The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Dear @Clementine_Ford …

Posted on | December 2, 2015 | 69 Comments

 

Let’s play a game, you and me. Call it, “Yours and Mine.”

You are in Australia (yours) and I am in America (mine).

You are female (yours) and I am male (mine).

You are a “progressive” (yours) and I am conservative (mine).

It would be a simple gambit, as an opening move in Yours and Mine, for me to say that Australia’s progressive women are all idiots, sluts, dykes, fat, ugly, etc. In response, your move would be to say that American conservative men are all racist, sexist, homophobic theocrats, etc. Let’s skip that, eh? I stipulate, arguendo, that you can out-hate me, and that you excel in accusing anyone who disagrees with you of mala fides. Never has anyone directly criticized Clementine Ford who was not presumed guilty of “misogyny” or some other such Thought Crime.

This mode of discourse — whereby feminists seek to discredit and thus effectively silence all opposition by encouraging the belief that anyone who opposes feminist ideology is not merely wrong, but also evil — is rhetorically dishonest. It is a propaganda tactic, a method of sophistry, and if schools still taught basic logic and rhetoric, I daresay you would be the target of much more effective and devastating criticism than having Michale Nolan call you a “slut”:

A SYDNEY man as been fired from his job as a hotel manager after calling popular feminist writer and commentator Clementine Ford a ‘sl**’ on Facebook.
On Friday, Ms Ford shared a screenshot of her interaction with Michael Nolan with her 80,000 Facebook followers and tagged Mr Nolan’s employer Meriton Apartments in the post.
“I wonder if the folks over at Meriton Apartments are aware that a man listing himself as a supervisor for their business likes to leave comments on women’s Facebook pages calling them sl**s. I wonder if they are also aware that he is a racist,” she wrote. Mr Nolan has posted several racist jokes and memes on his personal Facebook page.
In a statement to Ms Ford, Meriton Apartments said they do not condone Mr Nolan’s behaviour and he has since been let go from his job.
“Michael Nolan was removed from the Meriton site on Saturday 28th November pending an investigation, and as of 2:30pm today 30th November 2015, he no longer works for the Meriton Group,” the statement read. . . .
Ms Ford says she hopes speaking out against online misogyny will reduce the chance of other women receiving abuse online.
“These men don’t get to just go around leaving these kinds of comments and attempting to degrade women just for the hell of it,” she wrote on Facbook last week.
“Why should they get away with it? Why should there be no consequences at all for them? Why should I put up with that?
“There are basically no consequences for men who behave like this, so we have to start making consequences for them.” . . .

Well, you have now defended yourself at some length, but can you answer this: How is the identity-politics mentality of feminism not merely a species of special pleading? Many years ago, to amuse myself, I had fun with idiots on Usenet groups who supposed that a Civil War history forum was a suitable place to impugn the Sacred Honor of Our Fallen Heroes. To choose one side of an argument, and then to unload upon one’s antagonist all the rhetorical ammunition at hand, is a fine sport. Pompously serious fellows like Mark Pitcavage, Ph.D., did not enjoy the way I played the game, but it is not my purpose here to refight those arguments, Ms. Ford. Rather, I recount that ancient Usenet quarrel to explain to you that special pleading in the War of Ideas — arguing vociferously on behalf of one’s own particular tribe — is a phenomenon quite familiar to me. And the problem of our age is this: Certain special pleaders have succeeded in convincing the intelligentsia that their special pleading is synonymous with social justice.

There in Australia, for example, I suppose that Aboriginal Rights is considered by your intelligentsia to be a Holy Crusade. Considering that I have never visited Australia and know next to nothing about your aborigines, I’m sure I could not be fairly accused of hating them. Maybe the aborigines are all fine upstanding citizens, and maybe progressives like yourself are correct to suspect prejudice lurks in the hearts of those ordinary working-class people in Australia who roll their eyes when the media Down Under begin lecturing them (as I imagine the media is prone to do) about the Tragic Plight of the Oppressed Aborigines. Or perhaps, on other occasions, the eye-rolling of ordinary Australians is in reaction to the latest iteration of another theme, the Aboriginal Success Story: “Look here at this fine fellow who, having overcome poverty and prejudice, now has achieved some wonderful thing.”

Such media exercises are not truly journalism, but rather evangelism. This kind of “reporting” is didactic and tendentious and, despite the supposed ignorance of the ordinary Australian at whom such journalistic sermons are preached, the truck driver in Brisbane who sees these Morality Tales of Aboriginal Oppression recognizes he is being lectured, guilt-tripped by well-educated media types who think they are better than him. These moralistic media preachers, in Australia as everywhere else, presume themselves fit to tell the rest of us what to think.

Whatever the Controversial Issue may be this week — immigration or education, poverty or disease, climate change or sexual harassment — it’s always the same thing. Our Moral Superiors™ feel a constant duty to instruct us in the Correct Attitude, as if we are unruly schoolchildren who need to be told for the umpteenth time How to Play Well With Others.

Damn you. Damn you all, and damn your smug sense of superiority.

This, I think, is what Michael Nolan was attempting to express when he went on Facebook to call you a “slut,” Ms. Ford.

What are the everyday problems of Michael Nolan’s life? I don’t know, any more than I know anything about the plight of the Australian aborigines. At a distance of 10,000 miles from Sydney, I cannot hope to inquire among Mr. Nolan’s family, friends and acquaintances to ascertain his general character and reputation, nor to learn what sort of difficulties and hardships he might be dealing with.

What I do know is this: No one amongst Australia’s intellectual class — a class to which you, Clementine Ford, quite prominently belong — gives a damn about Mr. Nolan or anyone like him. The ordinary Australian, who works all day to pay his or her bills, rates so low in the estimation of elitists like yourself that you cannot even be bothered to notice that such people exist, except in those cases where your sadistic impulses compel you to publicly shame and humiliate some fellow like Mr. Nolan whose existence offends you: “Who is this despicable slob who thinks he can say rude things to us and get away with it?” Feminism is always a lecture and never a dialogue. So it is with any other issue that attracts the enthusiasm of the intellectual elite. Our Moral Superiors™ will tell us what to think, and we are expected to praise them for this.

Damn you, and damn your expectations. Damn you all to Hell.

So, Ms. Ford, this is how we play the game of Yours and Mine. Here on my blog, I accuse you of arrogance and sophistry, and you are free to answer this accusation however and wherever you wish.

But you won’t, will you? No, it is beneath the dignity of Clementine Ford to address such an accusation as this from a lowly peon like me. You will pretend that there is no one on the planet who has seen through your transparent charade of superiority. For to acknowledge me — someone who has spotted your intellectual hustle as the shabby trick it is — would call attention to the general question of your own authority as an Arbiter of Correct Thinking. Who are you, ma’am, to tell us what we are allowed to think? What makes you so much better than the rest of us? Where is the proof of your extraordinary virtue, that qualifies you to stand in the pulpit, to condemn everyone else as sinners, and demand that we accept the Gospel of Progressive Salvation?

Damn you, Clementine Ford, and damn your claim to “journalism.” You are selfish and dishonest and, more importantly, you are a vengeful sadist who craves power to punish and humiliate others.

You are a very bad person — you are wicked, evil, corrupt, consumed by your own depravity — and anyone who admires you is a deluded fool. But though I publish this accusation in hope that the whole world will read it, so that they may condemn you as a cruel bully and a cunning liar, I do not expect any answer from you, because that is not how people like you play the game. No, what you seek to do is to dictate the rules of the game, and to decide who is allowed to play, so that You always win and They always lose, and then you and your buddies gather around to congratulate yourselves on how fabulously clever you are.

Damn you, Clementine Ford, and damn all your friends, too.

Game over. Thanks for playing Yours and Mine.

— Robert Stacy McCain

 

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Category: Intellectuals, Journalism, Media Bias, Sex Trouble

Comments

69 Responses to “Dear @Clementine_Ford …”

  1. kilo6
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 2:32 pm

    You are selfish and dishonest and, more importantly, you are a vengeful sadist who craves power to punish and humiliate others.
    You are a very bad person — you are wicked, evil, corrupt, consumed by your own depravity — and anyone who admires you is a deluded fool.

    Bravo!

    They are the universal wolf of Troilus and Cressida

    Then everything includes itself in power,
    Power into will, will into appetite,
    And appetite, a universal wolf,
    So doubly seconded with will and power
    Must make perforce a universal prey,
    And last eat up himself.

    If you prefer more earthy dialogue, if these idiots are in power the future looks dark–darker than a carload of assholes (that lovely quote of George V. Higgins was in Stephen King’s On writing

  2. RS
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 2:41 pm

    If you’re referring to the alumni, it’s already happening in a myriad of different ways, not the least of which are a) refusing to contribute to the periodic fund drives and b) refusing to consider Mizzou for our children. Fortunately, we’re blessed in this state with two high quality, well respected universities for STEM and liberal arts which are not Mizzou. My two older kids attended those and received high quality affordable educations and have decent jobs–including the one who majored in liberal arts.

    If you’re referring to the worthies at the university, change will come shortly once the reality of my first paragraph begins to sink in, and that doesn’t include the state legislature with a bagillion grads from the College of Agriculture.

  3. RS
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 2:48 pm

    But the thing is this woman is a nobody with absolutely no power to damage the business in any way.

    Perhaps you’re right. Unfortunately, making that determination requires diverting effort from the raison d’être businesses exist: to make money.

    We complain about “the personal being political” all the time, but then want private business to deal with the political fallout from employees’ behavior. Would Mr. Nolan’s employer have lost business because of his actions? I don’t know. But I do know, dealing with the issue kept his employer from focusing on the reason Mr. Nolan’s job existed in the first instance. To make money.

  4. Adobe_Walls
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 3:28 pm

    Did she actually deny being a slut?

  5. robertstacymccain
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 4:37 pm

    “Mr. Nolan played into the hand of the SJWs by responding in kind on social media and using impolitic, course language.”

    Look, I have had it up to here with stupid men who do stupid things and thereby give feminist the chance to say, “A-ha! See how terribly oppressed we are?” But I am not in charge of telling other people what to do and therefore am not responsible for the errors of others. I try, in my own discourse, to offer examples that others may emulate. Calling a feminist a vindictive sociopath is not going to get you fired, is it? It is certainly not libel, as far as Ms. Ford is concerned and, based on my own extensive research, vindictive sociopaths are quite common in the feminist movement.

  6. RS
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 5:15 pm

    Calling a feminist a vindictive sociopath is not going to get you fired, is it?

    No, I wouldn’t fire an employee for that. I would consider firing an employee for deploying the word “slut.” The former, when backed up with evidence is reasonable argument. The latter is pure vitriol without substance behind it.

    Contrast that with your posts about the “sex-positive” feminists who boast about their promiscuity and self-define as “sluts.”

    I view this in the same fashion as I would view someone deploying the “N-word” in a post about Black Lives Matter. It adds nothing to the debate and merely gives the other side an ill deserved talking point.

  7. mole
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 5:25 pm

    That would be nice if its true, but our state run broadcaster gives her a bully pulpit any time she likes it.

  8. mole
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 5:27 pm

    Much the same here, there are no pictures of me on the net (apart from a few riot squad ones with masks on) and Im extremely cautious about spacechook, not even bothering to deliver education to those who dribble crap. Its just not worth it.

  9. mole
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 5:42 pm

    Ms Ford only exists because of out state funded broadcaster.

    Heres a list of a handful of her crap they have published, this doesnt include hundreds of radio/tv panel appearances.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/clementine-ford/35806

    Heres a few of her article topics.

    Open sexism: Give us a twirl? Give us a break

    Should drinking while pregnant be a crime?

    Calling a World Cup victory a ‘rape’ is no joke

    A lesson for men’s rights activists on real oppression

    Hands off our hard-fought abortion rights
    Male privilege extends beyond the airwaves

    I am tired of playing the role of the Approachable Feminist, and this International Women’s Day I urge feminists to embrace their anger uncompromisingly and without dilution, writes Clementine Ford.

    Shes a s mad as a box of frogs.
    But it does bring to light the problem of having a state funded media captured by creatures of the left. All political debate in Australia is tainted by having a 1.5 billion dollar a year media behemoth bust pushing green/left policies.

    Oh and on Aboriginals.
    Great people, as long as they pull themselves away from the semi-communist tribal system.
    I could go into great detail (Im related on one side of the family to about 300 Aboriginal people) but in effect, the worst and most criminal are expected to be allowed to prey on others in their extended family group for money/places to stay/food regardless of the responsible persons situation.

    Eg: An old lady customer of mine used to use my business as her “bank”. She had regular amounts of money she would forward to me to hold for her in ‘trust” which, when she needed it she would come and see me for the cash.
    This is because it was impossible for her to go to a bank and withdraw money without other family/tribal people with her, and if they saw she had money beyond a few dollars they would demand some, which she would be obliged to hand over.

    Its a common problem in the broader Aboriginal community, the worst people cause huge misery to the rest.

  10. robertstacymccain
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 6:15 pm

    The tribalists and the socialists have much in common, really. I despise the rhetoric that conflates thrift with greed and prudence with privilege. How does a “rich” person become that way? It is not necessarily that he earns more than others, but that he saves more. This is how family fortunes are built over time, by the accumulation of wealth and its transmittance through inheritance. Some people who inherit wealth squander it — there are impoverished Vanderbilts and Astors, you know. Other people, through hard work, thrift and shrewd investment, manage to advance from poverty to wealth — “The Millionaire Next Door.” Well, there are certain traits and habits that make it possible to do this, most of which can be characterized simply under the category of prudence.

    Socialists ignore all this, and expect the rest of us to subsidize the fool in his folly. The lazy, ignorant, drunk and promiscuous are presented to us as Victims of Society, and socialists accuse us of GREED if we don’t believe they are deserving of a taxpayer-provided meal ticket.

  11. Finrod Felagund
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 6:53 pm

    I regret that I have but one upvote to give this comment.

  12. NeoWayland
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 6:53 pm

    Aesop knew. #373.

  13. mole
    December 2nd, 2015 @ 11:12 pm

    I can give you chapter and verse on this, in Australia it requires an active effort to live in poverty and squalor, yet many, many thousands do it.

    Heres 2 Aboriginal ladies Ive had extensive dealings with.

    1: Alcoholic, living in a state supplied house with family of alcoholics, place is literally a pigsty, long term medical conditions caused from a life of self abuse. No furniture in the house, a fridge and TV the only unsmashed items. Cockroaches everywhere, clothes are worn till they rot off.

    2: Single older lady, all 3 of her kids are gainfully employed (1 a receptionist for a huge multinational, 2 boys are tradesmen), her (state) house is clean and her yard an oasis of coolness in summer.

    She fosters other Aboriginal kids (neglected and taken by the state) some with severe socialisation issues. Her house is always crowded because of the fostering, but the kids all go to school clean, dressed and with lunches. Yet shes a prisoner in her own home.

    See because she lives surrounded by her “own people” she will never leave her house without someone being there as she knows it will be robbed.

    Heres a post I did on an old group blog, no longer running, it will give you an idea of the sort of situations Im referring to (with pictures, and bonus cockroaches)

    https://tizona.wordpress.com/2011/05/05/australian-squallor-welcome-to-the-underclass/

    https://youtu.be/MaBkfC7SOJ0

  14. DeadMessenger
    December 3rd, 2015 @ 4:52 pm

    Question then: how would a Christian with sincerely held beliefs evangelize (i.e., perform their Great Commission duty) on their own time while employed? As we all know, practically any word out of a Christian’s mouth will offend somebody somewhere.

  15. Mike G.
    December 3rd, 2015 @ 7:17 pm

    Self-flagellation is not good for you. Something about hairy palms and going blind. Or so I’ve been told.

  16. Animal
    December 5th, 2015 @ 10:55 am

    “Clementine Ford: Why I reported a man’s abusive comment to his employer”

    One of the several reasons I love being self-employed. If someone calls to report something I said over on Animal Magnetism, I can tell them where to head in.

  17. Squid Hunt
    December 5th, 2015 @ 5:02 pm

    You of all people should know bringing up broken glass is triggering with that horrid rape at UVA, you monster!

  18. Squid Hunt
    December 5th, 2015 @ 5:05 pm

    Time to remove my employer from my Facebook.

  19. News of the Week (December 6th, 2015) | The Political Hat
    December 6th, 2015 @ 6:00 pm

    […] Dear @Clementine_Ford … Never has anyone directly criticized Clementine Ford who was not presumed guilty of “misogyny” or some other such Thought Crime. […]