Re: the vitriol

Apparently there was a balm in Gilliard.

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The beautiful thing is about that is that Reynolds is just about the most agenda-less political blogger there is.

As for the larger issue — that was the silliest damn slapfight I’ve ever seen.

1) Steve Gilliard dies, and Six Meat Buffet honors the occasion by reminding everyone that Gilliard thought nasty racist rhetoric was just dandy when the targets were black conservatives (Gilliard was black). The blogger used some strong language and imagery — which was tasteless when the guy was not yet cold — and started to gibber about halfway through.

2) Gilbert links to and quotes SMB’s piece without comment and with a cryptic title.

3) This leads people who have apparently wandered in from someplace else and have no knowledge of Gilbert, Gilliard, or SMB to conclude that Gilbert approved of SMB’s harsh words.

4) Those people write disapproving emails and call Gilbert mean names (e.g. “fucking idiot”). Apparently, though, no one offers to cut off her head and rape her corpse, so she’s still doing better than Kathy Sierra.

5) This gives Gilbert a fit of the vapors, and she hangs up her paid blogging gig.

6) In the comments, her supporters decry the terrible lack of civility and the presumed censorship. When other people write in to suggest Gilbert’s being a bit of a ninny, and could do this or that to correct the situation, and need not give up blogging, her supporters accuse them of censorship, call them mean names, and tell them to shut up and go away.

As a bonus, some dip in the comments blames the whole thing on the throbbing undercurrent of Southern racism.

Irony celebrates a big win by getting stinking drunk.

wow.. i didn’t know we still had this many readers.

AOG, i never thought OW was anything but a hack. there was an underlying nastyness in everything he wrote and it looked as if he was holding back his true nature.. he is now simply being what he was hiding all this time.. a lot like keith olbermann.

Oliver Willis used to write insightful commentary?

When?

I don’t know that I’d characterize him as nasty. His writing never really rose to the level of vitriol of the likes of Gilliard, Kos, Black, Marcotte, etc.

Rather, he’s always struck me as the kind of writer that would feign outrage when it was politically expedient of him to do so. If ever the saying “Never support that which you profess to oppose” applied to any blogger, it was him.

He’s bagging on 6 Meat Buffet for comments they made about Gilliard when just a few weeks ago, he was dancing on Jerry Falwell’s grave. He’s either too politically blinded to see the double standard. Or he’s too stupid to see it.