I guess it's significant. When half the world's, (and certainly most of the left's) media run to mop the brow of every non-binary tweet squealing "It's not fair!", rushing to pull the blinds down on ugly (inconvenient) views of reality, the ones who will allow oTHeR PeOPLe'S OPIniONS to be heard might be the ones who dispense with fewer fucks for the offended...
It's just, when you say free speech fundamentalism, Laurie, do you mean it? Are there eugenicists on Substack? Are there 'pick up artists' sharing tips on how to coerce and gaslight women into bed, schooling rapists on how to evade prosecution? Are there paedophile manuals? Do they allow anyone to say anything? Because that's what 'free speech fundamentalism' is, and if that is the case, why on earth are you focusing on Graham Linehan?
"That includes white, straight, cisgender men who are far less likely to be personally harmed by targeted hate speech than they are to be disadvantaged by speech restriction;"
But what if the speech restrictions do harm? What if the white, straight, 'cisgender' men really are personally affected by harassment and hate speech?
For example, having people say you're obsessed with your daughter's genitals? Speaking about the harassment you've suffered for taking a moral stand, and the subsequent failure of your long marriage and then have Ryan John Butcher (editor of PinkNews) mock you for it on Twitter? Or former friends openly speculate, to their 2.8 million followers, you've lost your marbles? Being subject to vexatious litigation and police reports? Receiving hand delivered threats? Being relentlessly piled on by a dishonest media narrative? Having your shows cancelled? Your wife's business doxxed?
I've followed Glinner for some time now and I'm yet to understand what it is he's ever said or done that could provoke this. So maybe I'm rabidly right wing, fascist and bigoted. The only thing is, I'm a life-long lefty who really cares about people, and if I'm hurting people, I'd appreciate it being pointed out how. That's, err, the way you could stop it. Do you want to stop it?
Back to those worthless white, straight, 'cisgender' men - does the fact Glinner falls outside of your narrow, ideologically stacked subgroup of 'people I care about' mean we don't take this seriously, or that he hasn't suffered? It really is extraordinary that the white, straight and no-effort-in-transition males can escape this category just by saying they are part of the special group, isn't it?
(I feel like adopting the tone of David Attenborough, crouching behind the PowerPoint presentation at a diversity and equality training seminar, whispering "by simply clutching a homemade badge, reading 'Marginalised' 'Persecuted' and 'Misgendering me is attempted murder' these males have managed to leap from the laissez faire, "fuck 'em, they're alright, the smug supremacist bastards" group to that of an endangered species with unparalled humanity afforded to them, celebrated with rich folklor...")
You, Laurie, are an upper-middle class, privately educated, white woman. Yeah yeah, you've said you're pansexual and genderqueer, which admittedly sounds like a debilitating and embarrassing set of conditions, but aside from the 'political act' of cutting your hair and going out with a guy called Margaret who has a beard, hairy chest and, presumably, cock, you are now married to a man - a very ordinary, if posh, man. Sounding suspiciously heteronormative there. Why should we listen?
Well, this is not explained: there's no time in this extremely verbose and meandering essay. Laurie goes onto list "tech libertarians soaked in a specific vintage of California ideology which considers the freedom of the individual utterly sacrosanct" which, A) surprised me, a commoner, who envisioned them as mainly gender identity nuts working at Twitter or other woke-washed multinationals and B) brought to mind the way the wishes of less than 1% of the population to access spaces reserved for women outweighs the wishes of a large share of those women themselves. Don't pretend you're a collectivist, mate.
Laurie says Substack (SS from here on in - just know it's not a dogwhistle - not of my making, anyway) has a position on muh' freeze peach that's "nuanced, considered and wrong". I get the feeling she's giving it the large one, puffed up like a proud cockatiel, all outspoken and zero fucks given while in reality treading very carefully so as not to upset her new platform. A posh form of "'old me back! 'old me back!" while being held back by five big men.
She also wants it known she's taken an analytical, impartial approach in this. Which in reality seems doubtful.
She's telling us she's going in there and not taking no for an answer, then meekly gliding in with a little 'excuse me, sir' delivered with a curtsy.
Back at the soirée, however, we have a development; the nasty, homophobic arse has been kept in drink and he's now swinging his fists! This is, she feels, another problem with various solutions (a deep thinker, our Laurie), dependent on whether your party is a fundraiser or a fight club. Because, obviously, these really do exist (for those awful brutish people on council estates - and we've all seen Big Fat Gypsy Weddings, haven't we? Feral. There's no other word for it).
Ever the disciple of social codes, Laurie scolds herself for having already broken the first rule of fight club, but still has the guts to flaunt her contrarian non-conformity - she hates Tyler Durden, he's 'not a fucking folk hero'. Oh yeah, she went there.
After reciting SS's defence of its policy around that anachronistic free speech thing, which lists the Streisand effect, giving angry mentalists a martyr complex, ridding bad ideas permeating the culture by platforming better ones (inexplicably, Laurie thinks that's a crap idea. I cannot imagine why) Laurie contends the futility of this has been explained, like, sooo many times now. Come on guys friends, you're not expecting her to rehash all that now? It's near goddamn proven. She says.
And anyway, Laurie has bigger fish to fry - explaining why these ideas are 'mistakes' would be falling into Glinner's infamous sealion snare of exhausting resources that could be spent on true activism, such as authoritarian diktat. He really is one sneaky fucker. Just let her get on with writing the rules Graham, OK?
"...it's a mistake to believe that the best and only way to resolve conflict is to treat all opinions as if they have equal merit"
Inviting us to consider Karl Popper (he of the paradox of tolerance) Laurie is starting to sound like any one of the indistinguishable but apparently authentically individual NB clones who populate the comments sections of PinkNews or Fully Automated Luxury Space Queer Communism (infamous for their banging material analysis and grasp on praxis). They too think Popper's theory means anyone who upsets or challenges their comfort blanket thesis is a monster who must be crushed. But, Laurie, Popper was not talking about people who say stuff you don't like but can't intellectually take down. He was talking about those who want to obliterate other groups, to wreak genocidal havoc or remove basic human rights and abuse power from thereon. Considering your side's performance, it's probably a silly thing to invoke.
"I could explain that the marketplace of ideas is heaving with short-sellers and stolen goods. I could explain that fascists don't come to the marketplace of ideas to shop."
Well, could you? It seems like you're cruising by with soundbites alone. But, of course, rigid, determined ideologues won't listen - although they'll still exist, and there's always an audience, which is the whole point.
So please, go on: explain how the man who wants discussion, who appealed to Stonewall for dialogue years ago, or the faction of feminists who have been abused, threatened, maligned and screeched out by the white noise (sorry, am I allowed to call it that?) tactics of gender activists are the ones who single-mindedly ride roughshod over the meek and decent at the scary bookfair you need to destroy.
As for stolen goods, this is not a copyright issue. It's OK to recycle ideas. What purpose did this analogy serve aside from making it all sound terribly dodgy and unsavoury and, and... just awful!?
Sadly, Laurie ain't got time for lowering herself to mere questions: as we saw in the first part she ran the gamut of possibilities. She's done her bit and the last thing she needs is diversion. Proudly straddling her warhorse, invigorated with unshakeable certainty, she's asking:
"what makes someone clench down with white-knuckled desperation on the notional redemptive power of liberal debate?"
I could perhaps suggest that reading a book would help you to grasp this, or, for once listening - but the following floors me:
"What, even when armed white supremacists storm the centers of government?"
What the fuck Laurie? I can't work you out - are you playing dumb, or just lumbered with the intellect and nous of a potato masher? The hypocrisy, complete absence of fact or self awareness are difficult to witness, my empathetic shame is triggered. I'd need to truly despise you to enjoy the shadenfreude and I don't know if I can bring myself to have the strength of feeling for such a clearly inadequate, vapid grifter.
In all seriousness, who is clinging on to a framework of bullshit they manifestly can't justify here? Who really is in the hermetically sealed echo chamber, fingers shoved into their ears and launching into ludicrously verbose essays to defend not defending or evidencing their claims? This entire screed is nothing more an appeal to your arrogant self identification of idealistic purity and supremacy. You, the moral guide, issuing rules which stand "because I said so". Us, the simpletons who can't be trusted to know what is and isn't good for us, graced with your expense of words and instruction.
Are you suggesting we are somehow aligned with, synonymous with, the nutters who think Trump was ordained by God and needed reinstating by avenging militia? I'm starting to think you're stuck - or have forever existed - in a mode of stylised, vacant miming, with intermission only for occasional indignation and unconscious, unashamed floundering. You float through life, doing the bare minimum as an edgelord-left rent-a-gob, dropping sly winks and references - DOGWHISTLES! - as you barracade yourself up in your gated 'queer' community.
Were any gender criticals involved in the Capitol storm? I know Jessica Watkins was, and, even as leader of Ohio State Regular Militia, that cheeky trans vulnerability card was quick out the drawer. And of course the neo Nazi Taylor Parker-Dipeppe escaped jail because 'he's suffered enough' and what can you do with a transman in prison? All Taylor did was target the homes of minority groups with swastikas and written warnings. And threaten journalists. Who knows, Taylor could have been trying to stop the spread of bad ideas?
I suppose the spectre of trans people within violent militia / far right movements is both a reason for sadness, and hope. For fuck's sake Glinner - if the Oath Keepers can be inclusive, what's your problem? Even mosque bombers are trans-accepting these days - just check out Emily Hari.
"You can’t use pure logic to dismantle a defensive impulse, and you can’t argue down a trauma response with reason"
Have you thought of saying this to Mridul Wadhwa? That might actually be a feminist act. Do it, I'll sign a little certificate you can hang on your wall.
"It’s far easier to understand why someone is clinging on to an idea that obviously isn’t working if you consider what will happen if they let go"
Oh, do go on - does falling out of favour with your friends count? When you know, really, they're irrational and irredeemably indoctrinated? Loosing your hold on an identity which gives you a singular claim to relevance? Or, more to the point, being exposed as a waffling charlatan with no logical basis for your extraordinary assertions?
"it isn’t hard to see why absolute freedom of expression above all else might be a convenient thing to believe in"
Well, maybe. It makes me wonder though, what comfort might the censorship side avail from crushing it? And why does this not concern you?
I don't believe in absolute freedom of expression - I think, for example, PIE should not have been able to publish and organise as they did. Sharing instructions on bomb-making, child grooming, how-to guides on escaping legal consequences of certain crimes are wrong. I also believe graphic fantasies about rape, especially when in reference to real-life people are indisputably intolerable (do hope you can bring this up with Jane Fae, formerly John Ozimek, who wrote much in the defence of 'Girls (Scream) Aloud' a violent rape, mutilation and murder fantasy blog - Ozimek also gave out some sage advice on how to wipe your devices of illegal porn).
I also believe that you shouldn't be able to spend probably thousands of words alluding a man is akin to an abusive, homophobic, violent drunk who upsets and offends all around him without a scrap of evidence or solitary example. It's just that righteous passion though, isn't it? Excited to see how you're going to take up the fragrant Jane Fae. Which you will, won't you?
That's all for now, folks. I'll be back soon with the nail-biting finale (or, the penultimate one, depending on my trigger level) to this seminal literary work and appeal for love, equality, and destroying that terrible man. Careful now!
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