The bolded is where the disconnect is.
It’s not a “differing viewpoint”. Dawkins is wrong here. Full stop. I’m sure it’s been explained to him in much the same way it’s been explained to you.
At best, it’s a careless and ignorant choice of language that he should have apologized for by now. Has he? That tweet is 2 weeks old. What has he said since then?
The conservative side of most issues is overwhelmingly not arguing in good faith to the point where assuming good faith in any public debate feels like a massive waste of time. Basically, a bunch of JAQ offs ruined it for everyone else.
For better or worse, if you want your differing viewpoint to be engaged with, you need to demonstrate that you are intelligent, that you’ve done your research, and that you understand why people like Dawkins and Harris are viewed with skepticism.
What? No. There are plenty of good debates out there.
Lol, troll game respects troll game:
Sorry Cactus, you’re several levels below that level of elite troll.
This thread is helping me balance my poster ignore range.
My favorite posters are the ones where strength of assertion is inversely prepositional to knowledge.
That is, if I may be so bold, an interesting approach.
Wait, why are you bringing up nationality? What if I went to Sunnydale High for two years but graduated from Bayside High but want to identify as a Sunnyside alum? Is that not allowed?
Does your work have unisex or non gender bathrooms? Do they support transitioning through additional leave or their medical plan? Would an out trans person be safe walking around your office or going out for work drinks? Would a new trans emplyee be the first trans person many people in your work have seen? Are there visible signs of trans safety for employees and customers?
Depending on your answers, assuming someones gender without asking is very low down the list of things you need to be working on.
Also people are making this increasingly less ambiguous in many settings. Most people I know have a preferred pronouns identifier in their workplace email signature for example to help things along. There’s no need to walk on eggshells with this stuff if we create an inclusive environment.
@Cactus again, the lady from the OP was a whitelady who was the chapter president of the NAACP who ‘identified’ as black without really disclosing to anyone that this was not her ‘birth race’. This is super problematic and someone in that kind of position should be smart enough to understand that they would need to disclose this to the minorities that she is ‘representing’ in the community. Therefore Dawkins Twitter post is total balderdash and horseshit.
In general I don’t support people getting cancelled for slighty problematic views or saying something and not really understanding what that deeply meant, but I’m not really aware of any instances of this if someone owned their mistake and apologized. The main thing that happens is random people just generally being toxic to public people which is not a new phenomenon. So in this instance, which is worse, the canceling of some dude who should know better and but 7 logical fallacies into a misrepresentation designed to create a poor environment for an entire group of people, or this mythical karen unicorn who was canceled because they took some backward viewpoint then apologized and wasn’t let back into the herd. I’m sure the later has happened more than zero times but are you aware of any instances of this? Is the majority feeling too oppressed in our society?
It’s still so funny that cactus is using IDW debate points from 4 years ago.
Now he’s saying oh what if I was born half Korean and half Vietnamese and want to identify as one, lmaooo I want to believe he’s just trolling but sadly I don’t think he is
Are we drawing live to an “Is there something wrong with demanding integrity in video game journalism”?
He’s not trolling. He’s just a child. That jogs with a loaded pistol in his spandex hot pants.
I jog with a loaded pistol in my pants, too, if you know what I mean.
The post by RegretS is excellent in that he points out the majority (like most people here) will think it’s a dunk tweet because they are unaware Dawkins himself is aware of what it’s problematic. Where he went wrong was in his use of the word “choose”. You have to be very careful with wording. You don’t "choose to be gay, trans, or your race. To me, that’s the inexcusable part of the tweet
And I fully understand and respect this. But I also understand that some (usually religious) people won’t and will refuse to abide by these definitions. My main question in posting this thread is if we’re okay with that? Or are we going to take away their jobs, awards, and vilify them out of existence? Or worse… Should we enact laws forcing them to use the wording we prefer?
You guys misunderstand the living shit out of 99% of my posting. I admit I’m not smart enough (or just don’t live this shit 24/7 the way many of you do) to comprehend these issues without stepping back and seriously thinking about them. And I’ll make careless errors like Dawkins did here. I try and look at all sides. I’m all for, and willing to fight for equal rights of gay people, trans people, racial equality, etc. I think government should absolutely accommodate them with whatever facilities and programs they can. But when you start going after other citizens or trying to force them into a certain mindset, I think that’s wrong even if I myself think they’re mindset is 100% wrong
I remember Dawkins had another huge mishap a while ago (I think it was involving abortion or women’s rights). Can’t remember what it was, but it was a very clumsy tweet. I guess scholars and people like him should be held to a much higher standard. They’re not like me where if I’m clumsy with my wording all I got to deal with are a bunch of no-lifes with nothing better to do than circle jerk on each other in some internet forum
He’s wrong because he used the word “choose”. I missed that and it’s all that needed to be pointed out with respect to him and I’d have backed off immediately. I think it was a poor choice of words on his part. Otherwise, he’s probably done more for LGBTQ rights that most through his activism on religious nonsense. If he were to come out and say he really thought it’s a choice, I’d be just as disgusted with him as anyone else. I just don’t believe he really thinks that. How can he as a scientist?
I agree with this
I would think Dawkins (and Harris and Peterson) have shown they’ve done their research and are intelligent enough to debate almost anyone. I disagree with some of Harris’s viewpoints and most of Peterson’s, but god damn I’m willing to concede they deserve to speak at any respectable university
Saw it right after you liked it. Didn’t think it was worth mentioning. I’m 98% sincere/2% troll. I always start off sincere, but when I get childish idiotic unthinking put downs hat’s when the gun in swimming trunks and while jogging trolling begins for my own amusement rather than get into a back and forth posting of cartoon memes
Allowed in my book.
They wouldn’t have any of those problems with me personally. Yes, we have a unisex restroom (although I’m not sure it’s specifically there for unisex).
Many in my office do too. Again, I’m more focused on the enemy than I am the victim, because it’s the enemy that threatens minorities. Whether it’s about race, guns, trans people, or any progressive cause, I’d rather educate the other side before cancelling or shaming. I just don’t think that works
I liken it to smoking. My grandmother says that when she was growing up almost everyone smoked. You could even smoke on airplanes, or in movie theaters. I’ve watched real live footage of the Apollo moon landing and they were smoking in the fucking control room! Now, the overwhelming majority of people don’t smoke and it’s not because they were shamed, cancelled, or because of any laws against it. It was simply because people became educated to the negative effects of smoking. As more and more people DIDN’T smoke others realized that hey, maybe they’re onto something and I shouldn’t either. And now they don’t smoke for all the right reasons. I’d much prefer someone respect a trans person’s rights because he understands WHY they should have equal rights and not because he felt forced into doing so. Even if he complies, he’ll still be a bigoted POS. Once he/they see they’re in the minority, they’ll have to step back and reconsider that their position is wrong
So getting back to free speech. The Dawkins tweet reminded me of Canada’s law and maybe I conflated the two. But I don’t think laws, cancelling, shaming, and taking back awards, are the way to go regardless of what the topic is. There is a huge divide in this country (world?) and I don’t think silencing people is the way to go, but rather more discussion is needed. As it is, the right wing party of the US has no actual policy points and are reduced to fighting off the left for silencing them and it’s fucking working for like 70M of their base
/end
No I’m not. I’m just an average non political PC junkie struggling to understand why 70M Americans are racist pieces of shit. And I think the answer has more to do with you guys. I mean, I get that you didn’t make them racist and they were racist all along, but the reason they can’t seem to catch up with the rest of society is because people like you are not only useless when it comes to educating, but you cause them to dig in and tell you to fuck off
This sounds like a “you” problem.
grunching lol Wookie has a PhD in biology
I was scatting and bebopping on Cactus in the other thread so I’m gonna take his side here. I don’t think Dawkins was being hateful, he was just being a square old fogey who’s never been to a pride parade. I got big calling-my-grandkids-for-help-programming-the-VCR energy from that tweet.
