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5/12/2018 Timeline of harassment and sexual assault allegations against Michael Shermer - Lousy Canuck (switch to...) Mock The Movie {advertisement} Timeline of harassment and sexual assault allegations against Michael Shermer September 12, 2014 | Jason Thibeault | atheism, gender, harassment, humanism, Michael Shermer, privilege, pseudoscience, timeline Today’s a big news cycle in movement skepticism and movement atheism. My old timeline is woefully incomplete and drastically altered by new revelations, now, thanks to Mark Oppenheimer’s article on the state of misogyny in the atheist and skeptic movements over on Buzzfeed. So, I’m pulling out the relevant links and pullquotes and revamping this timeline. It’s going to be largely intact from the old one, only maybe expanded to provide more context to each individual point. As with previous timelines this will be a living document — it’s as likely new links will be added or intermixed as I have time, but you’re more than welcome to contribute links in the comments. June 19, 2008 Alison Smith At The Amazing Meeting, Alison Smith, then-JREF employee through August 2010, and founder of the now defunct Skeptical Analysis of the Paranormal Society (down) (cached copy), alleges that Michael Shermer plied her with alcohol to the point of losing time and memory, then brought her to his hotel room and had non-consensual sex with her. (This is known, in legal circles and to us Social Justice Warriors and feminazis, as rape.) September, 2008 Pamela Gay Gay has recounted in several places, without naming names, a story that while being introduced to Michael Shermer at Dragon*Con in 2008, he made a drunken lunge at her breasts instead of shaking her hand. DJ Grothe has related this story a number of times to a number of people, indicating that he had intervened to stop the public groping from happening. May 2010 Ashley Miller https://the-orbit.net/lousycanuck/2014/09/12/timeline-of-harassment-and-sexual-assault-allegations-against-michael-shermer/ 1/15 5/12/2018 Timeline of harassment and sexual assault allegations against Michael Shermer - Lousy Canuck At a dinner event she attended featuring PZ Myers, Ashley encounters Michael Shermer, who allegedly spoke with her for several minutes while massaging his genitals through his jeans. She describes the incident here. May 23rd, 2012 pseudonymous commenter Miriamne A comment left at Friendly Atheist names Michael Shermer as allegedly having harassed her, and “trying to sleep with a new young woman every TAM”. August 7th, 2013 Unnamed victims via Brian Thompson Brian Thompson, former employee of JREF, claims to personally know a number of women who have been harassed by Shermer, via Twitter. He specifies two instances of ‘being creeped at’, one of ‘being groped’ (by Shermer and/or another alleged creeper, Ben Radford). This could certainly refer to him being present for Shermer’s lunge at Pamela Gay. Elyse Anders Elyse describes some unwelcome salacious comments from Shermer after she drops a chicken tender at the TAM9 reception buffet. August 8th, 2013 Unnamed victims via PZ Myers — Alison Smith PZ Myers posts accounts by sources he trusts regarding allegations of Michael Shermer’s witnessed and experienced predatory tactics and alleged sexual assault of women he coerced into a position where they could not legally consent. August 9th, 2013 Unnamed victim through delphi_ote A participant at the JREF forums corroborates the existence of allegations against Michael Shermer by unnamed alleged victims. naomibaker naomibaker relates her story about how she was contacted ostensibly by Michael Shermer’s wife asking if the story she told about a cheating husband without names was talking about Michael. She listed names that Shermer had apparently had affairs with, several of the names being recognizeable. August 12th, 2013 PZ Myers Michael Shermer’s lawyer issues a cease-and-desist letter demanding that PZ remove the post containing the allegations and claiming that PZ did not hear directly from the alleged victim as he stated, pointing out an update suggesting that Carrie Poppy is responsible for putting the alleged victim in contact with PZ (no word on whether PZ actually spoke to the victim directly though); and claiming that PZ has a profit motive in blog hits. (DOWN) (A cached copy exists on scribd.) PZ Myers The post where PZ Myers linked the relevant PDF disappears after getting 70 comments within the span of an hour or so. (DOWN) (A cached copy exists on Google Cache. A second cached copy exists on freze.it.) PZ Myers The previous post is quickly replaced with this one stating that PZ has contacted Ken from Popehat. August 13th, 2013 https://the-orbit.net/lousycanuck/2014/09/12/timeline-of-harassment-and-sexual-assault-allegations-against-michael-shermer/ 2/15 5/12/2018 Timeline of harassment and sexual assault allegations against Michael Shermer - Lousy Canuck Carrie Poppy Carrie Poppy and PZ Myers publicly state that Carrie only put the alleged victim into contact with PZ, and that Carrie is not really involved otherwise, despite the assertions in the cease-and-desist letter. rikzilla rikzilla relates a story where Shermer propositioned his wife, calling her sexy and asking her to his room for private drinks while he was present. Dallas J. Haugh Dallas posts a suicide note which includes allegations of rape against Shermer. It is taken down by a relative when he is secured and taken to a hospital; after he’s released, he reposts it. August 14th, 2013 PZ Myers The deadline given to PZ by Michael Shermer’s lawyers to acknowledge receipt has elapsed. The post is still up. August 16th, 2013 Ian Murphy Ian Murphy publishes an email exchange with Shermer wherein Shermer makes some comments, against his lawyer’s orders, about the allegations and his dealings with PZ Myers. August 22nd, 2013 Emery Emery On a fundraiser page built by Emery Emery, the “Ardent Atheist”, to raise funds for Michael Shermer’s legal offense, Shermer himself comments in support, stating that he was aware of the effort and that any funds not used toward suing PZ Myers would be given to a charity of Emery’s choice. August 26th, 2013 John Loftus John Loftus claims to have personal email from Michael Shermer suggesting that he knows who made the accusations against him, and that if anyone else heard what Shermer told Loftus, Shermer’s innocence would be obvious. He then later walks all of that back when Shermer apparently suggests he DOESN’T know who made the accusation, and was just guessing. I cover this episode on my blog. August, 2013 Taylor Proctor, Derek Colanduno After seeing Derek Colanduno of the Skepticality podcast, lamenting “witch-hunts” and “lies” regarding the allegations of sexual harassment being made about Michael Shermer, Taylor Proctor reported some untoward behaviour by Shermer that she’d experienced at Dragon*Con 2008, expecting that he knew she was not a liar. On Sept 18th, 2014, Proctor brings up this conversation on Facebook on Colanduno’s wall. Colanduno then claims she is a liar, but Proctor provides screenshots of the conversation from August 2013, wherein he claims he’d have a talk with Shermer. In 2008, Colanduno was in fact director of the skeptic’s track at Dragon*Con, and each subsequent year through 2014. Colanduno went on to invite Shermer to Dragon*Con 2013 and 2014. September 5th, 2013 Emery Emery In an update on Emery Emery’s legal offense fund for Shermer, Emery Emery states that they’ve reached the first goal of $5000 and that Michael Shermer “has no choice” but to sue PZ because the post is still up. https://the-orbit.net/lousycanuck/2014/09/12/timeline-of-harassment-and-sexual-assault-allegations-against-michael-shermer/ 3/15 5/12/2018 Timeline of harassment and sexual assault allegations against Michael Shermer - Lousy Canuck September 10th, 2013 Michael Shermer Michael Shermer tweets, then deletes, a photo of himself onstage in Germany in front of a sign that says “no drinks onstage” in German. Someone managed to get a screencap before it was removed. The tweet reads: Skeptics in the Pub Köln “No drinks on stage”? What fun is that? I like to keep my glass full w/out my knowing it… September 19th, 2013 Emery Emery The fundraiser closes for Michael Shermer’s legal offense fund, having raised a total of $8,289. November 6th, 2013 Pamela Gay During the “Ripples of Doubt” science blogosphere event following Bora Zivkovic’s admission that he’d serially harassed women for sex, Pamela Gay talks about the fallout from her speech at TAM 2012, Make The World Better, wherein she described some of the harassment she’d encountered without naming names. Her post about that fallout and the damage the speech did to her career is called Truth Against Humanity. She again describes, without naming names, the incident with Michael Shermer attempting to grope her and being stopped by DJ Grothe. May 31, 2014 Pamela Gay In the months since her post on Ripples of Doubt, Pamela Gay describes how she’s sorry she’d stayed silent about the incident in 2008 when Shermer allegedly attempted to grope her, and acknowledges the psychological damage that bottling it up and hiding it to protect her career has done. She further alleges that DJ Grothe, who intervened in the incident, threatened to testify on Shermer’s behalf against her if she didn’t stop talking about the incident. Interestingly, she didn’t name any names then either, and DJ Grothe has reportedly shared the story of intervening against Shermer with a number of independent members of the skeptical community.