This is the result of a dispute I’ve explained before (see here). Because the FFRF has caved into to gender extremism, an area having nothing to do with its mission, and because, when they let me post an article on their website about this, they changed their mind and simply removed my post, I have decided I can no longer remain a member of their board of honorary directors. So be it. Everything is explained in this email I sent FFRF co-Presidents Annie Laurie Gaylor and Dan Barker about an hour ago, to wit:
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan,
As you probably expected, I am going resign my position on the honorary board of the FFRF. I do this with great sadness, for you know that I have been a big supporter of your organization for years, and was honored to receive not only your Emperor Has No Clothes Award, but also that position on your honorary board.
But because you took down my article that critiqued Kat Grant’s piece, which amounts to quashing discussion of a perfectly discuss-able issue, and in fact had previously agreed that I could publish that piece—not a small amount of work—and then put it up after a bit of editing, well, that is a censorious behavior I cannot abide. I was simply promoting a biological rather than a psychological definition of sex, and I do not understand why you would consider that “distressing” and also an attempt to hurt LGBTQIA+ people, which I would never do.
As I said, I think these folks should have moral and legal rights identical to those of other groups, except in the rare cases in which LGBTQIA+ rights conflict with the rights of other groups, in which case some kind of adjudication is necessary. But your announcement about the “mistake” of publishing my piece also implies that what I wrote was transphobic.
Further, when I emailed Annie Laurie asking why my piece had disappeared (before the “official announcement” of revocation was issued), I didn’t even get the civility of a response. Is that the way you treat a member of the honorary board?
I always wanted to be on the board so I could help steer the FFRF: I didn’t think of it as a job without any remit. The only actions I’ve taken have been to write to both of you—sometimes in conjunction with Steve, Dan (Dennett), or Richard—warning of the dangers of mission creep, of violating your stated goals to adhere to “progressive” political or ideological positions. Mission creep was surely instantiated in your decision to cancel my piece when its discussion of biology and its relationship to sex in humans violated “progressive” gender ideology. This was in fact the third time that I and others have tried to warn the FFRF about the dangers of expanding its mission into political territory. But it is now clear that this is exactly what you intend to do. Our efforts have been fruitless, and if there are bad consequences I don’t want to be connected with them.
I will add one more thing. The gender ideology which caused you to take down my article is itself quasi-religious, having many aspects of religions and cults, including dogma, blasphemy, belief in what is palpably untrue (“a woman is whoever she says she is”), apostasy, and a tendency to ignore science when it contradicts a preferred ideology.
I will continue to struggle for the separation of church and state, and wish you well in that endeavor, which I know you will continue. But I cannot be part of an organization whose mission creep has led it to actually remove my words from the internet—words that I cannot see as harmful to any rational person. I am not out to hurt LGBTQIA+ people, and I hope you know that. But you have implied otherwise, and that is both shameful for you and hurtful for me.
Cordially
Jerry
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024/12/29/i-resign-from-the-freedom-from-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
Like me, Steve Pinker has resigned from the Honorary Board of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF). His resignation was sent yesterday. Steve is a bigger macher than I. both intellectually and, in this case, because he was Honorary President of that Board. I put below his two emails, reproduced with permission.
The first one was sent yesterday to the co-Presidents of the FFRF as well as the editor of Freethought Today!, which originally published my piece and then removed it.
From: Pinker, Steven
Sent: Saturday, December 28, 2024 11:49 AM
Subject: resignation
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan,
With sadness, I resign from my positions as Honorary President and member of the Honorary Board of the Freedom from Religion Foundation. The reason is obvious: your decision, announced yesterday, to censor an article by fellow Board member Jerry Coyne, and to slander him as an opponent of LGBTQIA+ rights.
My letter to you last November (reproduced below) explains why I think these are grave errors. With this action, the Foundation is no longer a defender of freedom from religion but the imposer of a new religion, complete with dogma, blasphemy, and heretics. It has turned its back on reason: if your readers “wrongfully perceive” the opposite of a clear statement that you support the expression of contesting opinions, the appropriate response is to stand by your statement, not ratify their error. It has turned the names Freethought Today and Freethought Now into sad jokes, inviting ridicule from its worse foes. And it has shown contempt for the reasoned advice of its own board members.
There are not the values of not the organization I have supported for twenty years, and I can no longer be associated with it.
Sincerely,
Steve
*************
As Steve notes above, this second letter was sent over a month ago to the same people, with copies to me and Richard Dawkins, as all of us were discussing the issue of “mission creep” with the FFRF.
From: Pinker, Steven
Sent: Monday, November 11, 2024 10:04 AM
Subject: RE: Comment for FFRF
Thanks, Annie Laurie. But I think it’s important to distinguish two things:
1. The right to bodily autonomy, an ethical issue.
2. The nature of sex in the living world, a scientific issue.
Some trans activists believe that the only way to ensure the first is to rewrite the second, imposing what we regard as fallacious and tendentious claims in defiance of our best scientific understanding. This is unfortunate for two reasons: it’s a conceptual error, confusing the moral and the empirical, and it’s counterproductive to force people to choose between trans rights and scientific reality. Those who favor scientific reality will be alienated from the cause of safeguarding trans rights.
I see FFRF as in the vanguard of separating key moral and political commitments from honest scientific inquiry (after all, a major impetus for enshrining religious doctrine such as creationism is that it is necessary for the preservation of moral values). Many people have noted that the radical factions of the trans movement have taken on some of the worst features of religion, such as the imposition of dogma and the excommunication and vilification of heretics. FFRF can be firmly on the side of trans rights without advancing tendentious (and almost certainly false) biological claims. Of course, it’s fine for views that we regard as tendentious to be expressed in FFRF forums, as long as respectful disagreements are allowed to be expressed as well.
Best,
Steve
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024...igns-from-the-freedom-of-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
Richard explains his decision in the email below, sent not long ago to the heads of the FFRF. I, for one, hope that these resignations might make the FFRF rethink its direction.
I reproduce Richard’s very civil resignation with his permission:
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan
It is with real sadness, because of my personal regard for you both, that I feel obliged to resign from the Advisory Board of FFRF. Publishing the silly and unscientific “What is a Woman” article by Kat Grant was a minor error of judgment, redeemed by the decision to publish a rebuttal by a distinguished scientist from the relevant field of Biology, Jerry Coyne. But alas, the sequel was an act of unseemly panic when you caved in to hysterical squeals from predictable quarters and retrospectively censored that excellent rebuttal. Moreover, to summarily take it down without even informing the author of your intention was an act of lamentable discourtesy to a member of your own Advisory Board. A Board which I now leave with regret.
Although I formally resign, I would like to remain on friendly terms with you, and I look forward to cooperating in the future. And to delightful musical evenings if the opportunity arises.
Yours sincerely
Richard
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024...ns-from-the-freedom-from-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan,
As you probably expected, I am going resign my position on the honorary board of the FFRF. I do this with great sadness, for you know that I have been a big supporter of your organization for years, and was honored to receive not only your Emperor Has No Clothes Award, but also that position on your honorary board.
But because you took down my article that critiqued Kat Grant’s piece, which amounts to quashing discussion of a perfectly discuss-able issue, and in fact had previously agreed that I could publish that piece—not a small amount of work—and then put it up after a bit of editing, well, that is a censorious behavior I cannot abide. I was simply promoting a biological rather than a psychological definition of sex, and I do not understand why you would consider that “distressing” and also an attempt to hurt LGBTQIA+ people, which I would never do.
As I said, I think these folks should have moral and legal rights identical to those of other groups, except in the rare cases in which LGBTQIA+ rights conflict with the rights of other groups, in which case some kind of adjudication is necessary. But your announcement about the “mistake” of publishing my piece also implies that what I wrote was transphobic.
Further, when I emailed Annie Laurie asking why my piece had disappeared (before the “official announcement” of revocation was issued), I didn’t even get the civility of a response. Is that the way you treat a member of the honorary board?
I always wanted to be on the board so I could help steer the FFRF: I didn’t think of it as a job without any remit. The only actions I’ve taken have been to write to both of you—sometimes in conjunction with Steve, Dan (Dennett), or Richard—warning of the dangers of mission creep, of violating your stated goals to adhere to “progressive” political or ideological positions. Mission creep was surely instantiated in your decision to cancel my piece when its discussion of biology and its relationship to sex in humans violated “progressive” gender ideology. This was in fact the third time that I and others have tried to warn the FFRF about the dangers of expanding its mission into political territory. But it is now clear that this is exactly what you intend to do. Our efforts have been fruitless, and if there are bad consequences I don’t want to be connected with them.
I will add one more thing. The gender ideology which caused you to take down my article is itself quasi-religious, having many aspects of religions and cults, including dogma, blasphemy, belief in what is palpably untrue (“a woman is whoever she says she is”), apostasy, and a tendency to ignore science when it contradicts a preferred ideology.
I will continue to struggle for the separation of church and state, and wish you well in that endeavor, which I know you will continue. But I cannot be part of an organization whose mission creep has led it to actually remove my words from the internet—words that I cannot see as harmful to any rational person. I am not out to hurt LGBTQIA+ people, and I hope you know that. But you have implied otherwise, and that is both shameful for you and hurtful for me.
Cordially
Jerry
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024/12/29/i-resign-from-the-freedom-from-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
Another one leaves the fold: Steve Pinker resigns from the Freedom from Religion Foundation
Like me, Steve Pinker has resigned from the Honorary Board of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF). His resignation was sent yesterday. Steve is a bigger macher than I. both intellectually and, in this case, because he was Honorary President of that Board. I put below his two emails, reproduced with permission.
The first one was sent yesterday to the co-Presidents of the FFRF as well as the editor of Freethought Today!, which originally published my piece and then removed it.
From: Pinker, Steven
Sent: Saturday, December 28, 2024 11:49 AM
Subject: resignation
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan,
With sadness, I resign from my positions as Honorary President and member of the Honorary Board of the Freedom from Religion Foundation. The reason is obvious: your decision, announced yesterday, to censor an article by fellow Board member Jerry Coyne, and to slander him as an opponent of LGBTQIA+ rights.
My letter to you last November (reproduced below) explains why I think these are grave errors. With this action, the Foundation is no longer a defender of freedom from religion but the imposer of a new religion, complete with dogma, blasphemy, and heretics. It has turned its back on reason: if your readers “wrongfully perceive” the opposite of a clear statement that you support the expression of contesting opinions, the appropriate response is to stand by your statement, not ratify their error. It has turned the names Freethought Today and Freethought Now into sad jokes, inviting ridicule from its worse foes. And it has shown contempt for the reasoned advice of its own board members.
There are not the values of not the organization I have supported for twenty years, and I can no longer be associated with it.
Sincerely,
Steve
*************
As Steve notes above, this second letter was sent over a month ago to the same people, with copies to me and Richard Dawkins, as all of us were discussing the issue of “mission creep” with the FFRF.
From: Pinker, Steven
Sent: Monday, November 11, 2024 10:04 AM
Subject: RE: Comment for FFRF
Thanks, Annie Laurie. But I think it’s important to distinguish two things:
1. The right to bodily autonomy, an ethical issue.
2. The nature of sex in the living world, a scientific issue.
Some trans activists believe that the only way to ensure the first is to rewrite the second, imposing what we regard as fallacious and tendentious claims in defiance of our best scientific understanding. This is unfortunate for two reasons: it’s a conceptual error, confusing the moral and the empirical, and it’s counterproductive to force people to choose between trans rights and scientific reality. Those who favor scientific reality will be alienated from the cause of safeguarding trans rights.
I see FFRF as in the vanguard of separating key moral and political commitments from honest scientific inquiry (after all, a major impetus for enshrining religious doctrine such as creationism is that it is necessary for the preservation of moral values). Many people have noted that the radical factions of the trans movement have taken on some of the worst features of religion, such as the imposition of dogma and the excommunication and vilification of heretics. FFRF can be firmly on the side of trans rights without advancing tendentious (and almost certainly false) biological claims. Of course, it’s fine for views that we regard as tendentious to be expressed in FFRF forums, as long as respectful disagreements are allowed to be expressed as well.
Best,
Steve
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024...igns-from-the-freedom-of-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
A third one leaves the fold: Richard Dawkins resigns from the Freedom from Religion Foundation
Well, that makes three of us. Steve Pinker, I, and now Richard Dawkins, have all decided independently to resign from the Honorary Board of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF). The organization’s ideological capture, as instantiated in throwing in their lot with extreme gender activism and censoring any objection to their views—as well as in the increasing tendency of the FFRF to add Critical Social Justice to their mission alongside their original and admirable goal of keeping church and state separate, has motivated us in different degrees to part ways with the group. I emphasize again that the FFRF did and still does engage in important work on keeping religion from creeping into governmental activity.Richard explains his decision in the email below, sent not long ago to the heads of the FFRF. I, for one, hope that these resignations might make the FFRF rethink its direction.
I reproduce Richard’s very civil resignation with his permission:
Dear Annie Laurie and Dan
It is with real sadness, because of my personal regard for you both, that I feel obliged to resign from the Advisory Board of FFRF. Publishing the silly and unscientific “What is a Woman” article by Kat Grant was a minor error of judgment, redeemed by the decision to publish a rebuttal by a distinguished scientist from the relevant field of Biology, Jerry Coyne. But alas, the sequel was an act of unseemly panic when you caved in to hysterical squeals from predictable quarters and retrospectively censored that excellent rebuttal. Moreover, to summarily take it down without even informing the author of your intention was an act of lamentable discourtesy to a member of your own Advisory Board. A Board which I now leave with regret.
Although I formally resign, I would like to remain on friendly terms with you, and I look forward to cooperating in the future. And to delightful musical evenings if the opportunity arises.
Yours sincerely
Richard
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024...ns-from-the-freedom-from-religion-foundation/ (Archive)
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