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OK, I need to come out of hiding. Have made my account public again. I am not finding the recent escalation of nastiness coming my way very easy to deal with, though. I will block you instantly if you accuse me of believing things I don't believe for motivations I don't have.
Yesterday, it was announced that I will be taking part in a panel on whether we can cancel cancel culture. This led people to accuse me not only of wanting to ban criticisms of racism, but also of being far-right, a paedophile & a terrorist apologist.
I have just published a book I wrote with @ConceptualJames that breaks down various theories accurately and argues that a liberal approach where we try to eradicate identity stereotypes will work better to achieve social justice over an identity politics one where we cement them.
Nevertheless, Jim has now been accused of being a far-right extremist who either thinks PoC shouldn't be in STEM or that PoC think they shouldn't be in STEM even though he has never said anything remotely like either of these & has repeatedly said the precise opposite.
Some people seem to think the 'debate' over whether 2+2=4 is a silly thing where people are talking past each other & doesn't actually matter, but I think they might see why it does when they have read our chapter on 'research justice' & 'decolonising knowledge.'
I encourage you all to read that chapter in its entirety including the endnotes which is where the lengthy quotes from empirical postcolonial scholars pointing out the racist & orientalist nature of the attempts to make STEM a white, western thing & how much damage this can do.
Meera Nanda, in particular, says that this anti-scientific endeavor which she correctly blames on postmodern concepts of knowledge as a construct of power has much more in common with the religious right's attempt to hold back scientific & moral progress in India.
Being able to argue that "2+2=whatever you want it to" really is a first world luxury enabled by living in a society where sufficient numbers of people have respected & done science & maths that you have your life, health, security & technology to pontificate foolishly upon.
Let me be clear. I think people should have the absolute right to believe that 2+2=5, the earth is 6000 years old, biological sex is a social construct, vaccines cause autism, the world is flat, Covid is a conspiracy or whatever idiocy they choose to believe.
Nevertheless, those of us who care about reality & the usefulness of taking reality as the basis for our attempts to advance in knowledge, social justice & the wellbeing of all humans should help the effort of reaching a public consensus that these ideas are not worthy of respect
I know many people *still* think we are making a lot of fuss about nothing even as ludicrous & harmful narratives of self-interested ideological nonsense continue to proliferate from the post-truth right & postmodern left as they fight their war of narratives, but we are not.
It would be greatly appreciated if people who agree that we currently have quite a serious problem & that we will be royally screwed if either the postmodern left consolidate their cultural dominance or if they are toppled by the post-truth right would help in any way they can.
As for those who still think everything is basically fine and all we are actually seeing is a few far-left nutjobs and some recalcitrant bigots whining about being criticised for their bigotry, I don't what to say to you anymore.
At this stage, I'd just appreciate it if you would get out of the way of principled people who are neither nut jobs nor bigots and are trying to restore some reason, charity & communication to the world.
All I can hope is that the escalation of sheer malicious, dishonest hatefulness that gets poured all over me on a daily basis indicates that I am actually achieving something & represents the desperate thrashing of a silly & unethical ideology being shown to be such.
Anyway, please bear in mind that this amount of nastiness is flying at me constantly & that I am not always managing to be as patient as I would like to be & sometimes I just have to go away & shut it all out & sew tea parties & listen to psychological thrillers.
I still don't actually know if I am being less patient & charitable than I should be or if I am still being too much so & should take the gloves off. A friend (not Jim) recently told me that I'd still be arguing out the fine points as the revolutionaries wheel out the guillotine.
But I can only do me & I have a lot of support & I still don't get as much nastiness as Jim does. He took the gloves off some time ago & frankly, I'm surprised he's still as patient as he is which is "not very." It's just too much & it is *so* vicious & dishonest.
