Ever get excited about your event lineup only to discover Milkshake Duck is speaking? There’s no feeling like making an announcement and having your responses fill up with information about someone’s history of harassment accusations or treatises promoting “scientific” racism. As surprises go, that falls squarely in the unpleasant category.
No one knows or can know everything about the speakers they invite, but you don’t have to make those choices alone. Secular Woman can help. We do it all the time. We get messages from organizers asking about a speaker they’re not familiar with. We work with organizations as they’re building their schedules to spot potential problems.
We don’t know everything about everyone either, but we have more than a decade of institutional knowledge and contacts who’ve worked with a wide variety of people in the secular movement. And yes, we pay attention to “gossip”, though we’re clear about information we can confirm and that we can’t.
Of course, any final decision about who you promote falls to you. Not every internecine conflict is a deal breaker. But we can help you walk into these decisions with your eyes open.