Having just finished Jon Ronson’s excellent book, ‘So! You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Huh?’ I’m all over this latest Stephen Fry Twitterstorm story like a rash.
One of the many points Ronson makes in his book is that it’s often those who allow themselves to be cowed by the outrage crew who suffer most. A figure like Max Moseley, he argues, simply didn’t feel shame and therefore emerged unscathed from his shaming episode. “As soon as the victim steps out of the pact by refusing to feel ashamed,” says Max in the book, “the whole thing crumbles.”
Which brings me to Stephen Fry, who last night told an outrageous joke likening a BAFTA-award winner to a bag lady. The subsequent outcry is such that he’s deleted his Twitter account.
Now, disregarding the fact that he’s often flouncing off Twitter, it’s clear that Fry is upset by the reaction, when — if you ask me — he shouldn’t be. Because surely if you tell an outrageous joke, part of the effect is the outrage? Fry has the safety net of being personally acquainted with the target of the gag, with whom it’s a bit of bantz, so he can rest easy knowing there’s no high-status bullying stuff going on; everybody else can fuck off, can’t they?
So Stephen, I can see that you’re coming from a place of ‘this is a disproportionate reaction to my outrageous joke’, but even so, it’s not like you’re going to lose your job. No one will die. What you should do is laugh at the offence-takers. Enjoy the ride. And by doing so you’ll strike a blow for those less powerful than yourself, the ‘innocent’ victims also mentioned in Ronson’s book, who have had their lives virtually destroyed by keyboard warriors wielding digital pitchforks.
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/feb/15/stephen-fry-deletes-twitter-account-after-baftas-bag-lady-offence
In Fry’s defence, the world would be a much better place if literally everybody followed his lead and deleted their Twitter accounts.
OOAA
#hearhear
#haha
#heeheeimthelaughinggnomeandyoucantcatchme
Sorry, no Bowie thread for a couple of hours so couldn’t resist.
#dontlookattwitterIwrotesomethingawfulonit
Social media is a load of me bollix. Delighted to see Stephen Fry realizing it at this stage. He must be as sick as I am of every offhand remark being parsed.
Just talking with Archie on Twitter about this. I like Stephen Fry – in the sense that I think he’s a nice man and a good man – but he’s incredibly thin skinned. Too much so for social media, really.
I’m reading So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed? at the moment. It’s excellent. Shame is such a powerful motivating force for so many of us. We live our lives in terror of it, one way or another. It’d be so much nicer if we could all be Max Moseley: “Yes. I like BDSM. So fucking what, you bunch of idiotic prudes? Oh, and not only am I not ashamed, but I’m going to sue you on a minuscule technicality, and win, just to. Stitch that, twats.”
I’d love to have that kind of chutzpah.
Is it fair to say then that he’s too thin-skinned to be telling the sorts of jokes he does?
It probably is, really.
With tastes like his, Max Moseley is probably already thick-skinned.
Minuscule and chutzpah both correctly spelled, in the same post?
Man, I love this place.
I agree, Mr Fry does appear to be a little sensitive at times.
I don’t do twitter. Mostly because if I wanted the opinions of idiots, I’d ask.
Agree with you totally about Max Mosley. Good on him. Fuck the lot of them.
It’s interesting how Max Mosley seems immune from just about any kind of shame, up to and including the Hitler-loving antics of his father.
Why should he feel shame because of his dads (horrible) politics?
I didn’t say he should feel shame. I said it was interesting that he didn’t.
So, you don’t think he should feel ashamed of his father loving Hitler?
My opinion doesn’t come into it. I simply find it interesting that he has (or had) such a high profile considering his family background.
I find your reticence to give your opinion interesting. It’s almost like you’re hiding something. Something dark and terrible.
Funnily enough my grandmother was arrested for protesting at a Blackshirts rally in Sheffield in the 30s.
Apparently the protesters used to roll marbles under the police horses hooves.
Sounds cruel, but then as now the police were roughing up the protesters and protecting the fascists.
This where the phrase “lost their marbles” comes from.
Sounds like very sound advice. And Ronson’s point is a good one.
I’m sure it’s because I’m a hopeless fogey, but the word “Twitterstorm” just makes think: storm in a teacup, much ado about nothing. In 24 hours no one will remember anything about it. Cyber outrage is a very transient emotion.
But an “Afterwordstorm” though. Blimey, that’s something that shakes at the very foundations of Western civilisation. Batten down the hatches!
If “Afterwordstorm” is to become a “thing” around here I insist we respect the traditions of this site and call it an AWS, thereby confusing new visitors into looking it up as well as taking pity on ultra-slow one-fingered typists like myself.
That’s EXACTLY what a massive typist would say.
If you give it then you have to be able to take it. Strikes me that it’s a one way street with Mr Fry.
And, yes, the world wouldn’t become a terrible place if Twitter ceased to exist.
Offence is a grenade thrown with the pin still in. You can ignore it, lob it back, or blow yourself up with it. It’s odd how often people choose the third option. As David Baddiel says, outrage confers identity on the anonymous.
A pity Fry doesn’t follow his own advice (if, indeed, he actually said this)
http://i.imgur.com/Tk3BbWA.jpg
In fairness, I don’t think he’s offended so much as sick of people yelling at him that *they’re* offended at his joke.
I don’t mean to defend Fry (not a fan), but he’s not the one taking offence here, is he?
The Twitter mob are offended by the joke. He’s exasperated by their readiness to take offence.
It’s all a load of bollocks anyway, isn’t it? All those involved should just grow up and stop taking themselves so bloody seriously.
I realise Fry is not the one taking offence, of course I do. But if he really believes the sentiments expressed in the meme above, I can’t see why he’s taking it so badly.
Lemme see if I’ve got this right: he’s outraged at other people’s outrage and some people are outraged at his outrage while others are outraged at those people’s outrage. Is anyone outraged by their own outrage?
He’s frustrated by other people’s outrage, not outraged by it. But flouncing from Twitter does make it look like he’s outraged, granted
You know, if there’s one thing I’ve learnt from being in the Army, it’s never ignore a pooh-pooh. I knew a Major, who got pooh-poohed, made the mistake of ignoring the pooh-pooh. He pooh-poohed it! Fatal error! ‘Cos it turned out all along that the soldier who pooh-poohed him had been pooh-poohing a lot of other officers who pooh-poohed their pooh-poohs. In the end, we had to disband the regiment. Morale totally destroyed… by pooh-pooh!
Milligna?
They wish!
Blackadder Goes Forth – lines spoken by Fry himself, as Melchett (who very much had a touch of the Goon Show about him)
Ah, of course.
Le bon mot, Moosetyn, le bon mot.
That should, of course, have read: “Le mot juste…”.
*Silently unsheathes Tachi*
I particularly enjoy a person pointing out to me that something I’ve said is offensive without that person actually being offended themselves. It’s a moralising past-time for some people; rather than go bird watching they’d rather go offence watching. “Ooh look over there, a lesser spotted offence against Anabaptists; just one more to go and I’ll have all the post-Lutherian radicals in an uproar!”
The post-Lutherian radicals are never not in an uproar. That’s their usp.
You know, I don’t know why some people change churches. What difference does it make which one you stay home from?
Your reference to “bird watching” is a bit offensive, Bisto. They prefer to be referred to as women.
Just as well I didn’t opt for whale watching then.
Leave the Welsh out of it and all.
I always try and keep the Welsh out of everything. Even rarebit.
Gotcha! Das Racist!
*Writes Ahh_Bisto into the Big Black Book Of Shadows and strikes a line through it.*
Look you boyo.
http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/640xn/p015pm3k.jpg
This happened to me – I assumed someone’s “mate” was male; they happened to be female. I apologised, but without mentioning the earful I’d get from my wife (and other female friends) if I called them “mate”. Don’t think anyone was really offended, but it just seemed daft how a simple issue of word use and assumption could escalate into a full blown row.
We do seem to live in a world where positively everybody wants to be seen as some kind of victim – hence the popularity of Irishness for example. This constant search for something to be offended by, or at least pretend to be offended by, is arguably symptomatic of that.
And in the meantime your average disabled person or OAP gets showered in obscene personal abuse every time they have the temerity to leave their homes. But this doesn’t happen online and therefore doesn’t really happen at all.
Well, Moose – maybe the onus is on you to stop showering OAPs in obscene personal abuse then.
Come on, some of these Afterworders are asking for it.
A Saxon t-shirt! In this weather!!
Yeah Moose, take up showering with OAPs instead.
I will not shower with OAPs or any anagram thereof.
Have now read the story. None the wiser as to why that joke is considered so offensive.
I don’t care for Stephen Fry at all, but I say fair play to him. If I were him I’d have sacked off social media a long time ago, and if he was getting dug out on Twitter over this nonsense then I think the sane response is to stay off Twitter. Actually closing your account is a little melodramatic, but still – fair play, the man has stepped away from the keyboard.
The real issue here, to me, seems to me that the heat and fury over the lack of “diversity” at the BAFTAs/Oscars has lead to an atmosphere in which certain people are utterly desperate to find something, anything, to be annoyed about on the night.
He should try having a view on Junior Doctors and Moon Landings 🙂
Can we please do the moon landings again? I think I missed this first time round.
I always thought the thread when Dave said that the moon landings didn’t actually happen was faked.
by lizards.
PLEASE. It was my favourite thread ever in the long and glorious *cough* history of this site.
Can I just say that I’m offended that Poppy should be so presumptious as to think Stephen Fry needs her advice.
That’s EXACTLY what a massive sexist would say.
Meanwhile :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/35576677
I’d have thought Lescott would be better off apologising to the Villa fans for his incompetence.
(cont) on the field rather than in his car.
(c*nt) or (cont)?
I’m still outraged by ‘Peter’s Friends’ and ‘Carry On Columbus’.
Fry speaks!
http://www.stephenfry.com/2016/02/15/peedinthepool/
Hm, I don’t see a massive amount of difference between Twitter, ‘social media’ and what we do here. It’s all just strangers talking bollocks on the internet, isn’t it? Why hate one and not the other?
The medium is vaguely similar, but the internal culture is quite distinct.
We don’t have a character limit here, which allows discussion to occur naturally, instead of forcing everyone to condense their thoughts down to nuggets which leave tons of room for misinterpretation. We don’t do the hate mob thing. We don’t all suddenly jump on one comment and hound the author offline. We don’t dox individuals and try to ruin their private lives.
We also have a relatively healthy exchange of views going on, and we’re exposed to a full range of them. Twitter’s self-selecting nature allows people to create a bubble wherein they only have to interact with like-minded people (see for example the total clusterfuck that was Twitter’s attempt to forecast the last General Election), and which sends people into a rage when a rogue alternative view somehow seeks them out. Twitter encourages a mob mentality, groupthink and a determination to be on the “right” side of the debate. It disencourages actual thought, because you can’t really do nuance in 140 characters (or at least I struggle to).
We also don’t have the blatant popularity and attention whoring that’s so rampant on Twitter, or the celeb-worship. You could argue that we used to have something comparable with the up arrows and Heppo’s occasional visits from Mount Olympus, but they’re both long gone.
This place is just a lot healthier and more down to Earth, so far. Twitter attempts to channel human interaction via its own very narrow parameters (speed, concision, the lowest common denominator), and in doing so fucks it completely. Which is one of the many reasons its share price is in the toilet and senior staff are jumping ship left, right and centre.
Obviously, there’s a lot of things Twitter does very well (pun games, breaking news, the occasional rib tickling bon mot), but – speaking purely personally – I found that the good did not outweigh the bad, and I also got sick of discovering that people I really liked were actually sanctimonious dickheads who I’d probably cross the road to avoid in real life (hello, Graham Linehan). That, and football transfer rumours/opinion. Dear god, the place was unbearable when the window was open.
OOAA
Thanks. I don’t have a Twitter or Facebook page, although I tend to think I ‘know’ them both because I lurk a lot. Obviously not as well as I thought.
That’s EXACTLY what a massive Community Content Outreach Coordinator and Social Media Strategist and Blogger-in-Chief Brand Ambassador would say.
Is that disencourage as in discourage, or did I miss a neologism memo?
Unfortunately, much like Twitter, we do still have a surfeit of smart arses.
Does Twitter have a clique too?
Here’s a new oxymoron: ‘Twitter senior staff’.
*a warm round of applause*
I can do “nuance” in six characters.
http://www.stephenfry.com/2016/02/15/peedinthepool/
It’s no big deal – as it shouldn’t be. But yes, for anyone interested I have indeed deactivated my twitter account. I’ve ‘left’ twitter before, of course: many people have time off from it whether they are in the public eye or not. Think of it as not much more than leaving a room. I like to believe I haven’t slammed the door, much less stalked off in a huff throwing my toys out of the pram as I go or however one should phrase it. It’s quite simple really: the room had started to smell. Really quite bad.
Oh goodness, what fun twitter was in the early days, a secret bathing-pool in a magical glade in an enchanted forest. It was glorious ‘to turn as swimmers into cleanness leaping.’ We frolicked and water-bombed and sometimes, in the moonlight, skinny-dipped. We chattered and laughed and put the world to rights and shared thoughts sacred, silly and profane. But now the pool is stagnant. It is frothy with scum, clogged with weeds and littered with broken glass, sharp rocks and slimy rubbish. If you don’t watch yourself, with every move you’ll end up being gashed, broken, bruised or contused. Even if you negotiate the sharp rocks you’ll soon feel that too many people have peed in the pool for you to want to swim there any more. The fun is over.
To leave that metaphor, let us grieve at what twitter has become. A stalking ground for the sanctimoniously self-righteous who love to second-guess, to leap to conclusions and be offended – worse, to be offended on behalf of others they do not even know. It’s as nasty and unwholesome a characteristic as can be imagined. It doesn’t matter whether they think they’re defending women, men, transgender people, Muslims, humanists … the ghastliness is absolutely the same. It makes sensible people want to take an absolutely opposite point of view. I’ve heard people shriek their secularism in such a way as to make me want instantly to become an evangelical Christian.
But Stephen, these foul people are a minority! Indeed they are. But I would contend that just one turd in a reservoir is enough to persuade one not to drink from it. 99.9% of the water may be excrement free, but that doesn’t help. With Twitter, for me at least, the tipping point has been reached and the pollution of the service is now just too much.
But you’ve let the trolls and nasties win! If everyone did what you did, Stephen, the slab-faced dictators of tone and humour would have the place to themselves. Well, yes and they’re welcome to it. Perhaps then they’ll have nothing to smell but their own smell.
So I don’t feel anything today other than massive relief, like a boulder rolling off my chest. I am free, free at last.
Earlier today, amid this box-of-choccies-sated post-Valentine’s morn, my good friend – I say “my”, but he is of course our good friend – Bob, for it was none other than he, clipped on a nosepeg, à la (which should in this case of course be aux, but no matter; I take succour and comfort from the knowledge that I’m among forgiving friends here) nageuses synchroniséés, bravely breaststroked his bronzed, powerful frame across the rancid river of raw sewage, that Styx of stinking detritus, that meandering Scheissebahn of moral putrescence, that foetid flow of effluvium that separates his own bijou Twitter enclave from mine own, manhandled himself somewhat stiffly but manfully ashore, his biceps rippling and dripping and glistening and glinting teasy-weasingly in the early-morning shafts of fin de l’hiver sunlight and … where was I? Ah, yes, shafts … stiffly…. What? Was I? Good heavens; I do beg your pardon, although Stephen must plough on regardless … and he – Bob, that is, not Stephen – pointed out to me, Stephen, a most odd thing indeed. Most, most odd. Highly peculiar. You see, dear reader, it is but a simple matter – a “doddle”, as a baglady might choose to phrase it in her endearingly salt-o’-the-earthy way – for anybody with a walloping fuckload of followers (and I, by some miracle of destiny, had managed to garner lots and lots of the lovely loves over time; I have no idea how many exactly, but I imagine, and this is a pure guess, absolutely ballpark – capish? – a round number plucked out of the ether for illustrative purposes only, that there were approximately two million one hundred and eighty-four thousand six hundred and eighteen of them, or thereabouts), particularly if one is a self-confessed tech geek such as I, to configure – or even “rig up”, as our baglady no doubt dixit – the mentions displayed by one’s Twitter feed so as to see only the tweets addressed to one that are tweeted by the tweeps whom one follows oneself. So why, Stephen, don’t you do that, Stephen? Well, Stephen doesn’t do that quite simply because if Stephen did do that, how on earth do you think Stephen might hope to bask in the approval and admiration of total strangers that Stephen so manifestly, so patently craves?
Hmm, Stephen? Hmm?
When our mutual friend Archie and his long-standing cyberchum Bob announced that they’d been conversing on Twitter, I felt I had a duty to fake surprise.
In fact, I’d known from almost the first moment I saw them trade witticisms that they would end up on the social media service, judging that they were made to follow and occasionally message each other and no other outcome was imaginable.
As for our other feelings, the rest of the Massive and I had no need to feign our unqualified joy at the prospect of Arch n Bob shooting the breeze in 140 characters or less. Pretty clever, accomplished and sour-natured, they are each everything a loving web community could wish for in a cohort.
Which brings me to a surreal thought that has been haunting me all week. How would I have felt if Bob had announced that he would like to present his new Twitter compadre . . . and into the room, blushing prettily, had tiptoed not the lovely Archie, 32 (and the rest), but the gargantuan, shambling form of our official national treasure, 57-year-old Stephen Fry?
Too, too brilliant.
Everything between Gutenberg and Valparaiso has just been filler.
Untoppable post, Mr V.
Dogfacedboy, copy-n’-pasting Frypaper, another Stephen From The Mount, without adding to the debate himself. As if. Get over it.
Stephen Fry, Wilde-worshipping baglady. In that baffling and slightly creepy address to the Oxford Union, he mentioned being attracted by the young (boy) students waiting to enter the building. Described them as something like downy, cuddly. Hmm. Let’s imagine a guest speaker of the same age and gender and general appearance, but differently persuaded, mentioning the attractiveness (with a palpable sexual connotation) of the young girls queuing to hear the address. But no – let’s not. Let’s imagine a man of similar appearance and age to Fry, again otherly inclined, marrying a girl version of Fry’s younghusband. Oh dear. Let’s not. No – let’s leave the lovely, lovely man alone, because that’s all he wants, the poor, misunderstood, bighearted, cuddly-wuddly, snuffly bearkins. He’s never courted celebrity, never sought the spotlight. All he wants is to left alone with his love under a big fluffy pile of dewy gardenias.
Good grief. Another Afterword shitfest.
Fry is simply an overblown, self absorbed arsehole who will simply benefit in the long run and, with the creeping support of sympathisers everywhere will continue to ‘amuse’ us all with his jaded, presumptuous ….. you know the rest.
This whole pile of media inspired outrage is simply an offence to bag ladies everywhere.
2016. Bag ladies. The unfortunate, the fallen from grace, the druggies, the insolvent, the divorced, the abused, the new prostitutes, those who in our society give up because they have reached the point where they see no alternative, no way out.
Many of them will disappear, but I’m quite sure we can still look forward to Mr Fry’s observations once the dent in his pride restored.
Shitfest? Are we reading the same thread?
Acts confirmed for Shitfest:
Nickelback
..er that’s it so far.
The Skids
Puddle of Mudd
Bloodfart
Savoy Brown
Hot Chocolate
The Floaters
The Floaters always used to mess things up for the Beach Boys.
Woody Woodmansey’s Poo-Boat.
“Woody” – hurr hurr.
Nappy Brown
I Pooh
Loudon Wainwright The Turd
Very good, you all. Glad to see the Afterord sense of humour restored and fully operational. I would have thought our antipodian contingent could have curled out our friends The Bondi Subs? Probably still asleep.
Magazine – The Sh*te Pours Out Of Me
And Jethro Tull will be be performing Thick As A Brick
“The unfortunate, the fallen from grace, the druggies, the insolvent, the divorced, the abused, the new prostitutes”
Isn’t that an unrecorded verse from Dylan’s Chimes Of Freedom?
The New Prostitutes.
TMFTL.
I spat out my Werther’s when I read Mr Fry bemoaning the “sanctimoniously self-righteous”.
I like Twitter, but I only use it for Stuart Maconie to tell me what’s coming up on The Freak Zone and Resident Records to let me know about latest releases.
Oh and to periodically call Toby Young a c**t, but everybody does that don’t they?
I follow Rupert Murdoch on Twitter so I can insult him non-stop. Complete waste of time, water off a fuck’s back, but I get a reasonable amount of catharsis out of it.
I like Stephen Fry and I agree with the advice, although to a guy like him it’s maybe not possible. Apart from the ‘sensitive ego of the act-or’ thing, Fry’s a manic-depressive so he probably has disproportionate reactions to these things.
Like that episode where he was filming in Africa where some old throwback gave him his opinion on homosexuality, and it sent him into a suicidal depression. He seems to have a pretty fragile psyche – it’s a lot more complicated than the standard “luvvie” throwing a strop.
I feel for the guy and I wish he’d tell the mob to go f*ck themselves but it’s probably not his way.
To be fair, he did, fairly unambiguously say, “you sanctimonious fuckers should fucking well fuck the fuck off” or something very close to that.
Yes, but it was more of a hurt, tantrummy ‘fuck you’ than a proper, defiant ‘fuck you’. Plus he undermined it by then deleting his Twitter account.
I wish I could think of more people who have handled their roasting well. That footballer who looked like he was grabbing his now daughter’s boob? Russell Brand and the Parklike pisstake?
Conversely there was an author who on Amazon had what read like a breakdown in real time. She began by taking issue with a reviewer and ended 36 pages later by threatening to call the FBI.
And Sandi Thom who wins all the real-time breakdown points.
Oh yes! She did pretty well, all things considered.
If Fry needs a few ‘fuck yous’…..not nasty ones, just a ‘Stephen, what the fuck IS the point of you’-type ones…..I am perfectly happy, taking one for the team and all that, to give him a few.
He did but it was the wrong type of “fuck off.” As Poppy says; it was a wounded lashing-out which the mob were probably pleased with.
It should have been a “Go fuck yourselves. Or don’t. Up to you but either way I’ve better things to get on with.” Then carried on using his account as normal and ignoring the pitchfork-wielding crowd.
But like I say he’s got problems which means he probably can’t cope with things that most of us could shrug off.
I feel for Lord Stezza here. He is a comedian, doing jokes. The Twitterati seem not to understand this and are taking offence on behalf of someone who took no offence. He is dealing with this as he sees fit. He is perfectly entitled to do this.
Multiple-comment attracting threads about goings on in “the twittersphere and “video” “games”? I must have a serious chat with the Afterword doorman about verifying the seniority of those entering this Club – some younger “sorts” smuggling themselves past security methinks.
There’s nothing more abhorrent to these ears than the squeak of “trainers” on the old marble steps…
Hear, hear. The tension between the cans is kinda loose but …… what ……hello……. hello……..1,2,….1,2,….. That’s better.
I thought he looked well past his sell-by date last night. I mean, for presenting the awards. Actually, perhaps for life too – he seemed tired and unwell.
A really limp performance with going-through-the-motions puns and ‘yes, I’m gay’ gags. I don’t think he believed he could do it any more, like someone who knows people can see through his act these days.
I was at a film awards ceremony last weekend where simon amstell was the host. I’m not a fan, I don’t really know his stuff but he’s not my idea of funny, but he was very good, fresh and lively. That’s what these things need. Look at the way the Americans do it with the Oscars and Golden Globes – a new act most years but they’ll use the good ones more than once.
Fry doesn’t cut it anymore. He used to be brilliant at this, but you could sense he’d lost the audience.
Re the OP, I suspect he knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s in the business of garnering publicity and that’s what he’s managed to do with no real reputational damage.
Instead of trying to mansplain his ‘joke’ to everyone, Fry should check his privilege, otherwise he may find himself no-platformed.
Nope, you’ve lost me there
That’s exactly what a member of the patriachy would say.
Come On You Spurs!
Mr Fry should make more use of the “block” button.
It’s called ‘So you’ve been publicly shamed’, not ‘So! You’ve been publicly shamed, huh?’ I wouldn’t have read it if it was called that. Honestly.
In my original draft I called it ‘So! You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, Have You, Huh?’ but I thought that was over-egging the pudding a bit so I toned it down in the edit.
Bit of an insight into my ‘process’ there.
I’d have called it ‘So your been publicley shammed’ so I could capture the ‘Eats Shoots and Leaves’ market and the ‘Are you sure you speak enough English enough to live here?’ market.
And the Afterword grammar fascists. Natch.
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/proper-grown-ups-blissfully-ignorant-of-latest-twitter-row-20160215106255
I’d respect Fry more if he were to give Arsenal-3rd fan, Alan Davies, a good old (non-verbal, Stephen) kicking.
Indeed, now I come to think of it, I’d warm to anyone if they did that.
I suppose when you have a million followers on Twitter even a 1% negative reaction is going to mean thousands of negative comments. What does the notifications panel look like for celebs who get that many retweets? “You have 189,673 notifications”?
Slightly different issue here. Yesterday was an outrageous joke provoking the wrong kind of outrage. Here, Polly Vernon reports being attacked simply for stating what on the face of it doesn’t seem a particularly contentious opinion. (Haven’t read the book.)
On the one hand I do wonder if she’s being a bit thin-skinned, but on the other I can imagine reacting the same way.
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/16/polly-vernon-hot-feminist-all-the-attention-came-from-women-telling-me-how-stupid-my-book-was
“I do wonder if I’ll ever take such risks – publish anything as heartfelt, as exposing – again. Probably not. And I wonder who else is choosing not to say things they really mean, for fear of how Twitter will react.”
Interesting.
I’m getting something very different from that article. Polly Vernon says the title of her book was “chosen to provoke”. She then published it and received a negative response on Twitter – not trolling, no threats or crossing of the line, simply “casual contempt”. I believe in some cultures this process is referred to as “getting poor reviews”.
Her response? Bad dreams, therapy and the statement “Four days after publication, I developed a facial twitch.” I think someone is taking themselves a little too seriously.
Basically, it sounds like Polly Vernon wrote a book, some people didn’t like it/disagreed with it, and after recovering from the shock she’s now here to warn us that there are some really critical people out there. Some of them even write reviews for the Guardian for a living.
I honestly don’t see what the problem is, and the stuff about who else might refrain from publishing “anything as heartfelt” is borderline laughable. If you tell a million people your views, a couple of thousand of them will tell you that you’re a bellend, even if you are the genius who gave us the classic “What I Bought This Week” column.
Yes, she’s definitely being thin-skinned. Equally I can imagine feeling the same way because the rush to uninformed judgement is so indiscriminate and/or hostile.
I hope that she’s not saying she objects to poor reviews, but there’s a difference between someone saying they don’t think your jacket goes with your jeans and someone else, who hasn’t even seen your jacket and jeans, sending you an email saying, ‘Twat! Your jeans suck! You’re a disgrace to people who wear jeans.’
Here are the chosen quotes from Twitter: “vacuous”, “pointless”, “disgusting”, “moronic”. “sickening”, “inane”, “bad”, “wrong”.
It’s not impossible to imagine that a Guardian reviewer might use any of those in an article. In fact, they’re all words you can commonly find in discussion of movies and records on this very site – in fact, I’d been intending to use all of them regarding the new Kanye West album in the next few days when tigger describes it as a work of genius.
By Polly Vernon’s own admission, no one trolled her and the whole thing was done and dusted within a few days – people moved on. Just some bad reviews, from anonymous people, on a fly by night social network.
The solution to this entire “problem”? Don’t look at Twitter. It’s clearly not a very nice place, and when you deliberately publish a self-consciously “controversial” book, there will be some people on there who are ready to tell you it’s a load of old crap. They counterbalance all the people who will tell you that you’re wonderful.
There’s no evidence from the article that any of the judgments in question were indiscriminate, or uninformed – beyond quoting one person who admitted they’d not read it. They appear to have simply been negative judgments of a very ordinary stripe.
There were probably people who really liked Vernon’s book. There were also clearly some who hated it. I’d guess that’s part and parcel of being a writer. The very fact that Vernon describes the process of being reviewed by the papers as something she “could have survived, if it hadn’t been for Twitter” rather nods to how thin-skinned she seems to be, in addition to raising the question of whether she wrote this latest column from beyond the grave.
Yes, but… um…
Help!
“At a time when it is easy to lose faith in an online world that seems to centre around trolling, bullying, hating, trivialising and belittling, it is worth remembering the incredible power of the internet to inform and educate, lucidly and entertainingly.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2016/02/15/stephen-frys-new-startup-is-a-pinterest-for-education/
A much better use of his intelligence and influence.
Viz’s take on the issue:
http://viz.co.uk/calls-everyone-sacked/