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This is a highly biased and misleading account, both of Webb's role in the Lavender Scare and of the supposed rigor of the arguments deployed in support of the

This is a highly biased and misleading account, both of Webb's role in the Lavender Scare and of the supposed rigor of the arguments deployed in support of the JWST naming. Personally the most compelling accounting of this matter I've seen is in the internal emails exchanged within NASA discussing the naming, which were made public by FOIA [1 & 2]. I would especially draw your attention to the analysis of an external historian (whose name is redacted) beginning on page 301 of [1], which rightly emphasizes Webb's direct, personal involvement in Oval Office discussions with President Truman about these matters. NASA chose to ignore this information and retain the JWST name. After substantial community pressure a more detailed historical report was released [3], which in my view clarifies that Webb was not the motive force behind the efforts at State but in no way exonerates him. At the end of the day, the telescope was named by a NASA administrator for another NASA administrator. Was Webb personally a bigot? Unclear. Was Webb a person of his time and a practitioner of realpolitik? Seems likely. Did the actions taken under his direction make life worse for gays and lesbians? Definitely. Would it have been better if NASA had chosen to honor someone else with the naming of a $10B telescope? Indisputably. [1] https://media.nature.com/original/magazine-assets/d41586-022-00845-6/20247466 https://media.nature.com/original/magazine-assets/d41586-022... [2] https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00845-6 https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-00845-6 [3] https://www.nasa.gov/feature/nasa-shares-james-webb-history-report https://www.nasa.gov/feature/nasa-shares-james-webb-history-...

naasking 4y ago
> After substantial community pressure a more detailed historical report was released [3], which in my view clarifies that Webb was not the motive force behind the efforts at State but in no way exonerates him. Exonerates him of what, specifically? > Did the actions taken under his direction make life worse for gays and lesbians? Definitely. Were they actually under his direction? Because it seems like it was a federal law, so why exactly does that qualify as "his direction"? > Would it have been better if NASA had chosen to honor someone else with the naming of a $10B telescope? Indisputably. I dispute it. Not because Webb is a "better" candidate than anyone else, but because I dispute the core implication that merely existing in a time and place and following the law, with no actual evidence of wrongdoing, by itself implicates a person in some kind of wrongdoing that should disqualify their contributions from being recognized.
Beltalowda 4y ago
From what email in [1] on page 301: > There are a few blog posts--none of which are written by archivists or historians--that use circular, strawman arguments to attempt to exculpate Webb of his involvement in the Lavender Scare. These arguments focus on misprints in non-peer-reviewed sources. These blog posts fail to engage any of the existing peer-reviewed historical research and archival evidence regarding the period that positions Webb in a leadership role regarding the LGBTQ firings as early as 1950. I would like to imagine that these bloggers have their hearts in the right place--that they aren't intentionally trying to erase LGBTQ history--and that their errors simply stem from their lack of training in historical and archival research. Well, these blog posts engage with the arguments made in major newspapers and articles, I don't think that's a "strawman argument" at all. If these arguments are bad then the fault is entirely with the people making the bad arguments, not the people replying to them. I don't really have the time – or interest – to dig deeper in the matter to find out if the gist of the email is correct or not (there's a lot of information and not everything is easily accessible), but I found this a very curious paragraph which needlessly and unfairly attacks people. Also not a huge fan of the credentialism and rather patronizing language. This makes it pretty hard to have honest respectful conversations, and in that sense the author of the email is "part of the problem" (that is, the problem it's so darn hard to have reasonable honest conversations about this).
dekhn 4y ago
After reading your linked reports, I don't really see anything that I consider truly convincing that Webb did anything wrong, or even requires any sort of exoneration. If you have to dig hundreds of pages deep into a report to see speculation about intent, maybe that's not so convincing?

naasking 4y ago

> After substantial community pressure a more detailed historical report was released [3], which in my view clarifies that Webb was not the motive force behind the efforts at State but in no way exonerates him. Exonerates him of what, specifically? > Did the actions taken under his direction make life worse for gays and lesbians? Definitely. Were they actually under his direction? Because it seems like it was a federal law, so why exactly does that qualify as "his direction"? > Would it have been better if NASA had chosen to honor someone else with the naming of a $10B telescope? Indisputably. I dispute it. Not because Webb is a "better" candidate than anyone else, but because I dispute the core implication that merely existing in a time and place and following the law, with no actual evidence of wrongdoing, by itself implicates a person in some kind of wrongdoing that should disqualify their contributions from being recognized.

Beltalowda 4y ago

From what email in [1] on page 301: > There are a few blog posts--none of which are written by archivists or historians--that use circular, strawman arguments to attempt to exculpate Webb of his involvement in the Lavender Scare. These arguments focus on misprints in non-peer-reviewed sources. These blog posts fail to engage any of the existing peer-reviewed historical research and archival evidence regarding the period that positions Webb in a leadership role regarding the LGBTQ firings as early as 1950. I would like to imagine that these bloggers have their hearts in the right place--that they aren't intentionally trying to erase LGBTQ history--and that their errors simply stem from their lack of training in historical and archival research. Well, these blog posts engage with the arguments made in major newspapers and articles, I don't think that's a "strawman argument" at all. If these arguments are bad then the fault is entirely with the people making the bad arguments, not the people replying to them. I don't really have the time – or interest – to dig deeper in the matter to find out if the gist of the email is correct or not (there's a lot of information and not everything is easily accessible), but I found this a very curious paragraph which needlessly and unfairly attacks people. Also not a huge fan of the credentialism and rather patronizing language. This makes it pretty hard to have honest respectful conversations, and in that sense the author of the email is "part of the problem" (that is, the problem it's so darn hard to have reasonable honest conversations about this).

dekhn 4y ago

After reading your linked reports, I don't really see anything that I consider truly convincing that Webb did anything wrong, or even requires any sort of exoneration. If you have to dig hundreds of pages deep into a report to see speculation about intent, maybe that's not so convincing?