Category Archives: Twitter

CJ Werleman: Misrepresentation, Dubious Ethics and Unoriginal Hackery.

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strawman

I own a couple of Werleman’s books: ‘God Hates You, Hate Him Back’ & ‘Jesus Lied – He Was Only Human‘. I’d never heard of him beforehand, but I was happy to receive them as Christmas gifts a few years back – my Dad’s cool like that.

They’re ok – they don’t cover any new ground, the humour is a bit too school yard for my taste and reading them created the impression of an author who’d spied an opening in a growing a market – but it doesn’t really matter. I decided they were essentially good, as they were accessible (that’s a polite way of saying ‘dumbed down’).

The so-called ‘Four Horsemen/New Atheists’ are often accused of being elitist, as if that’s somehow an invective. Whilst not really sharing this concern, I think I understand one aspect of it. We have a group of incredibly intelligent, likely privileged (white – must mention white!) and qualified individuals who write on topics in such a manner that may require a life-time worth of research and expertise to fully get to grips with. Not everyone feels this way of course, but it’s not necessarily entry-level stuff for some either. I count myself amongst those that have their own intelligence challenged (and often pummelled) by the ideas these people so effortlessly hold court on. So I also consider any contribution to a body of literature that’s critical of religion to be a good thing, especially if it reaches a broader audience.

Needless to say we won’t be seeing Werleman follow up with ‘Allah Hates You, Hate Him Back’ or ‘Muhammad Lied – He Was Only A Charlatan’ any time soon, as he’s currently preoccupied with the deeply courageous task of mocking Republicans, ‘New Atheists’, and bravely highlighting the dangers posed by talk show hosts & neuroscientists (see the article ‘What atheists like Bill Maher have in common with medieval Christian crusaders‘). Islamic terrorism can wait – or rather, is explained away as a product of politics, not a fundamentalist interpretation of Islam – as though the two are mutually exclusive. Drop in a pinch of white guilt, a dash of masochism and you’ve already heard this elsewhere, many times before, many years ago.

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Twitter Suspension – Podcasting and Vegas!

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twitter_jail_icon

It looks like I’ve been suspended on Twitter. I’d planned to just wait it out, but I’ve received tons of messages and emails about it, which is surprising and very kind.  Thank you!  So I thought I’d share some info.

No reason has been given for the suspension and I’ve initiated the appeal process with Twitter.  This can take days, weeks, or could result in permanent suspension. I imagine it’s all a pretty automated affair.

I’ve a suspicion they’ll come back and inform me I’ve been reported for abuse (something similar seems to have happened to prominent video blogger Thunderf00t for annoying the right people).  Obviously, anyone who’s followed me for some time will know that any complaints of abuse could not have been sincere – or accompanied by a single valid example.  It’s a comfort to know that I’m annoying the right people enough to the point that they feel silencing me is a worthy endeavour!  I can’t be certain who’s responsible, but who cares?  It’s all a bit dull, isn’t it?

Obviously genuine abuse online is very serious & a deeply unpleasant thing, and it is good that Twitter takes a strong stance on it.  It’s just a shame that Twitter’s automated process is so deeply flawed.  We now have an online environment where members of ISIS can tweet endless selfies with various dismembered body parts to no consequence, yet a handful – or perhaps even one person can have me suspended on false charges.

It seems Twitter suspends first and asks questions later.  But what are you going to do?  There are real problems, and then there are Twitter problems.  It’s amusing to think that some prominent bloggers actually make a career out of this sort of online ‘nontroversey’.  Shall I rage on about harassment now?  Censorship?  Bullying? Use it as evidence that there’s a concerted effort to silence men online? Perhaps not.

To be honest, the trolls couldn’t have chosen a better time. I fly out to Vegas this week, so had planned to have some twitter/podcasting downtime.  Who’s been to Vegas?  Any suggestions for things to see? Hit the comments!  Talking of ‘deep rifts’, follow my backup account @GSpellcheck and I’ll tweet you some pictures from the Grand Canyon. I’m incredibly excited!

Podcast:

The podcast will be completely unaffected by this silliness – and I have one episode left to release for September, which should arrive this week.  Make sure you’re subscribed in iTunes, Stitcher or your preferred podcasting service.  If you rely solely on my twitter feed for new podcast episodes, I’d suggest joining the mailing list on this blog and I’ll email you when new content is available.  Alternatively, you can just like my Facebook page.

I can’t say this enough, but thank you for all the podcast support.  I’ve recently surpassed 150,000 downloads, which is absurd.  This has far exceeded my wildest expectations from when I first started last November.  All you wonderfully generous patreon supporters mean a lot to me.  Speak to you soon.  Do I bet on red or black?

 

 

 

 

Quinn Norton Implodes – In The Interest Of Clarity

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BBC

After the recent confusion caused by a statement heard on BBC Newsnight that “Men are raised to hate women” I decided to ask the journalist responsible for an explanation.

The outcome was unexpected and inspired me to pen this blog post, which in turn led to in my view, unfairly, hours of bizarre accusations from a tiny number of individuals

1Although the overwhelming majority of (I realise this is not indicative of being right) people seemed to agree that clarification was necessary, and the initial statement was too much of a generalisation to be helpful to say the least, the very small number who did take issue with me seemed to fall in to two camps.

Some argued that the statement was perfectly reasonable and not deserving of question.  And that it was actually my lack of understanding that was the real problem, or the manner in which I questioned.

Others seemingly fell afoul of a catastrophic inability to differentiate between the following two statements, (one genuine, one imagined):

“What exactly do you mean by that?  Please explain”

And

“Sexism and misogyny are not genuine problems in society”.

I could not attempt a defence of the second statement, even if I were stupid enough to actually believe it, or want to.

Obviously there are a lot of good people who feel incredibly passionate about sexism and misogyny for incredibly valid reasons (captain obvious) and may have felt I was somehow denying the importance or existence of these issues.  As explainable as this perception may be on some level, it is not even remotely accurate to anything I have said, implied or argued.

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Quinn Norton: Trolling, “Men Are Raised To Hate Women” and Other Confusing Statements.

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They See Me Trollin'

Twitter has been big news of late, with reports that they plan to implement an abuse reporting function.  I’ve been asked a few times what my thoughts are on the matter, and I’m all for it.

Threatening and unlawful behaviour is completely unacceptable and those who engage in such a manner should be held accountable.  I displayed my willingness to side with this sentiment recently by reporting a clearly threatening tweet (not to me) to the police.

My only concern is: how will this be regulated?  Will Twitter have the manpower (or women!!!!!) to efficiently distinguish abusers and trollers from genuine disagreement or attempts to engage in meaningful discourse? Given the vast numbers of Twitter users and the seemingly unrealistic task of policing it, is it likely to be an unmanned,  automated process?  An algorithm simply reacting to multiple ‘abuse reports’? Only time will tell.

‘Troll’ seems the buzzword of late.  The problem is, that “troll” in the context of the internet has no unified definition.  I personally take trolling to mean the act of intentionally making insincere statements to an individual, or individuals in order to provoke a response, or as they would call it,  a “victory”. Others use it simply to describe an individual who seeks out arguments online.

I’m trolled daily in the former sense. People will tweet me en masse with clearly disingenuous statements in the hope that I may respond.  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.  It often depends on how dull my commute to work is that morning.

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Team GFGS WaterAid Fundraising

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Image Created By @Wavish

Image Created By @Wavish

Back in March I started Team Good For Good’s Sake (#GFGS).  The idea was to raise money for a good cause, simply because we agreed that doing good is worthy for its own sake.

The result was staggering.  Nearly £11,000 was raised. Thoroughly spanking the myth that one cannot be good without God firmly to the other side of mythsville.

It is for this reason I have started a new cause for us to support, this time WaterAid.  This is a great charity.  Please click to see just what it is they do, and how important it is.  Please click ‘Sponsor Me’ below to donate.

Just giving

You can also donate via text by texting GFGS99 £5 (or any amount) to 70070.

I’m still constantly awed by the intelligence and compassion displayed by the people who interact with me on Twitter.  This kind of thing strikes me as special, and I’m fully aware that it cannot last forever.  Because of this, I think it’s great to use our shared camaraderie to do something worthwhile whilst we can.  Why?  Because we can.

Rather than having a short space of time to raise funds,  as was the case previously, I’ve decided this will be an on-going initiative, ending on Christmas Day.  I realise £10,390 is probably impossible to repeat or better, so I have set the starting limit to £500, but you’ve surprised me before!

I’ll provide any updates here and tweet them out accordingly.

What will we have achieved by Christmas day?

Thanks

GS

Podcast – Thoughts and Thanks

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Podcast

Recently  (Fri 12th July) I was fortunate enough to be part of The Herd Mentality Podcast hosted by Mr Adam Reakes, with special guests Mr Oz Atheist, and a young up and coming comedian, eager to make a name for himself, Ricky Gervais.

He’s going to be big one day.  Remember you heard him here first.

You’ll click below to listen to it immediately if you know what’s good for you.
iTunes (Episode7)
Direct Link
Android (Stitcher)

I had lots of fun.  I’m a huge fan of Ricky; I’ve been to his live shows, adore his sitcoms and hold fond memories of laughter-filled evenings gathered with good friends, cold beverages and a download of his latest podcast.

ricky-gervais-show-550x366The irresistible combination of wondering what Karl Pilkington will say next, how exactly Ricky will react to it, whilst Steve Merchant tries to hold it all together has made me laugh to the point of abdominal pain.  Please seek them out if you haven’t already listened to them.

It is for this reason, that hearing the disembodied voice of Ricky booming from my laptop seemed familiar enough for me to forget I was actually part of the conversation at times.  And I often did.  This is fine by me however, as I said, lots of fun!

A huge thanks to Adam and Mr Oz for making this happen. They were responsible for all the technical aspects and organisation respectively.  All I had to do was take the day off work (already worth it), sound disappointingly Mancunian (I’m not Prof Brian Cox) and be entertained by two Aussie gents and my favourite comic.  A great way to spend a morning, I hope you’ll agree.

A massive thanks to the Podfather himself for giving up his morning just to have a chuckle with a few like-minded strangers.  I was really taken aback by Ricky’s generosity and praise. It’ll stick with me.  Kindness is magic.

“How dare you have a go at Rihanna!” is still making me chuckle. Haha!

Thanks to anyone who has already listened and sent kind words our way.  I’ll never cease to be amazed at how rewarding just having fun on Twitter has become.

Please subscribe to the Herd Mentality Podcast and check in on the previous episodes too.  There’s some great stuff in there.  Also, please check out the hilarious Ricky Gervais on his YouTube channel and subscribe.  Go and get the guitar…

GS

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