Originally a comment by sambarge on Acrimonious divorce.
M.A. Melby: Thanks. I see that now and I recall it in the thread on the drag performers being banned from the Glasgow Pride.
It didn’t sit well with me then but the response has been disproportionate and unhelpful. I like the description “clusterfuck” and I’m going to stick with it.
Demanding that Ophelia answer a question that she sees more nuanced than others, castigating and slandering her on other blogs and social media, and encouraging other bloggers and commenters to join in is pathetic. All of these acts are typical of why I could never feel quite comfortable on FtB. This sort of bullshit happens all the time. Pharyngula is the worst, of course, but it looks like PZ has put an end to the social threads and those folks are making plans to start their own thread of clusterfuck elsewhere.
And to what end? Has the world been made safer and more welcoming for trans people by this clusterfuck? I submit that the threat to the life and happiness of trans people isn’t feminists having nuanced discussions on what gender means. The sort of people that would hurt, isolate, and condemn trans people aren’t asking themselves: “What does ‘being a woman/man’ even mean? Is it constructed or innate? If it’s innate what aspects are and which are social? What affect does race, class or sexual orientation have on constructions of gender?” That was not the internal dialogue of Michelle Duggar as she recorded a message that warned parents that men would dress as women to get into public restrooms and rape their daughters. That is not the internal dialogue of a man beating a trans sex worker to death because he just got sucked off by a “she-male” and what if his friends find out and call him gay.
I’ll tell you what the end has been: a whole lot of clusterfucking and no improvement in the understanding of gender or the lives of trans people, with a side of fetishizing the continued, disproportionate victimization of trans people.
Always nice to see more shit flung my way, just for fun.
I thought it was your commenters. Sorry. Since I don’t like it when colleagues do it to me…
What “those folks”, myself included, are setting up is intended to maintain the social connection of the Lounge, sharing stories about our families, recipes, personal worries and triumphs. If that’s a clusterfuck, well then, I guess I’m just a clusterfucker.
@PZ.
I don’t think you deserve any portion of the blame for this clusterfuck. You took steps to stop the hatred and bile directed at Ophelia and evreyone respects you for that.
[edited]
Great. PZ, I’m throwing shade, not shit, and on your commenters, not you. Sorry, but I read the comments on your blog this weekend and other weekends too. A great place if you’re accepted; a fucking minefield if you’re not. But hey, you’re right. Nothing minefieldy about these blog comments, huh? Nah. You can post an comment and not be sarcastically challenged in the replies.
Anne, obviousy the clusterfuck is the conversation/accusations about Ophelia and the escalation from one comment to Ophelia is the destroyer of trans life. Obviously, I’m not talking about what you’re talking about but why let a good straw man go unused, right?
Wait, is Cranky Cat Lady one of the ragers? I don’t think so.
Ian lots of people are telling me you sound exactly like a troll, so if you want to keep commenting, try harder not to sound like one.
I deleted the part about Cranky Cat Lady.
I think “clusterfuck” is the best possible description of what is occurring. I think the two “sides” stopped arguing about core values related to trans rights and inclusion a long time ago to focus on who said/did what shitty thing when and why it’s way worse than whatever shitty thing their side said/did. If our real goal is to be a movement that’s open and welcoming to trans people and activists, then let’s focus on that, and put the rest of this clusterfuck behind us. If everyone actually agrees on the fundamental issues regarding trans rights and inclusion, why can’t we just move on? What’s holding us back?
I don’t know if she is or not. I read a lot of raging but, I must admit, the names run into one. I was just annoyed by her obvious strawman. Obviously, I was talking about the ragers, just like PZ was in his post announcing the end of the social threads.
Ugh. I wish this would all stop, or at least just suspend for a while. Very toxic.
For what it’s worth, and assuming nothing about what the post/comment intends:
a) I think PZ has been more than decent through all this.
b) He’s also dead right about ‘social’ media.
c) I figure community is kinda hard anywhere. Here, sheesh. Media used, complex of grievances present, antagonistic interests elsewhere… I could go on. Notwithstanding, yeah, not Mr. Community taking, here, exactly.
d) None of this is to be taken as self exculpatory.
And that’s all I’m going to venture, in faint hopes of somehow not actually making anything worse, blundering around this thing.
Ophelia Benson @ # 8: I deleted the part about Cranky Cat Lady.
Yes, please try to keep this from spreading further: sfaict, Dana Hunter is the only blogger Lady here with a Cranky Cat.
Garrett @ # 8: … the two “sides” stopped arguing about core values related to trans rights and inclusion a long time ago to focus on who said/did what shitty thing when and why it’s way worse than whatever shitty thing their side said/did.
Donnie’s comment at # 9 follows too closely on yours for me to nag about not having read it – but at least it provides a great illustration of your point.
Donnie @ # 9 – You seem quite confused about the history of Rodda leaving FtB – but, as she requested all her blogging history here get deleted when she left, and FtB complied, I can’t set you straight with links or quotes. Suffice it to say, very little humor showed up anywhere along the line.
Sorry if my comment was misdirected (Re- Cranky Cat Lady). My vigilance is on high alert right now.
Ophelia, I know my comments are in moderation but I don’t care. I just wanted you to know that I have found solid evidence of the cause of this shitstorm. It is the SlymePit. Most notably Oolon.
Google “Oolon Slymepit” and 136,000 results appear along with comments he’s frequently made there.
Just wanted you to know where this is all coming from. Thanks.
Thanks, Ophelia. I’m not one of the people flinging things, and I don’t like what’s been going on. I hope things calm down so you can enjoy blogging again.
Argh – I deleted a comment by Donnie.
Don’t be spreading any more toxins around than we already have, people!
Thank you Anne.
Ian I know that, I’ve always known that. It’s always been one reason I don’t trust him. He used to think the slime pit was a big joke. I don’t think he’s any kind of valuable source for how to be not horrible.
I’ve been mostly holding off commenting on these threads, because every time I try to write something I start thinking of how it will be misconstrued. Eh, screw it.
Ophelia, hang in there. Of course I’ll tag along it you move to another site, but I see no reason why you should have to deal with the disruption. The folks targeting you don’t own FTB any more than you do.
PZ, I think you’ve done just fine through this episode. Good for you for not letting people use your blog as the “I Hate Ophelia” meeting place, fuck the people who whine that Pharyngula isn’t a “welcoming place” any more if they can’t use it as such, and good riddance if they leave and find another, purer place for their righteous indignation.
Perhaps another way of making the point: If Ophelia has joined your “enemy” list, you’ve painted yourself into quite a tight corner.
It’s amazing how minor a transgression need be to justify the release of the hounds.
[Ophelia I’m sorry if you feel this is in appropriate and understand if you decide to delete it but with every fiber of my being I feel this needs to be said.]
CuriousOnLooker I did delete it, so I hope you kept a copy.
It may need to be said but it doesn’t need to be said here. I got very very tired of commenters going to Pharyngula to complain about all my crimes, so I don’t want people coming here to complain about PZ’s. Take it up with him directly. (Not least, there’s no reason to assume he’ll read this thread again.)
For the record, when I referenced Pharyngula, I meant the commenters using the social threads to escalate attacks on Ophelia. I didn’t mean PZ. I thought that was obvious from the context but I should have clarified.
Ophelia,
Understood, and thank you very much for the explanation.
My reading comment was that the shit was being flung at the commenters occypying their nests in the social threads rather than you.
I believe the criticism was directed at the frequent ‘progressive purity testing’ and such, rather than the chit-chatting.
Oolon was certainly hard at work at the rumour-mill, and the slymepit is certinaly cackling with glee at all this, but my impression is that they actually loathe one another, what with their comical outrage at at his blockbot thingo.
I don’t know. Has the world been made safer and more welcoming for female scientists by the Tim Hunt clusterfuck? /sarcasm
Z, your proposition that [Tim Hunt:female scientists] is analogous to [OB:trans females] on the basis that they were both clusterfucks is not convincing.
Care to elucidate your attempted sarcasm?
My main point: in both cases, there’s no short, pithy answer to “How does this help [target group]?”, and the whole thing may have been counter-productive in some aspects. At the very least, the Hunt brouhaha gave some nice ammo and air-time to anti-feminists.
The analogy can carry further, though:
In both cases, a person made public comments concerning the specific group that could be interpreted as… problematic.
In both cases, this provoked both thoughtful critical reactions and some not so thoughtful ones.
In both cases, some of the not-thoughtful reactions crossed the lines into outright personal attacks against that person and characterizations of the person, not the behavior.
In both cases, there was increased scrutiny and interpretation of what that person said and did before and after the incident in order to find “where they stand” on the issue.
In both cases, the reactions were partially fueled by the target group’s… discontent about previous transgressions against the group that had not been perpetrated by the person in question. I.e. angry/frustrated/somethingelse people finding a target for their anger/frustration/somethingelse.
Z, if you take those similarities and ignore the dissimilarities, then I understand your perception.
For example, Tim Hunt in his capacity as an Honorary Professor, opened his speech to women scientists and women journalists in a world conference event with his infamous joke about women scientists, whilst Ophelia in her capacity as a blogger made a response to a response to a commenter on her blog.
(So yes, both were public)
It is understandable that they are frustrated due to previous transgressions against them. Considering the ongoing persistent Ophelia has been dealing with for years on end, if previous transgressions are an excuse, it works both ways.
Yes, the scopes are different. Analogies are rarely perfect. There’s another unmentioned difference with the Tim Hunt situation – he had no direct exchanges with his critics. My main point was that the question in the post title was pointless.
I didn’t say they were an excuse. There is a bit too much “I have the right to be angry” on both sides of the current conflict, and this is one of the main reasons why the conflict exists in the first place.
Exposing the sexist (or racist, homophobic, transphobic*, etc.) attitude of a Nobel Laureate scientist who actually has or has had power to include or exclude scientists from working in his award-winning lab is important. He had the ability to make or break careers and he just admitted a sexist belief about working with women.
Your analogy reminds me of the Stewart/Colbert Rally for Reason, where Jon Stewart argued that both sides of the US political spectrum engaged in irrational, hyperbolic rhetoric, citing the right-wing Birther movement and the (apparently) left-wing Truther movement. I don’t like agreeing with Bill Maher on anything but he correctly pointed out in rebuttal that while there was an anti-Bush/Cheney element to the Truther movement, no elected Democratic leader claimed 9/11 was an inside job or challenged the patriotism or loyalty of the Bush Administration. On the other hand, a lot of elected Republican leaders (and candidates for the Republican nomination for President) publicly and regularly called for Obama’s birth certificate and questioned his country of origin/legitimacy of his Presidency.
On the face of it, Stewart’s analogy is correct. Angry, irrational things are being said on both sides. However, only one of those sides has power and therefore only one of those sides really needed to be challenged on what they were saying/doing. So, it’s not a question of “scope” but a question of the relative power of the speakers, both in the case of the Birthers/Truthers analogy and your Hunt/Benson analogy.
*I wonder that Hunt’s answer would be to the question: Are trans women women? Yes or no? I suspect his isn’t a wagon you want to jump on, unless of course, you’re only interested in the fight and not the subject matter.
I posted too quick:
Also, another reason your analogy doesn’t work is simply because Benson is genuinely NOT transphobic while Hunt, by his own admission, is sexist. So criticism of his sexism is appropriate (unless you think sexism is okay or acceptable because he’s old and he did good things in a lab) where as manufacturing Benson’s transphobia and then criticizing her for it is wrong.
I mean, you know, that’s facts of the cases and not rhetoric but worth pointing out, I think.
Has the world been made safer and more welcoming for trans people by this clusterfuck?
No.
No it hasn’t.
Also d’ugh! Of course and how could anyone even thinks so?
My first thoughts on this: “clusterfuck of stupid”. Should’ve posted with © ☺
Without trying to create more drama, most of the problems with the culture of FtB stem from Pharyngula’s commentariat, with the Big Kahuna egging them on. Until the Big Kahuna ditches the troublemakers, this will happen again, and again, and again…
@ Ian Staines – July 28, 2015 at 3:48 pm :
Seconded by me.
Also did you say edited? Here? How?
@33. polishsalami : Just in case you don’t already know, it seems PZ Myers is already taking steps that lead in just the direction you seem to be suggesting. He has now closed the Lounge and Thunderdome / Mended Drum social / off-topic threads and apparently has new rules coming to break up the clique~ishness maybe even the whole Horde as we’ve known it. Dunno.
Ian Staines’ contributions suggested that he was either a troll, or a very inept defender whose comments didn’t help the atmosphere. As a result, a number of his posts were removed or edited down.
I think we both lose the copyright to Jon Stewart.
@ Z : Ah, okay. Thanks.
If “woman” means “anyone who identifies as a woman” then what does sexism mean? surely fetuses that are aborted for being female aren’t “identifying” as female, they simply are. Women who are raped and sold into sexual slavery and paid less than male colleagues are not asked their identifiers before men do that to them. What does sexism mean when you can identify into or out of it? has anyone provided a compelling reason why someone can identify as a different sex but not a different race?
These are all basic questions that need to be asked if identifying as a woman is supposed to make someone a woman. They aren’t answered to any reasonable degree, just shouted down, usually with a black listing thrown in.