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When What Looks Like Political Bias Isn't:
Thread on My Personal Experiences at Psychology Today Taking Down My Articles
1/n ending in END
Thread on My Personal Experiences at Psychology Today Taking Down My Articles
1/n ending in END
Moral: Things often are different than they superficially appear and you really need to know the full story before reaching conclusions -- a moral that, imho, goes well beyond this specific experience.
Over the last 6 months I have posted 3 blogs that PsychToday has taken down after posting. All contested left academic views or narratives in some way.
My favorite? The Orwelexicon, first posted at PsychToday and taken down. I made some great hay with this, priming the pump by billing it as "banned" by PsychToday, before publicizing the Quillette release https://quillette.com/2020/01/29/an-orwelexicon-for-bias-and-dysfunction-in-psychology-and-academia/
Some of my nutcase detractors framed this as "the piece was so bad it was rejected by Psych Today so of course that rag Quillette took it."
But it was not rejected by PsychToday because it was bad, or because PsychToday was biased.
But it was not rejected by PsychToday because it was bad, or because PsychToday was biased.
They rejected it because it was mostly political editorializing, not mostly psychological evidence, theory, or practice.
They were right about that. Fair & justified takedown because of poor fit, not because they evaluated it as bad or were biased.
They were right about that. Fair & justified takedown because of poor fit, not because they evaluated it as bad or were biased.
2nd Blog. I first posted this on Psych Today. They took it down.
https://medium.com/@leej12255/help-stop-another-academic-outrage-mob-eca601397495
It was a call to try to stop an academic outrage mob.
https://medium.com/@leej12255/help-stop-another-academic-outrage-mob-eca601397495
It was a call to try to stop an academic outrage mob.
Why did they take it down? Their guidelines *explicitly* prohibit activism. That is an excellent guideline; I thoroughly endorse it.
I had forgotten their rules. That blog deserved to be taken down.
I had forgotten their rules. That blog deserved to be taken down.
When I took out the activism, they posted a blog making almost identical points. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/rabble-rouser/201912/censorious-academics-try-again
I posted this blog two days ago, and, to my dismay, they took it down yesterday. On multiple manifestations of leftist biases in academia, including discrim & purge of conservatives and wildly unjustified claims accepted as truth. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/rabble-rouser/202005/political-biases-in-academia
Why did they take it down? The version I posted 2 days was mostly an annotated bibliography: A long list of mostly peer reviewed articles revealing political biases, with a little commentary on some of them.
When taking it down, again, they said, in essence, "PsychToday is not the right platform for that type of list, if you can turn it into a narrative essay, we will post it."
I revised it, turned into a narrative essay, and it is back now live!
I revised it, turned into a narrative essay, and it is back now live!
In fact, the narrative version is (imho) a far superior blog than the mere list of references (Note: It still has the full list of references for anyone so interested; but it leads off with a narrative discussion of the importance and manifestations of those biases).
Win-win.
Win-win.
But I am threading this, because, superficially, it could seem "obvious" that my blogs were being "targeted" by PsychToday on thinly-veiled political grounds.
One might wonder, "that all sounds well and good, but if they are taking your blogs down, but not anyone else's, it still looks like bias to me. Of course they don't admit it."
That's wrong, too. I am sensitive to such manifestations of political bias. From The Orwelexicon:
That's wrong, too. I am sensitive to such manifestations of political bias. From The Orwelexicon:
But anyone can see that it is manifestly not what is going on here. How? Look at other Psych Today blogs. I looked and looked and found NONE like the ones of mine that they took down.
Sometimes, when the ref calls a foul on you, its because you committed a foul.
Sometimes, when the ref calls a foul on you, its because you committed a foul.
Why retell this story? I suspect this type of thing happens all the time. Superficially things look like bias (any type of bias, not just political ones) and maybe they are, maybe not. But usually, one needs far more info than one usually has to reach that conclusion.
In fact, leaping to unjustified conclusions of bias actually has an Orwelexicon entry, which itself derived from peer reviewed psych science:
But this point goes even way beyond judgments of bias. It goes to judgments of almost anything. Reaching justified conclusions about social phenomena in the real world is very difficult. One often needs lots, usually WAY MORE, info than one usually has.
This is my version of Penn & Teller showing you how they do their tricks.
I revealed how/why PsychToday took down these articles, so you could see how it looks like political bias, but really isn't.
I revealed how/why PsychToday took down these articles, so you could see how it looks like political bias, but really isn't.
How many other things look like political bias, race bias, sex bias, or any other bias that aren't? How many other things look like one thing but, if we had better info, we'd know it was something else? IDK, but I bet its more than most of us would ever suspect.
END.
END.
