Urban v's the Commentariat

[SpineyNorman]

This is news to me:

VOICELESS: Vice began as Voice of Montreal (1994) and quickly turned into a “welfare scam”. Vice used money that was meant to provide work to Haitian-Canadian immigrants to publish reviews of hate literature.

 

[DaveCinzano]

Stand by your stations:



A WORLD WAITS IN SILENCE

 

[LDC]

This week's Novara had the double act of Bastani and Butler joined by the Marina Prentoulis AND Lindsey German. Far too much lefty excitement for a Friday afternoon.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Stand by your stations:



A WORLD WAITS IN SILENCE

Some excellent comments on her "open letter".

 

[bimble]

This is what she's talking about when she says she's been a victim of 'anti-semitic bullying' on the tube. She apparently claimed falsely to be an actual jew, not just a half a one.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

...a half a one.

Fucking listen to yourself.

 

[bimble]

oh dear, have i somehow offended you? If so do explain how. I was the only jewish kid at my school, I know what anti-semitic bullying is and I find LP characterising her experience in that way pretty offensive to be honest.

 

[Buckaroo]

oh dear, have i somehow offended you? If so do explain how. I was the only jewish kid at my school, I know what anti-semitic bullying is and I find LP characterising her experience in that way pretty offensive to be honest.

Why do you find it offensive? Call her a liar if that's what you mean but why is her experience of anti-semitic abuse less worthy than yours?

 

[bimble]

I don't want to play that game, never mind. It may just be personal due to my experiences that I felt that way when I read her calling a Jewish joke antisemitic bullying. If that's the worst she's experienced then maybe it was upsetting for her, even though they apologised at the time and seemed like nice kids etc. I got Yids out scrawled on my stuff, called kike Jesus killer and all that for years, so it's all relative I suppose. Whatever.

 

[equationgirl]

Anti-Semitism isn't good whoever is on the receiving end, and it does sound like being stuck in a lift for a few minutes with a person spouting such vileness would have been pretty horrible.

There's no hierarchy to such abuse, it's all pretty nasty.

 

[bimble]

err ok, sorry if I offended anyone with my offendedness, or my antisemitism. All unpleasantness is unpleasant, you're right, would you ban Jewish jokes though? Or just ban telling them to Jews? It gets a bit confusing there, cos what if it's Jewish people telling them presumably that's ok?

 

[J Ed]

You don't have to be a particular ethnicity to be a victim of prejudice of it, think about all the Sikhs in the US who have been shot on the basis of Islamophobia.

 

[bimble]

I should probably bugger off now, cos this is (unsurprisingly) a bit of a touchy subject for me, and not really up for being told how to feel about it. Ban Jewish jokes if you like long as Jews can still tell them to each other.

 

[crossthebreeze]

err ok, sorry if I offended anyone with my offendedness, or my antisemitism. All unpleasantness is unpleasant, you're right, would you ban Jewish jokes though? Or just ban telling them to Jews? It gets a bit confusing there, cos what if it's Jewish people telling them presumably that's ok?

Bimble, no wonder this is a touchy subject for you, what happened to you at school must have been horrendous for you, and is obviously a worse experience than some fairly unthreatening idiots in a lift.

She mentioned "Jew jokes" not "Jewish jokes" though - my understanding - which admittedly might be wrong - is that Jew jokes are blatant and crude antisemitic jokes told by racists, while "Jewish jokes", while sometimes close to the bone and dealing in stereotypes, would be the kind of humour which Jewish people tell (and should keep on telling to each other or to anyone they choose) - the difference would be both whose telling the joke and what their intent was, and of course there's a middle ground between the two. But even if racist/antisemitic jokes directed at someone come out of the mouths of nice young students who aren't physically threatening and are part of a group where some apologise, it would obviously be an unsettling experience.

 

[bimble]

I know, I'm sure it was unpleasant. I didn't much like her calling that antisemitic bullying, in her article with no explanation of what she meant, but do get that may just be me. Never heard of a Jew joke but context is everything with this stuff, of course.

 

[Idris2002]

What do we think of this one then? Laurie discovers that the angst of the millenials (dread phrase) is a class thing not a generational thing.

What we talk about when we talk about millennials

I thought it was good for what it was, but of course the generational analysis of politics and society is an American thing, not something you see much on this side of the Atlantic (like unironic use of 'millenial'), and her class analysis is pretty much ABC stuff.

 

[Idris2002]

And it turns out that Laurie is speaking in Halle tonight.

Kommende Veranstaltungen | Laurie Penny | Unspeakable Things in Halle | Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Sachsen-Anhalt

Should I go along and ask her difficult questions? If so, what should I ask her?

 

[Idris2002]

Well she's not doing too badly.

Making a point against the finger pointers who say you can't complain about sexism in the west if Muslim women are oppressed.

Not sure if that answers the guy's question , but he was a dick anyway.

 

[Idris2002]

It's the system where you write your question on a slip of paper and then submit it. That's a SWP thing anyway.

 

[Idris2002]

" why worry about the glass ceiling when the cellar is filling up with water". Good line.

 

[bimble]

Should I go along and ask her difficult questions? If so, what should I ask her?

Maybe ask her about her 'open letter to the german people' and why she presumes to know that german people's shopping choices are all to do with their crippling guilt about what their great grandparents did?

By the way, the english translation of her talk is a bit wonderful:

"Angry and fulminant writes Penny based on their personal experience of self-optimization, Fucked-up Girls, Lost Boys and sexual violence (also in the Occupy movement). She concludes: The Backlash against sexual freedom for men and women and against social justice is obvious - and feminism must be courageous!
We therefore want to talk to the author about lies, love, freedom and more diversity, courage and glitters in times of capitalism. The evening will be held in English ."

 

[Idris2002]

Well the dickhead mentioned above was attacking her on similar lines. I think he was one of those anti- Deutsch people.

She's doing the lost boy thing now, crisis of masculinity etc. Simplistic analyses for everybody!

 

[bimble]

Would you feel it's ok to ask her what the "jew joke' was, the one that she got told to her in the lift at elephant & castle?

 

[Idris2002]

Would you feel it's ok to ask her what the "jew joke' was, the one that she got told to her in the lift at elephant & castle?

There's no fucking way I'd ask her that.

Hipster-y, studentish crowd here, if that matters.

 

[Idris2002]

"Homophobia is used to police male behavior". She gets some things right.

 

[alfajobrob]

I don't believe a word LP writes tbh.....it's always clouded.

 

[bimble]

There's no fucking way I'd ask her that.

Hipster-y, studentish crowd here, if that matters.

I think you're very brave even being there, anthropologising.

 

[Idris2002]

Someone's asked her opinion of tinder, proving that hipsters ruin everything and students are the worst.

 

[alfajobrob]

"Homophobia is used to police male behavior". She gets some things right.

What does that mean?

 

[Idris2002]

What does that mean?

It means shut up and do as you're told, or you're going home in an ambulance.