Like a lot of people, I was a bit gobsmacked a couple of months ago when rapper B.O.B. came out as a literal Flat Earther, as in, someone who literally believes that the earth is a disk, not a sphere.
Having something of a professional interest in bad ideas and the people who hold them, I’ve been poking around in the FlatEarthosphere ever since. Turns out they have a lot in common with the bad-idea-believers that I’ve been writing about daily since I started this blog.
Like the internet’s innumerable antifeminists, the Flat Earthers love making interminably long videos in which they ramble incoherently about their beliefs.
Happily for those of us with shorter attention spans, they also like making memes, many of which are strikingly similar to antifeminist memes not only in their often inept design but in the fundamental dishonesty of many of their “arguments.”
Consider, for example, the way that Flat Earth mememakers have given science dude Neil deGrasse Tyson the Anita Sarkeesian treatment.
The Flat Earthers hate Tyson, who took down B.O.B. and his Flat Earth beliefs on Twitter in a literal mic-dropping moment on the Larry Wilmore show and even by making a cameo in a diss track aimed at the rapper.
While not inundating Tyson with death and rape threats, as far as I know, the Flatties have pored over his past writings and public appearances looking for things they can go after him about — much as Gamergaters did with Sarkeesian.
And, as Gamergaters have done many times with Sarkeesian, the Flatties have taken innocuous remarks from Tyson and misrepresented them so thoroughly that, to them at least, they look like a “gotcha!”
You may recall how Gamergaters seized upon Sarkeesian’s statement that “everything is sexist, everything is racist, everything is homophobic.” The comment, taken out of context from a talk she once gave, became the subject of endless jokes and indignant blog posts and even a music video.
And there were of course memes:
Sarkeesian was pretty clearly just pointing out that sexism (and racism, and homophobia) permeate almost every nook and cranny of our culture. Which is true. But Gamergaters assumed (or pretended) that she thought plants and birds and rocks and things were all sexist somehow.
The Flatties have done the same thing with some comments from Tyson on the not-quite-perfectly-spherical shape of the earth.
Earth is not only oblate — wider at the equator than pole-to-pole, but pear shaped — slightly wider just south of the equator
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) September 19, 2014
He gave a slightly longer explanation of this at an event in 2007. It’s not something that he made up; it’s true. The centrifugal force from the rotation of the earth has made the earth ever so slightly chubby. (Why it’s chubbiest slightly south of the equator I don’t quite know.)
Obviously, Tyson isn’t saying that the earth is literally the shape of a pear. He’s saying that it deviates an eensy teensy weensy bit from a perfectly spherical shape. Indeed, in the 2007 event he made clear that the earth is only very very slightly pear-shaped; that “cosmically speaking, we’re a practically a perfect sphere.”
None of this is really very hard to grasp. I’m utterly baffled by dark matter and string theory and most other things that astrophysicists spend their lives pondering, but I understand centrifugal force. Everyone who’s ever been on a merry-go-round understands centrifugal force.
But Tyson said “pear-shaped,” and the Flat Earth mememakers aren’t going to ever let him forget that.
Other Flat Earth mememakers find the word “oblate” funnier than “pear.”
There are more Neil deGrasse Tyson pear-shaped-earth memes out there — many many many more.
But I’m not sure anyone will ever be able to top this one.
Such is the state of Flat Earth memery today.
And after all this, the Flatties have so little self-awareness that they attack him for making jokes about them.
Jeez, Flat Earthers, so sensitive about a joke? Grow a pear.
Buttercup Q. Skullpants:
I hope they meet a delicate, submissive woman like Chiyoko from Akira:
http://static4.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_small/5/55582/1873199-akira_07_66.jpg
…who would probably be played by Scarlett Johansson in any future western version.
… I was going to write up a snarky list of things conspiracy theorists could do to debunk their own theories, but when all Flat Earthers would have to do is let go of whatever they happen to be holding at the moment, what’s the point?
My Little Flat Earther: Dropping Shit Is Magic.
Buttercup:
I don’t believe there is such a solar system, but we should definitely encourage all of them, to go looking for it.
Moggie:
Yeah, Im still mad about that. I love ScarJo, but dammit, I’d like to escape her once in awhile. I don’t want to see her in everything. I think I’ve reached peak ScarJo, at this point. I’m so tired of seeing her in everything it’s getting kind of spooky. Is she a clone, who needs work or something?
Incidentally someone should do a series of memes with her face superimposed on every. single. character.
@ SFHC
A flat sphere moving upwards with an acceleration of 9.81ms^2 would produce an effect indistinguishable from gravity.
Of course you’d soon have speed of light issues; although people who aren’t convinced the earth isn’t flat might not be amenable to the concept of light even having a speed.
Going to a submissive Asian galaxy is fine, but don’t go to one of those thuggish African or Middle Eastern galaxies, or you’ll be a flatearthrace traitor!
Nostalgia – feel free to skip.
Reminds me of a science class I took in high school. They made us watch a flat earth video and then discuss what we thought.
We tore into it like coyotes on an injured fawn, it was glorious. . .
Everyone knows the Earth hit the wall millennia ago! It’s just trying to force us to think it’s attractive with its big forests and pretty oceans and we’re just evolved to need its ability to sustain life!
#FatEarth
Okay, now I’m getting the mental image of ScarJo getting the opportunity to film her Dr. Strangelove, in which she plays almost all of the key roles, including the men.
PI:
Plate cucktonics.
No, I don’t know what that means either. I just like the sound.
Plate cucktonics!
Those can cause deadly volcucknic eruptions and cuckinental drift!
The logic demonstrated by these anti-Tyson memes puts me in mind of this Chris Morris sketch:
I feel conflicted, this is a person whose work I find entertaining from a perspective I am unfamiliar with. On the other hand this. Followup video of his review of Bad Homer.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=moTcZCGQoCU
He already went down the mra bowl didn’t he? I should’ve picked it up when he protested the events surrounding twitter actually enforcing some standards? Or on his views regarding sexual harassment from the family guy ep?
Gah, the stupid! It burns!
@Alan:
… A flat sphere? And it should be m/s^2 or ms^-2. But otherwise, pretty much. That’s tied in with the equivalence principle in General Relativity.
Not really. There’s a formula for adding velocities together in special relativity (u+v)/(1+(uv/c^2)). You can keep accelerating at a given rate forever, and you will asymptotically approach the speed of light, but the fact that you can’t go faster than the speed of light doesn’t mean that your acceleration has to change as you get close.
So why don’t they just fly to the edge of the Earth, take some picture of Great A’Tuin and come back?
B.O.B. is a successful rapper right? Couldn’t he raise some money for this?
@ jenora
Er, I’m trying to rebrand the circle.
That last formula is interesting. So we could theoretically have spaceships with artificial gravity for the whole journey?
okay the horizon is always at eye level, yeah yeah, sure, maybe that’s true, maybe not, I don’t care… but if you’re a flat earther, what do you think the horizon EVEN IS!? the reason the horizon exists AT ALL is because of the curve of the earth!
@msexceptiontotherule
They’re sphynx cats:
http://cdn2-www.webecoist.momtastic.com/assets/uploads/2010/02/sphynx_cats_6x.jpg
http://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/images.hellogiggles.com/uploads/2014/06/08/shutterstock_164258678-500x375c.jpg
http://www.our-happy-cat.com/images/sphynx-cat-grey.jpg
They’re like cute gremlins.
Well the Earth is 4.5 billion years old, and as we age it gets a little harder to shed the pounds from around your lower torso. Cut Earth some slack will ya, it’s got 7 billion kids to feed.
@skybison
He also needs to get a picture of an elephant or two as well, for proof.
Because the edge is surrounded by a giant ice wall that no human has the ability to go beyond. Temperatures are thought to approach absolute zero as you near the edge, so it’s impossible to explore.
It’s the edge of the sun’s light. No, really.
Also, the Flat Earth Society forum is amazing. I can’t even tell half of the time who is being sincere. Note the following exchange, talking about finding the edge of the earth:
@skybison, don’t you know? The pilots are all in on it! The great lie-about-the-shape-of-the-earth-for-some-reason-that-totally-makes-sense-I-promise conspiracy!
the edge of the sun’s light? what? why would it move with me, then?
I’m willing to join the flat Earth movement if it means I get my own personal sun that follows me around like a celestial spotlight.