News/Commentary

Scientist Richard Dawkins rejects woke demands: ‘The only possible response is contemptuous ridicule’

February 18, 2023 | | Print Article

This week, a ragtag group of far-left scientists issued a call for scientists worldwide to stop using certain “problematic words.”

What “problematic words” exactly? Words like male, female, woman, mother, father, alien, invasive, exotic, and race, according to The Telegraph.

“Instead, they encouraged the use of terms such as ‘sperm-producing’ or ‘egg producing’ or ‘XY/XX individual’ to avoid ’emphasising hetero-normative views,'” the British outlet reported.

In response to this demand, militant atheist Richard Dawkins essentially told his “woke” counterparts to take a hike.

“The only possible response [to this] is contemptuous ridicule. I shall continue to use every one of the prohibited words. I am a professional user of the English language. It is my native language,” he told The Telegraph.

“I am not going to be told by some teenage version of Mrs Grundy which words of my native language I may or may not use,” Dawkins added.

The unexpected clapback prompted a flurry of praise from classical liberals and conservatives alike:

Thankfully, Dawkins isn’t alone in his criticism of this “woke” madness.

“Other experts also branded the alternatives ‘absurd’ and argued they could cause confusion in scientific fields. They also pointed out that the terms ‘egg producing’ and ‘sperm producing’ were simply synonyms for male and female, and continued to confirm that sex is binary,” The Telegraph notes.

“I certainly do not agree and such language will not be appearing in any of my scientific work,” Prof. Karol Sikora, reportedly a cancer expert, said.

Undergirding the “woke” scientists’ call is the belief that the usage of “problematic words” counts as a so-called “microaggression” against the so-called marginalized.

For example, the terms “invasive” and “non-native species” are “microaggressions” against foreigners and should therefore be replaced with “newly-arrived” or “nuisance species,” these “woke” scientists reportedly believe.

“One of our authors trained in the USA recalls ‘how tired I was as an undergrad hearing how invasive species from other countries decimate pristine US ecosystems. It reminds me of when people tell me or other people of colour to go back to where we came from. Why would I want to be in a field that exoticizes immigrants or reinforces narratives that immigrants are a plague?’” the scientists reportedly wrote in a recent journal entry.

These “woke” scientists are all part of the EEB Language Project, which The Telegraph notes was launched this month in the Trends in Ecology and Evolution journal.

The project’s goals are two-fold. One goal is to combat alleged “white supremacy.”

The other goal is to compile “a repository of ‘problematic words’ that have been identified by US and Canadian scientists as harmful and it suggests alternatives,” The Telegraph notes.

For instance, the term “citizen science” has been deemed “problematic”  because it could be “harmful to people who do not have a nation state.” Therefore, people should use a stupid term like “participant science or community science” instead.

Even the term “double-blind” is “problematic.”

“[O]ften used to describe trials in which neither the participants nor scientists know if someone is on a drug or placebo, [it] has been deemed potentially offensive to those with disabilities, as has the phrase ‘survival of the fittest,'” according to The Telegraph.

The hilarious irony is that the EEB Language Project is full of contradictions. For example, it recommends people use the terms “male or female” instead of “man/woman.” The problem is that the project also says “male or female” are “harmful” as well. Whoops.

Dovetailing back to Dawkins, not everybody is praising him. Some say that he deserves some blame for this “woke” madness. Why? Because of his unyielding liberalism.

After all, he’s the most famous atheist in the world …

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Vivek Saxena
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