Beyond an outrage. Is this 2011...or 1911???
Reposted from Change.org:
A week ago, the magazine Psychology Today published an article titled "Why Are Black Women Less Physically Attractive Than Other Women?” on its website. Within hours, following widespread outrage and criticism, the post disappeared.
Colleagues and peers of Satoshi Kanazawa, the article's author, have since analyzed his same data and unanimously (and unsurprisingly) found his conclusions in error.
Yet Psychology Today has remained silent. They have refused to apologize or even explain why they published the article.
Articles like Kanazawa's are more than offensive or spurious—they're deeply harmful because they promote racist and sexist stereotypes as science.
That’s why documentary filmmaker Aishah Simmons and academic Alisa Bierria are leading a petition on Change.org to call on Psychology Today to apologize and take transparent steps to prevent the publication of racist and sexist material in the future. Click here to sign Aishah and Alisa's petition.
Kanazawa's article never would have survived a thorough and responsible editorial process. In fact, the author himself doesn't stand up to review.
Kanazawa has a history of pushing discredited research and is particularly notorious for making meritless claims about race and gender. (He is also known as the mind behind the much-mocked book Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters.)
In an attempt to defend previous publications, Kanazawa wrote, “If what I say is wrong (because it is illogical or lacks credible scientific evidence), then it is my problem. If what I say offends you, it is your problem.”
Well, as Khadijah Britton of Scientific American put it, “Satoshi Kanazawa has a problem.” So does Psychology Today.
Prominent women’s rights advocates, including Gloria Steinem and Beverly Guy Sheftall, former President of the National Women's Studies Association, have already declared their support for the campaign.
Please click here to add your name to theirs:
Thanks for taking action,
Shelby and the Change.org team
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OVERVIEW: On May 15, 2011, Psychology Today contributor, Satoshi Kanazawa posted an article entitled "Why Are Black Women Less Physically Attractive Than Other Women?". We demand that the Psychology Today editorial board publicly account for how and why this racist and sexist article was allowed to be published on the Psychology Today website, and take transparent steps to prevent this from happening in the future.
Kanazawa's article is nothing more than a vile regurgitation of racist and sexist beliefs about black women disguised as "objective" and "scientific" research findings, and contributes to a historical legacy of using distorted "science" as a tool to justify violent ideas about and treatment of black women. Kanazawa has a history of writing biased and error-ridden articles that attempt to justify racist beliefs. Other scientists have discredited his research and his legitimacy as a social scientist has been called into question. That Psychology Today publishes Kanazawa's often problematic articles casts serious doubt about the trustworthiness of their publications as well as the rigor of their editorial process.
Psychology Today is not just a magazine and website, but it's also a site that people access resources for mental health services for their well being. Publishing damaging and crude articles such as Kanazawa's demonstrates a profound disrespect for anyone who turns to Psychology Today for these resources.
Though Psychology Today has removed the article from their website without explanation, the editors have not acknowledged or taken responsibility for publishing the article, discussed the editorial standards they require from their contributors and whether this article satisfied those standards, or explained why Kanazawa remains as a contributor, despite being discredited by other social scientists. Psychology Today editors have a journalistic and ethical duty to be both transparent about how this article was published and accountable for this failure in public trust.
Because of the damage that this kind of misinformation creates for both the public and Psychology Today, we demand the following:
1) a public statement from Psychology Today editors demonstrating accountability for the article itself and the editorial conditions that allowed this article to be published on your website,
2) the removal of Satoshi Kanazawa as a contributor to your website, magazine, and any other Psychology Today publications based on his history of discredited research and repeatedly submitting racially biased articles to Psychology Today, including this most recent disturbing article that your editors chose to abruptly scrub from your website,
3) and the development of more thoughtful and sophisticated strategies for identifying how racism, sexism, homophobia/transphobia, and other oppressions and biases shape any so-called "objective" scientific inquiries, methodologies, and findings that your contributors examine in your publications. These strategies should be communicated to the public in an effort to be more transparent about how you are disrupting bias in your reporting.
Also, please visit this additional important change.org petition demanding that "psychological professional associations to devise a formal statement alerting the public that, given their track record, Psychology Today should not be considered a reliable source of psychological knowledge."
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