This site published a really good discussion of the whole mess: [persephonemagazine.com] It looks interesting and like someplace I'd actually feel comfortable hanging out at. I think I'm taking my business to them.
It's not about pride. It's about pageviews. Whatever Jezebel wants to call itself, it's still a part of Gawker Media, and Nick Denton has made it quite plain that he's willing to pander to the lowest common denominator by any means necessary. This is a man who once responded to my calling Drudge an idiot by saying he thought he was a genius. That's what he reveres. I'd already left Gawker, but I was hoping I could still post here in good conscience. Nope. Thanks for making me aware of this -- I'd skipped the story earlier and not really taken account of what was happening.
Weeell, now having taken notice of the disgusting mess that is this post -- [jezebel.com] -- I don't think I feel comfortable here anymore, either. Remember, it's still a Gawker website, which means it's still ultimately devoted to pageviews above all else -- including, apparently, even the most basic of journalistic ethics. Sorry, but I just can't get behind that anymore.
Others have addressed this compellingly already, so I'll be brief: this is disappointing and ultimately indefensible. A story that can be told with pictures blurred can be told without them. God forbid you ever do a story about child porn.
Oh, if they actually expected other people to say the prayer with them, yeah, no doubt. Maybe I should just shut the hell up until I see what you all are talking about, that might be a thought.
Well, for me, that would be the problem -- that is, that they didn't show similar respect to someone else for whom their faith was an integral part of their musical development -- not so much that they showed it to Houston. But as I said above, I haven't seen what they actually did yet, so I might end up agreeing with you that the way they handled it was awkward.
Well, then there's the question of how they handled it, which I can't see yet. It sounds like they may not have handled it very gracefully.
Whitney was, before everything else, a gospel singer. Anyone who loves her has to respect that, even if it's not something they can personally relate to.
Edna St. Vincent Millay's "Prayer to Persephone":
Be to her, Persephone,
All the things I might not be:
Take her head upon your knee.
She that was so proud and wild,
Flippant, arrogant and free,
She that had no need of me,
Is a little lonely child
Lost in Hell,—Persephone,
Take her head upon your knee:
Say to her, "My dear, my dear,
It is not so dreadful here."
Maybe, yes, and yes.
Well, the problem, which you're right, the article seems to have missed, is that had anyone referred to Thatcher as a "bitch", the British would have collectively foamed at the mouth.
No, you said he had no respect for her. While you, of course, having been as close to her as you were, understand much better what her and her family's wishes would have been.
I guess these people would have enjoyed a panel discussion I attended years ago which Tim Roth opened up as follows: "I'd like to begin my talk today as I do all my public speaking engagements, by saying, 'Maggie Thatcher is a cunt.'"
Yeah, you're pretty much helping them out by posting them at this point.
Well, I don't want to get quite as acidic as the other person who raised this point, but I do want to ask why sex work is automatically misogynistic. There are male escorts and male hookers. If you think of all sex work as female, that may say more about you than about the ad.
I know. I remember after apartheid ended in South Africa, in the first election open to Black South Africans, people waited up all night in lines to get the opportunity to vote. I was so humbled by that, and so frustrated with my fellow "freedom-loving" citizens of the U.S.A.
Normally I tend to be respectful of people's religious faiths, because I have many friends who are wonderful, intelligent, principled people who are religiously observant. But in this case, fuck these idiots with a rusty wrench.
Also, it's an opportunity to demonstrate your super-duper faith so that God will see it and give you something shiny.
I dimly remember having mumps when I was about 4. The only thing I remember is being very sick.
