No, Penn Jillette, Rape And Death Threats Are Not Free Speech

screencap from the movie My Chauffeur (1986)
Penn Jillette being artistic?

There has been a major storm over misogyny in the freethought movement for several years. Women in the movement who have spoken out against it have been harassed with rape and death threats among other nasty reactions. People who don’t see anything wrong with the misogyny, like comedian Penn Jillette, worry more about being able to call a woman a ‘cunt’ than why one shouldn’t be doing that in the first place. That’s the problem.

Buzzfeed has a very thorough article about the misogyny conflict in the freethought movement. It actually gave both sides of the issue and while I knew most of the incidents described the article also included interviews with several women who had been raped and/or harassed.

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Open Letter Addressing Sexism In Secular Community Is A Good Start

image of a man and women arguing

On Tuesday, leaders of most of the secular groups in the United States issued an open letter addressing the ongoing internal firestorm over social justice, sexism, and diversity in the freethought community taking place mainly in online forums and comment sections. I applaud the leaders wanting to take on this serious issue in the community and while it doesn’t go far enough in addressing the real issue in the dispute, I hope the letter does open the door to further progress.

You can read the letter at the end of this post then come back here for my comments.

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To My Freethought Friends: You Are On Notice

image of a Be Nice sign
Can’t we all just get along

There has been a serious issue with discussing diversity and sexual harassment within the freethought community. I have written a post or two about the matter and it seems that even a year since the biggest blowup – elevatorgate – the sexism and misogyny has not abated. It seems some immature boys can’t let go of the fact that their harassment is stupid and wrong. I’m declaring right now that I will quit any group that ignores or condones harassment and I will personally shun any person who harasses for any reason or continually makes excuses for such behavior. I didn’t come to this decision lightly but it seems some just can’t move forward and they are holding our freethought movement hostage. Enough is enough.

The other day on the Atheist Revolution blog there was a post about an Atheist blogger filing a DCMA complaint against another “Atheist” blog. The name of the blog is “Elevatorgate”. When I saw the site my jaw dropped. The entire site was devoted to Ad Hominem attacks on several bloggers and activists in the Freethought community who complained about diversity and sexual harassment in the movement and those who supported the bloggers who complained.

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Attention Men In the Atheist & Freethought Community! STOP IT!

image of DJ Grothe - President of James Randi Educational Foundation
DJ Grothe – President of James Randi Educational Foundation

Another conference and another bad experience by women at the conference followed by a backlash from men toward the women complaining. I am getting SICK OF IT! Knock the shit off now guys and show some respect for women. Right now some atheist men are no better than those on the religious right who want to return women back to the days when they were all barefoot and pregnant.

The atheist and freethought communities have gotten a black eye lately from a couple of highly publicized incidents where women attended some conferences and were harassed or treated unfairly by some men also attending the conferences or demeaned or outright dismissed in panel discussions.

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