As I said unequivocally in this post, I don’t necessarily agree with all the content nor the manner in which Thunderf00t presented his case against the neofeminists and the Atheism Plus crowd in his hack-job video, ”Why ‘Feminism’ is poisoning Atheism,” but I will say that feminists and their supporters are doing little to mitigate the situation. Creating “diversity” they are not, which renders this petition from Adam Lee, “Support Feminism and Diversity in the Secular Community,” not only meaningless but disingenuous.

Maria Maltseva makes the excellent case that leaders in the skeptic community who may be on the fence on feminism are fenced into a no-win situation:

If you refuse, you’re clearly a woman hater (since in those situations, feminism is said to be nothing more than equality between the sexes — a far cry what modern feminism teaches today). And who’s opposed to equality of the sexes/genders/races/and people of different sexual preferences, and a more inclusive environment for all? No one, as far as I know. Still, if you say nothing, it appears that you don’t care about women. And if you do agree to sign, then you’ve been trapped into supporting feminism, an amorphous and shape-shifting beast which is frequently anti-science (due to the bias those allegedly awful white males have been constantly injecting into the field), and you’ve betrayed the fundamental principles of the pro-science movement.

Unlike what P.Z. Myers argues with reckless abandon, namely that people who do not support feminism are vile, less-than-human cretins of the most despicable order (obviously a paraphrase), the problem as I see it is that critics of feminism and Atheism Plus — notice that to mention one is to also mention the other — like myself want nothing more than total equality of the sexes. Sure, the skeptical community has its bad apples like any community. But atheists, freethinkers and humanists, perhaps more than any other group of people, chafe at being told that they must support such and such or else be castigated, banned, blocked or otherwise shunned from the community as a consequence.

Feminists can’t escape the fact that the “movement” has deep and historic ties to politics, and while, in principle, of course most of us desire equality among the sexes. That goes without saying, but I don’t blame the droves of nonbelievers who want no association with politics whatsoever. I don’t take this view myself because, though often stained with corruption, politics is one of the practical ways that change can be enacted in a way that can positively affect millions of people.

As a side note, Myers is back to preaching again:

First, go read Amy Roth’s summary of the situation: there is a small group of Mabusesque obsessive haters who have been harassing a number of vocal atheists for the past few years. I know; I’m one of their targets, and I can tell you, these people are really screwed up and pathologically focused on hating anyone who dares to profess any support for feminism, or any kind of support for increasing the diversity of the movement. They’re loud, they’re persistent, and they’re an embarrassment to the community.

Now, once you’re in the right frame of mind to understand the context, go read Adam Lee’s petition to support feminism and diversity in the secular community.

You’ll know what to do.

Maybe I’m just as moronic as the cretins that he blasts on a daily basis, but wouldn’t “increasing diversity” in the community include welcoming the very people who have been critical of Atheism Plus, along with feminist supporters? Where is the petition to support harmony in the community? I realize that achieving harmony would be a long shot, but wouldn’t that be a better, more genuine goal, rather Adam Lee’s petition, which is so laughably hypocritical.