So how about that Paula Deen, huh? First there’s the whole thing with producing recipes for cheeseburgers served between two doughnuts while diabetic, and then there’s the racism. Isn’t American life interesting?

She has faced a volley of criticism this week over her remarks in a deposition for a discrimination lawsuit by a former employee. In the document, she admitted she had used racial slurs, tolerated racist jokes and condoned pornography in the workplace.

Part of her down-home charm, isn’t it? Wasn’t that the idea?

Ms. Deen has managed to offend even her most uncritical fans before, most recently in January 2012 when she announced her diagnosis of Type 2 diabetes on the same day she endorsed the diabetes drug Victoza and a lucrative collaboration with Novo Nordisk, the drug’s manufacturer. Because she had built her career on a no-holds-barred approach to sugar and fat (creating recipes like a cheeseburger patty sandwiched between two doughnuts and a Better than Sex cake made with cake mix, pudding mix, and heavy cream), she was roundly criticized for encouraging an unhealthy diet for others, hiding her illness and then trying to profit from it.

Well I’ve always liked Lidia Bastianich better anyway.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Guest post by Eamon Knight and AJ Milne.

Eamon Knight, starting with a silly claim by Rabbi Sacks:

you cannot expect the foundations of western civilisation to crumble and leave the rest of the building intact.

I see this fallacious metaphor often enough that it deserves a name. A society is not a building; it does not rest on its history in the same sense a building rests on its footings. A society is more like a living organism, with the capability of continually renewing and even resculpting itself (think of the radical transformation of insect larvae into adults).

(But if we do want to run with the civil engineering metaphor, note that these days, we can even replace the footings of large historic buildings in situ, eg. replacing rotted wooden pilings with modern materials like concrete and polymers. And in fact Western societies have been gradually, over the last few centuries, replacing the rotten wood of _a priori_ moral order with secular ethics based on known human needs.)

AJ Milne, starting with Eamon’s retort:

I see this fallacious metaphor often enough that it deserves a name. A society is not a building; it does not rest on its history in the same sense a building rests on its footings. A society is more like a living organism, with the capability of continually renewing and even resculpting itself (think of the radical transformation of insect larvae into adults).

Now that’s actually a decent metaphor, right there.

And re replacing rotting wood, exactly. And it’s not like it’s a new thing, either.

It isn’t like this is actually such an obscure phenomenon, Dear Mr. Sacks. But let’s review all the same, as apparently you’re in the slow class…

See, the earliest human civilizations of any size were fairly brutal affairs by modern standards. And there’s something of a continuum from those to what the various modern states try to make work now. I figure the earliest monarches are a little better than straight out dictatorships really only in that succession is worked out ahead of time, and the relative continuity of the hierarchy did, over time, allow a somewhat persistent social contract between the rulers and the ruled, which could then evolve to something a little less brutally one-sided. If you were lucky, anyway. As in: if it’s been worked out the king actually has to try people (or at least people with any title) in public and declare the charges, his son is generally expected to follow the same rules if he wants to get along as well as he did with folk who might care and might also be armed and/or tempermental.

That’s one of the things state religions maybe did for civilization: having a proper royal cult turned the tyrant into a king, and the state religions Constantine and Uthman found convenient for their purposes did much the same job. That’s one of the ways religious flakes maybe get to declare their preferred superstition a ‘foundation’…

But it hardly means anyone* wants the pharoahs back. Shocking, I guess, how we’ve allowed that particular bit of masonry to ‘crumble’, too, innit.

And the reality is, against the fable propagandists like Sacks sell, it was never about an absolute code. The code was always being worked out and modified over time by humans; it’s just that over the same time, this process has become somewhat less obscurantist. Time was once you declared yourself god and had a priesthood dutifully inform the people regularly that they’d better bow if they knew what was good for them; time moves on and if you had sufficient political acumen maybe you pick your holy man and holy book, or edit it to fit the needs, à la Constantine, and then thereafter if you get a little selective about which rules the constabulary actually bother to enforce, well, again, let’s be practical; who’s going to check whose shirt is of mixed fibres anyway? (Mind, this presents problems, sure; fundamentalists will fundament, given half a chance, and having that canon around was always a hazard that way, but anyway, we’re working with what we got, here…)

And then take that celebrated Magna Carta; it has a proper ‘in God’s name’ on it, somewhere, but it was a treaty made effectively at the point of a sword (and at best very selectively followed for generations after and only revived as the Rule To Follow somewhat conveniently by a parliamentarian who liked the cut of its jib much, much later). And now lots of modern parliaments argue like mad about what the law’s to be, and if you’re paying attention, what actually winds up written, it’s about a lot of things and power and politics and stability and who may actually protest and who may actually pay and who may actually show up to vote and so on… But some clerk will still have the job of stamping some god’s name on the finished document at the end of the day to make it all official-like, all the same. This is a little more naked than were those earlier emperors who would declare themselves god and then work out just what they could get their barons to tithe as a more practical matter behind closed doors, but the principle’s much the same.

Now you can protest legislation isn’t morality, but again, the latter’s essentially the same phenomenon, and they do reflect one another. And they do evolve similarly, and are similarly subject to revision. And we do, again, work them out, bit by bit, between ourselves, as we bump up against one another, fight and argue and sometimes get along. We’re social beasts with this curious thing about us called culture that can change vastly faster than can our biology, and change it does.

So, seriously: Sacks thinks the Gnus aren’t thinking about this? Huh. Cute…

I might be more impressed with his self-serving, tediously overexposed smear, if I could see he were. Or at least that he were reporting it with the faintest interest in reflecting something remotely like the reality our civilization has lived.

(*/Or wait, in fairness, there’s probably people who do. So let’s keep outvoting them, shall we?)

Part deux

I figure I kinda know the minds of hacks like Sacks by now. Next it’s gonna be, oh, look, religion did this great thing, made kings from tyrants, isn’t that great, hallelujah, yadda yadda…

Let’s not oversell anything. Kings may be a mite better, sure. A little more stability, a few fewer revolutions and violent bloodlettings over succession, that’s nice, sure…

But until it’s been tamed by time and politics and angry mobs and rebel barons, that’s the only thing that’s better about a monarchy. And lots of places the only way you get anything near a modern democracy out of that is when those pesky and frequently very ugly Enlightenment revolutions get rolling, and various dark threats about nooses made of intestines are uttered. Some places it’s less marked and total than those revolutions, but even there it’s a messy business often beginning in the streets; you don’t get to Elizabeth II and her largely ceremonial role from Henry VIII without a few very ugly brawls. And claiming any religion has a whole hell of a lot to do with any of that is again, typically facile and self-serving. Note that, sure, it took off in Christian Europe first, but it’s not like we particularly see the religious authorities universally egging it on, either, nor is it ever real clear it’s the religion that has a lot to do with that so much as the wealth and prosperity spreading more generally through society, the causes of which may have as much to do with geography as human creeds. And at a more meta level, sure, the priesthood sometimes does get closer to the people than the king they’re supposed to support, and the politics gets complicated, and you get your Romeros and your revolution theology, but that’s no more surprising than the fact that sometimes the people working in the secret police start realizing what they’re supporting with their work really isn’t in their long-term interest either.

And none of this, of course, again, makes the underlying code laid down by any particular religion at any particular time sacred, nor the religion itself that important, nor at all indispensable. Publicly run programs and less formal community and social groups fill vast areas of the civic roles the old state religions took (public education, especially, not that the religion is always so happy about letting that go). What’s worth discussing at any time, sure, is how well those are filling needs, and that will always be a complicated story, and secular democracies, as relatively new phenomena, are always working on those, and societies in general always tuning, always fiddling, and probably always will be. But this isn’t a sign of some dreadful underlying malaise or decay; it’s the hallmarks of the living, dynamic, changeable things our societies all are.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

More from the God hates women brigade.

Sajila Gujjar, 18, was a first year university student studying computer science in the Pakistani city of Quetta.

Family and friends described her as talented, intelligent and determined to make a difference.

She was especially popular among younger children in the Faqirabad neighbourhood of the city where she lived – providing them with free after-school tuition classes.

Last Saturday, Sajila left her home in the morning for university.

“It was the last day of her exams and she was looking forward to her summer holidays,” her mother recalls.

It was the last time her mother saw her.

In the afternoon, Sajila’s father Shahjahan Gujjar, received a phone call. A female suicide bomber had been used to target the students on a university bus and 14 young women were dead including his daughter.

The injured were taken to a nearby hospital, and relatives rushed there, so then the hospital was attacked by men with guns. Nurses were killed.

“This was an attack on women’s education because they want to keep us illiterate,” says Sana Bashir, a teenage biotechnology student who narrowly escaped the bombing.

She’s brave though. Appallingly brave.

Established in 2004, Sardar Bahadur Khan Women’s University is the only all-female university in the province of Balochistan.

For some tribal and conservative families in smaller towns, it was seen as the only place to send their daughters for higher education.

The bloodshed on the university campus may well change that now.

Sana feels the attack is a setback for women’s education. But she says it is not going to stop her from going back to her studies.

“We cannot let them achieve their targets [of preventing female education]. No matter what happens, I am determined to continue with my education. We cannot give up our goals we have worked so hard for.”

She shouldn’t have to be brave. It shouldn’t take appalling courage to go to university.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Dan Cardamon looks back on The Great War and rallies the troops. He exaggerates the time a little – it’s two years, not three – but it feels like twenty, so hyperbole makes sense.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYw-HjKrmY4

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

A funny bit on Hemant’s post about AA and Ed Clint and the lawsuit. One branch of the conversation somehow turned to harassment, when one wag (nymmed ”whatever”) joked that the fashion for conspiracy theories started with my documentation of harassment. Others disagreed and it went on as such things do.

Martin Wagner to Whatever

So people are harassing her on Twitter (which you admit), she complains about it (understandable), and your reply is that she has it coming. Glad we got your number on all this.

Whatever to Martin Wagner

        So people are harassing her on Twitter (which you admit)

No, I admit to no such thing. Ophelia calls it harassment. I call it a lot of shitty little comments designed to get Ophelia worked up. And it evidently works all too well.

Hahahahahaha – isn’t that great? No, it’s not harassment, it’s a lot of shitty little comments designed to get someone worked up. Totally different thing.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Update I had about two minutes before I had to dash off and I wanted to flag up these two posts but I didn’t have time to say anything.

I meant to say how proud I am to have Nirmukta among us.

Because of Anita’s wonderful post Why Your Daughter’s Marriage Shouldn’t Be Your Biggest Dream For Her for instance,

Placing emphasis on marriage means raising girls in a manner primarily aimed at moulding them into a societal expectation of what an ideal bride or wife should be like, instead of fostering and encouraging individual characteristics. And in a patriarchal society, these demands are never free of misogyny. The perfect wife looks like Aishwarya Rai, talks like Mother Teresa and is willing to be submissive like Sita. She is unambitious, unassertive, unaware or not demanding of her rights, and has been blessed with extra invisible hands to successfully manage all household work and (increasingly) also a job without the slightest complaints. Girls then are taught from a young age to value their looks more than their talents and skills, to place their career aspirations or financial independence secondary to the need for being married at the ‘right’ time and having kids, and to perpetuate this vicious cycle through their own daughters, all the while carrying a burden of living up to the good girl myth so as to not ‘invite’ rape, lest they become used goods. Because rape is something that is given to us when we “ask for it”, and the unit of measurement of a woman’s worth is virginity. Right?

And because of Sunil on “Brahmins Only” Housing.

A visit to their website confirms that their objective is the preservation and perpetuation of Brahmanism:

To preserve, protect, propagate and strengthen intellectual identity, integrity and self- esteem of the noble culture of Sanathana Dharma, spanning its various sampradayas and traditions represented by Acharyas and Gurus.

When we posted the image on the Indian Atheists page it got the expected amount of anger, but there were also a handful of commenters who thought this ought to be allowed. This post attempts to tease out the moral arguments for and against. (I’m not neutral on the matter and will make my position clear too.)

He goes on to do that.

Nirmukta is great. I’m so pleased to have them as colleagues.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Margaret Doughty has decided to become a US citizen – and has hit an obstacle.

…an USCIS official asked Doughty to confirm that, when asked, she would take up arms in defense of the United States. Doughty, who had just been made to swear an oath to tell the truth (as is customary with citizenship applications), felt honor-bound to answer the question…truthfully. She responded that she would be unfailingly loyal to the United States, but that her conscience doesn’t allow her to inflict violence on another person.

The immigration agent explained that the question, in Doughty’s case, was pretty much academic. The United States does not put sexagenarians on the front lines. Doughty, however, felt helpless to change her answer, and the agent told her that was going to be a problem, claiming that the USCIS recognizes only religiously-motivated objectors (Doughty isn’t religious; she identifies as an agnostic).

This is a long-standing issue with conscientious objection: religious c.o. is accepted while non-religious c.o. is not – as if “conscientious” simply meant “religious,” which it doesn’t.

Doughty is appealing to her Congressman, Blake Farenthold, for help with her case, and has been heartened by a letter written by Freedom From Religion Foundation attorney Andrew Seidel, who let the USCIS know in no uncertain terms that the law is not on the agency’s side. Wrote Seidel:

Either the officers in Houston are inept, or they are deliberately discriminating against nonreligious applicants for naturalization.

Seidel, however, cannot act as Doughty’s attorney, and the applicant has a call in to a local immigration lawyer who might.

Let’s remind each other to keep an eye on this.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Boko Haram has been busy killing people again.

Residents of Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, said suspected members of Boko Haram on Monday killed 22 persons in separate attacks. They said the terrorists were on a revenge mission against youth vigilante groups that have been hunting them.

The gunmen on Monday at about 3 p.m. attacked a secondary school, Ansarudeen Private School, Maiduguri, and opened fire on students writing their final year exams. Nine students were killed, while several others were seriously injured in the attack, residents of the area said.

The incident occurs less than 24 hours after gunmen attacked a school in neighbouring Yobe State, killing seven students and two teachers. Borno and Yobe, alongside Adamawa, are under emergency rule with a massive deployment of soldiers to the states.

In another incident in Borno on Monday, the gunmen attacked a group of fishermen on the banks of the Alau River, on the outskirts of Maiduguri, killing 13 of them.

Does god hate human beings? It looks that way.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

What is the difference between Bishop Burton College in Beverley, Yorks, and the Taliban?

Not much.

A young woman was suspended from college after accusing fellow students of rape and  sexual assault, a court heard.

Three men have gone on trial at Hull Crown Court accused of abusing the woman on  campus at Bishop Burton College.

The alleged victim, who is in her late teens, gave evidence to say she was told  to leave the college after reporting the men to staff.

Bishop “Taliban” Burton College.

The woman told the jury her parents persuaded her to report it to the police  after she received a letter from the college recommending she be excluded.

“I told the college I had been sexually assaulted but I didn’t give the  details of what had happened, I just gave them an outline,” she said.

“The college said I had brought it into disrepute by having sexual actions  with a group of people.

“A couple of days later they recommended that I was excluded.

“I was upset about it and my mum persuaded me to go to the police.”

The court heard a senior member of staff at the college interviewed the  alleged victim and sent her a letter which read: “I’m writing to confirm you  have received a recommendation for exclusion from the college for bringing the  college into disrepute by demeaning sexual actions with a group of people.”

It’s because she couldn’t find four male witnesses to the assault, I suppose.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

House Republicans have succeeded in passing a bill (which won’t make it through the Senate) demonstrating their hostility to women.

The Republican-controlled House of Representatives on Tuesday passed legislation severely restricting abortions, a move that could alienate women from the conservative party.

The bill would ban abortions 20 weeks after fertilization occurs, a time when a fetus begins to feel pain, Republicans said. The legislation makes exceptions for victims of rape and incest as long as they first report the crime to authorities.

And ask the Republican Party for forgiveness.

Republican leaders inserted an amendment to the bill that allows rape or incest victims to get an abortion if they reported the crime – a change abortion rights advocates said would shame and judge victims who are often reluctant to report the crime.

The legislation, called the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act…

I have to go puke now.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

There’s a study.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ue9Ao_bdX6Y

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Hmm.

Right, because I’m exactly the same kind of thing as a politician and I should be subject to exactly the same kind and degree of “satire.”

Who should be doing the growing up here?

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Meet Dan Cardamon!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lIW6RsUt-s

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

June 18

She just can’t stop.

June 16

A whole week with no documentation! That was a nice break.

June 9

A new one.

I borked the last tweet and the account (it was a new one, six tweets, all of the same type) is gone, so I’ll include the screencap too.

June 3

I guess @micknugent doesn't realise that @OpheliaBenson @pzmyers @rebeccawatson are pseudoskeptic faux feminists who bully secular women.

May 27, 2013 5:42 pm via TweetList!ReplyRetweetFavorite

@saramayhew

Sara E. Mayhew

Wow. She tagged Michael Nugent. She’s actually actively trying to get me disinvited from a speaking engagement at a conference. Now that’s harassment.

It’s a lie, too. I don’t bully secular women. I don’t, for instance, do what Sara Mayhew does. I don’t endlessly tweet about people I dislike. I don’t try to get them disinvited from things. I don’t make up shit about them. I’ve never bullied Sara Mayhew. I’ve done my best to avoid her. But it does me no good – she still forced herself on me at Eschaton, when I was sitting at a table with Eric and couldn’t escape. She still tweets about me every few days, apropos de rien, just to be malicious and persistent and nasty.

May 31

Diplomacy in action.

@AmbrosiaX Ireland might be the right country... after all they are experts in peace process.

May 31, 2013 11:54 am via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@karla_porter

Karla Porter

@karla_porter @AmbrosiaX @justinvacula I'm dumbfounded that AI thinks its a good idea to pay for nonspurts myers benson and watson to talk

May 31, 2013 12:05 pm via Mobile Web (M5)ReplyRetweetFavorite

@Zaminuszen

Za-zen

@Zaminuszen Seriously - if this is the 'movement's best, who needs it? Repetitive & washed up. @AmbrosiaX @justinvacula

May 31, 2013 12:11 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@karla_porter

Karla Porter

@karla_porter @Zaminuszen It's like choosing to buy the oldest loaf of bread in the grocery store (and not for croutons.) @justinvacula

May 31, 2013 12:22 pm via UberSocial for BlackBerryReplyRetweetFavorite

@AmbrosiaX

AmbrosiaX

@AmbrosiaX @karla_porter @justinvacula Growing up we went to "the day old bread store" for the low prices. #poor Privileged I am.

May 31, 2013 12:25 pm via webReplyRetweetFavorite

@SubManUSN

SubMan USN

@SubManUSN @karla_porter @justinvacula I'm sure you didn't choose the oldest of the day old bread.

May 31, 2013 1:11 pm via UberSocial for BlackBerryReplyRetweetFavorite

@AmbrosiaX

AmbrosiaX

Old old old old bread, you see. Stale. Old. Stale.

May 28 2

Intensifying. Or maybe not, I don’t know – I don’t see “Mykeru” much. I happened to see one though, and where that was there were more. It seems pretty intense to me. Some random guy ranting about me.

Remember Ophelia, if you accidentally have thoughts like a decent human being, that hitting bottom awaits you. #ftbullies

May 28, 2013 3:48 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

Maybe Ophelia Benson will stop and think "This will end badly for me...again" and not follow through. Gosh, I hope not #ftbullies

May 28, 2013 3:46 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

Ophelia, maybe when you dox someone this time it'll be different, you'll be applauded for your courage. Don't count on it #ftbullies

May 28, 2013 12:48 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

A little Open Letter action to Ophelia Benson: http://t.co/71awCImqxW #ftbullies

May 28, 2013 12:32 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

Dear Oafie Benson, skip the foreplay, dox Skep Tickle already and let me go to work on you, you fucking overstuffed bag of shit #FTBullies

May 28, 2013 12:09 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

Oafie Benson, being a cowardly shit, has to run it past the echo chamber: http://t.co/dUR4hvDSNi #ftbullies

May 28, 2013 12:17 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

May 28

Hahahaha so funny.

Do your part to give Ophelia Benson a stroke. Donate to the Justin "Clear and Present Danger" Dublin fund.

May 26, 2013 7:37 pm via TweetDeckReplyRetweetFavorite

@Mykeru

Mykeru

May 27

Twitter Twitter Twitter. This business where people you’ve blocked turn up on your timeline anyway when someone else replies to them – it’s irritating. My timeline keeps getting all messed up that way. Like right now.

Clue to organisers @micknugent, proper academics tend to turn down speaking in lineups w/ @OpheliaBenson @pzmyers @rebeccawatson as guests.

May 27, 2013 5:49 pm via TweetList!ReplyRetweetFavorite

@saramayhew

Sara E. Mayhew

What prompted that? No idea. As always. And what does it have to do with anything? No idea, again. Michael Nugent is running an atheist conference, not an academic conference. It’s not limited to academics; why would it be?

I’m not an academic. No indeed, and I never said I was. Ho hum.

May 26

Another sample. (It’s always a tiny sample you know. I keep seeing people saying I’m documenting the harassment. Ohgodno. Only a tiny sample. Only from Twitter and the occasional blog or FB post. Tiny sample.)

Mykeru tweets

@gbarajas3 As I’ve said in vids, @opheliabenson plays victim so she can victimize people. She’s a sack of shit @justinvacula#ftbullies

@Ametkhoshascake Apparently @opheliabenson enjoys playing first-person shooters by proxy #ftbullies

@opheliabenson Refuse to take down Katie’s personal information and you’ll own any consequences. Stop playing games with people. #ftbullies

Justin Vacula tweets

Ophelia Benson refuses to honor request asking to take down private tweets? – http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2013/05/more-documenting-the-harassment/#comment-552670 … + http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2013/05/more-documenting-the-harassment/#comment-552671 … – #ftbullies

Daneil Waddell tweets

@AmbrosiaX @OpheliaBenson Is fucking insane. Her response to Katie is psychopathically dismissive #wiscfi #ftbullies  @aratina

Opheila Remove Katie’s twitter timeline. Her family’s lives are on the line too. #wiscfi #ftbullies #goingtoofar http://freethoughtblogs.com/butterfliesandwheels/2013/05/more-documenting-the-harassment/

May 25

On it goes. I did have plans to talk about now for something completely different today, that is, to talk about a lot of things that have nothing to do with local harassment, but – it keeps rolling in and some of it needs documenting.

I got a Facebook notification this morning that Reap Paden had tagged a photo of me. Oh goody. I clicked on it to see what variety of shit it was this time. It took me, for some reason I don’t understand, to Vacula’s re-posting of it. This photoshop:

This is a bully-trope that I particularly detest – this business of relentlessly harassing people, then when the people say stop harassing me, pretending the harassed people are actually nursing a secret love for the harasser. ElevatorGATE’s impersonation Twitter account with my name on it was doing variations on that on #WISCFI during the conference – using profile logos saying “I heart Justin” and the like. Yeah no. I like lots of people. I love quite a few people. I do not love or like any of my harassers.

I told Vacula to leave me alone. He said no.

Ophelia Benson Don’t tag me. Leave me alone.

David Nonsearchable Vacula, stop harassing people. Seriously.

Ophelia Benson Reap Paden, too. He also tagged me. Leave me alone. Stop harassing me.

Justin Vacula Go home, pineapple. I didn’t tag you or anyone for that matter. I uploaded the picture, gave credit to reap, and went on my merry way. Funny you want to post here and complain claiming “harassment” although you were absolutely uninterested in discussion at #WIScfi. You are a coward and a fraud.

And on it went.

May 15

Sigh. It just won’t stop.

It’s a bit like taking mentions in a police report as a flattering form of interest.

No.

May 13

I managed five days without adding anything. Cause for optimism, don’t you think?

AmbrosiaX tweets

.@opheliabenson Surprise, surprise, you find a way to malign someone in another forum and then you’ll feign harassment here… (1)

. @opheliabenson What good excuse to you have to insert yourself into more drama and release information about where Justicar might live?(2)

. @opheliabenson I’ll help you w/ the answer. You have no excuse. And since when have you been concerned w/ keeping personal info about (3)

. @opheliabenson women for their safety? You have told many ppl that I hide behind being anonymous which only encourages ppl to find out (4

I don’t know what she’s talking about with “malign someone in another forum.” As for “feign harassment” – what a joke, given her persistent harassment (and maligning) of me. As I think I’ve said before, I have literally no clue why she is so fascinated by me and so enraged by me. As far as I can tell it’s just some inane bandwagon thing, but why this particular bandwagon I do not know.

Then “insert yourself”? That’s bullshit. I didn’t “insert myself”; Justicar named me in that video. My name is the first thing he said after the introductory throat-clearing. I am one of the people he harasses. And I didn’t “release” info about Justicar, he has said he lives in or around Seattle.

Ambrosia tweets

. @opheliabenson women for their safety? You have told many ppl that I hide behind being anonymous which only encourages ppl to find out (4

. @opheliabenson where I live. How is that ok, Ophelia? Have I ever encouraged ppl to look for personal info abt you or anyone? I haven’t (5

. @opheliabenson If you’re going to continue to be despicable, Ophelia, at least give your audience the full story. You are a true coward.

I have said that it’s easy for her to dismiss the harassment of people like me (including me) when she does it under a fake name. I say it again. Using a fake name makes it easier for her to harass and belittle people without repurcussions in her real life.

I can’t give my “audience” the full story because that would require screen capping tens of thousands of words every day, and looking at them in order to screen cap them. But I do not think I’ve given them a distorted story. And no I am not a coward. I dislike being harassed. I dislike it when total strangers to me such as “Ambrosia” make it a hobby to talk shit about me on social media. That does not make me a coward.

Ambrosia tweets

@Euwood_lox@aratina He will twist anything you say and try to make it look offensive so he can gossip with OB like wash women.

@Euwood_lox@aratina And he is anonymous and we have no idea what is the truth from him. Yet, OB finds it ok in his case.

“He” there is Aratina. I consider Aratina’s pseudonymity fine because he doesn’t use it to harass people.

@GeoffJones970@Eunecromancer For all we know, @aratina could be Ophelia.

Just one more heedless casual lie. Just one more breezy casual attempt to trash the reputation of a real person for no apparent reason except malice and stupidity.

May 8 2

Big disagreement with Sara Mayhew here. What is “creeping”? She tweeted to Improbable Joe that I “creep” her. I replied that it’s not creeping to check on what people are saying about you. She says that’s exactly what creeping is.

I don’t see it. I think “creeping” (I usually call it monitoring or stalking) is checking what people are saying, tout court. I think checking what people are saying about one’s own dear self is in a different category, especially when said people have a history of unilaterally arbitrarily for no apparent reasonly saying hostile unpleasant things about said dear self. Mayhew has a history of doing that to me, so I look at her timeline sometimes.

May 8

Ah yes, the ever-popular “she’s so old and ugly!!” trope. There must be only young pretty people in Our Movement!

Sara Mayhew tweets

Old dramallamas pzmyers opheliabenson. Replace them w/ bright future skeptic leaders. Btw, I’m sending 6 to TAM2013 http://risingstar.saramayhew.com/ 

May 7

One of my documented Watchers seems to enjoy the attention and long for more. She’s been yammering about me on Twitter all day – tweet after tweet after tweet. Talk about obsessive.

Nah. I’m not going to indulge her.

May 6

Wow – this one I wasn’t expecting at all. Not even a little bit. The post about whether skepticism is really a movement was just a thinking aloud post. It wasn’t an insult or an attack or even a criticism.

And yet – somehow – it was taken as such.

Sara E Mayhew tweets

“A Motionless Movement” says Ophelia Benson. From someone who does zero writing, research, outreach, or popularising of skepticism.

Well. That’s put me in my place. But I wasn’t saying skepticism is an underachiever or anything. I was just trying to figure out if it really is a movement, if I think of it as a movement, and the like. Lots of very good things are not a movement.

I should apologize. Dear Skepticism: I apologize for saying I wasn’t sure you’re a movement. I’m very sorry. I had no idea it would upset you. If you like to think of yourself as a movement, go ahead.

May 5

AmbrosiaX tweets

@clownshoe@ElevatorGATE You don’t know who I am, @OpheliaBenson ? Why haven’t you asked me if your loins are burning with this question?

@clownshoe@ElevatorGATE Just ask SurlyAmy who I am, @OpheliaBenson . She tried to pull the same shit a yr ago & I happily told her my name.

Keep going @OpheliaBenson … I am happy to show everyone how full of shit you really are.

And any spineless assholes who want to have a pity party with @OpheliaBenson , feel free to direct your comments to me instead.

This shit? What shit? Documenting the fact that you talk a lot of lying smack about me?

Full of shit? Why? Because I point out (and document) that you talk a lot of malicious lying smack about me?

She’s so angry, and apparently it’s all because I point out what she is doing. That’s odd.

Actually, @OpheliaBenson , why don’t you ask Melody who I am. I had no clue who she was and she blocked me after my conversation with Amy.

Would you like to meet me at WIScfi, @OpheliaBenson ? Would that even the playing field?

Oh, great. Does that mean I have to worry that every woman I don’t know at WiS2 might be “AmbrosiaX”?

ElevatorGATE tweets

Oafy by name.  Oafy by nature. We should get Oafy some crayons too.

Yeah. He has a “parody” Twitter account under that name.

clownshoe tweets

@ElevatorGATE who is Eneraldo to cast aspersions on @AmbrosiaX? NOBODY knows Eneraldo. By Ophelia-”logic”: Eneraldo’s opinion is moot.

No, it isn’t. Eneraldo has an apparent name, not a mere handle. Sure, it could be an alias, but “clownshoe” and “ElevatorGATE” and “AmbrosiaX” are self-evidently aliases. The three shit-talkers make it unmistakable at a glance that they are not accountable for their harassment because they do it under a false flag, like those corporations that don’t want to pay for double hulls so they sail under the Liberian flag, instead.

Ambrosia tweets

@clownshoe Thanks. She is such a duplicitous, talentless, desperate woman.

And all three of them are in a big old snit because…because they cyberharass me and I document their cyberharassment – so they’re in a rage at me. Makes a lot of sense.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I went out to do some things, as one does, and when I came back I found an envelope from Free Inquiry in the mail. I thought it must be the check for my most recent column, although it was an odd envelope for that – brown, and larger than a letter envelope. I opened it and found another envelope, a letter one this time, addressed to me c/o Free Inquiry.

I opened that and found a sick little thing from Martin Wiesner, aka Pogsurf, who started trolling me a week or so ago, for reasons I don’t know.

At the top it says

A SHORT QUIZ ABOUT THE PANELISTS @

Empowering Women Through Secularism,

Dublin 2013

Then it has the head shots of all the panelists except one.

Then it asks four questions.

1. Who amongst you enjoys anal rape jokes?
2. Who knows that making violent sexual threats are [sic] wrong, but has never apologised for doing this themselves, and for encouraging others to do the same?
3. Who joked when the UK’s Astronomer Royal won the Templeton Prize in 2011 that he should be anally raped?

Bonus question

Which branch of feminism or skepticism endorses rape culture?

Then Martin Wiesner’s signature.

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)