grey lining

Anonymous asked: “to the people asking for evidence on these accusations: missing the point. Believe survivors.”

“I refuse to prove that I exist,” says God, “for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.” — Douglas Adams

I admit I have been very lax in my baboonology for the bulk of this year. This is a combination of mostly having better things to do coupled with what I guess can be called cognitive RSI – the gibberish at freefromthoughtblogs and skepchick, for me, is a cumulative toxin and repeat exposure does not allow for immunisation, but rather the nausea has steadily increased to the point that it is now actually painful to see. Nevertheless, I have maintained a reasonable level of awareness of their relentless psychodramatics and 唱板板 via private channels and various news feeds.

It was the latter that pointed me to a link containing the first quote above, which leapt out from the surrounding sea of yet another pernicious, well poisoning, muckraking, pro-baboon tumblr page. The statement in itself maligns no one directly – its real repugnance lies in what it expects of the reader. It is perhaps the most succinct précis I have seen to date that represents what, ultimately, is freefromthoughtblogs’ and skepchick’s true mission statement –

“scrutinise and question everything; ‘everything’ of course, does not include us. Us you believe, always and without evidence, for we are faith based organisations. Every time you doubt anything we say, no matter how preposterous, we drown a kitten”.

Douglas Adams pithy observation about religion is timeless – but never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined how accurately it also applies to the new, new atheism. Perhaps it is better he is not here to see it – because without blind faith and belief in unseen, unverifiable phenomena, freethoughtblogs and skepchick, the self-appointed torch bearers of godlessness and skepticism, are nothing.

The rest of the page, originally seen at morewillbenamed.tumblr.com, could be best considered as a snake oil distillery. It contained nothing new beyond the scurrilous slander and character assassination that is the staple of freethoughtblogs – it only stood out due to the fact the same smears were presented in concentrated, bite sized form, stripped of all the filler that on FfTB dilutes it and lets it pass, generally ignored by the non-cretin atheist and skeptic communities.

The site only existed for around 12 hours that I can ascertain – which is a shame. It was a perfect and pure representation of the vicious idiocy that is being evangelised by Myers and Watson – and it would likely have finally repulsed a further significant chunk of the remaining apologists and fence sitters that still believe these unfunny clowns somehow contribute value to A/S with an ugly dose of reality. Pages like these are the ultimate fruits of Myers’ and Watson’s labours – and they must feel so proud: encouraging any loser with an axe to grind to make anonymous, evidence free accusations of criminality against prominent A/S public figures, with no accountability or repercussions, and no mechanism for the accused to defend themselves. A fully “live” blacklist, with no checks or balances, of known ‘deviants’ to be driven out of the A/S communities by any means possible. This is precisely the toxic environment they have been working so tirelessly to create.

But as I said, the site disappeared as quickly as it appeared. I had barely clicked through the 3 pages of venom contributed in its brief 12 hour window when *poof*, “Sorry this page does not exist”, and it was gone… But more on that later. The now vacant tumblr name was almost immediately snarfed up by someone who baboons would brand a “troll” (pointless denying it, but no it was not me) and has been turned into a parody page – which, really, is the only response anyone sane can make to the shameless malignancy it replaced.

Meanwhile, another piece of this nonsense arrived in my newsfeeds – back at baboon central, the resident manic/depressive human roulette wheel was having another “episode” and adding another chapter to the poor victim narrative –

Who “famous skeptic” is, or what dung Jen flung, is anyone’s guess¹ – given that McCreight and the morons that read her have pissed on just about all of them at one time or another. While Jen is pretty much the intellectual runt of the FfTB litter, her lack of faculties in no way diminishes her enthusiasm for gutter smearing – to refresh your memories, look at what she did to Penn Jillette not too long ago. Possibly her second biggest triumph as a blogger after boobquake. Yes, her daddy is right to be proud. Whatever she did, it would have had to have been actionable to provoke this piece of self-pity theatre and to send her scurrying, beggar’s bowl in hand, to Popehat…

As for Popehat, I wonder if Jen is aware of exactly how Ken White feels about her master Peezee, who’s every vile habit Jen tries to emulate?

Ken White ® popehat wrote: He’s a practiced and increasingly successful attention whore, skilled in the classic please-notice-me three-step of saying something that is (in a very belabored fashion) outrageous, collecting predictable outraged responses, and then nailing himself to the cross over how harsh and foul and bigoted his critics are and how oppressed he is for Speaking Truth To Power. Everyone needs a hobby, I suppose. It could be worse; he could read poetry in cafes or do performance art or masturbate in the park or something.

http://www.popehat.com/2009/05/21/people-i-hate-are-hateful/

There is a lesson here from Ken White that you Jen, and the rest of the knuckleheads at FfTB, will never learn – professionalism and integrity. You can see that Ken, even though he expresses how distasteful he personally finds your baboon troop, is still prepared to defend the principles of speech and is prepared to offer professional advice, gratis. Unlike you Jen, who is happy to play judge, jury and executioner on the merest whiff of the most substance-free rumour (but only if it confirms your biases, of course).

McCreight’s purging of actionable libel prompted me to consider if these two items were related – and (mere coincidence or work o’ the devil?), give or take a timezone, McCreight’s pity party post and the vapourisation of morewillbenamed coincided…

But far be it for me to accuse BlogHog of anything without concrete evidence, even though she has over the last few years accused me of infinitely more on the basis of absolutely bugger all. I guess this is where my true “misogyny” comes to the fore… extending the benefit of doubt to all without favour, not just to the penis enhanced. Even to vapid, bipolar, dung-flinging narcissists like Jen. As an aside, shame her daddy isn’t a lawyer, or he’d come riding to her rescue as he so valiantly did during her last online meltdown.

On the other hand, were I to use “evidence” by the standards of PZ Myers and Rebecca Watson, then this is incontrovertible “proof” that McCreight was the owner of morewillbenamed. Fetch some rope and find a nice high tree…

And as for the contents of morewillbenamed, these fragments were retrieved out of various web caches. For those still dubious about the depths of the vicious stupidity those that Myers and Watson whip up into frenzies are capable of, here. Fair warning, this really is just pure libel from bitter axe grinders, but it is nonetheless evidence of what their slander mill churns out on a daily basis. None of it has not already been hinted at in one way or another at either FfTB or Skepchick. Available in an offline .zip if anyone needs it –

What I think was the first item –

http://www.freezepage.com/1375928658ZCXLQPVXOW

And the latest page prior to its purge –

http://www.freezepage.com/1375928382PPVFPEHNQF

The reactions elsewhere on FfTB are pretty much to be expected. Considering morewillbenamed was aping the behaviour that originated on their pages presented a conundrum. They couldn’t condemn, nor openly endorse. PZ Myers led the way with his usual hypocrisy –

http://freethoughtblogs.com/axp/2013/08/07/right-ways-and-wrong-ways/

The above image was screenshot from a Tumblr that’s arisen in the wake of the Stollznow revelations titled “More Will Be Named.” More than a little intimidating, that. And I suppose it’s meant to be. But an immediate problem was evident to many of us, and our very own Matt Dillahunty brought it up. To wit: there seems nothing preventing any anonymous rando from just submitting a false accusation to the site, and having some unsuspecting person’s name blasted to the world in 60-point type that they’re a groping rapey raper.

Yes, the clown actually said that, and I bet with his very best straight face.

Stefanny Zwan preferred the rationalisation by trivialisation route. First, the routine of being informed about it with a claim of no prior knowledge (look ma, a flying pig), followed by “who cares? It’s only tumblr… harmless…”

http://freethoughtblogs.com/almostdiamonds/2013/08/07/on-anonymous-accusations/

Truly world class sophistry. This is the serial slanderer that launched the anti-Vacula petition, amongst an endless catalogue of other filth, and had a conniption fit when Vacula published Sulky Amy’s personal details using her own sheltered workshop jewellery advertising propaganda and links. Anonymously naming and accusing individuals of rape without evidence is… harmless.

And, of course, there’s Greta Christina who barfed up this gem in a post that plays logical fallacy bingo: The Jenny McCarthy defence –

http://freethoughtblogs.com/greta/2013/08/12/harassment-rape-skepticism-denialism/

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. But claims of sexual harassment, abuse, assault, and rape are not extraordinary. They are depressingly ordinary. So the level of evidence we should need to believe a claim about sexual harassment, abuse, assault, or rape is substantially lower than the level of evidence we should need to believe a claim about, say, Bigfoot.

Uhuh. So “vaccines cause autism” deserves more respect than it’s given? Greta, you are The Queen amongst queens of pretentious, mendacious gibberish mongers. Quod erat demonstrandum.

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Since I wrote much of the above, an event has transpired that has rendered it all pifflingly trivial. And event that can justifiably be called, in terms of the A/S communities, The Singularity. An event which, I have always maintained, was a matter of when, not if, with the only variable being who.

PZ Myers is being sued for libel.

As much as I hate the lawyers’ feeding trough that is libel law, in this one case I make an exception. This is an event that is way, way overdue. Myers is, without any shadow of a doubt, the most vicious, shameless, treacherous and indiscriminate slanderer I have ever encountered. Under normal circumstances, his natural cowardice confines his poisonous spite to little fish, private bloggers (like me) and small time gelato shop owners (but only when he has the safety of hiding behind several state borders) who do not have the means to defend themselves. But this time Myers, in his never ending lust for gutter tabloid superstardom, has bitten someone that has the means to bite back. And bite back they did. I won’t rehash what has been covered elsewhere –

Origins (note the sick compulsion to inject the imagery of violence into the title), and frozen page in case it vanishes –

What do you do when someone pulls the pin and hands you a grenade?

http://www.freezepage.com/1376358218SBRRWUAFRJ

The “cease and desist”, an initial step required by California law, noting Myers’ usual revisionism of the original post –

http://www.scribd.com/doc/159838891/shermer-cease-and-desist-letter-to-pzm

https://i.imgur.com/ZUvIeHv.jpg

Al’s view –

I got your ‘grenade’ right here…

AtheistRev’s view –

More Internet Vigilantism as Shermer Accused of Rape

Justicar explaining the bleeding obvious to the obtuse (as per usual) –

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Myers narcissistic hubris at the C&D letter, quickly removed (no doubt from frantic legal advice), but fished out of online caches. The commentary is a lovely snapshot of the FfTB hive mind –

Lawyering up

Of particular note is Myers slimy trademarked shifting around of the narrative’s intent and ramping up the “poor victim” fear to suit the fluid political dynamics –

PZ Myers 12 August 2013 at 5:52 pm (UTC -5)

Yeah, I sent a quick note to ken at popehat — just for recommendations on what I should do next. I’ve also contacted my correspondent — she calls it “terrifying”. And she’s the one I’m most concerned about here.

And here we are. The bubble has burst. Myers has until 2:00 pm California time on Wednesday, August 14 to respond. Simple removal of the offending material will not suffice – nothing less than a full retraction and public apology will do. For a self-absorbed, infallible, unstoppable egomaniac like Myers, the sensation of impacting with an immovable object must be sublime. Much like a dog that’s used to feasting on steak and shitting in its masters bed with impunity suddenly having its own faeces rammed down its throat. The Naked One is probably watching this unfold through the bottom of a bottle, but sooner or later, he’s going to have to sober up and face it like the adult he’s spent his entire life desperately avoiding being.

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To accuse another human being of behaviour considered heinous by the general population on a public stage, without evidence and without the accused having opportunity for defence or the right to face their accuser, is beyond simply reprehensible. It is the tactical foundation of the Holy Inquisition, the show trial and Senator McCarthy’s HUAC – it is in fact one of the core foundation stones of all despotism.

Accusations of rape lie at the extreme end of such accusations. It is an accusation of the kind that sticks and has the potential to follow the named individual for a lifetime. Shermer is already receiving tweets like these, tweets that, quite simply, never should need tweeting –

Let’s turn this cat inside out and imagine someone scrutinising PZ Myers with the same malicious intent.

What one would immediately notice is his overt, possibly unhealthy, penchant for being surrounded by far younger women, some still teenagers – specifically the adolescent idiots at Skepchick. Using the same, “objective” analytic skills that the readers of FfTB and Skepchick use to cast judgement on all and sundry, one could rapidly arrive at the diagnosis of ephebophilia…

Unfortunately, courts the world over see no distinction between ephebophilia and pedophilia. See where this is going chumpy? Technically, using your very own standards of examination, you can be painted as a pedo… And there is no shortage of anecdotes from “people to scared to speak out” to support it. Real life “testimonials” like the one to the right (click to enlarge). There are many more. And you know what? I don’t find them that outrageous. I have stood in a bar, right next to you, and seen the way your gaze wonders, the way your spittle forms. I shudder to think what actually goes on in your mind.

There’s an old aphorism about glasshouses and stones I was saving for this, but it’s just eluding me. No matter. I’m sure someone with a brain as big as Peezee will remember it.

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So where do we go to from here? I really can’t help it, but deep down I’m hoping Myers’ idiot arrogance fills him with the same self-righteous, TrueBeliever, biggest-internet-warrior-in-the-world idiocy that possesses him whenever he’s seated safely behind his keyboard – and he fights Shermer. His history of Shermer bashing dates back well beyond this incident; the Pharyngula archives are overflowing with similar slanders; and then there’s the behaviour of the rest of the losers that make up whatever the status quo of the fainting couch (n) is right at the moment. It is vast catalogue of viciousness and personal invective that really, as far as intellect and intent go, is indistinguishable from Stormfront or Fox News. All of this will get dredged up. Perhaps, faintest hope of hopes, a class action eventuates – but that’s getting ahead of ourselves. Regardless of what actually happens, I do entertain the hope that Myers’ party is over.

I want to close with an extract from Myers’ What do you do when someone pulls the pin and hands you a grenade? post, the straw that broke the camel’s back, and of course it’s an unverified anecdote from an unidentified correspondent. It was added post-Shermer’s C&D as part of Myers’ usual obfuscatory plays, and is reproduced it in full as it gives us a glimpse into what the actual problems we face might be –

Michael Shermer was the guest of honor at an atheist event I attended in Fall 2006; I was on the Board of the group who hosted it. It’s a very short story: I got my book signed, then at the post-speech party, Shermer chatted with me at great length while refilling my wine glass repeatedly. I lost count of how many drinks I had. He was flirting with me and I am non-confrontational and unwilling to be rude, so I just laughed it off. He made sure my wine glass stayed full.

And that’s the entirety of my story: Michael Shermer helped get me drunker than I normally get, and was a bit flirty. I can’t recall the details because I was intoxicated. I don’t remember how I left, but I am told that a friend took me away from the situation and home from the party. Note, I’d never gotten drunk at any atheist event before; I was humiliated by having gotten so drunk and even more ashamed that my friends had to cart me off before anything happened to me.

But I had a bad taste in my mouth about Shermer’s flirtatiousness, because I’m married, and I thought he was kind of a pig. I didn’t even keep his signed book, I didn’t want it near me.

Over the years as rumors have flown about atheist women warning each other about a lecherous author/speaker, I thought of all the authors and speakers I had met during my time as an atheist activist, and I guessed that Shermer was the one being warned against.

Now there are tweets and blogs about his sexually inappropriate behavior as well as his fondness for getting chicks drunk, so I feel quite less alone. I don’t think he realizes he is doing anything wrong. Men who behave inappropriately sexually never think they are doing anything wrong.

I have mixed feelings about your grenade-dropping. I have heard arguments both for and against what you did. Whether or not I agree with it, I just want to say that the accusations against Shermer match up with my personal experience with him, insofar as he seemed hellbent on helping me get drunk, and was very flirty with me. Take it for what you will. I believe the accusers.

This paints a rather depressing, if accurate, picture of what FfTB and Skepchick consider “normal” – the frail, innocent, utterly helpless Vestal Virgin at the mercy of unrelenting beasts; the complete incapacity to make personal decisions or accept responsibility for oneself; everything, but everything, is coercion, there is no free will –“look what he made me do!!!”; everything, but everything, is debased and deconstructed into a perverse sexualised power game; and fear hangs like a pea soup fog in the air. Genuine innocence and bidirectional interaction is a dead and buried corpse. The women are feeble. They must be protected.

And the critical missing piece of the picture? No mention of Shermer, the rapist, bringing his fiendish plot to fruition by offering to help this woman back to her room. All that hard work for naught. The whole fantasy piece kind of falls apart doesn’t it? And it makes me think, if this is what makes Shermer a rapist, then I’m Ted Bundy. When I’m at a convention dinner, as I was at the 2010 GAC, my cossack blood kicks in, and it is one of the rare situations where I volunteer myself for a leadership role. I fit into the shoes of the host without thinking about it – I’m there to have a good time, and I feel duty bound that others have one to. I made sure no one’s glass ran dry, and even though a couple of ladies at the table could be considered attractive, especially dolled up, it never even entered my mind to consider the situation in terms of base, exploitative opportunism. This small piece of trivia is what separates the baboons from the rational world – everything, for the likes of Watson and Myers, is viewed through the prism of vulgar utilitarianism. The very idea that people can simply enjoy each others’ company without manipulating advantage and petty cost-benefit analytics seems genuinely alien to them. From this cold, calculating and, ultimately, jaundiced and inhuman perspective, it leaves no other motive in their minds for Shermer’s conviviality other than as a tactical ploy for the sake of abusing of power. And they call us sick? This is the raw, sphinctre-clinching fear of the neo-puritan – and this is where Myers and Watson want to drag our communities.

Let’s cut through the nonsense – I want to shred the Myers/Watson small “c” cynical deconstruction and debasement of our communities and take a step back for a broader look. I posit, as I have from the outset, that the sexism and misogyny nonsense they peddle is exactly that – nonsense. All it amounts to is a wedge they can use to drive into the ground and exploit for their own, let’s be blunt, culturally Marxist agendas – and breed division, ill-will, corruption of trust, fear etc. and then milk our fragmented communities via their travelling side show, peddling their 100% pure snake oil miracle cures. In effect, they dictate to us that they have the only solutions to the problems they created in the first place.

What bollocks. The real cause of our grief has been the ascent of the victim classes and their installation to a position of sacred untouchability, where the merest acts of criticism or questioning are decried as harassment and abuse. What freefromthoughtblogs and Skepchick have achieved is the empowerment of the absolute worst segments of the A/S communities to a position of absolute power from which they can damn the rest of us on the slightest whim. This is the new Jacobin Club, Myers is Robespierre and this is their reign of terror – merrily purging the intellectuals that stand in the way of their OneTrueWay.

Lets face it – the general readership that propel Myers and Watson forward are losers. The absolute worst our species has to offer – completely dysfunctional broken units, addicted to therapists and painkillers and absolutely incapable of interacting meaningfully with the world outside their sheltered workshops, with no useful skills other than wallowing in their own self-pity, absolutely incapable of differentiating, unassisted, common good nature from malignant evil – any external action, regardless of intent invoking an animal-recoiling-from-fire type fear. Don’t believe me? Go read the FfTB and Skepchick forums, or better yet, if you have the stomach, those of Atheism+. Try this if you’re brave –

Effects of not having privilege(Trigger Warning: Oppression)

And then on top of this, we take these hollowed out shells of quasi-humanoids and we invite them to large conventions, drafting harassment policies and cleaving away safe spaces for them to tentatively mingle with actual fully autonomous, personally responsible, mature adult human beings. And then… we feed them copious quantities of alcohol…

Seriously, what imbecile ever considered this to be a good idea?

Sometimes, the simplest solution to bullshit like this is hiding in plain sight. Really, what is the common factor to most of this crap? Booze. What was Becky Watson doing on the night prior to concocting her elevator fairytale? A twelve our bender in the hotel bar prior to stumbling back to her room at 4 AM. And all of Myers’ too-scared-too-talk expert witnesses? Booze is the common factor again.

At every turn with every new drama, always there is booze involved. Want to solve 99% of these problems? Easy. Make conferences and their attached venues dry areas. No booze. Stop the people that have no right to claim to be adults from indulging in the strictly adult social practice of drinking.

As for the real, functional adults – well they can book off-site bars where they can go have fun, blow off steam, mingle, laugh and bump uglies if they damn well please – in a safe, idiot free environment, spared the puritanical wrath of the professional victim brigade. Signed disclaimer mandatory –

• I am a responsible adult.
• I and I alone am responsible for my actions.
• I am here of my own free will and my will is my own.
• If I make an ass of myself tonight, I accept sole responsibility and I’ll eat what’s coming to me.

Problem solved. Too easy. All it takes is the will. Then maybe the real folks in the A/S communities can move on and focus on the things they should be focussing on.

Special bonus trivia  – Senator Joseph McCarthy’s died from acute hepatitis induced liver failure, most biographers now agreeing that it was due to life long alcoholism. Don’t you think that’s amusing Peezee?

Special bonus widget – P.Z. Myers Happy Rape Accusation Humiliation Countdown Clock

Special bonus “how the outside world sees us” link – ‘Science Falsely So Called’: How Can You Prove Your Innocence, Professor Krauss?

Special bonus Youtube clips – See PZ Myers and Rebecca Watson live up to their own impeccable standards. Watson is driving the camera in the second clip.

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¹ – The “famous skeptic” is probably Lawrence Krauss. Though as I’ve said, given the continuous indiscriminate character assassination that is the bread and butter of freefromthought blogs, it really could have been anyone. The deleted material dug out of Webcite cache –

http://webcitation.org/6IinTdv4o

Quote BlogHog –

Maybe Krauss is totally innocent. I can’t personally make any claims about his behavior since I’ve never really interacted with him. But I can say it’s true that multiple women have independently come to me with similar claims despite not knowing each other, and that is mighty suspicious. I’m not hyperskeptical of the common and mundane – aka, sexual harassment.

How gracious. Acknowledging his right to presumption of innocence, but going right ahead and repeating evidence free knitting circle gossip from unknown individuals with unknown motives anyway. Ends justify the means eh Jen? What’s a few broken eggs for the greater good? What a moral sewer your life is.