Re: Taibbi is going to Hell
 

I've always thought the Catholic Church had this one fundamentally right.

All of us sin, none of us are beyond redemption and forgiveness.

But there is a need to repent before that can happen. And one ought to confess and do penance when you repent.

To follow Hank's example, I know I made all too many offensive jokes about gay folks once upon a time, I don't remember if I did it on the board but I probably did. And I hope I've confessed and done enough penance. It's just wrong.

Taibbi strikes me as about as likely to repent or do penance as Trump. He's just not the repentant kind of guy. Where the baker seems to be. Good for him.

Re: Hell is Other People
 

I feel sorry for the headhunters who get through to me.

They always want me to go to Megalaw X where my practice will make oodles of dollars and I'll have more work than ever before.

And I say, why in God's name would I want more work?

Privilege, Chapter [?] of [Thousands? Millions?] to Come
 

I was joking about how skinniness would be a privilege last week. Well, this just appeared on my screen https://getpocket.com/explore/item/t...=pocket-newtab

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

I'm aware of the Taibbi accusations. I read about them when they came out.

You used the word "repent."

Why? On the other side, the #metoo side, they were all lumped together. Recall Aziz Ansari being thrown in with Weinstein and Moonves just for being a shitty, borderline creepy date?

Taibbi has been accused of making fun of fellow reporters who were females. He's been accused of running a column called "Fat Ankles" that made fun of a critic. His co-author was accused of writing a tasteless column satirically bragging about sleeping with 15 year olds.

Was he punching down? Sure. But that's just juvenile horseshit better ignored than made the subject of a witch hunt. Journalists are notorious for treating each other terribly.

If I edited the Guardian, I wouldn't bring up his past given the weakness and thinness of the alleged transgressions. There's simply not much there there, and I noticed the Post article worked hard to try to make it seem there was a lot more to the story. That's pretty much the Post's calling card these days. It's the biggest abuser of clickbait of the big three papers, as transparent in its slanting of reporting as the WSJ is in its OpEd pages.

That's a bizarre assessment. You'd think Taibbi would want to avoid having a debate on his past as it could put him at risk. By taking shots at call out and cancel culture he's putting himself in the dock. The more likely conclusion is he truly believes cancel culture is toxic grievance porn that's ruining the public square. And degrading the limited intellect of the public that consumes it (and those that enjoy it have few points to spare). Which it is.

To further discount your point, consider Andrew Sullivan's critiques of cancel culture. He's milqueoast. He's written nothing that could get him cancelled. Why would a person like him take on the subject? (Other than your facile comeback that he's doing it for exposure as part of his new venture with Weiss.) Why would Harper's author that letter? Are a significant number of the signatories people who've done something awful and are seeking to prevent it from being called out? Did Salman Rushdie author a pamphlet of rape fantasies in his youth that he's been hiding? Does Noam Chomsky tell racist jokes to fellow academics behind closed doors?

Your suspicion regarding Taibbi makes no sense.

I'm also still perplexed by your deeply strange moral stance. You also wrote the Taibbi should "own" his past. What does that verb, frequently used by social justice aficionados, mean? Seems to be a desire for some form of justice - that Newton's 3rd law should apply and no person having been mean or bad should escape it being revisiting upon him or her. Cotton Mather would like this idea. It's perfectly Puritan... and perfectly at odds with the randomness of reality, in which people acquire all sorts of things without deserving them and scoundrels get away with being scoundrels far more often than they face adverse circumstances.

We're developing a "fairness" cult in this country. The frustration to be found in this Sisyphean endeavor is going to leave a lot of naive folks highly disillusioned.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

I know that there are other issues about other things he said. Focus the specific way that he treated a specific reporter. From her article, there's not a lot of room for doubt that he did what she says he did. He set her up, and lied about her in a way designed to belittle and damage her. Not for laughs. Why are you trying to diminish what he did?

So fucking what? I'm sure a bunch of morons said dumb stuff on Twitter this morning, but I'm not pretending that you are somehow responsible for what they said.

That's great. I'm delighted to hear that he acted terribly in ways other than the one I was talking about. But so what? Why don't you respond to the thing I'm talking about instead of changing the subject?

It was a first-hand account by the person he treated poorly, and maybe you should read it before you minimize it. He published lies about her.

It's not either/or. In the same way that many of the people who signed the Harper's letter were accused of doing so in order to downplay or evade responsibility for things they have said and done, it's entirely possible that Taibbi sincerely believes that there is a "cancel culture" on the left and that no one else should pay attention to those people. Perhaps it's just a coincidence that discrediting "cancel culture" in that way also minimizes the bad stuff he's done. Or perhaps it's no coincidence at all, and Taibbi is complaining about "cancel culture" to play the victim. But if the Guardian doesn't give its reader more context, it's not informing them.

Oh, you naive, oblivious person.

In short, I think he's an asshole and his inability to apologize for behaving poorly shows it. If he wants to play the victim of "cancel culture," the context of his past is obviously relevant. Did I say anything about "justice"? No.

And you're confused about Puritans.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

1. I’m not diminishing by selection. All of it taken together is meh.

2. “Live by the sword...” To respond directly, your attempt to force a subjective analysis of each situation does make sense, but it must be noted that when I attempted to defend the accused in the #metoo panic using the same argument with exculpatory facts, most here, probably you, took the other side. Women should be believed first, then possible exculpatory facts adduced. I absolutely agree with you that every situation should be looked at discretely, but you understand that with that, you put the unifying generalizations of BLM and #metoo into scrutiny. #Metoo, BLM, and concerns about cancel culture all share a similar architecture - meaning they are movements which generalize, not infrequently incorrectly.

3. Your argument on Taibbi also fails because (and this is the best argument), he is not complaining about it. He is openly mocking it. He’s not AT ALL worried about blowback, obviously. Hes saying it’s shit and laughing at people who think it’s productive.

4. What has Sullivan to be concerned about? Sounding too much like David Brooks from time to time?

5. Taibbi is not playing a victim. He’s making fun of cancel culture. He’s using it as a punching bag. I see no victimization in his pieces. If anything, he seems bent on getting it to attack him. Which makes sense. It’s cheap and easy copy. Goad moralizers, mock them, publish. Rinse, repeat.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

I think you have a remarkable bent to think that no one should be held accountable for anything, ever.

Wait a second. You are confusing two very different things here. I resist generalizing about "cancel culture" because I keep seeing that term used to refer to situations where no one has been silenced at all or where people are very justifiably paying the price of acting poorly.

There a separate question of, which facts do you believe? In all the conversations we have had so far about "cancel culture," I don't think there's been a "who do you believe" issue. (There isn't one with Taibbi, either, since the stuff he did was all publishe.)

I am willing to believe it in particular cases, but I'm seeing a high proportion of bullshit with "cancel culture," much more than I've seen with others.

I guess you don't follow what I'm saying about Taibbi. He acted like as asshole to other people, in a bunch of ways, as a matter of public record. That is obviously material to his view that journalists ought to be able to "screw up" as he puts it, which is a funny way to put it since it implies that he didn't publish exactly what he meant to. Letting him opine about "cancel culture" essentially lets him launder his reputation. It lets him minimize what he did by suggesting there's something whiny about the people who don't like what he did.

I don't have time for this.

What I said to 3. He's "making fun" of cancel culture? Please. That's hiding behind humor. When you say mocking, that's more like it.

Re: Taibbi is going to Hell
 

vomit. No, https://www.flavorwest.com/unicorn-vomit.html

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

Let's put it plainly. "Justice" is a gaudy word. It's like cheesecake. If you've a clue you grasp that it's only ever existed enough to make sure markets and property rights were protected, and violent crime was suppressed. The arc of the universe not only doesn't bend toward it; no such arc exists. Power, and random events, dictate most of what occurs.

This is a genius dodge via limitation of definition. There are of course multiples of both of those exceptions. Unless one assumes the signatories of the Harper's Letter are all deluded.

This is your worst work right here.

No, there isn't. With cancel culture it's always a judgment call. Do we wreck a baker's career for the acts of his dimwit daughter? Do we fire a statistician for offering data adverse to the effectiveness of riots?

Cancel culture paranoia has been stoked by dishonest right wing brokers. But I've cited no Tucker Carlsons. I've cited moderates, liberals, and academics.

This is sleazily written and jammed full of wiggle words. Let's unpack:

So what. I'm doing that to you right now, effectively. Suppose I tell you to fuck yourself and you have kankles. You give a fuck?

Agreed.

Incorrect. One can "screw up" by being too on the nose. Ever "won" an argument with your SO and not gotten laid for a week? You're assuming screw up means something Taibbi doesn't. I think he means he made fun of someone nastily and took liberties in what he wrote which may have been over the top.

Name for this: Free speech. You're not the hall monitor. Don't like it? No one gives a fuck.

Translation: "I don't have facts to support this."

I can run with this in two directions. If this is joke on my edit, clever. If you believe there's a difference, eye roll.

Re: Taibbi is going to Hell
 

Catholicism would acquit Hitler. (It assisted him for its ends, one should also recall.) It's a borderless state that brutally held to power, pimping mindless, fictional, cynical gibberish to people who were scientifically illiterate. Its charms in the present are indistinguishable from those of your fortune teller. It only persists as a result of massive market power.

You go nowhere when you die. You know it, I know it... your beer drunk 20 yo cousin on a lawn chair vaping indica with his life before him like a thunderhead and his fu manchu goatee 'tween his free fingers knows this.

It may seem ham handed or stating the obvious to note this. But then I look around the country and see the right and left absorbing far more preposterous delusions than the existence of an afterlife and am compelled, depressingly chastened: Ya probably ought to say it just in case.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

I thought you were going to put it plainly.

Well, make up your mind. Previously, you agreed that if someone didn't suffer any harm, it wasn't an example of cancel culture. You also agreed that if someone got canned for good reasons, it wasn't an example of cancel culture, even if they also used social media.

One is a question of what fact to believe. The other is a question of what to do about them. Different kinds of judgment.

Also, "we" don't wreck a baker's career. We may express our opinions on social media, and we may choose to buy bread somewhere else. Also, "we" don't fire statisticians, unless the statisticians work for "us."

You may think this episode reflects something broader about the culture, but I see the creators of a TV show not wanting to work with the guy anymore.

Congratulations on not citing the people who are shitting the bed. They are, however, still shitting the bed.

"sleazily"? You flatter yourself.

No, but if you print false things designed to harm me in a publication read by my professional peers, then yes, I would give a fuck. Do you really not get that?

He did not just "make fun" of someone. The actual facts are in the WaPo piece you pretend to have read.

You give "free speech" a bad name. This has absolutely nothing with whether Taibbi can publish whatever he wants.

And when you say "no one gives a fuck," what you mean is, you don't give a fuck. You are only complaining about cancel culture because other people do give a fuck about things you don't give a fuck about, and you are cranky and resentful that you share a planet with them.

There are plenty of people with complaints about Sullivan, but my life is to short to go find their beefs to share them with a Sullivan stan so you can say, I don't give a fuck.

You probably like comedians who punch down.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

I don't agree that the narrative offered by Taibbi's accuser is a comprehensive description of the facts. I think he was smart to brush it off. Who needs a he said/she said on this stuff? That's designed to trap the accused.

No, we call for boycotts and seek to put him out of business.

He said something vile. I wouldn't want to work with that jackass either. That is not cancel culture. That's one of the instances in which a person has made himself so toxic, he's got to go.

They weren't intended to harm. They were intended to demean and insult someone Taibbi deemed a pain in the ass with no talent.

Not much there there. Reads like a hit piece trying to take out RS's marquis journalist.

I'm saying sane people don't get all riled about shit like what Taibbi did. Officious people with thin skin are annoyed by it. They're annoyed by everything. They're judgy. As I said earlier, people who like to judge tend to be failures. Moral judgment is the cheapest leverage. It only works in social media circles because an army of officious nobodies can get together and cry for a hanging. Any one of these people taken alone would be ignored.

I don't resent the peanut gallery having a voice. But they aren't mature, they can't see beyond their binary views. They're social justice hammers, and everything's a nail.

Were they to get together and mock Taibbi, perhaps say he has a terrible combover, lousy voice for radio and podcasts, laughs uncomfortably, and thankfully finally made enough money to have his teeth fixed, I'd giggle. It'd be hysterical to see a brutal back and forth where his own form of cheap shot is revisited on him. But no, the scolds of social media are dour, dullards with one thing on their mind - casting moral judgment upon others. How fucking boring is that? How pathetic? Hall monitors of the internet - Torquemadas of their parents' basements.

The internet is a great equalizer in terms of bullying. If a Taibbi slams you, slam the fucker back. If you want to go cry to the principal and demand he gets detention, you're weak. You suck.

Crickets. The only criticism one can apply to him is that he's whiny and an apologist for a religion that treats him as a second class citizen.

I like any joke as long as it's well delivered. Some punches down can be very clever and so taboo you laugh your ass off thinking, I really shouldn't laugh at that, but god its just so wrong... so fucked up. I can't not. But that's hard comedy to pull off for most humorists.

I think one who decides whether a thing is funny or not based on whether it's punching up or down is a serious freak who doesn't understand how humor works. Everything can be funny if done right. Everything is fair game.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

When you read her account, what did you think was missing? What additional facts that she made not have included would make it OK for him to have someone pretending to be a Russian government official call, to print lies about what she said in response, and to print lies about her conversations with a third party?
I didn't and you didn't, so we didn't.

Not sure I follow you at all. Cancel culture is when someone says something that other people find offensive but that you don't find offensive. If you agree that it's offensive, it's not cancel culture. So all this nonsense about cancel culture is just a way to disagree with people about what is and is not offensive, but in a euphemistic way that makes it sounds like it's a problem with them, not that you are defending speech they find offensive.

I have a hard time understanding why you have a problem with the guy who criticized Dolly Parton but you have none with Taibbi using his publication to lie about another reporter. Baker was at least commenting on a current political controversy, in a way that had nothing to do with his job, and Parton would have had no problem responding. Taibbi told lies designed to hurt his target professionally, with no way for her to respond. I think you have no problem with people who punch down, because you can call the target a loser, but when someone punches up at someone like Parton, he's the loser. You have a soft spot for people with social status, and you don't like it when people with less status criticize them. Your complaints about cancel culture are all about belittling the idea that people should be able to make their complaints on social media about people with more status. None of it has much to do with free speech.

As a matter of simple fact, you can use Google or Twitter and find people making other criticism of him, if you care. I have better things to do.

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

A. The guy said Parton, who’d done nothing but innocently support BLM, had “freak titties” and “betrayed her white heritage.” This is not a journalist going low on another. It’s vile. It’s not even attempting to be funny. He’s a troglodyte. I’d fire him simply for being trashy and stupid, without any hint of irony or possibility what he said was clever. Comedy has license. This guy is just a dumb redneck.

B. Taibbi walked the line. His was a mean spirited and lousy attempt to mimic Thompson’s made up story about Muskie taking ibogaine. I see it as a juvenile and failed attempt to copy someone Taibbi admired, and who made shit up all the time (read Thompson’s fake story about hanging out with a debauched Clarence Thomas for an example). (PJ O’Rourke did similar stuff early in his career.)

C. You’re wrong on status. I love a smart dissident. These moral scolds aren’t smart. They’re quite stupid, and their presence makes the internet less amusing. My chief criticism is the same one I have for all scolds, rule custodians, and morality police. They seek power, they seek blood, and they feel they’re entitled, that they’ve been shafted. But they never examine their own lacking that puts them in a rotten position. It’s basic lack of brains to a great extent. Show me a man who takes himself terribly seriously and I’ll show you a guy who doesn’t have a whole lot upstairs. (Eric Hoffer has the rest of my brief on that observation.)

Vaclav Havel was a dissenter. The internet mobs here aren’t worthy of washing his underwear (which probably smells pretty bad right now).

ETA: You have drawn out one admission I must make. I am picking and choosing the rules and who is deserving to be heard and who is not. I do not think any ardent moralizer, right or left, is worthy of consideration. I share your subjective view. Each opinion should be taken on its own. But how does one do that with mobs who simply scream and retweet and repeat their strange orthodoxies?

Re: Objectively intelligent.
 

Saying a lawyer "Need to Go Back to Law School" is not libelous. Neither is calling a doctor "a real tool." Whew!
https://mn.gov/law-library-stat/arch...812-081720.pdf