#LIKE WOW THEY SPOTTED THE EFFECTS OF REGRESSION ON HIM WITH ONE (1) LINE?!???

[microwaving-tesilid-argente]

@orathearsonman

crawls back up from the depths i have been called.... i will stay strong....!!!!!

every single chapter we get where tesilid hestio and ephael are in the same room and don't interact at all i die a little on the inside

[avaantares]

On Torchwood: Miracle Day

Why this post? Because I’m planning to be lazy in the future. :) I keep seeing this series come up in discussion, and I wanted to get my thoughts down all in one spot for easy reference. So this is simply a text dump containing my thoughts on Miracle Day, both positive and negative. (Spoiler: there are more negatives than positives.)

This will be long, so here’s a dash-saver...

(Disclaimer: It’s been a few years since I watched this series, and I only did so once, so the impressions I’m reporting below are based on what was most salient/most memorable from that viewing. If I failed to notice a detail or have forgotten something, that’s my error – though I would argue that I’m usually a pretty astute viewer, so if something critical is not clear on a first watch, that fault may lie at least in part with the show.)

Okay. Got your popcorn ready? Let’s go.

Things I disliked about Miracle Day:

Genre shift. Instead of a character-driven fantasy like Doctor Who and the first two series of Torchwood, MD is structured more like a political thriller. This is not inherently bad – Children of Earth straddled the line, and was still very effective -- but subjectively, MD didn’t feel like Torchwood at all to me. It felt really… American. (Full disclosure: I dislike a lot of American television writing in general; that’s why I watch more foreign TV than domestic, despite living in the U.S.)

The protagonists. The new characters failed to interest me as a viewer. There was nothing endearing or compelling about Rex, and I personally disliked his character and his attitude. I don’t remember anything particularly dynamic about his character arc, either (he… learns to be a team player, I guess?). Esther, who started out as a fairly generic model of Perky Blonde Sidekick, became more likable as the series progressed; she had stated goals that hinted at future growth, but the most interesting conflicts the series set up for her (i.e. the personal drama over her sister’s kids) were, to my memory, never resolved. (See also Rex’s daddy issues – we take time establishing that he has them, but nothing ever comes of it. What did that scene really add to his overall character growth? Did his father ever even get mentioned again?) Oddly enough, the most compelling character out of the entire new lineup was Bill Pullman’s creeptastic pedophile, and I kind of feel like that shouldn’t be the case with an ensemble cast of this size. (Props to Pullman on that performance, though. 10/10 would set fire to that character.)

Jack’s regression. This is admittedly a minor quibble in the grand scheme of things, but it still bothers me from a characterization standpoint. Jack started in series 1 of Torchwood as… well, a bit of a jerk, actually (which is not inappropriate for his character at that point), but he grows over time (as lead characters should). Between S1 and S2 (Utopia/tSoD/LotTL) he reaches a turning point, choosing to return to Cardiff because he wants to be with his team, and he continues that dynamic process throughout the second series. Then CoE pulls the rug out from under him, and he flees Earth in grief – but when he returns in MD, it’s without the sensitivity or empathy we’d seen him develop through the previous series. At various times he displays behavior that is whiny, bitter, clingy, and caustic. It feels like much of the growth of the previous seasons was negated while he was off-planet, only there’s no clear explanation for what caused it (or, for that matter, why he returned at all; we’d last seen him in a space bar chatting up Alonso Frame, with no apparent intention to come back to Earth). I’d attribute the change to the losses he’s suffered, but I don’t see a clear connection between grief and the petulant attitude he seems to lapse into in MD, and the show itself doesn’t make any attempt to draw a link (Ianto rates a brief mention when Jack drunk-dials Gwen from another man’s bed; I don’t remember if Steven, Owen or Tosh are even spoken of, apart from Jack borrowing Owen’s name once). And we really have no frame of reference for how long he’s been gone. It might have been decades for Jack.

Let’s Talk About Sex(uality). When watching a show, I don’t typically pay any more attention to sexuality/representation than I do to shot framing or dialogue – I’m aware of it, but it’s not something I zero in on to criticize unless they’re doing it badly -- so when I actually pause an episode to complain about the insulting stereotypes, there’s a problem. I know some people were unhappy that Jack was presented more gay than omnisexual, but eh, okay, they’re marketing to a new audience, they have a bunch of new characters to deal with, maybe they don’t want to spend time explaining Jack’s proclivities. But there’s no excuse for that cringeworthy scene with everyone mocking the flight attendant for being gay, even though he denies it – and the punchline is that he experimented with a guy once, so OBVIOUSLY he’s secretly gay, haha, they were right all along! Gay stereotypes are funny! Um. Wow. I remember staring at the screen with my jaw hanging open and saying, “I can’t believe John Barrowman, of all people, was on board with this.” After the casual, understated openness of the previous three series, the change in tone – the calling-out of anyone’s sexuality at all in a series where historically, nearly the entire main cast was (at least) bisexual -- was almost whiplash-inducing. (See above re: it just didn’t feel like Torchwood.)

Continuity? Schmontinuity! ...And this is where the series really lost me. I’ll admit, I’m a bit of a detail nerd, but mistakes like these are worse than sloppy – they’re downright confusing when you’re actually trying to figure out what’s going on in the show. The events of Miracle Day not only break the entire Doctor Who universe, but they aren’t even internally consistent with the rest of Torchwood. I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out just when the “Immortal Sins” flashbacks were supposed to have happened and whether or not a time loop was integral to the plot, because all the on-screen evidence in those episodes indicated that Jack was on his fourth tour of the 20th century: Jack explains to Angelo that he’s a fixed point in time – yet Jack himself wouldn’t learn that from the Doctor until 70 years later in his own timeline. Also, Jack is running around in the mid-1930s wearing his WWII-issue RAF greatcoat (and Webley holster, etc.) – but WWII hasn't started yet, so he can't have served in it (as an American volunteer or anything else) to acquire a coat, and he can’t possibly have one from the future as he has been living on Earth in linear time since 1869. (He didn’t have the coat when he was stranded on Satellite Five, and isn’t shown wearing it in other Torchwood flashbacks/photos until the appropriate era.) In short, the ONLY way the MD timeline works is if Jack went back to the 1930s after fleeing the planet in Children of Earth, which makes no sense at all from a story or character standpoint. Furthermore, the “explanation” for the Miracle contradicts everything we’ve been told up to this point about Jack’s immortality. Jack is supposedly a fixed point in time, being kept alive by the time vortex itself – except, apparently, when you set up a morphic field that somehow inverts the power of the time vortex around the entire planet, without affecting the flow of time, or any other fixed points, or anything else? And there’s also a nullification field that re-reverses the morphic field to let Angelo die, except for some reason it doesn’t restore Jack’s immortality when he’s inside it? Are we not even going to hand-wave an explanation for this? (Inconveniently, this also toasts our main character hook: Apparently Jack can die any time he likes by setting up a portable field to neutralize his immortality, like Angelo did. Welp, there goes our tragically-immortal protagonist. On to the next series.) …And let’s not even discuss the nonsense with the Trickster’s Brigade and FDR’s brain, which doesn’t jive with the Trickster’s repeatedly-stated objectives in The Sarah Jane Adventures. I’m all for name-dropping-in-a-non-legally-actionable-way-because-we-don’t-have-full-rights-to-Doctor-Who-properties, but that was just silly.

The $@%^&# ending. This probably belongs with the previous entry, but it made me furious enough to merit its own bullet point. Jack’s blood now makes other people immortal? …the HECK?! Is Rex a fixed point in time now? How does that even work? Does Earth somehow influence the time vortex? Can a planet clone the time stream? NONE OF THIS IS COMPATIBLE WITH THE REST OF THE WHONIVERSE.

The villains. One thing that made Torchwood as a series interesting is that for the most part, the formula for each episode wasn’t “Our Heroes vs. The Generic Bad Guys Bent On World Domination.” Antagonists were usually more complex, and often the conflict left the team in a moral gray area. Team Torchwood faced evil humans (”Countrycide”), betrayal from within (”They Keep Killing Suzie”), unwitting enemy agents (”Sleeper”), opportunistic human capitalists (”Meat”), time itself (”Out of Time;” “To The Last Man”), and even the government (Children of Earth), among others. Sure, there were occasional Generic Bad Guy episodes (”Reset”), but it wasn’t the norm – and in my opinion, the series’ weakest moments were when they fell into that more generic formula. (”End of Days” had some interesting moments, but the giant CGI monster stomping on Cardiff wasn’t one of them.) In MD, though, we have this amazingly complex setup for an intriguing and world-altering scenario, with hints that it stretches across decades if not centuries, revolving around Jack and those he loved, and there’s so much buildup that we know there must be some deep meaning behind it all… And then it’s revealed that the villain behind the curtain is A Group Of Evil Mob Bosses Bent On World Domination™. There’s not even any personal tie to Jack, who should (for the sake of symmetry) be at the center of it all. It’s just some Generic Bad Guys messing around with some stuff they found. Even though it’s his blood, Jack as a character is really just incidental to it all. The reveal would have exactly the same emotional gravitas if one of the Bad Guys had found Jack’s discarded vortex manipulator and used it to take over the world. It was just... unsatisfying.

...There’s more, but I think that’s enough digital ink spilled for the moment. I’m sure you can get an idea of my general opinion.

But, in fairness, now that I’ve griped about everything I didn’t like, let’s look at

Things Miracle Day did well:

The premise. The concept of people suddenly not dying, the fallout of that situation, and the questions it raises about life and death, civil rights. and society as a whole, is a brilliant concept! It would have made a very solid sci-fi film/series on its own; I just wish it hadn’t been crammed into Torchwood, because it didn’t mesh well with the story already in progress. Even so, there were moments where the sociopolitical drama actually played out quite well in spite of the show’s other issues. There were legitimately creepy horror elements – people being burned alive or dissected and not dying during the process – and it was interesting to consider the practical questions of where you put bodies, how you classify them, and so on. The family drama with Gwen’s father showed the more personal dilemma, while Vera’s incineration highlighted the danger of having the decision-making power in the wrong hands.

Gwen vs. Jack. Gwen having to choose between her family and Jack was the logical progression for her character’s story, and while I can’t say I enjoyed watching the trust between them disintegrate, I do think it was a good conflict to set up, and it gave both of them some much-needed character focus amid a very event-driven plot. (And it was a relief not to have any of those unconvincing awkward-sexual-tension scenes shoehorned in… wait, now I’m griping about the earlier series. Sorry.) Gwen had several good character moments during the series, actually; I remember the bit where she talks about killing her father as being particularly powerful, and she had a few fun one-liners as well (”I’m Welsh”). She was also given some good action sequences. Speaking of which…

Helicopter vs. shoulder-fired missile. With baby under one arm. Okay, not gonna lie, that entire sequence was pure candy.

Andy Davidson. Yes. Good. We can always use more Sgt. Andy. (Let him join Torchwood already!) Aside from their roles in the story, the presence of Andy and Rhys did provide a more solid link to the previous series. It’s not Torchwood without a minimum percentage of Welsh accents, after all. :)

The Oswald Danes storyline. It was creepy and disturbing, but the story of a psychotic killer, manipulated by a media expert, who rises to celebrity status and begins influencing public action was quite compelling (and, now that I think of it, may have struck a little too close to home… did I mention I live in the U.S.? *ahem*). Another thing I didn’t enjoy, per se, but it was certainly effective, especially coupled with Pullman’s convincing performance.

So there’s my (incredibly long and verbose) take on Miracle Day. I think it could best be summarized as “Great concept, weak execution.” Congratulations if you actually read this far. :)

[nicemango-feed]

Jordan Peterson - His Strange Atheist Bedfellows & His War on Cathy Newman

Over the last week or so, I’ve watched this Cathy Newman/Channel 4 saga unfold. It took twists and turns that were quite surprising to me, but shouldn’t have been - especially considering the recent trend of Movement Atheism to join hands with almost anyone that is sufficiently anti-left or anti-feminist. Even if that means allying with a Christian fundie snake oil salesman they themselves would have laughed out the room a few years ago. I mean just take a look at this short clip below, wtaf is this nonsense?

(clip via TMM)

As we see the rise of the Cult of Jordan Peterson, we also see the rise of I-love-Jesus atheism. Douglas Murray is a good example of that...though, he's been one long before Peterson arrived on the scene, to be fair. He's a hispter Jesus Atheist. 

Murray is embraced wholeheartedly by the increasingly rightward shifting atheist scene for his anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim stances (going so far as to worry about the future children Muslim asylum seekers may have, *possibly* growing up to become extremists even if their parents weren't) 

We could take in the 'nicest' asylum seekers, 'but their son could be a suicide bomber': @DouglasKMurray on second-generation terrorists pic.twitter.com/3yMHLjF2aj

— The Bolt Report (@theboltreport) May 29, 2017

“We could take in two asylum seekers, who might be the nicest most pro-British people ever, but their son might turn out to be a suicide bomber" - Douglas Murray

"But what levels, after all's said and done, do the celebrants of diversity want to get to? What is their ideal target figure? Is a ceiling of 25 per cent white Britons in London — or the country at large — optimal? Or would it be 10 per cent? Or none at all? A final, and perhaps harder, question: how — given the concatenation of claims against them — might "white Britons" ever acceptably argue, let alone complain, about such unspecified or unspecifiable odds?"  - Also Doug Murray 

You'll never believe who Doug is a big fan of: 

He's consistently been an excellent judge of character though, so we should *totally* trust him on this one...his other judgements have been So. Spot. On... especially regarding Trump.  -___-

***

Anyway, aside from I-Iove-Jesus-atheism (which is still some form of atheism), Peterson is also having the effect of stirring the embers of religion...in the hearts of some 'atheists' (being anti-left is a powerful uniting force). Perhaps some lost lambs needed a father-figure like JBP in their lives, to yell basic shit at them, shit that my grandma gave away for free...like 'clean your room!' 'Sort yourself out!'...they needed someone to lead them toward god's warm and loving embrace. Yay!

screenshot via @classiclib3ral

After this recent Channel 4 interview, we've seen a flood of predictable 'contrarian' thinkpieces pouring out in defence of this newly emerged hero...one who dares to challenge 'leftist orthodoxy', by sharing ‘truths’ that no one else will tell you. 'Truths' like, how women just don’t WANT powerful positions, (no really, I've watched lectures of his where he, a top earner on Patreon making over 60K $ A MONTH, spends a lot of time deterring women from wanting power positions. He talks about how awful and complicated being rich is, how it can make you (women) unravel) about how the gender pay gap can be explained away because women are choosing lower paying careers, what they need in order to be happy is marriage and babies, ok? Also, there is no systemic discrimination, you silly emotional, brainwashed neo-marxist sjws! 

"The more I see women in particular, they hit 35-40 …and they’re not married…and they don’t have kids…and they are not happy. Cuz what the hell are you gonna do from the time you’re 40 till the time you’re 80?! You got no family… you got no relationships? What are you gonna do?! Go run your company?!!! Yeah well… if you’re 1 in a 1000 that will satisfy you.” - an actual JBP quote. 

“each sex has it’s own unfairness to deal with, but to think of that as a consequence of the social structure….come on really?!" - also an actual JBP quote (from the lecture linked above)

Anyway, amidst those thinkpieces...shared by the most popular anti-left (but still clinging to leftist status) figureheads,  there is a wave of outraged culty fanbases coming together, speaking out in unison against this shrill harpy of a woman who dared to have an adversarial interview with Peterson. 

The ones with a bit of self-awareness and self-respect will never admit to being sympathetic to Peterson’s views (kind of like they did with Milo)...and so will phrase their disgust at this interview more along the lines of, “I’m no Peterson fan BUT, all he did was say true things while she aggressively strawmanned him.”

How dare she assume *this man* could be saying sexist things????

I honestly had to watch the interview 3 times to see if maybe I had missed something the first two times, and no, I still don’t understand where the hate and rage towards Cathy are coming from. 

Why are people SO upset that she didn’t perform to their liking (people who claim to be 'for equality & progress')? I don't get it...She was pretty standardly 'meh' I thought. Not great at grilling him, sure. But at least she tried to take on this shifty charlatan. I see it as I would if someone was imperfect in grilling someone like Mo Ansar, like sure they made some mistakes...but even attempting to expose someone like that is good (Though, I don't think Mo is remotely as rich, powerful or influential as Peterson...so not nearly as dangerous).

Why the full blown outrage? I mean, I understand where it’s coming from with people who are openly anti-left and anti-feminist, people who think diversity is a codeword for white genocide…people who think theres a leftist cultural marxist conspiracy to compel them to use non-binary pronouns, or some garbage like that - But I really don’t understand what so-called sophisticated thinkers & non far-right lunatics are doing lowering themselves to defend Peterson in any way whatsoever. 

There could have been a perfectly fair and measured critique, where people kept in sight who Peterson actually is; 

--An extremist thats radicalizing many young people every day, and making big bucks off it--

A man with ideas so regressive that they're sure to set us back a few decades, if they gain enough influence. His explanation here for accusations of sex assault is not to first find fault with the perpetrators of the assault, but to blame the idea that sex is no longer enshrined in marriage (not like marital rape ever happens or anything, never mind that many of the accused are MARRIED). I mean, I'm no stranger to hearing such garbage, I did grow up in Saudi Arabia, as a woman. 

I just don't expect to hear this nonsense being embraced so gleefully by people outside of a blatantly misogynistic theocracy.

Like any Salafist preacher in Saudi, JBP doesn't like the idea of casual sex. Quelle Surprise.

In this now disproportionately notorious Channel 4 interview he remained cool and calm is all. That is not to be confused with performing well or having decent ideas...or speaking 'truths'. 

He could have performed in any way and his sycophantic followers would have perceived it exactly how they do now. In their eyes he would have 'won' regardless. 

The harassment Cathy received from this misogynistic fanbase was mentioned in several publications. At first, even causing Peterson to tell his fans:

If you're threatening her, stop. Try to be civilized in your criticism. It was words. Words, people, words. Remember those? "C4 calls in security experts after presenter suffers online abuse." https://t.co/z4UAVOSYuO

— Jordan B Peterson (@jordanbpeterson) January 19, 2018

Don't let it fool you though, Peterson often engages in this kind of performative condemnation, of the alt right, or of misogynistic harassment...when he feels the mainstream media are on to him. But it isn't long before he shows his hand. 

He continued to post criticism of Cathy right after telling people to stop threatening her, which is not something you'd do if you were genuinely concerned about her being targeted. 

He then soon went on to do another interview where he started off obsessively complaining about her...and the apparent 'spin' that was being created, that she was some kind of planned feminist martyr, because this was a sort of ...I dunno face saving tactic, because she had received so much criticism. He said the criticism was being spun as harassment. 

So first he says stop threatening her, then he expresses regret for saying that and now is discrediting that it could be harassment or threats at all. That faux-concern didn't take long to unravel at all...

If that wasn't tasteless enough for you - he even dogwhistled to his followers through this other interview by saying,

29:30: "I was reviewing maybe 10-11 of these newspaper articles that had played this twisty game and accused me of like, siccing my internet trolls on poor hapless journalists and I thought --this was the dark part of me-- the shadow part thought, If I wanted to sic my internet trolls on channel 4 then there'd be nothing but broken windows and riots, and then there's a little part of me that thinks... wouldn't that be fun"

This man is dangerous, and he's clearly on some power trip. 

If a future interviewer ever tried to press him on this statement and say something like 'wow what an irresponsible thing to say after a channel had to call in extra security because of your fanbase' - he'd most definitely hide behind semantics, as he always does...and say something like, "Oh I wasn't signalling that they should do that, I was saying that that's the dark part of my thoughts, something everyone experiences...everyone has dark thoughts...but obviously I believe we should control those. So I'm not sure why you are misrepresenting what I was saying there" - Meanwhile, his followers would get enraged again that someone dared 'misrepresent' him, and again he'd get away with putting out troubling statements.

The idea that media coverage of Cathy Newman's post-interview harassment is part of a leftist conspiracy to portray Peterson’s poor fanbase as misogynistic is ludicrous beyond belief. Not like his own ideas could set the tone for his fanbase, and how people perceive them. It's got to be a conspiracy. 

Consider his chat with Camille Paglia which an article from Chatelaine puts as:

"Peterson said that men can’t control “crazy women” because men aren’t allowed to physically fight women. “I know how to stand up to a man who’s unfairly trespassed against me,” he said. “The parameters for my resistance are quite well-defined, which is: we talk, we argue, we push, and then it becomes physical. If we move beyond the boundaries of civil discourse, we know what the next step is."

"He adds that men unwilling to throw a punch are contemptible. “If you’re talking to a man who wouldn’t fight with you under any circumstances whatsoever, then you’re talking to someone for whom you have absolutely no respect.”"

"...talking to Paglia, he laments that his own socialization prevents him from taking a swing at a lady. Referring to a woman who accused him of being a Nazi, he said, “I’m defenceless against that kind of female insanity because the techniques that I would use against a man who was employing those tactics are forbidden to me.” It’s hard to decide which is creepier: Is it the suggestion, in Peterson’s rueful tone, that he’s kind of bummed out about the fact that he can’t hit women? Or is it the implication, if you were to follow his argument to its conclusion, that because women can’t be hit, they shouldn’t be allowed to participate in civil discourse with men at all?"

***

Regarding the Cathy Newman interview though, let's not forget who the real victim in all of this was - Jordan B Peterson, of course. 

Not only did Cathy treat Peterson unfairly (even though confrontational interviews like this are not uncommon in Britain, I hear), but it was actually HER Feminist fanbase that threatened and abused HIM. 

And who was reporting on that, huh? Only one noble MRA blog (there might be another, but I haven't found it yet). 

We mustn't laugh....they could be a reliable source, we shouldn't jump to conclusions.... 

Ok..I checked their twitter account and it's full of great stuff like Retweets of Breitbart's Raheem Kassam, Cernovich and Paul Joseph Watson. See? Perfectly reasonable account. 

Daily mail, on the other hand, was reporting on how Cathy received extreme harassment and death threats. But we're all aware that the Daily Mail is known for it’s far left, radical feminist bias right? Everyone but the MRA blogs have been infected...it's why you've got to go straight to these sources for REAL information without a cultural marxist bias.

Speaking of cultural marxism and postmodernism corrupting things, here's Peterson the free speech activist calling for entire fields of study to be shut down because he deems them corrupt. Fields like 'English Literature'. Totally normal professor. 

Well that escalated quickly. pic.twitter.com/6Y9qBhSco4

— CyberViolence [HC] (@CyberHarm) November 11, 2017

(clip via @cyberharm)

***

In all seriousness though, not everyone who jumped into this social media debate knew the backstory of Jordan B Peterson. I’m not faulting them for being unfamiliar with his views - and there are some fair criticisms to be made of Cathy’s interview but it just wouldn’t be the hill I’d die on when a swarm of far-right MRA types are already descending upon her. It just seemed wrong to pile on in the middle of all that. 

***

In the past, many on the left became complacent with the progress we’d made. We never could have imagined that these stone-age ideas about traditional gender roles, race etc. would aggressively claw their way back into the public square like this.

These regressive ideas we thought we'd put to bed, come again in the form of various new-media far-right commentators like Milo, PJW, Molyneux, etc…who spend their time decrying victimhood culture on the left that portrays women, PoC as ‘victims’ of some systemic discrimination. Though this far rightwingery isn't all new...it's just that Fox News has more friends now - friends with influence among young people. 

These uncucked heroes turn our attention to who the real victims are - White men (especially conservative) brave enough to take a stand against victimhood culture are the most victimized group of all. 

Peterson actually *weeps* in this clip about how some poor men have it real hard. Not the first time I've seen him cry for his causes either.

Funny, because he certainly doesn't have that kind of compassion for women. Maybe, just maaaybe..Cathy Newman sensed something off about his views. 

***

However, now that there’s some distance I’d like to point out that Cathy was indeed a bit ill-prepared for the interview. 

Exceptionally so? Nah, nothing outside of what I’d expect from mainstream journalists trying to grapple with the slippery tactics and sophistry of the new far right. That's how we get clueless 'Nazi next door' type articles. They aren’t in the trenches of youtube comments daily, hearing the arguments against every possible reasonable position that most of us took for granted. Unless they specifically research this or are personally targeted...they aren’t usually dealing with or studying crypto rightwingery, that hates more than anything to be called right-wing. Such free-speech warriors (who will sue you if you so much as suggest they are associated with the right or far right) cultivate a specific image, with a veneer of credibility that only thrives if the waters are murky on this…incredibly murky.  

Could some mainstream journalists be better on this? Yes, absolutely... as the far-right updates it's tactics, they should too. Especially if they want to have conversations where these types are held accountable for their positions.

I cringed when I heard Cathy's point about Free Speech. 

"Why should your right to freedom of speech trump a trans person's right not to be offended?"

That was really a gift to the Peterson trolls. I thought it was pretty basic understanding among journalists that the freedom to offend was an important one. I for one would love to hold on to my freedom to offend conservatives from around the world. As Peterson rightfully said, Cathy was benefitting from the freedom to offend Peterson at that very moment (hate to agree with Pete, but hey).

What I didn’t understand was the proportion of the anger. Yes that one bit was terrible...but say that and move on. Ultimately she attempted to do a good thing (at least to her best ability) by trying to expose Peterson for what a caveman he is.

Now I’m not a fan of Cathy Newman, I had no idea who she was before this whole thing. I have no emotional investment in her as a person. I just think the harassment and outraged articles calling her interview a 'catastrophe' are ridiculously out of proportion with how mediocre the interview seemed to me. It was nothing out of the ordinary - what they refer to her doing as 'strawmanning' Peterson, is her just trying to cut past his bullshit flowery language to make some sense of what his points actually are for her audience. Which he of course masterfully sidesteps because vagueness is his game, so he can’t actually be pinned to his vile positions if you don't have enough information on him. It reminded me of good ol' fashioned atheists trying to get a theist to acknowledge that a certain bit of scripture is violent or misogynistic. If you've played that game, you've seen the semantics dodges, you've seen the 'you're taking it out of context' accusations. This was just more of that. A pity many atheists fell for it though. 

I will say that Cathy barely scratched the surface with the things she could have pinned him on. His sexist tradlife ideas are shit but there are better ways to expose him. Firstly, I’d have asked about his posing with a Pepe flag and a white nationalist…

Then about his friendly appearance on a neo-nazi podcast, with a host that has advocated violence towards people residing ‘illegally’ in her fantasy ethnostate. 

He should have been asked this especially in the context of how he himself deplatformed (now) open ethnonationalist Faith Goldy from one of his Free Speech events, for going on a Daily Stormer (Nazi) associated podcast and not questioning them sufficiently about their beliefs. If that was something he judged Goldy on, surely he could see that he himself hasn't always met those standards. 

Peterson who is also a staunch defender of people fired for their unpopular views can’t get others fired quick enough (those he doesn't align with ideologically, that is). 

(As ridiculous & unhelpful as her tactics are, had this been blatant discrimination towards a PoC, Peterson's tune would be entirely different). 

He who complains about the left not tolerating differing opinions, reacts this way when confronted with an opinion he disagrees with. When...Infowars...is criticized. 

After holding him to account on his most blatant contradictions and hypocrisies, Cathy could have gone into his more absurd viewpoints where he considers Disney’s Frozen to be propaganda, simply because Elsa didn't need a man to succeed. How very dare she get by on her own. 

Talk about fragility and snowflakery...being upset by Disney movies....tsk. 

(click to enlarge)

Or she could have questioned him about a chat where he doesn't quite grasp the concept of consent, with 'race realist' and known misogynist Stefan Molyneux (who also has theories about movies like Star Wars being anti white, white genocide propaganda) 

how the hell can you have free sexual expression and also not rape people pic.twitter.com/AWM0gu7rHR

— Tom Bloke (@21logician) February 13, 2017

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But then again, it wouldn’t really have mattered what she said to be honest…because his fans would have been furious with her regardless. She had the audacity to be combative with the great Peterson. This is a cult like following, no jokes. 

(click to enlarge)

Had she made him look properly foolish with excellent points, they would have been twice as enraged and felt twice as victimized by the postmodern neo-marxists who are always out to get them. *sob*

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I have had many discussions with 'moderate' Petersonites, where they start fairly reasonably. It's almost as if they're reading from a script. First, they'll say they aren’t *at all* fans of Peterson (they just happen to agree with and defend everything he says and vehemently disagree with the critic). Then they jump to the fact that they are in disbelief that you could find anything particularly alarming about him at all...or that you could find him even remotely 'right wing' (there's that crypto rightwingery again). They demand that you back up your claims that he’s right wing… and from here on, it really doesn’t matter what you say. 

You could show his friendly appearances with neo-nazis, his proud posing with pepe (hate symbol) flags & white nationalists, his naziesque conspiracy theories about cultural marxism being everywhere. His conservative views on sex and gender roles, his love of sharing far-right media, none of that matters. They can explain everything away with a "Oh he meant it metaphorically" or "You haven’t seen his *entire body of work* otherwise you’d know he isn’t right wing, he was doing that ironically to piss off leftist SJWs like you", the excuses are endless. And that is why this brand of right wingers enjoys vagueness so much, because it gives them plausible deniability. 

Now, I’m sure there are some lectures by Peterson that aren’t far-right..but that doesn’t excuse him for times his views overlap with alt-right talking points, his alt-right associations and it certainly doesn’t excuse his free speech hypocrisies….when he is every bit a screaming, sniffling, unable to tolerate differing opinions, wanting to get people fired 'SJW' as the people he projects this stuff on to - except his idea of social justice is upholding the status quo…so SQW to be precise. 

He is what he hates. And his dogpiling fans are exactly the intolerant bunch they claim the left are. 

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Devin Booker is younger, however the Suns star is already boasting a sophisticated recreation

By nearly each measure, together with the all-important and often-overlooked measure of frequent sense, 21-year-old Devin Booker, in simply his third NBA season, is among the rising stars of this league.

On this view, which additionally occurs to be my view, the Phoenix Suns taking pictures guard, who is because of return quickly from a strained groin muscle, is a soon-to-be All Star, and a pure scorer who’s shortly increasing his total recreation. At an age that is youthful than many gamers who can be chosen within the 2018 NBA Draft, Booker is 12th within the league in scoring, averaging 24.Three factors per recreation, and he is including four.5 rebounds and four.1 assists. He was the youngest participant to compete within the three-point contest throughout NBA All-Star Weekend throughout his rookie yr, and he almost bested the Splash Brothers. Final season, at age 20, he dropped 70 factors in a recreation — simply the 11th 70-point recreation in NBA historical past. Booker has vastly outperformed his draft place (13th within the 2015 draft) and appears to have the potential to turn into an All-Star for the subsequent decade.

By nearly any measure, he is a star.

Besides by the measures that superior statistics gurus pay probably the most consideration to, that’s.

Booker represents a conundrum of the modern-day NBA fan: How ought to we consider a participant whose conventional statistics inform us is dominant however whose superior statistics inform us is much much less so?

Name them the Conventional Stats All-Stars. They’re the gamers who followers cannot determine are stars in substance and efficiency or solely stars in repute. the names: Guys like Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony and Pau Gasol, who’re all probably Corridor of Famers however who the extra math-minded basketball minds solid doubt upon their precise worth. Or youthful gamers like D’Angelo Russell, Victor Oladipo (till his breakout yr this season with the Pacers, not less than) and most of all, the Minnesota Timberwolves’ latest max-contract participant, Andrew Wiggins.

Booker has been thought-about one in all these gamers since he burst onto the scene because the Suns’ first-round decide in 2015 and made the All-Rookie First Crew. Certain, he may rating. However what else may he do? His protection was a sieve. It was as if he saved all his power for the offensive aspect of the ground. His recreation was removed from full.

I requested Booker about this the opposite day, as he was working his manner again from the primary massive harm of his profession. (He is due again round Christmas.) He is conscious that the superior numbers have not regarded kindly upon his profession thus far. He additionally is aware of that there is extra to nice basketball than superior statistics.

“You are a younger participant, sort of a go-to possibility, you are getting groups’ finest defenses, and we’re on a younger staff and we’re struggling,” Booker instructed me. “Superior stats are all the time higher on a successful staff. Everybody seems to be good. Protection is a staff factor. You see it with Golden State — as soon as a staff begins succeeding, everybody seems to be good. That is how the NBA works.”

So it begs the query: How does Booker’s progress examine with different Conventional Stats All-Stars?

And for those who’re a Suns fan, you are going to like the reply.

Let’s begin with Wiggins. He is the poster youngster for the standard vs. superior argument. Conventional statistics tab him as a rising star, sufficient to warrant a five-year, $148 million contract extension. His scoring averages took a soar every of his first three seasons, from 16.9 factors per recreation to 20.7 to 23.6, earlier than regressing this season as he is settled into a 3rd possibility behind Jimmy Butler and Karl-Anthony Cities.

Nonetheless, Wiggins does not rebound nicely in any respect. His scoring comes from quantity over effectivity. He isn’t an excellent mover of the ball and his protection is commonly atrocious — so dangerous that the statistical evaluation site FiveThirtyEight.com named him the NBA’s “least defensive participant” final season.

You’d hope that, as a younger participant matures, he will get a greater understanding of find out how to be a successful NBA contributor. However in accordance with some superior statistics, Wiggins has truly regressed. Take win shares. In his rookie season, Wiggins was value solely 2.1 wins to his staff, per BasketballReference.com, which ranked him 227th within the league. The subsequent season, he improved to four.1 (116th within the NBA) then four.2 (98th within the NBA) — not sufficient to warrant a max contract, maybe, however a marked enchancment. However by means of the primary quarter of this season, Wiggins ranks 250th in win shares.

Similar with the VORP (Worth Over Substitute Participant) statistic which makes an attempt to point out a participant’s value over a mean NBA participant. Wiggins has, for all 4 seasons of his profession, hovered close to the underside of the NBA on this metric: 418th his rookie season, then 358th, 469th and 458th thus far this season. Meaning regardless of posting nice counting statistics and getting that big-time contract, Wiggins could possibly be one of many least useful gamers within the NBA, in accordance with this metric.

How does this examine to Booker?

In Booker’s rookie season, a yr after Wiggins’ rookie season, he seemed to be very Wiggins-like. Booker ranked 234th in win shares and 448th in VORP — nearly similar rankings to Wiggins in his rookie season. In his second season within the league, Booker continued on the trail that some individuals consider is stardom (see: the 11th 70-point recreation in NBA historical past) whereas others consider is the land of the overrated. Regardless of averaging greater than 22 factors per recreation because the Suns’ main scoring possibility, Booker’s protection dragged him down, and he ranked 222nd within the league in win shares and 373rd in VORP — hardly any enchancment. The case for Booker changing into a Conventional Stats All-Star, probably the most backhanded praise in right now’s NBA, was changing into stronger.

This season, nonetheless, it has been a special story. At the same time as he is upped his scoring output to 24.Three factors per recreation, Booker has improved his effectivity, with increased taking pictures percentages from two, three and the free-throw line. Most significantly, in accordance with his coach, has been Booker’s defensive focus (though that has but to point out up in superior metrics like defensive ranking).

This season, Booker ranks 80th within the NBA in win shares and 65th in VORP. It is not elite but, like his conventional statistics are — however it’s a whale of lots higher than his first two years within the league.

His head coach raved concerning the steps Booker has taken to show himself right into a extra full basketball participant.

“He is a really basketball-intelligent, and a really clever child,” Suns interim head coach Jay Triano instructed me. “He hears [the criticism from advanced-stats people] and is aware of it. I believe that is why this yr he is taken a particular consideration to creating certain he isn’t that particular person and he does work higher on the defensive finish. It is focus. Typically you see that with lots of offensive gamers: ‘I can lose my focus right here, however I will be locked in on the different finish.’ That is the massive factor. We put in a defensive system, and with this method he is aware of the place he is imagined to be, and he is a sensible sufficient basketball participant to know, ‘Hey, if I am on this spot, I am in adequate of a place to do what I am imagined to do.’ And he is taken on the problem late in video games — ‘I’ve obtained him — I’ve obtained the perfect man on the opposite staff. I would like him.’ That is a step that he did not have earlier than. That is a part of the place we all know he is began to alter: ‘I would like this problem, and I wish to show to folks that I can guard guys.’ And he is executed very nicely at it.'”

It is an necessary factor for basketball pundits to recollect: Simply because a participant is any such participant right now doesn’t imply he can not turn into that sort of participant tomorrow. Kawhi Leonard grew to become an elite three-point shooter after coming into the NBA. LeBron James went from the man everybody noticed as somebody who shied away from massive moments to the perfect clutch participant within the league. I’d not be stunned within the least if Booker sheds his label as a participant who is way worse in a sophisticated statistics world than in a conventional statistics world. I’ve recognized him since his one-and-done season at Kentucky, and he is all the time been a preternaturally mature younger man with a excessive basketball IQ. If he is struggling in a single a part of his recreation, he’ll work his tail off to repair it. Triano has witnessed that progress up shut.

“It is onerous for us, once you see him every single day, to be like, ‘Wow!'” Triano stated. “Do you ever see your children develop up? Whenever you see them every single day, it simply sort of occurs. I do not know if I’ve stepped again and stated, ‘Wow,’ however there have been moments in video games the place you say, ‘Holy smokes — his recreation and the best way he is taking part in has been at a special stage.’ For us the massive factor is he is labored on his full recreation this yr. He is turn into extra attentive to the defensive finish of the ground, his skill to make passes to different gamers. And his effectivity due to that’s increased than it is ever been.”

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