I’m off to California for a week, and definitely won’t have internet access for the next 24 hours or so. I don’t even have time to put a nice graphic at the top of this open post!
But please do post whatever links or thoughts you want here; self-linking, as always, is delightful.
See y’all later, and be nice!
For LGBTQ Pride Month, neo_prodigy @ noscans_daily has made a list of over-abused queer tropes in superhero comics which very, very much applies to all other media as well.
Slightly old post now, but here’s Fuck The Neurotypicals – Kyrias writing about growing up with ADD.
What a coincidence. On the first week of July I’m going to California too (in my case, to interview some animators)
Moving my Helen Thomas related comment here to avoid a de-rail of Julie’s “facts on Israel” thread.
I think these are all good, useful points for keeping in mind as the issue of Israel/Palestine is discussed.
I also think Helen Thomas’ comments were inexcusable and reprehensible.
At the same time, Salon makes good points in two different articles (here and here) that Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin have made reprehensible comments about Palestinians, and of course Glenn Beck, Howard Stern, and Sean Hannity have said all kinds of despicable, stomach-turning things, and none of them are being expelled from the public discourse, much less their actual jobs.
It’s an appalling double standard. I don’t want Helen Thomas defining the Israel/Palestine debate, but I do want equal treatment for other high-profile people who put out vomitously offensive sentiments.
Elusis,
Helen Thomas is a journalist. Not an opinion journalist, but a regular journalist.
Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin are politicians.
Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity are bloviators.
Howard Stern is … Howard Stern.
For years, Thomas asked very pointed questions about the Israel-U.S. relationship at White House press conferences. She did her job, and while I’m sure there were angry letters, etc., no one stopped her from doing her job and she wasn’t “banished” from the public discourse. (Does anyone really think that if she wants to find a platform for these views, that she’ll have a hard time?)
Regular journalists don’t get to have public, controversial opinions and keep their jobs. I would certainly be disciplined and might lose my job if my employer knew I was commenting pseudonymously on blogs, much less appearing on camera saying something as offensive as she said.
Chingona,
I thought I understood that HT had moved from being a regular reporter to being an opinion columnist? I’m sure I read that somewhere in the coverage the past few days.
I still find her sentiments detestable, and her actions utterly inappropriate for a journalist who has been in the field long enough to know the rules for journalists. I am not defending Helen Thomas.
Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity walk the line between “journalist” and “commentator” with the backing of their “news” network.
And regardless of one’s profession, I believe that if you have a public podium and you make the kind of comments all those folks Salon named have made, you should be held accountable and sent home in disgrace.
I wish that those kinds of sentiment were not publicly acceptable, but we don’t have some entity that declares who is in and who is out, what’s okay and what isn’t. Fox provides the soapbox and the funding for the other folks you named, and they have an audience for those sentiments. It would be a positive development if the audience for those sentiments were so small or the public opprobrium that attached to them were so great that no mainstream business organization would fund them, but that’s really the only way to enforce this.
Limbaugh still controls his talk radio empire, and no one can take that from him, but he lost his NFL gig very quickly for his racist remarks.
Imus lost his radio show for his comments, though he later got another one.
It’s not that absolutely no one else gets held accountable or that only negative comments about Jews get you in trouble.
To clarify: My point, I guess, is that it’s not as simple as saying “there’s a double standard” when you’re talking about different roles/job descriptions and different platforms.
chingona – I agree, it’s not a simple one-for-one substitution.
Perhaps what is getting me is the gleeful hand-rubbing of the more offensive elements on the Right who are perfectly glad to tolerate and even perpetuate remarks from their camp that represent bigotry, ethnic hatred, misinformation, harmful stereotyping, and in general serve to worsen the possibilities for thoughtful conversation rather than improve them. And to glorify the people responsible.
I also agree with the point made in the second Salon article that says that, though it would be wronger than wrong to simplify HT’s consequences down to only this dimension (as you say, rightly: she is a journalist), it is hard not to see the possiblity for sexism and ageism to be factors making her an easy target.
Well, only three scandals today…
Let’s start with the illegal badges and cold plating scandals
Not to mention the very shady arrest of the exotic dancer who alleged witness tampering by a former councilman.
The geometry of spill containment: why we’d have been a million times better off drilling in ANWR than the Gulf.
http://bobhayesonline.com/2010/06/09/better-anwr-than-deepwater/
Robert, I simply don’t believe that Republicans who make this argument are arguing in good faith. There is no “we’ll stop all US deepwater drilling permanently if we can drill in ANWR” deal on offer, and there never has been; if your folks get to drill ANWR, that will not reduce by any degree at all their devotion to the “drill, baby, drill” mantra.
In another thread, Robert brought up the “Obama snubbed the British by removing a bust of Churchill from the oval office” canard.
Presidents traditionally redecorate the oval office at the start of their first term; busts, paintings, upholstery, and furniture are all traded out, art loans are returned (which is why they’re called “loans,” not “gifts”), etc. This is longstanding tradition.
Since conservatives believe that removing the bust of Churchill is a horrible diplomatic affront, is it the conservative view that this bust, once placed in the oval office by GWB, should never be removed by any subsequent president?
Robert, have you ever argued that George W. Bush dissed New York by removing the bust of New Yorker FDR? Will you argue that the next president must keep Obama’s bust of MLK in place, or snub African-Americans?
I agree that Obama made mistakes in his dealings with the British. But the specific issue of the Churchill bust is inane; that this has been an issue among conservatives says a lot about the conservative mindset, but not much about Obama.
The British specifically offered to extend the loan; Obama said no thanks, we don’t want it anymore. That’s going to be interpreted as a snub. Absolutely Bush returning the bust of FDR was a snub, although probably meant as a snub to FDR rather than to New York. The MLK bust, it will depend on what the next president does with it specifically – “take this back to the smithsonian and put it in a closet” will probably be a snub, “let’s put this in the east wing visitor gallery so everyone can see it” probably won’t be.
The point about ANWR is that we have a lot of oil resources that can be developed with less risk to the environment than the resources that ARE being developed. That makes little environmental sense.
Well, my city hired its first Latino chief and there’s so much bigotry in the IE towards Latinos period that the racist drivel has already started including that the Mexicans are taking over and this Mexican chief will only take Mexicans and that he’ll lead a boycott against Arizona, blah blah blah.
Incidentally, he’s actually a Cuban-American. He”s going on display next Tuesday at City Hall.
I’m researching blog topics but it’s coming slowly b/c of my state’s peace officer record laws.
A local newspaper and I got called out by another blogger who essentially told us not to worry ourselves with such past “trifles” (illegal conduct) because we’re being hateful and destructive.
So I authored my response.
but in the interest of full disclosure, I also refused to go out with him.
I have to add I did get an incoherent rant from my former elected official in response but it doesn’t make much sense!
Whoops, never mind.
In unsurprising news, the Boy Scouts continue to cover up their enabling of child abuse.