Threats from advertisers were a prime factor in Roseanne Barr recent firing. Here is one description:
The New York Times ran several opinion pieces approving the sacking of Roseanne. Here is one example: This is not a First Amendment issue. Constitutional rights are what you’re entitled to in the public sphere, not as an employee of a private corporation. Barr’s speech has not been curtailed; she remains free to opine (and mostly free to tweet) to her heart’s content. She’s just not free to do so while getting $250,000 a show from an employer whose reputation she stained and whose values she traduced.
I have seen no similar reaction from advertisers in response to racist tweets from Sarah Jeong of the New York Times that appear to support genocide against white people. Worse yet, Jeong’s position is to supervise editorial content as part of the management for the Times, so her rants can reflect more than just the personal opinions or tasteless jokes of a comedienne.
The New York Times has a long history of condoning and/or ignoring racism and genocide when it has fit their political agenda. Back in 1932 the Times got a Pulitzer Prize for reporting that whitewashed a man-made famine in Soviet Ukraine. During World War II, the Times went out of its way to avoid mentioning the Nazis were targeting Jews for extermination. Jeong’s comments apparently condoning genocide are unfortunate reminders of past mistakes from the Times.
My question: Why did advertisers threaten to boycott ABC but seem to be unconcerned about the New York Times editorial board?
The Times claims that Jeong’s tweets were a reaction to racist or obnoxious tweets that Jeong received. If similar tweets exist attacking Roseanne, will the Times reverse its opinions about her firing?
For background on history of the racism and genocide denial at the Times see:
And I do the cha cha like a little sissy girl, YA YA YA.
Okay, please explain why a tasteless tweet from a comedienne resulted in immediate response from advertisers but tweets condoning genocide from the NY Times management are no problem.
My observation is that the people who run the New York Times live a leftist bubble in Manhattan. They are totally disconnected from reality found in the rest of the country.
Would the Times’ advertisers be happy if their names appeared with Jeong’s tweets for the their customers who live outside the bubble?
Your observation is incorrect. The difference between the reactions to Roseanne and Jeong is not a reflection of the New York Times, but society as a whole.
Many fewer people throughout the country are outraged by Jeong’s remarks than were outraged by Roseanne’s. It’s that simple.
Very few people agree with your outrage. They just don’t feel it the way you do. It’s that simple.
And the NYTs is a major part of that “society” that tells people what to be outraged about and what not to be outraged about. And the left, as always, follows their lead.
All you have to do is look at these posts and see the hypocrisy involved. No logical reason of why one is an outrage and one is not, just that we, as the leftist part of society, have agreed not to be outraged.
All of this is just one reason that only left wing Democrats take papers like the NYTs or Washington Post seriously any more.
They are political and societal crusaders, not journalists any more.,
The fact that you believe the “outrage” against Roseanne was “told” to people by the Times is just further evidence that you really don’t see what is happening.
In this case I googled jeong, and found she was worse than Barr and yet nyts and the poster libs were outraged about one and could care less about the other…and now, in their post, I find they are outraged about one and not the other…because they are. They are following what the media tells them to be outraged about.
“They just don’t feel it the way you do. It’s that simple.”
Barr’s statements used a racial stereotype to make fun of a single person
Jeongs statements, listed below, are generalized racist comments about an entire race, including implications of genocide. I can only presume you are not familiar with both statements.
“Oh man it’s kind of sick how much joy I get out of being cruel to old white men,” she wrote in one.
“White people marking up the internet with their opinions like dogs pissing on fire hydrants,” she wrote in another.
Barr’s statements were worse because they were targeted at a single person. They were meant to hurt - they were an attack on that individual person.
On the other hand, Jeong’s statements were clearly jokes - and targeted no one. They were not intended to hurt anyone.
I’m as white as it’s possible to be, and I’m not offended by Jeong’s remarks. Neither is The Internet - the new court of public opinion. You blame it on the media, and anything else you can think of, but those are all reactions, not causes. The cause is that the world is changing.
This has been true as long as modern humans have existed. Things change - and that rate of change increases exponentially. Society has changed what it gets outraged by.
Trying to make a “logical” argument doesn’t mean anything - societal norms don’t shift according to the rules of logic.
You are trying to make a “logical argument” as to why you think Jeong’s comments were “worse” than Barr’s.
“Worse” is subjective. There’s no empirical measure of “worse”. Your “logical argument” was a defense you came up with, because one side fit your ideological position.
