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Talk:Christina Hoff Sommers
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Diploma mill?[edit]
Sommers obtained her PhD from Brandeis. While Sommers is an enormously problematic figure, I don't think it's reasonable to consider Brandeis a "diploma mill."
Two Points[edit]
First. people on the far left (Socialists, Marxists, Communists, and Left-Anarchists) all call themselves leftists. What is a rightist? Just say "the far-right". I hope this isn't too pedantic.
Second. FIRE at least seems like a principled organization. They defended the ethnic-studies professor that referred to the people that worked in the World Trade Center as "Little Eichmanns" along with PETA, and religious conservatives. At least, on their social media they decried the prohibition of the student who passed out fliers saying "Capitalism Kills" on campus. — Unsigned, by: 2600:8804:7501:1900:8c5:75c4:c66a:405e / talk
The Least Rational Feast On The Rational Wiki[edit]
WOW. This was bad. I don't think I've ever seen a more slanted, biased, poorly sourced, and factually incorrect wiki entry than this one. Let's get started on "'Rape Hysteria,'" since this seems to be the only section that at least attempts to represent her quotes.
- The few sentences referencing citation 23 are missing context.
- That's not at all what she criticized the CDC study for.
- The CDC has not constructively criticized that survey. In fact, data from the NCVS 1995 correlates with rape numbers in the 2000 CDC study cited.
- The BJS has stated that approximately 1 in 53 college women, not 1 in 40, will be sexually assaulted.
- She links to another Time article by Cathy Young[20] (which in turn links off to its own sources) to prove that rape surveys are biased. Young can't prove it Well no shit, there are about a billion out there. Now, I can explain in more detail later why the Campus Sexual Assault (2007) study is unreliable and does not prove that 1 in 5 or 1 in 7 women will be victimized.
- Young makes the criticism that his survey got a low response rate, although "low" in this case does mean a few thousand students for whatever that's worth. Young would be right. The study had a very low overall response rate of 40 percent, much lower than other more reputable studies. Also, the "few thousand students" interviewed were literally from two colleges. Seriously. Not entirely representative.
- The part where Cathy Young "zeroes in" on the CSA is not backed by any sources.
- Good bloody lord BURN THIS WITH FIRE.
--Walle637 (talk) 19:38, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
Shiny Penny[edit]
I am surprised that the article did not suggest that Christina Sommers was in some way connected to "Big Oil" and "Big Tobacco" as well. Whenever someone has a different position on a subject - it now seem normal to attack every aspect of that person first - and then, if possible, attack their position. To heck with facts! The vehemence of the attack usually indicates a weak basis for the very belief they are espousing. They need to lash out at anyone who dared tarnish their "Shiny Penny". Christian Sommers did not tarnish feminism - it was already tarnished! — Unsigned, by: Donaldfromottawa / talk / contribs
Maybe hypocritical?[edit]
The article accuses her of being a "DINO" and a "feminist in name only" to which I believe that it's an example of the no true Scotsman fallacy that is pointed out everywhere on the wiki. Maybe we could try to revamp it into something else that calls her hypocritical instead of accusing her of a term we've pointed out as fallacious? - RockfordRoe (talk) 15:40, 2 May 2019 (UTC)
- Anyone can say they are a feminist, just like anyone can say they are a democrat. Both terms are indefinite enough to make debating the associated claims no more than a quibble. Some people like that kind of argument. I don't see the point of it. I guess there are conservative feminists. Certainly radical feminists are unlike most and still are considered to be feminists.Ariel31459 (talk) 19:07, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Ikanreed's "You're abusing that fucking fallacy" corner[edit]
Today's discussion: No True Scotsman.
No true Scotsman is a fallacy used to justify assertions of universal truth in the face of counter-examples. You say all "x are y", but I say "z is x, z is not y", and you say "well z is not actually x" it's post hoc rationalization, and your universal truth isn't so universal.
To say that a person takes on a label for themselves, but don't really match with the goals, beliefs, or qualities of that label, is, rather than a defense of a universal statement disproved by counter-argument, an accusation of dishonesty about the person. This can be done in the service of a No True Scotsman fallacy. We could be saying "No feminists are misogynists" and excluding this misogynist ass from the label to help justify that to ourselves. But the actual words, as written in this article, make no such universal arguments.
The lesson of "You're abusing that fucking fallacy" corner is that, when calling out fallacies, you should remember that fallacies are invalid deductions. Conclusions that you can't draw reasonably from the evidence and logic at hand. So please, spare us a strawman, and use fallacies in the correct context. ikanreed 🐐Bleat at me 19:27, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
- Yes. Inconsistency is not fallacious. Ariel31459 (talk) 19:39, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Does she really belong in the "Feminists" category?[edit]
I have serious doubts this lady truly belongs in the "Feminists" category. For reasons already made clear in the article, I suggest removing Sommers from that category. TheRationalGamer 02:00, 20 June 2021 (UTC)