Apparently Richard Dawkins was worried that people might have forgotten what an asshat he is. So, helpful fellow that he is, he decided to give us all a demonstration of why he’s one of the atheist movement’s biggest liabilities, a “humanist” who has trouble remembering to act human.
Earlier today Dawkins decided, for some reason, that he needed to remind the people of the world of a fairly basic point of logic, and so he took to Twitter and thumbed out this little thought:
However petulantly phrased this is, the basic logic is sound: If I say that Hitler was worse than Stalin, I’m not endorsing either Hitler or Stalin. Unless I add “and Stalin was totally awesome and I endorse him” at the end.
The trouble is that Dawkins didn’t stop with this one tweet. He decided to illustrate his point with some examples. Some really terrible examples.
Yep, that’s right. He decided to do what comedians call a “callback” to some terrible comments he made last year about what he perversely described as “mild pedophilia.” And then he added asshattery to asshattery by suggesting a similar distinction between “date rape” and “stranger rape.”
Anyone seeing these comments as insensitive twaddle designed to minimize both “mild” pedophilia and date rape has good reason to do so. As you may recall, in the earlier controversy about so-called “mild” pedophilia, Dawkins told an interviewer for the Times magazine that
I look back a few decades to my childhood and see things like caning, like mild pedophilia, and can’t find it in me to condemn it by the same standards as I or anyone would today.
He went on to tell the interviewer that when he was a child one of his school masters had “pulled me on his knee and put his hand inside my shorts.” But, he added, he didn’t think that this sort of “mild touching up” had done him, or any of the classmates also victimized by the teacher, any “lasting harm.”
Huh. If Dawkins says that a teacher groping him was no big deal, I guess this kind of “mild” abuse shouldn’t be a big deal for anyone else, either, huh?
I’m pretty sure there’s some sort of logical fallacy here.
Given his history of minimizing these “mild” sexual crimes, it’s not a surprise that his crass tweets today inspired a bit of a twitterstorm.
Dawkins has responded with his typical petulance, and has stubbornly defended his comments as an exercise in pure logic that his critics are too irrational to understand.
What I have learned today is that there are people on Twitter who think in absolutist terms, to an extent I wouldn't have believed possible.
— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) July 29, 2014
.@mikester8821 Yes, it is so obvious it is painful. But they aren't debating, they are emoting.
— Richard Dawkins (@RichardDawkins) July 29, 2014
If you take a few moments to go through his timeline you’ll find many more tweets and retweets reiterating this “argument.” Dawkins is not the sort of person to admit to mistakes. Indeed, he so regularly puts his foot in his mouth it’s hard not to conclude that he must like the taste of shoe leather.
But these recurring controversies can’t be doing much for his reputation. Indeed, they seem to cause more and more people to wonder why anyone takes Dawkins seriously on any subject other than biology. Even his critics on Twitter are growing a bit weary.
https://twitter.com/somegreybloke/status/494045464308629505
https://twitter.com/markleggett/status/494044606342782977
https://twitter.com/endorathewitch/status/494071064008597504
Good lord. Look at Dawkins feed. Like every third tweet (or sequence) is something deplorable.
— 🦇VaginoplASCII🦇 (@nataliereed84) July 29, 2014
It seems that no matter what point Richard Dawkins tries to make, he only ever ends up proving that Richard Dawkins is a tosspot.
— Steph. 🏳️⚧️ (@EccentricSteph) July 29, 2014
Seems like it. I’m beginning to wonder why any atheists — at least those who are not also asshats — continue to think of Dawkins as an ally of any kind.
White skirts are great on me if I have tanned legs (faked or otherwise). I have a few white short sleeved work tops, and they look good so long as I have a summer kiss to my skin. I have no white winter tops at all.
One of the many ways I fail at being femaletm, is I have no sense of style or colour. As a blue-eyed, pale-skinned redhead (On the auburn rather than copper side), I’ve spent most of my life wearing black, forest green, with occasional dark browns, grey or navy blue. Once I hit 40, I suddenly realised that I like red and maroon/wine shades and started buying and wearing that. It was weird, I truly never liked reds before. So now I wear them on the grounds thatso long as I feel comfortable, it doesn’t really matter how I look, since I live alone, spend 90% of my time alone, and only look in mirrors to brush my hair. 🙂
*bleh* subscript fail.
Oh, and re: Capaldi, when I think of him in a fan context, it’s as The Angel Islington in Neverwhere
I don’t pay attention to WHTM for a week and then this happens… 800+ comments. Should I read them all? Any highlights?
He was also the father in the Fires of Pompeii episode. But it’s hardly new for actors to play different characters. Nicholas Courtney was Brett Vyon in the first Doctor’s day, before he played the Brigadier. Lalla Ward got her part as Romana in the story straight after she played Princess Astra, when Mary Tamm left. Patrick Troughton played a villain who banked on his resemblance to the Doctor at one stage. Phillip Madoc played Eelek in The Krotons and later played Solon in The Brain of Morbius. Yeah, a jump from villain to Doctor, but Capaldi’s already played more than that and multiple roles definitely have a history there.
Yes, the blue bit on the right is, and the red and blue bit on the left is a sort of boucle yarn.
Fribs is the one on medications. She’s doing well, though I’m still convinced she lost a bit of weight during her days at the get and hasn’t regained it. She just feels a little bonier than she did before she went, but I can’t give her the high-protein stuff now, because of her kidneys.
But putting it directly on the brain builds a good foundation for LogickThinking!
@gilshalos, good, it’s not just me who goes through colour phases! I don’t think I had any colour awarness or preferences in my twenties, but got into the goth stuff when I was about thirty, and did a lot of black or purple with the odd bit of crimson. Total change of taste later and I was wearing lots of forest greens and browns and rich tans, often in vintage men’s clothes. Now I wear the occasional black, with all the above colours, plus variations on rose pink, but as likely to be paired with long skirts as jeans. Plus the knitwear, of course. Wouldn’t have been seen dead in knitwear once upon a time.
I feel sorry for my mother when I was a teen. First she got trouble from me when she tried to lure me into ‘fashionable shops for teens’, then from my father(I found out later), for repressing my teen desire ofr neon and only buying me drab clothing 🙁
I don’t remember having much interest in clothes as a kid or teenager. Individual pieces I owned, yes, but not fashion. As a teenager, I was aware of not fitting in and certainly not being whatever passed for fashionable in 1970s Melbourne suburbia, but neither did I want to wear whatever it was the other kids wore.
Oooo! Makeup talk! And crafty talk! Gonna have to scroll back I don’t know how many pages now! Curse you, fun people!
Can we all just agree that Dawkins–at least by the time he had become a “prominent atheist–was, at best, a notable
evolutionary biologistethologist but was, and still is, no better than a first-year philosophy student who got stoned and watched The Matrix one too many times when it comes to that field?No, I like the stoner philosophy student more. At least they have a decent chance of sharing weed. Dawkins probably doesn’t even smoke.
And that marks my weird comment of the morning. Hi.
Sorry, I’ve been in way too many discussions lately where Dawkins is cited for is opions on the philosophy of science, a topic it is painfully obvious from his petulant screeds he has no knowledge of.
I have a hard time believing any evolutionary psychologist has a decent understanding of the philosophy of science.
Speaking of clothing, I bought a pair of cheap jeans last week on clearance. I buy everything on clearance. I am an incredible penny pincher and shopper. ANYHOO, I knew they didn’t fit super awesome when I bought them and that they didn’t look incroyable but I liked that they were cheap and would push me to lose another 5lbs. I trust in jeans when it comes to weight maintenance and moderate weight loss.
Today’s the first day I’ve worn them. Put them on. Yep, still too small in the waist band. That’s OK. Three weeks of 9,000 calories and a couple hours of moderate exercise will resolve that issue and get me closer to my weight goal.They make my thighs look mammoth but whatevs. It’s Friday. I’m only in the office for four hours. Then I can come home, strip naked and bask in the air-conditioned glory.Then I caught a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror as I walked by.
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! CAMEL TOE!
I can handle just about anything else but that won’t do!
I’ve adjusted them and I think I’ve got things rectified but yikes.
@cassandrakitty
Responding to a comment from a while ago…
Whole Foods sushi is terrible because they don’t make it. The sushi areas of Whole Foods are contracted out to a different company (what company that is depends on where in the country you are).
Usually drab for me: jeans, well worn t-shirts, and the like.
My jacket, though, is bright green. I also have one pair of ridiculously vibrant blue gym pants that I wear occasionally.
I call that pant/jacket combo the “You can see me, right? Please don’t kill me with your car” outfit for walking along sidewalk-less streets.
Totes colorblind looking, but really easy to spot.
I like to think I’m pretty stylish these days, but when I was a kid/teen I just had one outfit obsession after another:
kindergarten: 1 purple dress which I insisted must be worn at all times
third grade: huge bright orange matching shirt and shorts set, worn all summer long
fifth grade: 1 pair of navy shorts worn every day to school (they were part of my uniform, but I wouldn’t wear my other uniform shorts
middle school: homemade pants (out of cotton quilt-top material) which kept wearing out, so I would make a new pair of the same pants in a different fabric
high school: one pair of jeans I continually patched rather than replaced
etc.
Now I am still like that but also understand about laundry. Currently: pink dress worn every day of every weekend and sometimes during the week.
@contrapangloss my family doesn’t get why I keep buying white jackets, but it’s for precisely that reason. I prefer to not be hit by cars, thanks. Keeping my coat clean is not my #1 priority.
Cassandra – the last time I was in the Castro, the chocolate shop was gone. Replaced with another shop selling things you don’t need but want to have. Ah, capitalism.
Oh, clothing. I still remember, as a wee lad, putting on blue pants (not jeans) and a solid green placket front shirt. Almost to the door, and mother asks pleasantly, “You’re not going out dressed like that, are you?”
Both my husbands have been just like that. Current one has assisted me in learning how to do it for myself. I am normcore made flesh.
An airtight argument, right there.
Why do men’s pants go via having holes occur in the crotch. With my pants, it’s either the arse gets too thin (e.g. chenille fabric, knits) or the hems fray (e.g. denim).
I have formed this view from a sample of two but feel the need to extrapolate to everyone.
I’m tempted to say “too much rubbing to check everything’s still there”.
@ pallygirl – butt and knees, for me. Knees and crotch for MrGrumpyOld(nota)Nurse. The small grumps are usually too smudged to tell where the rips are.
I doubt, somehow, that this will assist with your where pants wear out thesis, but better too much data than not enough!
@ kittehserf – I snorted so hard I may have lost a filling.