment.
I drew Mo today for a blog post. Even had a nice Muslim stop by and tell me that I’m doing the right thing, and that not all followers of Islam are as backward as the fundies. I like that.
Who is being punished? The idea of blasphemy is being challenged. Anyone who is offended is applying their religious rules to people outside their religion. Attempting to deny the right to depict an image of Mohammed is the great offense, in my opinion.
And his reasoning amounted to it doesn’t bother me because I’m Sunni. That’s great, it really is, but it doesn’t change the fact that this is collective punishment of a great many Muslims who don’t see it that way but still haven’t done anything wrong to deserve this collective punishment.
The big problem, as Shahed Amanullah made clear, was revolutionmuslim.com. That’s what DMD was supposedly a response to:
“the fact is that millions of Muslim-Americans — many of whom have known about South Park caricatures of Muhammad for years — behaved exactly the way free speech advocates wanted them to: by remaining silent or expressing their feelings peacefully. The handful of thugs at a New York-based site called Revolution Muslim — who, by the way, are unwelcome in every New York mosque for their extremist rantings — were the only exceptions. And now these Muslim-Americans are being subject to mass insult as thanks for their respect of South Park‘s free speech rights…
Maybe it is to show all Muslims that attacks on free speech won’t be tolerated. But the fact is that over the course of 10 years, millions of Muslims respected the free speech of South Park and didn’t even lodge a polite complaint with Comedy Central. What exactly are we being punished for? Our inability to enforce a zero-tolerance policy and prevent a blogger from hitting the Enter key?”
Muslims, especially Muslim immigrants, who are being informed by the dominant culture (who are mostly white) that they are not welcome in this country.
What you’re doing is setting aside a day for vengeance, in which people primarily of the dominant racial group in the West get to feel aggrieved, over old news.
The assholes at revolutionmuslim.com started this a long time ago, and you got your kicks in last year. You got your vengeance. Making it a tradition now, that just invites dominant groups’ grievances, like continually obsessing over the death of Virginia Dare.
Nobody is trying to deny you that right. What I’m telling you is that you’re making solidarity with racists and xenophobes.
This is a wishful rationalization, which forgets that there are Muslim children growing up here who cannot be expected to have the same rational reactions as adults might. Many of them will rightly understand that they are being targeted for their immigrant status, and will be hurt by it.
No, that’s not what it means to be offended.
“Anyone who is offended by blackface is applying their cultural rules to people outside their culture.”
See what’s wrong with that? Simply being offended is not the same as banning your right to wear blackface. And asking you not to wear blackface is not imposing any rule on you. Protesting against your use of blackface is not imposing any rule on you. Calling you a racist is not imposing any rule on you.
And again, if people feel that they need to draw Muhammad for their artistic reasons, I’m not saying it’s always a problem. As I just said above, the Jesus and Mo comics, while they are criminally unfunny, are at least not centered around this day of vengeance.
Picking out one day of the year and asking people to target Islam specifically, as a response to an event two years ago, brings out the xenophobes. The xenophobes in the DMD Facebook comments demonstrate that.
It’s possible to draw Muhammad, if one feels artistically inclined to do so, without making a big racist day of it. There are 364 other days.
That is how you could challenge the idea of blasphemy without standing in solidarity with white supremacists. You could do it any other day of the year, instead of making a tradition now about dominant groups’ grievances.
Everyone who is supposed to be impressed by inane scribbling.
Do you consider sketching a person challenging?
How Great Thou Art, O right to depict an image of Mohammed. It’s awful. Just awful. The most precious thing, depicting Mohammed, what you’ve always dreamed of doing, is being taken away … well not actually taken away but criticized.
You know, if you want to be even more blasphemous, you could spend every day of the year drawing Mohammed and set aside one very special day so the rest of us can be spared petulant, self-righteous pranks which don’t accomplish jack shit.
Quoting Jadehawk:
“there’s one more aspect to this:
when ex-muslims, or activists within majority muslim communities/countries/etc. engage in this sort of activism, their acts are acts of resistance against power; their behavior performs cultural work that travels up the gradient of power.
when people from Western countries who have nothing whatsoever to do with Islam or Muslim communities do the same, their behavior performs cultural work that travels down the gradient of power, and as such is not resistance against power, but reinforcement of a system of power.
These details and interconnections do matter, even if they look like they shouldn’t.”
Dear life is like a pitbull with lipstick:
It is not people that are being called out, picked on or set up for discrimination.
It is ideas that are filed under the headings of bogosity, hatred, prejudice, ignorance, infighting and religion that are being called out.
Pointing and laughing is not only a useful tool, it is also harmless in itself. The only harm is that imagined by the object of the pointing and laughing. Yes, imagined.
You argue the wrong argument.
Love, CW
*Full disclosure: I have never drawn Mohammed or any other religious figure. I do find a clever rendition of their supposed likenesses illuminating from time to time.*
Really? Drawing a picture of Mohammed does all of that? You could’ve fooled me.
Maybe a better idea, consciousness razor @19, would be to set aside one day a year as Don’t Draw Mohammed Day. I see it as a boon, a balm, a relief to the oppressed. Not only that, but it would be the least we could do to accommodate, I mean, honor religious extremism.
seconding everything SG/life is saying. (which I guess means I’m seconding my own words in one instance, I guess. whatever, I do stand by those words)
@22:
Oh, no. Read again. I am saying that the idea that one who draws Mohammed is worthy of death is, or quite properly could be, filed under those headings. I admit I just picked the ones that first came to mind.
Not the drawing. The perception, filtered through the glass of religion that such is a grand and fatal sin, is my target.
of course it isn’t harmless. if it were, it would be neither a tool in the arsenal of bullies nor an effective tactic for social change
If that’s the least we could do, then we couldn’t do less. I don’t think that’s correct though, because we could draw Mohammed every day, and that would be the least. I have better things to do, but knock yourself out.
forgive the mixed metaphors
You are wrong, probably because haven’t been paying attention. I note you did not participate in last year’s thread, and so probably haven’t read it.
For example, as you are aware, there is a racist trope about Arabs being “camel-fuckers”. You heard it a lot during the First Gulf War, I’m sure. I know I did. It started going around again during the Iraq War, at least while people still remembered that there was a war.
So here we have a racist caricature of Muhammad fucking a camel.
Your first incorrect reaction will probably be to say that this has nothing to do with anti-Arab racism.
That is as incoherent as saying that a caricature of Moses making matzoh with the blood of Christian babies has nothing to do with anti-Semitism.
This picture is hardly unique. For a great many participants in DMD, this is about promoting racism against Arabs and Persians. This is not something that the atheist movement should be associated with.
We have for many years been in danger of being co-opted by white nationalist movements. We should avoid DMD and speak out against it; if ever it is useful to draw Muhammad, there are 364 other days to do it without making a big racist day of it.
“the fact is that millions of Muslim-Americans — many of whom have known about South Park caricatures of Muhammad for years — behaved exactly the way free speech advocates wanted them to: by remaining silent or expressing their feelings peacefully. The handful of thugs at a New York-based site called Revolution Muslim — who, by the way, are unwelcome in every New York mosque for their extremist rantings — were the only exceptions. And now these Muslim-Americans are being subject to mass insult as thanks for their respect of South Park‘s free speech rights…
Maybe it is to show all Muslims that attacks on free speech won’t be tolerated. But the fact is that over the course of 10 years, millions of Muslims respected the free speech of South Park and didn’t even lodge a polite complaint with Comedy Central. What exactly are we being punished for? Our inability to enforce a zero-tolerance policy and prevent a blogger from hitting the Enter key?”
What comfort to the children of Muslim immigrants, that they may know they are only imagining the xenophobia they experience on a daily basis.
http://www.jesusandmo.net/2012/04/25/ipa/
Funniest bad pun on the interwebs.
Ahem (from the post):
Muhammad is drawn far more on those other 364 days at Jesus and Mo, and it would be only a coincidence if Rashid al-Din had drawn that illustration of Muhammad on the same day as Draw Muhammad Day.
I think the point of this day is being misguidingly warped into the idea that it is inherently racist. Far from it, Draw Muhammad Day is a day to raise awareness that doing something as silly as drawing a picture of one major religion’s revered prophet, who nobody has ever seen and may not have even been real, is considered blasphemy by some Islamic sects. So let us condemn the racists hijacking this day while not losing sight of that.
It’s no rationalization; it was my intent. I couldn’t care less about anyone’s status as an immigrant, or a foreign national, or as a citizen of another nation. I am targeting a religious concept: blasphemy.
Nice fail at generalizing about everyone who drew a picture of Mohammed today.
Your concern is duly noted, and rejected.
Damn right I heard it. Just like I used to hear my father tell me that all black men wanted to fuck white women and not have to work. Fifty five fucking years ago.
I learned to challenge such ignorant claims because I could see in the world around me that it was not so. Because I could catch the timbre of hatred and fear in his voice and watch his bigoted buddies nod approvingly. Such claims were foolish, false and evil on their face even to a little boy. It pissed my father off, I can tell you. Later in life, near the end of his, he confided to me that I had taught him some things he had never considered on his own.
How can it be so terrible to do a little temporary harm (if being offended can be equated with harm) in the attempt to derail a greater and long lived harm? How does all the pointing and laughing that has been aimed at not drawing Mohammed compare to all the lives that have been lain siege to or brutally ended by those who took offense for such caricatures?
cute.
shorter crudely wrott: we’re punching down the power-gradient for their own good!
But Jesus and Mo doesn’t even feature drawings of Mohammed! It has drawings of a stand-in.
I’m not sure how you missed my saying this, but here it is again:
“If people feel that they need to draw Muhammad for their artistic reasons, I’m not saying it’s always a problem. As I just said above, the Jesus and Mo comics, while they are criminally unfunny, are at least not centered around this day of vengeance.”
Obviously I am not criticizing the Jesus and Mo comics here (except that they aren’t funny, but whatever, that’s because they’re a political cartoon and political cartoons are never funny). I’m not criticizing them as having the same problem as DMD, since they don’t.
It has become racist not simply because racists saw an opportunity, but because it is making a tradition about dominant groups’ grievances, like continually obsessing over the death of Virginia Dare.
No, that’s your retcon. What in fact it is is an anniversary of a one-off day, and that one-off day was a response to threats against Molly Norris and Comedy Central. There was a specific reason for it. And so as KG noted last year:
“I note that I did take part in the first DMD – as a one-off I thought there was a point worth making – but the quotes from the DMD page SGBM gave, and the comments of such as mpearle071 and Horace make it quite clear that it has now become hate Muslims day – or perhaps more accurately, hate brown people day. I’m not, of course, claiming that everyone involved has these motivations – but it’s very telling that those who are supporting DMD appear quite unconcerned about the effect on members of what is a vulnerable minority in North America and almost all of Europe.”
Racism is what happens when cross-cultural bad sentiments get memorialized on a particular day. We can deal with these things sensibly almost every day of the year, but when it becomes tradition then it necessarily becomes nationalistic and xenophobic. There’s no way around that; that’s how traditions around past offenses work. Memorializing this offense against Comedy Central on a particular day is just a terrible idea.
You can really condemn them today by not participating today, and not standing in solidarity with them. Like Paul said last time:
“count me out for the current incarnation, which is more about offending people and insulting Muslims for being Muslims instead of simply demonstrating solidarity in not following their silly rules about drawing Mohammed. To be clear, I know that a lot of people around here don’t think of it that way (our host included). And there are some great entries. But I don’t see how we can expect Muslims to filter the chaff from the wheat for us, and I don’t want any part of it while it’s being used as a handy excuse for bullying and othering a disenfranchised minority (I don’t hate you, I’m just showing solidarity with this large group of people that do!).”
No, Jadehawk. Identifying foolish and harmful doctrines in order to lessen its interruption of civilization and nurturing society is for the good of all. It won’t happen today or tomorrow but eliminating groundless practices that harm all people (like killing the apostate or the artist) is a process that essentially defines civilization.
Because it is of course
white man’sWesterners burden to lessen interruptions of civilization and nurture society. which is why we have to punch down the power gradient so much; to civilize those below us, you see.@life is like a pitbull with lipstick:
I really do understand your point. My intent in drawing the picture and posting the entry today was to highlight how the idea of blasphemy is not compatible with the concept of free speech in the United States. In the blog post I explained why I drew the picture. It wasn’t a racist caricature, by any stretch of the imagination.
I condemn holding any people to religious laws without their consent. Their race or national origin simply doesn’t enter into it for me. I hold the idea of the sanctity of a communion wafer in just as much contempt as I do the idea of images of Mohammed being forbidden.
Intent is not magic.
Right, I understand that most people don’t care about the fact that immigrants are discriminated against, Muslim children in America are bullied not only by students but also their teachers, mosques are vandalized, innocent Muslims are spied on by police illegally crossing state lines.
I understand that none of this stuff matters to you because you don’t care whether immigrants feel welcome or not. But maybe if you try to see if from their perspective, understand how they feel, maybe the nativist xenophobia we’re immersed in will start to matter to you. I’m hoping so.
And the children being raised Catholic also rightly recognize that when other kids say “you aren’t Christian, you worship Mary”, they are being targeted by nativists due to lingering racism and xenophobia.
(Even though those other kids may well think they are only targeting a religious concept, since that’s more or less what their parents told them.)
As you know, you’re making solidarity with racists and xenophobes.
It’s legitimate to criticize you for this. You are aware of what you’re doing.
still cute.
Nobody is holding you to any religious laws.
“Anyone who is offended by blackface is applying their cultural rules to people outside their culture.”
See what’s wrong with that? Simply being offended is not the same as banning your right to wear blackface. And asking you not to wear blackface is not imposing any rule on you. Protesting against your use of blackface is not imposing any rule on you. Calling you a racist is not imposing any rule on you.
“colorblindness” is fucking stupid. and harmful.
And you aren’t capable of doing that, because you’re a white American who’s targeting brown immigrants.
If Muslim kids see their older siblings drawing Muhammad, then that could be a good and useful thing. But when they see people whose families have been living here for generations do it, they are more likely to interpret it as what it primarily is, the anti-immigrant sentiment of Horace, mpearle017 and the like.
You can’t just ignore the racism and xenophobia, or expect Muslim kids to ignore the racism and xenophobia. This stuff unfortunately is going hand in hand with DMD, because racists love this kind of opportunity.
Here is an introduction to some relevant psychological research which indicates that this kind of action will not have the outcomes you expect. Please go read it and then ask me if you have any questions; I’ll be happy to provide more in-depth readings.
I want them to understand that certain religious ideas aren’t welcome. This just happens to be one of the ways I’m doing that.
I don’t think we’re going to get any further than to disagree on whether or not I’m being a xenophobe by participating.
That said, i’m done for tonight. I still greatly respect your ideas, life is like a pitbull with lipstick, and if you have suggestions for other ongoing projects to help in pointing out the problems with blasphemy, I’m open to hearing about them and putting them to use.
Thanks, Jadehawk. It’s still my intent, and if it’s misconstrued, so be it.
and it is still cute how you think your intent matters.
whether you are a xenophobe is just as irrelevant as your intentions. you are still aligning yourself with xenophobes, and your actions still have xenophobic effects
Paraphrase: Think of the children!!!
Yes, all discourse should be restricted to that it is appropriate to be consumed by children.
No. Because it is of course everyone’s burden to lessen interruptions of civilization and nurturing society.
We are all involved in trying to sort ourselves out and create a world that is safe for every man, woman and child. It is incumbent upon us all to take part in this process.
What is unfortunate is that there are impediments to this process that are peculiar to certain groups of people that may not enjoy the level of comfort that you or I do. To point out their peculiar failures is no more prejudiced than calling out the bad behavior of one school child in a class of forty.
To the extent that we expect that child to behave we can also expect that of groups of adults, any group of adults, without respect of their privilege on some broader scale. That some people do conflate criticism of behavior or belief with bigoted attacks on entire populations is another problem that needs to be pointed out, ridiculed and somehow remedied.
We’ve been at this task for what, thirty, forty thousand years? I say that there has been a powerful lot of progress made in that time. I say there is significantly less evil in the world today then in the past. I say that we should continue challenging bad behavior whenever and wherever it is manifest.
What I do not say is that “those people are bad and must be dealt with harshly”. Don’t imply that I do.
“you are still aligning yourself with xenophobes”
So far all actions one should analyze what groups that action might possibly align with, and if it turns out there is any unintended convergence I then become proxy for their moral evils?
#logicfail
Think of teh childrenz!!
your attempts at erasing the power differences by using all-encompassing words doesn’t actually make these power differences disappear, CW. nor does it make punching down the power gradient benign when you inaccurately include yourself in the same group with those who are fighting power structures and are punching up.
that’s… really fucking stupid. material comforts are completely fucking irrelevant here.
since i didn’t accuse you or anyone of prejudice, this is irrelevant. you are however contributing to discrimination.
don’t strawman me.
Dan, you have obviously profoundly misunderstood me. On pretty much every level. Let’s try again.
What you are communicating is that being Muslim is not welcome. You are not communicating anything about people who’ve made threats against Molly Norris, for example, because you aren’t targeting the people who made those threats. You are simply targeting every Muslim.
It’s not relevant to me whether you’re “being a xenophobe”.
The problem is that you are encouraging known xenophobes, you are increasing the amount of xenophobia in the nation, and you are thereby subjecting Muslim immigrants to more xenophobia than they would otherwise deal with.
All of these are moral problems — even if we stipulate for the sake of argument that you are not a xenophobe — because all of these are negative effects which make real people’s lives worse.
I frequently do but here’s the thing; I don’t want to join up with someone who treats Muslim people with such disregard.
You’re only looking at effects to yourself, now. You aren’t thinking about how this can hurt other people. All you’re thinking about is whether you agree with your own intent (a pretty low hurdle).
Look, we have people here all the time who say sexist things and they don’t intend to hurt anyone by it. And we all understand that they don’t intend to hurt anyone by it. Yet they do nevertheless hurt people by it.
Your intent is not nearly so important as you seem to imagine; you have a very self-centered way of looking at this. A serious moral stance takes into consideration one’s effects on the world beyond mere intent.
you wish. unfortunately, the reality is that power-structures are enforced, perpetuated, and even strengthened not merely by Teh Ebil Bigots. non-prejudiced actions with even the best of intents, if it causes discriminatory effects, is ultimately no different if done on purpose or done inadvertently.
so yes. it doesn’t matter if you’re a xenophobe; what matters is whether your actions support the position of other xenophobes, and whether they have xenophobic effects. and DMD does both.
Crudely Wrott, after you spilled your Al Sharpton shibboleths, I have no way of regarding you as anything but a resentful white racist.
You know what essentially defines civilization? It isn’t half-assed attempts at expressing artistic freedom, one day out of the year, to piss off a minority, while ignoring the bigots alongside you doing the same idiotic thing, and responding to criticism with this sort of pompous delusion that you’re doing anyone a fucking favor.
And it certainly won’t happen today or tomorrow if all you want to do is shit on people by sending a message that has the same amount of content as a fucking bumper sticker. If you’re so concerned about being free to communicate your ideas, ask yourself if this is how rational, ethical people with something to say actually fucking say it. It’s bad enough to make free expression look like a joke, but blithely disregarding the racist bullshit associated with this little holiday really takes the cake. Get some fucking priorities, then come back to tell us about civilization.
Jadehawk, lifeblahpitballblahlipstick,
You might have a point if this blog was a home for racist bigotry, but PZ and the community are very obviously anti-racism, there have been numerous posts decrying racism. Not only that, but there have been plenty of other posts specifically about blaspheme, such as the Sunday Sacrilege posts, or Crackergate.
You are engaging in Cargo Cultism – racists do this thing, therefore if you do this thing it is racist. That is a logical fallacy. Racists eat breakfast too, does that make me racist if I consume a bowl of cornflakes before going to work?
Yes, we seek to offend Muslims by drawing Mohammed, just as we seek to offend Christians by putting a rusty nail through a Christ Cracker(tm). If you aren’t ok with that, what the hell are you doing at Pharyngula? It’s what we do!
When you resort to claiming that we, atheists, are the powerful ones attacking a weak minority, it is clear that you have lost your grip on reality, go to the silly corner and have a bit of a think before resuming the tone trolling…
and you might have a point if DMD were limited to this blog. it isn’t, so you don’t.
–life is like a pitbull with lipstick
Please read my comment @ 35 where I describe briefly my early experience with thoughtless bigotry. I thought that I had said that such behavior was foolish and should be called out. I did call my father out on it and it put a wall between he and I for many years. In the end he softened his opinions because he came to see how ill informed and harmful they were. This was a formative lesson in my life. I have continued to apply that lesson ever since whenever I encounter bigotry and discrimination. I have been punched out for doing so and have even lost a job along the way for standing up for the idea that all people have the right to dignity and a responsibility to live a dignified life.
For the record: I do not promote the drawing of somebody’s prophet. I do not encourage anyone to do so. Neither do I condemn anyone who does so. I do point and laugh at those who draw a prophet just for the offense without a salient point regarding becoming more civilized. I also point and laugh at those who take such deep offense that they call for the death of the artist, even if the artist has a more constructive point to make.
We are all in this together and we are all going to have to participate in making a better world by shedding our old prejudices and tribal identities.
E Pluribus Unum and good night.
this is very adorable and all, but something isn’t racist because racists do it; something is racist if it has racist effects. but nice try at smearing us with this simplistic bullshit.
Yes, and so if there is any other option for you to communicate or act otherwise, then you should take it. Like, if there were 364 other days out of the year you could act.
This really isn’t hard to understand. If you want to protest against the government for, say, drone attacks, and you find out that the Aryan Nations have a protest planned at the day and place you were going to pick, you should reschedule. Because you don’t want to make the Aryan Nations look like they have more support than they do.
Since there are a bunch of racists doing this EDMD thing, and since there are other ways you can get your message across, the decent thing to do is avoid joining in with them.
(The question you pose is only a real conundrum when there truly is no other option available to you. Luckily that is not the case here.)
Okay, I’m getting a better idea of where you’re coming from (Please forgive this old, thick skull of mine).
If it’s this particular day that garners the association with the racists & xenophobes, that’s okay. I can publish a monthly/weekly anti-blasphemy post, and draw Mo every August, or something like that, and be sure to draw attention to the fact that religious rules against free speech are what I’m targeting.
I still don’t grasp how this can’t be extrapolated to be an argument against criticizing religion in general, or Islam in particular. I should only criticize Christianity, so that I don’t make any immigrants feel bad?
blindness to power gradients is stupid and harmful. therefore, this false equivalence is stupid and harmful.
@life is like a pitbull, OM
“Criminally” unfunny? I guess that depends on which code of law one is beholden to.
Atheists are not a dominant group, not yet at any rate. Anyway, having one day of united activism is standard practice. I guess we could have a Draw Muhammad Week, or several Draw Muhammad Days?
The threats on the lives of Matt and Trey and Molly were because they were going to draw Muhammad. The threatener, Zachary Chesser, got 25 years in prison for his death threats. That is what Draw Muhammad Day comes out of: standing up to the religious bullies picking on easy targets.
Not all days of activism are nationilistic and xenophobic, and this one doesn’t have to be either. That this particular day of activism is inescapably rude is a given, however, due to its mocking and daring nature.
Participating does not mean standing in solidarity with bigots. People participating should be quite capable of condemning the racists looking to hijack the event for a separate agenda.
intersectionality, you dumb shit; learn about it.
We are the community too, hey. I’m an OM, so is Jadehawk, so is consciousness razor. We are not exactly new here.
You should actually read the last thread on this subject.
Yeah, PZ means well, but he also fucks up sometimes and says some racist shit. Don’t ever just look at what the people you respect are doing and figure it’s a good idea. People fuck up. PZ has been fucking this up two years in a row now. He’s a good guy but he has some blind spots.
Aratina Cage, my dear white brother, I’m surprised at your unwillingness to read.
“What you’re doing is setting aside a day for vengeance, in which people primarily of the dominant racial group in the West get to feel aggrieved, over old news.”
Yeah, no Jadehawk. If I see one black guy attacking another with a knife, and I whack him with a baseball bat to stop the attack, that does not make me racists, even though racists beat blacks with baseball bats for racist reasons.
Intent matters. Two people doing the same thing for different reasons does not make those two people equivalent. This blog has a clear record of being anti-racist and pro-blasphemy. It is clear to any fair reader that PZs intent with this post was not about racism, but about blasphemy. You’re choosing to mischievously misread the article is your own problem, not ours.
it’s cute how you create this analogy where it looks like your action is the only possible action, and which implies that your actions is precisely targeted to only defend a victim from harm.
in reality, you’re engaging in a situation in which one “black guy” is harming another, but in which multiple models of intervention or harm minimization were possible but you picked the one that resulted in both “black guys” being harmed.
if they have the same effect, then they are equivalent, pretty much regardless of intent. thus, intent doesn’t matter. effects matter.
it would help your credibility if you didn’t bullshit like this.
And this would avoid making a xenophobic day of it. It’s still, in practice, kicking downward at people who have less power than you, but at least it’s not kicking in rhythm with the jackboots.
No, it’s actually possible to write about how Islam is wrong without sending the message that Muslims are not welcome. But that involves gathering facts and making arguments, not simply making conspicuous displays of disrespect.
EDMD was originally calculated to hurt people. And that’s because it was a one-off response to a particular event. It was retributive in nature, and some people saw it as necessary retribution — whatever, it’s over; I didn’t think it sent an effective message but it’s totally understandable why a lot of people did. Alright. But the thing to understand is that it was retributive, an intentional show of disrespect to Muslims. That’s not always justified, even if it might for the sake of argument have been justified at a particular time in response to a particular event.
Now you’re just being obtuse. I could have equally said something like “if a Jewish salesman scans me and I call him a money grubbing liar, that does not make me racist even though racists call Jews money grubbing liars”. My argument still holds – the intent of the person committing the act is important, and here, on Pharyngula, the intent of DMD is clearly blasphemy, not racism.
To turn your argument on its head, I could accuse you if being a Muslim fanatic, because you oppose DMD, just as Muslim fanatics do. It’s not a fair claim, is it, just as your claim that people that support DMD are racist.
Getting a clue matters.
Do you have a point? Jadehawk, pitbull and I aren’t opposed to blasphemy.
What the fuck does PZ’s intent have to do with it?
“Yes, and so if there is any other option for you to communicate or act otherwise, then you should take it. Like, if there were 364 other days out of the year you could act.”
Xenophobes draw Mohammed with racist intent 365 days a year. So in order to avoid stepping on the eggshells you’re scattering all over the place and avoid any possible perception that we’re in alignment with racists, then drawing Mohammed as a form of protest against radical Muslim positions on blasphemy simply has to stop.
Even if that were not true, I don’t have any interest in organizing my life around whether anyone is going to perceive my actions as having any kind of alignment with morally evil groups. Of course, I’m sure that’s what you do.
I can’t lay me down to sleep before acknowledging two more comments:
#56, life is like a pitbull with lipstick,
Porcupine, dead, sideways, with vigor.
#58, jennyxyzzy,
Thank you for you direct eloquence. I only wish I’d had the presence of mind to reply as you did. Well challenged and well spoken. Here’s hoping that there are those who felt the sting of your words. For myself, I find them comforting and can now sleep with a clear conscience and a much lighter heart.
I can live with that. There’s still Blasphemy Day International, and the rest of the year. As far as conspicuous displays of disrespect go, I’m afraid I’ll still be guilty of that, but it seems that I’m disrespecting ideas rather than people, and I try (though I’m not perfect) to include research and strong arguments in my posts rather than simply saying, “The Pope is a doody-head!” or “Anabaptists suck!”
Thanks for the conversation, and for provoking more thought.
I’m not the one being obtuse. whether something makes you a racist is again irrelevant, since we’re not talking about personalities and intents but about effects. and whether a jew gets called a money-grubbing liar by a racist or a non-racist is really entirely irrelevant to whether the effect is the propagation of a anti-semitic meme, and/or activation of stereotype threat, and/or any number of other outcomes that prop up anti-semitism.
that argument never stood, no matter how many different ways you chose to rephrase it. it’s not like you’re able to effectively argue against the “intent is not magic” thing without understanding it first, and it’s blatantly obvious that you don’t.
1)your reading comprehension is shit. I do not accuse anyone of being racist; that’s what “intent is not magic means”: whether they are racist is not relevant to whether their actions support and cause racism.
2)the unfairness of that accusation is irrelevant; it’s simply inaccurate, even if we rephrased it into the more accurately parallel situation of accusing me of causing fanatically Muslim outcomes (if that still sounds incoherent, that’s because your analogy is that fucking stupid; it’s difficult to squeeze coherence out of it) . my actions do not perform work that is similar to or even indistinguishable from those performed by Muslim fanatics. OTOH, participation in DMD has the same effects regardless of whether the person thusly participating is a racist or not.
Let’s run with that one. When you do this, it just so happens to coincide with lots of racists doing the same thing, because it’s officially “Call Jews money grubbing liars Day.” Maybe you didn’t know. Then you plan ahead to do it again next year (because you’ve got a totally-not-racist grudge against this salesman), knowing lots of racists are going to do it again along with you. Then the next year and the next. At what point should we supposed to stop believing you sincerely have nothing to do with them? And exactly when did you realize that this idiotic analogy broke down?
lol. yeah, her complete inability to comprehend what the concept of “intent is not magic” even means is totes “eloquent”
this is both hilarious and kinda sad.
It’s not simply offense; it’s a calculated display of saying “you are lesser than me.”
When theists say atheism means immorality we correctly recognize that this is an attack on atheists. There is no clear line between attacking atheism and atheists; there are many ways to attack atheists by attacking atheism, particularly as a source of immorality. Equally one can attack gay people by attacking “homosexual behavior” and we recognize that it’s a lie when they try to cover by saying they hate the sin but love the sinner.
For this to even be a plausible calculation, you’d actually have to have evidence that you’ve got a plan which will reduce harm. As I attempted to get you to think about, targeting a minority group — mostly a racial minority group of immigrants — for their religion is likely to cause cultural and ethnic retrenchment.
That is, it is likely to cause them to become more insular, less eager to engage with the wider society as full and active citizens, less willing to deal with the state and more likely instead to handle all their affairs internally to the group.
Also:
That’s exactly what you’re doing, and it’s low of you to deny it.
Jadehawk pointed out to you that DMD is not limited to Pharyngula. I can perhaps accept that your intent is not racism but I cannot accept that DMD is not generally racist.
You also imply that Pharyngula is free from racism which I don’t agree with. HumanApe has recently been banned but I am sure there are more like him.
I remember the equivalent post from last year, and would like to thank life is like a pitbull with lipstick for his engaging argument which made me think about this issue.
What can I say, Crudely Wrott?
I have no choice but to believe that you are a resentful white racist. You dragged out every Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson shibboleth. It was fucking horrifying, actually.
I am familiar with people like you; I grew up around people like you. A lot more of your dad’s racism rubbed off on you than you realize, buddy.
At the time you said you would think about it and get back to me — I figured to make more racist apologetics, but what the hell, I am an optimist and there is always the chance that you’d turn around and say “you know what, you’re right, that was racist and I’ll try not to do that in the future.”
You never did, and now when I bring it up again you are just as resentful. So I have no indication that anything has changed.
I, however, am quite happy to consider an action with no plausible positive effect and decide not to do it on the grounds of potential negative effects and alignment with racists.
this is what happens when social activism is done not for those negatively affected by social injustice, but for the activist to be able to feel good about themselves/morally superior. the actual outcomes of the actions become irrelevant and subordinate to intentions, self-perceptions, and preferences of the activist.
[Deflects Crudely Wrott’s dead porcupine away from Life Is Like A Pitbull.]
Life, Jadehawk, et al.–I’m with you. Something seemed really off to me about DMD, and I wasn’t sure what it was until I read your posts. I believe in freedom of speech and expression, and I love nothing more than seeing PZ and The Horde attack stupid ideas (whether they’re racist, theist, creationist, sexist, etc.). As you pointed out, though, it doesn’t matter how well-meaning the intent is–DMD brings out the racists and xenophobes, and only further incites anti-Muslim sentiment. DMD does not raise awareness (despite that being the purported intention); it just contributes to the problem.
The way you’ve worded this is wrong. Perhaps you meant something else — there are ideas similar to this which are not wrong — but what you’ve wrtten is wrong.
The idea of blasphemy most certainly is compatible with the concept of free speech in the United States.
If it were not, then it would be illegal to call something “blasphemy.”
If you believe in free speech the way it is practiced in the USA, then you must support people’s right to say “that is blasphemy against my religion and you shouldn’t do it.” (You don’t have to stop doing it; you only have to support their right to say it.)
Heck, if you believe in free speech the way it is practiced in the USA, then you must support people’s right to advocate for censorship, the end of the First Amendment, and the institution of a fascist dictatorship. This matter was settled in Skokie in the 1970s.
Honestly it is not clear to me that you really understand the scope of free speech in the USA. It is much, much broader than you have implied here.
@Jadehawk
Let your actions be dictated by radicals, I don’t give a shit, but don’t be surprised if your claims that *other* people want to feel good about claiming moral superiority rings rather hollow.
And now it’s time for some humor.
I’m told this was printed out by ACLU staffers and passed around the office with much amusement.
Noone has claimed that people that support DMD are racist and no one has claimed that you are a racist.
my actions, jim dear, are dictated by the outcomes they will have. and FIY, “i know you are but what am i” is really not a good argument, ever, for anything.
@Koshka
If you consider speaking out against those who support radical Islam’s position on blasphemy/images of Mohammed as having “no plausible positive effect”, you might indeed be happier elsewhere.
I can only write a quick comment right now, but I’d just like to say that I understand what Jadehawk and ॐ are saying and agree.
Many participants in DMD may have good intentions (or what they think of as good intentions), but they are participating in something that has turned into a “I can make/laugh at xenophobic jokes without feeling bad” day. Which is for many day as any other, since the day has been largely adopted by various assholes and bigots. That should be a sure sign that one should rethink their participation.
—
And now I’m late. Brilliant.
the intent to speak out and effect the deconstruction of the concept of blasphemy does not inherently produce deconstruction of blasphemy. thus, only some forms of “speaking out” will actually work as supposedly intended*. which, of course, means the above is a strawman of Koshka’s position.
*and an activist who cares more about effecting change than about being able to say that they are “doing something” will have to take that into consideration.
@Jadehawk
Nobody named you Empress of Outcomes, and if the outcome you believe is occurring originates with radicals then your actions are determined by those radicals.
As for the second part . . . you seem to have a very high opinion that whatever you say is true just ’cause. To which I have to say that no fucks are given.
Jadehawk/CR/lipstickpitbull are making the following argument:
[Group X] performs [Action Y] as a consequence of their membership in the group. Therefore, if [Person Z] performs [Action Y] they are also a member of [Group X]
Where in your argument, Group X = racists, Action Y = participate in DMD and Person Z = PZ or anyone else that participated
That is the logical form of your argument. The problem is that I could sub in other variables as follows:
Group X = Muslim extremists, Action Y = denounces DMD, Person Z = Jadehawk
The result given is a nonsense, demonstrating that the logical form is flawed.
Your other argument seems to be that Muslims may misinterpret the participation in DMD by Pharyngulites as being racist, therefore we should not participate. Trying to regulate your life by how others may misinterpret your actions is a quick path to madness. At any rate, the remedy is not to stop doing worthy things that are open to misinterpretation, but simply to explain your reasons, and if others choose to continue to misinterpret, well, that’s their choice, and it is they that are now in error.
since you’ve been told several times by now that this is false, I must conclude that now you’re doing this on purpose. so: stop lying.
Please tell me what positive effect you will have by drawing Mohammed at this time. I only see it as encouragement for racists to hate on Muslims.
Not what I’ve said. But, to address your strawman: it’s possible for most 8-year-olds, if assisted by an adult, to process media concerning racism, xenophobia and religious bigotry, even covering the most hateful slurs. That is not the issue.
But it is relevant whether we have a society in which more or fewer people grow up being targeted with bigotry. It is relevant whether more or fewer people grow up feeling like they belong here, like they are members of welcome and desired groups, the way white non-immigrant children are allowed to grow up.
This is not the only issue which matters. But it is not something you can just brush aside as irrelevant.
You are either an idiot or a liar.
Nope. X should Y to Z at time T.
X=you
Y=respond
Z=our arguments
T=after X understands Z
What the hell?
“Please tell me what positive effect you will have by drawing Mohammed at this time. I only see it as encouragement for racists to hate on Muslims.”
We distinguish our message by our self-identification as atheists.
Yes.
So I want to help you understand that nobody is imposing shariah law here in the USA, so that whole bit is just a straw-windmill to fight your noble fight against.
And, interestingly, we already have a well-established way of signaling that ‘Actions carried out against a “blasphemer” which violate existing laws or the rights of others are also not to be tolerated.’
The way it works is, somebody calls the cops and reports the crime …
is this a concession that there are no positive effects, or did you not understand what Koshka asked of you?
Oh for fuck’s sake. It’s quite clear that the sentiment being expressed was that the idea of “blasphemy” – that is, the idea that there are certain things that cannot be said because they are considered religiously offensive – is incompatible with the principle of freedom of speech, insofar as endorsing one idea requires one to reject the other to be logically consistent. Which is true.
I’m now seeing it more like this:
[Group X] performed [Action A] because of [Threat 01] from [Group Y]. [Group Z] jumped on the bandwagon, performing variations of [Action A] because it allowed them yet another outlet to express their hatred for [Group Y], which were not related to [Threat 01]. Continued participation by members of [Group X] in [Action A] is no longer advised, as the much larger numbers of [Group Z] participants (and data as referenced in some comments above) gives the appearance (if not the fact) of supporting [Group Z] and its hatred.
So Jadehawk, you’re going with the “you can commit racist acts, but not be a racist” line of argument? Because the only thing that I have “been told” several times is that just because my intent wasn’t to be racist, my action can still have a racist effect. You seem to be wanting to push the argument that someone can commit racist acts without being a racist, an idea that I treat with the contempt it deserves.
If someone misinterprets an action, the problem is with the person misinterpreting, not the person being misinterpreted. When we protest against against discrimination against homosexuals, there are plenty of Christians willing to misinterpret that as us doing the work of the devil. Should we stop working against discrimination then? Of course not! We simply explain that we are working against discrimination because homosexuals have done nothing wrong and deserve to be treated fairly. Of course, this rarely convinces the Christian extremists, but now it is clearly their problem, not ours.
In case you haven’t figure it out yet, I will defend the right to blaspheme tooth and nail. I refuse to give up that right just because some of my fellow blasphemers are racist gits.
To be honest, I’m starting to wonder if I’m not arguing against a fictional problem? Just who are these people that aren’t able to discern that a post about DMD on Pharyngula is a post about blasphemy, and not a post about racism? I mean seriously, show me some real people that are unable to make that distinction. I call your bluff, I do not believe that there are any such people, and you are in fact defending people that don’t exist.
There is one little problem with your formula:
A lot of atheists are racists.
Huh? Forgive my inability to understand.
What is the positive effect? What is your message?
And who is we?
Azkyroth, since Dan has already responded sensibly, how about you quit your white-knighting :)
An act which is not motivated by racial bias – especially one not motivated consciously by racial bias – may, in principle, have the effect of “giving aid and comfort,” broadly speaking, to those DO who engage in similar actions (or purport to) out of racial bias. Thus, it is reasonable, if imprecise, to characterize such actions as racist. (Not that this passes the
test, mind…)
I have yet to be convinced that this is one of those cases, partly because of technically fallible but experientially robust heuristics based on who I have seen arguing it, and partly because the arguments I’ve seen for it all seem to be reducible to variants of “because shut up, that’s why.”
In fact, I’m feeling motivated to find a pad of paper and dig up my scanner…
Some atheists do racist shit, so this doesn’t distinguish your message in any useful way.
Stick to doing paint-by-number portraits of Mohammed. We all know you can do those, and the message there is loud and clear: you feel very strongly about the lack of things you have to say. You should be proud and rest assured that we’ll hang it up on the refrigerator.
LOL! The “Sharia law is taking over our country!” schtick is definitely not on my agenda. My main concern is still creeping Evangelical Law™, not creeping Sharia Law™.
p.s.: Loved the article you linked to from The Onion.
I still like to make sure that particular point is quite clear, and that “He was blaspheming!” shouldn’t be used as an excuse for locking your neighbor in the stocks.
And some of them read and comment here!
Sorry – after rereading my last comment it might imply I am accusing current commenters as racist.
I am not making this claim, but referring to previous threads.
you should do something about that libertarian rot in your head. of course the effects of an action can be racist even if the actor didn’t intend them to be that way.
“misinterpretation” is not under discussion. a racist effect is not a matter of misinterpreting intent, it’s independent of intent.
ah, that’s what the “misinterpretation” red herring was for. to strawman some more.
in case you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m not trying to, nor do I have the means to, force you to stop. nonetheless, if you participate in DMD, you’re causing racist outcomes.
you’re right. the inability to discern intent of people posting on Pharyngula is an entirely fictional problem. but since it’s not one anyone except you has brought up, it’s also a fucking strawman.
you’re like a person calling “check mate” while playing go
“A lot of atheists are racists.”
[citation needed]
Normally I’m not big on asking for citations in blog posts, but if you think you can back that shit up go right ahead.
“is this a concession that there are no positive effects, or did you not understand what Koshka asked of you?”
Neither.
And none here have claimed otherwise.
DanJ,
Yeah, I get that, but I don’t find it a reasonable argument. The fact is that pretty much any objection that I could make about Islam can be appropriated by the rednecks at any time. In fact pretty much any objection I can make about Islam has probably already been made by racist pigs many times over. Should I just shut up then about the problems with Islam? No!
The fact is that in speaking out against Islam, we are going to have racists as bedfellows. Just as in speaking out against the Christian Church, we are going to have the more totalitarian thugs of the Chinese regime as bedfellows. Should I shut up then and no longer speak out against religion of any kind? No!
All we can do is explain that our motivation is not racism, but anti-religious. It probably helps if we speak out against racism at the same time (note that I have derided racism several times already in this discussion, for exactly this reason), just to be clear that our problem is with the idea of blasphemy, not people with brown skin. After that, there really isn’t much we can do. But here’s the thing: silencing ourselves over this issue for fear of being perceived of as racist is not a tenable solution. We must speak out against the religious oppression that was the root cause of DMD – we must do this because those Muslim extremists, living in their bubble, need to understand that there are people out there that consider there actions, which they consider to be most holy, as being immoral. They need to hear that, and the fact that we risk getting drowned out by bigots is an argument for us shouting louder, not for us shutting up.
You’re a denialist. Here is the citation for that.
“Stick to doing paint-by-number portraits of Mohammed. We all know you can do those, and the message there is loud and clear: you feel very strongly about the lack of things you have to say. You should be proud and rest assured that we’ll hang it up on the refrigerator.”
Pretty sure this ad hominem means one of us has run out of relevant things to say . . .
insult != ad hominem
Ad hominem is essentially the use of an insult as a premise.
“Using an insult in place of an argument” is marginal.
jennyxyzzy said:
Exactly. That’s going to be my new modus operandi for posting re: blasphemy. I think using the “Draw Mohammed” on Blasphemy Day International might help to draw attention to the blasphemy, rather than the racism (as EDMD seems to have been “usurped”, in a way).
I already attempt to make it quite clear why in my posts, but if this particular date is going to express the idea that I condone the behavior of others doing the same thing for different reasons (or in fact aid those others), then I’ll choose to break off that association.
This is not a great argument for targeting members of a minority religion, most of whom are immigrants (and the vast majority of the rest are African American), with this message which is clearly not being understood the way you thought it would be.
Then you might reconsider an action which is causes more insularity and less engagement. The predictable effects are contrary to what you’ve imagined.
It’s statistically and thus morally different, because you’re “calling out” a whole group — many of whom do not share those “peculiar failures”, Mr Derbyshire — and not simply one individual.
If you’re right about that one individual then you’re fine; if you’re wrong about that one individual then you have the opportunity to try to make amends.
But if you’re “right” about a group then you’re still punishing a significant number of innocents. This is why collective punishment is broadly understood as wrong; it’s even mentioned in the UN Declaration of Human Rights!
And if you’re wrong about the vast majority of that group then you’ve hurt a lot of people unnecessarily and there is relatively little opportunity to make amends.
But this isn’t criticizing behavior or belief; it’s bigoted attacks on them all for being Muslim, as opposed to white.
“You’re a denialist.”
Holy shit did you just parade the comments section of a blog thread to justify that “a lot” of atheists are racists?
That’s awesome. Just epically awesome.
I’m going to catch some shut-eye, but if you and Jade work really hard at it, you can Make Up The Facts and jade can then, as Empress of Outcomes, determine what those facts will mean for all people. Boom, no one can disagree with you, case closed.
Just, wow.
I’m not silencing myself, but choosing what I say and how to say it. I’m not doing that for fear of how I’ll be perceived, but because those choices have consequences that I care about. I’m targeting Islam, not Muslims, so if what I’m saying negatively affects Muslims and does little or nothing about Islam, I should try to fix my aim.
You’re acting like an oblivious troll with reading comprehension problems. Here is the citation for that.
complete inability to comprehend the significance of the image linked, and subsequent indignant blathering about “Muslim isn’t a race” in 3… 2… 1…
communicating in a way that has racist outcomes vs. silencing ourselves is, of course, a false dichotomy. at least for me it is. for all I know, jenny might indeed not be capable of effectively fighting the concept of blasphemy without inadvertently supporting racism.
This is an easy one.
See how much support you find among atheists for Pat Condell, or Geert Wilders.
Hell, look up any discussion on Pharyngula which has covered affirmative action or black people’s IQs
Ahhh, there you go Jim, Jadehawk’s response to me at #133 was indeed an ad hominem… Good of her to provide a real life example.
Sweet Jadehawk, how about you explain how my blasphemy supports racism? I mean really, lay it out for me in step-by-step detail so that I can see the error of my way. Or alternatively so that I can tear holes in your consistently faulty logic. Either works for me.
[stage whisper: I’ll explain it first and maybe save someone the embarassment.]
Ahem. Jeez, if out of nine people there had been just one person of color, I would have thought “hey, this is merely xenophobic, and not blatantly racist. The future looks bright!”
Pfft. It wasn’t a fallacy.
you don’t know what an ad hominem is. FYI, I’m insulting you, in addition to demolishing your arguments. my insult is not a premise, nor necessary for me to demolish your arguments.
please, do something about your horrible reading comprehension and reasoning skills. they are embarrassing (hint: this too is an insult, not an ad hominem)
if you mean participation in DMD, this has already been done, here and in last year’s thread. as for any other blasphemy of yours… well, I’d have to know what it is first, wouldn’t I, honeycakes.
you can’t even understand my arguments, much less judge them for consistency or faultiness.
Riiight. So what you’re saying then, is that you are actually unable to explain how my blasphemy supports racism. That’s… pretty much what I thought. You use that phrase, ‘supporting racism’ or even better ‘having xenophobic effect’ but I really don’t think you know what you mean when you use those words. How about you explain them, just so that we are all clear as to what you’re arguing. That way we can get off this silly roundabout where I try to understand your argument, show you why the argument is dumb, only for you to say “oh, but *that* wasn’t what I was arguing”. Please, be clear, be explicit, what *is* this xenophobic effect of which you speak?
wow, you’re stupid. I shall direct you once again to the fact that a)I was insulting you, and b)that the effects of participation in DMD have already been explained at length
i’m sure it’s true that you think that. I’m also increasingly sure that you will do nothing that might disabuse you of that, even though the effects of participation in DMD have already been explained.
you really think that’s what happened in this thread, don’t you. wow.
in reality, I’ve been very consistently making one single claim, while you’ve been flailing about misrepresenting that claim in a number of very imaginative ways.
life has explained it in rather great detail already. what exactly would repeating it do? just reread his comments in this thread, ffs.
and, for that matter, learn about stereotype threat and microaggressions, since it seems you lack in some very basic knowledge in how discrimination and prejudice work
Jadehawk, your argument can’t be so complicated that you can’t lay it out in two or three sentences. That’s twice now that I have asked you, and twice that you have dodged the question, which just reinforces my belief that you aren’t actually able to concisely lay out your position. Don’t tell me to go and read a wall of text – I’ll think you were talking about one part or another, I’ll come back and argue against that part, and you’ll tell me how stupid I am, that it clearly wasn’t that bit you were talking about. No, I’m not playing that game. State your case clearly, in a couple of sentences. It can’t be that hard.
Or do you really have nothing in your hand?
Dan @109 covered it. Some things get tainted, in such a way you don’t try to “take it back”. No Caucasian should wear a swastika, even if in India they’re still positively considered: It’s been tainted here, find a new symbol. If you don’t, you’ll probably be considered a racist, regardless of your “intent”.
This day is similar in nature. Racists ruined it. Pick a new day, heck, do it 2 days off from today and explain not only your reason why you drew it, but also why you chose to avoid the day itself, if you absolutely MUST draw Mo’ SOON!
People say “ends don’t justify means”, but let me tell y’all: Means do not justify ends, either. Even if your means are good, if your end result is more racism, it ain’t good means anymore. Gotta have good means AND good ends.
You are signaling, to mostly brown and black immigrants, that they are not welcome in your country, that they should be singled out on a yearly basis to be collectively punished for something a handful of people said years ago, that these few people’s crime should be held as emblematic of millions of people like them.
You are giving rhetorical cover to racists; the more “well-meaning” people participate in their preferred event, the more they can pretend that their own messages are not racist.
A preliminary question.
Do you understand why this picture is racist?
Don’t you remember? This is your problem:
Maybe that doesn’t apply to you.
We’ve been fairly clear and you haven’t responded to what we’ve been saying. Instead, you kept trying to put it into your own terms and kept getting it wrong. If you’ll go back and read, stop telling us what our arguments really are, and stop making up silly analogies, maybe you’ll get closer to understanding the point. Or if you do understand it but disagree, at least maybe the conversation could move forward.
indeed it hasn’t been, and yet that hasn’t stopped you from misconstruing it. but if you need to re-read my argument… well, no one is stopping you from re-reading this thread, for example comments #20, #49, or #55
if, OTOH, what you’re actually trying to know is what the specific xenophobic effects of DMD are, you should instead read last year’s thread, as well as the following comments: #8,#9, #12, #15.
that’s of course not an exhaustive list, but let’s face it: it’s not like you’re going to want to understand these the second time around, either, so it’s a bit of a waste of time on my account.
you need to stop making up these constantly changing excuses as to why you weren’t able to understand my comments, or how it’s not at all that you misunderstood, but that I’m a sneaky trickster or somesuch crap.
re SG @ #144: you have significantly more patience today than I do. let’s hope putting in that effort won’t be completely wasted.
Thankyou Life…,
Ok, so here’s what’s wrong with your argument. Fisrtly, you bring in the colour of people’s skins. I’m on board with the idea that sometimes racism takes the form of being anti-Muslim, but the counterpart of that is that *you* don’t then try and confound skin colour and religion together.
Secondly, what’s this talk about immigration? DMD is an attack on radical Islam everywhere, regardless of whether a person is in their country of origin or is an immigrant. Feeling welcome in a foreign country is not relevant in any way to this discussion.
Thirdly, what is this “punishment” of which you speak? Spell it out. Show how all muslims are being materially affected by DMD. Pointing out that there are muslims with a silly belief is not punishment, we do it all the time with Christians on this site, and I don’t see you arguing against it then. And no, you can’t trot out the argument that this is a different case because Muslims are a minority. I’ll let you into a little secret – the Internet exists all over the world, and most muslims live in societies where they are the clear majority, not the minority. This majority is the principal target of DMD, not the few outliers that end up in a western country, although those too are indeed included in the group.
Your last point is a bit more substantial,but I think that I have adequately dealt with it in my response to Dan. To repeat, seeing as we are all agreed that a religious identity is liable to attack by racists from another country, any time that we atheists single out a specific religion for criticism over it’s practices, that attack is always at risk of being hijacked by racist arseholes, whether it be white supremacists and anti-islam attacks, or Chinese totalitarians and anti-christian attacks, or Pakistani nationalist anti-hindu attacks, or whatever. The only way to avoid giving these groups rhetorical cover is to pretty much shut up about religion. I reject that course of action. How about you?
jennyxyzzy,
A preliminary question.
Do you understand why this picture is racist?
I did draw Mohammed. Badly. Twelve times.
Okay. I lie. Technically, I drew him four times and duplicated it. Just now. Since starting to read this thread and thinking: okay, should I bother this year? (I haven’t, previously.)
Vis à vis the discussion re racism/xenophobia:
I’m making fun of the theology, here. Gently enough, I think. Frankly, in my ever so humble opinion, it deserves it.
I am not going to write a lengthy* explanation of why I made this call. I will set out a few standard positions.
1) There are any number of jerks in this world whose opinions I otherwise despise whose opinions happen to align with mine elsewhere. It would be rather impractical of me not to express all opinions it so happens someone disgusting agrees with. As this is probably every opinion any human being could ever possibly hold.
2) Yes, there’s a climate of intolerance around Muslims and Arabs both right now in North America, and elsewhere. I’ve no interest in encouraging either, especially. Note also that this is in no way academic, for me. This effects people close to me. Given that there is, again, I will say: I do not endorse either attitude. What bigotry I may (even do) hold, I try to work with, daily. So far as I can, I attempt to separate it from the criticism of the creed, the dogma, and so on.
3) I’m reasonably confident most of the Muslims I know would either take little offense at this, or will take mild offense** but accept in perfectly civil fashion that this is my right. Whether I can hope they will also think further upon any of this, or think about what good honoring such rights ultimately does, and even that it may well trump this tradition and taboo, this, I will not venture. I don’t mean to be backhanded about it in saying I don’t know if they will. I’m just honestly saying: I don’t know.
(Oh, and 3a, honestly, my picture of this is the people who get truly incensed about this, look, they’re really hardly that widely supported anywhere. It’s just the usual dynamic: pushy jerks get all the attention, and no one particularly notices that all the guys you figure are standing with them are actually looking vaguely embarrassed, wishing they’d just shut up, already.)
4) Finally: I am for secularism, full stop, and for open criticism of superstition, whatever its source. This is my pen, demonstrating as much.
First
Second
Third
(*/Well, not lengthy for me.)
(**/And others, still, culturally Muslim, tho’ not particularly devout, would probably be more insulted that anyone would even imagine they’d be particularly insulted, if you follow.)
CR #145
Oh, it absolutely *does* apply to me, which is why I’m trying so hard to make sure that I am understanding you, and not misinterpreting. Trouble is, I feel like every time I try to restate your argument, to get a confirmation that I have correctly understood, you all seem to change our position – it’s like trying to get a handle on a slippery eel :-/
Jadehawk, I took like a six week break from Pharyngula and it wonders for my baseline of patience.
(It’s probably lowering every day, but I should be good for a couple more weeks.)
Just wanted to quickly state that I agree with Jadehawk and Life is like a pitbull with lipstick (and probably others, though I haven’t read the entire thread yet). I used to be a fan of the whole DMD thing, but it’s been hijacked by racist assholes. The difference between someone participating in it out of a racist hatred of muslims and someone participating to make a point about blasphemy is impossible to spot, and I do not want to be associated with racists. (and I don’t know who said this upthread, but identifying as atheist doesn’t help. There are plenty of racist atheists around (as evidenced by pretty much every thread on Islam that has recently appeared here on pharyngula) and it’s not just atheists who participate in DMD anymore either). Draw Mohammed Day has become a pool of shit, a day on which you get to wade through heaps of racist crap every year. Personnally, I won’t contribute to it anymore.
Life,
yes, I do get why that picture is racist. It doesn’t just stop at drawing Mohammed, but then goes on to put him in a demeaning position, which is unnecessary if you’re just chasing the blasphemy aspect. I fully get that, I really do. But support for DMD does not imply support for that picture, the proof, I support DMD but not the picture. One is racist, the other is not. This is not hard.
and incidentally, reading last year’s thread also shows that racists post on pharyngula, too (or at least: used to, much more frequently than now). horace and mpearle017 were really quite the specimens.
Jadehawk, your posts just repeat what I said was your position, that DMD is having a ‘xenophobic effect’ Yes, I know, I even quoted that back at you. I still have no idea what the hell you mean by ‘having a xenophobic effect’ though. I mean, give me the dictionary definition of ‘having a xenophobic effect’. You know, something like “Drawing Mohommade makes some people feel like —-, which leads them to —-, which in turn makes muslims’ lives a living hell”, or something like that…
this is incorrect. it is notable though that when it’s you doing the misunderstanding, the blame somehow lands on me (and not just for being unclear, which may have been a valid complaint; no, I get accused of changing my position, or even not having one at all), but when it’s muslims supposedly misunderstanding, then the blame lands on them.
I am instead asking that people show empathy and give consideration to the experiences of non-radicals, and consider
— if treating oppressed minorities with dignity, and consideration of their feelings as they exist, not as you’d prefer them to be, matters to you —
consider if this is an action which signals that they are welcome, or whether it signals that they are unwelcome, outcasts, pariahs who should be turned away from these shores.
+++++
As for the radicals, as I already said, it’s totally understandable why a lot of people wanted to hurt them.
EDMD was originally calculated to hurt people. And that’s because it was a one-off response to a particular event. It was retributive in nature, and some people saw it as necessary retribution — whatever, it’s over; I didn’t think it sent an effective message but it’s totally understandable why a lot of people did. Alright. But the thing to understand is that it was retributive, an intentional show of disrespect to Muslims. That’s not always justified, even if it might for the sake of argument have been justified at a particular time in response to a particular event.
It was years ago. It is not a good idea to have this one day which is dedicated to making a tradition about dominant groups’ grievances, like continually obsessing over the death of Virginia Dare.
There are reasonable people here who believe the first DMD, in 2010, was justified. I’m not interested in convincing them otherwise; it’s over; and they had some reasonable arguments for it. That was how the radicals were dealt with. But it’s over.
wait, what? you don’t know what the words “having a xenophobic effect” mean, in general? is that really your problem?
because quite honestly, I don’t know how to explain something that looks like plain English to me. it means an effect indistinguishable from that which we call “xenophobia”; it means something that increases the xenophobic signal, increases the severity or frequency of xenophobic microaggressions, creates a “chillier climate” for foreigners and those perceived as “foreign” or “other”, increases effect or frequency of triggering stereotype threat, etc. ; it’s basically a phrase that tries to distinguish prejudice from discrimination, because they are neither synonymous nor are they obligate symbionts.
maybe I’m ripe for a break, too. won’t happen since I’m addicted, but it’s a nice thought.
No, seriously, just no. Muslims are *not* a minority. Theirs is the biggest religion on the whole goddamned planet. DMD is not targeted at immigrant muslims, it is targeted at *all* muslims. In this battle, it is the outspoken atheist that is the oppressed minority. We are the ones threatened with being killed if we have the audacity to draw a picture somewhere, and we are the ones that are massively in the minority.
I have not, and will not ever participate in DMD.
That’s because I don’t align myself with people who hate me every bit as much as fundamentalist islamists do.
Yes, DMD has been a haven for right-wing extremist bigots and they’ve been welcomed by the initiator Thunderfoot who thinks that it’s totally OK and worth doing so because he obviously thinks that my enemy’s enemy is my friend.
Well, I’m pretty aware that I have many enemies. I don’t join forces with them on any question.
Oh, and I don’t let myself be bullied by the “you’re either with us or you support islamism ELEBENTY” George-Bush stance either.
I oppose religion 365 days of the year.
I oppose more extremist religion more passionately (it’s hard to get worked up about German Lutherans most of the time).
Stone me, you’re stupid. First, all Muslims includes many who are members of oppressed minorities, many of them in countries (such as mine, the UK), where they are far, far more so than atheists; so you admit you are aiming your actions at members of oppressed minorities. Second, all Muslims includes many who regarded the original Islamist reaction to the cartoons with disgust. Yet you admit you are aiming you actions at these Muslims as well.
Jadehawk,
ahh, finally. See, it wasn’t so hard. Here’s the problem with your position. Firstly, you keep talking about foreigners, yet as far as I can see, DMD, whether it is in it’s original anti-blasphemy form, or the other racist form, is not concerned about ‘foreigners’ Indeed it is mostly concerned about those muslims living in Islamic countries.
Secondly, surely your point about ‘micoragressions’ applies every bit as much to pretty much *any* anti-islam statement that I could care to make. It’s going to make all practising muslims uncomfortable, that’s pretty much the point of making the anti-aslam statement! Are you suggesting that I should just shut up and not criticise Islam? If not, what is the dividing line that makes some criticism of Islam ok, and some criticism ‘micro aggressions’? Because so far as I can tell, you are speaking out against anything that might make muslims (and particularly immigrant muslims, that apparently have a special place in your heart, to bad for the rest of ’em) feel bad.
Okay. I was talking about the anti-Arab angle, but I can see where you’re coming from.
That’s fine, I understand you don’t view yourself as supporting the racist aspects of DMD.
But here’s where you’re wrong. Because making a big fecking day of this signals to plenty of black and brown immigrants that they are unwelcome — since they are targeted in with this special day which is all about hurting them, unlike, say, the general “Blasphemy Day International” which is not specifically against Muslims —
and because these people are already a profoundly disadvantaged group, subject to employment discrimination both on their race and their religion, subject to police harassment both on their race and their religion, subject to housing discrimination and ghettoization both on their race and their religion, demonized by the likes of Pam Gellar, their places of worship are vandalized, their language and appearance puts them at a higher risk of hate crimes, their children are bullied and ostracized both on their race and their religion,
you are contributing to this heap of signals which tells them they are not welcome, in a way that white non-immigrants are not targeted — never signaled to be unwelcome like this —
you are thus contributing to the large and growing power differential which is continually harming these people based on their race and religion.
That happens whether you intend it or not. The outcome is racist because it functions as another way of differentiating darker skinned people from a society where it pays to be white; the outcome is racist because you’re driving them further into insularity, making it harder for them to engage with the wider society as full and active citizens, and harder to be recognized as a first class person — since every time DMD rolls around it reminds the white majority of the difference and separateness of these brown and black immigrants.
If you can comprehend, if you were taught, how anti-Catholicism functioned also as a vector for racism before Irish Americans were allowed to be considered “white”, maybe that’ll help.
Instead of pissing all over this thread, as you and your cronies have done, how about you use your time more constructively and protest at sites where people are being genuinely racist, you know, actual racism, instead of that ‘If you squint one eye, tilt your head and spin round real fast for five minutes you can just about make out something that might construe something that perhaps suggest that some asshole on the interwebz is being a bit of a twat about race’.
You see, we get to use the ‘no true Scotsman’ fallacy as an axiom when applying it to Skepticism, because No True Skeptic can be a Racist. You know why? Because Skeptics HAVE to apply objective reasoning and valid evidence to support their claims towards, well, everything and, in doing so, bias is excluded and, if you are not applying the fundamental rules of empirical skepticism, which are pretty fucking clearly defined, what with them being an actual analytical method and all, then you are not a true skeptic, which means you risk presenting biased argument, which might include racist or xenophobic components.
So, in effect, by way of your incessant whining on this blog, you are targeting the one social group of DMD participants who are the most likely to NOT be racist.
I rest my case. You may now fuck off.
KG,
Seriously? If I was attacking UK muslims, then yes, I would be attacking a minority. But when I attack Islam (note, when talking about muslims in general, I mean Islam – the group is sufficiently diverse that Islam is the only thing that all muslims share) I most certainly bloody well am not. Or at least, I suppose that Islam isn’t over 50% of the world population, so yes, it is a minority, but by that definition, everyone is a minority, and muslims the least so…
And you dare call me stupid… Pfft!
aside from the fact that in sociology “minority” refers to a disadvantaged group, Muslims absolutely are but a sociological and a numerical minority in Western countries; you know, the ones that created and are perpetuating DMD.
which includes the aforementioned immigrant muslims, and thus the effect on them mustn’t be ignored.
only if you pretend only one axis of oppression exists in the universe.
not by the majority of Muslims, you aren’t. if this were a targeted strike that only affected those that want you harm, you’d have point. but it isn’t; it’s a blanket condemnation targeted at all Muslims everywhere, as you said yourself. so you don’t have a point.
And because Chinese people are the biggest ethnic group on the planet, Chinese Americans are totally not an oppressed minority!
Sarcasm aside, you’ve even got your numbers wrong. There are at least 350 million more Christians than Muslims, comparing the lowest estimate of Christians to the highest estimate of Muslims. Probably more like 600 million at least.
billyeager, who was raised by wolves and is therefore one of the 4 or maybe 6 people on Earth who isn’t racist,
Ah.
No true skeptic can ever be wrong about anything, then.
jennyxyzzy
Gosh. are you stupid?
They are in almost all places where this will have any effect. Like the USA, like Europe. Because most Muslims live in places where they might have heard about Facebook and Twitter but worry more about today’s clean water and tomorrow’s food.
Factually incorrect.
First of all, see above. Second of all: So you’re painting all muslims with the same broad brush and think they’re a monolith with no differences and such. How educated.
You score 100 points on the opression olympics.
Here’s a bit of facts for you:
UK:
no religion: 50.7%
muslim: 2.4%
Germany:
no religion: 34%
muslim: 4%
USA:
atheist and agnostic: 4%
muslim: 0.6%
All numbers taken from the Pfft of all knowledge
I utterly disagree with ॐ’s opinion.
Also, to claim that the Jesus and Mo comics are “criminally unfunny” is silly hyperbole. They have their moments (subject to Sturgeon’s law, of course).
oh fuck you. I’m so sorry it didn’t occur to me you didn’t understand basic English terms and thought you had problems with the actual argument, not the words in it.
as life has explained a few times now, it’s original form was a simple act of revenge
which are not foreign or “other” (from the perspective of white, (ex-) christian folk)… how?
then make them judiciously and carefully, to minimize that effect and maximize its positive effects. Besides, who said social activism is easy? sometimes the intractability of a problem makes it so the privileged cannot act in a way that doesn’t cause more harm than good, because they’re being elephants in the porcelain store. that’s why the privileged are always only allies, never the leaders in social struggles.
I’m generally against punching down the power gradient, yes. but microaggressions are a wee bit more than just making someone feel bad.
Weak. Expected better from you. Shouldn’t have, all things considered.
‘No true skeptic’ can, of course, be wrong. Being wrong isn’t the problem though, is it and you damn well know it. Being horribly biased is the problem. That is what racism and xenophobia are, biases.
So, do I need to say it slower for you? No. True. Skeptic. Can. Be. A. Racist.
What’s not to get? Or is your spittle-flecked monitor so blurry now that your rage is unable to actually comprehend this fact?
jenny, a question.
do you understand the difference between DMD and the nude calendar recently featured on FTB? both are blasphemy; only one of them is punching down the power gradient. do you understand why?
Jadehawk,
Right. So you’re OK with making an attack provided that it is only targeted at those that believe drawing Mohammed is blasphemous. But apparently drawing a picture of Mohammed, which is a priori the most targeted attack possible, is not sufficiently targeted for you!
You’re not even being consistent with yourself now, which is not surprising. As I said at the beginning, your position is not logically coherent, and here’s the result, you end up arguing for an absolutely absurd position.
sorry billy, but you’re completely and utterly wrong. if skeptics can be wrong, they can of course also be biased. in fact, if you knew anything at all about humans, you’d know that it’s impossible to be completely bias-free, as a person. if that weren’t the case, we wouldn’t need science.
I should say I did participate in the first DMD; as a one-off reaction to the Danish cartoon furore I thought it had some point, expressing solidarity with the cartoonist (even though he’s clearly a right-wing bigot himself). But as jennyxyzzy so clearly tells us, it is now aimed at all Muslims: it could aptly be renamed “Hate Muslims Day”.
you’re one confused cookie.
people believing drawing Mohammed are not all threatening you or your freedom of expression. only some are, and this event is absolutely not just targeting those.
Actually, nothing at all would happen to me if I drew a picture of Mohammad (or actually, some vaguely Arabic looking guy) fucking a camel. That’s because I live in a country where Catholics are in the majority and am in no way whatsoever threatened by Muslims. On the other hand, I could make some Muslims who are already in a minority and often getting fucked over feel threatened and unwelcome. Yeah, that would totally be something I should pat myself on the back for. Such courage.
If you’d meant Islam, you’d have said “Islam”, liar.
no, you’re just confused. once again you’re incapable of understanding what the fuck I’m saying, and patting yourself on the back for it. it’s really pathetic.
besides, must I really explain to you that you having a point would not mean you were right in the end, but that you’d at least have a valid point that would have to be considered in the deliberation of the consequences of an action?
And just to repeat this again, since you’re being dense: I don’t think you do have a point, since DMD is not targeted but a blanket attack.
I am curious as to how this targets all Muslims. How does it target Muslims in Pakistan for example?
And what exactly is the point? What are the positive effects?
jesus fuck
FIFM
Jadehawk, I hear what you are saying about punching down the power gradient. I happen to not believe that it is actually happening in this case. Muslims are not some down-trodden minority when we look at the global situation. Most muslims live in places where they are most definitely the majority.
I’m going to guess that you’re American. Americans have a most distressing tendency of thinking that the Internet belongs to them. It doesn’t. When I say something attacking Islam on the Internet, I am engaging all of Islam, not just the small sliver which lives in rich western countries. Don’t forget that when I talk about ‘attacking’ Islam, I’m talking about blasphemy, or pointing out immoral acts commissioned by Islam. All a muslim immigrant in the US needs to do to stop feeling targeted by my attacks is to stop believing in the stupid shit that I’m attacking. If they choose to not do that, then yes, they are definitely targeted by my attacks, and I’m not ashamed of that. I *want* them to give up on Islam. I *want* them to feel ashamed of their religion. Don’t you? If not, why are you here?
Also, whilst we’re on the pissing contest about who is the most oppressed, if atheists have it so much cushier than muslims, they can easily just quit being believers, and get all of those magnificent privileges that we atheists are entitled to…
You know who else liked to draw and hated minorities?
That’s right.
HITLER.
Unbelievable.
QFT. I’m in significantly more danger from the Catholics glaring at me in the grocery store because they know I volunteer at the women’s health clinic than I am from the Muslim refugees and/or students in town
“Bigoted” is not the word I’d use in this case, since I think a lot of participants in EDMD do not regard themselves to be better than Muslims.
But it is a prejudiced attack on an entire population.
It is prejudiced attack because it treats all Muslims as deserving of a response to the actions of a few.
It would not have been prejudicial to draw pictures of Muhammad and mail them to the revolutionmuslim.com assholes who started this. They could easily be said to have earned such a response.
For it is certainly true that we would not be talking about this today if not for the threats of those at revolutionmuslim. Yet all Muslims have been treated as if they deserve the response that would more obviously have been directed at revoltionmuslim.com. That is prejudicial.
And now we have commenters here pretending that there are constantly, always somewhere some Muslims who deserve to be attacked like this, so we must flood the intertubes with drawings of Muhammad just to make sure that those unnamed, unseen, hypothetical Muslims are likely to see them.
And along the way millions of other Muslims deserve to be primed for stereotype threat. Just because they’re in the wrong place at the wrong time. So that’s prejudicial, in that it judges all Muslims as deserving this retribution, without any consideration for their behavior as individuals.
We? You’re older than I thought. I’ve been at this for I guess nine years, roughly.
And, interestingly, we already have a well-established way of signaling that ‘Actions carried out against a “blasphemer” which violate existing laws or the rights of others are also not to be tolerated.’
The way it works is, somebody calls the cops and reports the crime …
Alright, maybe you’re thinking “those people are good and must be dealt with harshly”. That’s another possible explanation for your apologia here.
Other people get to decide what they think of you; if you want to influence their decisions positively, don’t be such an asshole.
KG,
you see, I love it when you argue with such talent and clarity and wit. Here’s the thing. When I look at what I have written, and note that my words are open to misinterpretation, and then I write a note clarifying my usage of terminology, and you choose to continue in the misinterpretation instead of accepting the clarification, the problem is now at your end. The clarification has been given, you appear to have understood it’s intent, so just what the fuck is your problem, if it’s not that you want to believe something in the face of the evidence?
Well, these events usually get reported in the news in Muslim countries. Those media outlets have the same motivations as the media anywhere else — the most sensational coverage, in the shortest amount of time, with the least effort, is the most profitable.
They won’t get the message that they’re being criticized for feeling upset about depictions of Muhammad which are directed at them from the most powerful nations on Earth who’ve also been bombing their country with drones and killing hundreds of civilians.
They’ll just get the message that deliberately antagonistic depictions of Muhammad are being directed at them from the most powerful nations on Earth who’ve also been bombing their country with drones and killing hundreds of civilians.
If I drew Jesus fucking a camel… that could cause some trouble.
*predominantly Muslim countries
(Sorry; I’ve been reminded before that “Muslim countries” is erroneous. I’ll get it right eventually.)
Some here seem unclear as to what DMD is actually supposed to achieve. It’s supposed to let the bullies that throw out death threats know that we are not afraid, that we will stand up to them. It’s the same reason that PZ started Crackergate, in response to the kid getting punished for keeping a cracker.
We raise our voice, or take up our pens, in opposition, because discourse is the civilised way to resist such thuggish attempts. When people try to stifle our voices and take away our pens, they are offering succour to those that would use violence, and opposing those that would instead use words. Personally, I find this attitude Completely Fucked Up(tm)
Anyway, I’m done. I don’t have any more to say on this subject that I haven’t already said. Some of you will continue believing that you are fighting the good fight, saving the ‘oppressed minorities’, whilst actually you’ll be standing side-by-side with those that would use violence. Such is your choice. Just don’t prance around preening yourselves on how upright and moral you are.
Yeah, sure. Just because you believe something that makes it true.
Tell me, who on the global scale holds the power?
What was the majority religion of the population of the two latest countries to be invaded?
So, you also admit that you don’t fucking care if you add a bit of more attack and opression of marginalized minorities because they happen to believe something you disagree with. So, what exactly makes you different from the run off the mill bigot who gives a fuck about opressed minorities as long as they can feel morally superior?
we aren’t. but even if we were, white people/Westerners are globally the dominant group. and most muslims, globally speaking, don’t fall into this group. seriously, have you never bothered to read up on global stratification? do you know, for example, what the world-systems theory is?
you’re wrong.
ROTFLMAO. do you realize how few of the people currently arguing with you are American?
of course you don’t. so sad.
well, that might be your intent. but only the small sliver of muslims in western countries (plus a few people elsewhere, but still fewer than those in western countries) are going to be noticing what a bunch of westerners do with their free time on the internet. and even if they were the minority of people who received this message… how would that be an excuse to ignore them, anyway?
besides, considering western/white/(culturally)christian is globally dominant over non-western/non-white/non-christian, even a global attack on muslims, if it comes from the west/from westerners, is punching down the power gradient.
precious. let me guess, you believe in free will, and that a person can just make themselves believe or disbelieve
and that’s ignoring the fact that it really doesn’t matter whether you’re attacking something they actually believe. as life said, when believers straw-attack atheist beliefs, it’s an attack even when it’s a strawman and no atheist even believes the thing being attacked. the social dynamic of attack on a minority doesn’t change just because the person being thusly targeted may not believe what they’re bieng attacked with.
I want them to reason their way out of it, not have reactance and feel the need for retrenchment because they’re (correctly)feeling attacked and othered. what good does that do me?
*rolleyes*
again: do you understand the concept of intersectionality? because that comment still makes it sound as if only one axis of oppression existed.
Argh. The stupid, it burns!
*sigh*
A Skeptic can be wrong without being biased. If he is biased, as in a racist kind of bias, after all we’re not talking about Skeptics who prefer a particular flavour of ice-cream over another, then they cannot be applying the *fundamental* (because, hey, we get to use that word in a non-scary way) laws of scientific methodology and objective reason in their argument, which means they are not adhering to the very requirements of skepticism itself, ergo, no true skeptic.
You know damn well what the purpose of DMD is anyway, I bet you’d still be bitching about it being ‘wrong’ in some way even if one of the requirements was for Mo to be drawn as a white-majority-Western-male(tm).
Racism is abhorrent, but all you’re succeeding at is annoying the one social group who, by the very tenets of their argument, require the absence of bias, therefore, guess what, no racism accepted.
@billyeagar:
As Dr. Cox put it so eloquently:
Wrong wrong wrong wrong, wrong wrong wrong wrong. You’re wrong, you’re wrong.
A couple months ago I was in a WalMart and noticed a Hispanic gentleman picking up bags and putting them in a cart. I didn’t pause to appraise the situation and assumed immediately that he was a WalMart worker and asked him a question reserved for their employees. It was not his blue shirt that made me think this, rather it was the fact he was a Hispanic man. Of course, he was a customer, and I felt super horrible about it.
We all have biases, mine unfortunately are locked in the stupid Right-Wing Republican trope of “Hispanics are just here to get low-paying jobs we won’t do.” A skeptic can be racist, my bias and immediate thought was indeed racist.
It’s whether we address those ideas as incorrect that places us in a different category than a non-skeptic. It’s challenging our biases, recognizing where our prejudices lie, and taking steps to ensure we don’t let those biases control us.
For those who won’t google, what is reactance:
http://www.psych-it.com.au/Psychlopedia/article.asp?id=65
Intended result ≠ actual result
It happens.
cute. except that this is of course false. we are quite aware what people would like it to mean and do. we just disagree that this is the actual effect it’s having, and we don’t believe that intent trumps effect. hence “intent is not magic”
oh, but as long as me don’t mean to stand side by side with them, we aren’t actually really doing that.
(IOW: thanks for admitting that intent isn’t magic)
What relavence does this have? You don’t agree with them so you call them an American?
Well, actually, no, I don’t know.
Looks like everybody makes up their own “purpose”.
What is the stated, shared by all (or almost all) participants, measurable goal.
What would be a success of DMD?
2 years ago Thunderfoot declared victory when Pakistan banned FB and there were massive uproars.
If no muslim on planet earth gave a flying fuck anymore I guess people would declare victory, too, because they muslims have finally learned their lesson.
Sounds like heads I win, tails you lose.
I’ma just go ahead and grant that billyeager is a True Skeptic because he was raised by actual factual skeptical wolves in a deep and unexplored forest well into his mid-twenties with absolutely no human contact.
Even so.
The readership of Pharyngula is not entirely made up by True Skeptics raised by actual factual skeptical wolves.
So some of us still have a wee bit of racist conditioning, you know, most of us having grown up in racist societies, that is, those which are not exclusively wolf-based.
Therefore it is sometimes helpful to talk about racism.
(I wonder also how True Skepticism overcomes implicit biases, since I’m pretty sure even wolves’ adopted children have unconscious feelings.)
Contradictions, by jennyxyzzy:
it’s an annoyingly common habit. especially common among Europeans, but I’ve seen others do it, too.
basically, because the US has a reputation as the dumbest, most irrational Western country, arguments from (assumed) Americans often get dismissed simply with a sneer at how dumb, irrational, parochial, hyperbolic, or whateverthefuck the commenter is.
for example, a long list of idiots has been trying to claim that and invitation to “coffee” in the middle of the night never ever means “sex” in Europe, and that that’s all just in the heads of those silly, prude, confused Americans.
FFS, I think I can safely say that most people here DO know what the fuck DMD is SUPPOSED to achieve. However, it fails miserably at doing that. It has been hijacked by racist scum. It has become something that makes muslims feel unwelcome in western countries. Wake the fuck up.
Apart, of course, from those Europeans who weren’t raised in European woods.
I mean, I remember two or three comercials from the top of my head that made use of the “coffee” metaphor.
there seems to be an epidemic of people raised in woods, usually by wolves. someone should really do a study.
The evidence is in what you wrote, for which there is only one possible interpretation. You said DMD “is targetted at all Muslims”. When you realised you had exposed your bigotry, you tried to “unsay” it; but some things, you just can’t “unsay”.
Actually, when I say this:
That is to say, we get what it was supposed to be, when it was first introduced. What the purpose is ‘supposed’ to be now… I can only guess. Lots of people seem to think widely different things on this, for example: racist asshats seem to think it’s an opportunity to blindly hate on muslims.
Also, generally speaking, a decent sort of well-meaning skeptic (not kidding now) often could use a good short guide to the ways that bias can manifest without awareness.
Personally I’ve found Privilege, Power and Difference by Allan G. Johnson to be helpful. Although I will stress it is an introductory text. If you are conversant in the topic already then it might at most give you new ways of talking about it.
eh. even without that, it’s pretty obvious it’s meant as an attack on people. jenny has admitted she thinks people should feel shame if they’re not able/willing to will themselves into unbelief. and nevermind that that’s just not how losing one’s religion works.
Yeah. Wow.
rorschach once expressed astonishment at me when I said something which seemed to imply that people could “just choose to stop believing”.
It wasn’t really what I meant, but I’ve tried to be careful since then not to imply this, because, apparently, some people really are so unawares as to think it.
I guess I’m always a bit astonished too when I run into these people.
Life is like a pitbull and Jadehawk,
YOUR racism astounds me. Seven people died and many other were injured because some nutjobs took offense at cartoons of Muhammod but these people dont count because they were not American?
Who gives a shit about Southpark and American censorship? This day is about the riots and violence that occurred across the world in response to the Danish cartoons and the attempts by some religious fanatics to resurrect this kind of response to any other perceived slight.
This is not about insulting Muslims. Most Muslims couldnt give a stuff about drawings of Muhammod. This day is about saying to religious nutjobs that we will not live in fear of your response to offense. You do not have the right not to be offended and you do not have the right to force your religious opinions on others by violence.
Before reading your posts I thought people like Maryam Namazie were exaggerating when they said that Islamists find some of their strongest support within the liberal Left but now I see that I have underestimated the extent of post colonial guilt among us – when people can no longer stand up against extremist intimidation for fear of being labelled racist.
Yeah, awesome display of logical analytics there. Maybe, just maybe, now open your mind real wide now, perhaps your racist assumption anecdote falls entirely outside the scope of scientific methodology, because I’ve yet to encounter the Hispanic-in-Walmart-equals-employee theorem.
Could it be that, at that moment, your thinking fell somewhat short of rational objectivity? Mmm? Perhaps it was more like assumptive asshattery?
Indeed it is, in that particular case it was an incredibly ill-thought-out billboard. But was it created by racists? Absolutely not. The intention was not the result, but, in that it was something created to convey a particular, non-racist, message, it was simply wrong. It was not a racist act.
DMD, however, *may* be used by some racists as an excuse to tout their ignorant bias, but it was not created to convey a racist message. Unlike the AA Billboard, though, it is not ‘wrong’ as a concept.
If we choose to drop DMD because of a few hateful individuals who generally receive short shrift around here anyway, we’d be guilty of the same avoidance tactic forced upon those who are threatened with violence by Muslim extremists.
DMD is a non-violent non-cooperation campaign.
so many words, and all just for a strawman.
Pentatomid,
Racist asshats dont need an excuse to behave like racist asshats. Are you really suggesting that the rest of us should stop standing up against extremism because racist asshats may jump on board?
and again, it should be noted, an argument is dismissed by blaming it all on Americanness
mary2mary2,
You should probably make an effort to read what Life is like a pitbull and Jadehawk actually said before firing up at them.
You do understand that was the point of the anecdote?
Wow, you’re thick. That was not what I was suggesting at all. Are you that bad at reading, or was this some kind of pathetic attempt at strawmanning me? I’ll fight religious extremism wherever and whenever I can. But it’s not just about some racist asshats jumping on board. DMD has been completely taken over by them, to the point where it’s not worth taking the thing back anymore. You wanna stand against religious extremism, fine. There’s international blasphemy rights day for that. EDMD has gone down the drain.
mary2mary2:
For one, Molly Norris, the person who drew the original, poster-like cartoon on April 20, 2010, which declared May 20, 2010, to be the first annual “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day”.
(Does it not embarrass you to opine from ignorance?)
[ObDisclaimer]
Yes, I quoted Wikipedia.
(I should have made that explicit)
@John Morales:
You mean Molly Norris who disavowed the whole thing? I mean Christ, read the fucking Wiki article if you’re gonna post it.
I’m pretty sure they count. I’m pretty sure I thought that EDMD would bring them back to life I’d be in favor of it.
That’s why this day exists.
«Everybody Draw Mohammed Day was an event held on May 20, 2010 in support of free speech and freedom of artistic expression of those threatened by violence for drawing representations of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. It began as a protest against censorship of an American television show, South Park, “201” by its distributor, Comedy Central, in response to death threats against some of those responsible for two segments broadcast in April 2010. Observance of the day began with a drawing posted on the Internet on April 20, 2010, accompanied by text suggesting that “everybody” create a drawing representing Muhammad, on May 20, 2010, as a protest against efforts to limit freedom of speech.»
You are objectively wrong.
It is; insulting Muslims is the admitted motivation of several commenters here.
That’s sort of true, and good for them. It’s also sort of wrong; many Muslims are bothered by it but don’t react publicly.
Sort of. It’s a tradition that goes on year after year even though there the people who participate in it have never actually had the option of living in fear about it.
It’s pretty much an empty statement to say “I won’t live in fear of you Muslims!” when you haven’t ever had the opportunity to live in fear of them Muslims. You’re stoking your self-righteousness.
Anyway, what you’re doing is setting aside a day for vengeance, in which people primarily of the dominant racial group in the West get to feel aggrieved, over old news.
The assholes at revolutionmuslim.com started this a long time ago, and you got your kicks in last year, and the year before. You got your vengeance. Making it a tradition now, that just invites dominant groups’ grievances, like continually obsessing over the death of Virginia Dare.
Anybody who wants to draw Muhammad can do so, and 364 days out of the year it’s not automatically inviting the xenophobes to join you. But don’t make a holiday of targeting only Islam; this only gives cover to the anti-immigrant movements.
She frequently is exaggerating about the actual amount of support.
As you’ll note, no one here has proposed that blaspheming Muhammad should be illegal. Thus no one here is in support of these Islamists you speak of.
Your accusation is like saying that because I think people shouldn’t use racial slurs, I am in support of legally banning racial slurs. Nope.
Nah. I’m not a fan of guilt.
And nobody’s standing up against extremist intimidation here. There ain’t none around here to stand up to.
By the way you’ll note again what I said about the first DMD, in 2010. I explicitly said there were some reasonable arguments for it:
«As for the radicals, as I already said, it’s totally understandable why a lot of people wanted to hurt them.
EDMD was originally calculated to hurt people. And that’s because it was a one-off response to a particular event. It was retributive in nature, and some people saw it as necessary retribution — whatever, it’s over; I didn’t think it sent an effective message but it’s totally understandable why a lot of people did. Alright. But the thing to understand is that it was retributive, an intentional show of disrespect to Muslims. That’s not always justified, even if it might for the sake of argument have been justified at a particular time in response to a particular event.
There are reasonable people here who believe the first DMD, in 2010, was justified. I’m not interested in convincing them otherwise; it’s over; and they had some reasonable arguments for it. That was how the radicals were dealt with. But it’s over.»
pentatomid:
If your contention is correct, it implies that this very post by PZ is pandering to some racist asshats.
(Is that what you meant to imply?)
Who exactly is threatening you to stop drawing Mohammed? Is it the people on the thread arguing that DMD has negative impact? Or is it the racists? Or are you actually getting threatened by Muslim extremists?
Very Gandhi of you.
Katherine @ #198,
First, much love for citing Perry Cox.
I get sympathy embarrassment just reading your anecdote, and won’t say that your feelings there aren’t justified. But as someone who has worked retail, may I suggest that there might have also been unconscious cues that helped cause your misconception?
I’m a 6′ tall white male, and while shopping have been approached for help in retail stores a number of times by other customers who assumed at a glance that I was an employee. Having talked to some of them, I’ve realized that I have a “retail look”; that is, I know how stores are laid out, how to work out where items could be, and how to spot specific items at a glance down an aisle. As well, when I walk into a big store, my training to survey the customers for someone looking for help kicks in. People pick up on the cues in my body and eyes and figure I know what I’m doing*. One of them even said so. The guy you approached might have been one of my fellow retail veterans from some other store.
*Disclaimer: I rarely know what I’m doing.
@John Morales:
Wrup… misread your post. Forgive me for being stupid.
Katherine, yeah, I read it.
That it was disavowed doesn’t mean it wasn’t “about Southpark and American censorship”.
[meta]
Katherine @232, we crossed. :|
(And thank you for thinking about it!)
@John Morales:
Yea. I do good at reading my own posts before posting them, but I should do better work at reading other peoples’ posts XD
ॐ,
Indeed.
I note that the article claims that “Norris has since changed her name and gone into hiding”.
Ooh! I like this one because it’s wrong in an interesting way.
It turns out that perfectly normal people (many of whom do not even wear their buttocks upon their heads) can easily be influenced to act racist, in ways that they would not predict because they don’t know they’re so susceptable to peer pressure.
Even asshats tend to practice more asshattery when they get swept up into groups which are acting particularly asshattish.
If you would read the thread you might note what I am suggesting:
“It’s possible to draw Muhammad, if one feels artistically inclined to do so, without making a big racist day of it. There are 364 other days.
That is how you could challenge the idea of blasphemy without standing in solidarity with white supremacists. You could do it any other day of the year, instead of making a tradition now about dominant groups’ grievances.”
@227,
Molly Norris did disavow it. While that’s completely plausible as her actual sentiment, I’ll opine that her true feelings on the matter could very easily be different. She received a lot of credible threats, and went into hiding at the FBI’s suggestion. Prior to disappearing, she may have been understandably trying to protect herself with her public disavowal. I feel that falls much more in line with the actions and events than does Norris not supporting the notion, especially since she wrote in her original cartoon, “[Let’s] defend a little something our country is famous for.”
Indeed she has. Let it be noted that my statement was not that no one has ever had to live in fear of such violence. But the vast majority of participants in this never have, and it’s particularly unfortunate that they glorify themselves in her name while disrespecting her own wishes.
That’s because you’re not very good at reading between the lines, and you probably also are utilizing motivated cognition to arrive at some justification for your actions.
But an insincere statement on the matter would have worked just fine without such statements as:
“I wish that was what our energies were going toward — protesting revolutionmuslim.com’s threat to Comedy Central, and Comedy Central’s over reaction to it which set America on a slippery slope toward censorship!).”
That demonstrates she is still upset about the original matter. In an insincere statement, she would likely be more motivated to hide her feelings about it, presenting no outward indication of lingering indignation.
“The results have shown to be vitriolic and worse, offensive to Muslims who had nothing to do with the censorship issue I was inspired to draw about in the first place
This is totally unnecessary in an insincere statement; there is no reason to express any concern for Muslims who are being targeted by vitriol. She could simply reiterate that it is not her desire for people to continue this; such a straightforward statement would make her no less secure from attack.
No, she displays indications of being sincere, and no indications of being insincere. All the evidence thus points to her being sincere. You disrespect her by second-guessing her endlessly when her statements point clearly in one direction.
Also, the Wiki article indicates that she did not go into hiding until after July 11 2010. But she made her statements against DMD back on April 30 2010. So at that point she did not believe she was in such danger as to require hiding; there is thus no reason to assume she would feel like she was in enough danger to make an insincere statement while not even bothering to conceal herself from physical attack.
This is absurd as it does not admit the possibility that people can have reason to change their minds.
Furthermore, all her statements were in line with still supporting freedom of speech — she was explicit in saying she still wanted the focus to be on threats against South Park — But she felt that the worst should have been directed at the people behind revolutionmuslim.com. She was very clear about that. You are being extremely disrespectful to her by spinning her words and insisting she must not have meant to say what she said, just so that you can feel more justified in attacking Muslims.
This is a further statement of her sincerity, with a focus on the innocent bystanders which is totally unnecessary if she were insincere:
“Let’s call off ‘Everybody Draw Mohammed Day’ by changing it to ‘Everybody Draw Al Gore Day’ instead. Enough Mohammed drawings have already been made to get the point across. At this juncture, such drawings are only hurtful to more liberal and moderate Muslims who have not done anything to endanger our first amendment rights Do something positive with that energy, like…Draw Al Gore!”
Note she still values having gotten “the point” across. That’s still in line with her earliest statements. But she has become concerned for people who she never meant to distress. That is a typical reaction of empathy when things don’t go as planned.
ॐ,
I am in accord with your interpretation of Molly’s intentions and attitude, but even so, that people can become distressed by the very act of depicting a character that is labelled Mohammed* is something that should not be forgotten.
The distress may be real, but its basis (and you know damn well I don’t refer to deliberate insulting, but to mere depiction) is rationally unjustifiable and merely seems like a way to control people by asserting authority.
(Perhaps I’ve missed it, I admit I’ve but skimmed this thread, but have you addressed PZ’s approach? Do you find it problematic?)
—
* It’s not like anyone actually knows what the historical figure actually looked like!
I’m trying to follow what the folks against DMD are saying, and I don’t disagree. Let me just bring up what I find worrisome about what’s being said so I can see if I’m still following correctly:
1) Catholics are a subset of the dominant power group, region-wise, in the western world. However, in many places, they were specifically targeted for poor treatment (for example in the country I live in). Thus, wouldn’t doing something that offends Catholics while not actually hurting anyone (Crackergate) be punching down the power gradient as well?
Likewise, I suspect (I’d have to look up the stats, but I’ll wait to see if anyone disagree with me first), many/most evangelicals live at the bottom end of the economic scale, and therefore, presumably, a power gradient applies. Would mocking evangelicals therefore also be punching downwards?
2) We have heard a lot about in this thread about how being harsh to people causes them to retrench their ideas and become less open to being talked out of them. It seems that when arguments of this sort are brought up in other contexts, the folks making them are accused of tone-trolling. I’m not saying there isn’t a difference, but it’s not apparent to me yet.
3) Lastly, if participating in DMD automatically aligns one with bigoted forces that also participate in it, how can someone protesting DMD avoid aligning themselves with bigoted forces protesting it? Or, if the latter is possible by clearly explaining your intent, why does it only work in one direction?
These are my concerns. This is an important issue, I think, and I’m still not sure I get these angles.
Apparently Mo was quite the looker, so draw your standard anime bishie and add copious amounts of dark hair:
http://chillyoislamyo.com/how-the-prophet-muhammad-s-really-looked/
Note that his eyelashes had multiple compliments, and that there is no indication that he had a mono-brow.
I think this depends on who does it, as part of which culture. For example, it’s not the same if an ex-Muslim mocks Islam and if a someone like me does it, in a place where Muslims are currently only tolerated, in a place where in a relatively recent war they ended up fucked by all sides. Just as it’s not the same when I go out of my way to offend Catholics in my (catholic) country and someone doing it somewhere where they are being persecuted and killed.
Religion needs to be mocked and ridiculed, but we can’t pretend that some things don’t hurt individuals more than they actually benefit the cause.
Amazing how quick those who think DMD is an insult to Muslims resorted to insulting everyone who disagreed with them.
Where exactly did that happen? Noone here has done such a thing.
No, because one means to actively join a group that tolerates and encourages bigots and racists, while the other does not.
If we organized a protest against this and invited islamists to join, you’d have a point.
There can be many reasons to promote or protest something, but that doesn’t mean that all reasons are equally valid.
Say I protest the building of a new motorway through a nature preserve. My reason is that there are many endangered and protected species living there and the motorway can be built somewhere else, do you think that this automatically aligns me with some new-agers who oppose the motorway because they think there are fairies in the mound?
Slightly OT, but relevant. The adoption of the “infidel” label of things perceived as a threat to values.
Muslim consumers: How do global brands become ‘infidels’? http://phys.org/news/2012-05-muslim-consumers-global-brands-infidels.html
You will notice the example from Turkey with what Marx would have called the “lumpenprolitariat” adopting islamist values. Marginalised groups embracing militant views is something that happens over and over again. Savonarola did it long before the Weimar republic.
Life,
Thank you for supporting my theory. First Norris said that EDMD should be called off, then, when the threats reached a certain level, she did as bid and vanished. She escalated her response as the danger escalated.
What’s absurd is that you have to insert something I never said or implied into my statement in order to have an argument.
You have been extremely disrespectful of Molly Norris as a person by elevating her to a religious position and pretending that her words define what everyone else should do.
Your trying to drown everyone else out here and denigrate those with different takes is not going to actually make you right. Nor is lying about me, even if you feel justified just because your little dander is up.
Pentatomid @246,
See posts by Life, Jadehawk, consciousness, and probably others. They’ve been shouting people down, equating disagreement to hate, and trying to overwhelm with post volume almost since the start of the thread.
There are some easy questions in the General Social Survey which equate to “are you a racist?”
One of them is RACDIF4: “On the average African-Americans have worse jobs, income, and housing than white people. Do you think these differences are because most African-Americans just don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves up out of poverty?”
If you answer yes, then you’re a racist.
I sorted this question according to belief in God, controlling for race of respondent, selecting the last ten years of the survey. In case you want to replicate this, it’s:
Row : RACDIF4
Column : GOD
Control : RACE
Weight : COMPWT
Filter : YEAR(2002-2012)
Here’s the results: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/822/racdif4xgod.png/
As you can see, 45% of white atheists in the USA are racists.
That is a lot of racist atheists. QED.
Yep.
Until I hear Muslims, in significant numbers, stating the effect of feeling repressed, it is conjecture that we’re ‘punching down the power structure’ – a lovely sound bite, I might add – I don’t really give a fuck about offending religious sensibilities.
Just because Islam is associated with an ethnic group does not stop it from being a fucking oppressive religion that engages in punching down the power structure internally by forcing women to wear burqas openly proclaiming their sinful and second class status.
That is an act of hate, it is under the guise of a sick fuck religion, but it is oppression and hate blatantly practiced in a society that supposedly does not tolerate that shit.
I never thought of drawing Mohammad as anything but a ‘fuck you’ to a ‘fuck you’ religion, and perhaps bigots that take advantage of it out to be given a ‘fuck you’ as well.
It is the supremest of bullshit, these arguments of protecting minority religious sensibilities and not providing fodder for bigots, because the message is that repressive religion is not tolerated in a secular and humanitarian society, and besides, bigots and racists will make anything into an excuse to be ignorant and hateful.
It is Muslim society being targeted, not Arab or African or Polynesian (you get my point); it is anti – Muslim.
I’ve not seen many anti-Christian blogs where the commenters are more vicious than here towards Christians and other religions, so what now? Do we wait until Islam is mainstream to mock it publicly?
Draw Mohammad Day sends a fucking important message for free speech and against a woman prisoning practice, it is a powerful message to have a special day to recognize these principles of a free and equal society.
I am not going to start tempering my disgust because some sick fucks will try to twist my message for their own use. When special interest groups, namely Christian, are publicly given the ‘fuck you, not on public property’ civil actions against displaying their repressive and childish religious symbols, and secular advertising and billboards are erected and shown, this is what drawing Mohammad is doing, standing up for free speech, gender equality, and rationality.
It is a protest against the power structure of the fucking woman hating and violence promoting religions of the world.
Religion is where the ‘punching down’ occurs. If there is a problem with racism in the US and elsewhere, I am sure the fuck NOT going to censor my message and let those fucking freaks dictate my behavior, I am next going to fucking confront the bigoted fucking pigs just as publicly.
If anything, Draw Mohammad Day should be explained as anti-censorship CLEARLY, and expressly!, and we should carry the message that ALL RELIGION is hateful to women and knowledge and freedom.
Yes, actually it does. In the exact same way that expressing EDMD at the same time as racists will make some people assume that you’re a bigot and embolden the actual bigots, protesting the motorway at the same time as crazies will make some people assume that you’re one of the crazies and embolden the actual crazies. Supporting the same goals as fanatics and lunatics always gives comfort to them, which is why one should always criticize those on their “side” when they’re damaging, and at the same time, one shouldn’t worry about it too much. It will happen no matter what.
The Phelpses oppose war, but do so for disgusting reasons. That doesn’t mean I should leave if I’m protesting and they show up. I am NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEM. At most, I am responsible for making it clear that I am not aligned with them. Some people will be too ignorant, mentally deaf, or jingoistic to realize I’m not with them, even if I denounce them and have a history of denouncing them. I am not responsible for those people either.
That said, if we have to attach all sorts of qualifiers to any EDMD act to make it clear who and what is being criticized and why, then it’s probably a failure and should be abandoned.
PS This bullshit about illegalizing all abortion is way the fuck over the line, it is a religiously rationalized act of mass murder, and it is far fucking more serious than Draw Mohammad Day.
It needs to be addressed, somehow, powerfully. We need to have a Draw Christian Men Stoning Women Day.
That’s nonsense because it says nothing about the reason why they think it happens. Steady discrimination can have a huge effect on one’s motivation. What you asked for is if people believe there is a correlation between these things. Furthermore, it does not explore what those people think about poor people in general so they could just likely be classicists (does that term exist at your side of the pond?). The most important part however is, is your poll representative of white atheists?
Poor methodology.
Hello confirmation bias.
This doesn’t favor anyone’s theory about her actual beliefs.
You might consider acknowledging the likelihood that if she’d first gone into hiding and then said it should be called off, you’d interpret that as her giving an insincere response in order to reduce her harassers’ desire to find her.
What do you object to, the following? “You are being extremely disrespectful to her by spinning her words and insisting she must not have meant to say what she said, just so that you can feel more justified in attacking Muslims.”
Alas, your motivation is transparent. And I owe you nothing; I am not interested in taking your claims at face value when you are not willing to take another person’s at face value.
That word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Nah. She has given but one argument that favors my position. It is not the final word on the matter.
What is disgusting, though, is when people claim they are doing this for her against her wishes. That is prima facie immoral.
Anyone who explicitly disregards her wishes, and does not claim to be doing it for her, is comparatively less disgusting.
Could you provide a specific example of me denigrating someone? Comment number? I’ll have a look, and if it fits the bill, I’ll reconsider whether it’s justified.
There are a lot of comments here. I am permitted to reply to them. You appear only to be upset that the people you agree with didn’t get in more of the comments overall. Tough luck.
I haven’t any interest in lying about you.
I see you are projecting. You will be unable to show any quote from me which evinces anger at you. (I’m actually too tired.)
Typing people down? This isn’t like a room full of people trying to talk. There is no interference. Everyone can say as much as they like; it is impossible to shout anyone down.
I’m certain I haven’t done this.
You seem to think it’s unfair for people who disagree with you to actually reply to people you agree with.
Drawing Muhammed is just mocking a silly oppressive, sexist and cultural superiorist religion. Same as the infamous “Piss Christ” photo for Christians. Power does not matter here at all. It is about silly religious beliefs. Somehow it reminds me of a video of Christopher Hitchens I saw recently when another unbeliever at an atheist conference was being even an apologist for islamist terrorism. It’s not the same degree of apologetics, of course, but it is apologetics. Minorities do not have any more right to be oppressive internally than others have the right to oppress them: none at all.
Well, thanx again for proving that you’re an idiot who can’t hold more than one idea at the moment and therefore presumes that the rest of the world can’t either.
First, you’re moving the goalpost. I never said anything about “the same time (and place)” That (if done intentionally to maximize publicity) of course would be an act of joining ranks. Which is exactly what you do when you join EDMD which is full of racist bigots who have been invited and encouraged to participate
Well, if you go to a protest where the Phelpses are official supporters*, you directly support them and lend them credibility.
If you are an organizer and let them join your organisation (in the broadest sense), you support them.
If you’re an organizer and they show up at your event and you don’t make clear that you don’t endorse them and that they don’t express positions that you share, you’re aligning yourself with them.
If as an organizer you think that their numbers added to your invent are worth throwing other people under the bus you officially endorse them.
See, there are many different possibilities and many ways not to align yourself with them.
*Usually protests have official organizers and supporters. The spontaneous nature of the occupy movement has somewhat changed that.
life is like a pitbull with lipstick ॐ & Jadehawk,
I draw Mohammed for one simple reason. Certain Muslims have decided that drawing Mohammed is something I shouldn’t do because it’s against THEIR religion. I am being disrespectful to them because they are being disrespectful to me for insisting I obey the illogical requirements of a religion I do not observe.
When they stop being disrespectful to me, I’ll stop being disrespectful to them. Just because you’ve decided that I have to respect their religion because otherwise I’m being racist, I’ve got one simple response. Fuck you! I reject your charges of racism and I deny it. Just because your INTENT is to pretend I’m a racist doesn’t make me one.
@:-) <-Mohammed
So, if someone were to participate in DMD and not invite bigots, they’d be ok?
What if they participated and specifically distanced themselves from those bigots?
I’m not sure I see a massive distinction between drawing stuff on a blog thread and protesting drawing stuff on a blog thread – they suggest the same level of organization to me.
No, I don’t, for exactly the same reasons that I don’t think that participating in DMD automatically aligns you with bigots who like the day because it lets them complain about brown-skinned people.
But we’ve been told that intent doesn’t matter.
Apparently, you would be aligned with the new-agers because it’s impossible to tell you apart from them because you are doing the same thing – opposing the motorway.
I do think DMD has been by-and-large poisoned with bigotry, and I don’t know if it can be rescued from that. I suspect not. But assuming that anyone/everyone who participates is a bigot makes just as much sense as assuming that anyone/everyone that protests it supposed the general ban.
Alright, then you want to see the answer to RACDIF1: “On the average African-Americans have worse jobs, income, and housing than white people. Do you think these differences are mainly due to discrimination?”
Another easy question. If you answer no, then you’re a racist.
Same ten years; results: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/84/racdif1xgod.png/
As you can see, by this measure 67% of white atheists in the USA are racists.
That is a lot of racist atheists. QED.
(I suspect the earlier 45% is a clearer measure of coldness toward an out-group, and the 67% is closer to a measure of sheer stupidity about structural racism. But I’m curious what Jadehawk thinks about it when she gets back.)
They are very interrelated in the USA, but in any case, if one’s classism makes one believe that black people are responsible for their differential poverty — note that yes we do have plenty of poor white people but black people as a group are poorer, and note that the question did ask about the difference — then one’s classism has made one a racist as well.
Yes. It’s the General Social Survey.
‘Tis himself
That actually reminds me of my kids. It usally ends with both of them crying.
Also, was every single muslim you’re being disrespectful (although neither Jadehawks nor sg’s argument was about respect) to disrespectful to you? There are those who say “you know, you absolutely have the right to do so, I’d rather wish you didn’t”. It#s like walking up to a non-smoker and, although you actually don’t want a smoke right now, light a cigarette and exhale into their direction because some other violent non-smokers have pissed you off.
Complete strawman. Their argument was never about “respecting their religion”. You can throw many things that stick at both of them, but “accomondationist” certainly isn’t one of them. They’re saying that singeling out one religion, of whom a minority is crazy lunatics (while all of them are deluded), and which is subject of racist discrimination in those countries EDMD has some effect is certainly adding to the racist discrimination of said minority.
Furthermore, it’s an event that has been heavily ursurped by racist bigots and you’re joining their ranks. That does not make you a racist, but it means you’re participating in a racist event.
Say you’re against the blockage of Gaza, would you join the Hamas in a protest? Or would you look for other ways to voice your protest?
The artist was a devout Catholic.
It may not matter to you. That sums up how privilege works pretty well.
———
Who’s telling you to be respectful? It’s been repeated quite a few times that it wouldn’t be a problem if you decided to do this sort of blasphemy every fucking day of the year while clearly distancing yourself from bigots. How is that like suggesting you should be respectful to religion?
Anri,
Who do you believe is doing this?
‘Tis Himself,
I’m surprised you’re being so stupid today. Perhaps more coffee?
Anri
No, because there are two different things:
One is to protest threats and censorship while the other is to particiate in one single event
Intent doesn’t matter, but arguments do, and so do actions.
In order to distance myself from the new-agers I can make sure that I don’t protest at the same time and in the same places. I can make sure that my signs, colours, banners are very different.
DMD is going to the same spot as they do at the same time wearing the same hippie-attire they do.
See above. Do you think people are capable of telling veterans opposing war and WBC opposing war apart? If yes, you have the answer.
What I said was badly stated.
There may be a substantial difference between saying that people who participate are bigots and saying that people who participate align themselves with bigots.
I typoed badly in my last paragraph in any case, so let me try again:
“But assuming that anyone/everyone who participates supports bigotry makes just as much sense as assuming that anyone/everyone that protests it supports the general drawing ban.”
That’s a bit clearer.
Life/Pitbull #262
I can easily imagine a thoughtful person answering ‘No’ because these current differences are due to historical inertia rather than (current) discrimination – which would not at all imply that discrimination occurs or is important.
That would explain why the result differs so much from your previous attempt at a definitive test.
Of course, the ‘raised by wolves’ theory implies that you should be able to get near 100% on your next try.
I can easily imagine a thoughtful person answering ‘No’ because these current differences are due to historical inertia rather than (current) discrimination – which would not at all imply denial that discrimination occurs or is important.
FTFM
I’m not being stupid. You’ve decided that since I’ve drawn a picture of Mohamed with the specific intention of being disprectful to certain Muslims and I’m automatically and irredeemably racist. In your pointy little head you’ve decided that the only reason someone would ever draw a picture of Mohammed is to because they’re an Islamophobic racist. Well guess what, I’m not Islamophobic. I have no problems with Muslims except when they use their religion to promote evil like FGM or when they decide that I have to obey the requirements of their religion, things like not drawing pictures of Mohammed.
I personally do not think I’m being racist and I resent bitterly your PRETENSE that I am. Is this idea too difficult for you to understand?
I will draw pictures of Mohammed whenever I feel like it and if that doesn’t meet with your fucking approval then fuck you!
No. Again: it would not be an automatic and irredeemable problem for your strawmanning fucking self if you did it every fucking day of the year.
There’s an important ambiguity about what you mean by “support”.
If you mean that one group does not assent to the proposition that “bigotry is awesome” and the other does not assent to “this should be banned” then sure.
If you mean that one group does not perform actions which (probably unknowingly) perpetuate bigotry and the other group does not perform actions (probably unknowingly) which institute or perpetuate a ban on drawing, then the comparison probably doesn’t work.
‘Tis himself
Have you actually read what people have written and what they oppose?
We’re saying that drawing Mo this one single day as part of DMD aligns oneself with racists and a largely racist event. People have voiced their support for drawing Mo, making fun of Islam, criticising Islam and so on.
And I know that you are actually too intelligent not to understand the difference.
I apologize for certain grammatical, synthatic and spelling errors in my last post. They came about because I’m using a particularly unweildy hotel computer and becaue I’m angry that life is like a pitbull etc. has unilaterally decided that everyone drawing pictures of Mohammed is ipso facto a racist and can only be drawing those pictures for racist reasons.
Learning to read is a good thing. Here is the very first thing pitbull said:
Except that is not what Life is like a pitbull, jadehawk, consciousness razor or me have been saying. Not at all. You’re normally a rather intelligent person. What the fuck has happened to your reading comprehension?
‘Tis Himself,
It’s hard for people to judge that about themselves.
No, I haven’t. Quotes or it didn’t happen.
No, I haven’t. Quotes or it didn’t happen.
How about when they politely express their preference that you not draw Muhammad?
Since I called you stupid for saying that my “INTENT is to pretend [you’re] a racist”, it appears that what is difficult for me to understand is: what exactly is your evidence that I’m calling you racist?
There is perhaps an irony, though, in your simultaneous declarations that you’ll do whatever you want, and that anybody who makes a judgment call about your actions is also wronging you.
Generally you gotta pick one or the other.
That’s the second. First was also clear though: “No, because as documented last year, the day is dominated by racists.” [Emphasis new, but perfectly fecking obvious the first time around.]
My mistake. It was so short I passed over it.
Let’s just agree that we haven’t said this repeatedly throughout the entire fucking thread. I’ll be right back. There’s a brick wall I feel like having a conversation with.
What I’m asking is how one makes the statement that participating in DMD is bad because you end up being percieved as doing the same things as bigots,
while avoiding saying that protesting DMD is bad because you end up beign percieved as doing the same thing as fanatics.
To come at it from a different angle, if intent doesn’t matter, why is it ok to draw Mo for artistic reasons, but not for political reasons? And if the distinction can be made between drawing him for artistic reasons, why is it not possible to differentiate between drawing him as a protest against the fanatics’ ban and not Moslems (or immigrants or brown0skinned people) in general?
Take a step back here. Do you only care about how people perceive your actions, or do you also care about the effects your actions have on others? We agree that Islam is a bad thing. Don’t we have a choice in how we exercise our right to free expression, or is there only one way to do it?
Has anyone said it’s not okay to do it for political reasons? I think instead we’ve explicitly and repeatedly supported political speech in opposition to blasphemy.
It’s not the drawing of Mohammed itself that’s the problem. It’s the fact that this has turned into an annual event that is dominated by racists. Draw Mohammed, mock religion, ridicule Islam. No problems there. But do those things in the framework of DMD and you should be aware that you are participating in an event that is dominated by bigots.
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Sup
Protesting it by stating “you shouldn’t do that; it’s hurtful to people” is qualitatively different than stating “you must not do that; it’s offensive to God”, which is qualitatively different from the fanatical statement “you must not do that; it’s offensive to God; you should be stopped”, which is qualitatively different from the fanatical threat that “you must not do that; it’s offensive to God; I’m going to stop you”.
There is no way to mistake the first for the fourth or even the third. Someone of the latter persuasions would not have the desired impact by pretending to be the first. Someone of the first persuasion would not have any reason to pretend otherwise.
But there is considerable benefit for bigots to try to blend in with a larger crowd which contains non-bigots.
I don’t think it’s okay to draw Muhammad for artistic reasons yesterday, and I don’t think it’s typically destructive, enough to merit complaint, to draw Muhammad for political reasons any other day of the year.
I’ve been saying don’t participate alongside those who are making a big racist day of it.
I haven’t made any such distinction, and to be perfectly honest I am nigh incapable of seeing a distinction between politics and anything, let alone art. So I don’t really know what you’re asking.
From the perspective of the Muslim individual, the massive onslaught of material in one day is probably too much to bother with differentiating. It’s a wave of threats and reminders that one is marked as separate from this society. Though I suppose the feeling is already familiar enough to African American Muslims.
On other days, depending on how much sleep the individual has experienced lately, whether they had breakfast, whether they’re working on a cognitively demanding project, how their home life is going, the time of day, et cetera, it may be relatively easy to expend some effort worrying about the difference.
life is like a pitbull with lipstick @8 & 18
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Rolan, I’m sorry you didn’t like my sarcasm.
Yeah, not good at all if Draw Mohammad Day is getting trolled by racists.
I suggest we completely reverse the whole process and put together a prize for International Look Like Mohammad Day. This is fully in agreement with contemporary Islamic practice and should steal the thunder away from those who have used it as an excuse to lash out and hurt others sensibilities.
Of course posting pictures of the winner, the person who looks most like Mohammad, is also OK on this day. Interviews, tv footage, newspaper discriptions etc are fine, just no drawings of the prizewinners.
I’m not sure of the distinction here.
If we’re opposed to DMD because a minority community percieves it as bigotry against them, how can we seperate the two? If we’re opposed to DMD because the bigots see it as tacit support, how can we seperate the two?
Let’s make something clear – no harm is being done save through perception. A drawing can only ever hurt someone through their perception of it. Any effects of this are perceptive.
Well, I don’t know – that’s what I’m asking.
It’s being argued that DMD is the wrong way – I’m not in complete disagreement with this, but I have some concerns as to why, and I’m asking.
. . .
But lots of things are dominated by bigots.
Law enforcement is dominated by bigots – should we opt out?
Government is dominated by bigots – should we refuse to vote?
These are not of the same magnitude, by any means, of course, but the point is still there.
I’m not yet convinced that given a choice between a group containing bigots that are at least correct in practice (draw Mo), and one that contains bigots and is flatly wrong (you can’t draw Mo), and silence, that either of the latter two are the best choices.
That’s why I’m asking.
Originally done for Draw Larry Day, but it’ll recycle:
http://www.stars-portraits.com/img/portraits/stars/_tmp/13296-by-daulle.jpg
This is strange like saying “a burning cross or the daily display of a swastika flag can only ever hurt someone through their perception of it.”
There’s a trivial sense in which it’s true, but the reason that the perception of it hurts is because it is clearly signaling that outsiders are unwelcome.
Is it possible to opt out? It’s extremely difficult to do so unless you’re very wealthy. This does not seem to be an illuminating comparison, since it is trivial to opt out of DMD.
What will happen if you do? In the case of DMD, nothing.
What might happen if you set up a competing framework? In the case of DMD, maybe something neat.
It’s unclear why you’re asking about a false dichotomy that has not been proposed. There is another option which has been mentioned at least eleven times now.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t do it merely to protect your reputation. There are better reasons to not do it, which aren’t superficially all about you.
It’s not just that there is a perception of bigotry, but actual bigotry. You can take this “intent” nonsense and shove it up its own ass, but it’s entirely missing the point. Muslims are human beings whose welfare we should take into consideration. We can do that and oppose their religion at the same time. You make it sound impossible, and even if it were impossible, that still doesn’t mean you should do it anyway.
Ha!
life:
This is what I’m talking about:
(emphasis added)
If you don’t see a distinction, why did you bother with the modifier?
(emphasis added)
I’m sorry, I disagree.
Religion is, in large part, making exactly that type of mistake.
So, if I understand your point, you are of the opinion that they cannot distinguish between people participating while distancing themselves from the bigots while having no trouble distinguishing people protesting while distancing themselves from the fanatics.
I’ve already said I’m all for drawing Mohammed, ridiculing islam etc. and merely object to DMD as an anual event. The ‘Draw Mo’ camp doesn’t necessarily equate to ‘pro DMD’ as an event.
heres mine
http://blinchiki.wordpress.com/2012/05/21/happy-everyone-draw-muhammad-day-everyone/
I wasn’t the one trying to distinguish between ‘acts’ and ‘perceptions of acts’. I was asking how they can be separated.
What I’m saying is – should we assume all police officers are bigots?
Should we assume all non-officers are morally superior?
Well, either DMD has an effect, in which case your participation or lack of it changes that effect – or it doesn’t, in which case the whole argument is moot.
Ok, I’m all ears – what’s that framework? Beyond just opting out, I’m assuming?
/pedant: a dichotomy doesn’t have three options.
If something other than participating, protesting, and remaining silent has been proposed, I have truly missed it and I apologize.
Good discussion. Lots of heat, but overall it’s helped me see this in a different light. No one actually cares, but I understand Pitbull’s, Jadehawk’s, CR’s and others position much better now. Thanks, folks. I also understand the position of those opposed to them and how they feel as if they are being made into bigots themselves. They were not (Pitbull et al never made that claim nor even, AFAICT, implied it). Still, I recall once running into the “you’re a racist!” bandsaw when I made the comment that a disturbing amount of hiphop music is misogynistic and homophobic. I was, apparently, a member of KKK for stating that.
So, DMD. Giving cover to bigots or tweaking the noses of Islamists? It is a fine line to be sure. I think the original DMD was justified and got the message across, but since the day has been taken over by the bigots, it’s lost a good deal of its teeth and can cause hurt where none is intended (there’s that word!).
A parallel (bear with me); back in the day I participated in monthly Critical Mass rides. As a cyclist, a victim of three hit and runs who daily has to face belligerent, angry, entitled cagers, I was fed up with the car centric culture that all but ignored us as legitimate road users. So I joined CM and once a month, for a few hours, we reclaimed the roads, en masse, for a hour or two. It was intended as a full-throated fuck you, these our our streets and our rights too kind of protest. It worked at getting people to be aware we were here and was an effective (IMO) form of protest. Now? Not so much. Now it’s a parade. Taken over by clowns and kids who have no interest in the rights of cyclists. At least here in Seattle.
DMD has similar problems. Once a form of protest gets highjacked by those who are not interested in the original purpose, but especially if those highjackers are the worst kind of asshats, it’s time to look for other means of doing the same kind of protest. My solution? Don’t have a DMD. Have DMADDOTY (Draw Mohammed Any Damn Day Of The Year). Don’t draw him fucking camels. But draw him.
Yes!
“Their” artistic reasons. I am aware that many people believe they are making some kind of distinction which they think makes their work nonpolitical. Typically some lightweight variation of “art for art’s sake”.
I just got confused because of the way you directed this to me:
I don’t know how to make any coherent distinction. If you want to talk about the typical practice, whereby people label this thing “art” and that thing “political statement” that’s fine.
I thought you were asking me how the distinction can be made. Sorry. I think we can keep going if I just take others’ art/politics labels for granted.
If I say “you shouldn’t do that; it’s hurtful to people”, then that is what I am communicating. I am either making a coherent argument or not. It is trivially evident if I am really talking about my imaginary friend. A brief set of questions, and you won’t make the mistake of taking me to be talking about real people if I’m talking about a deity.
Therefore you are entirely capable of making the distinction you asked about. In fact,
you are currently: observing me making “the statement that participating in DMD is bad because you end up being percieved as doing the same things as bigots,”
and you are currently: “avoiding saying that protesting DMD is bad because you end up beign percieved as doing the same thing as fanatics.”
So you already know how to answer your question. Indeed you’ve had a working model of the answer for quite some time now. If you didn’t you wouldn’t be able to make sense of who’s saying what.
That’s something like Poe’s law you’re pointing at. It can be an intractable problem in some cases. What I am actually saying is not that it can’t be done but that in certain circumstances, like on a day of systematic racist and xenophobic harassment, the difficulty of differentiating among the multitudes can become prohibitively difficult, since there is a tremendous amount of data to process and it’s all hostile to one degree or another.
1) because this side is not hostile to them so it isn’t a stressor in itself, and
2) because the kinds of statements are qualitatively different and trivial to differentiate, which you will discover if you don’t try to gloss over them a second time.
Recycling: Poster for International Look Like Mohammad Day.
@pentatomid #153
“I used to be a fan of the whole DMD thing, but it’s been hijacked by racist assholes.”
Any time you do something popular and successful that Muslims might perceive as being insulting, regardless of your intent you’re going to get racists who jump in. At what point do we stop fleeing because someone is attempting to hijack an anti-religion message? As a community do we have so little backbone, so little voice?
I see that Crudely Wrott continues to condescend to others in inverse proportion to his cluefulness.
Jim:
Thanks for letting us know that you’re a shitmuffin who is perfectly okay with lending his unwitting support to racists.
I didn’t realize it was “radical” to care whether you might be harming people indirectly.
Koshka is a respected regular on this blog. Who the fuck are you, asshole?
No, actually, she’s been backing up her assertions with logical arguments, and you’ve done nothing but whine YOU CAN’T MAAAAAKE ME NOT DRAW MOHAMMED!!
Jennyxyzzy:
How many Stupid Shakes did you slurp down for breakfast, you walking Dunning-Kruger exhibit? That is NOT what has been argued. What has been argued is that if [Person Z] performs [Action Y] the effect of that act is indistinguishable from that of [Group X].
This isn’t everyday interpersonal interactions, which may or may not have a “message” to them. This is social activism, which is meant to have a message which should not be vulnerable to co-optation by political opponents.
Do you understand that racism is not strictly a character flaw and a form of ill intent, but a system of oppression that even well-meaning people have to combat in their own minds? Apparently not.
And “intent is not magic” isn’t even a new freakin’ concept. “The road to hell is paved with good intentions” is an aphorism that has been around a long time.
That’s not how communication works. Why do you think advertisers throw so much money into market research?
Such condescension and passive-aggression are hilarious from someone who has already had it explained to her numerous times and doesn’t have the intellectual chops to grasp it.
They are in predominantly white Western societies, where DMD is mostly being observed. Do you also think that women can’t be an oppressed minority because we constitute 51% of humanity? Or that the black people of South Africa couldn’t have been one, either, during the apartheid era because they outnumbered white people?
Oh, lol.
Dear FSM.
Billyeager:
“Don’t you have more important issues to think about?”
“You’ve lost your temper so I don’t have to listen to you anymore!”
EVERYBODY is biased. You cannot be a human being without having some biases.
Nice gendered slur there.
mary2mary2:
“If you complain about racism, you’re the real racist!” Uh-huh.
Coyotenose, being 6′ tall and white and getting confused for having the “retail look” is nothing like being brown and being assumed to be “the help.” Body language != skin color, and the effect of the mistake on your psychological well-being doesn’t even begin to compare.
You chose to disregard her most recent sentiments and assert that she doesn’t really mean them, but Life is the one being “disrespectful” to her?
tsig:
Amazing how you don’t understand the difference between an oppressive slur and an insult.
Mikmik:
Sigh….
Nobrain:
Lemme guess… straight white cis guy, ex-Christian?
John Scanlon:
FIFY. Although I think “misinformed” is a charitable interpretation.
‘Tis, nobody has said that everybody participating in DMD is a racist. Good grief.
The remaining options involve every other way of exercising free speech by being blasphemous, that day and every other day of the year, which don’t also harm minorities.
Next up: “Lord, Liar or Lunatic?”
“Any time you do something popular and successful that Muslims might perceive as being insulting, regardless of your intent you’re going to get racists who jump in. At what point do we stop fleeing because someone is attempting to hijack an anti-religion message? As a community do we have so little backbone, so little voice?”
Jim. What you said is true. Can’t avoid the bigots. But you (we) don’t have to flee. Adapt. Change tactics. Find another way to get the message across. If the bigots try to claim that, do it another way. Yell at them too. Lungs were meant to shout. Live your life AS that message.
jim,
Read my other comments. I think I’ve explained this already. There’s a difference between some racist assholes jumping on the bandwagon and the event being dominated by racist bigots.
I don’t know what you’re talking about now. You asserted the following:
“Let’s make something clear – no harm is being done save through perception. A drawing can only ever hurt someone through their perception of it. Any effects of this are perceptive.”
It is evident that you are trying to distinguish between acts and perceptions of acts.
I can’t understand how to give a shit, or why I would. This talk of moral superiority is really weird.
I think I shall have to reiterate what CR just said: «It’s not just that there is a perception of bigotry, but actual bigotry. You can take this “intent” nonsense and shove it up its own ass, but it’s entirely missing the point. Muslims are human beings whose welfare we should take into consideration. We can do that and oppose their religion at the same time.»
You’ve confused me. It seemed you were again offering what seems to be the false dichotomy you’ve offered before, that there is only one day to draw Muhammad, on May 20, and it can’t be done any other way. What I wished to communicate was that opting out on May 20 doesn’t change what your options are on other days.
Dan imagined one. The author of J&M has developed one for himself. I wasn’t proposing anything specific but it is obvious that people have come up with other ways to criticize Islam than DMD.
Ah, I overlooked “silence.”
It’s the “draw Muhammad any other of the 364 days” option I’m referring to.
pitbull with lipstick:
What you are communicating is that being Muslim is not welcome. You are not communicating anything about people who’ve made threats against Molly Norris, for example, because you aren’t targeting the people who made those threats. You are simply targeting every Muslim.
That argument convinced me!
We seem to agree on the perception/action bit.
I was answering consciousness razor with that bit.
I’m sorry – hard-line Moslems are not hostile to liberal (by which I mean typical) Moslems?
Are you making that claim, or did I misunderstand?
I’m not trying to gloss over them, I saying that we have heard the protest “You’re hurting people because you’re attacking god!” before. People who make statements like that aren’t differentiating between belief and individuals.
If that differentiation wes gemnerally made in people’s minds, there’d be no political discussion about gay marriage. But people honestly believe they are being hurt when their god’s dogma is questioned. Even if the person doing so couches it as ‘hate the dogma, not the dogmatist’.
We’ve had plenty of experience with that reaction on this blog.
Marcus, it is hard sometimes to tell if you are serious, but if so, then thanks for letting me know. :)
I think it’s reasonable to watch my back around police officers I don’t know personally.
Ok, I think best in analogies, so let me try one, if I may be indulged:
Due to some protest about, I dunno, cotton pricing or something, Buy White Sheets Day is a largely spontaneous reaction. By the time of the next Buy White Sheets Day, our old friends the KKK have made a big deal about buying white sheets to make their traditional uniforms out of. Because of this, even though it wasn’t started, or completely perpetuated by the Klan, their influence has marked Buy White Sheets Day as something non-Klan supporters don’t want any part of.
There wouldn’t be any problem with buying white sheets in general, or even buying white sheets on Buy White Sheets Day, but announcing that you’re buying white sheets due to Buying White Sheets Day would be very, very suspect indeed.
Someone doing so should at very least consider the message it sends about their associations.
Am I totally off base here?
Not on this issue, as far as I can tell.
Except even that is qualitatively different from “you must not do that; it’s offensive to God; you should be stopped”, et cetera.
They probably are in fact being harmed by such.
I recently accidentally harmed an atheist commenter here by talking too much about the lack of any foundation for deontological ethics. This person evidently does not know how, or was not prepared to, replace deontology with utilitarianism. I carelessly led him right over the edge of the abyss, though it appears he recovered fairly quickly via some social coping mechanism. The harm I did was immediately evident and it hurt me somewhat to watch.
Indeed I regard deontology much the way we regard belief in God when it shows up at Pharyngula. I find it risible, I sometimes have a hard time taking the speaker seriously, and yet I also want them to come away from it with minimal harm.
It is entirely plausible that someone can be harmed by attacks upon their god concept. Since we’re agreed that it’s a goal to work toward — generally speaking, although we somtimes back off for acquaintances who are in a time of tremendous stress — this at minimum raises the question of how can we do it carefully.
But I digress. The earlier issue was differentiation of claims.
“You are hurting people by displaying that they are unwelcome in this nation” is qualitatively different from “you are hurting people by attacking their god concept” which is qualitatively different from “you are hurting people by attacking their god concept; the government should stop you” which is qualitatively different from the threat that “you are hurting people by attacking their god concept; I’m going to stop you”. And there are probably other degrees of differentiation.
It’s pretty good, except there’s more. Your non-white neighbors are going to be shopping tomorrow, and if when they get to the store they find it’s still apparently fully stocked with white sheets then they’re going to feel safer in the neighborhood, but if the white sheets are all sold out then they’re going to feel afraid and unwelcome.
@lifeisapitbull #251
On the other hand, if you look at racdif2 which is whether there are differences due to “inborn disability” and add a subset to filter by belief in God you’ll see that under the “Don’t Believe” category that the percentage of “Yes” answers drops ten points from the general population, down from almost 15% to just over 5%.
Surveys and statistics . . . make ’em say whatever you want, right?
“There are some easy questions in the General Social Survey which equate to “are you a racist?””
I missed that part where they say that’s what racdif4 equates to. Is it still racist if you think African-Americans might be less motivated not because you are racist, but because you acknowledge the substantial impact racism still plays in society today and how that might affect them? In a way similar to the effect of being unemployed for some time in a crap economy can cause people to drop out of the job market entirely. I mean, you’re really big on understanding how things affect people, right? Are you *sure* your interpretation of the question is the only one? That is says exactly what you think it does? Maybe racdif2 is a better indicator, with less interpretive wiggle room.
You were probably better off just linking to the comments section of another blog post.
Fair enough.
I am generally in with you guys, then. Personally, I would like some variant of the three-posts rule* in that if someone participates, we’d let them discuss it before making assumptions about their motivations. Intent isn’t magic, but we don’t need magic to ascertain it, either.
For the record, that seems to be the case here – we’re saying ‘Folks, are you sure you want to be a part of this? It’s got (problem), (problem), and (problem)!’
In any case, thanks for engaging with me on this!
. . .
*”They’re more like guidelines than actual rules!”
Well, this looks like a promising analogy which totally won’t obscure the kind of motivations people have in the actual case at hand…
So do our “old friends” need to buy new sheets every year because they keep shitting themselves over the fact that these kinds of protests against cotton pricing are ineffective at best? Or what?
At the very least, you should ask why you think buying white sheets is an effective way of protesting cotton prices, whether you believe you have some right to buy cotton at a certain rate, and why you are going along with the Klan by targeting some minority who you think is responsible, rather than everyone who is supposedly fixing prices in whatever way you think infringes your rights.
@pentatomid #306
“jim,
Read my other comments. I think I’ve explained this already. There’s a difference between some racist assholes jumping on the bandwagon and the event being dominated by racist bigots.”
Doesn’t change my point. If as a community we allow them to chase us off, we’ll be running forever.
Hm?
If you want to compare atheists with the rest of the population, you should recode GOD as GOD(R:1;2-6)
Then you’ll have atheists versus everybody else. Now, when I do that, and I’ve still got the YEAR(2002-2012) filter on, I’m seeing atheists 5.3%, everybody else combined 8.3%.
You are controlling for RACE, right? Because if you don’t then you lump in some internalized oppression; black people are more likely to believe that they have an inborn inferiority.
Anyway, it’s not clear why you think this is a better measure of racism than the others, and it’s certainly not clear why you seem to think the others can be discarded.
I imagine the RACDIF2 difference is awareness of science. It’s low pretty much across the board, but atheists are a little bit more educated. And that’s great. But it doesn’t simply do away with the other much higher measures of racism.
Yeah, it’s pretty obviously a measure of racism though.
Because we know that people tend to blame others for their bad circumstances, I don’t think that’s really a plausible explanation for the effect we’re seeing in RACDIF4. I think when you ask people about whether that person over there can increase their amount of will at will, the answer from the respondent’s naive psychology is typically yes.
But okay, look, I already did RACDIF1 — “Do you think these differences are mainly due to discrimination?” — which is pretty much the height of system justification if anything is.
So this hope you seem to have, that white atheists would turn out to recognize that African Americans really are significantly discriminated against, turns out to be unfounded. Only 1/3 of atheists got the question right, and the correct answer isn’t a matter of opinion in the way you imagine RACDIF4 to be.
Pretty sure, yeah. Unless you want to argue now that African American poverty really isn’t due to discrimination, and you agree with those 67% of white atheists, who are totally not racist at all.
But it sure looks like you just agreed with the 33%. Which is good for you! High five for getting that one right. Now what do we do about the majority of white atheists?
Yeah, sorry about that – I didn’t have a really good motivation set up in the analogy. I was being vauge not out of dismissiveness, but out of lack of creativity.
I think I have a pretty decent handle on the motivations of both sides – it’s the effects I’m worried about. To me, this whole situation reads like a bad case of “This is why we can’t have
snarkynice things.” It’s depressing.“Anyway, it’s not clear why you think this is a better measure of racism than the others, and it’s certainly not clear why you seem to think the others can be discarded.”
Because as has been pointed out by both myself and #269/270, there is reasonable non-racist interpretive room around racdif4 that I’m not seeing around racdif2.
“But it doesn’t simply do away with the other much higher measures of racism.”
See immediately above, and also the second half of #315.
If anybody else wants to check it out, the tool I’m using is http://sda.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/hsda?harcsda+gss10
I imagine jim is using the same thing, but I’m still not sure quite which settings he’s using.
Ahem. And what about RACDIF1?
Sorry, 269/270 is addressing racdif1, point still holds.
“Because we know that people tend to blame others for their bad circumstances, I don’t think that’s really a plausible explanation for the effect we’re seeing in RACDIF4. I think when you ask people about whether that person over there can increase their amount of will at will, the answer from the respondent’s naive psychology is typically yes.”
That’s a lot of “I think” to go casting generalized insinuations about how racist the atheist community is.
@MDC #303
“Who the fuck are you, asshole?”
Someone who truly gives 0 fucks about your opinion.
@life is like a pitbull #323
“I imagine jim is using the same thing, but I’m still not sure quite which settings he’s using.”
Had not used that tool before, so I admit I’m stumbling through it a little. I had ended up here:
http://www3.norc.org/GSS+Website
Anyway, another reason I think RACDIF4 addresses racism is that when you control for RACE, and drop the YEAR filter [with or without recoding GOD as GOD(R:1-2;3;4;5;6) ], so that N is embiggened for each belief-category of African Americans [it rises to 30+ for each category if you recode atheists and agnostics together like I just said], then white respondents answer yes more often, across the board.
Haha! No it doesn’t.
Look, do RACDIF1 and control for RACE like I did at #367. Again you can recode GOD or not; doesn’t matter.
In every category, whites answer no 58.6% or higher.
In every category, African Americans answer yes 59.5% or higher.
That’s racism.
Oof, #328 was without the YEAR. With it, N is not large enough in some categories. So drop GOD. Whites as a whole, 70.2% no. African Americans 58.5% yes.
Greater disparity than without the YEAR, actually, showing that white people are getting more oblivious.
johnscallon’s point, as I read it, was that because there are non-racist justifications for answering “No” the conclusions we are able to extrapolate from the data don’t reach as far as you think they do. You are the one who definitively stated that answering the question wrong means that person is a racist.
And it still doesn’t account for what looks to me like conflicting data relative to RACDIF2. How do you account for the discrepancy? Because there is clearly a subset of people who think African-Americans lack motivation but who *don’t* think that is an inborn disability. That to me suggests evidence that answers to RACDIF1 and RACDIF4 may be taking historical/societal pressures into account (johnscallon’s point also) rather than a blanket statement that answering wrong makes a person a racist (especially if the questions were asked in the same survey, but different surveys don’t invalidate the point). So yes there are racial differences in the answers but I don’t see it following by conclusion that half of atheists are racists.
“Greater disparity than without the YEAR, actually, showing that white people are getting more oblivious.”
Is that getting off the point though that there are “a lot” of racist atheists?
Thinking that ongoing discrimination is no longer the cause of black poverty is still being obliviously racist; it is a failure to listen or take seriously what black folks are saying.
You have encountered this meme, I think.
Alright, look at the racial difference and tell me, how many do you figure it to be, then?
Jesus Fucking Christ, I am so gullible sometimes. I can’t believe I let you fuckers string me along.
No, no, no, no, no. The question is not “do African-Americans have less motivation than white people”, which is fucked for fuck’s sake anyways.
It’s much worse.
What RACDIF4 asks is whether the racial disparity in poverty occurs because “most African-Americans just don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves up out of poverty”.
Hoooly shit. Shit shit. That is the most straightforward victim-blaming racism there can be.
If you answer yes to that then you are a racist. Full stop.
There is just no non-racist way to say “On the average African-Americans have worse jobs, income, and housing than white people because most African-Americans just don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves up out of poverty.”
It is the quintessential victim-blaming.
I can’t fucking believe I even seriously discussed it with you fuckers.
45%. That is a lot of racist white atheists. QED.
Situationally, I can easily be talked into being one of them.
Personally I find RACDIF2 the least ambiguous question, going directly to whether the respondent believes there are inborn (genetic/inherent as I would read it) differences between the races that causes disability relative to other races. I think though (and I don’t know enough of the methodologies of the surveys to say to what extent this has been factored) that there would definitely be racists who disguise their answer to RACDIF2 so the percentage would be under-reported. Not enough to rise to the level of RACDIF1 or RACDIF4.
And I suppose it goes back to what you intended when you said “a lot”. One of the reasons I objected is because it seemed clearly intended to portray a significant number of atheists as racists, or that the atheist community at large has a rampant racism problem (both of which I would disagree with), even if from a semantic standpoint “a lot” could have any number of meanings. The number 30,000 as a raw number sounds like a lot, for example, even if as a percentage of a much larger number it would be relatively small.
All of which goes back to my original point which is that I have always associated atheism to not just anti-religion but also anti-racism. That association I admit took a bit of a hit over the Rebecca Watson discussions because sexism in the atheist community turned out to be more than I had previously thought, but I’m still not willing to trot out RACDIF4 and RACDIF1 and claim half of atheists are racists. 10%? 15%? How much cushion over 5%? Either is still too much but would be generally supportive of the idea that a self-identified atheist is much more likely than not to not be a racist, and for atheist initiatives generally to be clearly distinguishable in intent (yes, yes, I know you believe intent doesn’t matter) from racist initiatives. And definitely a smaller percentage relative to the general population. I imagine you’ll claim I’m very far off and RACDIF4 and RACDIF1 give accurate numbers of definitive racist atheists essentially making whether an atheist is a racist or not more of a coin flip. Is that really how you perceive the atheist community at large? I don’t see it, not like that.
In the spirit of charity, I can think – admittedly, it’s a real stretch – of one well-meaning response to that, which would be, “Yes, because the public schooling/social structures around African American communities tend to be sorely lacking, and African Americans are conditioned by their circumstances to tend towards failure.” I mean, it’s still not a great response, and I doubt even a fraction of a percentage of people who said ‘yes’ would have meant it in such a way… but it’s something.
I can’t believe that anyone would say ‘yes’ to that question without pause. Extremely sobering, and a real reminder to folks who think all atheists have it all figured out. We have our problems just as does any movement and it seems that widespread obliviousness to problems of race is one of them.
“I can’t believe that anyone would say ‘yes’ to that question without pause.”
Ugh, you must live somewhere different than I because I definitely know people who would say ‘yes’ without batting an eye. To the best of my knowledge none of them are atheists, but still, it’s pretty disgusting stuff.
I didn’t draw Mo.
I was too busy driving over 1000km to visit a science museum in southern Oregon that – quite commendably and successfully – organized a great viewing of the annular eclipse.
Because of me two girls, one 2 weeks from turning 4 (she wouldn’t let me get away with calling her just 3) and the other 7, have now seen their first solar eclipse. The older understands about the moons shadow being the cause and that only new moons cause solar eclipses while only full moons lead to the possibility of a lunar eclipse. In fact, it is these eclipses that made orbits (more?) intelligible to her.
Now I need to buy her an orrery, but I consider my day’s work yesterday to be well accomplished. Even without drawing Mo.
I get, em, crucified here every time I suggest it, but the industrialized world has a much bigger problem with classism than with religious bigotry and racism. I’m with ya, Pitbull and Jadehawk — the generally espoused FTB outrage against The Powers That Be tends to be muted when the oppressed are religiously devout,and most particularly when those devout are poor and disenfranchised. There is a HUGE distinction between a Pin The Tail On The Dominionist Day in Texas and a Let’s Offend The Most Despised Minority In America Day. For six billion of the world’s seven billion, tomorrow’s caloric intake is of greater concern than their cultural imperative to believe in supernatural nonsense. A DMD in Karachi or Tehran requires tremendous courage — here it’s a smug little three-inch putt.
I’ve just been searching online for any sign of a Muslim reaction to EDMD 2012 – official or unofficial, extremist or moderate, negative or positive – and I can’t find much. Apparently the government of Pakistan blocked Twitter for one day, but many people have evaded the block. That’s it. Anyone seen more?
Jim:
Who nevertheless took the time to answer me, and who has the gall to ask a long-time regular why she’s here. Anyway, thanks for revealing yourself to be a racist shit-sucking bottom feeder, and have a pleasant evening.
Caution: frivolous non-sequitor ahead:
I didn’t draw Mo today because I’m a lousy artist. Instead of my trying to draw Mo, I wish Allison Bechdel would go back to drawing Mo on a regular basis.
Also has anyone noticed that in Jesus and Mo the barmaid is wrong? There is a creator in her universe, albeit an anonymous one due to threats from overzealous fans of the original continuities. Some people take their fiction overly seriously.
I don’t think this focus on racism-about-biological-inheritance would help to recognize very much of the racism that exists today.
Tim Wise has something useful to say on the importance of recognizing racism-about-cultural-inheritance. I need to conserve my energy here. Please forgive the copypasta:
«If black folks really do have equal opportunity and yet still don’t achieve at levels equal to their white counterparts, then there must be something wrong with them as black people. Either genetically or culturally they must be inferior to whites. There is no other possible explanation.
And indeed, this is what conservatives say. Whether Murray and Herrnstein in The Bell Curve, who attributed relative black failure and the group’s economic condition to biological inadequacy, or Dinesh D’Souza, who one year later in The End of Racism attributed racial accomplishment gaps to cultural defects among blacks (what he called a “civilizational deficit”), the tune remains the same: the problem is them. If blacks were more like whites or Asians, biologically or culturally, they would do better in school and have better financial profiles. The problem isn’t a history of unequal opportunity, which gave some head starts and held others back, and it certainly isn’t discrimination in the present. It’s their genes, or perhaps their pathological community values, end of story. They are the problem. Indeed, recent Gallup polling discovered that roughly half of Tea Party supporters are willing to admit their belief that racial disparities in America are the fault of blacks themselves who just “don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves up out of poverty.” In other words, their values just aren’t strong enough, and they just don’t try.
To call this last viewpoint an example of racism, however, would be hotly disputed by those who adhere to it. Although most would agree that ascribing racial differences in well-being to biological causes is racist—after all, we think of racism as rooted in scientific notions of superiority and inferiority—they would just as quickly deny that racism adheres to similar arguments when the causation for the disparity is claimed to be cultural, rather than biological. Because culture is understood to be more fluid, many who point to what they consider cultural pathologies in the black community would insist that these arguments are not racist. They are not disparaging black people, per se, but only the dysfunctional cultural attributes that are commonly found in black communities, by which they normally mean high rates of out-of-wedlock childbirth, higher rates of reliance on government income support, and higher rates of crime.
But to deny that criticisms of black culture are racist is disingenuous. First, to suggest there is one “black culture” itself essentializes 35 million people and ascribes to the group the visible dysfunctions of a statistical handful of these. To begin, most black folks do not commit crime, let alone violent crime; most black women do not have children out-of-wedlock, and most black folks are not recipients of so-called welfare benefits. […]
Additionally, if characteristics are attributed to a group whose very boundaries have historically been rooted in notions of color/ancestry and “race” then the fact that the source of those characteristics is claimed to be cultural rather than biological makes little practical difference. Since the group lines of “blackness” (and for that matter whiteness) have long been connected to assumptions of genuine racial divisions, using those group categories as markers of cultural tendencies is every bit as racist as if one were to assert a genetic cause for group attributes. […]
Third, explanations for racial inequities rooted in cultural claims are racist because they selectively attribute causation to behavioral tendencies that can be seen across racial lines. If someone who is black does something that fits within the cultural framing of those who view black culture as pathological, the behavior will be explained with reference to the culture as a cause. But when someone who is white does the very same thing it will be explained as aberrant, or the result of individual pathology, because it doesn’t fit a larger cultural frame about whites. To use different explanations for the same behavior in this way is racist, especially when the behaviors in question might be just as prevalent if not more so in white communities. For instance, whites use drugs at rates that are equal to their black counterparts, and actually abuse alcohol at rates that are considerably higher than African Americans (7). So if drug use is to be seen as a cultural pathology in blacks (and it often is), and yet as an individual pathology in whites—even though it is just as prevalent in the white community as the black community—this can only be due to an essentialization of black behavior that assumes, by definition, a group inferiority.
To see how the culture-based explanations for racial disparity are every bit as racist as biological arguments, consider the case of anti-Jewish bigotry. Although Hitler’s campaign of genocide against European Jewry was rooted in his beliefs about Jews being a biologically distinct and destructive force, would his efforts have been any less racist—and would we have failed to call him a racist—had he stuck with older, more traditional forms of anti-Jewish bigotry: such as beliefs that Jews are culturally clannish, greedy, or have religious beliefs that cause them to kill Christian children and use their blood for baking Matzo? Would the murder of millions of Jews, under these auspices deserve to escape the charge of racism, just because Jews were being inferiorized on the basis of cultural assumptions rather than biological ones? Surely not.
So too, when European settlers came to America and proceeded to slaughter the indigenous of the continent they didn’t deploy—at least at first—scientific arguments to justify the slaughter. Rather they appealed to notions of cultural deficiency, civilizational inferiority and spiritual depravity. But by treating Indian folks as an undifferentiated mass, “racialized” if not scientifically “racial,” it would seem like a torturing of the language to deny that these actions amounted to a form of racism, simply because they began before biologized concepts of race had been fully developed. […]
And of course, the practical impact of culture-based assumptions to explain racial disparities is no different than were those assumptions rooted in biological theories. If you believe blacks as a group are less hard-working, less honest and less intelligent—no matter whether you ascribe these traits to genes or cultural values—it is unrealistic to believe that you would likely treat individuals from that group fairly and equitably. The odds are better than you would engage in what social scientists call “statistical discrimination,” which means assuming that any given representative of a particular group is likely to manifest the tendencies and talents that you consider the group itself to normally manifest. In this way, individual blacks, for instance, would be provided less opportunity irrespective of their true talents, all because the group assumptions had come to dominate any given evaluation, such as in a job interview. So at the systemic level, adherence to the cultural view of group disparities will prove every bit as racist in terms of impact, as if one believed in embedded biological inferiority.»
That USA Today/Gallup thing on the Tea Party says:
The ten year span I should have run on the GSS would be 2000-2010, since there is no 2012 data yet. I don’t know how I missed that. Anyway, RACDIF4 by GOD, controlled for RACE, filtered by YEAR(2000-2010) and weighted COMPWT. N is ~120, and the graph looks almost exactly the same as when filtered by YEAR(1990-2010), where N is ~200. The relative wrongness of each group is the same.
In the twenty year span, 41.1% of white atheists give the racist answer. In the ten year span, it’s 43.7%. So, call it 2/5.
This in turn depends a lot on whether what’s being measured is good or bad. Since you asked, I’ve done my best to get some insight, and I feel like I would consider 20% a lot of racists, but not 15%.
Yeah, I think it’s significant enough to be considered an ongoing problem worth addressing regularly. I consider the popularity of Pat Condell to be diagnostic, since he is a spokesman for a white nationalist organization.
Well I don’t think the atheist community is significantly worse in this regard than other typical geek communities. And I think we’re not as bad as libertarians.
“Anyway, thanks for revealing yourself to be a racist shit-sucking bottom feeder, and have a pleasant evening.”
Put one in the evidence column for jennyxyzzy @ #98.
I didn’t draw Mo today either. I didn’t draw Jesus on a cross on Easter Sunday, and I don’t draw big fat Buddhahs on other days of the week and laugh at them either.
I think I fail as a Gnu Atheist.
I hope I work better as a humanist.
@life is like a pitbull with lipstick
Thanks for the conversation btw. Have to admit did not expect you to have survey data on hand, that was pretty awesome and it really made for interesting discussion and I learned stuff.
The more I learn about UKIP, the less I like ’em. Which is impressive considering I’ve never liked ’em.
On the EDMD thing, I think it’s another “Planet of the Coats” situation, like I comically alluded to on another thread recently. Sure, I can see the pure logic of EDMD just being an anti-censorship protest. It is. But it doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and it has been co-opted by people with less than decent goals to a noticeable degree. Find another means of protest. After all, if your (and my) goal is to demonstrate the “crime” of blasphemy is a victimless “crime”, and in fact not a crime of any kind at all, it’s not like EDMD is the only way to do it.
I was in a similar situation a few years ago. I helped some friends with organising a rally for free speech. It wasn’t a massive thing, a few thousand people, almost not newsworthy. One of the problems we had is that the neo-Nazis and the BNP and various white supremacist groups and fascist groups thought this was a brilliant opportunity. So they called us up to let us know they would be favouring us with their presence.
This sparked an almighty row. There were the free speech absolutists on one side, the “I do not want to associate with those scumbags” on the other side, and it all got more than a touch moody. In the end, we went down the Deborah Lipstadt route of saying “we support your right to free speech, but we’re not going to give you space on our platform to exercise it.”. Since we were organising the event, we organised the speakers, the wardens etc, and we said to the sundry fascists etc “turn up, but none of you have speaker time on the stage”. In the end, about two neo-Nazis turned up, looked pissed off and went home. We pointed them out, gave them a wave as they left, and invited anyone interested in their views to seek them out. I think that pissed them off more than anything. They couldn’t really cope with being dealt with as insignificant.
Why is this relevant? Well, because I think EDMD is, in principle, not a bad idea. Group of people say you can’t draw X because it’s blasphemous, well I sure as shit am going to draw X. The problem comes when you take that neat, and it is neat, logical parcel and put it slap bang in the real world with all the juicy cultural context that exists. Is my drawing of X going to have unintended consequences. Consequences that are against my other ethical stances, like in this example, my stance against racism/xenophobia.
We’re all moral/ethical hypocrites to some degree. We all have to compromise and we all hate it. It’s the way of the world, there is no pure thing. The trick is not to deny that hypocrisy but to work against it. Like we all grew up in varying degrees of racist/sexist/homophobic/ablist/whatever cultures and unconsciously absorbed some of those ideas, so we compromise ideas of our own just to rub along in society. This isn’t a major thing, it’s quotidian, it’s boring, it’s bog standard. I am using some of my free time to type long-winded barely literate screeds onto the internet. I’ve also spent some time playing a computer game. Both of those products were developed abroad, both with some degree of “slave labour” (or at least exploitation of other country’s low wages). Both with some environmental cost. My time could, possibly, have been better spent. As could perhaps my money, and those global resources and that human effort and…
Well, perhaps it could.
Perhaps participation in EDMD is more harmful in an unintended way than I would like, were I to participate in it. If so, it’s not like there is a shortage of ways to mock the overly and unpleasantly religious now is there? Perhaps I might just compromise my neat little logical principles this once and accede to reality by putting my effort into finding a different means of protest.
Louis
[meta]
Tim Wise:
*clenches teeth*
It’s. A. Bigger. World. Than. America.
/nothanksfornotnoticing
I don’t see classism and racism as easily separable in the industrialized world– race and class covary as a function of well-being.
Might I suggest a compromise? How about replacing EDMD with a same-sex make-out day? Just go in front of your local house of worship and have a make-out session with your favorite same-sex partner. That way you can mock and piss off religious fanatics of all stripes and not have to worry too much about making common cause with bigots.
What a Maroon, #351,
Oh that’s right, exclude my kinky, currently mono but frequently poly open within reason and occasionally bi on both sides marriage from the equation! HATE CRIME!!!!!!11111
I will go to the appropriate place of worship and the Mrs and I will make out with each other and anyone else we damn well can thank you. We’re on the militant wing of the Poly Army. We’ll convert people by force of severe tonguing where necessary.
Outrageous. I’m calling my MP.
{Mutter, grumble, rhubarb}
Louis {Cheek + Tongue}
Well, yes, but it’s self-hate.
No need to involve the military.
Dude, keep that to yourself.
[citation needed]
I don’t believe it. But, even taking your extraordinary claim for granted, consider that Tim’s very first sentence is:
“This is part one of a two-part series on racism on the right and left of the United States’ political/ideological spectrum.”
What a Maroon,
But….but….
Awwwwwwwwww okay.
Louis
@life is like a pitbull with lipstick ॐ
“Muslims, especially Muslim immigrants, who are being informed by the dominant culture (who are mostly white) that they are not welcome in this country.”
Well, if someone comes to my country, and then starts telling me what I can and can’t do, then yes, that someone is NOT welcome to my country. If I have to respect their culture, they have to respect mine, even more since they’re the ones that chose to come to my country.
In fact, on this point, I don’t discriminate anyone based on ascendency, sex, race, tongue, origin territory, religion, political or ideological convictions, instruction, economic status, social status or sexual orientation.
Your [whatever from above] prohibits you from doing [something]? Then don’t. Or do. I don’t care either way, but don’t tell me *I* can’t do it.
Your indifference and moral irresponsibility prevents you telling anyone else what they shouldn’t do? Then don’t. But don’t tell me *I* can’t do it.
I’m back after 24 hours of doing other things.
I see I was wrong. life is like a pitbull etc. is not proclaiming all people who draw Mohammed are doing it for racistg reasons. She’s just accusing the vast majority of us doing the drawing of being primarily racist and there may, possibly, perhaps, be a few folk living in places like Anarctica or Greenland who might not being drawing Mohammed as a means of showing how racist they are.
Likewise, she even admits that there could possibily maybe, conceivably be some Muslims who are demanding the rest of us observe the artificial restriction of drawing Mohammed or else they’ll feel blasphemed upon.
She even accepts the slight possibility that there might even be a few people who are not pleased with the Muslims’ demands and who draw Mohammed without any racist intent. But these people are almost certainly imaginary and if they do exist are knowing aiders and abettors of racists. But since she does leave this faint suggestion of non-racist drawers of Mohammed as a dubious possibility, she can then accuse folks drawing Mohammed of being irredeemably racist.
‘Tis,
LILAPWL is SGBM who is a he, IIRC.
Unless I have something BADLY wrong.
Which is always possible.
Louis
Really?
Because everything I read indicated that what’s being said is that DMD aids and abets racists, and that people doing so should know that’s what they’re getting involved in.
Marching in a White Pride parade doesn’t make you racist, just willing to be seen publicly supporting racists.
You know, the way tithing to the Catholic Church doesn’t make you a child molester, just willing to publically stand with them.
Not the same thing at all.
And then goes on to say that we should defy this restriction – but we should perhaps at least check to see if some ways of doing this play into the hands of racists bastards.
‘Course if that’s not a concern, you’re golden, I suppose.
Not racists, just standing with them.
Remember all the times we see people that vote GOP but decry the right-wing policies of the Santorums of the world? And remember when we say to them, ‘Like it or not, scream about it as much as you like, if you vote GOP, you’re supporting them’? And they say ‘Look, I know there are bad people in the group, and they’re the public face of it, and in power, and they’re pushing a terribly destructive set of policies but I’m not voting for them, just, um, for the party they happen to be members of’?
And how we rightly call that bullshit?
Yeah.
Most Muslims are not trying to restrain you from drawing Muhammad. Most Muslims don’t like it, but they aren’t trying to interfere with your right to act like an asshole.
So let’s say you want to tell the guys at revolutionmuslim.com that they are not welcome, that they should go back to the desert or something (notwithstanding that they may well all be young men born in the USA). Okay.
But this message doesn’t just signal to those guys at revolutionmuslim.com that they should go “back” to some country where they’ve never lived and can’t speak the language.
It signals to all Muslims that they are seen as unacceptably different, so different that they deserve to have a holiday devoted to singling them out and discussing their difference — bringing together everyone who’s not a Muslim, to discuss whether Muslims can ever participate in “our culture.” (That image was featured on the front page of DMD 2012.)
This is no good for Muslims anywhere in society, but let’s consider college students since some DMD events on campuses have been highly visible and it’s relatively easy to find research about college students.
We know that priming individuals who are members of stereotyped groups to think of their group membership at inopportune times can cause them adverse effects; “situations that increase the salience of the stereotyped group identity can increase vulnerability to stereotype threat.”
We know that in North America, stress due to salience of Muslim/non-Muslim differences can endanger Muslims’ physical health. That study found the same effect on women’s physical health due to gender salience — so it’s a fairly robust finding — and would further predict “poor exam results (Schmeichel, Vohs, & Baumeister, 2003), […] overreliance on heuristics to make decisions (Masicampo & Baumeister, 2008), poor physical stamina (Muraven, Tice, & Baumeister, 1998), and unfocused attention (Inzlicht & Gutsell, 2007).”
Africans and Arabs are stereotyped as being less intelligent than Europeans, and in majority non-Muslim countries where most Muslims are African or Arab this stereotype extends to Muslims. We know that salience of these kind of stereotypes reduces performance on tests.
Here’s a personal account of how public focus on group differences can make life harder. In a study of Saudi students’ experiences with US mass media depictions of the Muslim morld, Arab world, and Saudi Arabia, “Waseela tells how she feels after one of these stories appears on TV. She does not want to attend her classes at RSU for fear of getting into the discussion about these incidents. She says, ‘I suffer from these conversation even after they end because for two or three [days] and may be the whole week I would feel that I do not want to go to class again… and even do not want to come to the university for my other classes as a whole because I meet my classmates in other classes as well. I sometimes meet them at the library or the Student Union.'”
This last example is more or less unavoidable; mass media coverage of events, at least events which are not deliberately caused by the media, is necessary. The point is that even when necessary, public focus on group differences can screw up individual Muslims’ lives, individuals who’ve done not a damn thing to cause these events. That’s lamentable when necessary. But when it’s not necessary, as DMD is not necessary, harm to real people cannot be automatically justified by appeal to abstract principles. That’s what ideologues do.
Again, most Muslims are not trying to restrain you from drawing Muhammad.
Our priorities are not one-dimensional. When people are being targeted by racism and xenophobia, when we’re faced with a choice between signaling that we are on the side of the xenophobes or on the side of innocent Muslims, we should be trying to signal to Muslim immigrants that we atheists are on their side.
Google cache of the link at #5.
Hm. Google cache of the link at #5.