Once upon a time, the growing atheist community was shattered by the emergence of a disruptive faction who thought there is more to this business than just disbelieving in gods. They were tyrants who wanted to force atheists to do more than yell slogans about how religion is a cancer, and maybe build constructive communities. These were the wicked Social Justice Warriors, or SJWs. They committed the abominable crime of bringing feminism into atheism, of being anti-war and anti-racism, of supporting equality with even LGBT people, and tainted the idyllic purity of true Reason and Rationality with…with values <hack, spit> and ideology (atheism was free of ideology before, existing in a realm of pure thought). These SJWs dared to dismiss the great good Old Guard of Atheism when all they did was exhibit a little light misogyny or xenophobia or corruption. They dared to criticize other atheists! They must be punished!

Well, I confess: I am one of those SJWs. Some people think I’m one of the ringleaders of this diverse group of terrible egalitarians and idealists, and therefore, they are entirely justified in coming to my blog and…actively demonstrating that I was right all along, and there’s a deplorable subset of atheists who aren’t very rational at all? I don’t get it, but regular readers of Pharyngula have noticed a series of abusive, nasty, misogynistic & homophobic & transphobic & anti-semitic & just plain vile comments showing up lately. Like these:

Just so you know, these are all from one lone vigilante, out to prove that he is a smart, reasonable, logical representative of modern atheism by going on an obsessive crusade against SJWs, using obscene slurs against everyone who is not a white Anglo-Saxon cis het man. He’s gone through dozens of hotmail accounts and made hundreds of these short, thoughtless posts to make his point, whatever it is, and I’ve just been blacklisting his accounts and deleting his obscenities almost as fast as he makes them. I don’t understand why, but he seems bound and determined to prove that some atheists can be deplorable, hateful, and illogical by making an example of himself.

So, I’m sorry to say, I’ve switched on the commenting feature that holds a new commenter’s first post in a queue awaiting my approval. This shouldn’t affect regular commenters, but if you’re new here, there might be a delay in your comments appearing. All because one atheist is an asshole.

For those who don’t know, Todd Stiefel is a wealthy philanthropist who has been giving money to atheist organizations for over a decade. It seemed a good and noble use of his money, but now I don’t know — maybe it wasn’t about the cause so much as it was a cult of personality. He is deeply peeved that anyone would disagree with Richard Dawkins, and is going to use his money to punish those who question his words.

Wow. He will not support organizations that criticize Richard Dawkins — that is his right, of course, no one is going to compel him to donate to non-Dawkinsite organizations — but it’s still a chilling comment. Is there a loyalty oath or statement of faith attached to any grant from the Stiefel foundation? This is exactly what I never wanted to see happen to atheism, that it become a dogma attached to a figurehead, no matter who it is. The details of that letter are ill-thought out, too.

He’s unhappy because the American Humanists were “extremely public”. I don’t know what that means. Did they put on a parade or put up a billboard? No, they issued a mundane press release, kind of the minimum statement to explain a change in their policy. What were they supposed to do, shut up and be silent and not criticize Richard Dawkins at all? As Stiefel writes further down, this was “an opportunity to educate, disagree, and criticize”…which is what they did! They made a statement that said, “Richard Dawkins has over the past several years accumulated a history of making statements that use the guise of scientific discourse to demean marginalized groups, an approach antithetical to humanist values”, and removed an honorary award because he no longer represented the values of the organization. That’s it.

To Stiefel, this is “figuratively burning a heretic.”

He goes on to claim that Dawkins is “canceled”, an over-used, meaningless term that right-wingers love. Likewise, he implies that Dawkins has been erased from history. Hyperbole much? Dawkins is still selling books, still being invited to speak, is still living a comfortable upper class life, and still has mobs of fawning acolytes, as we can see above. I am appalled that atheism is now supposed to have idols.

I’m not even going to discuss his entire “transethnic” excuse, other than to point out that Dawkins was using the term entirely according to this definition: “a racist transphobic trolling and derailling tactic deployed when trans oppression is being discussed”. While maybe there are contexts — complex, fraught contexts — where it can be discussed reasonably, a Twitter fart from Richard Dawkins is not one of them.

This has been an issue with Richard Dawkins for over a decade, and he has learned nothing, and gotten worse, if anything. He is still defending his anti-trans stance for which AHA rebuked him.

Dawkins, however, disagrees. He is, he said, not a misogynist, as some critics have called him, but “a passionate feminist.” The greatest threats to women, in his view, are Islamism and jihadism — and his concern over that sometimes leads him to speak off-the-cuff.

“I concentrate my attention on that menace and I confess I occasionally get a little impatient with American women who complain of being inappropriately touched by the water cooler or invited for coffee or something which I think is, by comparison, relatively trivial,” he said.

“And so I occasionally wax a little sarcastic, and I when I have done that, I then have subsequently discovered some truly horrific things, which is that some of the women who were the butt of my sarcasm then became the butt of really horrible or serious threats, which is totally disgusting and I know how horrible that is and that, of course, I absolutely abominate and absolutely repudiate and abhor.”

Man, Islam is still his excuse for everything. Hey, you American women, shut up and stop complaining about being groped at work or treated sexually in professional situations. Don’t you know Muslim are horribly abused? He still hasn’t grasped the fallacy of relative privation. He still thinks he’s a passionate feminist even as he suggests that women ought to accept that their co-workers get to touch them inappropriately.

Hey, Richard! Stop complaining about being snubbed for an honorary award! Don’t you know that transgender women are still being murdered by Christians, and good Christian lawmakers are busy writing laws to oppress them further, right here in America, and in the UK, too? By comparison, everything that has happened to you is relatively trivial.

When you “wax a little sarcastic”, and discover that your zealous followers are being totally disgusting, do you ever retract and apologize? Have you ever apologized to Rebecca Watson, who is still clearly occupying a quadrant of your great brain? Do you abominate and absolutely repudiate and abhor the fact that you, personally and directly, blacklisted her from any conference that invited you to speak?

Does Todd Stiefel realize that Dawkins has consistently failed to live up to the values of free inquiry?

Way back in 2009, the American Humanist Association thought I was worthy of their Humanist of the Year award. I was honored to receive it, and still don’t know if I really deserved it, but I do keep it in my office. I had no idea it could be taken away.

Apparently, you have to maintain your status as a good humanist, which I think is entirely appropriate. If I start promoting bigoted ideas, it should be retracted.

As has happened to Richard Dawkins, who was a recipient in 1996.

Regrettably, Richard Dawkins has over the past several years accumulated a history of making statements that use the guise of scientific discourse to demean marginalized groups, an approach antithetical to humanist values. His latest statement implies that the identities of transgender individuals are fraudulent, while also simultaneously attacking Black identity as one that can be assumed when convenient. His subsequent attempts at clarification are inadequate and convey neither sensitivity nor sincerity.

Consequently, the AHA Board has concluded that Richard Dawkins is no longer deserving of being honored by the AHA, and has voted to withdraw, effective immediately, the 1996 Humanist of the Year award.

I’m sure that Richard Dawkins has many more awards and honors than I do, so he’ll hardly miss one little trophy, but it still has to sting to be told you no longer deserve this one.

It also sends a message that humanists should regard trans rights as a great good, one not to be denied.

P.S. I also have one of these (Dawkins received a similar award from the IHEU/BHA in 2009). I think that makes me a certifiable humanist.

And this humanist has been saying “Trans Rights!” all along.

The 21st Century United States has been cursed with two of the most appallingly inane “geniuses” so far, people who have cult-like followings that regard them as grand public intellectuals in spite of all the patent bullshit that spews from their mouths. They are, of course, Jordan Peterson and Elon Musk. Future historians will be mystified by their popularity, because there’s so little there there, and what there is so tainted by lunacy that it will persuade no one.

They aren’t even from the United States. Some ineffable aspect of American culture has drawn them in and allowed them to flourish here — maybe it’s atmosphere of oblivious ignorance and worship of money? We’re like the Burnt-Over District of countries, where con artists can flower and succeed.

Anyway, Nathan Robinson has already deconstructed Jordan Peterson (and also Sam Harris, Steven Pinker, and Ben Shapiro — he’s the wrecking ball we need), and now he turns his gaze to Elon Musk. A small sample:

Musk’s preference for hype and exaggeration over follow-through and diligence has created a great deal of dysfunction within Tesla, as journalist Edward Niedermeyer reports in Ludicrous: The Unvarnished Story of Tesla Motors. Little that Musk says can be trusted. He has promised to fill space with his satellites to provide a powerful new alternative internet infrastructure—but this isn’t going to happen, though it may well massively inhibit the ability of actual scientists to do their work and ruin the night sky. His Neuralink company talks of uploading brains to computers and implanting chips that will be “like a fitbit in your skull”—but this is unlikely to happen either, and the MIT Technology Review says what has been revealed so far is “neuroscience theater” with little evidence to back up Musk’s astonishing promises. From the announcement that Tesla would switch to building ventilators to help COVID patients to the “mini-sub” that proved inferior to old-fashioned diving skill in the cave rescue, Musk comes up with flashy world-saving schemes one after another and rarely delivers. (Some of the schemes aren’t world-changing, just obviously doomed, as when he attempted to launch a competitor to the Onion called Thud.) Niedermeyer notes that, “Each of these announcements struggled to withstand close examination, ranging from mere exaggeration to quasi-delusional fantasy,” but “many outlets reported these developments unquestioningly,” contributing to Musk’s “legend as a twenty-first-century Renaissance man.” So many of these plans are from the “F.M.” world, and when you read analyses by science and tech writers from the “A.M.” world, you realize that the line between Elon Musk and Elizabeth Holmes is thinner than you might think. (When the Barnumesque B.S. is exposed, it can be extremely amusing, as when in a live demonstration, the “armor glass” windows on the Cybertruck were easily smashed.)

Niedermeyer documents the way that Musk’s claims sometimes border on outright fraud. Niedermeyer believes Tesla may well have pretended it could charge cars faster than it could in order to qualify for a state tax incentive scheme, and as he reported began to see that “potentially massive gaps existed between Tesla’s carefully cultivated image and reality—yet the company was capable of saying and doing whatever it thought it needed to maintain its reputation.” Tesla even required some owners to sign non-disclosure agreements when it agreed to repair problems with their cars, which created a minor scandal when it became clear that the agreement’s text would keep people from being able to tell government regulators if there was a safety issue. Niedermeyer also reports a shocking incident in which Musk personally called the employer of a blogger who had been debunking Musk’s claims online (the blogger was anonymous but had been doxxed by Musk’s fans). Musk threatened vague legal action, and the employer asked the blogger to stop commenting on Tesla, which he did. (Niedermeyer says the company has also repeatedly engaged in “blatantly defamatory smear[s]” of journalists who report critically on it.)

I’m glad we’ve got at least one real skeptic working in journalism, but of course, we’re all going to read the article and nod in agreement, and Musk will go on being the world’s richest spoiled 12 year old brat.

A great loss…Hector Avalos was a professor of philosophy and religious studies at Iowa State University, but also he was a great humanist and all around nice guy. We met several times; he made many trips up the road to Minneapolis to speak at Minnesota Atheist meetings, and he was always a pleasure to listen to. Here’s one recording of one of his talks (I think I was at that one!)

If only atheism had paid more attention to the example set by Hector.

I think Jesus has earned it — he’s a true eldritch horror.