Morons of the Internet: Rebecca Reid

This is the segment where I scour my favourite forums around the internet and find some particularly interesting articles about current affairs told in the words of my favourite human beings.

In this edition we have an extract from Metro, which for those that don't know is a shite paper aimed at providing terrible stories for morons who want to feel like commuters. It's of no surprise then that writers such as Rebecca Reid have no problem getting stupid articles published, such as how Father's Day tells us so much about toxic masculinity. Do prepare yourselves for one terrible argument that only seems to serves as peddling a narrative.
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https://metro.co.uk/2018/06/15/fathers-day-tell-us-toxic-masculinity-7633889/
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Jesus Christ you must be a depressing person to live with. I'd hate to have the attitude that if I didn't like something then nobody else can, but I think I grew out of that mindset when I was about seven. I hate to break it to you but Father's Day isn't about you, which must come as a shock to such a self centered bitch. It doesn't matter if you don't like a carvery, and would rather go somewhere else to whinge, because it's a celebration for your father, who may well enjoy food that you don't rate. That doesn't give you an excuse to demonise this event you self centered cow. I'm sure your father had to endure the disappointing eating choices you made when you were a kid because he loved you, so show some fucking respect and please him for once. You can at least try and please people with your attitude, as you're clearly never going to please anyone writing this sort of shit.

I want to find out in what universe the themes of beer, slippers, and car accessories are seen as depressing. Add in strong pornography and you have my ideal weekend. Lots of dads like drinking beer, and lots of dads like relaxing with their feet up, and lots of dads like accessories for their cars. Where's the issue here? I could understand your complaint if this event promoted infanticide and child molestation, but it's promoting drinking and relaxing. It's almost as if the event is some sort of holiday. The bigger question is why you would think any of these gifts define the behaviour of fathers across the country, but I guess we're about to find that out.

It's now become an assumption that buying a stereotypical and tacky gift for someone alters their personality for the worse, which is amazing considering you have no evidence that these gifts have anything to do with toxic masculinity. You'll find most souvenirs follow stereotypical trends, so how about we quit this thinly veiled crusade against men. And whilst we're at it let's stop equating presents with behaviour, especially when the presents in question are just cheap tat. I just don't understand how you can make these huge assumptions with such little observation and critical thinking. Buying your father a humorous card doesn't mean you're denying him the right to show emotion, or preventing him from becoming anything other than stereotypically masculine. These are completely separate issues.

I have a radical theory, and this might be hard to follow for some, that these gifts are marketed in this fashion because that's what the majority of middle aged dads want. I'm sorry you haven't been able to find a Father's Day themed butt plug for your dad, but no sensible person is ever going to want to gift one of them. It's just basic supply and demand economics, and apparently that's enough to be called toxic. Of course qualifying this vague buzzword isn't needed to improve the quality of the argument, and just the mere sight of this overused term is enough to instantly convince anyone of the horrors found on Father's Day. Not doing a great job at attempting to be taken seriously are we love?

Thanks for the info that some dads are different from each other. I would have never been able to work that one out without such insightful journalism. I'm not quite sure why you're still claiming these stereotypes are negative traits when you've provided zero evidence to back your arguments up. In all honesty who's going to buy a card for their parents ripping the shit out of them? Well, me probably, but I doubt the card industry would stay afloat if it relied on lazy insults.

I honestly just can't be assed with these ridiculous conclusions anymore. You shouldn't need me to point out that this is a fucking stupid argument of the lowest quality. I will draw attention to the comment that lazy gifts on Father's Day apparently contribute to the male mental health crisis in the West. Now fuck me that is one huge conclusion, which may I add is backed up once again with zero evidence. Funnily enough this weak point doesn't hold up against basic scrutiny, considering the majority of suicide victims suffering from mental health issues are young men, which as you've previously pointed out is not the target market of these stereotypical presents. It's almost as if these two points are completely unconnected, and being as you can't even point out a correlation I think we can chuck this absurd claim in the bin with all your other shit articles.

A quick shout out the box on toxic masculinity, that's written as if the reader is a fucking vegetable, which as this is a Metro article is probably a fair assumption. I don't think I've been patronised like that in a long time, so congratulations on reaching new lows in journalism. It must be said that the description of such a horrid subject does sound rather tame when compared to the appalling traits displayed by this idiotic writer. I'd much rather associate myself with toxic, masculine men than self centered and ignorant whales.

Oh fuck off with these gifts. Have you got anything else to talk about? You're not going to convince me that toxic masculinity is rife in the male population by talking about cheap presents. This is honestly the quality of argument I would expect from a primary school student, not a paid journalist. I'm not quite sure who's the saddest in this scenario. Is it the people that buy shit presents for their dad? Is it the journalist repetitively whining over these insignificant items? Or maybe it's the reader when they've finished reading this pile of manure. I also love the logic that dads shouldn't be reduced to harmful stereotypical behaviour such as binge drinking, so a better solution is to take them out for a pint of beer. Why joke about serious addictions when you can physically contribute to them? Remember, being a dad doesn't define your personality, apart from when you're given a stereotypical gift and then I'll happily define you based on your toxic masculinity.

You would think that a self proclaimed feminist would therefore shun Mother's Day in the spirit of gender equality, as we can easily apply the same arguments in this article to that similar celebration. But no, and in fact this writer wrote an article earlier this year moaning at the pathetic contributions made towards this sacred day, with a noticeable emphasis on men. What a hypocritical bitch. Why the fuck would I ever want advice from this imbecile? I'm sorry love but I think I'll leave my relationship with my dad as it is. Your shit argument is never going to convince anyone that this is credible advice. I still haven't found out what Father's Day tells us about toxic masculinity, but at least I've been given a primary school level lecture about relationships. Thank fucking God Metro is free.

Feminists and Evolutionary Psychology: Volume 2

In our second look at feminists rejecting scientific disciplines in favour of their own ideological opinions we find an article from a typical feminist blog. Admittedly this feminist blog actually seems to have bothered with some research on the topic, as well as having some background knowledge, instead of burying its head in the sand like many of these moronic 'science writers' who try and force their ideas of equality into everything. Although I don't hate this particular writer the article in question still full of the same old traps that feminist blogs always fall into, as well as some big factual inaccuracies.
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https://disruptingdinnerparties.com/2013/05/09/whyevopsychisalmostneverscience/
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I will begin by commending this article in opening with the view that evolutionary psychology is a perfectly valid discipline instead of just blindly claiming it's all wrong because you don't like it. I must admit it's quite a bizarre scenario to have a feminist lecture me on the validity of evidence, as usually it's me making this very point to criticise feminist theory, but in this scenario it's at least arising from someone with a science based background instead of some ignorant internet blogger. Still, whilst genetics and evolution are intertwined within one another, they are not the same, and so as an evolutionary biologist I'll gladly point to the route of sexism as partly genetic. Of course that comment comes with about fifteen million caveats, and my insignificant comments cannot hope to accurately explain such a complex area of science, but I will at least analyse your criticisms and see how they hold up. Without further ado, let's have a look at these assumptions:

There's certainly nothing wrong with calling out these assumptions as unscientific, although the explanation that evolution is a work in progress is misleading. It would be simply inaccurate to describe a constant process as a 'work in progress' because it assumes there's an end goal evolution in general is working towards, which is a point you actually raise in the very next sentence. I think I'll just put this one down as poor wording, as the core science behind this point is spot on. I am a bit confused by the comment about golden ages. I don't believe I've ever seen a study referring to golden ages, but these events certainly exist in literature and history. In fact there's numerous examples of them in almost every single society, whether that be the Dutch Golden Age, the Spanish Golden Age, or even the Golden Age of Hollywood. I honestly have no idea what point you're trying to make here. There is also an alarming lack of sources in this paragraph. I believe you're correct in the examples you give, but to fail at sourcing this information gives off the attitude that you must be right on any scientific point because that's your specialty. This is merely an argument from authority, and certainly isn't the way to make a point any more scientifically valid. Some might say you're just telling stories here.

There is certainly nothing wrong with the opening point, however the second starts to fall apart. You see evolution certainly can be directed change. Mutation and genetic drift may well be random processes, but mechanisms such as natural, sexual, and kin selection all describe directional changes. Natural selection for example would simply be unable to operate if the changes in environmental conditions caused merely random changes in allele frequency. This isn't a perfect process, and indeed there are many deleterious mutations that have spread through the population, but this still isn't evidence that evolution is purely stochastic. If it was stochastic it would make fuck all difference what environment an organism happened to live in, and adaptations would be unable to spread through populations. You make a final remark that the fact a trait is persistent tells you nothing about whether it became more common under selective pressures, which isn't strictly true, and a crucial part of viewing natural histories is theorising the selective pressures that lead to common traits. Studies such as the Galapagos ground finch are great examples of how selective pressures affect the frequency of traits within populations, with the persistence of certain traits being demonstrably distinguished. I'm honestly surprised that a self proclaimed geneticist hasn't been able to comprehend that allele frequencies over time are not purely random when Mendel's second law of independent assortment has been violated in numerous examples, with linkage disequilibrium also being a common process in genomes.

The idea of differing reproductive strategies is actually a very important point to make, although the evidence used to back this up lacks any sort of clarity. Infanticide certainly isn't as common as you make it out to be, and actually only exists in individually documented cases within primates. That isn't to say this seemingly counterintuitive phenomenon doesn't back up your argument, but let's stop with the assumption that all primates are routinely trying to curb the number of their offspring. There's also a strange comparison to abortion, which I would personally argue has the same evidence based merit as these anecdotal evolutionary psychology stories you're complaining about. Abortion is a completely separate issue to the point you're making.

What really did confuse me was the last point about male genes having a vested interest in the mother not disliking him, which is certainly not something I've ever seen evidence for. Since you've not bothered to back this sweeping generalisation up I'll happily dismiss the point, as I'm sure you would to if you found this statement in an evolutionary psychology paper. I find the idea that male genes benefit from having a strong relationship with the opposing sex hard to believe, as the cost of the male ejaculate compared to the female egg is minuscule, so a poor relationship between the father and mother would be catastrophic to the fitness of the mother, yet a small obstacle for the male. It seems you've fallen into your own trap of just assuming that there's a singular mating strategy found throughout nature. You seem to be in denial here that polygamy is a completely natural behaviour, and far more common than infanticide may I add. And that I can tell you is a far better assumption than the ones you've been making throughout this article.

We're moving away from evolution now. I must admit that I never find any studies peddling this rhetoric. Sure, there may be a few angry comments on Twitter, but since when do random morons on the internet represent a whole scientific discipline? I do suspect this article suffers from a very large straw man argument, cherry picking a few select comments that can't hope to successfully generalise this large field of study. I doubt the majority of scientists know the ins and outs of changing social values that come with the emergence of a sedentary lifestyle, so are probably unlikely to bring them up as evidence in their papers. We'll never know, as there's fuck all sources for the purely sociological points made here, so we'll just label these as irrelevant to the scientific discussion and continue.

To be fair to evolutionary psychologists this is actually a very accurate assumption to make. Mate choice is defined by a conflict over resources, and when males cannot actively dominate the supply of females they actively compete for reproduction by advertising to females. This is not something exclusive to humans, it's universal in sexually reproducing organisms. I'm sorry if you think this idea devalues the role of women, but this is a biological truth, and accounts for the sexual dimorphism found between sexes. Evolution doesn't care if you choose not to be a part of this system, because you don't get a choice whether to apply by the laws of nature if you're an organic being. Nobody is denying that women can't make choices, and in fact female choice is a widely seen mechanism in mate selection. I just hate this assumption often projected by feminist scientists that if you simply choose to go against the logic of evolution you'll somehow be able to defeat it.

I also have an issue with how you describe systems of mate selection. Mate choice is not an overly simplistic process, and actually a very complex one that requires explanation from multiple different hypotheses. The study you cite does not take into account these various hypotheses, and actually only focuses on the good genes hypothesis. Furthermore the cited study describes females that have been affected by a certain parasite, which is really insignificant evidence for the huge generalisation you've just made. There is far more evidence for instance that mate choice in guppies is largely determined by the sensory bias hypothesis, which is a drastically different mechanism than the good genes model. Does this mean females don't have anything other than a passive role in these systems? No, but females having a disproportionately large role in mate selection is not the predominant trend unless you were examining rarities such as seahorses or pipefish.

Come on now, you're allegedly a geneticist. You must be aware that the phrase 'some behaviour has a genetic basis' is a massive understatement. That's not denying the role of the environment within human behaviour, but recognising that genetics are fundamental for behaviour to manifest itself in humans. This particular article is running into the trap of assuming that a vocal minority of idiots represent the merits of a whole discipline. Are we seriously going to start sourcing Salon articles as academic discourse? You could easily attempt to invalidate everything in academia if you simply cherry pick poor studies. Interestingly it was the actual paper you had an issue with instead of the sub par journalistic source, but you are right to highlight the rather ambiguous generalisation the conclusion of that study comes to, although to then claim they're full of shit is very unfair when you yourself make the following conclusion that's no better:

How can you criticise a discipline for making gross generalisations but then turn a blind eye when your hypothesis is riddled with the exact same faults? Those scientists you criticise could just as easily use your tactics to invalidate your argument, leaving us with a non existent discourse. For some reason we're supposed to blindly believe that your explanation is superior, which is an attitude just as anti-science as the idiots you've been taking down all article. There's further evidence of this pathetic behaviour in the comments section where you prevented a participant in the discussion from responding because they disagreed with your perspective. Was their comment any good? No, but that doesn't give you an excuse to arrogantly prevent scientific discourse. This is an incredibly hypocritical attitude to have, because your whole piece advocates testing for assumptions. It turns out you're only supposed to test the assumptions that you don't personally align with.

At least those scientists provided evidence for their speculative conclusion, whereas your ramblings just make blanket assumptions without backing any of it up, which is now becoming a recurring theme. My main question with your explanation is why can't socialisation be an evolutionary trait? Why do you assume that this teaching cannot possibly have a merit in evolutionary terms? I also don't understand the assumption that men have a vested interest in learning to read each other better in order to keep social power. How the hell is that a better explanation than competition? Perhaps it's a bit unfair to start ridiculing your criticism of a terrible study, but I think these questions do need to be brought up considering you're so keen to reject evolutionary psychology.

As I've said before, I don't think you're accurately portraying a whole discpline here. Of course you're going to find studies riddled with faults if you only bother analysing one side of the argument. Funnily enough if you go beyond reading news based science you might actually find some primary evidence with academic merit. This, like the previous article we viewed, just simply dismisses the discipline without critically analysing the field, and so it's plainly obvious that you're merely rejecting an idea based on pure ideological biases rather than producing an objective assessment. It's a genuine shame, as you do seem to have a solid base in the technicalities, but you seem to hold your own ideas to different standards than that of disciplines you don't agree with. It's all very well if blaming behaviour on institutionalised sexism is based on guesswork, but when anyone else dares to think differently you instantly stamp that thought process out.

The concluding thoughts follow the idea that because of a few bad apples the whole field of evolutionary psychology should be shunned. Sure, you've highlighted some assumptions that stump a minority of studies, but where's the evidence that this whole discipline is inherently flawed?
Even though we have an article that approaches this topic from a scientific mindset, it still hasn't dodged the classic feminist flaws that manage to cloud many areas of the scientific world.

Feminists and Evolutionary Psychology Volume 1

To internet feminist activists anything that doesn't conform to their way of thinking must be part of some patriarchal sexist system. That's where the discipline of evolutionary psychology comes in, which aims to explain human behaviour through evolutionary mechanisms. Not surprisingly explaining behaviour using biological reasoning comes into contact with the feminist ideas that oppressive behaviour is inherently sociological. To illustrate how this irrational hatred in a single discipline is ingrained throughout the whole feminist sphere we'll split this conflict into three parts. This edition will showcase some moronic journalist who clearly doesn't comprehend scientific reasoning. The second article will be from a blog on the internet that at least attempts a rational counterargument. And the third and final piece will be from an academic paper.

This particular article comes from the hub of all scientific knowledge 'Jezebel', and is written by a lady called Lindy West, whose catalogue gives me the utmost faith that she knows fuck all about evolutionary theory. Still maybe click-baiting morons can produce a valid argument every once in a while, so here's her take on evolutionary psychology:
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http://jezebel.com/5941433/you-can-tell-evolutionary-psychology-isnt-true-because-its-not-true
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Now this is confusing. Here we have a title that would have us believe this is an article focusing on the truth of a subject, yet we have an opening line that outlines a clear subjective bias. But sure, hating something because it's manipulated into some political crusade is a fair enough reason for wanting to discredit it altogether. That's why I hate this article so much. In the intro it becomes instantly clear this isn't a serious piece of opinion journalism. Really all we get is an opinion that doesn't support the title, and some hilarious jokes, although when I say hilarious jokes I can feel my nose slowly starting to grow. I hate to be this person but no evolutionary psychologist is claiming women are attracted towards people who stomp animals to death, especially when that animal existed tens of millions of years before humans ever evolved. Still, just because this author disagrees with some psychological studies they are therefore invalidated, because remember, anecdotal evidence easily trumps any study in a scientific journal. I'm not calling you stupid because you're a woman, I'm calling you stupid because of your piss poor argument. I don't need to be an 'evo-psych dude' to figure that one out.

The good news is that instead of using scientific studies to discredit a scientific discipline, like maybe you would do if you claimed something wasn't true, this writer decides linking to other journalistic sources is a good idea. Why wouldn't you when they provide the reader with such a trove of evidence to back up the arguments in this piece? Well the only real source in this article supplies us with a survey, which I would argue is not a good way to determine inherent sexual desires. I find it simply inadequate to disprove inherent biological behaviours with a basic survey considering just how diverse and discreet sexual desires express themselves in human behvaiour. Even if we do use this study as evidence, there's still nowhere near enough information to discredit the whole of evolutionary psychology. this particular survey found an apparent cultural difference in desirable traits, which still doesn't disprove the role of genetics in attraction. You simply can't reject a biological explanation of something if you never even bother testing for it in the first place. All you've prove here is that different cultures value different sociological traits. That's not biology in any form, and cannot hope to answer this broad question from an evolutionary perspective.

Oh dear, here's a big evolutionary faux pas. How do you measure progress in evolution? That assumes there's an end goal of evolution, which there isn't considering its a constant process merely revolving around reproductive success. I know feminists love to go on about progressive ideas, but evolutionary processes have no notion of these terms, and so are entirely irrelevant in this discussion. Wouldn't be twisting this study towards your political ideology would we now? No I'm sure there's nothing hypocritical about this article whatsoever.

Again, where's the evidence that genes have no role in these behavioural trends? What is cultural evolution if not genes interacting with their environment? I hate this assumption that just because a behaviour is prehistoric it instantly means it's suddenly bad. How dare the majority of women select mates based on archaic traits. Why don't they conform to my progressive desires? Restricting female choice is absolutely what progressive ideals are all about. I don't know what the fuck evolutionary psychology has got to do with opposing freedom and equality, and there's certainly no evidence presented for this outrageous claim, so like everything else in this piece we can simply dismiss this slanderous comment as unqualified rhetoric.

I can't imagine why evolutionary psychologists would discuss things in the past tense considering evolution is literally allele frequency change over a period of time. You have to look back in time to observe the effects of evolution. The process itself doesn't change, it's a constant, and just because evolution may cause unexpected changes doesn't mean we can't snapshot a given area of natural history and describe how this applies to modern human behaviour. The only person claiming that evolution has an end goal is you with your progressive ideals. And anyway, just because evolution is a process happening all the time doesn't mean we're going to be seeing the huge radical shifts in sexual desires that you claim are happening within the brief timeline of modern society. That sort of change takes millions of years to observe, which is why we have to look way back in time to find evidence of these changes. You even say yourself that evolution is always changing desirable traits, yet in the previous paragraph we were outlining a set progress that funnily enough followed your political ideology. That's your second huge faux pas, and yet more proof you have absolutely no idea what you're rambling about
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Then there's the big reveal. Turns out this whole article is based merely on feelings, and not facts like the title made us stupidly assume. I for one am completely shocked. In the face of this individual's feelings there is simply no point in rationally explaining a scientific debate, because the way she feels is far more important. For some reason modern life separates humans from natural processes, and subsequently cancels out the roles of evolution, despite this writer claiming in the previous fucking paragraph that evolution is still happening. The rest of biology, well that's also irrelevant, because obviously the mind would never play tricks on an individual. Well here's a dose of reality, your experiences do not effect something that is biologically true. I'm not calling you a liar, as I do truly believe you've experienced the things you describe. What I am calling you is a moron who thinks their useless anecdotes somehow trump the wealth of evidence. Currently that's the only attitude in this debate that should be called out for bullshit.

Wouldn't science be easier if we could just throw away all that peer reviewed empirical nonsense in the bin and instead decide the validity of a scientific theory through some moronic test? The moral of this story is that evolution cannot be applied to human behaviour because people have different tastes. Fucking useless conclusion that adds absolutely nothing to the discussion, nor is it even valid. I'm not quite sure who this article is aimed at. The majority of people that advocate for evolutionary psychology in serious debates are scientific professors, and I'm sure they aren't going to be swayed by this reductionist nonsense. Maybe I might be willing to take your stance more seriously if you provided factual information instead of self-centered garbage.

This is possibly the lowest form of scientific journalism possible. There is zero evidence provided for such radical claims, and the only argument is essentially some woman putting her fingers in her ears and screaming how she doesn't agree with something when faced with evidence. That's not scientific reasoning darling, just pure ignorance, and ignorance alone is not a good enough excuse to simply dismiss a serious academic field of study.