SciShow Pulls Segment about Knitting After Complaints

Back in September I told you about knitters complaining about a SciShow episode narrated by Hank Green in which obvious mistakes in terminology and illustration of points were made, not to mention saying “we” don’t really know how knitting works while also calling it simple to knit a sock and saying that most of what we know about knitting has come through the intuition of knitters as well as trial and error.

You can imagine how well that went down with knitters, who mostly tried to be nice but called out the errors and the way this all sounds like the usual no one noticed this was cool until a man started paying attention kind of thing.

While a producer who is also a knitter left a comment on the post after knitters started criticizing it, they also did a deeper review of the episode and have since pulled it from their channel.

In a statement on YouTube attributed to executive producer Nicole Sweeney, the show says the were “certainly not trying to be dismissive of knitting and knitters” with the episode but they understand how it could be interpreted that way.

They said they were “really excited” to share about the physics of knitting but were “overwhelmed” by the response.

Our biggest miss was how some of the language we used in the video fit into a very long history of diminishing the work and innovation of people who have made, and continue to make, textiles. We are really sorry for that. Ultimately, fabric is one of the foundational technologies of human civilization and the reason it is treated as less exciting or important than other technologies is because it has traditionally been the work of women.

Well, they go that right.

The statement goes on to say that they have no plans to rework the video by “have learned a lot from this experience.” (Namely, don’t mess with knitters.) They mention having “tremendous respect” for the legacy of fiber arts and the intensity of the knitting corner of YouTube. Yes, we were here before you and will be here when you’re gone.

All joking aside, I don’t know if the episode needed to be pulled, but the statement shows that they took criticisms seriously and were thoughtful about what to do next. Which is the best we can hope from anyone who does us wrong. The apology seems sincere and we hope they’ve learned an important lesson about contacting experts for fact checking before publishing videos that cover worlds they don’t know anything about.

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I guess the trend of little scarves and bandanas isn’t going away, and there’s a good reason for that. These little projects are fast, and they’re good for beginners because of the low commitment and they make something that doesn’t necessarily look like a beginner made it.

And when you can combine a simple pattern with some super luxurious yarn, it’s a little treat that even more experienced knitters can get behind.

The Little Dot Bandana from Purl Soho (designed by Gianna Mueller) is a project like that. It’s a simple eyelet triangle, worked from the long side down to the point, so there’s a lot of decreasing happening but it’s a really easy project.

It calls for a hank of silk yarn and one that’s silk mohair, which gives the project a fuzziness and a little bit of a silky glow.

Of course you can use different yarn to get a different look. A linen yarn would be fun for a summer kerchief, or combine wool and mohair for a warm and cozy kerchief for cold mornings.

The pattern comes in two sizes, so you can stitch up a kerchief or a simple triangle shawl. The stitch multiple is 8 plus 23 stitches, so you can use that to make a triangle of any size you like, or you can use a heavier weight of yarn to make a different size if you prefer. The two strands held together as called for in the pattern makes a sport weight gauge, so you could try DK or worsted for a bigger and warmer project if you want.

This pattern is available for free from Purl Soho, or check out the pattern notes on Ravelry to find how other people made this project.

And if you need more options for kerchiefs to knit, check out this collection of kerchief knitting patterns.

[Photo: Purl Soho]

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