10 ms·

Scientists must resist cancel culture

46 points by steelstraw 5y ago

mrtesthah 5y ago
Scientists have been against cancel culture for a while now. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/states-that-dont-teach-evolution https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/states-that...
- robwwilliams 5y ago
  Hmm, scientists have their own private cancel culture: often based on tacit assumptions about the RIGHT way to do science. In the 1970s cultural anthropology and genetics were both hotbeds of cancel culture. And the canceling attempts were vividly reciprocal. For a recent incident: see EO Wilson’s shameful post-modern “obituary” in Scientific American, or read Napoleon Changnon on the warfare among tribes of anthropologist.
mempko 5y ago
It's not mobs that make decisions to censor but owners of companies and universities. Twitter can't get you fired because that decision falls on the bosses.
- NeveHanter 5y ago
  I would say in my opinion it's quite the opposite. The mob indirectly make the decision by forcing the "owners" by threats, boycott or giving the bad public on social media, or even in some cases in real life. If you're thick-skinned then you can life with that and do nothing, but most of the people would actually choose to censor/remove something or fire somebody instead of receiving the blow themself. For example I could just ignore opposing opinions I don't agree with, but I won't be ignoring threats, bullying etc. which are so common nowadays. I remember the times where you could have your opinions and if you did not directly attacked somebody or didn't break the law in your country you could post nearly anything you want and these were the times of the freedom of speech. You can't have your opposing opinion now in some of the topics because if you do, then you're risking getting cancelled, (shadow) banned, muted or at least having your opinion removed. Or as it's common you would get the badge of being left or right even if you're not. You won't find many people who could support your opinion or at least try to calm down the conflict/argue because most of the people don't care about the "wars" that are happening in the social media, they just want to have a nice and peaceful life. So, my opinion at the end is that we shouldn't care who creator is or what he did, the only thing we should care about is or isn't his creation, whether it's valuable or invaluable for me, my relatives, society or the environment. And if somebody disagree with some opinion, then he should post his opinion/argument if it gives any value for future on-topic discussion or some unique view, but do not start a flame war or literally try to destroy somebody' life or day because of that. In the end you do you and i do me. Also, just to clearly point that out, I'm not from the US and I'm neither so called far-left nor far-right as probably no one is.
  - mempko 5y ago
    > which are so common nowadays. Has anyone actually backed this with data? Threats are more common now? Really? How do you know? Just because some "free speech" media pundit says so doesn't make it true.
SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago
Why is this article focused on whatever is happening on some social media site when schools are banning books, barring teachers from teaching subject matters deemed obscene, and churches are hosting book burning parties? I feel like there are some wacky priorities going on.
- genjipress 5y ago
  There are.
- dissent 5y ago
  Because the far right have always been nuts and society is somewhat inoculated against them. The far left seem to be able to penetrate far more deeply and are actually successful in suppressing free speech and scientific wrongthink.
  - Daishiman 5y ago
    Multiple right-wing legislators in the US are obsessed with banning "critical race theory", and when you look at their proposed bannings it seems more like banning anything that would teach the history of racism in the US. This affects millions of students, but sure, the problem is "the far left".
    - javajosh 5y ago
      It's nice to see that "whataboutism" can be wielded as well by left wing ideologues as right wing ones! The simple truth is that science and civic discourse has always been under attack from the right, and always will be, because right-wing views naturally gravitates toward authoritarianism. But the left has decided to join in recently. The left invented something new, a kind of distributed authoritarianism, with MeToo and woke/cancel culture, which gives every person of a "blessed" identity the absolute power of a tyrant over anyone within earshot who is of a corresponding "cursed" identity. I speak as someone on the receiving end of this, in family court. It's a shift in power that leaves straight white liberal men abandoned and demoralized. We are dehumanized, treated to precisely those iniquities that we've fought hard against for so long. Our expressions of pain and worry are ignored and demeaned by our erstwhile friends, and if we complain about that then we are attacked further as being manipulative and dishonest. It is a perfect little trap, that can apparently only be escaped by donning a certain red trucker hat. As another poster said, society has developed a resistance to right-wing censorship over time. But the left-wing censorship is a new innovation, and it's much harder to combat. I truly worry about my 2-year-old son growing up endlessly hearing about his toxic masculinity, his inherently oppressive identity, and always being at the mercy of other people's feelings, while his own are ignored or demeaned. The left is, if anything, more dangerous today in terms of censorship, forcing speakers to be silent, everywhere, lest they risk hurting someone's feeling, and thereby have their entire lives destroyed.
KerrAvon 5y ago
They seem to be upset about Dorian Abbot not being able to give a particular lecture. This is the last paragraph of the editorial he cowrote that seems to have caused all the trouble: > Then an ideological regime obsessed with race came to power and drove many of the best scholars out, gutting the faculties and leading to sustained decay that German universities never fully recovered from. We should view this as a warning of the consequences of viewing group membership as more important than merit, and correct our course before it is too late. https://www.newsweek.com/diversity-problem-campus-opinion-1618419 https://www.newsweek.com/diversity-problem-campus-opinion-16... The stated goal of the programs he was opposing here is to increase diversity at universities. You can reasonably disagree that it will do that (and he does in the remainder of the article, some of the points are very good) without invoking Nazi Germany. It's incredibly disrespectful and unlikely to convince people who aren't already on your side. And if the consequence of this is that you can't give a lecture one time, well, I'm having a difficult time finding the Zylkon B cans nearby.
- sharikous 5y ago
  > The stated goal of the programs he was opposing here is to increase diversity at universities. You can reasonably disagree that it will do that (and he does in the remainder of the article, some of the points are very good) without invoking Nazi Germany. Actually he disagrees with the goal itself (diversity, or rather what kind of diversity is desiderable to pursue). > And if the consequence of this is that you can't give a lecture one time, well, I'm having a difficult time finding the Zylkon B cans nearby. Yep. That's no Nazi Germany. But it's disingenuous to say that the only consequence is he won't give a lecture one time. And canceling a lecture is a very worrying thing to do, especially for such a mild "offense". The quote attributed to Voltaire is very relevant in this context.
- kspacewalk2 5y ago
  I have the same problem with the anti-lockdown and anti-vax-mandate protesters here in Canada. You might have a valid point here and there, but as soon as you bring up how the Covid measures are "oppression" just like in Nazi Germany, you instantaneously turn yourself into an ignorant clown. What the hell is wrong with people comparing every policy or social trend they don't like to gassing millions of people to death? Get a grip and pick up a history book.
codys 5y ago
This article mis-represents criticisms of Angewandte Chemie publishing Tomáš Hudlický's essay (opposing efforts to increase diversity in organic synthesis) by attributing them to a "Twitter firestorm" while other publications note this event caused members of Angewandte Chemie's international advisory board to resign in protest, and other Chemists criticized the essay [1]. There may be a way to thoughtfully discuss this issue, but this article is a poor attempt at it. 1: https://cen.acs.org/research-integrity/ethics/Essay-criticizing-efforts-increase-diversity-in-organic-synthesis-deleted-after-backlash-from-chemists/98/web/2020/06 https://cen.acs.org/research-integrity/ethics/Essay-criticiz...
_8j50 5y ago
Would have been nice if nazi scientists were "cancelled" after WW2. Before as well, perhaps nazi pseudoscience and eugenics would have had less prevalence. The law should also bring back ostracizing and outlawing. Humane but more effective and just than prison. Joined ISIS? Get outlawed. Participated in mob robbery, riot or insurrection? Will pay for your ticket out of the state or country because you are now banned. The comfort and protections of a civilized society do not belong to those who reject civilization.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Would have been nice if nazi scientists were "cancelled" after WW2. Would have been even nicer if Nazis (and not just the scientists) were “cancelled” before WWII.
  - _8j50 5y ago
    Agreed. Bottom line: calling out bullshit and making people accountable for comments made in a public setting is good.
- javajosh 5y ago
  Professors are getting canceled because one student reacted badly to one thing they said one time. This form of cancel culture needs to be stopped! This form gives every student total power over their teachers, based only on their own subjective feelings, and power like that inevitably corrupts. (It's kind of like how the police have a "Marshall Law bubble" around them at all times; of course they are going to abuse it!) The other form of cancel culture that needs to be stopped is the taboo against asking uncomfortable questions. If you look around the world looking for admirable governments, do you see a pattern? If so, would you be cancelled for naming it? Is that okay? Are we so committed to egalitarinism that we want to forcefully ignore measuring differences between human populations, or even framing hypotheses that imply a difference?
  - _8j50 5y ago
    I don't disagree with anything you said and I stand by original comment. Not mutually exclusive.
mint2 5y ago
Why is the title as (Wiley.com) not “(random chemistry journal on Wiley)”?
crooked-v 5y ago
It's a familiar pattern at this point: a piece complaining about 'cancel culture' that conveniently elides actually mentioning any of the content that got people 'canceled', while focusing on the impolite responses of the 'cancelers' and implicitly or explicitly arguing that literally anything should be allowed (or, rather, forced to be printed under an organization or government's auspices) as long as it's framed in a polite manner.
kwertyoowiyop 5y ago
So much politics on HN these days.
- nathanaldensr 5y ago
  It's become /r/politics and ever other political sub on Reddit.
a_shovel 5y ago
> Some institutions have actually institutionalised censorship. For example, the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), a major publisher, has issued guidelines for editors to „consider whether or not any content … might have the potential to cause offence“. Is Krylov seriously asking us to consider this censorship? This is called politeness. The citation for the list of innocuous terms to "censor" is another, very similar piece by Krylov, which cites this [0] memo from the University of Michigan's IT department. It lists no consequences for failing to use the alternate terms. Quote: > Not all words on this list may be offensive to everyone. Regardless, if a colleague considers a word or phrase offensive, their lived experience should be acknowledged, and an alternative word or phrase should be used. This is not "All who refuse to adopt our Newspeak must be re-educated", this is "If someone says a term is offensive, just be polite and go with it, and here are some alternative terms to help with that." It doesn't even tell you to stop using it in general, just when someone objects! Calling this "censorship" is ridiculous. Let's look at the other two examples as well. First, consider what happened to Tomáš Hudlický after he wrote the article. > The journal removed the paper from its website. ... A planned special issue of Synthesis in his honour was cancelled, invitations to speak at conferences and to review papers ceased, citations to his papers were deleted, and collaborators were encouraged to dissociate themselves from him. He wasn't fired, or demoted, or disciplined. Mainly, people just stopped wanting to associate with him. Was this proportionate? Let's now consider what the wider chemistry community thought about the article: > Sixteen editorial board members resigned in protest of the publication. The journal ... issued an abject apology, suspended two editors, and began an internal investigation. Condemnation ensued in blogs, journals, and statements issued by chemical societies. What happened to Hudlický seems like the straightforward consequence of holding a deeply controversial view. Lots of people won't like you for it. They don't owe you the things they were planning to give you before you wrote an article everyone hates. Saying all of them simultaneously "capitulated to the mob" is an entirely baseless framing (that's all too common in this type of writing). As for Dorian Abbot, paraphrasing the article, "A group of activists initiated a social media campaign to uninvite him. MIT cancelled the event." Again, unpopular people are not owed speaking appearances. Disinvitation is not punishment. The point of these talks is the prestige of having a respected expert make an appearance and share their views. If the audience doesn't like you, there's no reason for the university to invite you to speak. If this is all that happened to Abbot, I'm struggling to see why I ought to care about this. In summary, an organization asked people to consider other peoples' feelings before publishing things, and some unpopular people were not allowed to give prestigious lectures. Going back to the top of the article and reading Krylov compare this to autocratic regimes and murder highlights just how dishonest and hyperbolic the framing is on all of these "cancel culture" articles. They're all like this. [0] https://drive.google.com/file/d/11a8cUt1SCfIxQRBZk_TnRYM5ltENL7LI/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/11a8cUt1SCfIxQRBZk_TnRYM5ltE... [1] Further reading: https://michaelhobbes.substack.com/p/moral-panic-journalism https://michaelhobbes.substack.com/p/moral-panic-journalism
4WIW 5y ago
People who disagreed with the article, flagged it as "spam or off-topic". The article discussing cancel culture got canceled (flagged) -- how ironic is that?

46 points by steelstraw 5y ago

Scientists have been against cancel culture for a while now. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/states-that-dont-teach-evolution https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/states-that...

robwwilliams 5y ago
Hmm, scientists have their own private cancel culture: often based on tacit assumptions about the RIGHT way to do science. In the 1970s cultural anthropology and genetics were both hotbeds of cancel culture. And the canceling attempts were vividly reciprocal. For a recent incident: see EO Wilson’s shameful post-modern “obituary” in Scientific American, or read Napoleon Changnon on the warfare among tribes of anthropologist.

mempko 5y ago

It's not mobs that make decisions to censor but owners of companies and universities. Twitter can't get you fired because that decision falls on the bosses.

NeveHanter 5y ago
I would say in my opinion it's quite the opposite. The mob indirectly make the decision by forcing the "owners" by threats, boycott or giving the bad public on social media, or even in some cases in real life. If you're thick-skinned then you can life with that and do nothing, but most of the people would actually choose to censor/remove something or fire somebody instead of receiving the blow themself. For example I could just ignore opposing opinions I don't agree with, but I won't be ignoring threats, bullying etc. which are so common nowadays. I remember the times where you could have your opinions and if you did not directly attacked somebody or didn't break the law in your country you could post nearly anything you want and these were the times of the freedom of speech. You can't have your opposing opinion now in some of the topics because if you do, then you're risking getting cancelled, (shadow) banned, muted or at least having your opinion removed. Or as it's common you would get the badge of being left or right even if you're not. You won't find many people who could support your opinion or at least try to calm down the conflict/argue because most of the people don't care about the "wars" that are happening in the social media, they just want to have a nice and peaceful life. So, my opinion at the end is that we shouldn't care who creator is or what he did, the only thing we should care about is or isn't his creation, whether it's valuable or invaluable for me, my relatives, society or the environment. And if somebody disagree with some opinion, then he should post his opinion/argument if it gives any value for future on-topic discussion or some unique view, but do not start a flame war or literally try to destroy somebody' life or day because of that. In the end you do you and i do me. Also, just to clearly point that out, I'm not from the US and I'm neither so called far-left nor far-right as probably no one is.
- mempko 5y ago
  > which are so common nowadays. Has anyone actually backed this with data? Threats are more common now? Really? How do you know? Just because some "free speech" media pundit says so doesn't make it true.

SamoyedFurFluff 5y ago

Why is this article focused on whatever is happening on some social media site when schools are banning books, barring teachers from teaching subject matters deemed obscene, and churches are hosting book burning parties? I feel like there are some wacky priorities going on.

genjipress 5y ago
There are.
dissent 5y ago
Because the far right have always been nuts and society is somewhat inoculated against them. The far left seem to be able to penetrate far more deeply and are actually successful in suppressing free speech and scientific wrongthink.
- Daishiman 5y ago
  Multiple right-wing legislators in the US are obsessed with banning "critical race theory", and when you look at their proposed bannings it seems more like banning anything that would teach the history of racism in the US. This affects millions of students, but sure, the problem is "the far left".
  - javajosh 5y ago
    It's nice to see that "whataboutism" can be wielded as well by left wing ideologues as right wing ones! The simple truth is that science and civic discourse has always been under attack from the right, and always will be, because right-wing views naturally gravitates toward authoritarianism. But the left has decided to join in recently. The left invented something new, a kind of distributed authoritarianism, with MeToo and woke/cancel culture, which gives every person of a "blessed" identity the absolute power of a tyrant over anyone within earshot who is of a corresponding "cursed" identity. I speak as someone on the receiving end of this, in family court. It's a shift in power that leaves straight white liberal men abandoned and demoralized. We are dehumanized, treated to precisely those iniquities that we've fought hard against for so long. Our expressions of pain and worry are ignored and demeaned by our erstwhile friends, and if we complain about that then we are attacked further as being manipulative and dishonest. It is a perfect little trap, that can apparently only be escaped by donning a certain red trucker hat. As another poster said, society has developed a resistance to right-wing censorship over time. But the left-wing censorship is a new innovation, and it's much harder to combat. I truly worry about my 2-year-old son growing up endlessly hearing about his toxic masculinity, his inherently oppressive identity, and always being at the mercy of other people's feelings, while his own are ignored or demeaned. The left is, if anything, more dangerous today in terms of censorship, forcing speakers to be silent, everywhere, lest they risk hurting someone's feeling, and thereby have their entire lives destroyed.

KerrAvon 5y ago

They seem to be upset about Dorian Abbot not being able to give a particular lecture. This is the last paragraph of the editorial he cowrote that seems to have caused all the trouble: > Then an ideological regime obsessed with race came to power and drove many of the best scholars out, gutting the faculties and leading to sustained decay that German universities never fully recovered from. We should view this as a warning of the consequences of viewing group membership as more important than merit, and correct our course before it is too late. https://www.newsweek.com/diversity-problem-campus-opinion-1618419 https://www.newsweek.com/diversity-problem-campus-opinion-16... The stated goal of the programs he was opposing here is to increase diversity at universities. You can reasonably disagree that it will do that (and he does in the remainder of the article, some of the points are very good) without invoking Nazi Germany. It's incredibly disrespectful and unlikely to convince people who aren't already on your side. And if the consequence of this is that you can't give a lecture one time, well, I'm having a difficult time finding the Zylkon B cans nearby.

sharikous 5y ago
> The stated goal of the programs he was opposing here is to increase diversity at universities. You can reasonably disagree that it will do that (and he does in the remainder of the article, some of the points are very good) without invoking Nazi Germany. Actually he disagrees with the goal itself (diversity, or rather what kind of diversity is desiderable to pursue). > And if the consequence of this is that you can't give a lecture one time, well, I'm having a difficult time finding the Zylkon B cans nearby. Yep. That's no Nazi Germany. But it's disingenuous to say that the only consequence is he won't give a lecture one time. And canceling a lecture is a very worrying thing to do, especially for such a mild "offense". The quote attributed to Voltaire is very relevant in this context.
kspacewalk2 5y ago
I have the same problem with the anti-lockdown and anti-vax-mandate protesters here in Canada. You might have a valid point here and there, but as soon as you bring up how the Covid measures are "oppression" just like in Nazi Germany, you instantaneously turn yourself into an ignorant clown. What the hell is wrong with people comparing every policy or social trend they don't like to gassing millions of people to death? Get a grip and pick up a history book.

codys 5y ago

This article mis-represents criticisms of Angewandte Chemie publishing Tomáš Hudlický's essay (opposing efforts to increase diversity in organic synthesis) by attributing them to a "Twitter firestorm" while other publications note this event caused members of Angewandte Chemie's international advisory board to resign in protest, and other Chemists criticized the essay [1]. There may be a way to thoughtfully discuss this issue, but this article is a poor attempt at it. 1: https://cen.acs.org/research-integrity/ethics/Essay-criticizing-efforts-increase-diversity-in-organic-synthesis-deleted-after-backlash-from-chemists/98/web/2020/06 https://cen.acs.org/research-integrity/ethics/Essay-criticiz...

_8j50 5y ago

Would have been nice if nazi scientists were "cancelled" after WW2. Before as well, perhaps nazi pseudoscience and eugenics would have had less prevalence. The law should also bring back ostracizing and outlawing. Humane but more effective and just than prison. Joined ISIS? Get outlawed. Participated in mob robbery, riot or insurrection? Will pay for your ticket out of the state or country because you are now banned. The comfort and protections of a civilized society do not belong to those who reject civilization.

dragonwriter 5y ago
> Would have been nice if nazi scientists were "cancelled" after WW2. Would have been even nicer if Nazis (and not just the scientists) were “cancelled” before WWII.
- _8j50 5y ago
  Agreed. Bottom line: calling out bullshit and making people accountable for comments made in a public setting is good.
javajosh 5y ago
Professors are getting canceled because one student reacted badly to one thing they said one time. This form of cancel culture needs to be stopped! This form gives every student total power over their teachers, based only on their own subjective feelings, and power like that inevitably corrupts. (It's kind of like how the police have a "Marshall Law bubble" around them at all times; of course they are going to abuse it!) The other form of cancel culture that needs to be stopped is the taboo against asking uncomfortable questions. If you look around the world looking for admirable governments, do you see a pattern? If so, would you be cancelled for naming it? Is that okay? Are we so committed to egalitarinism that we want to forcefully ignore measuring differences between human populations, or even framing hypotheses that imply a difference?
- _8j50 5y ago
  I don't disagree with anything you said and I stand by original comment. Not mutually exclusive.

mint2 5y ago

Why is the title as (Wiley.com) not “(random chemistry journal on Wiley)”?

crooked-v 5y ago

It's a familiar pattern at this point: a piece complaining about 'cancel culture' that conveniently elides actually mentioning any of the content that got people 'canceled', while focusing on the impolite responses of the 'cancelers' and implicitly or explicitly arguing that literally anything should be allowed (or, rather, forced to be printed under an organization or government's auspices) as long as it's framed in a polite manner.

kwertyoowiyop 5y ago

So much politics on HN these days.

nathanaldensr 5y ago
It's become /r/politics and ever other political sub on Reddit.

a_shovel 5y ago

> Some institutions have actually institutionalised censorship. For example, the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), a major publisher, has issued guidelines for editors to „consider whether or not any content … might have the potential to cause offence“. Is Krylov seriously asking us to consider this censorship? This is called politeness. The citation for the list of innocuous terms to "censor" is another, very similar piece by Krylov, which cites this [0] memo from the University of Michigan's IT department. It lists no consequences for failing to use the alternate terms. Quote: > Not all words on this list may be offensive to everyone. Regardless, if a colleague considers a word or phrase offensive, their lived experience should be acknowledged, and an alternative word or phrase should be used. This is not "All who refuse to adopt our Newspeak must be re-educated", this is "If someone says a term is offensive, just be polite and go with it, and here are some alternative terms to help with that." It doesn't even tell you to stop using it in general, just when someone objects! Calling this "censorship" is ridiculous. Let's look at the other two examples as well. First, consider what happened to Tomáš Hudlický after he wrote the article. > The journal removed the paper from its website. ... A planned special issue of Synthesis in his honour was cancelled, invitations to speak at conferences and to review papers ceased, citations to his papers were deleted, and collaborators were encouraged to dissociate themselves from him. He wasn't fired, or demoted, or disciplined. Mainly, people just stopped wanting to associate with him. Was this proportionate? Let's now consider what the wider chemistry community thought about the article: > Sixteen editorial board members resigned in protest of the publication. The journal ... issued an abject apology, suspended two editors, and began an internal investigation. Condemnation ensued in blogs, journals, and statements issued by chemical societies. What happened to Hudlický seems like the straightforward consequence of holding a deeply controversial view. Lots of people won't like you for it. They don't owe you the things they were planning to give you before you wrote an article everyone hates. Saying all of them simultaneously "capitulated to the mob" is an entirely baseless framing (that's all too common in this type of writing). As for Dorian Abbot, paraphrasing the article, "A group of activists initiated a social media campaign to uninvite him. MIT cancelled the event." Again, unpopular people are not owed speaking appearances. Disinvitation is not punishment. The point of these talks is the prestige of having a respected expert make an appearance and share their views. If the audience doesn't like you, there's no reason for the university to invite you to speak. If this is all that happened to Abbot, I'm struggling to see why I ought to care about this. In summary, an organization asked people to consider other peoples' feelings before publishing things, and some unpopular people were not allowed to give prestigious lectures. Going back to the top of the article and reading Krylov compare this to autocratic regimes and murder highlights just how dishonest and hyperbolic the framing is on all of these "cancel culture" articles. They're all like this. [0] https://drive.google.com/file/d/11a8cUt1SCfIxQRBZk_TnRYM5ltENL7LI/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/11a8cUt1SCfIxQRBZk_TnRYM5ltE... [1] Further reading: https://michaelhobbes.substack.com/p/moral-panic-journalism https://michaelhobbes.substack.com/p/moral-panic-journalism

4WIW 5y ago

People who disagreed with the article, flagged it as "spam or off-topic". The article discussing cancel culture got canceled (flagged) -- how ironic is that?