Talk:Quillette

Phrenology
Who told you this is phrenology? This is just bad descriptive prose: "With his huge mop of blond hair, his tie askew and his shirt escaping from his trousers, he looked like an overgrown schoolboy. Yet with his imposing physical build, his thick neck and his broad, Germanic forehead, there was also something of Nietzsche’s Übermensch about him. You could imagine him in lederhosen, wandering through the Black Forest with an axe over his shoulder, looking for ogres to kill. This same combination—a state of advanced dishevelment and a sense of coiled strength, of an almost tangible will to power—was even more pronounced in his way of speaking."

If you just want to bash the author there is stuff: " In early January 2018, he was briefly a non-executive director on the board of the Office for Students; a controversial appointment, he resigned over a week later after misogynistic and homophobic Twitter posts were uncovered." Ariel31459 (talk) 00:39, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
 * added the section, I just wanted to make prose-related edits. Young is a noted eugenicist, however, and the publication has advanced views that whiff of phrenology, noted in the body paragraph. It just stinks a lot here. 00:48, 26 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Here's an article with them saying a literal 19th century phrenologist's work was basically valid because they're sure criminality is biological. Will you fall on your sword now and admit that you're wrong?  No.  You're gonna be a fuckup again and take this petty goddamn argument all the way.
 * God help you if you search "physiognomy" on their site, a synonymous contemporary pseudoscientific field that they use to mean phrenology(but for real this time) because it's less famously debunked.
 * Sometimes I just grab you by the shoulders and shake you screaming "How. Are. You. So. Bad. At. Detecting. Far Right. Pseudoscience." It can be plain as fucking day, and you'll pedantically defend it to death like I haven't read the whole article I'm citing. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 04:19, 27 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Listen to yourself. You're a burnout. The reference was no evidence of anything. Christ you can be a knucklehead.Ariel31459 (talk) 23:27, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Listening to myself. Checking.  No, you're still full of shit in a way that reveals you to be a complete moron.  I reiterate my wish about wanting to shake you and scream not to be so fucking stupid.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 00:46, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Just gonna play devil's advocate. How is quoting a 19th century phrenologist and then publishing pieces that only seem to, in a puffpiece, refer to, in passing, a guy with a "germanic forehead", means they are phrenology supporters? They did cast aside Lombroso's views and condemn it as "motivated by racial animus" (that's a mouthful to say "racist"), but they promoted the idea of "biological criminality", with nice words like how they penned his ideas, based on phrenology and physiognomy, as "revolutionary" rather than the more accurate "radical"; "revolutionary" implies Lombroso achieved a scientific breakthrough when it's just a racist pseudoscience that was abandoned. Quillette did seem to lament that the idea of biological criminality is casted aside later and the article constantly makes me feel uneasy like it's a mask for hereditarianism, a gate for eugenics, but it's not quite explicit. I looked up "physiognomy" and aside from the one that was shared, there was an article promoting "cultural nationalism" directly refers to "physiognomy" only in passing as well. It's full of a flawed "both siders" premise. But it's a pretty alarming take to say "humans historically rely on cohesiveness of ideology and physical appearance and that led to successful societies since it promotes cooperation so we need to be cultural nationalists (which sounds a lot like promoting ideological purity and the flawed and disastrous us-vs-them; they did say ethnic/racial cohesion wouldn't work a few times)". It sounds like a stretch to try to apply evopsyc, with wolf cooperation and tribe mechanisms as an example, to modern society. Then there's an article on differences between men and women and can't say it's relevant? Anyway, that's all three results I got from searching simply "physiognomy" and I can't say it's super damning. Both two articles are bad, but the criminality one seems relevant and is the most suspicious one, but you already shared it.  03:42, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

what was this amazing edit supposed to be except letting them off the hook? 09:20, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * It was supposed to be acknowledging that they don't do phrenology.--Greenrd (talk) 10:28, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * But the initial revision already went into the craniometry part? I called it "dubious racialist craniometry". 17:40, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Anyway, I still feel it's a bit of a leap to be confident about them advancing phrenology, so I limited to just critics accusing them as so. What I know so far is that they're indeed a bunch of crap, but I'm still on the fence if they really said or hinted (at length) at something like "skull shape can predict personality traits" which phrenology is. I do know scientific racists these days tend to be more underhanded about things, just don't know if they're really disguising phrenology or just trying to hide general racialist bullshit (which doesn't have to include phrenology) behind craniometry. 18:43, 10 August 2019 (UTC)

Hoaxed
Probably not worth adding to the article, because they retracted the hoax as soon as enough people were mocking them for publishing it(which took less than 24 hours), but they published a piece about how a construction worker "leaving the DSA" full of clearly and purposefully inaccurate statements. In spite of the writer failing their identity verification, they published the piece anyways. And added their own untrue elaborations. Jacobin article on the event ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:28, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Quillette's editor has denied the accusations of untrue elaborations:

 Why don’t you release them then? We have nothing to hide and your claims of embellishment are complete bullshit https://t.co/YBXuakZdcK &mdash; Claire Lehmann (@clairlemon) August 10, 2019
 * -Greenrd (talk) 07:46, 10 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, so now Quillette's integrity is more important than the random claims of an anonymous source. If what she says is true, she can release her own fucking copy of the correspondence.  It's a completely unnecessary shifting of burden of proof suggesting that it's 100% true to me.  ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 15:43, 13 August 2019 (UTC)

Haha, while that's not worth adding to the article, nothing is stopping me from talking about how they fell for another hoax and published articles from a man who just farted out degrees from psychology, John Glynn, who also tricked other publications into publishing things for writing things they like. I know I'm like a month late but yeah. 23:07, 22 October 2019 (UTC)

Problem with climate change denial section
Michael Shellenberger is not a climate change denialist - far from it. He has worked on climate change mitigation. Check him out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Shellenberger

Also the source is wise international... which is anti nuclear organization worthy of being added into https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Anti-nuclear_movement#Notable_anti-nuclear_groups_and_people

Here is wikipedia page of wise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Information_Service_on_Energy

As a curiosity: they are funded by renewable energy industry, as you can see from their pages: https://wisenederland.nl/groene-stroom/partners-groene-stroom-ja-graag

I decided to change the name of the section into "Environmental contrarianism". It is ridiculous to blame Shellenberger of climate change denial - or at least in that section there was zero evidence of that.
 * Sure thing, on further investigation it appears Shellenberger is simply an ecomodernist. 22:56, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, doesn't seem accurate to call him one. Maybe his proposed solutions and critique isn't accurate (who knows, I don't have a stance on ecomodernism and I don't know if RationalWiki has one), but he seems to acknowledge climate change anyway. 22:57, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Mentioning Shellenberg and ecomodernism?
I am very sure the antinuclear propaganda does not belong on the page, however I am generally unsure if mentioning Shellenberg is necessary. As far as I can tell he leans conservative but does not generally push bullshit, certainly nothing compared to the grade other characters we talk about on the page do. The title also implies that ecomodernism is some sort of bad thing, but as far as I can tell it is not even well defined as a term or an actual movement, never mind warranting a mention here. Overall it feels like the paragraph was written by someone with a grudge (who has also not even read our nuclear power page where I think this sort of thing belongs). Thoughts? 2A02:1811:2C0B:1500:CC6E:A060:A23F:8B77 (talk) 22:18, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Earlier, I took issue with the article calling Shellenberg a climate change denialist. The edit was done by Greenrd a contributor that has a kinda spotty record on setting things straight and then was moved into a section called "climate change denialism" by D. mentioned that he's an ecomodernist, so I guess those terms should be expanded and discussed a little as that term is indeed broad.  22:26, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I think that would probably either warrant a new page for ecomodernism or being an addition to the nuclear power page, with a mention that Shellenberg has shared a platform with racists to whichever variant is taken up. Like I said I really question whether Shellenberg has opinionated anything warranting our inclusion in the article section here, it doesn’t seem like it’s our objective to point to every single contributor to Quillette, but rather highlight it as an outfit that tends to publish some side articles to legitimise it’s promotion of HBD, which is getting more and more overt each year. 2A02:1811:2C0B:1500:CC6E:A060:A23F:8B77 (talk) 22:38, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it should be changed to a sidenote to the main article. I.e. "Quillette has published less egregious articles in other fields to lend benefit of doubt to their readers, to make their bad articles seem all right too." 23:10, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

The racialist/sexist/transphobic/Islamaphobic neo-Nazi apologists of Quillette are let off far too lightly here. This is Rational Wiki. Being Rational means understanding and believing in the worldview of the Left, which is simply objectively true from its very premises, regardless of so-called 'evidence'. Those who deny any part of it or deviate from it in any way should be condemned utterly and, if possible, driven from their jobs and harrassed without mercy. This is the Rational way. Our time is coming.'The Future Belongs to Us!' Irrational, fascist, sexist, racist, Islamophobic, transphobic neo-Nazis like the contributors to Quillette, or the fascist apologists who have criticized the brave comrade who wote this particular article will be dealt with. Reason will Rule. Doug1943 (talk) 20:06, 29 August 2020 (UTC)
 * ” The waciawist/sexist/twansphobic/iswamaphobic neo-nazi apowogists of quiwwette awe wet off faw too wightwy hewe. Thiws iws wationaw wiki. Being wationaw means undewstanding awnd bewieving in the wowwdview of the weft, which iws simpwy objectivewy twue fwom its vewy pwemises, wegawdwess of so-cawwed 'evidence'. Those who deny any pawt of iwt ow deviate fwom iwt in any way shouwd be condemned uttewwy awnd, if possibwe, dwiven fwom theiw jobs awnd hawwassed without mewcy. Thiws iws the wationaw way. Ouw time iws coming.'the futuwe bewongs tuwu us!' iwwationaw, fascist, sexist, wacist, iswamophobic, twansphobic neo-nazis wike the contwibutows tuwu quiwwette, ow the fascist apowogists who have cwiticized the bwave comwade who wote thiws pawticuwaw awticwe wiww be deawt with. Weason wiww wuwe.” - this inbred boy

20:44, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

Source that discusses them extensively
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=YPc8EAAAQBAJ

Could yield useful info. Chillpilled (talk) 09:13, 11 August 2022 (UTC)