A brutal line from a brutal piece, about a nonprofit founder that took advantage of post-George Floyd fundraising largesse to enjoy a lavish lifestyle while producing nothing.
"And as the months drifted by and it became clear that the American establishment was perfectly able to absorb what was happening, despite all the angst, and as the forces of culture war steadily pecked away at that short-lived feeling of unity, the inevitable discovery of million dollar mansions bought with donated cash helped push a lot of previously-excitable liberals into their quite and embarrassed era."
I repeat myself over and over.
If the Establishment is good at nothing else, it is very good at figuring out who can be co-opted, who can be bought off, who can be neutralized, who can be ignored.
"What the hell happened to liberals and to the media that they controlled? Why did the default media worker morph from being a center-left technocratic Ezra Klein wannabe into an intersectionality-worshipping radlib with vague economic politics? "
Because intersectional dipshittery, endless and endlessly performative namecalling, demands for more diverse oppressors, none of that changes the way the economic pie gets sliced.
"As I point out in the relevant chapter of the book, even nonprofits that are guilty of no illegality have exquisitely fine-tuned systems for turning your money into ash."
Look at The Clinton Foundation, which is basically an influence peddling scheme and jobs program for Friends Of Bill.
I do believe these foundations are much more than that ... think of the possibilities. Foundations can donate fully funded staffers to congressional offices ... to work on legislation —let me send a fully funded lawyer to your office to write the bills I want written.
I cringed at that exact line in the piece when I read it, and also had a pretty good feeling this piece would be on your radar.
But yeah, the cringiest part of the whole story, by far, is the fact that the guy was originally just designing an app that could consolidate police complaints (I guess?), but once that much-simpler idea couldn't be accomplished, he went in a total tech-bro type of direction and claimed they were going to create an alternative to 911. I'm literally laughing as I type that out.
Worth noting there was another piece in the NYT recently about the money being spent by the CEO of GLADD. It's a different concept, but there is a larger theme there as well. GLADD won nearly all their battles, and now they don't exactly know what to do with their organization (nor its money!).
And yet you're writing this in the comment section for an article that excoriated the pieties of mainstream liberalism. Yeah, there's a lot of bias and stupidity in the media but even at the NY Times there's still people that do good work.
They "do good work" ... months or even years after it's socially acceptable to do so in their peer circle. No bonus points are awarded for that, I'm afraid.
I don't know much about the Kresge Foundation, whose spokesperson gave that stunning quote about no expectations, even if plenty is available about it online. But that piece should make donors say: WTF
"the writer would have to be well-respected and have good liberal credentials."
There is no single person so well respected to pull this off. There has been a parade of respectable people who questioned what was going on, only to have some mild tweet from 2011 recast as incontrovertible racism and their entire career discredited. Even Obama would instantly be un-personed the moment he breaks ranks.
My mom used to say that the only way to convince someone your way was better was to let them try it their way. I thought that was cynical to the point of hopelessness, but it keeps being true.
Maybe it is as simple as getting Liz Warren to explain her turn from sharp Harvard Law professor with expertise in the financial services industry to a tweeting and meming machine seeking clicks and donations over policy and election wins.
Funny enough, if we put the whole Yelling Woke Era as 2012 thru 2022, that's nearly my entire 30s (I turned 40 in November 2023). Here's hoping my 40s deliver something better and less unpleasant.
I doubt any news org will step forward for a post-mortem of The Racial Reckoning. They're (most of them) clearly too busy selling us the new version of the Kamala I-phone.
1. Twitter put media, academia, the professional political and non-profit class, vain celebrities, and the shitposting rabble all in a panopticon for a decade.
2. Donald Trump became the President
3. We all got locked inside for months due to an unprecedented and confusing public crisis, leaving everybody unable to even momentarily escape #1 and #2.
The comments section every NYT article that spends some time critically analyzing the Dems/Kamala/etc. are full of tote-baggers lamenting the MAGA takeover of the grey lady.
I'm talking run-of-the-mill, toothless "this messaging needs to be more clear" opinion pieces written by paint-by-numbers liberals. It's goofballworld.
I read the NYT daily, and dive into comments sections quite a bit. Yes, there are some of these types, but I don't see it the same way you do. I don't find those reactions overwhelming at all.
Interesting. I have read the NYT for decades and generally scan the comments for articles where there should be decent discussion. There seldom is...usually one or two divergent viewpoints from the inevitably narrative-supporting article followed by a long Greek chorus of how the NYT has lost its way and how can people with such thoughts be allowed to read it. Maybe you get a different edition...
I think we both know I don't get a different edition, but yeah, have definitely never read anyone stating they're not sure how people with such thoughts be allowed to read it. Ever.
Oh, I get annoyed by those types. I just think the vast majority of readers/commenters actually largely agree with most of Freddie's readers. Anecdotally, that's true of most liberals I personally know as well.
Interesting. Anecdotally, I've begun to find that most of the liberals I personally know agree with Freddie except when related to their primary obsession or interest, meaning they've pulled back from full wokeness except for one aspect of it, the aspect that is most clearly linked to their own identity concerns.
I suppose that is a good example of where we differ, because I just looked at the comments, and I see a bunch of people criticizing Stephens' piece, but I don't see people bemoaning the fact that Stephens is writing for the NYT, or people lamenting a MAGA takeover of the NYT.
Stephens is a conservative who dislikes Trump a great deal, dislikes Democrats a great deal, and his pieces reflect that, which I think is totally fine.
You keep saying this, but they are very few and very far between and they seldom if ever delve into topics like this which is where they should be focused.
I agree, and I think it's time to admit to ourselves and others that privately most of us knew all of the politics that came out of that were a crock, but we either felt too scared or too shitty to say it. Going through the motions was the path of least resistance on most strata of society, from corporate America (throw thousands a dollars at DEI initiatives and call it a day) to the individual level (put up a couple of signs, buy absolution via a couple of modest donations, give lip service to reforming the police or "defunding" if you liked your politics a little spicy).
I used to bash the hippie boomers for being ineffective, but sometimes you just have to eat your words. The entire left-wing resurgence that started around 2008, gained steam with the Sanders campaigns, and crested and vanished in the summer of 2020 amounted to a a set of riots in response of George Floyd and CHAZ/CHOP. People talk about the riots a lot, but the absolute death rattle of the entire movement was CHAZ. Definitely a worse ending than the Summer of Love. I idolized Hunter S. Thompson as a young man, but that passage from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas only gets better with time.
"History is hard to know because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of "history" it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time--and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened. [...]
There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda...You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning...
And that, I think was the handle--that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting--on our side or theirs. We all had the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave...
So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark--that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back."
Time gets the last laugh, we are exactly like our parents' generation in the end I guess.
The self-reflection is a good start, but what’s it going to take for you to not be a coward next time? In a few years there will be a new cause, and I’m guessing you’ll do the exact same thing.
“Your worst sin is that you've destroyed and betrayed yourself for nothing.”
Can't speak for anyone else, but some of my resistance to woke stuff was wrong. For instance, I started a debate about pious yard signs -- and in the middle of it, a black person in my city got shot for going onto somebody's porch to ask for help. I had to admit that those signs would be useful if they signified 'It's safe to go on this porch.'
I'm lucky that I have a bunch of FB friends who will engage in such a debate. But I didn't start too many of them, because many of my opinions about performing wokeness are based in personal irritation, suspicion of movements in general, and religion, which I don't feel I should vent at people who don't share them -- and which I could not honestly defend in a reasoned debate.
In general, the more personally irritating I find something, the less able I find myself to oppose it. (With the exception of fake Winnie-the-Pooh quotes, about which I am That Person.)
"And as the months drifted by and it became clear that the American establishment was perfectly able to absorb what was happening, despite all the angst, and as the forces of culture war steadily pecked away at that short-lived feeling of unity, the inevitable discovery of million dollar mansions bought with donated cash helped push a lot of previously-excitable liberals into their quite and embarrassed era."
I repeat myself over and over.
If the Establishment is good at nothing else, it is very good at figuring out who can be co-opted, who can be bought off, who can be neutralized, who can be ignored.
"What the hell happened to liberals and to the media that they controlled? Why did the default media worker morph from being a center-left technocratic Ezra Klein wannabe into an intersectionality-worshipping radlib with vague economic politics? "
Because intersectional dipshittery, endless and endlessly performative namecalling, demands for more diverse oppressors, none of that changes the way the economic pie gets sliced.
"As I point out in the relevant chapter of the book, even nonprofits that are guilty of no illegality have exquisitely fine-tuned systems for turning your money into ash."
Look at The Clinton Foundation, which is basically an influence peddling scheme and jobs program for Friends Of Bill.
All totally legal and vetted by pricey lawyers.
I do believe these foundations are much more than that ... think of the possibilities. Foundations can donate fully funded staffers to congressional offices ... to work on legislation —let me send a fully funded lawyer to your office to write the bills I want written.
Good point. I guess that comes under "influence peddling"?
Excellent Freddie!
I cringed at that exact line in the piece when I read it, and also had a pretty good feeling this piece would be on your radar.
But yeah, the cringiest part of the whole story, by far, is the fact that the guy was originally just designing an app that could consolidate police complaints (I guess?), but once that much-simpler idea couldn't be accomplished, he went in a total tech-bro type of direction and claimed they were going to create an alternative to 911. I'm literally laughing as I type that out.
Worth noting there was another piece in the NYT recently about the money being spent by the CEO of GLADD. It's a different concept, but there is a larger theme there as well. GLADD won nearly all their battles, and now they don't exactly know what to do with their organization (nor its money!).
When is the media critical of themselves? Can you say Matt Lauer? Brian Williams? How long did their shenanigans go on before action was taken?
Let’s face it. The media in this country is lazy, lacking curiosity and they get used constantly. And who likes to admit they got played?
More like "abuse me more, I like it!"
And yet you're writing this in the comment section for an article that excoriated the pieties of mainstream liberalism. Yeah, there's a lot of bias and stupidity in the media but even at the NY Times there's still people that do good work.
They "do good work" ... months or even years after it's socially acceptable to do so in their peer circle. No bonus points are awarded for that, I'm afraid.
Substack is the redoubt of independent journalism. Racket News has been a bright star. But who got the Pulitzers?
thanks. My money will flow to those I want to give it too.
Thanks for letting me know that all (if not most) non profit organizations are in it for the money....and their cause.
Who's not.
I don't know much about the Kresge Foundation, whose spokesperson gave that stunning quote about no expectations, even if plenty is available about it online. But that piece should make donors say: WTF
"the writer would have to be well-respected and have good liberal credentials."
There is no single person so well respected to pull this off. There has been a parade of respectable people who questioned what was going on, only to have some mild tweet from 2011 recast as incontrovertible racism and their entire career discredited. Even Obama would instantly be un-personed the moment he breaks ranks.
My mom used to say that the only way to convince someone your way was better was to let them try it their way. I thought that was cynical to the point of hopelessness, but it keeps being true.
Maybe it is as simple as getting Liz Warren to explain her turn from sharp Harvard Law professor with expertise in the financial services industry to a tweeting and meming machine seeking clicks and donations over policy and election wins.
She tried the wonk route, being super planned for everything. It only worked about a tenth as well as tweeting nonsense. So I get why.
I'm not mad. I'm just disappointed.
What has tweeting nonsense accomplished?
Funny enough, if we put the whole Yelling Woke Era as 2012 thru 2022, that's nearly my entire 30s (I turned 40 in November 2023). Here's hoping my 40s deliver something better and less unpleasant.
This does seem entirely coincidental but also seems like there is something to this as it maps my experience as well.
I doubt any news org will step forward for a post-mortem of The Racial Reckoning. They're (most of them) clearly too busy selling us the new version of the Kamala I-phone.
The 'how' is pretty obvious, right?
1. Twitter put media, academia, the professional political and non-profit class, vain celebrities, and the shitposting rabble all in a panopticon for a decade.
2. Donald Trump became the President
3. We all got locked inside for months due to an unprecedented and confusing public crisis, leaving everybody unable to even momentarily escape #1 and #2.
It was a perfect storm.
“Why haven’t we had a real postmortem about all of this?”
Because anyone who did it would immediately be coded as right wing. One of your pervious pieces addressed it well.
https://open.substack.com/pub/freddiedeboer/p/it-seems-like-the-reckoning-has-become
The comments section every NYT article that spends some time critically analyzing the Dems/Kamala/etc. are full of tote-baggers lamenting the MAGA takeover of the grey lady.
I'm talking run-of-the-mill, toothless "this messaging needs to be more clear" opinion pieces written by paint-by-numbers liberals. It's goofballworld.
I read the NYT daily, and dive into comments sections quite a bit. Yes, there are some of these types, but I don't see it the same way you do. I don't find those reactions overwhelming at all.
Interesting. I have read the NYT for decades and generally scan the comments for articles where there should be decent discussion. There seldom is...usually one or two divergent viewpoints from the inevitably narrative-supporting article followed by a long Greek chorus of how the NYT has lost its way and how can people with such thoughts be allowed to read it. Maybe you get a different edition...
I think we both know I don't get a different edition, but yeah, have definitely never read anyone stating they're not sure how people with such thoughts be allowed to read it. Ever.
Well that's awesome you don't get annoyed by them.
I do.
Oh, I get annoyed by those types. I just think the vast majority of readers/commenters actually largely agree with most of Freddie's readers. Anecdotally, that's true of most liberals I personally know as well.
Interesting. Anecdotally, I've begun to find that most of the liberals I personally know agree with Freddie except when related to their primary obsession or interest, meaning they've pulled back from full wokeness except for one aspect of it, the aspect that is most clearly linked to their own identity concerns.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/27/opinion/harris-walz-interview.html#commentsContainer
Was reading the linked article, plugged my nose, and opened the comments, whose contents explain what I was getting at earlier.
I suppose that is a good example of where we differ, because I just looked at the comments, and I see a bunch of people criticizing Stephens' piece, but I don't see people bemoaning the fact that Stephens is writing for the NYT, or people lamenting a MAGA takeover of the NYT.
Stephens is a conservative who dislikes Trump a great deal, dislikes Democrats a great deal, and his pieces reflect that, which I think is totally fine.
Is there anything more pathetic than all of the fury and insanity of BLM in 2020 collapsing into "Vote Kamala"?
Also, the NY Times still has good people that do good journalism.
You keep saying this, but they are very few and very far between and they seldom if ever delve into topics like this which is where they should be focused.
I like Eli Saslow.
Name them!
Eli saslow.
I agree, and I think it's time to admit to ourselves and others that privately most of us knew all of the politics that came out of that were a crock, but we either felt too scared or too shitty to say it. Going through the motions was the path of least resistance on most strata of society, from corporate America (throw thousands a dollars at DEI initiatives and call it a day) to the individual level (put up a couple of signs, buy absolution via a couple of modest donations, give lip service to reforming the police or "defunding" if you liked your politics a little spicy).
I used to bash the hippie boomers for being ineffective, but sometimes you just have to eat your words. The entire left-wing resurgence that started around 2008, gained steam with the Sanders campaigns, and crested and vanished in the summer of 2020 amounted to a a set of riots in response of George Floyd and CHAZ/CHOP. People talk about the riots a lot, but the absolute death rattle of the entire movement was CHAZ. Definitely a worse ending than the Summer of Love. I idolized Hunter S. Thompson as a young man, but that passage from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas only gets better with time.
"History is hard to know because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of "history" it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time--and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened. [...]
There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda...You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning...
And that, I think was the handle--that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting--on our side or theirs. We all had the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave...
So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark--that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back."
Time gets the last laugh, we are exactly like our parents' generation in the end I guess.
The self-reflection is a good start, but what’s it going to take for you to not be a coward next time? In a few years there will be a new cause, and I’m guessing you’ll do the exact same thing.
“Your worst sin is that you've destroyed and betrayed yourself for nothing.”
Can't speak for anyone else, but some of my resistance to woke stuff was wrong. For instance, I started a debate about pious yard signs -- and in the middle of it, a black person in my city got shot for going onto somebody's porch to ask for help. I had to admit that those signs would be useful if they signified 'It's safe to go on this porch.'
I'm lucky that I have a bunch of FB friends who will engage in such a debate. But I didn't start too many of them, because many of my opinions about performing wokeness are based in personal irritation, suspicion of movements in general, and religion, which I don't feel I should vent at people who don't share them -- and which I could not honestly defend in a reasoned debate.
In general, the more personally irritating I find something, the less able I find myself to oppose it. (With the exception of fake Winnie-the-Pooh quotes, about which I am That Person.)