If this is the direction the New Atheism is going, I like it:
The 16 Sexiest [Female] Atheists.
15 Sexy [Female] Scientists. Though truly, more than half of that collection merely reminds one how rare it is to find women who are both attractive and intelligent, much less able to think rationally … at least on the job, when their runaway emotions and difficulty in accepting responsibility—the core of feminism, where every difficulty a woman faces is always “someone else’s fault”—aren’t skewing that. Same thing for the Atheist list: The gorgeous ones aren’t the ones writing books, or even articles … or even blog postings. Yes, I know Kirshenbaum writes; but since she invariably manages to get things exactly wrong in the accommodationist vs. New Atheist spat, and is either “playing dumb” or really is dumb when it comes to countering her critics in that—not to mention that, like Benson, she seems to need a man to co-author her books, i.e., to do the “heavy intellectual lifting,” though the forthcoming book on kissing seems to be an impressively (and ironically) solo effort—….
And how could that list miss Daniela Schiller (drummer for the Amygdaloids)? Or the cancer-fighting biomathematician Franziska Michor? Or Leda Cosmides? Or even Danica McKellar (math degree)?
Of course, the moronic feminist response to all that is still very predictable:
For me, the problem with a post like this is that, rather than celebrate human sexuality, it reinforces the cultural notion that women are valueless (regardless of career choice or ideological stance) unless they conform to a rigid notion of physical attractiveness.
If you enjoy looking at these women, that’s fine. But posting this shows a disrespect to your female readership by exhibiting willful blindness to the hardships they face in being taken seriously in academic pursuits.
Never mind that the women there are being celebrated for being sexy and smart; to the nitwit feminists, even that isn’t good enough to make them happy.
But then, the “Chunky Monkey Mind” Feminazi in question is really just upset that she doesn’t (and can’t) conform to those same “rigid notions of physical attractiveness,” isn’t she? (Probably all of the Ben & Jerry’s isn’t helping.)
And, of course, the list isn’t “racially diverse” enough, either:
if atheists hope to spread the idea of free and critical thought into a wide spectrum of communities, it would help if the same homogeneity that exists in the religious world were not also sooo obvious in the secular world of free thinkers as well….
there are indeed some non-white/european sexy women scientists on the planet. it would be nice if you included some of them – i do grant the asian woman.
there is an old saying: “the most segregated day in America is Sunday”. if atheists had regular meetings — based on what i see on the internets — we’d be lumping the atheist/free-thinking communities right in with that saying.
To which the appropriate response is:
My favorite women in the world are actually darker-skinned Latinas, as it happens. If you can point me to some sexy non-white scientists, I will most gladly add them to the list.
Damn us patriarchal, oppressive white men all to heck for excluding non-white women from science (and atheism) now, too, even when they’re every bit as good at it as we are! When will we ever learn??!
I will now go and flagellate myself, on behalf of my race and gender.
Actually, I think I’ll take a print-out of those lists with me for while I do that….
