This Week in Comparative Victimologies

Greg — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:42:00 +0000

This video has been making the rounds.

The apparently pro-Hillary Talk Left blogs about it here.

I can’t mention enough that I’m not a Hillary Hater. If she had won the primary fair-and-square, I would’ve spent the next seven months explaining out of one side of my mouth to my Madison friends how Hillary’s not Joe Lieberman in drag, and how while comparing her to Lieberman might in some ways be appropriate, calling her a man in drag is something that should only be laughed at privately, in pro-drag, pro-fem circles. Meanwhile, out of the other side of my mouth, I’d have to make the argument to friends back in Ohio that she’s not not the liberal demon their hate-spam makes her out to be. My profound respect for Hillary Clinton only began to erode during her race-based campaign leading up to the South Carolina primary, and with subsequent reminders of her campaign’s continuing acceptance of that sort of thinking.I’m with Althouse on this one. Although where she seems to say “fair is fair” –

Yes, of course, some of that stuff is awful, but political fighting is harsh, and if women are going to be in it — really in it, as Hillary is — they’ll have to get knocked around. I’m not going to wring my hands over this. It’s part of progress. Males are savaged too. It means they’re taken seriously.

– I’m inclined to say “unfair is unfair.” In the Hillary video, the editors intersperse “MSM” clips with reactionary, redneck, and indisputably misogynistic non-mainstream propaganda that’s much more offensive than anything from the mainstream media. I’m thinking, for example, about 3:15-3:25 in the Youtube clip, which includes the very non-mainstream dropping of the “c-bomb.” MSM? I don’t think so. (Well, maybe there was this one time.)

No one can argue Barack hasn’t been effectively slandered by the ignorant, hateful, racist, bigoted, intolerant non-MSM, and to a similarly chilling extent. Hasn’t just about everyone been subjected to this email?

It’s clear to me we need to start pulling together. If, as seems likely, our pro-Clinton friends want to drag this out longer, I hope we can all remember that most haters out there aren’t fans of Hillary or Barack. In fact, they’re counting on us to win the election for McCain.Obama is wise, I think, to always try to be “very cautious about getting into comparisons of victimology.”

Another shot at “news.”

Greg — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 03:32:00 +0000

I’m obviously by no means the first to criticize modern news media. Moreover, when I do get my feathers ruffled by it, it’s not because of corporate ownership and the like, which many of my friends are much quicker to criticize. I don’t mind editorializing; in fact, I love it. What I do mind is editorializing disguised as reporting. A friend from the UK once pointed out to me how “you Americans” can’t even report on a natural disaster without editorializing. “Tragic Events Unfolded.” “Terrifying Hurricane.” In other words, proper news should report that the events unfolded, and that the hurricane hit shore; but it should leave the assigning of adjectives to the reader.

Of course, now we’re wired to let them get away with much more. Election headlines disguise even the least rigorous editorializing as news. Take this article. Admittedly, this sort of article exists precisely to keep agents of change at war with themselves, and thus maintain the status quo. Apart from that, I have no journalistic qualm with reporting that X percentage of Y demographic voted for Z. Unfortunately, it always goes further. Once they tell us “why” certain people voted a certain way, they’ve usually gone too far. If 20% of the electorate in a given State claims “race” mattered in choosing a candidate, the article shouldn’t imply 20% of Democrats equals “Democrats divided by race.” And “black voters voted for the black candidate”? The obvious implication is that they voted for him because he’s black. How does this “significant minority” of 20% so easily morph into this blanket statement? It’s more than a little condescending to think “we” know why blacks or anyone else voted for whom they did. Did gays in California and New York vote for Hillary because she’s a lesbian? No, they voted for her because they thought–and for the record I clearly disagree–she’d be best on the issues that mattered to them. We might also wonder what forces motivate the news media to track the “gay vote” in those two states but not others. How does the vote differ from the general population? Christ, people. Logic classes, anyone?

BunnyBlinks » gender

This Week in Comparative Victimologies

Another shot at “news.”