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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsVive la libération: St. Louisans celebrate as their city is declared a George F. Will-free zone
"Indignation is the default position of certain people in civic discourse. They go from a standing start to fury in about 30 seconds."-- George F. Will, responding to the public furor in response
to his syndicated column in defense of college rapeboys
"The change has been under consideration for several months, but a column published June 5, in which Mr. Will suggested that sexual assault victims on college campuses enjoy a privileged status, made the decision easier. The column was offensive and inaccurate; we apologize for publishing it."
-- from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's editor's note announcing
the shitcanning of our George F.'s syndicated column
Earlier this week, as you've no doubt heard, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch dumped our George F.'s stinking butt. Here's how Politico reported the story (links onsite):
By KENDALL BREITMAN
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has dropped columnist George Will and told readers that his provocative column on sexual assault on college campuses was a factor in the decision.
The change has been under consideration for several months, but a column published June 5, in which Mr. Will suggested that sexual assault victims on college campuses enjoy a privileged status, made the decision easier, the editors note read. The column was offensive and inaccurate; we apologize for publishing it.
The newspaper also used the note to announce that it will be replacing Wills spot with Michael Gerson, a Washington Post columnist and former speechwriter and top aide to former President George W. Bush.
We have heard from both conservative and liberal readers asking for new conservative voices, the note said. We believe Mr. Gersons addition to our op-ed page will be a refreshing and revitalizing change.
Wills column caused an uproar with its reference to the supposed campus epidemic of rape, a.k.a. sexual assault and that universities make victimhood a coveted status that confers privileges.
Groups such as The National Organization for Women slammed the columnist for his opinions and a hashtag, #SurvivorPrivilege, began as a result where people would tweet sarcastically on privileges they were given for experiencing sexual assault.
The Washington Post defended Will, calling his column well within bounds of legitimate debate.
Our George F. thinks the column was "well within bounds" too. As Erik Wemple reports on his washingtonpost.com blog, in a taped CNN interview "Will argued that writing about sexual assault on campus makes sense for him as a columnist: "This is my job, is when dubious statistics become the basis of dubious and dangerous abandonment of due process, to step in and say, 'Take a deep breath, everybody.' "
And we've already seen, at the top of this post (again courtesy of Erik Wemple), our George F.'s response to the furor unleashed by his idiotic column: "Indignation is the default position of certain people in civic discourse. They go from a standing start to fury in about 30 seconds."
He's kidding, right? Does he really not see the irony? This is a man who lives, at least publicly, in a permanent state of indignation. Just to be clear, and hard as it may be to believe, our George F. was not speaking into a mirror when he made his comment about the "default position" of indigation. So it's not like J. Pierrepont Finch in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, whom you may remember we watched and heard just a short while ago, in the person of Bobby Morse, singing:
Yet there's that up-turned chin and the grin of impetuous youth.
I believe in you!
I believe in you!
- See more at: http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2014/06/vive-la-liberation-st-louisans.html
Response to TexasTowelie (Original post)
Post removed
DFW
(54,277 posts)George at least couched his BS in language that indicated he could write by himself.
Look what former fellow Bush Lite speechwriter Matthew Scully had to say about Gerson during the preparation of a W SOTU speech:
"My most vivid memory of Mike at Starbucks is one I have labored in vain to shake. We were working on a State of the Union address in Johns ( McConnell's) office when suddenly Mike was called away for an unspecified appointment, leaving us to keep going. We learned only later, from a chance conversation with his secretary, where he had gone, and it was a piece of Washington self-promotion for the ages: At the precise moment when the State of the Union address was being drafted at the White House by John and me, Mike was off pretending to craft the State of the Union in longhand for the benefit of a reporter."
Gerson's columns indicate that his arrogance and his level of self-serving have not abated any. The readers of the Post-Dispatch should not look forward to an improvement in the level of their right-leaning op-ed column, and calling Gerson "conservative" is like calling Fox "fair and balanced." The self-applied labels, as the song goes, "ain't necessarily so." He's not conservative. He's just another right wing hack.
shenmue
(38,506 posts)but George Will is a fucking idiot.