Rebecca Watson and the Elevator of Doom!!!

Aka How to blow something way out of proportion in the most ignorant way possible.

By now most people in the Atheosphere have heard of the huge flame war going on over Rebecca's comments, male privilege and feminism. As usual, I am probably one of the last to comment on this. So here is the back story as I understand it.

I actually watched the video Rebecca posted to her blog that contained this incident. In amongst 4 or 5 other points she squeezed in this story of how when in Dublin she was approached by a stranger while in an elevator and invited back to his room for 'coffee'. She said, as a note to guys, that this was creepy and that they shouldn't do stuff like that. I completely agree with that. Inviting anyone you don't know/just met back to you hotel room for any reason is a bit on the creepy side and does not make a good first impression.

Some people who watched this video picked up on that one point and totally blew things out of proportion. At her next speech she used this episode as an example of some of the difficulties that still exist in the atheist movement when it comes to women. She also quoted and used the name of one of the more vitriolic of posters. Many people didn't like the fact that she refered to the poster by name and not 'some person'. Too bad. Many blogs, especially in the atheosphere, have disclaimers that anything you post there can be used againt them for ridicule. This is mostly for deranged Christians, but can be used for anyone.

It both saddens and angers me to see how badly this has all been blown out of proportion. In my view, there are a lot of people out there that really need to get out from behind the keyboard and experience some of the real world. Rebecca said and did no wrong with this.