Below is the press release (in two languages) describing the cancellation of our discussion by a group at the University of Amsterdam. That cancellation (or “deplatforming”) is described in my previous post.
This press release was sent out by the people who came together to organize my visit to the Netherlands involving two scheduled events. This visit was a private initiative, not the initiative of an organization.
The original is in Dutch, but there’s also an English translation, and since most readers here are anglophones, I put the latter version first.
In English:
Meeting at UvA with American professor emeritus Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry cancelled due to Palestine position
Earlier I had invited you to the meeting of betabreak, the discussion platform of the Faculty of Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Computer Science (FNWI) of the University of Amsterdam about a recent article by Dr. Coyne in the journal Skeptical Enquirer (https://skepticalinquirer.org/2023/06/the-ideological-subversion-of-biology/). The meeting was to take place this Friday in the FNWI-UvA building Science Park 904. Participating in the discussion would be, in addition to Jerry Coyne: Maarten Boudry (Flemish philosopher and skeptic) and Michael Richardson (Professor of Evolutionary developmental zoology at Leiden University).
The meeting’s organizer, Betabreak (https://www.betabreak.org/committee), called off the meeting because of Coyne and Boudry’s Palestine position. Betabreak indicated that many members of committee of Betabreak were uncomfortable giving Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry a stage given their position on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Betabreak’s committee also expressed concern about the impression a debate with Coyne and Boudry would make on Betabreak’s organization. Betabreak’s committee concluded that the debate with Boudry and Coyne could not take place given the current political climate.
Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry will discuss the article in the Skeptical Enquirer at another location on Friday without an audience. A video recording of this conversation will be made available via the Internet. The discussion participants are dismayed that the decision of betabreak of the FNWI of the UvA (https://www.betabreak.org/) to cancel a scientific discussion because of the political-societal views of the discussion participants leads to the fact that the discussion will take place in a private residence.
You are welcome to attend the conversation between Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry. Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry are available for questions about the situation.
More information about Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry can also be found on their website/weblog:
– Jerry Coyne: https://whyevolutionistrue.com/
– Maarten Boudry: https://maartenboudry.be/category/blog
In Dutch:
Bijeenkomst op UvA met Amerikaanse emeritus hoogleraar Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry afgezegd vanwege Palestina standpunt
Eerder had ik u uitgenodigd voor de bijeenkomst van betabreak, het discussieplatform van de Faculteit der Natuurwetenschappen, Wiskunde en Informatica (FNWI) van de Universiteit van Amsterdam over een recente artikel van dr. Coyne in het tijdschrift Skeptical Enquirer (https://skepticalinquirer.org/2023/06/the-ideological-subversion-of-biology/). De bijeenkomst zou aanstaande vrijdag plaatsvinden in het FNWI-UvA gebouw Science Park 904. Aan het gesprek zouden deelnemen naast Jerry Coyne: Maarten Boudry (Vlaams filosoof en skepticus) en Michael Richardson (Professor of Evolutionary developmental zoology aan de Universiteit van Leiden).
De organisatie van de bijeenkomst, Betabreak (https://www.betabreak.org/committee), heeft de bijeenkomst afgeblazen vanwege het Palestina standpunt van Coyne en Boudry. Betabreak gaf aan dat veel leden van committee van Betabreak zich er niet prettig bij voelden om Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry een podium te geven gezien hun standpunt over het Palestijns-Israëlische conflict. Het committee van Betabreak gaf aan ook bezorgd te zijn over de indruk die een debat met Coyne en Boudry zou maken over de organisatie van Betabreak. Het committee van Betabreak komt tot de conclusie dat het debat met Boudry en Coyne niet kan doorgaan gezien het huidige politieke klimaat.
Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry zullen op een andere locatie op vrijdag zonder publiek met elkaar in discussie gaan over het artikel in de Skeptical Enquirer. Van dit gesprek zal een video-opname worden gemaakt die via internet beschikbaar zal worden gemaakt. De gespreksdeelnemers zijn ontsteld dat het besluit van betabreak van de FNWI van de UvA (https://www.betabreak.org/) om een wetenschappelijke discussie af te blazen vanwege de politiek-maatschappelijke opvattingen van de gespreksdeelnemers er toe leidt het gesprek in een privé woonhuis zal plaatsvinden.
U bent van harte welkom om aanwezig te zijn bij het gesprek tussen Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry. U kunt Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry dan ook vragen stellen over de situatie.
Meer informatie over Jerry Coyne en Maarten Boudry kunt u ook vinden op hun website / weblog:
- Jerry Coyne: https://whyevolutionistrue.com/
- Maarten Boudry: https://maartenboudry.be/category/blog
What on earth is that piece of circumlocution supposed to mean?
No idea. Were fights breaking out at Betabreak about the invitation? Even if they were, cancelling the event will only make feelings worse.
Ooo, wow, so sudden! Something terrible must be happening in the background that the wizards are protecting us from! Oh, thank you wizards, I’m so afraid of dangerous .. things .. and stuff.
#TotallyPlanned
#MysticalManipulation
See RJ Lifton, 1961, Ch. 22:
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_Reform_and_the_Psychology_of_Totalism
#Dialectic
#Cowards
Four thumbs up for four hashtags. Plus two smiley faces for the two sentences preceding them.
Appreciate that.
… I suppose the good thing is PCC(E)’s talk is getting a publicity boost!
#AcademicTalkBuskingInAmsterdam
🙂
… ummm, but — if that’s in mockery of the garish communication habit of modern Internet discourse, I would say yes, I agree emoticons/hashtags/etc. are abominations of sorts, but seems if I can’t beat it, then use it – see how it goes. I think there’s something to it.
Thank you Mr. Planet. The 8 criteria identified sound an awful lot like modern day wokeness.
At the risk of forcing you into overposting 🙂
Do you think this has always been a human trait that was noticed and catalogued by Lifton? So maybe it’s not worse today, but we’re noticing it more because of observation bias?
Sure, there are instances of organizations applying these methods, but do you think the kinds of cancelings we’re seeing today are intentional, or is it an outgrowth of ingroup / outgroup dynamics and organically driven by “true believers”?
I’m struggling to understand how a group could cancel the chance to have someone as accomplished as Dr. Coyne speak on a topic in which he’s a noted expert.
oh dear – I could go on, but let’s pick it up on another post… I’ll note that cults are known from antiquity – Pythagoras, for instance, …
For the post here, I think perhaps simple small groupthink accounts for it. But deliberate – like, waiting for near event time. Maybe also just jerks.
Seems about right actually. Organization that is not about world politics adopts a specific political position. Members and guests of the org who hold a different position on the same topic are anathema in the literal sense. The faculty union at my university is about to undergo the same process, and it’s expected to have the same result (some union members will be excommunicated). I’m honestly surprised that Jerry and his friend were not more explicitly denounced as Bad People.
Your comment reminds me of something Nellie Bowles wrote a few weeks back at The Free Press (Jerry posted it here on WEIT) about npr hiring only people who “look different but think exactly alike” (or something to that effect). I thought it was a clever line.
Talking of which, Jerry’s cancellation has made it into the Free Press daily newsletter today.
So it was not so much about repercussions as about the Palestine-standpoints of the two invited speakers. These should have been known to the organizers, for both have been quite vocal about this.
We have had days of fights between pro-Palestine demonstrators and police, as many university cities have, so the timing is unfortunate.
Proves the point you make elsewhere about the politicization of science in the clearest possible way.
It’s the politicization of science *and* of everything else.
Everything is seen through a political lens. Everything.
Soon we’ll have to pick our ice-cream based on our “tribe”.
Well, i boycott Ben and Jerry’s😊
Don’t you dare get chocolate if you’re vanilla!
+1
😊
Freedom of speech and freedom of thought are taking significant hits everywhere these days. School boards in the United States are outlawing teaching about vaccines, including the polio vaccines, and setting rules to fire teachers who mention there are gay people. This is deplatforming.
I see no fundamental difference between deplatforming teachers and deplatforming what happened here. Yes, the motives are different, but the actions taken to prevent freedom of thought are the same.
Thanks and financial support (where possible) are due to all those who tirelessly fight efforts to kill freedom of speech.
I love (sarcasm) this quotation:
“Betabreak’s committee also expressed concern about the impression a debate with Coyne and Boudry would make on Betabreak’s organization.”
It sounds like they were afraid that your conversation might change some minds. They wouldn’t want that, would they? Does Betabreak’s really believe that science progresses through censorship?
That’s the only reading that makes sense to me.
Well, that should fix the Middle East. Good for Betabreak for seeking constructive solutions. /s
Jerry, why not see if you can hold your discussion in the attic of the Anne Frank house? Just to make a point (albeit not the point you went there to make).
Yes! Yes! Clever
Not possible, of course! That’s a huge tourist attraction.
Clear pro-Hamas stance calling for international sanctions of the principals. Unacceptable.
They should read Tim Snyders’ “On Tyranny –Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century”. Lesson one is “Do Not Obey In Advance” .
“Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do. “
Don’t take it personally: Prof Dawkins’ stroke came after the stress of him being deplatformed from an intended speech at Berkeley.
It happens now and again (too frequently) on anything or anyone even tangentially involved with anti-woke and particularly Israel.
I have experienced a smaller version of it myself – predictable given my anti-woke and HUGE blue and white flag waving Zionist stance.
To be coarse: fu*k ’em. They tip their hand by this, displaying their load bearing narcissism and paper thin skin. “Religion of Peace”. Right-o!
People who want to hear your talk (most of us here I imagine and a larger audience elsewhere) will hear it anyway.
Enjoy the Netherlands though – I’m very jelly about your trip though I disagree with your take on herrings!!
best,
D.A.
NYC
Here’s a guy who mounts a good defence: wondering why zero attention is being paid to various other conflicts.
https://hymie.substack.com/p/please-god-choose-some-other-people
You seem to be making a measured response to this, which is right. I think you’re obviously correct to point out that this is a politically motivated deplatforming (I don’t like that word, but they used this language themselves, so I guess it’s right), and that is unworthy of a group with a scientific mission.
But they’re students. They’re students who have made a mistake here. From the somewhat apologetic tone of their communications, it seems like at least some of them know that they have made a mistake.
I’m glad you’ll get to do your talk in another location, and it’s surely worth saying that this was a mistake. But perhaps no need to lay into the young people too much. They are allowed to make mistakes. Maybe they will even be prevailed upon to correct this one fairly soon?
As you see, I didn’t lay into the young people too much. The apologetic tone likely comes from the letter writer who, I hear, wanted us to talk but wrote on behalf of the group vote.
Dr Coyne, To be cancelled in a city famous for tolerance! Now is the best time to have your picture taken with the Spinoza statue not far from the Rembrandt Museum. I would love to see it posted here.
Great idea!
I am disappointed but not surprised. I suppose my only surprise is that this is happening in the Netherlands. I didn’t know that they had also become illiberal.
“Liberal” doesn’t mean what it used to without a premodifier.
Someren should have told Jerry Coyne about the unrest on Roeters Island. The organization clearly was afraid of riots on their doorstep.
The more I read that press release, the more mealy-mouthed and cowardly it appears. It boils down to: if you have any viewpoint, on any subject at all, that is not exactly the same as ours, or the people we are afraid of, you are not allowed to talk to us about one of your special interests, even if that has nothing whatsoever to do with the subjects on which we have entrenched views.
This is nothing less than totalitarian, and I can scarcely believe that it has issued from such a humane society as the Netherlands. It is very upsetting.
Maybe these students are in training for a career path toward becoming president of a U.S. university???
Ha! I’m not sure if they would be capable of achieving the minimum academic qualifications needed for that post, even these days. Maybe a position as subordinate DEI operative.
The minimum academic qualification for that post these days is successful plagiarism.
+1
It’s everywhere.
I hope they get some negative blowback.
It might be worth noting that, percentage-wise, the Netherlands was the most vicious country in the world in terms of its Jew-killing during the Holocaust. The myth of Dutch tolerance should be put to sleep.
Send some strongly worded response.
Took the opportunity of a light posting day to read your Skeptical Inquirer piece. Excellent.
Thank you.
Verified with the AI:
“Yes, it is ironic that a speech on the ideological subversion of biology was cancelled due to an ideological position of one of the speakers. This situation exemplifies the very issue the speech aimed to address – the intrusion of ideology into the realm of scientific discourse and inquiry.”
Just imagine all the issues seen by such imminent minds as Planck in 1930s Europe. Love SI and reading it now.
Well, that’s completely outrageous. Can’t have biologists and philosophers talking about biology and philosophy if their politics is deemed wrong this month, can we?
On the up side, making an enemy of Maarten Boudry is a pretty foolish thing to do, while I don’t agree with him on everything, he is the classic dogged pursue-it-to-the-end philosopher. If he ends up a major voice for academic freedom, all the better.
“Betabreak indicated that many members of committee of Betabreak were uncomfortable giving Jerry Coyne and Maarten Boudry a stage given their position on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.”
Unless the speakers are speaking on the topic of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, I truly don’t get this reasoning. It’s a) not going to change the situation in Gaza, b) not change anyone’s minds about the conflict, and most importantly, c) it’s entirely not relevant to the topic being discussed.
If this is some sort of virtue signalling on the war, it’s stupid virtue signalling that achieves nothing other than denying people a chance to listen to experts discuss an unrelated topic.
You know, even if we were talking about the war in some other venue besides a science group, it’s still unwise to deplatform people after they’ve been invited. If you have a view on the war, you should listen to the other side; I do that all the time.
Yeah, there is that. Deplatforming in my view is something that if it happens should be in the most extreme circumstances and done with the greatest regret.
The relevance factor to me is something that at least would have some sense to it. Let’s say that if your views are that the Palestinian kids have those bombs coming to them, there might be grounds to think you’re really not someone who should have a platform. Similarly if you were to argue that being an Israeli civilian makes you a legitimate target for rape, kidnapping or murder in the name of Palestinian liberation, again not really someone who should have a platform to begin with. In the context of debating the war, of course.
What? In a hypothetical forum to discuss a war, you would deny a platform to proponents of either side just because one or both sides wanted to present a justification of its war-fighting strategy? What would there be left to discuss? Handwringing about the tragedy of it all?
Maybe I’m blinded by your prior libel that Israel is committing mass murder as a way for you to sound above it all but I don’t think you are any more neutral on this question than I am. In war, the goal is to win, to destroy your enemy’s ability to make war on you. If he puts his children in the path of your bombs, those children do indeed have it coming. You can’t lose a war out of concern for the enemy’s children protecting his military targets who will grow up and try to kill yours.
I don’t think either of the views I’ve presented is “either side”. I deliberately used distorted examples to highlight that there may be grounds to filter out the more odious views from a public debate.
Looking at the idiots who chant for Palestine, the central message is not one supporting terrorist tactics on Israeli civilians, nor do the most diehard supporters of the Israeli bombing campaign come out to cheer on the death of Palestinian children. Maybe there are a few on either side who are like this, but they don’t represent where the fracture lines in the debate are. No-one is saying “we’d have a viable two state solution if not for Israel objecting to its citizens being targeted by terrorists” or “we’d have a viable two state solution if not for the Palestinians objecting to their children being blown up by the Israeli military.” It’s not where the debate is.
*Maybe I’m blinded by your prior libel that Israel is committing mass murder”
There are approximately ~34,000 dead Palestinians in the conflict so far. Sorry, what’s libelous about pointing out that there’s a lot of civilian casualties in this bombing campaign? If the term mass murder feels wrong to you, replace it with some other more amenable term that accounts for the massive loss of life at the hands of the Israeli military. Whatever position you think I hold, I’ll point out that I’m appalled by the destruction war has on civilians. I’m pretty consistent on this no matter which military or terrorist group is doing it.
And I object to being characterised as above it all. I’m clearly not. I’m looking at the situation as nothing but cause for despair. There’s a lot of smarter and informed people than me in positions of power who have been unable to stop this carnage, so why should I think my views on the matter make one bit of difference? I feel completely helpless on this issue, not least because of apologists for chaos demanding deference to their myopic opinions. That’s my lot in this. A stupid Australian sitting at a keyboard unable to find anything optimistic about the events as they are playing out, with atrocity after atrocity beamed to me in real time. I’m not above it, I want out of it, and I want to get away from the stupid apologists who are okay with the continuous horror of it all. I’m not. It’s awful beyond words.
How long before no one is left to speak because they have to meet every requirement based on present and passed affiliations, utterings, etc. so as to be “right” enough of a person to hear anything from at all? The intolerance of the “tolerant”.
I hope this imbroglio is being covered at least somewhere in the Dutch media.
Despite the press release, I haven’t heard of much interest in the press, unlike the case of Dorian Abbot and the U.S. press, which was rather parallel.
So far it seems the only coverage is in a liveblog on Folia, the University of Amsterdam’s magazine.
It has a slightly different take: apparently it’s not about Betabreak disagreeing with the speakers, but mainly about safety. They cite the Betabreak committee saying they “can’t guarantee the safety of the spectators as well as the speakers, given current developments on campus. In addition, platforming those who hold a view that contradicts the view of many UvA students would contribute to the already hostile and unsafe environment on campus.”
That last sentence might be about the gen-X type of ‘safety’, i.e. not hearing adverse opinions.
(On a positive note, when the article links to here, they call it a ‘website’!)
For context: most of the UvA’s buildings have now been ordered closed until the end of May due to occupation, property destruction and even a hunt for university administrators by masked rioters over the past week. Like most of the West, the Netherlands are dealing with a huge and unexpected wave of antisemitism. Just yesterday, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam felt they had to cancel two concerts by the Jerusalem Quartet over safety concerns. The general public looks on bemused and annoyed, and massively voted for Israel’s singer at the Eurovision Song Contest.
Obviously we cannot handle the TRVTH. Interesting problem in a democracy. Maybe most people (IQ 100 by definition – maybe despicable and deplorable by the elites but still there, still need jobs and can still create issues if not addressed) really do need an intermediate layer of “Explanations kind” (Dickinson) narratives, aka fairy tales and children’s stories, to fill their need and allow them to get back to work.
The difficulty in handling the truth is being displayed not by people of average intelligence but by (a small minority of) those at the far right of the bell curve, the ones who get admitted to elite private American and selective Canadian colleges. Mind you they seem not to be curious enough to be challenged intellectually once they get there and that is a big part of the problem. They are poorly prepared, not dull.
In the early years of elected legislatures, only property owners could vote. Owners aren’t necessarily smarter than non-owners, especially if the property came to them by inheritance, but even the dullest scion has a clear enough understanding of his interests not to vote for politicians who want to take his property away from him. American states one by one adopted universal (male) suffrage sooner in the mid-19th century than the European monarchies did, even where Parliaments had wrested most real power away from the King. This suggests to me that the United States had more confidence in the ability of its ordinary people to have a grasp of the truth sufficient to decide their representation in government. (Of course it was never intended that slaves would vote.). I think this is still true, although highly progressive taxation combined with universal suffrage is a danger not faced before 1917. It’s our groupthinking academic establishment and its highly intelligent acolytes that are the problem. If I was going to disenfranchise anyone it would be them. They’re the ones who can’t even see the truth, much less handle it.
The lunatics are taking over the asylum.
De-platforming either side serves no purpose other than deepening division and causing more hate.
A gay friend raised concerns to an MP and was insulted, refused an answer and blocked, because he expressed concerns about ‘the wrong side’.
There’s a government proposal to give visas to Palestinians to come here ‘temporarily’. Pew Research states that 93% of Palestinians are completely opposed to homosexuality. Gavin expressed concerns about this bringing more homophobia here. Joanna Cherry MP, herself a lesbian, called him ‘racist’ and blocked him. Gavin is a lovely guy, he wasn’t being racist, his concern is about Islamic ideology, ie not a race. Many defended him and pointed out that we must not import antisemitism either.
His comment is now causing more division and has hit the media. https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/scottish-news/gay-scots-raising-fears-over-32814404
I’ve had to think hard about this. Neither Israel nor Palestine are beyond criticism, and I’ve always had empathy for civilian victims caught up in both sides of a conflict, I welcome Ukranians brought here, but I believe that, in this instance, we need to help victims in situ.
My thought is that there are Islamic states that could take them in, and Palestinians would be more comfortable there. But then I feel bad thinking that way, as if I’m washing my hands of my human duty to help those in need.
But then I learned that we have 137,000 victims of FGM here, and I can’t agree with importing more perpetrators. I support all victims, but I will never stand with an ideology that oppresses women, does FGM on girls, throws gay men from rooftops and says marital rape is a god given right for men.
Joanna ‘de-platforming’ Gavin has caused more division by not letting him talk to her. She’s my MP, but I won’t be voting for her again.
The other Islamic states don’t want the Palestinians either, for largely the same reasons your friend Gavin doesn’t want them in England. The other Arab nations hope that if Israel doesn’t starve them to death or push them into the sea—she won’t, of course, but they would, in a heartbeat—soft-headed people in the West will over-rule Gavin and settle them here.