By A.J. Mell

Rebecca Watson, a.k.a. the Skepchick, brought her winning blend of humor, skeptical chops, and unabashed girl power to the Lower East Side on Saturday as the third speaker in NYC Skeptics’ Public Lecture Series.

Speaking to an audience of almost 70 people at University Settlement on Eldridge Street, Watson gave a smart, chatty, PowerPoint-assisted talk on “Women and Skepticism,” leavened with wry observations and the occasional “unicorn break.” (Watson may be a hard-headed critical thinker, but she’s still a unicorn-lovin’ girl and doesn’t care who knows it.) A brief Q & A followed the presentation.

Rebecca Watson and a full house of attentive skeptics.

In a field where Y chromosomes predominate, the 27-year-old, Boston-based Watson has become the bespectacled public face of female skepticism. Toward the beginning of the lecture, she outlined the course of her own growing activism, which began with frequent contributions to James Randi’s online forum. Initially, she registered the Skepchick website to market the pinup calendar of the same name, a bit of tongue-in-cheek cheesecake which proves definitively that not all skeptics are bitter old men or socially maladroit mouth-breathers who speak fluent Klingon. (The site has since blossomed into a lively online magazine aimed primarily at young women.) More recently, Watson produced a well-received pilot for a proposed NPR series entitled "Curiosity Aroused"; she can also be heard dispensing informed opinions and tart witticisms on "The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe," a popular weekly podcast hosted by previous series lecturer Dr. Steven Novella.

Watson has devoted much of her energy to bringing more women into the fold—no small task, since her own research indicates that women are more inclined than men to believe weird things. (It’s a credit to Watson’s skeptical integrity that she reaches this uncomfortable conclusion, even though it goes against her own expectations.) Among the odd facts that came up in the presentation: women are more likely than men to have accidents on Friday the 13th, and less than 28% of the visitors to her girl-centric website, www.skepchick.org, are women.

Watson and the NYC Skeptics Board of Directors.

So how do we correct this depressing imbalance? Watson suggests a combination of web-based outreach, an attitude adjustment that discourages obnoxious alpha-male practices like “flaming,” and a general irreverence toward the old-boy’s-club mentality that dominates skeptical discourse. Nevertheless, she acknowledged that changing attitudes within the community is not enough; change also has to happen at a deeper societal level. Women find power in superstition because they’ve been denied more legitimate avenues. Ultimately, bringing more women into skepticism involves creating a society where women are encouraged to stand up, speak their minds, and not be afraid of controversy.

Watson modeling the the NYC Skeptics "Darwin08" t-shirt.