So, seeing as the fuckwitted cretin has spoken again, it is time to post post post.
Satoshi Kanazawa is mainly a disgusting vile misogynist and a pathetic excuse for a human being (see below), currently paid money to be more disgusting and vile by the London School of Economics (Hi thar, LSE!). Why LSE wants to continue paying Satoshi Kanazawa to be increasingly disgusting and vile is indubitably one of the greatest mysteries of the universe*.
Satoshi Kanazawa is an evolutionary psychologist. Evolutionary psychology is an eminently useful field of study, which has the potential to yield many scientific explanations to the sort of human behaviour we take for granted.
However, evolutionary psychology is also infested with woomeisters and complete idiots incapable of statistical analysis, critical thinking, and failing at Anthropology 101 (such as: SO THERE ARE CULTURES IN THE WORLD THAT ARE DIFFERENT THAN THE WESTERN EUROPEAN????? IMPOSSIBLE).
The woomeisters have been many a time lambasted by Ben Goldacre, like in this post which points out, among other things, the European bias in the research claiming that pink is more girly because of the girly genes that like pink more. I won’t even bother with any criticism, because, seriously, words fail. As Ben Goldacre says:
Boys who were raised in pink frilly dresses went down mines and fought in World War 2. Clothing conventions do change over time.
Yes, well.
Unfortunately, Satoshi Kanazawa is one of the least competent evolutionary psychologist on Earth, possibly even in the universe. (He is also very very evil.)
Apart from his marketing genius and pure evilness (Kanazawa is known to have been called the Ann Coulter of evolutionary psychology), Satoshi Kanazawa is most known for:
1. His ridiculous research trying (and failing) to link “attractiveness” with reproductive strategies and reproductive success, and all sorts of vacuous claims regarding “attractiveness”. His statistics proved to be flawed and were many times criticised, which Kanazawa obviously ignored.
He also claimed that women are getting more “attractive” faster than men, which is absolutely ridiculous. Why it is so is obvious even to a non-specialist: males and females receive HALF their genes from BOTH male and female parent, thus any actual physical differences between males and females take an extremely long time to emerge. (More at Gene Expression).
Also, the question of “attractiveness” itself remains largely unresolved. Attractiveness is dependent on the cultural milieu, and has no absolute value. There’s nouniversally recognised definition of “attractiveness”. The method of judging the relative attractiveness of research subjects is very subjective, and, in the end, rather meaningless (also, see Jezebel – also for the links to the press coverage of the whole debacle).
Of course, despite valid criticisms the first thing Kanazawa does after spitting out another 5000 words of vapid ejaculations is running off to meet the press.
2. His dubious claims about the link between lower average IQ and poverty in Africa. Kanazawa says:
Because I’m not a racist scumbag and also can think logically, I’d rather be inclined to say that the causation goes the other way round: because of poverty on the average the brains of poor children in Africa do not develop the way they could if not for lack of proper nutrition and so on, and so forth. But then, what do I know? I don’t even have a PhD. Also, I’m politically correct.
What was however, absolutely disgraceful, was the way LSE backed Kanazawa in his claims. The thing is, the CRITICS his research did not demand that he be silenced and it had nothing to do with “academic freedom”.
That is, unless you think that academic freedom is your god-given right to publish poorly-if-at-all fact-supported racist drivel in peer-reviewed journals, forever unchallenged.
3. For being a despicable human being. Because faced with statements like that I have actually nothing more to say, I urge you to read his op-ed about the war on terror for yourself:
Yes, we need a woman in the White House, but not the one who’s running**.
Wow. So it’s okay for hundreds of milions of completely innocent people to die as long as they’re not USians? OKAY!
(Also, if I were Ann Coulter, I’d be seriously offended)
(But then, Ann Coulter is Ann Coulter, so she most likely wasn’t)
Well, now Dr Kanazawa came to tell us all what exactly he thinks about those eevuhl feminists, pardon, feminazis, and their evil feminazi agenda. At this point, this particular kind of drivel was only expected and a matter of time:
Why modern feminism is illogical, unnecessary, and evil
Feminism is the radical notion that women are men (link)
ETA: 21/05/2011 removed some problematic wording <3
* Or not. Follow the money! Also, it must be very convenient for racist people over at LSE to have a brown-skinned person who will conveniently say for them all those racist things they want to say, but are no longer allowed to in public.
** Hillary Clinton was running for the president at the time.
*** But only if they are reasonably attractive. Where attractive = Kanazawa would like to have sex with them.
ETA: here it is, the Evolutionary Psychology Bingo! (Via lolscience)
[…] Evolutionary Psychology: Attractiveness Sendai Anonymous tears into Satoshi Kanazawa for His ridiculous research trying (and failing) to link […]
Would have actually considered reading more of this, were it not laden with ad hominem attacks of the extremely childish variety. It is one thing to disagree with someone who has quite controversial work, but it is something else to be a baby about it. As a feminist, I don’t necessarily agree with a lot of the stuff he posts, but I admire his boldness and willingness to at least explore and present ideas in subjects that most other people would not. He gets paid because he is a brilliant man with some good theories.
Also, I stumbled upon this by random happenstance and will not be back, so you can consider this my Parthian shot.
Sod off and get thee to the fainting couch. Kanazawa is a fuckwitted moron and that is an objective fact. He’s also a misogynist, racist bag of dicks.
Hey I’m glad this blog is here.
I jsut want to say I agree Satoshi Kanazawa sucks big ass hairy balls. AND guys like him are the reason why people do not take psychology seriously as a science.
Thanks for letting me blow off some steam.
It’s not just quacks like Kanazawa. Psychology Today and other MSM outlets choose to give these crackpots exposure and validation of their ideas (if you read it or see it on teevee it must be true!) because the Masters of the Universe them some biological essentialism to justify rich white dudes remaining on top.
are u a chick?
No, she is definitely mammal.
I’m sorry, I’ve made a mistake: she’s actually closer to being chick than mammal. In fact Sendai A. is a lizard.
Thank you sister, amen!
For an evolutionary psychologist he really is incredibly stupid and not very well read. His argument about the color pink is ridiculous. The association between girls and pink is a relatively new development. Until he 1940’s pink was considered a boy’s color–it was ‘stronger’ and closer to red.
he needs to be put down.
He is a bigot hiding behind his useless degree. All his so called “studies” are his lame opinions and defences of his insecurities. Also, it seems he’s very jealous of women in general, but especially women of color stating in a negative manner we “have more testosterone” than other races- More than him for sure.
Please explain: WHAT THE FUCK AM I READING? I mean, seriously. Academics reached a new low. That and I’m reading “Evolutionary” as “Evilutionary”.
Been looking for a wall to post this all along. This Chinese/Oriental bastard doesn’t come “kind to the eyes” – so how will he know.
Most of his race are less than 5 feet tall, extremely ugly and reek of various sick lizards they consume. I think LSE is fast becoming a dumping ground for all these human rejects. Remember the organisation’s involvement with the Gaddaffi’s and here comes the Neanderthal Lecturer
Criticizing a bigoted idiot doesn’t give you a free pass to be an even worse kind of bigoted idiot.
I love how ugly male evolutionary psychologists love to assert that men are not judged on physical attractiveness. They apply trends in modern, Europeanized cultures to all humans ever. Studies show that the importance women place on attractiveness varies by culture, and cultures with oppression of women and female sexuality are the ones where male attractiveness is least important. In societies where women are sexually liberated and not dependent on men for financial support, male physical attractiveness becomes the only important factor. Even in modern societies, a man’s life prospects are known to be heavily determined by physical attractiveness. Also, this asshole pushes the idea that a woman’s only enemy is time, but ignores the fact that in many cultures women actually gain increased status with increasing age and numbers of children, and in fact women denigrate each other by claiming that the other’s breasts are too small and perky. Also female sexual experience allows women to make better choices and to be more seductive. Unfortunately many white and asian male scientists emphasize the importance of youth and naivete in female attractiveness when these may be attractive in cultures where women are oppressed so they don’t cheat on men.
I just got through watching a video on youtube that this asshole needs to watch, about beauty.
The shallow minded, one dimensional people of this world like him, won’t make it in the new world. If he wants to keep it “REAL”, he’s not good looking himself at all!