I’m tired of calling the discussion about sexism within the skeptic and atheist movements a “controversy”. As I see it, what myself and others who talk about the fact that our communities are as subject to sexism (and racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc) as the rest of society are encountering is denialism. Look, we know that skeptics and atheists aren’t perfect. Aspiring to an ideal of rationality and fairness doesn’t make us perfect, it just means we’re trying to be better. As we know, there are prominent skeptics involved in serious legal troubles. There are prominent skeptics with troubling views about climate change. Skeptics and atheists are people, flawed and aspiring to be better – just like everyone in the world.

While at Convergence/SkepchickCon 2012 this past weekend, I did a lot of things, but one of the most fruitful and important was to attend the “Don’t Feed the Trolls” panel on the second day of the Con. The panel consisted of a number of prominent female skeptics (Rebecca Watson , Cristina Rad , Stephanie Zvan , and Heina Dadabhoy ) along with a couple of male colleagues (Greg Laden and Jason Thibeault ) discussing the issues of gender attitudes, sexism, and misogyny in the skeptical movement. I think having these discussions in an open, public format is important, because there are a number of trolls out there who are not interested in reasoned, calm discussion on these issues; instead they are interested in intimidating those with whom they disagree and are attempting to silence them.

We all know about this latest Daniel Tosh thing . As Lindy West explains , you can make a rape joke if you’re doing comedy right. This got me thinking of what passes for “comedy” with most skeptics and atheists. It’s shit. Horrible, horrible shit. First you have the “science comedians” or “atheist comedians” who have tepid, hacky jokes pandering the the interests and opinions of skeptics and atheists. Here’s a made up example:

Their main argument, as far as I can tell in between the derailing, namecalling, Godwinning, and other extreme ridiculousness is that it’s unnecessary and punitive to have a freedom-crippling set of rules governing how people treat each other. They seem to be saying that decent people are decent and most people are decent and anyway those online rape threats are just weirdos who never go anywhere and anyway they never saw anyone being sexually harassed at a conference. I think that’s how it goes.

We atheists know that creationism relies on bad logic and laughable arguments. Here’s what’s super interesting (though not at all surprising): anti-feminist creationists and anti-feminist atheists use the same shitty logic and laughable arguments when it comes to crapping on women!

Over the on Uncommon Descent - a site “serving the intelligent design community - someone going by “scordova” tries to beat up on Rebecca Watson using basically the same ridiculous nonsense reactionary and hateful atheists have been using to try and pillory her about being a woman for years. What’s super amusing is that the writer thanks Thunderf00t for tipping them off to how messed up and female Rebecca is. Has Mr. Give-me-leg-biting-or-give-me-death decided that crushing female resistance is more important than his atheistic principles, or did creationists just hear about Ms. Watson’s crimes against masculinity through his “work”? Probably the latter, but the idea of these skeptical atheists who hyperventilate over uppity ladies deciding that feminism is an enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend situation and allying themselves with creationist lunatics is…sort of delightful.

MRAs, anti-feminists, and general dudebros are fond of responding to feminists and just-not-horrible people (especially women) by whining making strongly worded claims of misandry. Inspired by the amazing How To Be A Reverse-Racist: An Actual Step by Step List For Oppressing White People by A. D. Song and Mia McKenzie I’ve created this handy guide to using the inherently unfair (to men) system to create a gynocratic fempire that I would like to call Misandria.

Today I’m sharing a guest post from Huey P. Newton , one of the co-founders of the Black Panther Party. I love, love, love this piece because it represents exactly the kind of self-reflection that inspired me and that we hope to inspire here at More Than Men. This is the entire text of a speech Newton delivered on August 15, 1970. Enjoy. - Sasha

During the past few years strong movements have developed among women and among homosexuals seeking their liberation. There has been some uncertainty about how to relate to these movements.

Those of us who argue for diversity are prone to empathy. We not only see that our position is logical and reasonable, but we are passionate about it. We feel about these things very strongly. These issues matter to us very much. It’s why we’re so prone to burnout. We pour are hearts into this and it hurts us when we’re attacked about these things. Since More Than Men started at the beginning of the year I have felt used up and beat up and emotionally exhausted several times, and I don’t even get the worst sort of abuse. The only rape threat I ever received was from someone who didn’t even care enough to notice that I’m a guy.

As an organizer for my local Skeptic group, it was important to me to include an anti-harassment policy. My co-organizer and I very much wanted the gender ratio to be as close to 50/50 as it could be, for both speakers and attendees. To that end I wanted a good anti-harassment policy in place. I never imagined that it would be an issue. I guess at heart I’ve been far too much of an optimist.

Saladin Ahmed is a Muslim, Arab-American fantasy writer. (If you enjoy fantastic fiction, I recommend his novel [Throne of the Crescent Moon[(https://www.amazon.com/Throne-Crescent-Moon-Kingdoms/dp/0756407117/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1)].) As you’d expect he’s experienced some racism and religious bigotry directed at he and his family, especially since 2001. Last August he was asked if that hate was something he had experienced in the publishing trade, to which he replied:

“…talking about this or that sector of society as being less or more racist is kind of like talking about this or that part of the ocean being less or more wet.”