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Resignation Letter

bariweiss.com

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Re: Resignation Letter

#211

Post by eric_b »

The "orthodoxy" the author writes about is real. I am a skeptic and cynic by nature. In my experience "common wisdom" is usually anything but. In software and technology I've found when you eschew dogma and "best practices" you more often than not get better results.

But, in 2020 you cannot question or be skeptical of the "progressive" agenda. Merely hinting that you are not fully bought in will get you labeled as a racist, or even worse these days, a "Conservative".

The group of folks that screamed to high heaven about the rise of "facism" in 2016 have become the very people they purportedly despised. Using the media as a political propaganda outlet, being intolerant of other viewpoints, using shame and ostracism to control the population etc.

Here's something I don't understand: Jeff Bezos, maybe the ultimate robber baron of our time, and no fan "of the people", is the owner of the Washington Post. Since his purchase, it has moved so far left as to become almost a caricature of a "news" paper. A skeptical person would ask - what reason could he have for pushing a major media outlet to write so much - what can only reasonably be called - propaganda? A critical thinker would be very concerned indeed about buying too far in to said agenda based on who's pushing it.

Re: Resignation Letter

#212

Post by asdf21 »

joshuamorton wrote: post #199
asdf21 wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/rich-noyes/2019/11/12/i... 96% Negative Spin from the main 3 networks. >Silent on Economic Success: Despite record highs in the stock market and a fifty-year low in the unemployment rate, the President’s handling of the economy was given a stingy 4 minutes, 6 seconds of airtime during these six weeks, or less than one percent of all Trump administration news (645 minutes).

You're citing an openly right wing media watchdog whose goal is to perpetuate the narrative that right wing ideas are suppressed. It calls CNN "hacks" in it's headlines. That's not a reliable source.

Exactly who else is going to cover the % of negative media coverage on Trump, in your mind, other than a "right wing" source?

Re: Resignation Letter

#213

Post by tootie »

KKKKkkkk1 wrote: post #102

People here are debating whether Weiss is a good person or not and whether they like her opinions or not. I think we're missing the key point in this letter, which is that she's saying that she experienced workplace harassment at the Times. That's unacceptable. My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist;…

Calling a racist a racist isn't harassment. Neither is firing a racist. This is all stuff that I would expect my employer to be doing to be responsible.

Re: Resignation Letter

#214

Post by api »

0x8BADF00D wrote: post #198
jrumbut wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have 1,600 journalists last year that were sent to 150 countries [1]. What other organization is doing anything like that effort to gather facts around the world? Who is doing more collective discovery (and making it accessible to the public at a price an average person can afford)? I can only think of a handful of organizations that are serious candidates (Reuters? The BBC? Wikipedia?). Weird puff pieces, drama…

> I can't take them too seriously until I see an alternative that does the work of collective discovery. There is an alternative. It is you and I. The citizen journalist will become the arbiter of truth tomorrow. And that arbitration will be decided on rationality. There will be no more credentialism and gatekeeping. That is why the traditional media companies are scared shitless.

> There is an alternative. It is you and I.

How do I tell the difference between an honest citizen journalist, a propagandist, a liar, a lunatic, or a troll?

Conventional journalism of course is not perfectly trustworthy, but at least there is some penalty for extreme untrustworthiness in the form of loss of reputation of the paper and its brand. The NYT is an illustrative case. My opinion of that paper dropped significantly after its role in providing only the most softball criticism of the (then impending) Iraq invasion. I'm not the only person I've heard say this. NYT paid a price for cheerleading for that disaster.

Re: Resignation Letter

#215

Post by chasing »

seibelj wrote: post #143
chasing wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, please. If you say dumb or offensive stuff, people are going to react. It's not the "right think regime" — it's people disagreeing, often with some extra acid if you're a high profile New York Times opinion columnist and readers don't feel you deserve that kind of an international platform for your words.

I disagree. Saying you agree with free speech, such as the Harper's Letter which is about as milquetoast and generic as it gets, is viciously attacked on the left for being racist, anti-trans, the authors are scum, anyone who signs it should be fired, and on and on. As a testament to the existence of cancel culture and the stifling of any opinion against the party line in the progressive media, I can't think of a mor…

First, I think you're lumping "the left" together and assuming "the left" believes whatever the most extreme "left" tweets say.

Second, Bari Weiss can write whatever she wants. Totally her right. She's got a website there in the link! She can continue to reach a global audience. Does the NYTimes need to promote her? No, that's not a right I'm willing to die for.

Third, why on earth is Bari Weiss' opinion more sacrosanct than mine? If she says something I consider offensive, I might say I think it's offensive. If she says something dumb, I might say I think it's dumb. If she says something astute, I might say I think it's astute. She has a HUGE megaphone, so of course lots of people will respond to her. That's not "cancel culture." That's a side effect of having a huge megaphone. With great power comes great responsibility, etc.

Fourth, when I hear people complain about "going against the progressive party line" or whatever, I generally hear people wanting to be some flavor of racist, sexist, transphobic, or just asshole-ish without consequence. Oftentimes people in marginalized group react in a way that feels extra venomous to those of us not in those groups because they can feel their lives are constantly hindered and harmed by the sorts of thoughts that other people can just toss out and then walk away from. If this happens, I might suggest listening to the free speech from those people and trying to understand rather than writing screeds against "cancel culture" or whining about how you, as a very well-publicized and probably quite wealthy writer having your rights squashed. And that's why the Harper's Letter was annoying.

Re: Resignation Letter

#216

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

csours wrote: post #135
banads wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>it would be VERY hard to convince me that they have done it at the same level of concerted effort. What exactly would it take to convince you of that?

Examples of coordinated liberal messaging based on hate and fear that has had a large impact on social discourse. Note: Safe spaces, affirmative action, etc do not apply for me personally. While they have at times gone off the rails, they are based on inclusiveness, not hate and fear.

I would characterize the current liberal consensus on race issues to be something like:

* There's no activity that's safe from racism. Whether you're participating in a hobby, doing your job, or just hanging out with friends, you've gotta keep yourself worried that there might be racism hiding in the corner.

* Racism is almost never benign. If you notice even mild racism, you'd better confront it, because it might be a cover for virulent racists who want to hurt you.

Do you think that's unfair?

Re: Resignation Letter

#217

Post by jimbokun »

majormajor wrote: post #99
gfodor wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hilarious that the top comment exemplifies the problem. It seems few today are still able to engage with ideas directly, always trying to filter them through some, any, lens to discredit the ones they don’t like. Sometimes it’s attacking the speaker, sometimes their associations, sometimes the tweets they have “liked.” If all else fails, seek out language in the text itself for unfalsifiable “dog whistles” that allow…

The people who have spent decades trying to keep the airwaves "clean," "family friendly," "anti-communist," etc, are suddenly shocked that they don't get to set the rules anymore, and that they're on the wrong side of some of them. Context is everything for this discussion, because if you truly don't want there to be such censorship, you have to be aware of the motivations of the people pushing for change at the top…

Bullshit.

Censorship by the right, and censorship by the left are not the only two exclusive options. Free exchange of ideas in a constructive and respectful fashion should be the ideal.

Re: Resignation Letter

#218

Post by slg »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #107
slg wrote: post #5

It always amazes me when the people who champion "the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society" will also turn around and say something like their political beliefs being mocking by coworkers is "unlawful discrimination". She doesn't want free speech. She wants consequence free speech. She wants her detractors silenced by the law. What a hypocrite.

I don't understand why she's such a polarizing figure. In particular, the criticisms I've heard from her and other free-speech advocates amount to "anyone who supports free speech but also exercises their own free speech rights to criticize others is a hypocrite". I understand that it's confusing to distinguish between "criticism" and "suppression of speech" (e.g., campaigning to get someone fired from their job), bu…

I am Jewish. The response Weiss received has nothing to do with being Jewish. There are countless other Jews who work at the NYT without issue. Her job is to voice opinions in the pages of the NYT. She is being criticized for how she chooses to perform that job. I was focusing on the discrimination aspect of her accusations because I do agree that some of the treatment she received qualifies as harassing. However nothing she experienced is discrimination.

Re: Resignation Letter

#219

Post by gwright »

minikites wrote: post #154
eej71 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the Tom Cotton op-ed and didn't find any racist element to it. It would be interesting to have you highlight which paragraph was racist in your eyes.

You don't think the entire op-ed that consists of "send in the military to slaughter tens of thousands of people protesting institutional racism" is racist?

Why are you using quotes in that statement?

Re: Resignation Letter

#220

Post by ebg13 »

seibelj wrote: post #179
minikites wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think the entire op-ed that consists of "send in the military to slaughter tens of thousands of people protesting institutional racism" is racist?

58% of Americans supported sending in the military to stop looting and property destruction, including 37% of African Americans (a sizable minority). I would assume they wanted to prevent the city being burnt down rather than stop non-violent protests. https://www.newsweek.com/majority-americans-support-calling-... https://www.forbes.com/sites/nicholasreimann/2020/06/02/58-o... When the protests are peaceful, you don…

> When the protests are peaceful, you don't need to send in military. When the city is burning, it could be a solution.

What about the many reports that the protests started peaceful until the police started shooting? You may disagree about whether it's racist to decide in that circumstance to send the military against the group that isn't the police, but it does seem to be willfully blind to the relationship between cause and effect in a way that to some is highly suggestive. Racism isn't always saying "death to black people". Sometimes it's saying "stop resisting" with a baton and a gun when you instigated conflict in the first place.

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