Shirtstorm (split from Rosetta Mission thread)

[mr friendly guy]

Me I'm not. I'm arguing that while the shirt is not (in and of itself) sexist, the context in which he chose to wear it means the act of wearing it is.

In the same sense, there's nothing inherently sexist about erotic paintings, but using them as pinups in a workplace can be sexist.

Because women really DO have problems in our society with being the targets of unwanted and excessive male sexual interest. And seeing that sexual interest expressed without restraint or courtesy to them really DOES cause problems and DOES tend to exclude women from workplaces and public spaces.

Which doesn’t follow its in this case. Your problem is your generalise rather than focus on the specific situation. Even you must be able to see how stupid that is.

Lets have a look at this workplace of misogyny

They would have also learned that the shirt was made and given to Taylor as a birthday present by a female friend, Elly Prizeman. And they would have seen a photo of him wearing that shirt right next to a smiling, waving female colleague, planetary scientist Monica Grady.
In a supremely ironic coincidence, a clip of Grady jumping in noisy joy at the Philae landing was offered by Guardian writer Alice Bell as a “positive” conclusion to a column that lambasted Taylor for his shirt and his colleagues for overlooking such a sexist atrocity.
Grady’s delight at the success of the mission clearly wasn’t ruined by a gaudy shirt with “sexualized” women on it. Sadly, the same cannot be said for Taylor: His Twitter account, so full of excitement a few days ago, went entirely silent after his public humiliation.

The picture of Monica Grady can be found here. OMG. Can't you see her fear being photographed to a misogynist wearing that shirt. Clearly that shirt stops women entering STEM fields with such misogyny.

When you look for monsters misogyny under the bed, you're going to find whatever you're looking for under the bed.

Wait – you’re are going to say that “we don’t get it”, “we miss the point” and the shirt was “just a way to segue” into the real argument which is sexism in STEM fields. Well unfortunately it looks like someone made a claim, got called on the bullshit and then shifted the goalposts and said, no, no, when we said x we really meant y. Frankly this isn’t the first time feminists have resorted to such tactics. If a Creationist or a Trekkie did that type of tactic here, they would be crucified. I am all for equal opportunity when mocking idiots.

Feel free to mock the idiots, but the catch is that as far as I can tell the idiots aren't here. If you want to mock them go elsewhere. If you want to mock me, be advised that I will call you out on strawmanning.

Ahem.

It's a catch-22 for people trying to raise awareness. You can't make people aware of how pervasive gender issues are without pointing out things like the "shirtstorm", but every time you do, people come out of the woodwork and accuse you of focusing on trivial issues like some guy's shirt, even if you admit (which every feminist I've heard speak about the issue has) that it's not a big deal in and of itself but the larger pattern it represents is a very big deal, and we should all be aware of the bigger issues. Feminists have tried to use this as an example to segue to a discussion of those issues, and reactionaries have blocked that segue so they can point and say "look at all these crazy old birds getting their literal panties in a bunch about some dude's shirt".

He later admits that this could be a "tactical blunder".
Now I am not for calling him an idiot because for all I know he would have cut straight to the point instead going on about a shirt. However the fact remains shirtgate started because some butthurt feminists with a propensity to manufacture outrage did just that. Too bad.

One of the many ways in which women can feel harassed in society is by the idea that their bodies are eternally on display, eternally being compared (critically) to some idealized figure of sexual attraction. That men around them see them as objectively less good for not looking like some silicone-plastic underwear model, that they are being viewed dismissively as "the fat chick" or "the lady in the frumpy dress" or "the girl with the bad teeth." Many women even internalize this- either they think of themselves as ugly, or they form social in-groups that are almost obsessively devoted to perfecting the art of dressing, painting, shaping, and grooming themselves to appear as attractive as humanly possible. Or, in the case of cosmetic surgery, in-humanly possible.

Now, men are not immune to sensitivity about their appearance, obviously. But for women it's a whole different order of problem.

Men relatively rarely go in for surgery purely to improve the appearance of secondary sexual traits. Women do so on a regular basis.

Cosmetics and beautification for men are a niche market.

Cosmetics and beautification for women are a multibillion dollar industry.

Men can get by in most professional environments just by showing up clean and with a mediocre haircut and broadly appropriate clothing. If they're dressing down a little or forget to shave one day, nobody's likely to call them out of

Women are routinely expected to apply multiple types of cosmetics and more complex, more uncomfortable outfits just to flatter their appearance enough to be normal by the standards of their environment.

And yes, individual women or individual workplaces may violate this trend; I am generalizing precisely because I discuss a general truth. This is something that has been experienced by virtually all women at one time or another, but which cannot be specifically attributed to THIS place and THAT time by a person who is trying to talk about their entire society.

I am tempted to do similar to what Thunderf00t did and post a picture of a woman whose appearance has been destroyed by use of crystal meth next to that of a super model and say, "If you find the super model more attractive than the first person you're sexist," because by finding the latter more attractive than the former, you're making women feel that they are being eternally compared to (critically) to some idealized figure of sexual attraction. That's apparently harassment. But you know what, that's would be a waste of effort. At least the "shirt objectifies women" argument wasn't this lame.

BTW since reinforcing the prevalent social view that to be beautiful you must look a certain way = harassment, how do you explain why Kim Kardashian reinforcing the same social view is not harassment ( of women who aren't "hot" by the prevalent social standards of the time) under your own internal premises and logic.

1 & 2 have no relevance to Matt Taylor’s shirt, and I wasn’t asking about sexism in the hiring of staff. I am asking about why the image on the shirt is sexist. Point 3 might possibly relate to it, but frankly showing that you admire a certain body shape in a woman doesn’t translate to “I see women as walking pair of tits,” no more than a gay man wearing a Conan or He-Man shirt translates to “I see STRAIGHT men as walking pair of pecs.”

And yet, a substantial fraction of women feel that it does.

Are you, or for that matter some specific individual woman, qualified to tell them they're so objectively wrong that their feelings on the matter aren't relevant?

I sure hope you realise the absurdity of saying we can't know what the women are thinking better than them selves (hence we should listen to them) yet SIMULTANEOUSLY saying these same women know what a third party (a man) is thinking.

You know what Simon. If these women had Emma Frost type telepathic powers I will believe them. However the fact remains you're still stuck on square one. How about these women discuss in an adult manner with say Matt Taylor and they might have found that the shirt was made by a female friend, and that he had been photographed with women working in the STEM fields which aren't intimated. But hey apparently they know what a man is really thinking. So they don't need to research the matter. Which is why most of them will be stuck as commentators instead of actually doing something.

In this case, the cost is that a guy doesn't wear a particular shirt on the job on the day he expects to talk to reporters.

You're sure that's the only cost. Really?

That's a big part of what this comes down to. A large number of women have said, at varying times, that they do not like seeing pinup models (or shirts full of pinup models) strewn around their workplace.

It used to be commonplace for Men At Work to have pinups all over... in an era when women were not welcome in the workplace, and when it was assumed that if a woman was working it meant she was less virtuous, more sexually available, than the "good girls" who stayed at home.

Now, some women may be fine with having attractive females in varying states of undress pinned up all over their workplace. Or they may try to 'give as good as they get' with attractive males in varying states of undress.

But for quite a few other women, it is not okay, they may try to pretend it is but it really isn't, and they will never be comfortable with it. And they can never actually cause a man to experience the same discomfort they feel. Because in our society, as it actually operates, men almost never have to feel that type of discomfort. Even duplicating the conditions under which women feel the discomfort, with the genders flipped, won't replicate the subtext and the lifelong series of individual encounters and experiences that shape how women perceive sexual situations differently than men.

Comic book type art is viewed the same as pin ups now, is it? But I will humour you. I don't think pin ups are appropriate for the type of work environment if you're trying to do some type of formal thing. For example my work environment the physiotherapists, nurses, occupational therapists have uniforms, doctors both male and female have a certain dress code. This promotes a certain semi formality, because that's what the culture society expects for a hospital. The culture in the ESA is most probably different and there is certainly a line which may be crossed. Note this doesn't follow that just because something is inappropriate that its sexist.

Just for the record, if a woman has male pin ups I wouldn't give a damn as long as I can bring a geeky calendar. Alls fair.

As a result, the nature of the hurt, of the offense, can only be described to men in terms of analogies and parables, like the ones I've repeatedly linked to in my posts. And the real test of whether one is an asshole or a decent person, as a male in modern society... well. It's whether when someone says "this hurts me," you pay attention, or whether you just shrug and ignore it. Or, worse yet, start coming up with elaborate justifications for why the issue doesn't really matter and is all in her head because this woman gets silly ideas sometimes, and because men who agree with them are a bunch of suggestible white knights.

No.

The fact that some women are capable of ignoring XYZ, for whatever reason, does not mean XYZ is irrelevant. The fact that your black friend thinks racism is no longer really a problem for him does not mean, when large numbers of other blacks say "racism hurts me," you're allowed to ignore them. The experience of one person, or of a minority of persons, cannot negate a reality experienced by the entire group of persons.

I have a better idea. Lets talk and find out WHY it hurts. People who use the privilege "argument" has used it like an ad hominem. It exists the same way stupidity exists. It might explain why someone cannot "get" an argument the same way stupidity may explain why Creationists will never get basic science no matter how many times its explained to them. But it cannot explain WHY their argument is flawed, no more than I can dismiss a Creationist's argument on the grounds the author is an idiot.

If you can justify WHY its bad other than gut feelings I can go with that. As I have repeatedly said. However all I have seen is premises which are internally inconsistent - for example why is this shirt sexist but Kim Kardashian's posing for the cameras is not, when they both satisfy the very criteria you have stated which makes it harassment. I just don't know how can't see that's a problem. But one obvious way is that it allows anyone to accuse someone else of <insert bad thing here> and get away with it if they can get enough posers to jump on their bandwagon. Because there are no rules. There is no way to defend oneself against a charge which is nebulous if you cannot even explain why the former is sexist but the latter is not other than gut feeling.

I know, lets play the analogy game. Muslims are angry at the European artist for drawing Mohammud. The fact that some Muslims are not doesn't refute the fact that a large number of Muslims say drawing the prophet is offensive, and you're allowed to ignore them. Muslims are clearly not as privilege as white Christians. Therefore we shouldn't ignore their grievances. QED.

See how bad it is when your argument boils down "trust your feelings young Skywalker, you know its true," rather than "Logic dictates Captain." But I guess I better check my non white privilege.

Matt Taylor might be privileged, but frankly what occurred to him was bullying by lying shitheads who don't even know what the words "pornographic" or "naked" means even as they uttered them, and insulted women when they suggested a shirt fucking stops women from entering STEM fields, and insulted human scientific knowledge when they said "I don't care about landing on a comet." They also insulted victims of bullying when they said Matt Taylor apologised because he realised what had "fucked up" (AFTER he had been bullied). What next? Gays who commit suicide do it because they also realised they "fucked up?"

You are cherrypicking the most obnoxious statements (probably including some outright parodies) from a large group of people, deciding they represent the group, and dismissing the whole group in a spiteful tone.

The problem with that is presumably very obvious, since I know you have a brain.

Oh really? Parodies is it.

Slate

But unfortunately, the shirt featured a design of scantily clad women in pornographic poses.

I think she needs to use the internet and find out what porn really is.

Pornographic allegation. Tick.

http://www.xojane.com/issues/sexist-shi ... att-taylor

When a researcher wears a shirt covered with naked women on a live broadcast, you can see why there's a shortage of women in STEM.

Naked women on the shirt allegation. Tick. I don't know about you, but naked kind of means not to wear clothes. I guess that S.E. Smith who states that the shirt is obviously sexism in the same way the women are obviously naked. That is not at all except in the imagination of butthurt feminists.

I don't care if you landed a spacecraft on a comet, your shirt is sexist and ostracizing

This is the sort of casual misogyny that stops women from entering certain scientific fields. They see a guy like that on TV and they don't feel welcome.

I don't care about landing on the comet tick. The shirt stops women from entering STEM fields. Tick.

https://twitter.com/roseveleth/status/5 ... 7490561024

No no women are toooootally welcome in our community, just ask the dude in this shirt.

Sounds like Rose Eveleth is attacking Matt Taylor for mistreating women. An allegation which is patently false given the evidence presented from women he knows.

I would try digging up the youtube video for the wanker who said if he apologised it must have been because he fucked up, but why bother. You're just going to say its "most probably a parody". You know what? These are not the most obnoxious comments, only the ones easy to make fun of. The most obnoxious ones goes to a retweet done by Rose Eveleth who felt it was soooo awesome for Matt Taylor to be hunted down and harpooned.
https://twitter.com/roseveleth/status/5 ... 3647159297

RT @SarcasticRover: I assume the lander is just saving its harpoons so it can hunt down that bearded idiot in the gross shirt.

Oh the irony of feminist bitching when someone has an overreaction and gives Rose an unjustified death threat. I guess its ok for her to wish physical harm to Matt Taylor but the misogynist of Taylor's defender when ONE person does it. That demonstrates the gross hypocrisy and how her supporters hypocritically complain about it. People in glass houses and all that.

Now you might say, "ok so what if they aren't parody sites." I am still selecting specific comments and articles EVEN THOUGH THEY STARTED THE WHOLE SHIRTSTORM AFFAIR. Yeah I am clearly being selective.

****************************************************************************************************************************************************
Before someone jumps in and goes "how can you oppose feminism, don't you think men and women should be equal hur hur." Yeah, I do think they are equal. Which is why I identify as an egalitarian. Let modern day feminists keep that title with the associations such as getting offended by a NON SEXIST shirt and all the other bullshit baggage they have accumulated with the term. Oh those chickenshits who abused Matt Taylor can go fuck themselves. Oh wait, is that misogyny. Maybe I should check my privilege.

[Thanas]

As far as I am concerned, one should not judge people based on one shirt they wear. I wear suits when I go to classical concerts and shirts when I go to rock concerts, doesn't mean I should be solely judged on that.

This whole thing is ridiculous. Was it inappropriate to wear the shirt? Maybe, but that is between him and his employer. As long as nobody can point to any actual evidence of sexism (in actions) on the part of Matt Taylor this is all just manufactured outrage.

I also find it quite hilarious people attack him only over this shirt. I guess if I get the famous Tyrion "Gods of Tits and Wine" shirt (promoted by Lena Heady btw) I am oppressing women as well? Or how about the many famous plastics depicting the rape of the Sabine women? Is the office in my university that has a replica on the wall sexist as well? Because if we go down that route, I am filing a complaint against Hollywood for oppressing me as a German.

[mr friendly guy]

If we assume the shirt is inherently sexist then there needs to be some degree of inherent sexism/racism in the Kim Kardashian photoshoot because of the obvious objectification and fetisization of her body, as well as because of the lineage of image, ie, it was based off of a shoot that combined a lot of strange exoticism/racial fetishism/possible racism into a weird mix. While this may seem odd, it should not be odd that a woman doing what she wants, in a liberated way, could also be reinforcing a sexist paradigm.

Yes. At last someone who applies the standards consistently.

This means there are also times when personal choices (for example, a domination or non-consent fetish for a woman) is and should be a protected choice but would appear to reinforce a negative bias if it was, for example, put within the lens of a TV-Show or advocated for as public policy. This is partially what happened to the poor fellow: he went from being just a dude in a shirt in a context everyone understood to being a dude on television where his presence there seemed to be a tacit approval of female objectification by the ESA and STEM fields in general. Though, in a fully liberated society we should expect Dr. Taylor to be able to wear his shirt and have no problems, or at least less of a total shitstorm, because in a liberated society it would not appear sexist (or maybe not even unusual) because it would no longer be a reinforcement of a negative system, since by definition that system is extinguished in a liberated society. That's generally our model future to work towards. If we can conceive of a future where a women space agency person can wear that shirt and not cause a furor then it is only biasless to assume a man would too, given an egalitarian society.

The obvious problem is we are not in that society yet, and we still have problems, so where do we go from there?

If a "fully liberated society" is the goal, then as with any goal some people are going to get there first. If Matt Taylor wore the shirt because it was given by his friend who see no problems with it like how a liberated society should, then those who aim for this should be rights hold him up as an example of what they hope to achieve. Not tear him down. That would just make things go backwards. But I am too cynical to think that is what they really wanted. I think they wanted blood, 15 minutes of fame and to jump on a bandwagon. Am I wrong in that assessment?

So I think the only reasonable solution is to examine art like this as a cultural artifact, but not to demonize them. This shirt, in some societies, would be an expression of rebellion against a system that forces women to be sexless and permanently shrouded. It would be positive. In a society of sexual liberation and biasless gender fluidity it should not be alarming. In our society it reinforces the objectification of feminine form. But the problem at heart here is the society, and the cultural lens you use to examine it, not the shirt itself. And if we assume the presence of sub-cultures then a kink-friendly woman with retro interests who is friends with perhaps another kink-friendly scientist who also has retro comic book gal interests might find a t-shirt like this a positive or at least delightfully subversive gift to give and wear as an expression of fun and personal choice.

It is simply more honest to address the actual problems and sources of sexism at the source than to attack cultural artifacts and signifiers that can become detached from their original meaning, and while I will not attack the people who (well-meaning or not) try to take on societal problems wherever they show up, I think the cultural narrative about objectification is venturing uncomfortably close to an argument for sex/slut shaming and over-stating objectification's role in a larger interlocking system of sex bias.

I think an internet meme with Matt Taylor showcases this quite well. It shows Taylor wearing his shirt with the words saying that science judges you not on how you dress, but on your work. Too bad some feminist and social justice warriors forget this.

(though I would take issue with MrFG's tone on some points, even if such issue-taking is entirely meaningless. I would say we should not criticize "feminism" or "social justice wankers" as a whole because of their interest in this, since I think that only leads to a fall-back position with the crazy people, and pushing socially motivated people further from useful forms of activism.)

Two points I want to make.

The first point is I used to think by definition I would be a feminist. I would also be an egalitarian, but in this case the label is just a descriptor of my views. However after seeing how feminists behave, its clear they have a few other ahem tenets rather than the obvious one about men and women being equal. From shirtgate to the hypocrisy in donglegate to criticising Sam Harris for using the male pronoun to describe... a male author, it carries more than what I identify with. So as long as feminism includes concepts where these are "intrinsic to it" then yes, its perfectly fine to criticise it even if you agree with its primary tenet about equality.

The second point is social justice warrior/wanker/whiner is used as a perjorative, but it doesn't follow that social justice is itself bad (yeah language is funny that way). I am going to start with a lead in. When MKSheppard was still posting here, he made a joke about how he was secretly hired by Mike Wong to post on SD.net to make conservatives look bad. Because his views were so over the top, even though he really did hold those views. I could make the same joke that SJWs were created by conservatives and the right wing to make liberals and the left wing and social justice look bad. Because that's what they do. Its taken a while, but even some feminists are staring to see such an effect. So social justice should be promoted, but SJWs with their manufactured outrage deserve mockery when they say stupid things.

[mr friendly guy]

As far as I am concerned, one should not judge people based on one shirt they wear. I wear suits when I go to classical concerts and shirts when I go to rock concerts, doesn't mean I should be solely judged on that.

This whole thing is ridiculous. Was it inappropriate to wear the shirt? Maybe, but that is between him and his employer. As long as nobody can point to any actual evidence of sexism (in actions) on the part of Matt Taylor this is all just manufactured outrage.

I also find it quite hilarious people attack him only over this shirt. I guess if I get the famous Tyrion "Gods of Tits and Wine" shirt (promoted by Lena Heady btw) I am oppressing women as well? Or how about the many famous plastics depicting the rape of the Sabine women? Is the office in my university that has a replica on the wall sexist as well? Because if we go down that route, I am filing a complaint against Hollywood for oppressing me as a German.

How dare you say such things Thanas. You're a white male. Statistically speaking most probably heterosexual too. So you have white privilege.

You also didn't get the message. If you wear a sexist shirt you stop women entering a chosen field by the power of..um, um.. yeah you big misogynist meanie. Just ask Chris Plante and Arielle Duhaime-Ross from the Verge.

[Thanas]

Has anybody actually proven that the shirt was definitely sexist? To me it could be, but only if you chose to take some of the most unkind interpretations possible. It is one thing to say a former clan member dressed in white robes envokes a racist image, but from all accounts Matt Taylor doesn't habitually degrade women, so IMO at the very worst he should apologize for a failure to communicate. Which he did. The story should be over.

[mr friendly guy]

http://thefederalist.com/2014/11/17/its ... t-bullies/

It’s Time To Push Back Against Feminist Bullies
The attacks on scientist Matt Taylor are crazy. Enough already.

How many times have you heard the line that feminism is simply “the radical notion that women are people”? And when was the last time you thought that sentiment even remotely expressed whatever the h-e-double-hockey-sticks is going on in feminism these days?

In the last week alone, we saw the social media outrage machine (with assists from friendly journalists, of course) force Time to apologize for including “feminist” in a cheeky poll of which words should be “banned” from overuse or misuse. (It had won the poll by a wide margin before the thought police cracked down and forced its removal.) Bloggers and writers at The Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, the New York Review of Books all called on Time to renounce the inclusion of “feminist” in the poll.

We witnessed a mob of online feminists harass a male scientist to the point of tears because of his sartorial choices. Dr. Matt Taylor helped land a spaceship on a comet hurtling through space at the clip of 135,000 kilometers an hour, the first time humans had come even close to accomplishing such a tremendous feat. He is a great man who has accomplished great things for all of humanity. But when he discussed his team’s accomplishments on television, you see, he was wearing a shirt made by a female friend out of fabric depicting cartoons of scantily clad women. Quelle horreur!

The outrage couldn’t have been more over-the-top. “I don’t care if you landed a spacecraft on a comet, your shirt is sexist and ostracizing,” read a real headline that humans with no sense of reality actually wrote and published. Shrill outrage site Jezebel claimed that Atlantic reporter Rose Eveleth, who started the “#shirtstorm,” had been subject to death threats. Their headline “Woman Gets Death Threats for Tweeting About Disliking A Dude’s Shirt” led to a story of a few people being mean to her and saying stuff like “jump off a cliff.” As one Jezebel commenter noted, “they’re death threats in the same way that saying ‘go f— yourself’ is a rape threat.” Trigger warning: A review of Eveleth’s outrage-tweets over a shirt someone wore might make you embarrassed to be human.

When University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds simply wrote an op-ed for USA Today criticizing the feminist bullying, he was accused by feminists of egregious behavior, including “doxxing” — the practice of revealing a person’s private information for the purpose of intimidation. When people pointed out that there was literally not one shred of evidence to support the claim that Reynolds had done any such thing, claims were revised to (falsely) say he’d encouraged “his flying monkeys” to misbehave. Feminists tried to suggest that Reynolds’ employer should be upset about what he wrote.

And when Nancy Pelosi was asked by Nancy Cordes of CBS News if she’d given any thought to stepping down on account of how she’d just overseen yet another drubbing of Democrats in the House, she accused the assembled press corps of misogyny, claiming they’d never asked male leaders such questions. Even the Washington Post’s Dana Milbank — I repeat, even Dana Milbank — couldn’t take the idiocy, since of course male leaders are asked such questions all the time.

That’s it. Enough already. Enough. Enough. Enough. Whether we want to or not, we have to deal with our feminist bullying problem.

It’s time to stand up to the bullying
A relatively small percentage of the population identifies as feminist — only about 20 percent of Americans, according to this 2013 poll. And whatever you think of feminism, its bullies are an even smaller subset of that group. Feminists — and feminist bullies — can seem more populous than they are for two important reasons. One is that much of our media lacks diversity of thought. Many reflexively identify as feminist and promote feminism, unaware, perhaps, of how outside the mainstream much feminist discourse has become.

Another reason is that social media amplifies outrage machines, which are easily manipulated by feminist bullies demanding some kind of action.

Social media outrage mobs by definition do not reflect general views. The vast majority of people don’t want our best and brightest scientists put through “like something from the show trials of Stalin,” as London mayor Boris Johnson said of this past week’s shameful incidents. Most of us responded normally to the spaceship landing on a comet. We freaked out with excitement. We would never in a million years think something like this:

But if we don’t want the social media mobs to dominate, we simply must stand up and be counted. Johnson wrote that “For all those who monstered him and convicted him in the kangaroo court of the web – they should be ashamed.” They should. They should be absolutely ashamed. And people who don’t want a world where feminist outrage mobs make our best scientists weep on national television to show their guilt for wearing the wrong clothes, well we need to speak up. Next time we see people behaving like bullies, we should call it out.

There are many ways to respond to a bully but one important way is to defend those they pick on. I myself thought the shirt Taylor wore was inappropriate for the workplace. But any mild judgment I might have made was completely obliterated by the insanity of those making his accomplishments all about their supposed victimization. Enough.

Stop Apologizing

OK, this is an important one. I know when bullies are picking on you, you might want to just get them to go away. You might think that cowering to their demands and offering a weepy testament of their superiority is a good way to go about this. You give them your lunch, they go away. You know the drill. And it may well be a good idea in the short-term. But if you care about how such acquiescing enables further bullying, you can’t do it. Time’s managing editor and Dr. Taylor made a mistake by apologizing. So has everyone else who has ever been forced to apologize for things that were either no big deal or not in any way wrong.

What both should have done was tell people to grow up and gain some perspective. To stop obsessively whining about imagined slights and to cease being in a constant state of offense.

Apologizing for offense used to be a great idea when people didn’t get offended by every single thing happening on the planet. I mean, it’s still a good idea to be considerate and apologize if you offend someone. But lest we institute government-mandated apology breaks every 15 minutes, we simply must require some semblance of sanity and relationship on the part of the person claiming to be aggrieved. Matt Taylor did not owe journalists who stole his legit thunder an apology. These forced apology tours also demean the value of an apology, which hurts civil society and human relationships.

Standing up to feminist bullies helps women

Some of the people most worried about feminist bullies are women. That’s because we suffer from the image they project of women being perpetual victims. And not just perpetual victims but frail little things unable to handle cartoon images of scantily clad women. In my list of things in life that have been tough, I’d rank roughly everything before “seeing a really cool guy wearing a shirt.”

Feminist bullies are so invested in the false idea that women are oppressed that they’re giving all women a bad reputation. Women, contrary to the image perpetuated by feminist bullies, are not weak. We are strong. We can handle all sorts of things and do so every day. We live full lives with complex and meaningful relationships and we have many professional and personal accomplishments. Women and girls are able to navigate life quite well, thank you very much, and it’s actually easier when women aren’t constantly talking about how supposedly oppressed we are. We’re not. I mean, sure, everyone in life has troubles. None of those troubles, for the vast majority of women, include “seeing a dude wear a shirt while discussing how he just landed a spaceship on a literal freaking comet.”

The yahoos at Verge (did I mention it’s a Vox site?) said, “This is the sort of casual misogyny that stops women from entering certain scientific fields. They see a guy like that on TV and they don’t feel welcome.” That’s a lie. I mean, many women actually are less interested in STEM careers than many men for perfectly valid reasons. They don’t avoid them because of a guy wearing a shirt. Girls and young women passionate about space science didn’t notice his shirt. Or, if they did, they didn’t care. Particularly relative to the excitement of the scientific accomplishments Dr. Taylor and his team — which includes women scientists, of course — achieved.

Bullies are bad for everyone, actually

It’s not just women who are hurt by feminist bullies. Everyone is. That’s because human relationships are harmed in the toxic outrage culture. The very perpetuation of humanity relies on men and women getting along well. People who stoke resentment and anger between the sexes, or create false claims about women’s oppression, are making it more difficult for happy, healthy, human relationships to flourish.

And just the waste of time we’ve all had to expend on this is also bad for society. No offense (or be offended, I don’t care) but people with gender studies degrees don’t land spacecraft on flying comets. They frequently detract from same with endless pointless conversations about imagined grievances.

We need to say no to double standards

Last week we saw Kim Kardashian slather her body with oil and put everything on display. Much joviality ensued. I mean, if anyone suggested that she wore something inappropriate to work, I missed it.

But we live in a culture where third-wave feminists engage in “slut walks” to send the message that nobody should be judged by what they wear. And yet if you make cartoons of the very same things these women wear on slut walks and put them on a shirt, that’s “ruining the comet landing”? That doesn’t even make sense.

I suppose there are people who can say “Matt Taylor was asking for harassment because of what he wore,” but those people sure as heck aren’t feminists, who claim that such views are sexist. And feminist extremists are the same ones pushing all sorts of gender identity and trans activism, arguing that men wearing women’s clothes to work is no big deal. If that’s no big deal, how much less of a big deal is a shirt with representations of women on it?

It honestly may have always been this way, but there’s no disputing that right now American feminism is a tangled mess of double standards, Puritanical policing of men’s behavior, fascist speech codes, and petty grievances. It’s in a state of constant outrage.

In a Q&A with the Wall Street Journal last week — before #ShirtStorm broke — Taylor was asked if his sleeves of tattoos had hurt his success. He said, “The people I work with don’t judge me by my looks but the work that I have done and can do. Simple.” Taylor is lucky he works with scientists who judge him by his work and not his appearance. Let’s all aspire to such behavior and finally help feminist bullies learn to do the same.

There are many reasons why the vast majority of Americans do not identify as feminist. Feminism has its own problems. But the one thing most of us should be able to agree on is that feminist bullies are damaging civil society. We must stand up to them if we don’t want them to harm it any further. We shouldn’t be bossed around by people who constantly whine, manufacture outrage and offense, and cull the internet for things to be upset about.

Lets call this what it is. Bullying. The only difference between those bullies in the movies who take your lunch money, is that Social Justice Whiners cloak their bullying in the mantle of equality and self righteousness. Aided and abetted by those who cry that its most probably from "parody sites."

I wouldn't pretend to know what Matt Taylor had to put up with. But this feminist is right about something. Apologising for bullshit offences just empowers the bully. I may or may not have folded as well (although I don't have a twitter or tumblr account). I simply don't know. But it would be great if someone who they decide to bully next could give the John Sheridan apology though.


This picture just says it all what is wrong with this episode.

[mr friendly guy]

You know, as much as I detest Rose Eveleth I said straight off the bat death threats were unjustified against her.

http://mic.com/articles/104278/woman-ca ... th-threats

That fact was thrown into sharp relief this week after one a woman called out an instance of everyday sexism and was rewarded with death threats. And all because of an ugly shirt.

The incident is an important reminder of the difficult position that women working in the male-dominated tech and science sectors constantly find themselves in: If they stay silent, the culture is unlikely to change, and yet when they do speak out, they are dismissed, harassed and even threatened.

I pointed out the fact that Rose Eveleth in a mean spirited way suggested Matt Taylor should be harpooned and hunted down.
https://twitter.com/roseveleth/status/5 ... 3647159297

That's cruel, uncalled for, callous but not a death threat on Rose's part. Naturally her defenders ignore this part in a bid to make her out as some fucking angel who is just criticising sexism.

The relatively mild critique was not well-received by men on the Internet, however, who responded with death threats and assertions she should kill herself.

I guess relatively mild critique if we ignore the description of physical harm.

Then I realised I was simply not applying feminist reasoning.

You see this article lists the death threats, conveniently highlighted for our convenience.
These include for Rose to

1. Jump off a cliff
2. Hope you get ebola
3. Please kill yourself

I am new to the "death threat" business and all that, but I am pretty sure death threats constitute actually threatening to kill someone.

Were those posts mean spirited wishing physical harm on someone? Hell yeah (oh that sounds familiar). Death threats? No. They are death threats in the same way this is a death threat.

By feminist logic Rose just issued a death threat against Matt Taylor. So I am going to amend my statement. Rose did not receive a death threat, but if she did they would be unjustified.

Not only are these SJW parasites hypocritical and mean spirited, but they also play the professional victim. And I say that with the thoughts of real victims of sexism in mind, who SJWs cheapen. Fuck them and the high horse they rode in on. Oh wait they might see that as a rape threat now.

[Simon_Jester]

@simon Jester will get back to you when I finish work. But I want to clarify a few things

It is relevant to others, but not to me. Please distinguish between people who say "the act of wearing the shirt is sexist and inappropriate" and people who say "the shirt itself is sexist."

Except that was what I was talking about, and when you reply to that you inadvertantly give the impression you were debating that point. It didn't strike me as you saying, ok but I have a different argument.

To be quite honest I think you've been too quick to strawman everyone talking about this issue by selectively rebutting the worst possible arguments and the worst possible conduct by anyone involved in the issue.

I don't know who said that but it sure wasn't me. I've never used the phrase "social justice warrior" or abbreviations for same in my life until this very moment, in this very sentence.

Firstly you clearly have used the abbreviation before "this very moment in this very sentence." I just quoted you saying it. That's a minor point but I found it bizarre you would say that.

...Please reread the actual thread. While the abbreviation "SJW" can be found in my posts, it is only found inside quote boxes, generally yours. The reason I said what I said is that you messed up your quote tags and misattributed something to me.

You messed up your quote tags. Denying it makes you look foolish.

And again, I honestly cannot remember ever using that charming derogatory "social justice warrior" in my life, except perhaps as a response to others who thing it's good to coopt "people who fight for social justice" and turn it into a term of mockery. Sort of like how the far right took "liberal" and "progressive" and did its best to turn them into swear-words, with predictable bad results for American political dialogue.

Also, can we just make some sort of rule that using the term "SJW" un-ironically is basically just a concession? I mean, anyone who says it just sounds like such a twat. I find it impossible to take anyone's argument seriously if it relies so heavily on the term.

How do you tell they are using it un-ironically?

Well, it sure sounds like you are.

More generally, I think Ziggy has a point. "Social justice warrior" is like "white knight." It is very easily abused by assholes who want to demean people that call them out on being assholes. Because it lets you say "Awww, look at the cute little offended person, fighting for social justice!" as a way of dismissing and sneering at the idea that there might actually be a problem.

As I've said before this is a really fundamental point. If someone thinks there is a problem, you listen. You don't dismiss it, you don't sneer at it. You address it. If you disagree, fine- but while disagreeing, remember that other people may be affected by things you barely even perceive, if you don't have to deal with the same crap that they do.

You, 'Friendly Guy,' have been using the word about once a paragraph or so. To me, it makes you come across as arrogantly dismissive that there might be a problem with, say, men reserving the right to put up pinup girls in their offices in a mixed-sex workplace. Or having men wear shirts that say the same.

[Simon_Jester]

Aaand the auto-logout just ate a post I spent quite a bit of time composing in reply to 'friendly guy.' Unfortunately, I literally do not have enough time, nor do I foresee having enough time tomorrow due to Thanksgiving, to burn another hour or two trying to patiently explain to him things. I can summarize, though.

1) He's cherrypicking. No, seriously. His argument seems to focus almost entirely on the bullying of Taylor by the internet community, and his evidence for this is "some bloggers exaggerated by calling the shirt 'pornographic' or saying it had 'naked' women on it, therefore they're all full of shit, including the ones I didn't quote." Likewise, he's taking ridiculous statements like "the probe is hunting for him with its harpoons" which is about as plausible as being stalked by the Curiosity rover, and treating them as co-equal with statements like "I will murder you."

2) He's complaining that no one has "tried to explain" why the shirt is sexist. But this has been explained repeatedly, more than once by me I think. And each time, he dismisses the explanation out of hand, refusing to perceive or acknowledge it. Or saying it's all about "feelings" as though there is no such thing as feelings, or as though human beings don't make decisions based on whether they feel safe or comfortable in a given place.

While I am willing to try to give him another explanation, it's going to be the last one. I can put up with people who don't get my explanations, but I have absolutely no patience for a person who will read my explanation, dismiss it without even trying to comprehend it, and then mock me for not explaining things. That's a true waste of my time.

3) He's so busy trying to treat the concept of 'privilege' as a joke that he doesn't realize he's literally turning into a cartoonish parody of an arrogant person blind to the ways other people can be harmed because he personally is immune to that type of harm. In other words, he's displaying the toxic combination of arrogance and privilege.

[jwl]

I've looked on the facebook page of the person who made the shirt. Found this: https://www.facebook.com/ellyprizemanlt ... =1&theater

I wonder what would have happened if he wore that one.

[mr friendly guy]

As I've said before this is a really fundamental point. If someone thinks there is a problem, you listen.

Sounds like you did a lot of listening to the bullying of Matt Taylor. This thread is about "shirtstorm" right? Right?

You don't dismiss it, you don't sneer at it.

You mean like how the bullying of Matt Taylor was described by yourself as most probably from parody sites. Sounds like sneering to me. People in glass houses and all that.

You address it. If you disagree, fine- but while disagreeing, remember that other people may be affected by things you barely even perceive, if you don't have to deal with the same crap that they do.

I did address by repeatedly saying to explain it. I listen to you and Grand master Terrwyn explain why. This is big strawman on your part.

You, 'Friendly Guy,' have been using the word about once a paragraph or so. To me, it makes you come across as arrogantly dismissive that there might be a problem with, say, men reserving the right to put up pinup girls in their offices in a mixed-sex workplace. Or having men wear shirts that say the same.

Good grief, the strawmen keep on coming don't they. I didn't actually say pin ups were automatically appropriate. Maybe you should heed your own advice an reread the thread buddy.

Secondly the term SJW preceded me. Its been used for sometime AFAIK around the internet. We rarely get the opportunity to make up words. We just use ones which are already around with, wait for it, wait for it, an already pre-existing meaning. SJW are used to describe such people who bullied Taylor. Don't like it, go create your own term and see if it sticks.

Aaand the auto-logout just ate a post I spent quite a bit of time composing in reply to 'friendly guy.' Unfortunately, I literally do not have enough time, nor do I foresee having enough time tomorrow due to Thanksgiving, to burn another hour or two trying to patiently explain to him things. I can summarize, though.

Oh this should be good.

1) He's cherrypicking. No, seriously. His argument seems to focus almost entirely on the bullying of Taylor by the internet community, and his evidence for this is "some bloggers exaggerated by calling the shirt 'pornographic' or saying it had 'naked' women on it, therefore they're all full of shit, including the ones I didn't quote."

No one accused you to quoting those bloggers moron. I quoted those bloggers and criticised them. You jumped in and said it was most probably from parody sites. So I defended it. Naturally the goal posts moved to "attacking bloggers you didn't quote." Its fair game to criticise those bloggers because it was specifically the tweet from Rose Eveleth which started the shirtstorm affair. This thread is still about shirtstorm right?

You have repeatedly jumped into the middle of an argument which criticises a particularly POV, argue against the criticism then go, well it doesn't apply to your argument anyway. But I did your the courtesy of listening to you and explain what I thought was wrong with your argument.

Likewise, he's taking ridiculous statements like "the probe is hunting for him with its harpoons" which is about as plausible as being stalked by the Curiosity rover, and treating them as co-equal with statements like "I will murder you."

My god your irony meter is truely broken. Firstly I explicitly said no one used a death threat using the standard definition of the word (in a later post after I did more research, ie I withdrew the claim that feminist bloggers had received death threats). That is no one actually used statements like "I will murder you" AFAIK. Secondly I said statements some members from both sides were mean spirited and wished physical harm on a particular person. You might have disputed this, but your statement was such a giant strawman I really can't tell. Thirdly one side considers wishing physical harm as a death threat, therefore applying the same standards, Rose Eveleth also gave Matt Taylor a death threat. Good for the geese is good for the gander and all that.

2) He's complaining that no one has "tried to explain" why the shirt is sexist. But this has been explained repeatedly, more than once by me I think. And each time, he dismisses the explanation out of hand, refusing to perceive or acknowledge it. Or saying it's all about "feelings" as though there is no such thing as feelings, or as though human beings don't make decisions based on whether they feel safe or comfortable in a given place.

Actually I said no one in those blogs I read tried to explain. I said this thread is the first time I seen someone try to explain it. I have said that I find the explanations here unconvincing because they apply a double standard. Here is the rub Simon, when that happens the explanation isn't an explanation at all, because it becomes arbitrary what is sexist and what is not. This has repeatedly flown over your head.

While I am willing to try to give him another explanation, it's going to be the last one. I can put up with people who don't get my explanations, but I have absolutely no patience for a person who will read my explanation, dismiss it without even trying to comprehend it, and then mock me for not explaining things. That's a true waste of my time.

At least I did you the courtesy of listening to your POV. Apparently you're so full of privilege you can't see how bullying is bad and attempts to hand wave it away as "most probably from parody sites" is fucking disgusting. I am going use SJW standards and say that your privilege means you have never been bullied before so you can't see how its bad. Even when they cry on national television. At least I listened to your arguments.

3) He's so busy trying to treat the concept of 'privilege' as a joke that he doesn't realize he's literally turning into a cartoonish parody of an arrogant person blind to the ways other people can be harmed because he personally is immune to that type of harm. In other words, he's displaying the toxic combination of arrogance and privilege.

Ha ha ha ha ha. ROTFL. Blame the SJWs Simon for turning privilege into a joke. Privilege exists but as I said earlier, the way its used in an argument (a lot of times, but not all) is like an ad hominem. That makes its use a joke.

Since it flew over your head I will try and explain again. Saying someone doesn't get it because of privilege is like saying someone doesn't get it because of stupidity. It might explain why they don't get it, but it doesn't explain why their counter argument is flawed. When people use it like the former, it already has become a joke. While you might not be aware its been used like that, I am and stated it plainly in your metaphorical online face so you know where the jokes coming from.

You whine about us taking privilege not seriously, when you start off saying the "only" way to explain it is to use parables. Fuck that. Go watch Cenk Uyghur or Anna Kasparian on TYT explain white privilege. Its actually more clearer than the "privileged people just can't see it and its not my explanation just sucks donkey balls" line of argument.

[mr friendly guy]

Privileges

Firstly lets get this out the way before we go with the usual “you don’t get it,” “you’re privilege,” (even though I am THAT privileged not under their own criteria.

Privilege exists. It might explain why someone might fail to see why their argument is flawed, but it does not in and of itself explain why the argument is flawed. For example in a British rendition of the famous Blue eye, Brown eye experiment one white woman failed to see the discrimination against minority cast members.

She didn’t accept their anecdote stories yet insisted on her own, she didn’t accept studies quoted because she personally hasn’t seen it happen. She didn’t accept that minorities were subjected to searches more than white people. Note what is being disputed isn’t that if this happens, its bad, both sides agreed. They argue whether it did happen,which is slightly different from the Shirtgate saga. It doesn’t take a genius to point out the flaws with her argument, but at the risk of not being thorough lets go
1. If your anecdote evidence is acceptable, why not theirs especially when they describe it happening in a different location to you
2. Why is your anecdote evidence superior to studies which covered a larger and wider sample size? Surely you can only win this argument on the grounds that the study was flawed.
Now whether this woman thought this way because she was privilege or stupid (frankly she wasn’t the sharpest in the shed) is less important to why her argument was flawed.

Another person on the show was a fat white man saying that racist comments were no different than calling him fat. The flaws of that statement are
1. One can change their weight. One cannot change their race.
2. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with being a certain race. Ask a doctor what is wrong with being fat.

Once again at the risk of being repetitive, whether he couldn’t see how retarded he sounded because he was privileged or just plain stupid is less important. What is important is that his argument can clearly be demonstrated to be flawed.
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Bigotry and feeling offended

If one asks why racist epithets or racist imagery bad, we can justify it in several different ways.
I can explain why racism is bad both on an individual level and on a societal level. A egalitarian society functions better than one that is not, all other things being equal. Racism runs counter to egalitarianism.

An individual with the same rights as everyone else maximises utility. We can also criticise racism on human rights grounds. There is also no good justification why a person’s race should affect their rights. We’re all humans after all.
Ok, if racism and by extension bigotry is bad, the bigoted epithets are also bad. But why is something a racist epithet and another isn’t. Aren’t they just words? Why is it different from calling someone by their usual ethnonyms. Well firstly words have both a denotation and connotation.
The word chink may mean weakness, but put that with a capital C is becomes an insult against Chinese people. The same with other racial epithets like the N word. The connotations don’t occur in a vacuum, they occurred because of historical events which are beyond our ability to influence by virtue of having already happened.

Words have both meaning and connotations, and when you use them, you’re using all that societal and historical baggage that comes with it. When some racist shows a picture of the White House photoshopped with watermelons, you know the connotations (Blacks were slaves who grew watermelons for whites, and Obama is the president). No matter how many times they say it’s a joke, the connotations are there because it wouldn’t have “the punch” if we didn’t realise it. If this was shown to a Chinese person who didn’t understand American culture or history, they would most likely shrug and go “I don’t get it.” Its clear that the target audience understands the racist connotations. In this particular society and culture, people understand the connotations and not just the meanings of this. Keep this little point in mind because I am going come back to it.

But even if your feelings are hurt, and you are offended surely my rights don’t just end when your feelings begin. The things are more complicated than that. Its very hard except on warped ideological grounds to argue that being bigoted benefits society. So I have no objections to people calling bigots out on their bigotry. Heck I am in a country with racial vilification laws and I feel fine with that.
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Drawing the line and cultural context

But if its wrong to offend someone, won’t there come a point where somewhere out there, someone will be offended and its impossible to keep everyone happy.

That’s true and sometimes the line can become blurry. However we should discuss things. Some are more clear cut than others, and depends on cultural context.

What do I mean by cultural context? Lets give examples. There was a KFC add on Australian television which got some Americans accusing it of racist undertones. In it two Aussie cricket fans had ended up in the West Indian section of the ground, the crowd was getting rowdy and they placated the crowd by sharing with them their KFC meal.

Most Australians saw it as an advertisement for how tasty KFC is (or the claim anyway). Some Americans however saw it differently. That’s because fried chicken has connotations with being the food of slaves (ie Black people like the West Indian fans). I will come back to this point after further examples.

The word niggardly means “miserly” or “stingy” and had been mistaken for the racist epithet with similar name even though the two words are not etymologically related.


Another example was posted on here a few years ago. Where a white council member used black hole to describe the state of the budget. The allusion to the astronomical phenomena is obvious. A black hole sucks in all things including light (hence why its black) and the budget presumably is similar in the sense that money goes in but nothing comes out. An African American got offended and felt they should have used the term white hole, even though such an analogy would make no sense for what the council member was trying to describe.

In the first example I would argue there is no racism involved as the racism is dependent on cultural context. Australia has its own problems with racism, but not in the same manner as the US, so the fried chicken example means little.

In the second example the word niggardly is not in any way related to the N word nor does it have any racial connotation. In the third example the word black hole doesn’t actually have any racial connotation that I am aware of.

Can the connotations change in future? Sure they can. In the 1960s the words “Japanese product” had the connotation of “crap”, not so now. The word “Chink” has racist connotations but Asian singer Leehom Wang thinks he can “reclaim it” and turn it into something positive. That means that some words which are bigoted now, may not be in the future and vice versa.

However at present, in those 3 examples I would argue there is no racism involve (in the cultural context) because it doesn’t currently have those connotations nor the denotations with racist imagery and words. I submit that if we have this discussion in good faith, that once this is explained and if both sides behaved with reason, then we should conclude that its just a misunderstanding, and end it at that.

************************************************
That shirt

So ok. Lets sum up my thoughts and arguments.

1. Bigotry is undesirable in the community
2. There certainly should be a backlash if someone does something or says something bigoted
3. Some actions, images, words are clearly bigoted either universally, or only in the cultural context of the society they are spoken in.

Ah, but what happens with Matt Taylor’s shirt. I would argue that in the cultural context, its not as clear cut vs racial epithet and leans more towards the KFC, black hole examples.

Why? Because while a racist epithet and imagery has CONSISTENT connotations generally understood by both the person using it and the person its being used against, a shirt with girls dressed in bikini’s does not. For various reasons like um, in Western nations similar and stronger images are shown all the time in magazines, women walk without much clothes in “slutwalk” just to name a few. This is considered a positive and I have no problem with that.

What I do have a problem is why is one ok, and another like Matt Taylor’s shirt is not. A hypothetical alien looking at the weirdness of human culture would be puzzled by this.

The answer to that question is that its very hard to justify on the surface (that’s important, on the surface). Why this is sexist but the other is not. Now what about below the surface. I have listened and I am not convinced. I am not going to reiterate why I found those arguments unconvincing again.


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But its privilege

Here is where the privilege argument gets tiresome and lends itself to the butt of jokes like “check your privilege.” An argument stands and falls on its own merits and not on the characteristics of its author. A person not being able to see privilege should still have a crappy argument, which a hypothetical logical alien looking at earth with no concept of privilege would rip apart.

Privilege may make people adopt double standards, but those double standards are themselves subjected to scrutiny and criticised.

Privilege might make someone think their anecdotal evidence surpasses evidence gathered from a large study. That claim however can still be analysed and shown to be false.

Just as I can point out why racist epithets are negative without resorting to privilege, so too I expect others to justify their statements without saying “you’re privileged and you just cannot see it.”

Herein lies the perverse nature of how the privilege argument is used. It will never stop. The white heterosexual male disagrees with you. Oh its privilege. Oh, he really is gay? Well he is still white and male. Privilege. Ok what about a minority gay male. Still male. Privilege. What about the non white lesbian woman. Privilege, because she works in an environment where she has never experienced such a thing.

How the hell do you adjudge an argument falls on its merits, or because the author is privileged? I would argue SJW and their ilk do not even try.

Next time someone uses the privilege argument I vote we say “ You can’t see it because you’re stupid.” It would be just as bad as the privilege argument, but what it lacks in the logic department, it makes up for in the irony department.


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No rules

Now we near the end of the matter. When you can decry something sexist without any consistent justifications, and an appeal to personal feelings, then anyone, anywhere can be accused of anything, without a way to defend themselves. It becomes arbitrary.
You could be the nicest person in the world and still be accused of sexism. Because you see its “casual” sexism, and they cannot see it because of privilege. Matt Taylor could have been given the shirt by a female friend, gets on well with female colleagues such as Monica Grady and still be considered a misogynist that needed to be hunted down. Oh wait that happened.

This is no more better illustrated than This. You see, digging up the past of various SJWs who criticised Taylor, (including Phil Plait from the article I previously linked to and others who remarked how cool it would be to hunt down Taylor) we find… they did exactly the same as Matt Taylor did and are now desperately deleting their public photos to avoid the hypocrisy being revealed. Before someone says, “that’s different,” I would like to point out they don’t think so or else they wouldn’t be furiously deleting their photos would they?

Now rather than gloat on the hypocrisy, I want to simply point out the danger of having no rules, no consistency over some topic. Its not dependent on fairness, its dependent on whims of others who choose to create manufactured outrage and then persuade a bunch of SJWs full of their own self importance and convinced of the righteousness of their cause to jump on the bandwagon and dogpile someone to the point of tears. Someone could do exactly the same thing but escape without criticism, only to join in years later with a straight face, without missing a beat. Because what is considered wrong, fluctuates with what is "in" at the moment. Which brings me to the next point...

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Social justice warriors and word meanings.

I will make this easy for people.

Social justice – "justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society".[1] Classically, "justice" (especially corrective justice or distributive justice) referred to ensuring that individuals both fulfilled their societal roles,[2] and received what was due from society. "Social justice" is generally used to refer to a set of institutions which will enable people to lead a fulfilling life and be active contributors to their community.
Good.

Social justice warrior – A pejorative term for an individual who repeatedly and vehemently engages in arguments on social justice on the Internet, often in a shallow or not well-thought-out way, for the purpose of raising their own personal reputation. A social justice warrior, or SJW, does not necessarily strongly believe all that they say, or even care about the groups they are fighting on behalf of. They typically repeat points from whoever is the most popular blogger or commenter of the moment, hoping that they will "get SJ points" and become popular in return. They are very sure to adopt stances that are "correct" in their social circle.
Bad.

Niggardly – means stingy. Has no relation to the N word even though both sound similar.

Social justice warrior – has very little relationship to social justice despite being similar sounding. In fact given the backlash by feminists against SJW who are also feminists in the links I posted, I can make a case they help social justice in the same way the boy who cried wolf help sheep.

Just like niggardly the term SJW existed before I used it. For example SJW existed at least since 2012 on urbandictionary. I didn’t make the term up. I just used the appropriate pre existing term to describe the people who abused Matt Taylor. I did use the term social justice whiner and social justice wanker because sometimes social justice warrior just isn’t insulting enough.

For those who don’t like the fact that SJW has ironic meaning intrinsic in its definition. Make up another term to describe these people and see if it sticks.
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I was going to use a parable about a woman being bullied to tears, to see if Simon "gets it" about how bullying is bad. But fuck that. He will most probably say its from a parody site or some other bullshit.

[Jub]

So, you're dealing with a worker who is incrementally more likely to need to take a few months off work. Just like if you hired someone who turns out to have a chronic medical condition, and there are rules against discriminating against people like that too. Except that unlike chronic illness, maternity leave can be scheduled six freaking months in advance because it's predictable.

I mean, do you think women just unexpectedly show up to work thirty weeks pregnant and say "guess what, I'm leaving for the next six months?"

Simon, are you saying that women never do this? That no woman has ever just showed up for work and left due to pregnancy? How about the women that say they're only going to be off for a few months and never come back to their position after giving birth? These are all risks to the employer that should be factored in when they determine how much to pay somebody.

Another factor is not just looking at what happens over a woman's lifespan, but looking at how long each person on average stays at a job (4.4 years according to this article) a woman missing 12 months for a pregnancy means she's missed about 23% of her projected working lifespan. Not to mention that many women will have all of their children over a short span of years, meaning that if a woman gets pregnant shortly after you hire her, her production could be effected by this for the whole of the time she will work for you. Is this not worth factoring in when determining wages?

You also have look at the resume of a man, and a woman, at equal ages only one took say 5 years off after having two children and the man worked right through. Automatically the man has more work experience and thus, at some jobs, will be preferentially hired and/or hired on at a higher starting wage. I fully agree with this being the case, the worker with more time spent in the field is, on average, going to be the more productive worker.

On the flip side, if women truly were just as good as men in all regards when it comes to work, shouldn't we expect companies to preferentially hire women seeing as they cost less for the same work? Companies hire illegal workers for this reason so they've shown themselves willing to break laws to get lower wage workers, so why aren't they all preferentially hiring women for the same reason?

You know instead of just talking at you how about I link to stats that show just how much less effective women are then men in various areas.

Take for example sick days, according to this study women take 42% more sick days then men. That's 1.5 extra days a year that a man works than the average women. It's not a huge difference, but it's an extra half a percentage of productive work days lost per year. I'd rather hire the person that's going to be at work when I need them to be and that person is a man.

If we're looking at straight productivity this report shows a 1-3% gaps in production in favor of men in piece work jobs across men and women of all ages. This gap widens when one looks at specifically women between ages 31-50, the ages where women are often the most taxed by family matters.

I'm also trying to track down a link, but I can also recall reading a study that showed when expecting a new child men typically took on more hours at work and started looking for promotions. on the other hand, women, for rather obvious reasons, took less hours and often sought less demanding roles in the workplace.

So even just based off the two studies I could find solid numbers for, we should expect women to be paid between 1.5% and 3.5% less on average, with a larger wage gap for women between 31 and 50 simply based on sick days and lack of productivity. This only partially factors in pregnancy, and doesn't factor in things like aggressiveness in asking for raises/promotions, qualifications, or time spent in the work force. All of these things can also be expected to have an effect on wage and hiring rates for males and females.

Statistical analysis.

It is trivially easy for a large firm to prove whether it's been turning away male or female applicants at a significantly higher than statistically expected rate. Likewise whether it's been underpaying them. Where's your faith in math?

Stats don't prove anything when you're talking about hiring on a case by case basis. Prove that I didn't turn away some of the female applicants due to poor qualifications, large amounts of time not working between jobs, a bad interview, incorrect answers to a survey given after the initial interview. Likewise, if I'm paying women less it might be for any number of reasons, perhaps women are less forceful when it comes to asking for wages, maybe they have less hours worked because they missed time pregnant, maybe the job relies at least partially on brute strength and the women aren't producing at the same rate as the men I hired are. Any and all of those can skew the stats.

Our tool for reducing the burden of childbirth, in this case, is called "maternity leave" and you appear to be opposed to it.

I was unaware that maternity leave fixed the issue of my company being out a worker for 6-18 months (with a chance of it being longer or even a permanent parting of ways) in the same way that glasses fix blindness.

Remember, you're not talking about someone who can't do the job like a deaf music critic. You're talking about someone who can do the job perfectly well but might need some time off some day, and trying to justify paying them 10 or 20% less for the same work now and forever because of the chance that they'll take off, oh, 1 or 2% of their working lifetime starting with six months or so of advance notice.

It is not making you look smart, or sexism-free.

If the woman isn't showing up for work she's fundamentally incapable of performing the job. Full stop.

As I've shown above, women miss on average more sick days then men and also miss more time off work over a career in general due to childbirth. Over the course of a working career spanning from 25 to 65 a woman will, on average, have missed 60 more days than a man sick, as well as likely missed one or more years due to child rearing with more years spent working reduced hours or in positions with more flexible schedules. These are facts that show that we don't yet have the means to make women in the workforce equal to men.

The female soldier who can do exactly as many of those push-ups may well have a considerably higher level of drive, determination, overall athleticism, and ability to take care of her health. Because she'd have to, to be able to match a male in those areas while 'playing at higher difficulty.'

Yet the woman who has done exactly as many push-ups will still likely be lighter and thus lifting less weight than her male counter part, she will also likely tire faster when endurance is an issue. Plus even if her strength is the same, putting a pack that weighs 60lb. on an average US woman (5'4.5" 132.5lb.) is significantly more strain than putting that same load on the average man (5'10" 157lb.). The above average women, able to match and exceed men should be accepted into the same roles men are, we just need to realize that it takes an above average women to match an average man when it comes to physical tasks and that at the high end the best woman has never bested the best man.

So rather than deal with the reality by simple, effective means, you would prefer to ignore an obvious solution for ideological reasons and "hope that somebody" comes up with a solution that doesn't trigger your filters.

No, I'd rather address the root cause at the lower levels and ensure that equal work is graded equally. Thus there would be no need for any action at the higher levels. In the mean time, I would endorse a study that shows exactly how grades differ between boys and girls at the high school level and try to determine what is simply skilled women excelling at different tasks than men and what may be bias in grading between genders. Then I would advise universities to take this into account when looking at grades in the effected fields.

I would not endorse trying to get equal numbers in all programs by mandating that x% of student slots must be filled by females or relaxing entry standards for women in fields not unduly effected by bias.
________________________________________________

What you're missing here is that society is more than the sum of its niche subcultures. Modern society, in order to function, requires that people from different subcultures be [...?]

I'm not sure what you were meaning to say here as some it was cut off.

This, necessarily, involves some compromise. People who are easily offended have to learn to accommodate people that offend them. But people who easily cause shock have to learn to accommodate people that might be offended by them.

If we insist on all the compromises going in favor of whoever wants to cause the highest shock value, we will rapidly find ourselves facing problems maintaining basic order in society.

Likewise if we bow to the pressure of those most easily offended we risk going back to having Tipper Gore trying to ban certain genres of music or men feeling like they can't enjoy looking at a swimsuit calendar.

It is not about whether homosexuals should have the same rights to public displays of affection as heterosexuals. It is about whether anyone has the right to, say, tear a loved one's clothes off and start having sex in a public park.

Yet I get the feeling that you'd be offended with a dominant taking their gimp or for a walk on a leash and that may be their equivalent to a stroll down the lane holding hands. What about public bondage or flogging? Neither have to be sexual, but I bet you're against those being displayed in a public park where a couple of any pair of possible genders making out doesn't seem to offend you. Why does only the stuff you personally are comfortable with seeing get a pass from you?

It is not about whether a lawyer has freedom of speech. It is about whether the lawyer has the right, when speaking on behalf of their client in a courtroom, to express political views that would be at odds with their client's interests.

So long as the lawyer is not, at that second, speaking on behalf of his client sure he should be free. If say, a lawyer is done for the day or taking a break in the middle of a day at court, he should be free to be himself as much as he so desires. Only when directly speaking for the company/client to an outside party should the person be restricted and even then I find myself wanting to say that people should be free even then, and if the company or client wants to address the issue later they may do so.

It is not about whether you have the right to be interested in bosomy blondes; it is about whether you have the right to essentially turn yourself at work, while representing an organization that employs both men and women, into a walking billboard for "my ideal woman is a lingerie model and I want everyone to know it."

What's the issue with that? I'm not saying that I want any given women to look that way, hell I may not even be comfortable dating a person that does look that way, I'm merely expressing that I find them pleasing to look at. Woman have the right not to go out of their way to dress up or to shape themselves how I want them to look, I just may not date women that don't look attractive to me.

Because professionalism is not purely about which topics are taboo. There are things that were never taboo, but have always not been okay for an attorney to say while speaking on behalf of their client, for instance. Because the attorney has a responsibility to represent the client in good faith, and to do nothing which might prejudice their case.

The attorney is not and never can wholly responsible for a clients fate. If he says something or does something that a client feels hurts his case the client can speak out about it. Nor should anything the attorney does prejudice anybody against his client for this reason.

Likewise, it has never really been taboo for men to court women. But in a workplace environment, where women and men have to be able to work together efficiently, it may be inappropriate to make romantic advances to your co-workers randomly. Because people who keep having to turn each other down for unwanted dates don't work together very efficiently.

I've maintained relationships with people that I've wanted to date and who said no to me as well as with people who asked me to date them that I've turned down. I must be some sort of superman because you seem to think that this is a hard thing to accomplish.

Again, the issue is not taboo. Removing or reducing the nudity taboo as part of a general social consensus is fine. Social consensus evolves over time. But if there is a social consensus that everyone is required to, for example, cover their genitals in public...

You personally don't necessarily get a free pass to walk around with Jub Junior swinging in the breeze. And you certainly don't get to say "everyone else needs to lighten up and not be offended by my actions!" Because in that case, you are not being singled out because of who you are, because of anything fundamental to your identity. You're being singled out because of how you choose to behave in a public space.

The reason for this is simple: you are creating a public nuisance.

Yet I bet you support women breastfeeding in public even if it creates a social stir. What is the difference between one person creating a social stir for a reason you support and another doing it for something you don't support? How is a man getting tossed out of a restaurant for having his dong out any different than a woman getting tossed out for breastfeeding? In both cases people have created a stir, but in one people call the man a pervert while in the other the women is brave for standing up for her rights.

Hint: This means you have the social grace of a monitor lizard, although you have a lovely justification for your lack of social grace.

Or I have a thicker skin than most and feel that their being offended is a personal problem and not one worthy of my concern. Go ahead Simon, try to find something that well and truly offends me to the point where I'll disagree with your right even had said or done that thing. Try me.

If someone declines to bathe for two weeks and starts stinking to high heaven, then it is entirely appropriate for people to approach them and politely ask them to start washing themselves. If the behavior persists, it is appropriate to try and remove the persistently unhygienic person from the environment.

Because that stink is a public nuisance. It interferes in a very real way with people's ability to do their jobs around the stinking person. It can correlate to actual hazards to health. And it is something the stinking person could choose to put an end to at any time, with a trivial exertion of effort.

Now, other people MAY be patient and forgiving and choose to ignore the stinking person's bad behavior. But that is a privilege extended to the stinking person, not a right.

Their choice. It's annoying for sure, but if they choose to stink and I've explained that I wish they would bathe, I've done all I can. I'm not going to make them bathe, I'm going to learn to deal or find a place where I don't need to deal with them. In fact, when it comes right down to it they do have the right to stink, in so far as I have no right to make them not stink. If I were to douse them with cologne, dump soapy water on their head, or try to shove them into a stink proof sack, in all cases I am assaulting and/or battering them.

What I ask is that everyone behave in public in a manner consistent with public order, with getting along and collaborating to make society work.

This requires that everyone be prepared to compromise. People who hate taking baths have to compromise on hygiene with a general public that hates what unwashed humans smell like after a month or two. People who love blasting loud music have to compromise with people who aren't interested in listening to their music. People who like to get drunk and wander around the neighborhood have to compromise with people who don't like running into drunks.

Yet you seem to think the ones that aren't socially normal should have to compromise more. Are some people more equal than others Simon?

Cross-dressing is a borderline case precisely because it's hard to say to what extent transvestitism is part of who a person is (i.e. the product of gender dysphoria) and to what extent it's part of how they choose to behave.

It shouldn't matter which it is, in all cases it should be allowed so long as the form of dress is suitable for the work being done.

But in any case, that may be a borderline case. But many other issues are NOT borderline. T he existence of edge cases doesn't mean there is no rule at all here.

In fact it does, one man's edge case may be another mans tipping point or the line another will not allow to be crossed. How you define an edge case is precisely the issue here.

Social norms already take care of that very effectively, because male privilege remains a real thing even in careers that are statistically mostly female.

Now, if large numbers of male applicants are being unjustifiably rejected from jobs, or singled out and marginalized even after getting those jobs, or having to face a constant stream of obnoxious jokes about their sexuality and clumsy unwelcome come-ons... That's different.

But for the love of sanity, think about what this situation actually is. When someone says "this thing hurts me, don't do this," listen to them. Don't keep dismissing and lawyering and screwing around rather than admit there's a problem.

Women are free to act as they see fit just as men are. If men are treated any better in those fields than women are in other fields I applaud the women for being accepting and accommodating, I also recognize that they're making a choice to do so.

And yet there are things it is not customary to do, and which you can get in trouble for doing. Like, say, have sex in public.

See, what constitutes a public nuisance is negotiable. There is no inherent reason why an exposed breast has to be a public nuisance. But those negotiations have to proceed in some kind of orderly fashion; they are not just the product of permanently saying "whoever wants to create the biggest nuisances, can do so."

Unless of course you're engaged in civil disobedience to prove a point... but people who practice civil disobedience know they are breaking a law and accept they will experience consequences, in order to prove their point. You're not doing that.

I may not be doing that, but I support people who do push the boundaries of what is acceptable. Frankly I'm of the opinion that as long as it's safe, sane, and consensual that anything should be open to be done anywhere.

Then no one can ever trust anyone to represent them ever, and no one can ever go to a workplace without worrying about gratuitous insults and hazing.

Your 'ideal' society excludes a lot of people who don't like being insulted, or need to be able to trust others to represent their interests.

If that person wanted full control of how they were represented they would have either chosen a person that will follow their directions or have represented themselves. If a person doesn't like being insulted they have every right to jibe back as much as they like. Plus, if the kind of society I'm describing actually existed, the social norms would have doubtless changed to fit. Thus in a full liberated society the issues you've brought up may not be issues.

Which is why, necessarily, the publicly defined code of what constitutes 'civil' is the product of consensus. Compromise. Sometimes that means you don't get to do what you want.

Why should I have to get less because somebody else dislikes that I have more? Seriously, what do they gain from restricting my freedoms against my will?

In this case, the thing that is being criticized was NOT AT ALL taboo until recently, because sexism against women was normative in Western society until at most a few decades ago.

You're treating this as though the man is making a bold statement by saying "I like bosomy blondes in lingerie." Which is bullshit. The message he's sending is "women look like sex objects to me" to all the women present, which is bad unless you really enjoy marginalizing and disrespecting women.

Are you sure that's the message, because it's not the message I saw and it's not the message all women saw either. You've yet to show that shirt was indeed sexist nor show any objective way of measuring what is and isn't sexist. Until you do so, you can't claim to speak for any women present except for those that have spoken up about. I choose to believe that the women speaking up are a vocal minority, you can choose to see it differently.

Since we have people in the US who wear similar shirts, the reaction can easily be aimed mainly at other Americans.

Now, are you asking, "what if I get fired over this?" Well, frankly, if ESA's institutional values include and accept that shirt, then they should have the guts to ignore American public opinion. On the other hand, they may find that European female professionals don't want to work with ESA employees who have such attitudes.

Yet the person living and working in Europe was bullied to the point of tears and driven from social media over this. Yet you still seem to support the women doing this over the man who did nothing wrong.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Just like niggardly the term SJW existed before I used it. For example SJW existed at least since 2012 on urbandictionary. I didn’t make the term up. I just used the appropriate pre existing term to describe the people who abused Matt Taylor. I did use the term social justice whiner and social justice wanker because sometimes social justice warrior just isn’t insulting enough.

How fucking stupid are you? Nobody accused you of inventing the term "SJW". We all know perfectly well what it means. The point that sailed over your head is that USING the term makes you sound like a complete moron. It's a term almost exclusively used by smug little shits that frequent The Red Pill subreddit and that kind of nonsense. There's no good reason to pull that term out. It's like people that talk about the "fascist feminists" and stuff like that - it is a bogeyman for a virtually non-existent niche used as a smug way of dismissing the arguments of a broad group of people. It's a completely useless addition to any conversation, and simply associates you with a group of bigoted asswipes.

[mr friendly guy]

Just like niggardly the term SJW existed before I used it. For example SJW existed at least since 2012 on urbandictionary. I didn’t make the term up. I just used the appropriate pre existing term to describe the people who abused Matt Taylor. I did use the term social justice whiner and social justice wanker because sometimes social justice warrior just isn’t insulting enough.

How fucking stupid are you? Nobody accused you of inventing the term "SJW". We all know perfectly well what it means. The point that sailed over your head is that USING the term makes you sound like a complete moron. It's a term almost exclusively used by smug little shits that frequent The Red Pill subreddit and that kind of nonsense. There's no good reason to pull that term out. It's like people that talk about the "fascist feminists" and stuff like that - it is a bogeyman for a virtually non-existent niche used as a smug way of dismissing the arguments of a broad group of people. It's a completely useless addition to any conversation, and simply associates you with a group of bigoted asswipes.

The point that sailed over your head is that I am not using the term in the manner those "smug little shits" who frequent a site I've never been to are using it. To call someone a moron for using a word because of the actions of other people I most likely have zero association * with is, well frankly moronic.

Your post however demonstrates one thing. You don't actually care how much evidence and arguments I have made to debate this issue. You're more interested in the fact that I used the term Social Justice Warrior and feel smug because that somehow makes me a moron according to that hole in your head which you call a brain. That sounds strangely familiar. Oh I know, like those "smug little shits that frequent The Red Pill subreddit" who also don't care about an argument made. Oh dear me, my irony meter just broke.

BTW - how do you know its "almost exclusively" used on The Red Pill subreddit. Since you're a little slow, let me join the dots for you. I have seen that term used frequently on places I visit posted by people who aren't bigoted, so take your guilty by association and shove it.

* unless someone I know just so happens to visit that site and uses the word in the manner Ziggy described.

[Vendetta]

The point that sailed over your head is that I am not using the term in the manner those "smug little shits" who frequent a site I've never been to are using it. To call someone a moron for using a word because of the actions of other people I most likely have zero association * with is, well frankly moronic. .

Because they and their ilk specifically invented and spread the term as a label for people who disagreed with them so that they didn't actually have to engage with criticism of their opinions. It's a thing which did not exist until they created it, and it is specifically intended to be an accusation that the person they are dealing with does not honestly hold the position they are espousing but are doing so for "social justice points" or to be a "white knight".

If you adopt their terms you buy into a meaning they defined. Anyone who uses the term is de facto at the very least ignorant and lazy, the majority of people using it use it out of actual malice.

Ah, but what happens with Matt Taylor’s shirt. I would argue that in the cultural context, its not as clear cut vs racial epithet and leans more towards the KFC, black hole examples.

What cultural context are you talking about though?

I mean everyone else is talking about the cultural context where STEM fields are still ones in which women are massively underrepresented. Signals which reinforce their status as second class or outsiders, like a tacky shirt, are just another straw loaded onto that camel. Individually the straws aren't "a problem", the problem is that there are too many things like that in the field. Too many reminders to women that they aren't treated as equals by their male colleagues. This is what microaggression theory is about, the idea that the sum total of a large number of individually trivial social interactions can reinforce the status of a minority as an outsider.

They're also talking about the context of Matt Taylor being interviewed as a proffessional representative of his employer and he wears a tacky ass shirt that makes his organisation look like a bunch of layabout chancers who shouldn't be trusted to dress themselves. If I wore that shirt to work I'd be told to go home and change it because it's not appropriate for the workplace, if I wore it as a proffessional representative of my employer on international television I'd be lucky to hang on to a job cleaning toilets for them.

Here is where the privilege argument gets tiresome and lends itself to the butt of jokes like “check your privilege.”

"Check your privelege" isn't a joke, dumbass, it's a reminder that you are speaking from a position where some of the disadvantages you are commenting on don't impact you and never will. It's a reminder that you are failing to empathise with the condition of others before opening your mouth.

[salm]

They're also talking about the context of Matt Taylor being interviewed as a proffessional representative of his employer and he wears a tacky ass shirt that makes his organisation look like a bunch of layabout chancers who shouldn't be trusted to dress themselves. If I wore that shirt to work I'd be told to go home and change it because it's not appropriate for the workplace, if I wore it as a proffessional representative of my employer on international television I'd be lucky to hang on to a job cleaning toilets for them.

Are you saying this because of the shirts percieved sexist nature or would you say the same if the shirt wasn´t percieved as sexist and only ugly/tacky/eccentric?

[mr friendly guy]

Because they and their ilk specifically invented and spread the term as a label for people who disagreed with them so that they didn't actually have to engage with criticism of their opinions. It's a thing which did not exist until they created it, and it is specifically intended to be an accusation that the person they are dealing with does not honestly hold the position they are espousing but are doing so for "social justice points" or to be a "white knight".

If you adopt their terms you buy into a meaning they defined. Anyone who uses the term is de facto at the very least ignorant and lazy, the majority of people using it use it out of actual malice.

You and ziggy are both describing THEM using the word in a manner in a way I am clearly not. If you think I am, then call me out on using in that manner rather than me simply using its denotation to indicate that complaining about a shirt which Taylor's female friends didn't object to is not very well thought out. In fact from your POV, wouldn't it be a good thing I use THEIR word in a manner they didn't expect, that is use it as a perjorative, but FULLY expect to justify my arguments rather than as "I don't have to answer your point because I called a SJW." It seems you are doing the very same "poisoning the well tactic" you accuse them of doing, only you and dismiss an argument on the grounds that "at at the very least ignorant and lazy, the majority of people using it use it out of actual malice."

Did you guys go over there and get your butt whooped because they kept on using the term social justice warrior on you? Is that why you get so worked up over it?

What cultural context are you talking about though?

Society in general, well Western society in general since Matt Taylor is from there. Which I thought was quite obvious from the context.

I mean everyone else is talking about the cultural context where STEM fields are still ones in which women are massively underrepresented. Signals which reinforce their status as second class or outsiders, like a tacky shirt, are just another straw loaded onto that camel. Individually the straws aren't "a problem", the problem is that there are too many things like that in the field. Too many reminders to women that they aren't treated as equals by their male colleagues. This is what microaggression theory is about, the idea that the sum total of a large number of individually trivial social interactions can reinforce the status of a minority as an outsider.

Actually everyone else isn't talking about that. Thanas for example is talking about whether the shirt is sexist or this is an issue. Which actually related to the point you're raising. For the shirt to be a signal which reinforces a second class status, it would depend on how society perceives such a shirt would it not? If a hypothetical culture saw such poses as good, but another one as bad, it would ok to wear it in the former and not the latter. Since you obviously read my spiel you would know that I point out that there are examples which are WORSE than Taylor's shirt, BUT at the same time considered ok in the society he comes from. Which makes it not so clear cut as the other examples I gave. Wait, did you actually read what I wrote?

They're also talking about the context of Matt Taylor being interviewed as a proffessional representative of his employer and he wears a tacky ass shirt that makes his organisation look like a bunch of layabout chancers who shouldn't be trusted to dress themselves. If I wore that shirt to work I'd be told to go home and change it because it's not appropriate for the workplace, if I wore it as a proffessional representative of my employer on international television I'd be lucky to hang on to a job cleaning toilets for them.

My, my, my. What an arrogant Tosser you are. Let me copy and paste what I wrote on the very first page. "I would call the shirt very casual, and certainly this would not be tolerated in my place of work. However the dress code is between him and his employer."

Congratulation buddy. Both of us agree that the shirt would not be tolerated in our respective place of work. However I have the perspective to realise that Taylor's workplace is different, and as someone who is NOT his employer, I shouldn't tell them what can and cannot be worn except in some exceptional circumstances. Which I am happy to elaborate on if asked. But none of which includes the fact that you personally find his shirt tacky. Actually I find it tacky too, but that's neither here nor there.

And if you seriously watched his interview and paid attention to his shirt rather than his message, I only have to ask what the fuck is wrong with you?
BTW

You : he wears a tacky ass shirt that makes his organisation look like a bunch of layabout chancers who shouldn't be trusted to dress themselves
Me : They kind of landed a probe on a comet which no one else has done before.
You: But that shirt..wah wah wah.

Glad to see you got your priorities right. Oh and before you go sexism, I was making fun of how you focus on the shirt being in your opinion "tacky" as an indication that they are unprofessional and ignore the fact they managed to do something which no one else has done in science, when making that unprofessional judgment.

"Check your privelege" isn't a joke, dumbass, it's a reminder that you are speaking from a position where some of the disadvantages you are commenting on don't impact you and never will. It's a reminder that you are failing to empathise with the condition of others before opening your mouth.

Can I just ask you to read what I wrote earlier, rather than just cut out a few lines? Because this was kind of addressed and frankly if you raise an argument which was addressed on the first page, I really don't see why I should humour you further.

[Ziggy Stardust]

You and ziggy are both describing THEM using the word in a manner in a way I am clearly not. If you think I am, then call me out on using in that manner rather than me simply using its denotation to indicate that complaining about a shirt which Taylor's female friends didn't object to is not very well thought out. In fact from your POV, wouldn't it be a good thing I use THEIR word in a manner they didn't expect, that is use it as a perjorative, but FULLY expect to justify my arguments rather than as "I don't have to answer your point because I called a SJW." It seems you are doing the very same "poisoning the well tactic" you accuse them of doing, only you and dismiss an argument on the grounds that "at at the very least ignorant and lazy, the majority of people using it use it out of actual malice."

What the fuck are you blathering about?

YOU ARE USING THE WORD IN THE EXACT SAME CONTEXT AND FOR THE EXACT SAME REASONS AS THE PEOPLE WE ARE COMPLAINING ABOUT.

All your gibberish about how you are using it in a "different" manner is just pointless nonsense. As has already been pointed out to you, you are poisoning the well by using a loaded term as a means to blanket disregard the arguments and opinions of a broad group of people.

It's ironic you accuse US of poisoning the well, as nobody here has tried to dismiss your arguments at all. Everyone here that I can tell is addressing your arguments straight-on. You are the one that has some incredible and bizarre fetish for the term "SJW", while stubbornly ignoring how fucking stupid it makes you sound.

[Terralthra]

"SJW" has taken the place of "PC" before it - as a way to try to undermine people who you don't agree with by trying to make it seem outlandish to try to be nice to other people. Most people who actually care about social justice don't call themselves "social justice warriors", just like people who tried to use ungendered titles for professions in the 70s and 80s didn't call themselves "politically correct". People whose positions were threatened or who felt attacked came up with the terms in order to insult that which they did not agree with. "People who care about other people's feelings" doesn't have a lot of sting, and if you relentlessly attack "people who care about other people's feelings", you kind of come across like an asshole. Thus, terms like "PC" and "SJW".

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

There should really be a positive version of that term, though, shouldn't there? I mean, if the only ways to describe a gay man were "a man who prefers to lie with other men as most men would lie with a woman" and "faggot", it would be pretty hard not to use the latter in discussion even while being aware that it was invented by anti-gay people. Egalitarians would fit the bill, maybe?

[mr friendly guy]

What the fuck are you blathering about?

That's a question you should be asking yourself.

YOU ARE USING THE WORD IN THE EXACT SAME CONTEXT AND FOR THE EXACT SAME REASONS AS THE PEOPLE WE ARE COMPLAINING ABOUT.

All your gibberish about how you are using it in a "different" manner is just pointless nonsense. As has already been pointed out to you, you are poisoning the well by using a loaded term as a means to blanket disregard the arguments and opinions of a broad group of people.

It's ironic you accuse US of poisoning the well, as nobody here has tried to dismiss your arguments at all. Everyone here that I can tell is addressing your arguments straight-on. You are the one that has some incredible and bizarre fetish for the term "SJW", while stubbornly ignoring how fucking stupid it makes you sound.

Bull fucking shit moron. Its ironic you say nobody has tried to dismiss my arguments, which implies I made an argument WHICH IS THE OPPOSITE OF WHAT YOU ACCUSED THEM OF DOING. This no more tries to dismiss an argument than Mike Wong does when he ridicules Trekkies as Federation Cultists.

BTW I love how you say "nobody here has tried to dismiss my arguments". Which is quite funny when you said this

Also, can we just make some sort of rule that using the term "SJW" un-ironically is basically just a concession? I mean, anyone who says it just sounds like such a twat. I find it impossible to take anyone's argument seriously if it relies so heavily on the term.

Sounds like dismissing an argument based on the fact someone used a bad word.

Concession accepted dipshit.

Frankly if I changed the perjorative from social justice warrior to idiot it would not make a god damn difference to the strength of my argument. So I am not relying so heavily on the term except in your imagination fuelled by the power of whatever hallucinogen you're smoking.

"SJW" has taken the place of "PC" before it - as a way to try to undermine people who you don't agree with by trying to make it seem outlandish to try to be nice to other people. Most people who actually care about social justice don't call themselves "social justice warriors", just like people who tried to use ungendered titles for professions in the 70s and 80s didn't call themselves "politically correct". People whose positions were threatened or who felt attacked came up with the terms in order to insult that which they did not agree with. "People who care about other people's feelings" doesn't have a lot of sting, and if you relentlessly attack "people who care about other people's feelings", you kind of come across like an asshole. Thus, terms like "PC" and "SJW".

I would argue then when egalitarians have started using the term to mock those who gives us a bad rap by focussing on very trivial and not very well thought out argument, then the language has moved on.

[Zeropoint]

There should really be a positive version of that term, though, shouldn't there?

Eh, why not just use the existing term as a term of praise and virtue? Social justice is good. Fighting for good things is good. Therefore, a Social Justice Warrior is a good thing to be and people should be proud to be identified as such.

Furthermore, earning the disapproval of the kind of people (i.e. bigoted regressive assholes) who use the term in a derogatory sense should itself be a badge of honor.

[Purple]

There should really be a positive version of that term, though, shouldn't there?

Eh, why not just use the existing term as a term of praise and virtue? Social justice is good. Fighting for good things is good. Therefore, a Social Justice Warrior is a good thing to be and people should be proud to be identified as such.

Furthermore, earning the disapproval of the kind of people (i.e. bigoted regressive assholes) who use the term in a derogatory sense should itself be a badge of honor.

Honestly speaking from my experience the term is not used against the average activist but against the kind of people you see on the internet or some times IRL. You know, the fools who will gladly attack you if you are not offended by something they thing you should be offended about. People who get off scoring PC points on the internet and will find no problem too small and trivial in order to fight their battles. And whilst only a vocal minority they give everyone a bad name.

[Joun_Lord]

There should really be a positive version of that term, though, shouldn't there?

Eh, why not just use the existing term as a term of praise and virtue? Social justice is good. Fighting for good things is good. Therefore, a Social Justice Warrior is a good thing to be and people should be proud to be identified as such.

Furthermore, earning the disapproval of the kind of people (i.e. bigoted regressive assholes) who use the term in a derogatory sense should itself be a badge of honor.

It has too much negative connotations. Its a bit like the term "Men's Right Activist". Actual people for men's rights (shit like sometimes divorce or child custody being unfair towards, the fact men cannot legally be raped in some areas, prison rape being treated as funny, male spousal abuse being treated like a joke, etc) cannot use it for fear of being grouped in with the people who use the topic of men's rights as a jumping off point to attack the rights of women. Those sorts are labeled MRAs by themselves and thus the term takes a negative light. People can then use the term to try to label others, making people want to back to so as not to risk being associated with "those people".

Someone trying to call themselves a SJW would be lumped in with the negative nancies who aren't really about social justice but complaining on the intertubes that someone dares call a kid a boy or girl, or buys their little girl something pink, or even just the time honored tradition of hating on white straight able bodied men for every fucking thing (leave white straight able bodied men alone, they never did nothing to nobody). Any actual points they would want to make or changes they would like to enact would be drowned in a sea of vitriol as they are accused of being with the hateful tumblr crazies.

Thinking about it, I wonder if the recent blowback against people labeled "feminists" is because of people working to associate it only with the more extremist "man-hating" feminists who are like the female equivalent of Men Rights Activists.

Could just be opponents seeing everyone opposed to them as pure enemy. Things like for Conservatives the term "Liberal" being almost a dirty word and for Liberals the thought that all Conservatives being stupid brutish rednecks that hate all minorities. Nobody sees the moderates and only applies the worst aspects of the enemy to the whole group.

Even your use of "bigoted regressive assholes" to describe anyone anti-SJW seems like this crap I be spewing from my eatery hole. The enemies of the SJW could not be people who hate on SJW for their rather bigoted attitudes, people angry at their misuse of actual social ills to play the hating game, or even just actual SJW who have a mad on about the so named SJWs preventing them from calling themselves SJW without being unfairly labeled as hateful nutters, just bad bad people.

I'm not immune to such sentiments either. Being a young atheist in a rather un-atheist friendly location has shown me the poorer side of Christianity and resulted in my labeled all Christians as bigoted, hateful, spiteful, backwards fools who preach peace and love even while spitting violence and hate. While of course some are, quite clearly or else I probably wouldn't have had that view, plenty of others are not. It is very tough trying to relabel Christians in my mind but I try.