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UPDATE: Vacula has resigned.
As most of you are no doubt aware, the atheist and skeptic movements have had just a teensy bit of a problem with misogyny in their ranks. You may recall the unholy shitstorm that erupted last year when Rebecca Watson of Skepchick casually mentioned in a YouTube video that it might not be such a good idea for dudes to try to hit on women in elevators at 4 AM. The assholes of the internet still haven’t forgiven Watson for her assault on the sacred right of creepy dudes to creep women out 24 hours a day, every day.
Watson is hardly the only skeptic to face vicious misogynist harassment for the crime of blogging while feminist. Last month, Jen McCreight of Blag Hag announced that near constant harassment from online bullies was wearing her down to such a degree that she felt it necessary to shut down her blog – hopefully only temporarily.
I can no longer write anything without my words getting twisted, misrepresented, and quotemined. I wake up every morning to abusive comments, tweets, and emails about how I’m a slut, prude, ugly, fat, feminazi, retard, bitch, and cunt (just to name a few). If I block people who are twisting my words or sending verbal abuse, I receive an even larger wave of nonsensical hate about how I’m a slut, prude, feminazi, retard, bitch, cunt who hates freedom of speech (because the Constitution forces me to listen to people on Twitter). This morning I had to delete dozens of comments of people imitating my identity making graphic, lewd, degrading sexual comments about my personal life. In the past, multiple people have threatened to contact my employer with “evidence” that I’m a bad scientist (because I’m a feminist) to try to destroy my job. I’m constantly worried that the abuse will soon spread to my loved ones.
I just can’t take it anymore.
McCreight’s harassers and their enablers were delighted in this “victory,” taking to Twitter to give McCreight some final kicks on the way out the door. “Good riddance, #jennifurret , you simple minded dolt,” wrote @skepticaljoe. “I couldn’t be happier,” added @SUICIDEBOMBS. “Eat shit you rape-faking scum.”
One of the celebrators that day was an atheist activist named Justin Vacula, who joked that “Jen’s allegedly finished blogging…and this time it’s not her boyfriend who kicked her off the internet.”
So here’s the latest twist:
Justin Vacula has just been given a leadership position in the Pennsylvania chapter of the Secular Coalition for America, a lobbying group for secular Americans whose advisory board includes such big names as Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Susan Jacoby, Wendy Kaminer, Steven Pinker, Salman Rushdie and Julia Sweeney.
It’s an astonishing choice. In addition to gloating that bullies had led McCreight to shut down her blog, Vacula has harassed atheist blogger and activist Surly Amy, including writing a post on A Voice for Men (yes, that A Voice for Men) cataloging all the sordid details of his supposed case against her. At one point he even posted her address, and a photo of her apartment building, on a site devoted to hating on feminist atheist bloggers.
Blogger Stephanie Zvan has set up a petition on Change.org urging the Secular Coalition of America to reconsider its choice. You can find further examples of Vacula’s questionable behavior there.
As Watson notes in a post on Skepchick, Vacula’s position with the SCA is likely to “drive progressive women away from the secular cause.” She adds,
I will never, ever get involved with SCA so long as someone like him holds a position of power anywhere, let alone in a state I live in. So Vacula is actively driving people away from SCA. …
It’s all a real shame, because SCA fills an important role in our movement and I’d like to give them my support. … I don’t believe secular organizations should reward bullies and bigots with high-level positions, even if those positions are volunteer-only.
I recommend that everyone here take a look at the petition.
@PG
So how do you explain Vacula’s decision to publish all of this on a site that wants rape to be de facto legal?
And yes, people who post on hate sites are actually assholes. I think that’s a level of name-calling we can all agree with.
@Ugh
“And yes, people who post on hate sites are actually assholes. I think that’s a level of name-calling we can all agree with.”
This is a hate site.
sublbc, minus the bullshit: “Just because he wrote an article for a site that thinks there should be no consequences for rape and child abuse doesn’t mean he hates women WHAT WOULD GIVE YOU THAT IDEA.”
@PG
lol. Thanks for listing the naughty names I used, would have never figured them out otherwise.
So, why is Justin the one who determines whether this was a “threatening move”? Surely the person who is being discussed determines whether they feel threatened by the discussion.
Also, where exactly did Justin apologize for posting the address? It wasn’t in his “clarification”. He merely said that he regrets that other people misconstrued his action in a fairly textbook nonpology.
Has he ever apologized (or even nonpologized) for deciding to publish an article on a hate site? (Note: that also provides context to the address posting. I’d be a lot more nervous if someone associated with a group that would like to legalize rape posted my address than if a person associated with a group that would like to spread videos of kittens did.)
The atheist he-man thing is because a lot of outspoken atheists are giant assholes with superiority complexes. Now, if you’re otherwise a good person and you’ve got your head screwed on right- like, say, Hitchens or Dawkins or even PZ Myers- then you can channel this into something productive.
However if, on the other hand, you’ve got dumbass opinions and/or you’re just a full-blown idiot, that gets magnified tenfold and you become a festering dickweed with delusions of grandeur, like Vacula.
Also, Freethought Blogs is sort of low-hanging fruit for trolls.
There’s not just the fact of Vacula posting Surly Amy’s address, phone number, AND A PICTURE OF HER APARTMENT, there’s also where he did it.
If you’re not familiar with the travails of Pharyngula, ElevatorGate, and FreeThoughtBlogs, then you won’t recognize the name “The Slimepit.”
The Slimepit, now the “Slymepit,” was once a long-running comment thread and is now a website devoted entirely to hating Rebecca Watson, PZ Myers, Skepchick, FTB, and anyone sympathetic to or associated with them.
Why the fuck would you post the address and contact info AND A PICTURE OF THE APARTMENT of a woman who writes for Skepchick on a blog that is entirely devoted to hating Skepchick, unless you wanted to increase the harassment that woman had to deal with?
Either Vacula is dumb or he’s malicious.
AVfM, after all, loves to doxx people — including mommy bloggers. Their “leaders” get sexually aroused by writing about beating women. Anyone who writes for AVfM is by definition an asshole, sorry if that hurts your feelings.
I’d say that “misogyny” refers to the systematic devaluation of women. (But sometimes words can have multiple meanings, so I suppose I’d accept other definitions like “prejudice against women” or “hatred of women” as well.)
“Misogyny” stills seems like a pretty meaningful word to me.
Dude, even if the atheist community was no more misogynistic than society as a whole, it would still be misogynistic because we live in a misogynistic society.
And while not all criticisms of the feminist movement are misogynistic, much of the anti-feminism I’ve seen from within the atheist community is.
What feminist dogmas, scriptures, and superstitions? Tell me, I’m curious. I value skepticism. Tell me what these dogmas are and why you think they don’t hold up under the weight of the evidence. If you can show me that I’ve accepted some “feminist dogma” that isn’t true, I’ll change my mind.
This is a giant pantload. You either believe women are fully human or you don’t. Eschew obfuscation, dickhead.
And what, pray tell, is “pure feminism?” This I gotta hear.
@ Ugh
Guilt by association. Because he’s featured there does not automatically make him an MRA, or anti-feminist. Besides, he never posted there. His piece was co-opted. His only contribution is that piece and it doesn’t say anything about hating feminists, or women. Your honesty on this matter is noted. Moreover because Paul Elam wishes rape to be legal (I still haven’t found the article where he said this, did he remove it?) does not mean Justin Vacula wishes rape to be legal. That’s two logical fallacies, one is guilt by association, and the other is poisoning the well. Anymore you wish to throw my way? A strawman, perhaps?
Hate sites. Can we add FTB to that list? I would believe actively having smear campaigns against people just because you disagree with them, attempting to get them fired from their jobs and threatening them with physical violence is enough of a violation of moral fiber to get it elected, wouldn’t you think? No? Maybe not. Maybe they’re just assholes.
Oooh, Ugh, he noted you
Better run for the hills!
Hey, PG, I dunno if you didn’t notice, but Greg Laden was unceremoniously tossed off the network several months ago. So I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about with that second paragraph. But no, even if that were true, that’s not what a hate site is. AVfM is about denigrating, oppressing, and being violent toward an entire class of human beings (two classes if you count the children who would be placed with abusive fathers or insufficiently cared for in MRA fantasy land). That’s what makes it a hate site, not disagreeing with someone or even being jerks about disagreeing.
As far as I can tell, Vacula’s piece on AVfM is a long excerpt previously published on his blog, plus original material to publish on AVfM. And honestly, if a hate site publishes your stuff, you ask them to take it down (and you consider what life choices you’ve made to make yourself popular with a hate group). He still holds copyright to his content, so he has no excuse for not doing so.
His post was co-opted? Because when you go to the piece on AVfM, it says that there’s added commentary on it. That, to me, suggests that he knew the piece was going on AVfM, did nothing to stop it, and, in fact, added more information to the post. I don’t think it’s unfair to say that providing content for a website that advocates for rape to be legal suggests a degree of sympathy for their views, or at least suggests that you don’t find the other content on the site completely repugnant. I mean, he’s voluntarily associating his name with that site and its content. It’s the fourth hit on google for his name now.
Yeah, AVfM isn’t a hate site no matter how much Ugh wants it to be. It’s a stupid site, and it sucks, but calling them a hate site is a serious accusation, and referencing a few shitty quotes in isolation is not enough. For the claim to have traction, AVfM’s primary mission would need to be to attack and disenfranchise women, or explicitly perpetuate ideas of inferiority. They don’t do that, even if they are pretty misogynistic and even if it may be implicit in some of what they write. But still- not a hate site.
Skyrim, what you’re saying leads me to believe the following: that you either have not read AVfM, or cannot read for comprehension. Either works for me.
Yes, it’s pretty vacant up there, isn’t it?
It would beggar belief if Amy feels it was a threatening move to post her very publicly available business address – just because it was on the Slymepit and because it was by Justin Vacula. Do Justin Vacula have a previous record of maliciously posting other people’s addresses on fora to deliberately trump up hate? Do the denizens of the Slymepit have a previous record of looking up people (in this case women) and hurting them? If the answer to both of these questions are no, then her concern is noted but unwarranted. As it is, none that I am aware of on the Slymepit is a culprit of either of these offenses. So is Amy right to be worried or is she simply trumping up her fear for dramatic effect? I’ll let you decide. (Won’t take a genius to deduce which option you’ll take, as it absolutely must be so.)
1) He edited the post 2) he regrets he posted it 3) what more do you want?
You mean co-opted by the organisation? It’s possible he gave his permission, but did he write the piece specifically for AVfM, or even for a missive of the MRM? No. It helps to do some research before you speak out, unless you want to look like an ignorant fool.
Oh, PG doesn’t realize he’s the ignorant fool (though I would guess he’s aware that he hasn’t done any research). That’s cute!
PG, you might want to take your own advice about looking like an ignorant fool.
Ayup, we’re clearly having a discussion that’s going nowhere fast. “If you look at it the right way, the night sky is pink.” “No, it’s black.” “That’s a total exaggeration.” “Yes, you’re right, it’s very dark blue.” “But if you glance out your window, you’ll see that it’s pink.” “… nope.” I leave it as an exercise to the reader which half of the dialog is Nepenthe and which half is PG.
The entire piece was co-opted, yes. If you’ll notice (if you don’t lack in reading comprehension), the ‘added information’ was before the piece was co-opted on AVfM. Which you would notice if your head weren’t up your arse. The content comes from his blog which was false DMCA’d, you can read this in the bloody editoral at the top, for crying out loud. The added commentary comes from his blog, following the original post, then co-opted by the site. He most likely gave them his permission, but so what? The piece concerns specifically Surly Amy and the DMCA claim made against him. Nothing else. Maybe you’re not aware, but guilt by association is a logical fallacy, same as ad hominem and tu quoque. It doesn’t matter that Jason Thibeault, Crommunist and others attempt to justify their use of inherently badly argued positions, it’s still a fallacy, and doesn’t become less of a fallacy just because they say it’s not.
I have a hypothesis.
As a one-time Nice Guy(tm) who managed to avoid becoming a libertarian shitstain, it’s my thinking that the misogyny in the skeptical/atheist community comes from people who are like me but with even less self-awareness. They hate women because they see all women as the girls who turned them down in high school. Essentially, they seem to think women are invading their territory to humiliate them even further, and if a woman (like, say, Jen McCreight) decides to do something that titillates them, but later calls them out on something they’re doing wrong, they (and their Serena Joys like Abbie Smith and GirlWritesWhat) turn on them, because they feel like they’re being humiliated all over again. Essentially, they’re stuck in their own heads and are so convinced they’re infallible that they lash out.
I’m not quite sure what to say about this. Shutting them out of the movement is not practical, but it seems like the only sensible solution; however, that will just make a few of them go George Sodini. I’m sure there’s a better answer.
Indeed, cute. Infer ignorance by ignoring actual arguments being made and instead project ad hominem and strawmen.
Feel free to come in any time, Nepenthe. In the mean time, this waterslide looks inviting.
Having removed all context of the history of people stalked and killed after having their names and addresses and photos on the interwebs all evidence disappears and it can be dismissed as a wild assertion.
Except it is not and it can not.
It is an obvious threat. It is meant as a threat. The degree of willful ignorance necessary to claim that it is not a threat is utterly absurd.
Yeah, so, that additional commentary was definitely not published on Vacula’s blog. He wrote that for AVfM. Thou shalt not tangle on issues of publishing with someone who does copyright investigations for fun.
Re: guilt by association. You would be completely correct in citing that fallacy if someone here had, for example, claimed that Vacula supports legalizing rape since Elam does. But no one’s done that. What is being claimed is that Vacula has no qualms with writing material for and publishing on a site run by someone who supports legalizing rape as a part of the mission of that site (or who supports threatening judges and suicide as activism, etc. etc.). Do try to keep up.