R.S.V.P. is an abbreviation for the French “répondez s’il vous plaît” which means “please respond” and traditionally is appended on invitations so that the host knows who and how many guests to expect.
Richard Dawkins and PZ Myers are running around saying they weren’t “gate crashers” at a pre-screening of “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed”. But that’s exactly what they were. PZ Myers claims he went through the same process to get a reservation for himself and a number of guests as all the other guests by going here
ADDENDA: 3/25 There is no way to get to the URL above from the main page www.getexpelled.com. The above is not a publicized address. The links from the main page all go to TOUR BUS events not movie screenings.
The sticking point is that Myers was never invited. Myers RSVP’d to an invitation he never received. He fooled the host by gaming the invitation/response system employed. The host wasn’t checking RSVPs against a list of invitations sent out but rather just assumed that any RSVP received was in response to an invitation sent out. One could possibly say this was due to Myers’ ignorance of what RSVP means but he seems to be “As Smart as a 5th Grader” so that’s not a credible excuse. The only other alternative is Myers’ purposely and knowingly deceived the host which of course means Myers is dishonest. THAT is credible.
One might blame how this was allowed to happen on the naivety of the producers in trusting that RSVPs would be received only from invited guests. Honest people don’t tend to think like thieves so it might not have occurred to them that RSVPs would be received under false pretenses. But that still doesn’t excuse Myers’ dishonesty.
Richard Dawkins isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed but even so it’s hard to believe he believed that Myers was an invited guest but the possibility exists that Myers duped him into believing he was a legitimate participant in the pre-screening so I’ll reserve judgement on Dawkins for the nonce in this one case.
The question remains as to why Myers was singled out of a crowd waiting to get in when a more notorious and easily recognized skunk at the garden party (Dawkins) was not. I’d guess it’s because Myers was vigorously exercising his anti-religious potty mouth loud enough to offend other guests and someone complained while the other members in Myers’ anti-Christ crusader party were exercising a modicum of discretion. That’s just my working theory and it could be wrong but I wouldn’t bet even money on it being wrong. Too bad Myers doesn’t have the stones to be honest about his indescretions. Real men ‘fess up when caught pulling sophomoric stunts but I guess Myers can’t play it down by saying something whimsical like “Sorry, the devil made me do it.” 😆