Here
is a link to JT Eberhard's description of an incident involving Bria
Crutchfield and an attendee of the Great Lakes Atheist Convention.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/
And
Jen McCreight’s response to JT.
Sounds to me like someone said some racist shit and Bria Crutchfield got emotional. Some reports even say that she had some tears and said she was sorry at the end of her emotional response.
I
don't get why she'd need to be called out on this. I don't see any
sign that it was gonna become a regular thing, people saying racist
shit at atheist cons and other people getting emotional about it.
Seems to me the first response should have been concern and
understanding for Bria. If it were to become a regular thing, I'd
want to address the people saying the racist shit to find a solution, not the people being most upset by it.
As
for
the woman who asked the ignorant question and got an earful, I
think a-lot can be determined by how she responded to being called
out. Was her response regret and remorse or defensiveness? How did
she react to seeing that Bria was so upset by her comment? I don't
know the answer. I'm not without sympathy for this woman who may have
been ignorant in the true sense of the word. My hope is that the emotion
may have jolted her into paying more attention to the words that were
being spoken not less.
Analogy time; When a woman yells STOP at a man in a parking lot, a man who may have been innocently walking in her direction because maybe that's where his car is, the right response isn't, “Fuck you, I'm just going to my car.” it's “Oh, didn't realize I was scaring someone.” and stopping, and letting her get safely in her car before proceding. Because even though he doesn't assault women he knows that she lives in a world where women are assaulted and he's sensitive to that, just as the woman at this convention should be sensitive to the racism that Bria no doubt deals with daily.
Analogy time; When a woman yells STOP at a man in a parking lot, a man who may have been innocently walking in her direction because maybe that's where his car is, the right response isn't, “Fuck you, I'm just going to my car.” it's “Oh, didn't realize I was scaring someone.” and stopping, and letting her get safely in her car before proceding. Because even though he doesn't assault women he knows that she lives in a world where women are assaulted and he's sensitive to that, just as the woman at this convention should be sensitive to the racism that Bria no doubt deals with daily.
Could
Bria have responded better. Maybe. Striving to be
calm and composed even in the face of idiocy is a noble goal, we
could all be more like Mr. Spock, but I don't think it's my place (or
JT's) to call out a woman of color for how she responds to racism
(even if it was inadvertent racism). Obviously if Bria had been
violent or threatening that would have to be addressed but instead
she just responded a bit late, during a different speaker. I think
that's quite understandable. I can imagine the emotions building and
growing as she sat there and I can relate. I do hear JT saying that
the anger was justified but how she dealt with the anger was
inappropriate. I think that when we recognize that an emotional
response is understandable, we should also be accepting that
emotional responses tend not to be calculated and perfectly timed.
All that said, I like JT. I like him a lot. I think he
is wrong here. But, I think he is doing his best to be
intellectually consistent and is acting with integrity. I will not demonize JT or cast him as a racist. I
don't think that JT's motive is to silence minority voices even as I
think his response to Bria may inadvertently have just that effect.
And now, as many of the bigger names in the atheist
movement get drawn into yet another noisy controversy, let me address
the divisiveness concern. Woohoo! I've heard it said that infighting
is the biggest weakness of the left. I've always thought it was our
biggest strength. And with atheism this holds true also. What did we
want/expect? A monolithic school of united atheists in lockstep? Lets
fight, debate, divide. Our numbers continue to grow. We don't believe
in god(s). That's enough unity for me. And we can rally when need be.
We can come together in amazing numbers to fight for separation of
church and state, just as fundamentalist Christians and Mormons had
no trouble putting aside their considerable differences to fight to deny gay
people equal rights. As I've said before, we can't slam moderate
religious people for not calling out more extreme religious people
while we ourselves put aside such self critique so as not to be
divisive.
(Should the video of the exchange surface I of course reserve the right to revisit my thoughts on this.)
(Should the video of the exchange surface I of course reserve the right to revisit my thoughts on this.)
