philosophysmoker-Mstarz

Here's what happened: sometime in the somewhat recent past, Mrs. Zero and I somehow ended up with a kid. We named it Junior Zero, which was the obvious thing to do, and things have been going pretty well. He's healthy and super duper cute, and it's been a pretty amazing experience so far. The only real problem we've been having is that taking care of Junior sort of cuts into the time we would ordinarily spend doing other things, such as sleeping, keeping the house clean, staying in shape, reading philosophy papers, writing philosophy papers, keeping up with sports, keeping up with the news, keeping in touch with friends and acquaintances, reading books, reading blogs, approving blog comments, and writing blog posts. Among other things. So that's why I haven't been posting very much lately.

Things do tend to slow down around here in the summer, of course. Even under the best circumstances, there's just less Smokery stuff to write about in the summertime. And then lately whenever I sit down to write a post, I usually don't get very far before some other responsibility presents itself. Sometimes this takes the form of preventing Junior from getting killed or destroying something important, but often it just means spending time with him. (This post, for example, has taken me a week to write. (Also, I don't like to just sit down and quickly dash something off--whenever I do that, I end up saying something stupid.(Which is not to suggest that I successfully avoid saying stupid stuff the rest of the time.))) Maybe this is weird, but I've felt more like spending time with my kid than writing. And then, when I do sit down to write something, my actual philosophy projects have been getting most of my attention.

But I thought I should come out of the woods to let you know that I'm still here, and that the blog hasn't died, and let you know what's going on with me. I'm just a lot busier than I used to be, and I guess the reality is that I'm not going to be posting as regularly as I used to. I think I'll get better as things settle down and I get more accustomed to the new stuff I have to do now. And I expect that I'll post more as job-market season approaches, and as school starts in the fall. And I expect that, at least sometimes, I'll be interested in discussing how one goes about balancing attempts at career advancement with successfully keeping one's children alive.

One thing I can tell you right now is that being a father adds an entirely new dimension to the stress I feel about the job market. I'm worried about all the things I was worried about before, but now, in addition to the length and breadth they always had, the worries have a previously inconceivable depth. I feel like a Flatlander experiencing Spaceland for the first time. Man alive.

Anyways, sorry about the no new posts in a long time, and thanks for hanging with us even though there have been no new posts in a long time.

--Mr. Zero

I received an email last night from the author of an article in a forthcoming issue of the APA's newsletter on Feminism and Philosophy, about the changes to the comment policy. She writes:

In light of Mr. Zero's change to the comment policy, I thought I'd point out that an article I have written for the APA's Feminism and Philosophy newsletter references some comments that were posted to an old entry in The Philosophy Smoker. I tell the story about my first year on the job market: I turned to your blog for advice about interview attire, and was shaken by some extremely sexist comments posted on your blog -- I lost all my confidence and saw the profession in an extremely different light, due to those comments. In the article, I focus on how the anonymity of the internet relates to our identities as professional philosophers. I thought my experience with anonymous commenters on your blog was a valuable story to tell.

I was planning on alerting you guys to the article once it was published, but I bring it up now to highlight how valuable this recent comment policy change may be. (I also hope you're not upset to see your blog publicized as hosting some really sexist comments. Sorry about that. If it's any consolation, I also point out some really sexist comments on Leiter's blog, too.) Thank you for taking seriously the effect comments on your blog can have. I really enjoy reading (and occasionally commenting in) The Philosophy Smoker, and I think you generally do a really good job dealing with sexism and related issues.

This is exactly what I want to avoid. The thought that someone would come to this blog for help and be hurt by what she found here makes me sick. I believed then and I believe now that there was, at that time, a legitimate reason to permit those comments to be published, in spite of the obvious and serious drawbacks. But things are different now, and there is no longer any legitimate reason to do this. This blog is part of the solution, not part of the problem. This has always been our goal, and the recent change to the comment policy is designed to better accomplish this.

--Mr. Zero

About a year ago, I wrote this:

a little while ago, in a discussion thread concerning some content I lifted from some other blog, someone left an anonymous comment about the author of that other blog that was about 80% vicious invective (much of which was empirically false) and about 20% actual content. The person who was the topic of this comment wrote to me to ask why we would approve a comment like that, when it was so obviously a personal smear and made such a negligible contribution to the debate.

I told this person that I published the comment mostly because of the 20% of it that I thought was worthwhile. I also said that I think that sunlight is the best disinfectant. I think that there is a huge value in letting the dickheads have their say. I think there is no value at all in maintaining a public illusion that there are no dickheads, and I think there is a tremendous value in allowing the dickheads themselves to demonstrate once and for all that they have nothing of value to contribute to the discussion.

I still think that at the time, that was the right policy, although there were certain things I was not in love with about it, even then. While it seems to me that at that time the advantages involved with demonstrating the existence of sexism and racism in the profession and the demolition of these sexist and racist views outweighed the disadvantages, I never liked publishing those comments, and I never liked the idea that this blog was a place where a person could come to express those views.

Since that time, my views about the value of these comments and the role this blog should play in publicizing these issues have changed. A primary reason is that the What It's Like blog has come along and provides far more compelling evidence of the existence of sexism in our profession than the small number of douchey anonymous comments left here could ever hope to be. A secondary reason is that dickheads have a way of taking the fun out of things. I would rather have a more fun blog with a more restrictive comments policy than a less fun blog with a less restrictive comments policy.

As a result, my comment-approval philosophy has changed. I will not approve douchey comments. I will not approve trollish or needlessly quarrelsome comments. I will not approve comments that make unfounded claims about how easy it is to be a woman in philosophy, or how hard it is to be a white man in philosophy. I will not approve comments that, in my judgement, do not meaningfully add to the discussion or move it forward. I will not approve comments whose purpose is for some anonymous dickhead to piss on other people's good time.

Unless it's funny. Funny comments will get more leeway.

I will try not to be as heavy-handed as the moderators at some other blogs. I will allow people to be mean to each other, as long as they are mean in a way that is on topic and advances the discussion. I will not shut down comments overnight to give people a chance to cool off. But I am going to keep the assholes on a shorter leash.

--Mr. Zero

This is not meant to be a statement of Official Philosophy Smoker Policy.

Some dumb asshole recently left a staggeringly ignorant and racist comment in one of our comment threads. In the ensuing discussion, the point was raised that this is the downside of permitting anonymous commentary.

I've been thinking about this lately because a little while ago, in a discussion thread concerning some content I lifted from some other blog, someone left an anonymous comment about the author of that other blog that was about 80% vicious invective (much of which was empirically false) and about 20% actual content. The person who was the topic of this comment wrote to me to ask why we would approve a comment like that, when it was so obviously a personal smear and made such a negligible contribution to the debate.

I told this person that I published the comment mostly because of the 20% of it that I thought was worthwhile. I also said that I think that sunlight is the best disinfectant. I think that there is a huge value in letting the dickheads have their say. I think there is no value at all in maintaining a public illusion that there are no dickheads, and I think there is a tremendous value in allowing the dickheads themselves to demonstrate once and for all that they have nothing of value to contribute to the discussion.

Here's an example of this sort of thing in action: when we were (mostly) celebrating the APA's new anti-discrimination policy, there was a not insubstantial subset of commenters who opposed the policy, and who articulated the following reason for doing so: since the guy who presented the petition to the APA works at Colorado @ Boulder, and that department lacks homosexuals, there must be something or other wrong with something or other. Another thing that came up was that I, Mr. Zero, must be (secretly) gay (even though I already conceal my identity), or else I wouldn't care so much about the injustices heaped on gays. I allowed this discussion to go on for kind of a long time because it served the important purpose of demonstrating that there was very, very little serious opposition to the policy.

I also think it's worth pointing out that we almost never get comments like these. I approve well over 99% of the comments we receive, and although we've had a few problems where somebody is being a real dickhead, these have been isolated and rare. If we had a problem with abusive comments or something, I would consider adopting a more heavy-handed policy. But we don't. Other people have more restrictive comment-approval policies, and these policies appear to work well for them, but ours seems to work quite well for us. Almost all our comments are thoughtful, respectful, and intelligent. The comment about how Asians are treated at Harvard and Auburn, for example, was swiftly and completely demolished.

I think we have a really great community here. And that's why I'm proud to be a Smoker.

--Mr. Zero