Customers are many different companies, who are accused of pollution, or sales of unnecessary or dangerous drugs, but in principle, all companies that pay are accepted as clients. ACSH is spreading propaganda to influential people within the movement, who get paid for their work.

James Randi campaigned for climate skepticism in a few months. U.S. oil companies could pay a lot for such propaganda.

In order to keep the members of the movement as it focuses a lot on changing the direction of discussions takes place. For example, a discussion is taking place in society, that the swine flu vaccine caused narcolepsi in some children, the movement can try to start a discussion on homeopathy instead.

Advantage of this business idea is that it is inexpensive, and can be implemented at low cost.

Very sad.

“Nobody has suggested that men’s rights be abridged somehow. And they don’t have rights TO be abridged. The suggestion that “nobody has the right to talk to me without my permission” is a strawman, and nobody but the most radical of radical feminists (who serve to pull the overton window in such a way that we can actually discuss this shit!) have suggested.”

I assume you meant OR THAT “they don’t have rights TO be abridged”.

And I agree that you have SAID that you aren’t trying to say the don’t have the right to say it, but then you do things like equate the situation to “threaten[ing] the President’s life”, which is a patently unfair comparison, and, since threatening the president is a CRIME, makes me think you think the same of the situation we’re talking about. So I will admit not everyone has flat out said that men don’t have the right to speak. Some of y’all have just implied it.

If someone says “No one has the right to speak to me in a public setting unless I approve”, does that not become a discussion about rights, and what right a person has to be free from others’ speech while in public?

Nobody said that, except perhaps those people claiming that this is what Rebecca said. Which is exactly the crux of the argument.

I agree strongly with Verbose Stoic that there are no rights at stake by anyone on either side here, not even “free speech”. It is why I bristle every time someone complains that what Rebecca DID do, make friendly suggestion to men that they may not want to do something in certain circumstances, is an abridging of men’s rights. Per the recap by bladerunner, this is, in point of fact, the argument that Stef McGraw made in saying that men should be allowed to “be sexual beings” and flirt when/how they want as long as it doesn’t escalate from there to physical harm.

Nobody has suggested that men’s rights be abridged somehow. And they don’t have rights TO be abridged. The suggestion that “nobody has the right to talk to me without my permission” is a strawman, and nobody but the most radical of radical feminists (who serve to pull the overton window in such a way that we can actually discuss this shit!) have suggested.

I’m saying those people are trolls too, just like the people bladerunner says are “obvious trolls”. All of this is ridiculous. The conversations are going in these directions because people are bringing these points up. We’re arguing about these points because people keep getting the actual suggestion by Rebecca wrong.

On the subject of that disagreement, though:

“yet one can indeed limit hitting on for whatever reason one likes, no matter how arbitrary. Appealing to “free expression” doesn’t work because that isn’t actually expression (it doesn’t actually make a point), which is required (see the pornography cases for more examples of how you do need to be claimed to be making some kind of statement to get protection under expression; that’s why they made a claim about them making statements).”

— I will take those in reverse order, because B supports A. The statement is actually a request; in this case for coffee, in another example it could be purely and in arguable a “Wanna fuck?” question; I would argue such a thing is equally protected under free speech rules, and while pornography is images which do not necessarily make a statement by the nature of images, I would argue that words that make a coherent statement (as opposed to just walking up and saying “FUCKSHITPISSNIGGER”) would be “statements” protected by expression laws pretty much no matter what. If you have a court case that shows the courts holding a different position, I’d certainly reconsider. I doubt the courts would ever say the government can dictate who you can or cannot hit on, though, nor say that it’s not an “expression” of a type of statement (well, actually a question, but I’m trying to use your terminology). Which makes your A point invalid, except, again, in that there is a competing right from the employer to protect itself from liability, or even just to allow only speech it likes (if an employee publicly badmouths the company, they can quite obviously be fired, even though nothing could possibly be interpreted as harassing, it’s just words the company doesn’t like).

“This is a conflation of what “right” means that bugs me. There are no rights in play on either side, in my opinion. Unlimited or otherwise.” I am confused by that statement. If someone says “No one has the right to speak to me in a public setting unless I approve”, does that not become a discussion about rights, and what right a person has to be free from others’ speech while in public?