Meet JohntheOther. He’s very concerned about the atheist movement — he wonders very seriously whether perhaps we’re vulnerable, because we lack a codified dogma, to being parasitized by psychopaths and sociopaths. He preaches at great length here about his deep concerns and his sincere worries before getting down to the details of a specific incident and dangerous individual that troubles him greatly: the sociopathic behavior of Rebecca Watson at Skepticon a few years ago.

What is it with Rebecca? She is so damned good at attracting these nutcases. And nutcase he is: he’s an MRA, one of the clueless goons behind the often and deservedly mocked MRA site A Voice for Men, and he also seems to be one of those kooks obsessed with chastising me, too (Rebecca is not alone in her her kook magnetism). He’s one of those despised pseudo-scientific pontificators who love to mangle evolutionary psychology to justify misogyny.

Narcissistic personality disorder, avoidant personality disorder, histrionic personality disorder, these are arguably not aberrations of normal human psychology at all, rather they are the amplification of female personality traits which afforded women a survival advantage throughout human pre-history. In a world of scarcity where humans often died of starvation, women with the attributes of innate selfishness and skill at manipulating men meant increased survival for themselves as well as their offspring.

Appalling. This bozo is simply using an evolutionary rationalization, free of all evidence, to justify his predetermined conclusion, that women are narcissistic, histrionic, selfish exploiters of men. I’m no fan of evolutionary psychology, but I think most evolutionary psychologists would rush to wash their hands of the taint of this contemptible fraud.

So if you watched that video, you were watching a scumbag oozing faux sincerity and concern for the skeptic and atheist movements while making a slanderous attack on someone he considers a feminist enemy. Don’t be taken in by the smarmy used-car-salesman personality. The only sociopath you should be worried about is JohntheOther.

Let me explain for JohntheOther, the guy who is incapable of reading elementary social cues, what was going on in that Skepticon incident that he so deplored.

Rebecca Watson was telling a joke. That’s extremely common at Skepticon, which has always leaned towards the light touch and humor and audience involvement, and Rebecca is a known and popular speaker who often takes a sarcastic and comedic approach to skepticism. Everyone was primed for a good time; I know I was. I was there in the audience and was one of those ‘sociopaths’ laughing along.

She told a story about how she was assigned a handler, a young woman named Kasi, when she arrived at the conference. And then she explained how, with the power going to her head, she ‘abused’ poor Kasi at extraordinary length throughout the con.

What was funny about that? Two things. First, the target of the joke: Rebecca Watson was making fun of herself, or rather, her image as wild party girl and She-Wolf of Skepticism, and mocking that image. She was not abusing poor Kasi, she was making herself the butt of a self-deprecatory joke. Secondly, she defused it all by pretending to be this petty tyrant whose great crime was sending Kasi off on a scavenger hunt. A very silly and harmless scavenger hunt. I mean, come on, JohntheOther, how can you sit there like a po-faced humorless clot worrying so much about the terrible psychological abuse being inflicted on Kasi when she was sent scurrying off to get coffee, M&Ms, condoms one day and a pregnancy test the next, and vegetarian cashew chicken? How can you listen to an obvious funny story and write,

what happens when people lack an ethical compass? What if the people we view as influential lack an ethical compass? Humans are social animals, if “leaders” are sociopathic, does it automatically follow that we all become dysfunctional?

And he says, “What I don’t understand is the laughter from the audience”, while accusing them all of being dysfunctional sociopaths. I’m sorry, JohntheOther, but the audience was responding to the patent social cues and the humorous content of the story. Why are you incapable of recognizing that? Do you have a psychological disorder?

Actually, I don’t think he’s psychologically blind to it at all: I think he’s dishonestly ginning up a lie that Rebecca Watson is a psychopath because of his ideological fixation on advancing raging misogyny. The obvious indicator of that: he left off the punchline of the joke! He shows the buildup, but doesn’t reveal the kicker that made it even more hilarious. Rebecca had let Kasi in on the plan at the very beginning: the whole Tyrant Rebecca act was a game to punk the eminently punkable JT Eberhard, the organizer of the conference. He had to know this; it was in the original video that he carefully edited and framed with his sleazy psychological ponderings.

Also, Rebecca Watson showed up in the youtube comments to explain that to him.

I can’t figure out if you purposely misinterpreted and edited the video or if you’re just very stupid. In my﻿ talk I explain that I told Kasi about the bet with JT immediately, and from then on we just pretended that I was demanding things of her. The gag was that during my talk, she pretended to quit, thereby freaking out JT, at which point I made it clear that the joke was actually on JT. Good luck on that psychology degree, though.

Even better, Kasi shows up.

Hi, so… Kasi “the handler” here. Thanks for the lulz. That conference was the best time I had all year. I got to spend time with a person I greatly admire, Rebecca, who stayed up late talking/listening to me﻿ and went shopping with me and just proved to me that she’s an all-around wonderful person. Yes, we pranked JT, but he had no hard feelings. I wasn’t actually asked to go get her things-That was made up in the build up to the reveal during her talk. Everyone else got that besides this guy..

At this point, it should be clear: JohntheOther, aka John Hembling, owes Rebecca Watson an apology. He ought to be on his knees begging for forgiveness from the entire atheist community that he defamed with his phony accusations. He ought to be deeply embarrassed at his public display of stupidity.

Don’t expect such honest behavior, though. Here’s the reaction he posted on youtube:

is that why it had 80 up votes and 2 down votes before the RW fans arrived in force and dropped 64 down votes within a few hours? – this mob’s behavior does nothing except confirm and re-enforce my opinion of the great and mighty REB﻿

Right. He’s exposed as a pretentious liar, and his concern is that his video got downvoted, and his opinion of Rebecca is only confirmed.

You know what else is confirmed? My opinion of MRA assholes.

the tone of the JW fans piling on here telling me how wrong, humourless, mentally deficient and horrible I am﻿ is making my case for me.

A guy who made a 16 minute video accusing Rebecca Watson of being a wicked sociopath is now complaining about tone? I think he ought to listen to all the people telling him he’s wrong, humorless, and mentally deficient — they’ve got him stone cold to rights.