Elevator Story, Quatre

You know you've been waiting for another one. This time, it's courtesy of Jim Houston, a new blogger at Talking Philosophy.  Simple story:  guy and girl romp in elevator at train station in Scotland, thinking they can't be seen.  But there's a CCTV camera, and now they're in trouble with the law.  Did they do anything morally wrong?  What's the punishment that fits the crime ... if any?  Houston seems to have the situation under control.  Take it away .... Jim.

***

Update:  Wait a minute. He doesn't have it under control. He neglected to mention that the guy and girl were brother and sister!  Sensationalistic tabloid link here.  I think this would be a decidedly non-uplifting chapter of "my lift book".*

* Quotes because there's only a 1% chance I'm going to write a lift book, but it's fun thinking about it anyway.

Elevator Story, Trois

Seriously.  This is from Philip Galanes' advice column in today's New York Times--

I am a dark-skinned Mexican woman with a baby who has the lighter skin of her American dad. We live in an apartment building on the Upper East Side. Often, I find myself on the elevator with residents whose comments make clear that they assume I am the nanny or a maid on my way to work. Granted, I’m not in my best clothes, but I find this assumption racist. Should I say something to convey my irritation or just ignore them? --Martha in Manhattan

I don't think it's racist of the other residents to think Martha is probably the nanny.  Perhaps  9 times out 10, a dark skinned woman carrying a light-skinned baby really is the nanny, and they know that.  What's racist is the other residents having the level of certainty that would make them open up their mouths and talk to Martha as if she were the nanny.  It's racist to think a dark-skinned woman must be the nanny of the lighter-skinned baby she's with.  Surely the residents wouldn't overtly treat her as the nanny just based on a hunch--they think must be.

Elevator Story, Deux

I'm not kidding!  This is a great example of how unconscious assumptions can make women invisible--

I'm at a philosophy conference outside of the US. I think there may be even fewer women in philosophy in this country and its neighbors than in mine. The conference hotel is small, and philosophers don't look quite like most of the other guests. There are no nametags, and the conference just started today.

I got on the elevator this morning, on the 6th floor, to go down to breakfast at the designated time. On the 5th floor a young man got on, sporting a ponytail and sport coat (i.e., our uniform). On the 4th floor, a white-haired man got on. The young man turned to the older man before the doors were even closed and asked him "Are you a philosopher? Are you here for the conference?" (the lingua franca is English) and introduced himself.

I may as well have well been wallpaper. Female, and visibly pregnant to boot. No chance of my having deep thoughts or being someone worth knowing. Or--maybe I'm just overly sensitive, and it was the white hair that made the young man snap to. Someone 10 or 15 years older than me might be someone worth schmoozing with. Then again, I don't often see my white-haired female colleagues getting that treatment, either.

Evelyn Brister is the writer, here.

Feminism and Atheism

"Atheist meetings?  No thanks, cuz I don't like the ... " [fill in the blank]

I've been mostly internet-less in England and Amsterdam for the last two weeks, but still a bit plugged in thanks to my Kindle. I've continued to follow Elevator-gate just a bit, and this morning (up very early because of jet lag) I got to have a more thorough look-around.

Rebecca Watson is still being bombarded with sexual and sexist insults at ERV. Ophelia Benson is saying it's intolerable to attack a woman with sexist epithets.  Some people, like Russell Blackford, think the epithets are bad, but not that bad ... etc. etc.  A lot of people are no longer talking to a lot of people over Elevator-gate.  There are shifting alliances, blah-blah-blah....

I've been invited to speak about Elevator-gate at a local skeptics' group--and more generally about atheism and feminism.  So now I have an official reason to think more about this, and I'm no longer just a run-of-the-mill obsessive-compulsive. (Phew, that's a relief!)

**

Recap of the whole story, and then some comments--

So... there's an atheist conference in Dublin, this past June.  One panel is about atheism and women, and the first speaker is Paula Kirby--video here. The moderator raises the question why there are fewer women than men at atheist conferences.  Kirby offers the view, based on "my years of being part of all this" that she hasn't seen men holding back women.  She also says she's offended by the idea that women would be put off of atheism, and the atheist movement, because it's male dominated. Surely women aren't that easily frightened.

Later at the Dublin conference, there's another panel on communicating atheism, and both Rebecca Watson and Richard Dawkins are speakers--video here.  Watson puts the topic of the panel on hold in order to respond to the question discussed by the previous panel--why fewer women in atheist-land?  She rejects what Kirby has said as an argument from "ignorance" and an argument from "privilege" and claims that the explanation is (at least partly) that women get mistreated by men.  To support this, she offers anecdotes--sexist rubbish from emails she's received from atheist men.

Still later at the Dublin conference, something happens to confirm Watson in her belief that women get mistreated by men at atheist conferences--she gets hit on in an elevator at four in the morning, despite having said, in the guy's hearing, that she's tired and wishes to go to bed; and also despite her message on the panel. When she gets home she puts a video on You Tube, which begins with a mention of Paula Kirby, and talks about the elevator incident -- video here.

She later speaks again at a CfI conference, refers back to the Dublin women's panel, and covers examples of harassment by atheist men, and also mentions the elevator incident.  She's even more explicit than in the elevator video that the issue is why there are fewer women in the atheist movement.  She tells the student leaders that this sort of overt sexism keeps women away--"that's why they're not coming out to these events."  She also responds to reaction to her elevator video from a student activist named Stef McGraw.  McGraw had said that there was nothing wrong with elevator guy's overture--her post is here.  Watson says McGraw is "ignorant about feminism" and doesn't know the most obvious things from Feminism 101.  Sexual interest is one thing, sexual objectification is another.

Later still, Richard Dawkins makes a dismissive comment about the elevator incident--here and then again here.  And then, in turn, Watson dismisses him in a post called "The Privilege Delusion"-- here.  "Thanks, wealthy old heterosexual white man!" she writes, and promises to stop buying his books.  After that, the flood of comments for and against Watson begins, including a torrent of just the sort of sexual and sexist commentary she initially brought up in Dublin.  It gets uglier, and uglier, and uglier...

**

Now for the comments (numbered, even!)--

(1) There's no excuse at all for the sexual and sexist backlash against Watson. It's inappropriate, disproportionate, inarticulate, and just plain ugly.  Nothing she did or said justifies it, period.

(2) As much as Watson makes a legitimate point about misogynistic rhetoric that's been directed toward her, she's gratuitously dismissive toward people who see things differently.  She dismissed Kirby as "ignorant" and "privileged"; McGraw as "ignorant of feminism"; and Dawkins as too wealthy, old, heterosexual, white, and male to understand.

PZ Myers has defended Watson on grounds that she was "civil" to McGraw and "polite and respectful" to Kirby, but he confuses the question of delivery with the question of content. Yes, her delivery is pleasant and in fact funny.  She doesn't froth at the mouth.  But the content is insulting.  Instead of engaging with the ideas of people she disagrees with, she finds fault with the people themselves--they're too ignorant, too privileged, too unfamiliar with feminism 101, too wealthy, too whatever.

While I was away, some folks at Butterflies and Wheels raised the question how philosophers (like me) can be rattled by Watson's combativeness.  Aren't philosophers combative too?  Yes--very combative.  But the rule is that one engages with ideas--it's off limits to dismiss a position as due to your interlocutor's ignorance or privilege or sex or age, or whatever it might be.

But, but, but... isn't it true that some people really are too benighted to "get it"--that they really do need to take Feminism 101?  It's true, but dismissing someone in that fashion is a last resort, and certainly not permitted in direct debate between peers.  Since Watson was responding to Kirby, McGraw, and Dawkins as peers, it was inappropriate to write them off in the way she did. 

(3)  Let's get back to the original question--why are there fewer women than men in atheist circles?  Kirby's answer is essentially just negative: men are not holding back women.  Watson says the opposite--male sexism and sexual harassment keep women from coming to atheist events.  The message I see all over the internet is that feminists must agree with Watson.  But no, surely not.  As a feminist, I do care about the role women play, and whether it's justly or unjustly attenuated.  I am interested in causes and explanations, and don't feel "beyond male vs. female" in the way Kirby seems to.  But it doesn't follow I have to buy Watson's view of what makes the atheist community less hospitable for women than for men.

It could be that women are scared off by the prospect of dealing with sexism and sexual harassment.  But there are lots of other possibilities.  Perhaps the people you meet at atheist meetings argue too much--in their zeal to be ultra-rational and skeptical, maybe they don't know when to stop.  Maybe the immense value attached to candor in the atheist movement stops people from properly valuing tact and diplomacy.  Maybe people personalize debates too much.  In fact, the issue could be even deeper.  Perhaps women don't identify as atheists as often as men, and when they do, they identify as conciliatory, "live and let live" atheists.  So they're bound to be less interested in atheist activism. If that's a factor, the atheist movement would have to change in fundamental ways to increase female involvement.  You might have to examine some very basic things about the atheist movement, not just sexual and sexist antics that are extrinsic to it, to give women an equal role.

**

To speak a little more personally--I'm just one woman, and it's not clear to me which of my attitudes are gender-related and which aren't, but  Watson is quite wrong about what makes me reluctant to come out to atheist events.  I don't want any contact with neanderthal debaters like you see at many atheist blogs. It's got nothing whatever to do with fearing overt sexism or sexual harassment. I just don't want to run into Kevin, who wrote this about me at an atheist blog a little while back (with no complaint from the moderator)--

Jean: Let me clue you into something.
You’ve failed.
You will never win.
You cannot put the genie back in the bottle.
Live with failure every single minute of every single hour of every single day of the rest of your life.
I have no use for someone of your “intellect” telling me what I can or cannot say or learn.
And you will have to live with that abject failure forever.

Since the atheist blogosphere is full of Kevins, I'm a little reluctant to get any closer to "movement" atheists.  I suspect more women would feel like me about this than men, and so--I'd like to suggest--it's not just overtly sexist epithets we should be worried about, as feminists.  The whole style of interaction at atheist blogs is a problem.

More Elevator Guy

My muse this morning says "more elevator guy," which is quite a bit like Christopher Walken saying "more cowbell" in that great Saturday Night Live skit.  So ... just a few little things.

I was truly amused when someone accused me of being an accommodationist yesterday, for being sympathetic toward Richard Dawkins in this Watson vs. Dawkins kerfuffle.  To which I say--

HA!

If I'm sure of anything, I'm sure that it's OK to try to understand people who have done something anomalous (what he said isn't so odd, but his tone was surprisingly sharp).  I'm especially sure that if an author has long struck you as intellectually and morally perceptive, then it's particularly reasonable to try to figure out "what gives?"  The wonder is that so many Dawkins fans are so much less charitable.  (My attempt to understand Dawkins is here.)

And another thing--setting aside Dawkins, whose reaction has a particular history, the male backlash against Watson certainly has been misogynistic and creepy, but what's with Greta Christina's pitch to them?  We want you to understand what not to do because "we're trying to help you get laid"?  I actually think men should treat women with respect whether or not it helps them get laid. Imagine that! Why must this sort of pandering be part of the official feminist line?

And another thing ...

Agh!  Life is short, and that's enough.

GENDER STUDIES 9461 - Advanced Elevator Guy

While you wait for this course to be offered at a university near you, have fun playing "pretty goddamn dense anti-feminist bingo."  Courtesy of PZ Myers, who says courtesy of Katie Hartman, here.   Now who's going to create "pretty goddamn dense anti-Dawkins bingo"?  Fair is fair. (board below the fold)

Steven Pinker on Coffee vs. Sex

Footnote to a scandal.  Why does it make a difference whether you ask for coffee (with sex in mind) or ask for sex?   Steven Pinker discusses the matter in this truly fantastic video. Don't miss it!



The rest of Pinker's talk is here.

Thanks, [squiggly unpronounceable name].

"Richard Dawkins Torn Limb from Limb -- by Atheists"

It never ends!

p.s. (7/9) I have no sympathy with the backlash against Dawkins.  See my posts here and here and my comment about the backlash here.

Elevator Guy Hits the Wires (updated)

Here's an Atlantic post about the infamous elevator incident. One problem: the author says Elevator Guy "propositioned" Rebecca Watson, but that would mean he asked for sex explicitly. He didn't, he asked her to his room for coffee! There's some difference, even if one can assume he probably wasn't just in the mood for a beverage.  Why is it different, if presumably he was thinking of sex?  To explain would take a long story about meaning, communication and psychology--it's actually kind of interesting.  But it is different, and everyone knows it.

UPDATE 7/7: On my morning walk, I got to thinking about this.  Why is it different to ask for coffee, and only insinuate an interest in sex?  There are three advantages:  deniability, refusability, and ambiguity. 

Deniability. The speaker can protest (inwardly or verbally) that he was only asking for coffee--that's face-saving if the hearer says no. So it's an advantage for the speaker.

Refusability.  The hearer can refuse a request for coffee without addressing the more intimate topic of sex. She can say--"sorry, it's too late for coffee," or some such.  So indirect communication is better for the hearer.

Ambiguity.  Asking for coffee leaves it open where this will lead, the open-endedness being advantageous to both speaker and hearer.

Asking for coffee in an elevator is thus clearly better than asking for sex, but the apocryphal story has taken hold that Elevator Guy asked directly for sex -- see the Atlantic story and before that, at many blogs.  (For example, Amanda Marcotte reported that Elevator Guy had "cold propositioned her for sex" here.)  Result:  Elevator Guy's malfeasance and Rebecca Watson's victimhood have been exaggerated. 

Exaggerating victimhood has a funny way of triggering exaggerated dismissal, and I think that may be what's going on with Richard Dawkins.  He smells exaggerated victimhood and he says--"Bah, it was nothing!" (even though--come on!--it wasn't exactly nothing).

So I got to wondering--why does he smell exaggerated victimhood? There's nothing terribly exaggerated about Rebecca Watson's complaint in the video that started this whole controversy.  She laughs and smiles as she tells the story and she quotes Elevator Guy in a way that's restrained and presumably accurate.  She doesn't call the invitation a "cold proposition for sex."

Perhaps Dawkins was responding to exaggerations in the blogosphere, but I also suspect another factor.  If you watch the panel on which both appeared the day before the elevator incident, you can actually see foreshadowing of Dawkins' later outburst on the web.  




Watch Dawkins as Watson speaks about Paula Kirby (from about 3:00 to 5:00).  Here's what Watson says about Kirby's presentation on an earlier panel about women and atheism--

She made a comment that she felt that there was no problem with sexism in the atheist community because she's never experienced any sexism in the atheist community. In the atheist community we refer to that as an argument from ignorance, and in the feminist community we refer to it as an argument from privilege. I'm genuinely happy that she hasn't experienced any sexism, but I don't think that's a proper basis to make a judgment about whether there is any sexism in atheism.

I suspect this is a strawman, and Kirby didn't make the idiotic argument from "I have had no problem" to "there's no problem."  She just took her experience as some evidence like Watson wants to present her experiences as some evidence.  

Think about what it would be like if scientists disregarded negative data.  If the question is about whether autism and vaccination are linked, studies that find no link are just as relevant as studies that find a link.  Kirby should not have been dismissed as "ignorant" and "privileged."

To the extent that Watson wants to dismiss women with no negative experiences, she has exaggerated the victimhood of women.   My hunch (based on his body language in the video) is that Dawkins saw her as an exaggerator of victimhood before the later video about Elevator Guy ever appeared, and that's what put him on the road to dismissal.

Moral of the story:  neither an exaggerator nor a dismisser be.  One tends to lead to the other. The more one side dismisses, the more the other exaggerates; the more exaggeration, the more dismissal. And also--don't claim to be the paradigm case.  Women who don't get treated in a sexist manner are also entitled to tell their stories and to have them taken seriously.

Update:  The Kirby panel is here, and no, she doesn't make the idiotic argument Watson attributes to her.  More about her argument here.

Elevator Guy

"In your dreams, Elevator Guy!"

Here's a video that's launched a thousand ships--Rebecca Watson, secular activist, talks about getting on an elevator at 4 in the morning at an atheist conference in Ireland.  Elevator Guy, who was in her group at the bar, and heard her say she was going to sleep, gets on and asks if she'd like to come to his room for a cup of coffee.  In the video Watson says (rough transcription)--

Just a word from the wise, guys. Don't do that!  I don't know how else to explain that this makes me incredibly uncomfortable but I'll just lay it out that I was a single woman in a foreign country at 4 am in a hotel elevator with you, just you.  Don't invite me back to your hotel bedroom right after I've finished talking about how it creeps me out and makes me uncomfortable when men sexualize me in that manner.

The video got a response from some deranged misogynists in the comments here, which then lead to this post at Pharyngula, with billions of comments, and then this one and this one, with billions more comments. 

Obviously, the issue is not just whether Watson is entitled to be annoyed by Elevator Guy, and can express her annoyance wherever she likes. The issue is whether Elevator Guy was guilty of sexism, so counts as data for Watson's larger case that there is sexism and misogyny in "the skeptical community." She clearly thinks so, or wouldn't be lecturing "guys" as a group.  "Don't do that!" is a message to all men about how to interact with women.

I think that's what some people find annoying.  "That" is not always a bad thing to do, if it's coming on to women, or even coming on to women in elevators, or even coming on to them in elevators at 4 am in Dublin.  So--too broad!  But I do see what's objectionable to Watson about what happened to her personally.   She'd evidently made it clear how she was going to react both in the bar and in a panel discussion that very night. So Elevator Guy was asking even though he already had his answer.  He wasn't taking her attitudes seriously.  That pattern is objectionable and has the aroma of sexism--even if the guy was actually just a klutz.

Here's Richard Dawkins' take on Elevator Guy-- Dear Muslima and then Clarification.  And here's an outraged reaction to Dawkins. I sympathize with what Dawkins says, actually.  I just think he's missed the elements in the story that make Elevator Guy's come on a bit worse than chewing gum.