Social Media Outrage/Cancel Culture

[swampfrog]

I don’t know if we have any real idea what will happen to society 10-15 years down the road because I don’t know if any of us truly appreciate what FB/twitter/reddit/cougarstadium have become today. Is it the modern day town square or something much more insidious? We as a society are figuring that out and hopefully our better angels will prevail.

Reflexively I give little time and effort to the Twittersphere arguments you seem so worried about. Do some people lose their jobs? Are some folks doxxed? Is that bad? Yes, yes and sometimes yes. Do I worry about Chris Pratt being bullied online? No.

Your comprehension of meme-complex is a misunderstanding. Meme-complex is a reference to groups of memes as described by Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennet, and others. Also called a Memeplex.

Social media opinions come from somewhere, there is a link to the real world. That memeplexes propagate through social media at an accelerated pace is self-evident. A set of ideas (a Memeplex) is being transmitted through the population that rejects the enlightenment project entirely. Reason, logic, science, the rule of law, all of it. It shuts down debate as a tool of the oppressor. Free speech as a concept is a tool of the oppressor.

This is noted by multiple free speech advocates. Noam Chomsky recently commented on it:

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[swampfrog]

Another resignation. Cancel culture in the regular media also continues its march.

Today I sent my intention to resign from The Intercept, the news outlet I co-founded in 2013 with Jeremy Scahill and Laura Poitras, as well as from its parent company First Look Media.The final, precipitating cause is that The Intercept’s editors, in violation of my contractual right of editorial freedom, censored an article I wrote this week, refusing to publish it unless I remove all sections critical of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, the candidate vehemently supported by all New-York-based Intercept editors involved in this effort at suppression.

The censored article, based on recently revealed emails and witness testimony, raised critical questions about Biden’s conduct. Not content to simply prevent publication of this article at the media outlet I co-founded, these Intercept editors also demanded that I refrain from exercising a separate contractual right to publish this article with any other publication.

I had no objection to their disagreement with my views of what this Biden evidence shows: as a last-ditch attempt to avoid being censored, I encouraged them to air their disagreements with me by writing their own articles that critique my perspectives and letting readers decide who is right, the way any confident and healthy media outlet would. But modern media outlets do not air dissent; they quash it. So censorship of my article, rather than engagement with it, was the path these Biden-supporting editors chose.

But the pathologies, illiberalism, and repressive mentality that led to the bizarre spectacle of my being censored by my own media outlet are ones that are by no means unique to The Intercept. These are the viruses that have contaminated virtually every mainstream center-left political organization, academic institution, and newsroom.

The current iteration of The Intercept is completely unrecognizable when compared to that original vision. Rather than offering a venue for airing dissent, marginalized voices and unheard perspectives, it is rapidly becoming just another media outlet with mandated ideological and partisan loyalties, a rigid and narrow range of permitted viewpoints (ranging from establishment liberalism to soft leftism, but always anchored in ultimate support for the Democratic Party), a deep fear of offending hegemonic cultural liberalism and center-left Twitter luminaries, and an overarching need to secure the approval and admiration of the very mainstream media outlets we created The Intercept to oppose, critique and subvert.

Making all of this worse, The Intercept — while gradually excluding the co-founders from any role in its editorial mission or direction, and making one choice after the next to which I vocally objected as a betrayal of our core mission — continued publicly to trade on my name in order to raise funds for journalism it knew I did not support. It purposely allowed the perception to fester that I was the person responsible for its journalistic mistakes in order to ensure that blame for those mistakes was heaped on me rather than the editors who were consolidating control and were responsible for them.

[old_gregg]

do you understand what cancel culture is? nobody would blame cancel culture if a news outlet refused to run a story about a bigfoot sighting or the rothschilds being lizard people and the editor threw a hissy fit and quit.

[swampfrog]

do you understand what cancel culture is? nobody would blame cancel culture if a news outlet refused to run a story about a bigfoot sighting or the rothschilds being lizard people and the editor threw a hissy fit and quit.

There are an increasing number of media and academic sources making the case that cancel culture and institutional censorship (especially in academia and media) are rising and have the same root--intolerance for viewpoint diversity. In this case he is specifically stating that this is the last straw, but it is a pattern of behavior in center-left institutions--in this case The Intercept specifically--that is being objected to. Categorizing a seasoned media veteran's well articulated essay as a simple "hissy fit"? Disagree.

[frank ryan]

There are an increasing number of media and academic sources making the case that cancel culture and institutional censorship (especially in academia and media) are rising and have the same root--intolerance for viewpoint diversity. In this case he is specifically stating that this is the last straw, but it is a pattern of behavior in center-left institutions--in this case The Intercept specifically--that is being objected to. Categorizing a seasoned media veteran's well articulated essay as a simple "hissy fit"? Disagree.

I've never seen a more politically correct term in my life.

[beefytee]

I've never seen a more politically correct term in my life.

What's the potentially offensive term this is replacing?

[swampfrog]

Additional information for interested parties.

The Intercept editor's response can be found here:

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Glenn has posted the last draft of his rejected piece here, including this tidbit:

I will also, in a separate post, publish all communications I had with Intercept editors surrounding this article so you can see the censorship in action and, given the Intercept’s denials, decide for yourselves...

[old_gregg]

There are an increasing number of media and academic sources making the case that cancel culture and institutional censorship (especially in academia and media) are rising and have the same root--intolerance for viewpoint diversity. In this case he is specifically stating that this is the last straw, but it is a pattern of behavior in center-left institutions--in this case The Intercept specifically--that is being objected to. Categorizing a seasoned media veteran's well articulated essay as a simple "hissy fit"? Disagree.

what are you talking about? he wanted to run a story about the hunter biden emails with factual inaccuracies and implications that joe biden is corrupt. like every other editorial board that does not report on elvis's current whereabouts, they said no. he did not like that. he is throwing a drama queen shit fit. also, calling glenn greenwald a season media veteran is hilarious--he is a partisan hack who lucked into the leak of the century.

[old_gregg]

here's a link which glenn greenwald thinks justifies his shit fittery, when it just shows that he's a piece of shit as a colleague and as a "journalist":

https://greenwald.substack.com/p/emails-with-intercept-editors-showing

[old_gregg]

There are an increasing number of media and academic sources making the case that cancel culture and institutional censorship (especially in academia and media) are rising and have the same root--intolerance for viewpoint diversity. In this case he is specifically stating that this is the last straw, but it is a pattern of behavior in center-left institutions--in this case The Intercept specifically--that is being objected to. Categorizing a seasoned media veteran's well articulated essay as a simple "hissy fit"? Disagree.

this isn't "viewpoint diversity" (), this is about his insane proposed treatment of a factual background that is 100% not authenticated.

[Jeff Lebowski]

here's a link which glenn greenwald thinks justifies his shit fittery, when it just shows that he's a piece of shit as a colleague and as a "journalist":

https://greenwald.substack.com/p/ema...ditors-showing

I am think I am with you on this one. This is the end of the email:

Returning to my suggestion at the top of this memo, I think the draft could work if it is revised and shortened to focus on the sections about liberal media bias, about Joe Biden not being directly asked questions as much as he should (using your submitted questions to center that), and how all of this contributed to sub-optimal amounts of reporting on the corruption allegations, which, although they aren’t backed by any evidence implicating Joe Biden himself, nonetheless reveal greater detail about how his family has used his name for profit. This version could be around 2000 words, which is enough to cover the ground I’ve outlined here.

Seems pretty reasonable to me.

[Flystripper]

this isn't "viewpoint diversity" (), this is about his insane proposed treatment of a factual background that is 100% not authenticated.

It is even worse than Trump retweeting conspiracy theories. He wants to write the conspiracy theory article that Trump retweets. It is a good thing that his editors want to have a modicum of credibility in what their company publishes. To ask for a point counter point treatment is giving his shit writing too much credence, good for the editors to push back against a "founder".

[frank ryan]

here's a link which glenn greenwald thinks justifies his shit fittery, when it just shows that he's a piece of shit as a colleague and as a "journalist":

https://greenwald.substack.com/p/ema...ditors-showing

The way Greenwald curated the Snowden and wikileaks releases should tell you all you need to know. It's so funny Greenwald is breathless about this, while downplaying any scandal involving Trump. He is a lot like his bff Assange.

[frank ryan]

What's the potentially offensive term this is replacing?

It's a faux academic word created to legitimize painting people as victims.

[Eddie]

It's a faux academic word created to legitimize creating people as victims.

Well - I have a diverse viewpoint from you on this. We're just going to have to agree to disagree.