Wednesday 11 April 2012

No, he's not actually irony-impaired

A very strange third attack on our very own Fern Hill has emanated from the keyboard of one Warren Kinsella. Suffice it to say that we all know that his irony-impaired act is totally disingenuous, and this is hardly the first time he's used this sort of tactic. You can rest assured that he knows that "good friend" is uttered in irony, and that he's playing some sort of game.

My theory is that he thinks that he's responsible for giving Fern some credibility from the whole Hudak business, and that he thinks that Fern is somehow basking in pleasure from his attention, and now that DJ has not proven a reliable ally to a Liberal buddy, he feels obliged to take away what he hilariously thinks he's given. And, likewise obligingly, the tedious Liberal authoritarian followers unsurprisingly follow suit. Couple that with Dawg's awesome act of totally sucking the wind out of WK's sails, and now it's personal, about his ego.

These sorts of tactics might work with buffoons who care and who live and die by what other people think of them, like Stockwell Day (nice takedown, guy), but for us at DJ, this is mainly rubberneckishly instructive, though admittedly less so than the actual megafail trainwreck that was the ProgBlog response to M312. Warren is a bright and very successful guy, but ultimately he too is limited by the things that brought him success, of which he is a clear product.

But DJ comes from another place and has another end. I have been a part of the Canadian political internet since the time when babble, the grandmother of the Canadian progressive internet, was itself young, and, in fact, quite a bit before that. This was also before FD, a site of whose "qualities" and "character" I am intimately familiar. I know very well what sort of loathesome little toads inhabit it, that disingenuous enabler git Connie Fournier included, I know that they mean people like me no good, and worse than no good.

Our Fern comes from the selfsame political culture that existed before Warren was ever any kind of player on the Canadian political internet and will probably exist after he retires from it. She too is well aware of what is at stake, is not a child on the interwebs, and can handle herself thankyouverymuch.

But, as I said, we should all take this as an instructive moment when the political culture of the traditional media and Parliament Hill meet the culture of internet debate and are shocked to discover that it is full of ordinary people with ordinary human relations. Thank you, Warren, for obligingly providing us this little reminder. Have fun with your quixotic little campaign. All of us, Fern included, will sit back and enjoy our popcorn.

19 comments:

fern hill said...

You're making the popcorn? :D

That was lovely, Námo Mandos. I almost had a glimmer of WTF is going on.

Beijing York said...

Bravo, Námo Mandos!

Niles said...

We haven't respected his aw-thorrr-itay?

I dunno. Mr "I don't need no steenking blog aggregators on account I don't got a blog I got a website where I discuss timely topics and allow (some) comments" Kinsella let himself get signed up at PB immediately on the heels of this. Why? To counter the bad PR odor of the exodus? Because he needed to support the place as...what? What import is it to him?

I can only wonder about some of the bloggers still at the aggregator if WK continues on with his "FernHitlerll" series.

I'm not saying bloggers still there are agin Ms Fern or DJ! or the stances taken here. I'm saying it looks like they're going to be deliberately pressed between a rock and a hard place, trapped at a party where WK is given rein to rant loudly.

I guess they will all find their own limits.

double nickel said...

It's a mystery to me why WK involved himself to this degree.

Scotian said...

As explanations for what WK is doing it makes as much sense as anything does, the fact that he is going this far out of his way to smear Fern Hill with what is clearly a bogus frame-up has struck me as more than a bit absurd. I think WK has forgotten that most internet political types regardless of political persuasion are well aware of how easily things get taken out of context, misrepresented all for sake of nasty attack hits. This isn't back in his heyday when you could just put out press releases with this sort of hit and expect your victim to be essentially screwed unless they had similar level resources/access as WK to the media of the day. I've said it before and I'll say it again...one of the women I most revere in my family used to have some contact with WK in the Lib party back in the 80s, she didn't like him and thought his type of attack politics would overall do more harm than good for the party, and watching him over the years and decades since I have to say I think she was correct all along, with this latest bit of his only underscoring that.

Besides, I hear he decided to take Antonia Z's comment she wrote and instead of publishing it created a false Antonia account and put words in her mouth. Got to love the respect for free speech and women being shown in that, especially since she got a screen capture of it and thee was nothing in that comment that deserved censorship except a contrary opinion to Kinsella's by a prominent women's rights media personage. I think that shows exactly how much WK truly values real progressive values including women's and speech when it counts, that being in his actions as opposed to his purty words.

Nice post on the issue Mandos, and it does explain a lot of why he is going so far out of his way on this one. Too bad Kinsella (assuming your theory is correct) doesn't get that Fern Hill had earned her credibility online long before he ever noticed her, and did so all without his help. If anything these attacks are only going to enhance her credibility thanks to how patently obvious they are as a frame-up, and further reduce his own. Your reasoning at least gives some sort of explanation for how something this stupid from someone who does have some brains when he chooses to use them sensibly (regardless of what one thinks of him overall and his choices in using them to deny he has any would be equally absurd IMHO as what he is doing to FH, not that he is showing it in this matter of course), and one thing I have noticed about WK over the years is that he has shall we say a sensitive ego.

deBeauxOs said...

Yep. Bloggers who didn't find cause for concern in the high-handed manner STribe handled DJ!'s request for clarification regarding the support 2 PB members gave Woodworth's M312, may take exception to sharing close quarters with getting-long-in-the-tooth boy-o & has-been political operative libcon and Sun columnist WK.

Whatever. We're out of that mudpit, as are others sickened by STribe's actions.

Bleatmop said...

Gotta love WK's logic on this one

1. Fern Hill is friends with the founder of FD and posts there.
2. Therefore Fern Hill is somehow responsible or associated with every disgusting thing that gets posted there.

Wait, what?

fern hill said...

Yes, that's the logic. But not the facts.

1. fern hill is ironic Facebook-type 'friends' with the founder of FD.

2. fern hill is NOT a member of FD and has NEVER posted there.

3. Therefore fern hill is responsible or associated with. . .

There. Fixed.

Anonymous said...

Hi Fern Hill, i'm just a conservative impressed that you are willing to team up with connie to fight internet censorship. greetings from the other side. if this kind interchange continues, maybe we can solve a few problems! Bye for now, JD

fern hill said...

Welcome, Jim Dandy. It seems a lot of people are coming to the conclusion that rabid partisanship is stupid and bad for the people. It's good for political parties, though, so we'll have a hard time fighting it.

There are many issues on which so-called left and right can agree. My favourite example is prison farms. So-called lefties approve because they're humane and effective. So-called righties like them because they're cost-effective and don't pamper prisoners.

So, why can't we agree that prison farms are good and should be kept?

Beats the hell outta me.

Dr.Dawg said...

Please don't tell WK that I posted on FD--twice! Those were the days. Unfortunately, the intrepid Speech Warriors have banned me from even looking at their site now. My irony meter just exploded.

fern hill said...

Must have some Italian in them. They seem to hold a grudge real good. ;-)

Bleatmop said...

Oh wow. The facts of the story make WK's posts even more ridiculous. Is this guys supposed to be respected or something? I've not even heard of him until just recently.

the regina mom said...

So I've just come from Facebook where I read that WK has blocked our friend AZ on Twitter. Seems he has a long-standing hatred of feminists. In the comments following AZ's status update a woman reveals that when WK was on the student council at Carleton, he tried "term after term" to shut down the women's centre! She says he's "a dick."

Niles said...

Well, WK *had* to block her. After all, she defended Ms Fern and considers her a friend ergo Ms AZ is *also* a friend of FreeDominion and all the things said there.

Evergreen said...

I posted a question on the first link asking where Fern Hill has written about her friendship with Edward Kennedy since the post is titled after Fern Hill but is full of quotes from Edward Kennedy. Being a newb I didn't take a screen cap of the post awaiting moderation, but it is now gone. Funny thing is I thought it was a legitimate question, and no it wasn't full of snark. Go figure. Speaks volumes.

fern hill said...

Hi, Evergreen.

A lot of people have said they left comments there that never appeared.

I guess they should be grateful that they didn't get the AntoniaZ treatment.

Evergreen said...

Wow - I just checked that out. How does this guy keep any credibility with anyone? Unbelievable.

fern hill said...

I think a lot of people are rethinking that whole 'credibility' and 'WK' in the same sentence thing.

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