So we finally canceled our NYT subscription last week, after the latest fiasco of an article by Pamela Paul. It’s not just their endless transphobic “just-asking-questions” routine, to be honest. That’s well-documented and embarrassing — and a repeat of their 1990s-era failures to respect gay issues or cover them with the care or attention they deserved. Recall:
The Times… even refused to use the word “gay” in its pages until June 1987, doggedly sticking to the more clinical “homosexual.” And it underplayed the spread of AIDS, waiting nearly two years after its first, now-legendary item broaching the subject to run a story about AIDS on its front page.
The Pamela Paul article was just the last straw for us. Frankly, we should have unsubscribed when they published notorious troll Jesse freaking Singal, someone so beloved by the vilest denizens of the internet that many online critics write his name as J***e S***al to avoid mob harassment from his fans.
But the Times has, frankly, been dropping the ball all over the place. There was the 2020 Tom Cotton op-ed advocating a military coup. There were the numerous times they interviewed Republican operatives and described them as regular everyday voters. And they completely fucked up their coverage of DeSantis’ Florida book-banning campaign.
It’s just a never-ending clown show. At some point one has to wonder if they’re actually interested in truth, or if they just want to keep both-sides-ing everything to death.
See Also
McSweeneys: In Order to Keep Our Editorial Page Completely Balanced, We Are Hiring More Dipshits
The Onion: It Is Journalism’s Sacred Duty To Endanger The Lives Of As Many Trans People As Possible
Meanwhile
Wired: Conspiracy theorists think a movement to legalize corner stores is a conspiracy to ban freedom of movement. And they’re harassing traffic engineers and city planners about it.
Defector: A decent analysis of George Santos and the post-shame/post-reality moment he inhabits.
Joy
This dog responding to instructions from a song
This very accurate observation:
whales are a lot like lizards in that neither of them are a species of housecat — whalefact (@awhalefact) February 20, 2023
Check out this live, mostly-acoustic performance of the classic Aphex Twin electronic composition Alberto Balsam, interpreted beautifully by the Swedish psych-rock band Dungen. (Yes, the original song is inspired by shampoo and features samples of the sound of the musician’s hair being cut).
Secretly Ironic 