Walking with Facts and Tips
Hi and Welcome to the A & J PEI Treasures E Jean Simpson Author Blog Post and Podcast. I’m your host, Jean coming to you from the beautiful Province of Prince Edward Island, Canada!! The blog post and podcast is an opinion piece and only reflects this author’s opinion and not that of any other entity. I hold no designations in politics, economics or medicine. I am retired from the mental health field. I am a humanitarian and speak from that viewpoint only. Whether you agree with me or not, at least I hope it makes you think. This week I share some thoughts and useful facts and tips. If you want to find out more, then stay tuned…!
For my post this week, I look through my newsfeed. Some of it is unbelievable. Some things I thought were bad jokes. I’m always caught by surprise by what people will think when available evidence says differently. Let’s look at one such example. In 2020, psychologist and neuroscientist Wei Ji Ma summarized the state of research on women in chess as "there is currently zero evidence for biological differences in chess ability between the genders" but added "that does not mean that there are certainly no such differences." Now for those of you not in the know about psychological research…one of the things in my day was that things had to be stated tentatively and replication is needed to confirm the findings. So, the added stuff is just psychological babble that is deemed necessary by the profession, but for the layperson muddies the waters. In other words, what she says is our study shows zero difference between biological differences in chess ability and gender but someone else might do another study and find something more. They do find some female gender differences but they disappear when played against men in double blind studies. So, would it make a difference whether transgender people played chess? Well, the science suggests not. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_i...
Now moving on to another fact that I’ve had to look up to share a link over and over ad nauseam because it comes up constantly and it is the answer to a very dangerous piece of misinformation. “…researchers have taken different approaches, but have similarly failed to find a connection between homosexuality and child molestation.” So, the statements made online trying to make such connections are false but some still try to find a connection and dig deep for it. Then any supposed proof is blown to the winds like so many dandelion seeds without evidence. A secondary one with this regard is another dangerous piece of misinformation. It is important to know what LGBTQ2S+ means (I found the following, but not complete the 2S in Canada stands for 2 Spirit which adds to the following definition. Remember different countries may have different acronyms), “LGBTQ is an acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning and/or queer. The community has been wrongfully associated with pedophiles in the past. It has been widely reported that this link is untrue…” https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-fa.... Of course the words “this link” refers to the misinformation of LGBTQ2S connected to pedophiles. Even with all this information, misinformation is still passed around to damage this group. On the other hand, sexual minority children are more likely to be victims. In other words LGBTQ2S+ children are more likely to suffer many forms of abuse including sexual. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti.... Some studies exist that suggest some inappropriate things. So, the other thing about psychological studies is that some can have flawed procedures so if you are going to bandy about studies, maybe check out the feedback on it from their peers as most will have opinions and replicate which also can disprove poorly done studies. Yes, replication is doing the same study over again to see if you get the same or different results. You’ll be able to find that too. Not every study is golden.
Always having been a curious person, when I see something that seems intolerant, I tend to check it out and try to find the science behind it. I think some of the most damaging misinformation out there surrounds the LGBTQ2S+ community and it is literally killing people including people just supporting inclusion (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/storeown... ) tells the sad story of a person being murdered for being a supporter. “False claims of protecting children against LGBTQ2S+ people are fueling anti-transgender legislation.” This quote does not give the whole problem but the article does. Not only has this been used by some religions to argue that children need to be protected against Transgender people, but also that they need to protect children against gay and lesbian people etc too. They have restricted rights for sexual minorities and made them unable to work with children. It has been used as a whole sale argument to talk about recruitment. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outloo... . This brings me to another piece of poorly researched information…the recruitment fallacy. I cannot even begin to count the times I have felt the need to say, they’re not recruiting…because the rant makes it sound like there is some kind of recruitment drive going on. This is not factual nor is it useful. “These conspiracy theories are based on earlier antisemitic conspiracy theories and posit that the LGBT movement is an instrument of foreign control and domination.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-LG.... The argument is also made that the transitioning of Transgender kids is being done on young children and again this is discussed to be false in the Washington Post article above.
My new vocabulary for the week comes from an article shared by Mr. George Takei and it is Stochastic terrorism. It was the first time I ever saw Stochastic terrorism used. This article talks about the term https://thinkbigpicture.substack.com/.... I had not heard the word Stochastic prior and it seems a relative newcomer to the discussion of human rights in modern times. Actually the term appears to be a relative newcomer only being used since 2018 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stochas... . Sorry, I don’t always keep up with the latest terms. This one explains a truly frightening phenomenon. It is a word we need to understand and to be aware of. We also need to understand the huge harm done by scapegoating activities toward all minorities.
Another bit of misinformation that has been passed around for centuries is in the area of religious intolerance. The false rhetoric around one religion is that of Wicca. Detractors emphatically state that it is not a religion, that they worship the devil, do evil and maybe even kill small animals. This article explains how false it is https://www.livescience.com/39119-myt... . Admittedly, I did have a Druid cousin who did sacrifice a pumpkin years ago…and other stuff that got some bad publicity at that time. It brought a lot of attention and he slowly drifted out of the limelight https://edmontonjournal.com/news/loca.... No one quite knew what to think of it at the time as many don’t know what to think about it now. However as with the ‘pagan’ religions, Wicca is simply nature based and some meet with others and some are solitary. Being Solitary does not mean that one is undecided, but that they can practice within their own experience. Beliefs are varied and there are many different sorts. Solitary Wiccans often make their own path using their ethics. No one wants to accept that there are different religions and different ideologies. They figure you’re just unfocused and will come around if they present enough religious options to you or maybe drive you away from it to a ‘real’ religion. Religious intolerance has been going on for centuries. Always the ‘accepted’ religion of the area is the one that decides what it should be. We seem to have gone backwards in time in this regard on a lot of things. Even now there are people spewing hate against Jewish people. There is also hatred between various sects within the various religions. People are using religion as a weapon rather than as a spiritual comfort. Personally, I don’t care what religion you are. My philosophy is that as long as you don’t spew “Love one another as I have loved you” and then add provisos, I’m fine with you. I’m not recruiting and I’m not interested in being recruited. I’m not a leader and I’m not a follower in this regard.
This next idea is a big one. People go around saying that they have the right to free speech. Their free speech isn’t hurting anyone. Many organizations around the world suggest differently. UNESCO itself has a statement and some resources if you want to know more https://www.unesco.org/en/countering-.... According to this article, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/hate... there is more to the idea. The thing we need to guard against is allowing free speech to degenerate into hate speech and Stochastic terrorism. This idea includes hate speech creating the perfect storm to encourage violent acts. So, one thing we may need to look at is what the difference between free speech and hate speech is. It is possible that there is a problem in the USA because There is no legal definition of "hate speech" under U.S. law” but they do go on to state, “Generally, however, hate speech is any form of expression through which speakers intend to vilify, humiliate, or incite hatred against a group or a class of persons on the basis of race, religion, skin color sexual identity, gender identity, ethnicity, disability, or national origin” https://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreed.... It makes me wonder if it is so easily summed up, why is tolerance lacking in some American politics and in the world in general, would a change or addition to the law make a difference?
Some research has been done in the area of social inclusion. For example, “Therborn (2007) posits that all individuals need to be physically present in a society and have a voice that is respected.” https://www.researchgate.net/profile/.... They find there are benefits to this, but many complications and no society yet has perfected inclusion. There is also suggestion that minority groups are prone to exclusion and it has negative effects “A recent iteration of the term social exclusion has its roots in the European Union where it has been described as a relational process that interferes with social cohesion or the ability of groups to accept diversity and tolerate difference (O’Connor, 1998).” https://www.researchgate.net/profile/.... What this suggests is that lack of inclusion creates problems with social cohesion. This means we separate into groups and the ‘devalued’ minority groups are excluded and this leads to problems. Without addressing this aspect, we will remain a society fragmented and forward momentum will be stalled. This makes it important to stop devaluing groups based on race, religion, orientation, age, etc.
I end this blog post with the following quote by Bernard Baruch “Every man has a right to his opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.” This is the main point of the blog post and podcast. We need to deal in facts and science and not keep society at a standstill. Self research can be important, but more important is factual information. There is so much misinformation/disinformation and hate that exists around marginalized groups that we need to take special care to make sure we have the proper facts. We owe this to our fellow humans. Whether you agree with me or not, I hope it makes you think. Thanks for listening to my podcast and/or reading my blog post and thanks for your interest in A & J PEI Treasures! Keep watching because we’re always working on something. Thank you!
The podcast that matches this blog post can be found on Anchor FM: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/sh...
Blog Posts are available on
WordPress: https://aandjpeitreasures.wordpress.com/ and
GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...
Podcast are available on:
Anchor FM in a variety of formats: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/sh...
iHeart Radio: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-e-...
Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/e-... name a few
All my e-books can be found on:
Smashwords (my Affiliate link): https://www.smashwords.com/profile/vi...
You can also find us on:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/EJS08026749
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5zp...
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.ca/ej2466
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/e-j-s-151a...
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AndrewAandJP...
For my post this week, I look through my newsfeed. Some of it is unbelievable. Some things I thought were bad jokes. I’m always caught by surprise by what people will think when available evidence says differently. Let’s look at one such example. In 2020, psychologist and neuroscientist Wei Ji Ma summarized the state of research on women in chess as "there is currently zero evidence for biological differences in chess ability between the genders" but added "that does not mean that there are certainly no such differences." Now for those of you not in the know about psychological research…one of the things in my day was that things had to be stated tentatively and replication is needed to confirm the findings. So, the added stuff is just psychological babble that is deemed necessary by the profession, but for the layperson muddies the waters. In other words, what she says is our study shows zero difference between biological differences in chess ability and gender but someone else might do another study and find something more. They do find some female gender differences but they disappear when played against men in double blind studies. So, would it make a difference whether transgender people played chess? Well, the science suggests not. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_i...
Now moving on to another fact that I’ve had to look up to share a link over and over ad nauseam because it comes up constantly and it is the answer to a very dangerous piece of misinformation. “…researchers have taken different approaches, but have similarly failed to find a connection between homosexuality and child molestation.” So, the statements made online trying to make such connections are false but some still try to find a connection and dig deep for it. Then any supposed proof is blown to the winds like so many dandelion seeds without evidence. A secondary one with this regard is another dangerous piece of misinformation. It is important to know what LGBTQ2S+ means (I found the following, but not complete the 2S in Canada stands for 2 Spirit which adds to the following definition. Remember different countries may have different acronyms), “LGBTQ is an acronym for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning and/or queer. The community has been wrongfully associated with pedophiles in the past. It has been widely reported that this link is untrue…” https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-fa.... Of course the words “this link” refers to the misinformation of LGBTQ2S connected to pedophiles. Even with all this information, misinformation is still passed around to damage this group. On the other hand, sexual minority children are more likely to be victims. In other words LGBTQ2S+ children are more likely to suffer many forms of abuse including sexual. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti.... Some studies exist that suggest some inappropriate things. So, the other thing about psychological studies is that some can have flawed procedures so if you are going to bandy about studies, maybe check out the feedback on it from their peers as most will have opinions and replicate which also can disprove poorly done studies. Yes, replication is doing the same study over again to see if you get the same or different results. You’ll be able to find that too. Not every study is golden.
Always having been a curious person, when I see something that seems intolerant, I tend to check it out and try to find the science behind it. I think some of the most damaging misinformation out there surrounds the LGBTQ2S+ community and it is literally killing people including people just supporting inclusion (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/storeown... ) tells the sad story of a person being murdered for being a supporter. “False claims of protecting children against LGBTQ2S+ people are fueling anti-transgender legislation.” This quote does not give the whole problem but the article does. Not only has this been used by some religions to argue that children need to be protected against Transgender people, but also that they need to protect children against gay and lesbian people etc too. They have restricted rights for sexual minorities and made them unable to work with children. It has been used as a whole sale argument to talk about recruitment. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outloo... . This brings me to another piece of poorly researched information…the recruitment fallacy. I cannot even begin to count the times I have felt the need to say, they’re not recruiting…because the rant makes it sound like there is some kind of recruitment drive going on. This is not factual nor is it useful. “These conspiracy theories are based on earlier antisemitic conspiracy theories and posit that the LGBT movement is an instrument of foreign control and domination.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-LG.... The argument is also made that the transitioning of Transgender kids is being done on young children and again this is discussed to be false in the Washington Post article above.
My new vocabulary for the week comes from an article shared by Mr. George Takei and it is Stochastic terrorism. It was the first time I ever saw Stochastic terrorism used. This article talks about the term https://thinkbigpicture.substack.com/.... I had not heard the word Stochastic prior and it seems a relative newcomer to the discussion of human rights in modern times. Actually the term appears to be a relative newcomer only being used since 2018 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stochas... . Sorry, I don’t always keep up with the latest terms. This one explains a truly frightening phenomenon. It is a word we need to understand and to be aware of. We also need to understand the huge harm done by scapegoating activities toward all minorities.
Another bit of misinformation that has been passed around for centuries is in the area of religious intolerance. The false rhetoric around one religion is that of Wicca. Detractors emphatically state that it is not a religion, that they worship the devil, do evil and maybe even kill small animals. This article explains how false it is https://www.livescience.com/39119-myt... . Admittedly, I did have a Druid cousin who did sacrifice a pumpkin years ago…and other stuff that got some bad publicity at that time. It brought a lot of attention and he slowly drifted out of the limelight https://edmontonjournal.com/news/loca.... No one quite knew what to think of it at the time as many don’t know what to think about it now. However as with the ‘pagan’ religions, Wicca is simply nature based and some meet with others and some are solitary. Being Solitary does not mean that one is undecided, but that they can practice within their own experience. Beliefs are varied and there are many different sorts. Solitary Wiccans often make their own path using their ethics. No one wants to accept that there are different religions and different ideologies. They figure you’re just unfocused and will come around if they present enough religious options to you or maybe drive you away from it to a ‘real’ religion. Religious intolerance has been going on for centuries. Always the ‘accepted’ religion of the area is the one that decides what it should be. We seem to have gone backwards in time in this regard on a lot of things. Even now there are people spewing hate against Jewish people. There is also hatred between various sects within the various religions. People are using religion as a weapon rather than as a spiritual comfort. Personally, I don’t care what religion you are. My philosophy is that as long as you don’t spew “Love one another as I have loved you” and then add provisos, I’m fine with you. I’m not recruiting and I’m not interested in being recruited. I’m not a leader and I’m not a follower in this regard.
This next idea is a big one. People go around saying that they have the right to free speech. Their free speech isn’t hurting anyone. Many organizations around the world suggest differently. UNESCO itself has a statement and some resources if you want to know more https://www.unesco.org/en/countering-.... According to this article, https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/hate... there is more to the idea. The thing we need to guard against is allowing free speech to degenerate into hate speech and Stochastic terrorism. This idea includes hate speech creating the perfect storm to encourage violent acts. So, one thing we may need to look at is what the difference between free speech and hate speech is. It is possible that there is a problem in the USA because There is no legal definition of "hate speech" under U.S. law” but they do go on to state, “Generally, however, hate speech is any form of expression through which speakers intend to vilify, humiliate, or incite hatred against a group or a class of persons on the basis of race, religion, skin color sexual identity, gender identity, ethnicity, disability, or national origin” https://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreed.... It makes me wonder if it is so easily summed up, why is tolerance lacking in some American politics and in the world in general, would a change or addition to the law make a difference?
Some research has been done in the area of social inclusion. For example, “Therborn (2007) posits that all individuals need to be physically present in a society and have a voice that is respected.” https://www.researchgate.net/profile/.... They find there are benefits to this, but many complications and no society yet has perfected inclusion. There is also suggestion that minority groups are prone to exclusion and it has negative effects “A recent iteration of the term social exclusion has its roots in the European Union where it has been described as a relational process that interferes with social cohesion or the ability of groups to accept diversity and tolerate difference (O’Connor, 1998).” https://www.researchgate.net/profile/.... What this suggests is that lack of inclusion creates problems with social cohesion. This means we separate into groups and the ‘devalued’ minority groups are excluded and this leads to problems. Without addressing this aspect, we will remain a society fragmented and forward momentum will be stalled. This makes it important to stop devaluing groups based on race, religion, orientation, age, etc.
I end this blog post with the following quote by Bernard Baruch “Every man has a right to his opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts.” This is the main point of the blog post and podcast. We need to deal in facts and science and not keep society at a standstill. Self research can be important, but more important is factual information. There is so much misinformation/disinformation and hate that exists around marginalized groups that we need to take special care to make sure we have the proper facts. We owe this to our fellow humans. Whether you agree with me or not, I hope it makes you think. Thanks for listening to my podcast and/or reading my blog post and thanks for your interest in A & J PEI Treasures! Keep watching because we’re always working on something. Thank you!
The podcast that matches this blog post can be found on Anchor FM: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/sh...
Blog Posts are available on
WordPress: https://aandjpeitreasures.wordpress.com/ and
GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...
Podcast are available on:
Anchor FM in a variety of formats: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/sh...
iHeart Radio: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-e-...
Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/e-... name a few
All my e-books can be found on:
Smashwords (my Affiliate link): https://www.smashwords.com/profile/vi...
You can also find us on:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/EJS08026749
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5zp...
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.ca/ej2466
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/e-j-s-151a...
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AndrewAandJP...
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A & J PEI Treasures/E Jean Simpson, BEd, BA, MA
A & J PEI Treasures is located on Prince Edward Island, Canada. We are a husband and wife team and our companion animals. There are a number of things that drew us to the Island…one of which was the n
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