Talk:James Thompson

From RationalWiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Icon sociology.svg This article contains information about one or more living persons.

Articles about living people must be handled carefully, because they are more open to legal threats.
Reference any contentious allegations solidly; unreferenced allegations should be removed.
If legal threats are raised on this page, please direct the potential litigant to RationalWiki:Legal FAQ; do not interact with them.

I am not sure about the word "deceptively"[edit]

Why would we expect him to rant about his views on race and sex while being interviewed by the BBC about a Japanese earthquake? He'd obviously never be invited back if he did. The article describes this as deceptive, but it hardly seems deceptive; more a case of "when in Rome [i.e. on the BBC], do as the Romans do" - and his views on race and sex probably weren't relevant to the interview anyway. --Greenrd (talk) 19:05, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Troll Tobias (talk) 19:18, 11 May 2019 (UTC)
It's a serious point, I'm not trying to troll anyone. And the specific views of his that I noticed being mentioned in this article, BTW, I do not agree with - I believe men and women are equally intelligent on average, and I understand that some non-white ethnic groups such as Turkish people are more right-wing on average than British people, not more left-wing. Look at it this way - there's probably no chance of Thompson changing his views as a result of reading this article, but if there were any chance at all of that happening, that's probably not going to be helped by interleaving science-based criticisms with unfair criticisms as, IMO, this article does. And the same goes for fans of Thompson.--Greenrd (talk) 19:38, 11 May 2019 (UTC)
The point about Thompson's deception is the same as Noah Carl. These "race realist" individuals have been described as living a "double life". Tobias (talk) 16:13, 12 May 2019 (UTC)
I don't doubt that, in general, they have. My point is that they are under no obligation to disclose their controversial views, as far as I am aware; it is the responsibility of the BBC to determine if its guests are "suitable guests" under their own standards. Or perhaps they don't routinely pre-vet interviewees, and instead rely on staff and viewers to flag such issues up. Either way, I don't think it's reasonable to criticise him for staying quiet about that. Do we even know for sure that he held these views at the time of his broadcast interviews, for that matter? -Greenrd (talk) 20:36, 12 May 2019 (UTC)