31 Comments

I'm glad it turned out to be false - I didn't want Jon to be another disappointment.

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He's still a disappointment to me -- I don't think much of liberals who mock actual genuine leftist thinking -- but I'm glad he made the video. And he should know by now the quality of American "journalism" [sic], which is not much better than News of the World.

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I'm glad about this situation for exposing biased journalism and manufactured slander toward JKR. This helps! It's good to get things wrong here too, we're human and angry and willing to reconsider. All good in the hood.

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Fair play to you, Graham.

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Too much journalism (and Social Media posts on all sides) are “Hot Takes” these days. If I see something spicy, I hold off for a while because more often than not it turns out to be bullshit.

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I watched the podcast. Jon Stewart clearly implies that JK Rowling is at the very least insensitive to Jews. Here's what he says after referring to a horrible anti-Semitic caricature. "I feel like she saw this and said, 'Can we get these guys to run our bank?' it’s a wizarding world…who should run the banks? Jews. ‘Yeah…they look like Jews…what if the teeth were sharper?’” So, yeah. Sounds like the usual sophomoric humor I expect from JS. I am surprised at his denial, though. Maybe there are women in his life who spoke to him about this. Dunno.

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"Maybe there are women in his life who spoke to him about this."

Some of them lawyers, I'd bet.

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Please stop presuming that UK libel laws apply in the US. Stewart could've called her a nazi pedophile, she can't sue him in the US.

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I can't see how any assumptions about jurisdictions can be made from MAM's comment. This isn't about tit-for-tat suing, as lawyers, or an advocate, or anyone can still advise on what might be the best course of action. He came out pretty quickly to refute the slant it was given. He likely has a good idea about how these things play out.

She may not be able to sue him in the US but it would harm his standing and career if he did say that in the way you suggest. Those in the US can't take pot shots at those located elsewhere, like the UK, thinking they are 'beyond the law' and neither can those in the UK. These virtual borders or arbitrary firewalls are a weak defence. To sue someone, or to threaten that, is not the only course of action.

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The denial seems weird given he did say it, albeit in a jokey way.

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Sometimes humor doesn't come across the way we want it. What he might have meant and what people saw it as may be two very different things. Happens to all of us, even to professional comedians.

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I think the Glinner post should have stood because regardless of dodgy editing, there was something to his comments. He just pulled back but he was still rather dishonest. I used to be a fan of his, not so much now.

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Good, I likes the Stewart. This one anyway 😉

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And Sir Patrick!

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Still one of the sexiest men on the planet. Real men wear kilts!

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How do we know, if I saw this post and not the other thread, I'd be wait, what?

So it was an error, we all make those.

What I dislike about disappearing stuff was some of the superb and informative comments that were on that thread. About the history of antisemitic tropes that you've now wiped too. How and why this was so incendiary and foolish for some to have lit the blue touch paper on. Why? Now no one can learn from what happened. I would have preferred a clarification, laid out there, plain for all to see and people's dawning realisations as they read through the comments that all was not as it seemed. We need to know this is what happens when three-year-olds with an agenda of me me me get to write 'articles' or play at being journos or publishers to spread rumours online and others who are nice and safe get to stoke hatred. And how it catches us off-guard. It was a brilliant example.

Whoosh! Poof! And just like that in a ball of lovely pink and blue smoke none of it evvveerr happenend. It's madness.

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I don’t like the disappearing stuff, either, as it’s a bit unsettling. In old-fashioned pen and paper double-entry bookkeeping, there’s never to be any erasure, only correcting entries. That way a complete record of activity is kept, mistakes and all, for any auditor to plainly see, and accounting students to learn from. Seems the best policy to me!

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Agreed. It's the same in a few official areas, like UK medical records. That's not so great as it means they can be lengthy and full of mistakes and errors and it relies on good input and records management to include the corrections (ideally where people will see them). And to know how to read them. And parts get lost when transferred or updated. I was always aware that any work note I made could be called in evidence if required. Ideally not burned if it was found to be a little awkward later on. Or subject to a 50 year rule :-)

But the integrity of the contemporaneous record is held. That is a start towards a shared thread, understanding and accountability. There is a genuine fear amongst people that some national records and archives are now cloud and digital with a mishmash of hosts, authors and data owners and any semblance of having 'a' or the 'set' of unified records is lost. Link to a legal ruling? Sorry, page not found, the host doesn't exist. Oops there was a typo when someone cut and paste. No one thought to check how it, the 'original' would be stored to be referred back to if needed. That links to the trans desire to rewrite history and change birth certificates. Not so long ago even copies were frowned upon. Now you can just magic up a new truth?

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There have been a few people removed or banned here after it kicked off a few days back and it all seems a bit fever pitch and insane. I'd written on another post in response to someone else about the censoring or 'removal' of voices in online forums and then this happened. That's what this is. Wonder who's keeping the receipts.

We're uploading our lives and selves online and none of it feels very real or tangible any longer. Disconnected. Behind firewalls. Like ghost profiles that hang around long after people have died and kith and kin are not 'allowed' to 'curate' that themselves, whatever the wishes of those departed. I am a bit raw with a few people now, in my actual real life rewriting narratives, and other people's lives, who perhaps can't speak up now, to suit themselves and 'reframing' events in a palatable light that reflects things better for them. Cherrypicking. Who cares about dissenting voices. No wonder we're all confused and outraged the whole damn time!

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Oh the cognitive dissonance just gets better, I just got a notification that you liked a now deleted comment about a witch hunt...which doesn't exist...page not found...how surreal.

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I saved it just to prove what I suspected. Thanks for the verification!

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I agree. I made a comment about bullying, but when it became clear that there had been dishonesty in how it was presented, I happily (and I was happy, I've no existing beef with Stewart) retracted in a reply. But I left my comment. I've no shame in admitting I was mistaken and no issue with my take on bullying as it stood against the initial complaint as we saw it.

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I was relieved to see how many people, and how quickly they appended a further comment to say exactly that. I thought Graham had been hacked. Hats off to you. Proper, simple apologies, no weasily non-apologies or sorry for your interpretation, or misspeaking that our public life is full of. It restored my faith in a lot. It was a community acting in a dynamic and responsive yet thoughtful way (in the main). It's a rollercoaster and wearying.

If you'll indulge me, there are moments when people do the simple thing that I think most of us can agree is the 'right' thing and things can be seen in a very clear light. What springs to mind is Patrick Hutchinson’s decision to carry an injured far-right protester to safety in the middle of a 'protest' (riot?) about to turn even more heated than it was. And what he said afterwards about his motivations. It was like a parable unfolding before our eyes.

Other things can be so hard to determine and so potentially sensitive I am wary about speaking up, intervening and ploughing in (in life, online and here). I realise it might sound hugely pompous, but then I can't watch this unfold without trying to intervene or support in the ways that I can. Having it on a record of sorts that I have at least noticed. That's instinctive. Each of us must do this as we can, and with as little singeing of our finger tips and care for our mental health and that of others. We must support those under an onslaught of attack-first-think-later. We must pass the duty to keep fighting for rights and justice to others at times. And those most exposed.

I once commented here, months ago, hoping Graham would take care of himself after a few hairy things happened. Someone flamed me in outrage that I was somehow telling him what to do and undermining him. Eh? Quite a bizarre unwarranted attack and I had to keep firm to not attack back from behind my keyboard and chose to keep trying to explain (hence why I end up being so verbose here).

I am surprised but not so surprised and it strains credibility that a famous US news hound political commentator made statements and they could, and were, easily construed as implying things it turns out were not a specific attack but more of a general point that got inferred beyond an inference of an inference. I am also a little surprised that he was so unaware of news reports and doesn't keep up-to-date with what's been happening for years now, when that's his bread and butter and somehow missed the uniquely dedicated and almost universal attacks on one famous woman. And others who speak out. And his timing. Before naming someone, and alluding or questioning their motives, I'd hope that might cross our mind. With great power (and the platform) and all.

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Thanks for your wonderfully thoughtful posts. Actually, I was thinking of begging Graham to take a week or two off, go somewhere nice. I've been involved in lengthier struggles, none anywhere near as strenuous as Graham's, and I know how easily we forget to take care of ourselves in the midst of a storm.

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Fair enough Graham.

I’m relieved that Stewart isn’t being an arse, but you have to wonder about the motives of Newsweek.

Such a lot of debate is like the playground bully who says “let’s you & him fight.”

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Newsweek is trash. Jon Stewart set the record straight. Kudos. And Glinner is on the right side of things.... once again.

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Probably worried she may sue 😂

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People taking a nuanced convo and tenuously turning it into a propaganda episode to make a reasonable man look like a raging misogynist for clicks?? Nooo 😨😂

On a separate note Jon Stewart reminds me a bit of my Da and I’m feeling quite confused about it 😅😅😂

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What were those words Jon Stewart used? Light-hearted was one (two?). These idiots we are talking about have no idea of what that might look like, nor do they have any sense of fun, of humour, of irony or of anything else that exists outside their own narcissistic little world.

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“Your business model is arson.” Go Jon!!

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Right choice. I had wondered what had gotten him to lash out JK Rowling in the first place. Jon Stewart is one of very few people on the liberal left that still champion free speech and expose the self righteous.

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