ger2@freedyn.de   
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   From: bob7duncan_albasani_now_freedyn_open-news-network_sporger2@freedyn.de   
      
   In 2014, a woman named Tchiya Amet accused Neil deGrasse Tyson of   
   raping her while they were both graduate students in astronomy at UT   
   Austin, ultimately leading to her dropping out of the program. In   
   the aftermath, I encouraged journalists at mainstream outlets to   
   pursue it. But they told me that they ran into problems convincing   
   their editors to allow them to publish what details they could find   
   —for example, confirming that Amet was indeed enrolled in the   
   program. The story was picked up by a blog on the religious   
   commentary site Patheos in October of last year, and I reached out   
   to journalists again, with a similar response.   
      
   I have, since I first learned about them, felt that Tchiya Amet’s   
   allegations merited a response, and I waited, for years, for one.   
   Another post from Patheos last week featured an interview with Amet   
   along with stories of alleged sexual harassment from two other   
   women, an astronomy professor and a Cosmos production assistant.   
   (Buzzfeed also had a subsequent article citing a fourth woman with   
   similar claims).   
      
   Tyson was finally prompted to respond this week with a Facebook note   
   (which I assume, based on his celebrity and the nature of these   
   accusations, was vetted by both a lawyer and a publicist). He   
   admitted to engaging in behavior that he felt had been   
   unintentionally misinterpreted—except the rape, claiming all sexual   
   contact between him and Amet was consensual.   
      
   But he also said, “A few years later…I learned that she had dropped   
   out of the program” and I saw what I believed to be a lie   
   immediately. When I discussed it with my daily Black scientist chat   
   group, they agreed. Would he really have us believe that in the   
   1980s, in a field where there are almost no Black people, he hadn’t   
   noticed right away that the only other Black graduate student had   
   dropped out of the program? It wasn’t credible.   
      
   The truth is that Black academics (Blackademics) usually know what’s   
   up with Black people in departments across campus, even when they   
   hate each other. It’s also the case that Blackademics are often   
   loath to air our dislike of each other in front of white people. We   
   know that the bar for being seen as “good” is higher for us than   
   others, and we tend to be forgiving of people who may not be our   
   favorites.   
      
   Yeah, all lying niggers.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)