Sometimes the Crocodile Eats the Appeaser First
[guest post by JVW]
Those of you who take the Churchillian admonition seriously will find yourselves shaking your heads sadly at this story:
Patrick Harrington spent nearly two decades building up his series of yoga studios in the Denver area which operate under the name Kindness Yoga. When the COVID-19 shutdown went into effect, Kindness Yoga received $300,000 in emergency aid from the government, which it used to pay its employees for eight weeks. With Colorado businesses beginning to reemerge, Mr. Harrington had hoped the worst was behind them and that business could gradually return to normal with a July 1 reopening date planned.
But not in these banal and cruel days. Instead of reopening, Kindness Yoga has announced its permanent closure, a victim of the hyper-sensitivity around race and gender issues. A detailed article, which appeared in a journalist-owned publication called the Colorado Sun, is a fascinating read — detailed, perplexing, depressing, infuriating — so if you have ten or fifteen minutes I recommend reading it all, but here is a taste:
Harrington, a straight, white guy who expanded Kindness to nine studios and 160 employees across metro Denver, announced last week that he was closing them all after a handful of yoga teachers, including a Black woman and a transgender man, called out Kindness on social media for “performative activism” and “tokenization of Black and brown bodies.” The teachers’ public comments, following a Black Lives Matter post on Kindness’ Instagram page that they termed too little, too late, evoked a backlash that was fierce and immediate.
Within 48 hours, as the nightly protests over police violence unfolded around the Capitol in Denver, just three blocks from Kindness’ Capitol Hill studio, the yoga company received nearly 400 emails from students who were upset, including many wanting to cancel their memberships. A week later, the emails had reached 800 and counting. Harrington has yet to read all of them, but with each one he opened, the direction his already precarious business was heading grew ever more clear.
The owner of Kindness Yoga, and one of the most well-known yogis in Denver, is struggling to piece together the words to explain what happened — in the span of a week — to his once-stellar reputation and his 19-year-old business. He is stunned, though remorseful. He is eager to speak up, yet on edge for fear of saying anything that could make all of this any worse.
”My goal is to represent our attempts at being a diverse, inclusive place where people felt like they belonged,” he begins, slowly. “I may not say things perfectly … I’m practicing learning how to speak in a way that is more inclusive and caring of diversity.”
Already operating in the red, Kindness was struggling to make it through the three-month pandemic shutdown. The membership cancellations were more than the business could withstand. Harrington and his wife, Cameron, are now putting their Denver home on the market to dig out of the financial hole.
Lest you think that Mr. Harrington is just another troglodyte right-winger like — well — like I am, know that from the very beginning Kindness Yoga has hosted “people of color” exclusive yoga sessions in which “white allies” were asked not to attend. From the very beginning the studios used gender-neutral bathrooms, long before they were a progressive fad, and they held LGBTQ yoga workshops to earn their rainbow merit badge. Though the business did run on a membership model, they also accepted drop-ins who were asked to pay a session fee of whatever they could afford, with some struggling yoga adherents paying as little as one dollar to participate.
But nothing is ever really entirely ducky in the world of grievances, is it? Even as Mr. Harrington and crew thought they were building a progressive yoga studio, beneath the placid surface there were rumblings of discontent:
But outside the public space of yoga class, some teachers who identify as gay or trans or as BIPOC (Black or Indigenous people of color) were asking for change and said they got no meaningful response from management.
The grievances aired on social media in the last several days described — with few specifics — a culture where the voices of minorities and LGBTQ teachers were not heard. In interviews with The Colorado Sun, yoga teachers Jordan Smiley, who is Indigenous and transgender, and Davidia Turner, who is Black, said the white management team at Kindness was not willing to put in the work to make change.
For example, Turner said, the board of directors declined to hire an outside diversity expert as she suggested, instead “cherry-picking” certain diverse members of the staff that they felt comfortable talking to about race and inclusivity. After hearing that Kindness’ website was too white-centric, management then invited people of color and other minorities to an hours-long yoga photoshoot. They were accused of “tokenism.”
And of course social media plays a starring role too. Kindness Yoga, like I suppose most companies whose customers are active consumers of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tik-Tok, and the like, employs an outside firm to help with social media, and it would appear that the firm oftentimes schedules social media posts for weeks in advance. Thus, in the immediate aftermath of the George Floyd killing and the subsequent mass protests the company’s Instagram page featured a banal post asking the company’s followers to divulge their favorite game. Unsurprisingly, this frivolity didn’t go over well with the activist crowd.
As you read the article, it becomes clear that it was Ms. Turner and Mr. Smiley (ironic name alert) who were beating the drums the loudest to punish Kindness Yoga for its transgressions (pun unintended). Both instructors are of an age where they almost assuredly grew up surrounded by participation trophies, and neither one strikes me as a good candidate for empathetic understanding of life experiences outside of their own. Indeed, both of them now plan to open their own yoga businesses, so we can only wish them well as they navigate the world of studio leases, licensing, incorporation, insurance, and taxes. Naturally Ms. Turner wants to have a yoga studio geared towards people of color and Mr. Smiley wants his clientele to heavily include the LGBTQ community, so three cheers for woke segregation. And in the perfect capstone to the entitlement mentality, let’s not let this paragraph escape notice:
Neither Smiley nor Turner talked directly to Harrington about their complaints before the Instagram posts. Turner said she followed the “chain of command” and talked to other managers instead. Smiley said talking to Harrington “would be a danger to my mental health.”
It would be a lot easier to be fully sympathetic of the situation in which that Mr. Harrington finds himself, were it not for the fact that he seems to be far too obtuse to internalize any real lessons from the loss of his business. Though the article quotes other minority and LGBTQ employees of Kindness Yoga lamenting the closure and questioning the motives of the two disgruntled instructors, Mr. Harrington appears to be intent on marinating in white guilt:
Harrington, who filled up the room when he taught a yoga class, says now that he didn’t understand the depth of Kindness’ role on racial issues.
“I didn’t realize the responsibility that our organization had to be a voice for matters of race,” Harrington said. “And it happened so fast that when we tried to speak … it showed up as performative, or too little, too late.”
No, Mr. Harrington, your responsibility was to provide a competent and productive yoga experience for your customers, not to be crusaders on matters of social justice. Maybe if more companies understood this simple fact they wouldn’t be torn asunder by the predictable drama from the snowflake crowd. I suspect that deep down Mr. Harrington actually gets it, but he’s far too committed to the plot to go off-script:
“Did our community in Denver gain something by Kindness Yoga closing its doors?” Harrington said. “I struggle to understand the benefit of this outcome for white people, people of color, LGBTQ+ people. I don’t see the benefit of taking us down this way.”
After a beat, he added: “My privilege could have me blind to that. I’m trying to learn.”
Sometimes the crocodile eats the appeaser first.
– JVW
Leftist Colorado business closes doors over being “insufficiently woke,” owner immediately descends into navel-gazing and progressive self-flagellation…c’mon, Britta Perry HAS to be involved in this, right?
(And a very special RIP to “Advanced Dungeons and Dragons,” once one of Community’s best episodes, now a streaming casualty of Netflix’s inability to understand comedy. This is not the Chang we can believe in.)
Demosthenes (7fae81) — 6/30/2020 @ 3:46 pmSometimes it’s not edible and should be flushed… https://twitter.com/ProjectLincoln/status/1276531053205823489?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1276531053205823489%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ace.mu.nu%2F
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 6/30/2020 @ 3:46 pm“ Smiley said talking to Harrington “would be a danger to my mental health.””
_ _
Too late, already damaged.
harkin (5af287) — 6/30/2020 @ 3:50 pm_
I love watching leftists eat their own.
Gryph (08c844) — 6/30/2020 @ 4:01 pmI don’t understand why some people can’t look at a situation, go “oh, grow up.” and move on with their lives. Kindness yoga’s customers should have looked at the studio, decided if it met their needs as a yoga studio, and gone with that. And Kindness yoga apparently couldn’t win in that situation, so what would motivate anyone to change in the future.
I have someone on my social media who constantly constantly constantly reblogs super performance-woke stuff (she’s an old friend, that’s why I haven’t unfollowed her). Then she gets mad if you don’t reblog all that stuff. I’m like, “lady, as part of my job I try to ensure that we are not overlooking minority and poor kids who are smart and motivated but haven’t had the advantages some of our other students have had, and make sure they get the same opportunities. That’s real life anti-racism stuff. And you are mad at me because I didn’t reblog your 800th post today?”
Performance whatever isn’t actually whatever, it’s just a show indicating you belong to this or that group. (this is the same problem I have with, frex, people who say “wuhan flu.”)
/rant
Nic (896fdf) — 6/30/2020 @ 4:36 pmSometimes I think there is another 1% — not the rich, but those marginal personalities that cannot exist knowing that someone, somewhere, is enjoying life. Not even 1% probably. As Tyrion Lannister put it so succinctly, “Heads, pikes, walls.”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 6/30/2020 @ 4:54 pmWhat is scary is that students, who are presumably there to learn, are instead making life and death judgements about others based on god-knows-what input from their “mentors.” The crime? Apparently the owners did not hop-to when some loony-tunes activist with nothing better to do decided to make demands. Oh, wait, he didn’t tell anyone the demands, and the owner failed to read his mind.
We need to vote these people off the island, and soon.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 6/30/2020 @ 4:58 pmKevin M (ab1c11) — 6/30/2020 @ 4:58 pm
How could they justify ex post facto rules if people need to be told what it is they should not do?
Sammy Finkelman (70b0bc) — 6/30/2020 @ 5:02 pmWhat is society to do with a tiny minority whose GOAL is to make life impossible for anyone who does not cater to their every whim? I’m thinking that the stocks would be a good addition to the criminal justice system.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 6/30/2020 @ 5:13 pmNow this truly a waste…2 naturalized or 2nd gen Americans who likely escaped Communism fighting over woke culinary B.
urbanleftbehind (9b68ac) — 6/30/2020 @ 5:51 pmS.
I read this as two very disgruntled employees who decided now was a good time to burn down the house.
Then she gets mad if you don’t reblog all that stuff
I have a basic rule for Facebook. I never repost a meme or anything like that. No matter how praiseworthy or outstanding the causen, memes and chain posts die with me.
Kishnevi (dd21f2) — 6/30/2020 @ 5:51 pm@11 I’m not on facebook, but mostly I reblog on whim. Most frequently art photos.
Nic (896fdf) — 6/30/2020 @ 5:58 pmThe material world is an illusion. Attachment to material things creates suffering because attachments are transient and loss is inevitable. Thus suffering will necessarily follow.
nk (1d9030) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:00 pmOff-topic (mostly) but since this is snarky political correctness thread…anybody else looking forward to seeing Hamilton on teevee this weekend?
The connection to this thread is that the block-buster (and woke, from what I understand) musical casts African-American and Latino actors as America’s lily-white founding fathers. I have no problem with that and think it’s clever, but it seems silly that it’s considered an outrage for white actors to portray minority characters, but perfectly fine for minorities to play white characters.
People should cheer Hamilton’s inclusive (and extremely successful) approach and try to emulate it.
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:08 pmThese people are nuts. Why would anyone support them or anyone like them?
NJRob (508cb3) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:14 pmIt is the Wuhan fku Nic. That’s where the virus was uncovered. Your PC indoctrination doesn’t change that fact. Similar to this owner thinking he was an ally and thd crocodile wasn’t going to eat him.
NJRob (508cb3) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:17 pmIt (a play with whites as historically famous POC) would have be as a show in a speakeasy setting or a highly securestream, and probably under the auspices of a Dave Chappelle or Chris Rock. I thought Hamilton also had some Asians, at least some of the southeast (Filipino, Vietnamese) kind.
urbanleftbehind (9b68ac) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:19 pmThis also strikes me as an actionable claim where 2 employees deliberately destroyed a business so they could build their own and profit off the destruction.
NJRob (508cb3) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:20 pmThat happens a lot in the crossfit box realm, where Yelp attacks are deployed by ex-coowners seeking to launch there own box.
urbanleftbehind (9b68ac) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:22 pmOK, so that means our whole solar system could be, like, one tiny atom in the fingernail of some other giant being…
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:25 pmIf that is the form of your dream, but it is still only a dream.
nk (1d9030) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:54 pmIt is the Wuhan fk u, Nic.
Teh Big Kiss Off!
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 6/30/2020 @ 6:57 pm@20. W/apologies to Belushi’s Bluto: “Do the “Pluto”/Do the Pluto”… 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:00 pmIts funny how they are feeding the crocs, black knight style.
Narciso (7404b5) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:01 pmThe material world is an illusion. Attachment to material things creates suffering because attachments are transient and loss is inevitable.
Dude, I’ve got that George Harrison album too.
(Kidding, kidding. I actually like George Harrison. He’s clearly the best of the Beatles, followed by Ringo, Paul, and that other guy.)
JVW (ee64e4) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:05 pmThis story annoys me. When I go to a yoga class, I don’t anyone to notice me or the color of my skin. I want the instructor to be so focused on teaching a well paced class and making sure that sure that no one’s downward dog is ready to crash and burn. IOW, I want an instructor who makes it his mission to have a successful yoga class. Bring the wokeness bullshit into the class while I am struggling to maintain a pose, and it will be the last class I attend with said instructor. I am not paying for someone to notice my brown skin and adjust their instruction accordingly. What exactly do these people want? Do they think their skin color or sexual identification makes for a better yoga instructor or class? Do they think that, if the owner of the studio doesn’t regularly acknowledge (and praise them) for their differences, he needs to be cancelled? It’s unfortunate that the studio owner caved to the mob – and worse, caved but isn’t even really sure why. These people should never presume that they are worthy of a warrior pose ever again, because they are so far from being any sort of warrior…
Dana (25e0dc) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:08 pmP.S. Great choice for post title, JVW.
Dana (25e0dc) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:08 pmIsn’t yoga a part of that whole Hindu/Buddhist thing? Realign your chakras, and develop your atman, and what happens to you in this life is what your karma ordained for you as a lesson for your next life? If it was this man’s karma to strive only to have the material world which he embraced dissipate from him as though it had never happened, isn’t it a lesson in vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas?
nk (1d9030) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:16 pmHaiku, that was an accidental typo. Funny, but accidental.
Typing from Williamsburg, VA. What a beautiful, historic place. Hope it stays that way and the left doesn’t burn it to the ground.
NJRob (508cb3) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:18 pmIt is the Wuhan flu Nic
It’s Covid19.
Kishnevi (46054d) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:18 pmIt’s not a flu virus in the first place.
In the second place “Wuhan flu” is simply a phrase that Trump and his enablers use to deflect attention from his massive screwups. Remember, had Trump acted merely competently at the start, the effects of the virus would be far less and the economic impacts therefore much less severe, and Trump would be looking at a possible landslide victory from voters assured he could handle the job.
It came from china, it was covered up by the who, whose head owes his office to xi, thats not even arguable. The main ports of entry in europe were through italy who spread it west. The most reliable treatment has been demonized by an incredibly cynical exercise in bad science. The same bad science that enabled the shutdowns and gave a free pass to the rioters
Narciso (7404b5) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:23 pmWhen S.E. Hinton novels and current zeitgeist intersect:
urbanleftbehind (9b68ac) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:47 pmhttp://news.yahoo.com/1-2-oklahoma-officers-shot-215216452.html
@14 I saw it in London last year and really recommend it. Even if you aren’t into musicals, it’s very guy friendly.
@16 you mean I shouldn’t be calling it what the medical professionals do, instead of what the far right tribalist want me to call it? Nope, that’s just far right virtue signalling and is no better than far left virtue signaling.
Nic (896fdf) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:51 pm30. I’ve noticed something: Most of the people scared sh!tless over the Kung Flu (yeah, I went there) are NeverTrump types. Most of the “Let’s get the economy going!” crowd seem to be Trump humpers. Of course, there are exceptions, but it seems to be a pretty good rule of thumb.
Gryph (08c844) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:52 pm33. If you used the proper medical name for every disease and drug out there, you wouldn’t sound any smarter because most laypeople wouldn’t even know what you were talking about to begin with.
Gryph (08c844) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:01 pmPeople who understand that taming the virus is a pre-requisite for restoring the economy are reality-based. Any who takes Trump thinking seriously isn’t.
Today Captain Ed at HotAir linked to a report just released by Goldman Sachs on the economic benefits of masks:
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:05 pm36. You’re forgetting Dave, by definition a rule of thumb is not applicable to every situation. I dislike Trump severely. I didn’t vote for him in 2016 and I won’t in 2020. These are absolutely non-negotiable for me. AND I am also in the “quit being a baby and get the economy moving again” crowd. The cure is still proving to be worse than the disease.
And it will take more than Freak-o-nomic bullscat from Goldman Sachs to change my mind.
Gryph (08c844) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:10 pmRight, right – you’re smarter than all the medical doctors AND Wall Street too.
Remind me again why you’re not rich?
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:14 pm@35 While true, they do know this time.
Nic (896fdf) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:16 pmThe Goldman Sachs report is based on data.
Your dismissal of it because it disagrees with what you want to believe just illustrates what I said about the difference between reality-based (scientific) and magical (Trump) thinking.
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 8:19 pm“ Because this is so very much a TWA (3rd wave antiracism) moment and because its perspective has been creeping into the fabric of educated American society over several years, we are becoming desensitized to how ancillary to civic progress is this peculiar, furious, and fantastical indoctrination.
We seek sociopolitical change, yet we find on the vanguards a contingent who have founded a new religion. They insist hotly that they “really are right,” because racism is bad, isn’t it?
Indeed it is. But it is also bad for increasing numbers of Americans, out of fear for their social acceptance in wider society, pretend to subscribe to the semi-coherent tenets of an anti-empirical faith feigning higher wisdom with big words and manipulative phraseology.
They see themselves as the heirs of bygone heroes who would actually have been sickened by them. Progressive Americans’ task is not to learn charismatic but purposeless self-flagellational routines, but to fight injustices with sense and logic. Only TWA adherents think the two are the same.“
https://reason.com/2020/06/29/kneeling-in-the-church-of-social-justice/
harkin (5af287) — 6/30/2020 @ 10:21 pm_
Dana (25e0dc) — 6/30/2020 @ 7:08 pm
They generally have a variety of insecurities and anxieties. They are bullies. They don’t like themselves and the only way to feel better about that is to attack other people.
No, or yes, maybe. It doesn’t really have anything to do with this. Anyone who triggers their insecurities must be attacked. Things like color or identification are simply attack vectors.
This really only makes the problem worse since this would be seen as patronizing or condescending.
Exactly, this is why they need to destroy anyone who is. In the end, it won’t help them but they don’t know that and they think if there aren’t examples of people who are worthy it won’t be obvious.
frosty (f27e97) — 6/30/2020 @ 10:26 pmharkin (5af287) — 6/30/2020 @ 10:21 pm
This religious angle is interesting when you realize the government is letting it paint on the road and hang banners out of state department buildings in foreign countries.
frosty (f27e97) — 6/30/2020 @ 10:31 pmIts that chesterton (apocryphal) if you believe in nothing substantial, youll fall for anything thats what two generations of institutional decay have yielded.
Narciso (7404b5) — 6/30/2020 @ 10:41 pmJVW and others have extrapolated a long way based on one (presumably not so objective) guy’s side of the story.
800 irate customers sounds like there might be something more to it than just a couple disgruntled and out of control employees.
I’m just pointing out that I doubt anybody here really knows the full story of what happened, and why.
Dave (1bb933) — 6/30/2020 @ 11:57 pmWhy on Earth would anyone want to know the full story? It’s yoga in Denver.
If you really want to help a brother out, drop a note to Disney to drop that ridiculous Mandalorian crapora, and use the money to bring back Phineas and Ferb and Milo Murphy’s Law. Do it for the children!
nk (1d9030) — 7/1/2020 @ 2:58 amDana, I don’t know what these people want, other to annoy and inconvenience everyone else with their grievances. But this is nothing new. In fact, it’s been going on for decades.
Remember Little Black Sambo’s? It was a nationwide restaurant chain in the 60s and early 70s, inspired by the children’s book. The idea was to create a family-oriented, child-centric atmosphere. Parents could read the book with their children, then go out to eat and discuss the stories, because the walls were painted with illustrations. We ate there almost every week when I was a child.
What’s the harm in that? Children learning to read, having a nice meal with their parents and talking about the stories. Mom or dad could point to an illustration and ask, remember that story? Tell me what happens in it. Reading skills, memory skills, speaking skills, it’s early childhood development.
Well, first wave woke got offended, because the name of the book and the restaurant had the word “Black” in it. This was around the time the Brady Bunch was popular on TV. A widowed father with three sons and a divorced mother with three daughters get married and move their unrelated children into a house to start a new family. Only they’re not really a “family,” that why they’re called the Brady Bunch. The repeated theme in every episode was, “This is discrimination!”
That’s emblematic of the first wave woke movement, finding discrimination everywhere and anywhere. Little Black Sambo’s was condemned as racist, because it ridiculed and discriminated against black people, protests mounted, and eventually the book was practically banned and the entire restaurant chain shut down. And that’s too bad, because they were really good children’s stories, and they were very nice restaurants.
This is how ridiculous that was, fifty years ago. First, little Sambo was not “black,” as in African; he’s a dark-skinned Hindu Indian. Second, at no time in the book or in the illustrations on the restaurant walls is Sambo denigrated, ridiculed or discriminated against. Third, he’s the hero of the stories! He’s just a little boy in India, who goes on some educational adventures.
Fourth, and most importantly, wouldn’t a black family experience the same benefits of teaching their children to read, then going out to dinner and talking about the stories with them, as a white family? Or any other family, regardless of race or ethnicity, for that matter. The restaurant doors were open to everyone.
Fifth, and finally, why would anybody object to or be offended by white parents reading a book to their children about a dark-skinned Indian boy, about their age? Their white children love Little Black Sambo. They want to be like him, smart, resourceful. What the hell is wrong with that?
It would seem that Little Black Sambo’s did more to promote family unity and racial harmony than any woke grievance-mongering crowd. So, to return to the question, what is wrong with these people? I don’t know, but clearly they’re mentally deranged.
All that said, it’s too bad what happened to Kindness Yoga. But the business probably wouldn’t have survived the pandemic in the first place. Harrington was already in the red and didn’t have the capital to remain open in the midst of rising infections, hospitalizations and deaths in the coming months. He would inevitably have had to close the studios and declare bankruptcy, but at least he could have sold the real estate at some point, recouped some capital, and kept his house. He didn’t deserve to be smeared by woke grievance mongers. No one does.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 7/1/2020 @ 4:52 am38. You’re great at arguing points I don’t even make. You should really start a straw man factory. I bet you would be rich, douchebag!
Gryph (08c844) — 7/1/2020 @ 5:28 amI could be rich, well-liked, and smart if I’d just knuckle under and wear a mask because “common sense.” See! I can make straw man arguments, too!
Gryph (08c844) — 7/1/2020 @ 5:30 amGryph (08c844) — 7/1/2020 @ 5:30 am
You’re not going to be as good at though until you start buying straw wholesale.
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 5:43 amGryph #34
I believe in getting the economy going but in wearing a mask. In this age of a very contagious disease, it is the way you can help stop spreading it to somebody else. If the choice is contagion, hysteria, and a necessarily arbitrary lockdown, or a mask, I like the mask. It’s a mark of a responsible citizen. Heck, it’s just good manners.
By the way, I tend to see continuity between anti-vaxers and anti-maskers.
Appalled (1a17de) — 7/1/2020 @ 6:09 am51. You kind of hit on something, albeit unintentionally. Do you know what else is considered “good manners” in certain quarters? Maintaining your “social credit” score over in Communist China, which in practice means being a Communist Party lickspittle.
I am very pro-vaccine because they are proven effective in most cases. I am anti-mask because the experts can’t seem to agree from week to week about how effective they are and I think a reasonable person could infer an agenda beyond simply “good manners” and/or medical efficacy.
I make reasonable efforts to maintain social distancing. And to anyone who thinks I’m being selfish or narcissistic, my mother is going to have a knee replacement and I won’t be able to visit her in the hospital because of CoViD-19. I don’t like it, I do tend to question how necessary it is, but I accept it.
And to all those out there who are accusing me of “thinking [I’m] smarter than the experts,” y’all must be pretty g/d stupid to need a bunch of experts to tell you how to live your lives.
Gryph (08c844) — 7/1/2020 @ 6:35 am#52
I suspect Dr. Fauci regret
Appalled (1a17de) — 7/1/2020 @ 6:59 am#52
Let’s try that again…
I suspect Dr Fauci heartily regrets lying about the efficacy of masks early in this pandemic in order to save supplies. Frankly, if there were anyone that could take Fauci’s place, he could have been justifiably fired.
But at this point, what’s the excuse for not wearing a mask? Freedom? I just don’t want to and you can’t make me? I want to be like Trump?
Appalled (1a17de) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:09 amBut at this point, what’s the excuse for not wearing a mask?
I wear a mask everywhere outside my home, though I’m lucky to have a job where I can stay home and rarely go out. Some aren’t so lucky, like my spouse.
Is it just a coincidence that people started to abandon lockdown behaviors en masse since a month ago? Do you think it might be because people saw mass gatherings (i.e., protests) without lockdown behaviors like masks, and everyone getting away with it?
The excuse is that too many people in high places exempt themselves or those they like, whether it’s Trump (though he’s constantly tested), the Illinois governor’s wife, the minister in the UK, the protesters, etc. A national mandate would make sense, but it would never be enforced across the board and, guess what, people notice.
beer ‘n pretzels (c2e30a) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:39 amAnd then there’s the tale of The Appeaser Bites Back.
Paul Montagu (c8b54e) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:49 amMayor Durkan was already leaning toward restoring the CHOP back to the city (after some negotiations and concessions and platitudes), but the protesters went too far when they protested in front of her personal residence last Sunday, led by one of the city’s more obnoxious socialist councilmembers. It’s one thing to protest in front of her office, but this time they made it personal. Stupid protesters. Stupid Ms. Sawant.
This morning, Seattle SWAT came out in force and commenced dismantling CHOP.
Well, when it comes to Covid-19, some people got it right off the bat, while with others it took time, and others never got it at all.
nk (1d9030) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:49 amSome of these people are mentally ill. Others cloth their hatred of others in the love of the “Other”. And some, are simply true believers, and are willing to “Take one for the team”. Notice that most of the men shot by Stalin in the Show-trials ended their days as dedicated Stalinists. Even their own deaths, couldn’t shake their love for “Comrade Stalin”. Similarly, for every liberal who turns conservative after a mugging, there’s another who simply doubles down on their “soft on crime” approach. One Leftist for the Nation was shot a few years ago, in a particularly senseless “mugging gone wrong”, and proudly announced from this hospital bed that he was even more in favor of defunding the police, and not punishing crooks.
And if you go back farther, remember the Left-wing Stanford student, a lovely young girl, who went to South Africa to “stop Apartheid” and ended up being killed (necklaced) by some Soweto blacks. The father went to the township, forgave everyone, and donated a large sum to the town. I’m sure the parents are proud they “Took one for Team Left”.
rcocean (2e1c02) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:54 amJVW and others have extrapolated a long way based on one (presumably not so objective) guy’s side of the story.
800 irate customers sounds like there might be something more to it than just a couple disgruntled and out of control employees.
It’s true that we don’t know the whole story and we likely never will, but I look at it this way: the two antagonists were given ample opportunity to explain to the reporter what about Kindness Yoga bothered them, yet the best they could come up with is the usual pabulum about “voices not heard,” too many white folks on the website (which, when the company made an admittedly ham-fisted attempt to correct it, morphed into cries of “tokenism”), a claim by the transgender chap that he was told what he could and couldn’t wear, and the black lady’s desire that the struggling company shell out bucks to hire a “diversity consultant” was rejected. I’m sorry, but I want something a little more tangible to justify demolishing a company’s reputation, especially one that seemed to make every effort to be achingly progressive.
And I don’t think that getting 800 people to drop a simple email message in order join on to a racially-charged protest is that hard these days, especially given the way that progressive white folks are falling all over themselves to appear woke. Mr. Harrington acknowledges that he has yet to read all 800, so I would be willing to give pretty long odds that they aren’t all from Kindness Yoga members and that plenty of them are just manufactured outrage.
JVW (ee64e4) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:55 amIf you look at Russia in 1917, Spain in 1936, Germany in 1933, Cuba in 1958, etc. you’ll see that so-called Moderate left and liberals NEVER stop the extreme left. They just don’t have the stomach for it. All their energy and passion is devoted to stopping those horrible right-wingers. So, don’t expect Biden to rein in BLM or Antifa. He’s only uttered a few words of condemnation because politics requires it. IRC, Clinton pretended to be against Gays in the military in 1992, and Obama and Biden pretended to be against Gay marriage in 2008. Now, they all proudly boast they were lying. So I don’t doubt that Biden supports getting rid of George Washington and Jefferson and Lincoln. He just won’t say it – NOW.
rcocean (2e1c02) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:00 am60. Well said rcocean. Biden is lying. Thats obvious. Just trying to move the Overton Window some more to replace our history with something culturally approved by the Zinn’s of the world. Rewrite history into a socialist utopia. Now that is woke.
NJRob (caa76f) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:22 amHow historically illiterate do you have to be to consider the rise of Nazi Germany or General Franco to be the rise of the ‘left’ and lump them in with the Castro and Lenin?
Time123 (d1bf33) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:40 amAre you aware that the statues at the heart of the complaint, the monuments to confederate generals, were part of an effort to make the confederacy seem better than it was? They’re a white washing of the actual history, no pun intended.
Time123 (d1bf33) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:42 amIt is unclear where the name or nickname Sambo was originally used, (it;s used for an Indian servant in the book Vanity Fair in 1847) but it is mainly noted for people of African descent and that’s hwo they try to explain its etymology/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambo_(racial_term)
In Uncle Tom’s Cabin, one of Simon Legrees’s slave overseers is named Sambo
https://blackamericaweb.com/2017/01/11/little-known-black-history-fact-sambo
But “Little Black Sambo” is Indian from India and dates from 1899.
Perhaps inferior, if not offfensive?
Sammy Finkelman (70b0bc) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:56 amFrancisco Franco did not have bonespurs. He did not have fat-bellied burghers worried about their 401(k)s to the exclusion of everything else for troops, either. What he did have was Moors from Morocco.
nk (1d9030) — 7/1/2020 @ 8:59 amScott Lively Would Rather Be Beheaded Than Forced by the Government to Wear a Mask
Radical anti-LGBTQ activist Scott Lively posted a video on YouTube Saturday in which he argued that requiring people to wear masks to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus is akin to the Nazis forcing Jewish people to wear yellow stars on their clothing and declared that he’d rather be beheaded than to be forced to wear one by the government.
……
“These things must be balanced against the disastrous consequences of surrendering personal liberty to overreaching government, especially regarding face masks, which are in some ways worse than police-enforced lockdowns because they represent a literal in-your-face exercise of statist power like Islamist head coverings for women or the Nazis’ yellow star for Jews,” Lively said. “Unnecessary public mask wearing, as opposed to reasonable usage, is no less a statement of psychological submission to higher authority than a dog collar.”
“In the greater scheme of things, I believe liberty is more important than security if one is forced to choose between those two,” he added. “Those who don’t believe that are ripe for the Mark of the Beast, which is what this entire season of chaos is really about, in my view. Personally, I would rather die or be maimed from COVID-19—or be beheaded by a mob of anarchists and Islamists—than become a safe slave in a global totalitarian government.”
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:09 amAre you aware that the statues at the heart of the complaint…
Are you aware they’re not stopping at the statues at the heart of the complaint?
beer ‘n pretzels (1d265b) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:15 am@67, yes. And I’ve said before that the left needs to provide some better leadership around that distinction. While you can find examples of it it’s been weak.
Time123 (9f42ee) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:21 am@67, but my point was that the bad outcome rob raises, replacing what actually happened with a more politically palatable fiction, is what was done with the civil war monuments.
Time123 (9f42ee) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:22 amWhy We Should Keep Confederate Statues Standing
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:39 amIt wasn’t just Fauci, it was a concerted disinformation campaign by the Trump administration, including the Surgeon General and many others who don’t take orders from Fauci.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 9:55 amUS buys nearly all global stock of coronavirus drug remdesivir
…..
“President Trump has struck an amazing deal to ensure Americans have access to the first authorized therapeutic for COVID-19,” Azar said in a statement.
“To the extent possible, we want to ensure that any American patient who needs remdesivir can get it. The Trump Administration is doing everything in our power to learn more about life-saving therapeutics for COVID-19 and secure access to these options for the American people.”
…..
HHS said it secured more than 500,000 treatment courses of the drug.
“This represents 100 percent of Gilead’s projected production for July (94,200 treatment courses), 90 percent of production in August (174,900 treatment courses), and 90 percent of production in September (232,800 treatment courses), in addition to an allocation for clinical trials,” it said.
Remdesivir will cost $3,120 for the typical patient with private health insurance, the drugmaker said Monday, adding that it will cost hospitals about $520 per dose for privately insured patients.
The shorter, more common course of treatment would work out to $3,120, while the longer duration would cost $5,720, the Wall Street Journal reported.
RipMurdock (d2a2a8) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:02 am…..
It’s awfully convenient of Trump’s admin to put blame for stuff on Fauci when we know it’s pulling teeth to get that administration to value human life or tell the truth.
Can’t wait to read his book. There’s going to be a whole library of them. Amazon Prime Video will make another bazillion off Trump Tales.
Hope I get to read the Mary Trump book. It’s amazing what Trump can get from judges these days.
Dustin (739c8b) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:02 amI don’t think I said anything about “The rise of Hitler or Franco”. Hey, nice “pushback” must have cost you what 2 seconds of typing? But “mission accomplished”.
rcocean (2e1c02) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:25 amExcept that “Spain in 1936” was taken over by Franco and “Germany in 1933” was taken over by Hitler, both of whom were anti-communist.
Paul Montagu (c8b54e) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:40 amYou give in to the mob, you get more mobs.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:42 amShhh! Logic doesn’t matter, context doesn’t matter, truth doesn’t matter.
“Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense.”
“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.”
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:46 amI suspect Dr. Fauci regret
Don’t trust China. China is asshoe
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:46 amWell, when it comes to Covid-19, some people got it right off the bat, while with others it took time, and others never got it at all.
It appears teh ‘vid mirrors Life. Or one’s chances of getting shot while walking the streets of Chicago.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:51 amJonah Goldberg argues persuasively in Liberal Fascism that Nazism and Fascism are properly viewed as left-wing (statist, collectivist, socialist) ideologies.
I’m glad rcocean agrees with him.
“Right-wing”, Goldberg argues, should mean the classical liberalism of the Enlightenment and American founders, emphasizing the rights of the individual (in earnest, after slavery, segregation and other institutionalized forms of racism were eliminated) over the power of the state.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:52 amAppalled (1a17de) — 7/1/2020 @ 6:09 am
Maybe, neither group seems large to me and I don’t think they overlap completely. I think there is a spectrum between anti-maskers and mask-at-all-times-outside-the-home. This isn’t a binary situation.
Appalled (1a17de) — 7/1/2020 @ 7:09 am
Full disclaimer; I wear a mask when it is appropriate to do so. So, I’m not making an excuse for not wearing a mask. That being said the flip-flop on masks does not encourage trust and both situations, the previous masks-don’t help and the current masks mandates, are simply blanket statements that are not correct. What’s the excuse for wearing one at all times, even in a car by yourself, other than virtue signaling? Both extremes, never wear and always wear, are not based on science. The best approach is for the government to provide correct information to the public so that they can make informed decisions.
Wearing a mask has an impact on your chances of catching and spreading covid. Because of that everyone should wear one in situations where they can catch or spread the virus. But in neither case, catching or spreading, are they 100% effective. The government now mandating masks in all public places is simply a political statement and it’s being used by both sides politically. In that regard, I do think there is value in giving the government, and other people, the finger and telling them to get stuffed if only to encourage better behavior. And I don’t mean don’t wear a mask as a symbolic way to do that. I mean literally exercise your right to demand something better than these ridiculous uses of executive authority.
I see the mask situation similar to how I see concealed carry. Concealed carry will not keep you safe if you don’t know how to use a gun, don’t make appropriate decisions about when to use it, do not execrise good situational awareness, or put yourself in bad situations. Said another way, if carrying a gun makes you go into a dangerous situation you otherwise could, and would, have avoided it’s not helping you. If the government now telling everyone to wear a mask makes anyone think it’s a magic bullet and covid is spreading because of these stubborn anti-maskers they are fooling themselves.
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:56 amYou forgot the sh#tty trap music to go with that truism, Haiku. I’m down to bimonthly visits and medical appointment duty with mom b/c of that ish.
According to one Willie D, this is a modern day Sambo.
urbanleftbehind (3c7eb6) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:05 amSo what?! There is ample evidence that they significantly reduce the risk of transmission, and in no case do they increase the risk of transmission.
End of story, for anyone who wants to reduce the spread of the virus and help the economy recover.
This makes no sense.
Masks work. Meaning they reduce the chance of transmission between people significantly. That means mandating their use in public places is fully justified on medical grounds in the throes of a raging pandemic.
And in the rest of the world, there is almost no disagreement about this. It’s only here, where the irresponsible and ignorant leader of one political party has discouraged the use of masks – for his own selfish political reasons – that it has become a politically-charged issue.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:10 amDave, there is an argument about whether Nazi Germany and other fascist regimes were socialist or not, but I’m leaning toward “not”. They definitely used big government in pursuing their objectives but, at the same time, were strongly anti-communist. I think Mr. Granieri had it right: “Indeed, most supporters of Nazism embraced the party precisely because they saw it as an enemy of and an alternative to the political left.” And this…
And so forth.
Paul Montagu (c8b54e) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:11 am*…his own selfish and ultimately self-defeating political reasons…
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:13 amPaul Montagu (c8b54e) — 7/1/2020 @ 10:40 am
This only matters for limited definitions of anti-communist. The right-left dichotomy is useful to people on the edges that want to distinguish themselves from the other group but I’m not sure it’s that helpful to people who are neither marxists or fascists. That a leftist would identify with Stalin or Mao and distance themselves from the Franco, Hitler, or Mussolini begs the question why? The marxists have killed people in the millions. This is the only thing they’ve been more successful at than facists. Neither group supports liberalism in the classic sense. Both are authoritarian. Both embrace violence as a political tool. Both have fundamentally flawed economic ideologies. If you’re a classic liberal both groups reject everything you believe in. Both groups will put you up against the wall as soon as they can. Why exactly would someone self identify as a marxist over facists other than we seem to keep giving marxists chances to kill us?
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:17 am#75 Whatever. Nothing to do with my point. But carry on.
rcocean (2e1c02) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:23 amDave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:10 am
Because of our comment history, you didn’t really read what I wrote but imagined something else. Specifically,
is not true because you’ve chosen to redefine what I said. You’ve also chosen a definition of “risk of transmission” that I’m not using.
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:27 amPaul,
Of course the Nazis were bitter political opponents of the social democrats and communists. And the German communists and social democrats hated each other even more than Nazis (if they had been able to get along, Hitler would have never come to power by legal means).
The Bolsheviks were the bitter political enemies of every other socialist faction in Russia, too. And in many other countries like France, too. Totalitarian movements generally don’t get along with each other, regardless of similarities in their ideologies.
I think the most important distinction was national socialism vs. international (which in practice meant: controlled by Moscow) socialism.
The economic parts of the Nazi platform were practically indistinguishable from communism (or the Green New Deal, for that matter…):
For many Germans, the “deal-breaker” of communism (i.e. international socialism) was its foreign-ness, not its social-ness.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:33 amYou included as justification of your point, fundamentally wrong information. You compared kumquats and turtles, arguing that both are moon rocks. I mean if you ignore that small thing, OK. It’s a very Trumpian argument, truth is only as important as the volume by which you can yell it, and how it makes you feel.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:34 amPaul Montagu (c8b54e) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:11 am
What you’ve quoted is true as far as it goes but it doesn’t cover the issue. It’s fine that they started small-business men and artisans, not the industrial proletariat but they very much attempted to control the means of production.
The marxists attempted to control the means of production by starting at the bottom, grabbing the property directly, and going up. The fascists started at the top and went down. They would establish regulations, including price controls and labor standards. So, the property could be owned by private individuals, or by the state, but it was effectively controlled by the state.
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:38 amDave, but the foreign’ness and the social’ness were neither the point, it was the racial’ness. They were 100% bought in on capitalism, as long as it was only owned by “Germans” along racial lines. That Hitler himself didn’t actually make the cut.
Totalitarianism can be an attribute of both the left or right, look at the governments of central America over the last 70 years, they’ve bounced back and forth on ideology, but have been pretty universally totalitarian. Strongman gonna strongman, the underlying philosophy doesn’t really matter
Look at Trump, he wants to be a strongman, he has no political first principles other than what’s good for Donnie.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:42 amWuhancoronabatflu explained in craft terms:
You and 9 friends are crafting.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:51 am1 is using glitter.
How many projects have glitter?
Totalitarianism is Karenism. With guns.
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:52 amTotalitarianism is Trumpism. With a competent leader.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:05 pmOT- Another career flames out; Fox fires Ed Henry.
A little too Foxy with the ladies, eh, Eddie.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:11 pmI remember when I was young
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:11 pmMe and Vonnie had so much fun
Holding hands and getting stoned
Had a ‘64 Goat and a place of my own
But now the thing that made it all complete
Was watching a mob of dem crocodiles eat
While the other kids were poundin’ down the brews
We were watchin’ dem crocs eat the latest cooze
Well their feeding frenzy is something shocking
When just one won’t fit teh bill
I never knew me a better time and I guess I never will
Oh Lawdy mama those scary sounds
When blood and guts never touched the ground
And the folks in charge never made a sound
He down with CCP
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:14 pmYeah, you know he
@92: Someone who goes by “Colonel Klink” is probably an authority on this.
beer ‘n pretzels (1ad688) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:17 pmColonel Klink (Ret) (305827) — 7/1/2020 @ 11:42 am
I’ve never understood the argument that fascists are worse because of the racism angle. Marxists have killed more people and they are indiscriminate. Does killing while ignoring skin color make them more virtuous? It certainly makes them more woke but that seems like a flaw in the system. If you only had those two to choose from self-interest would weigh toward fascism. Given that there are more choices I don’t understand why anyone chooses to be a marxist.
This is not true. Fascists opposed any sort of international free-market capitalism. They were willing to tolerate what they called capitalism so long as it served the state but this type of capitalism is more correctly called corporatism.
frosty (f27e97) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:18 pm#90. Really? My point was that moderate leftists/Liberals never stop the extremists. Cited 1917. 1936, 1933, and 1958 with Castro. Your point is that Lenin was a Leftist and Hitler wasn’t. So what? Hitler was a Leftist. But how often does a Leftist admit that? Never. So its a boring discussion.
As for Franco, you brought him up. I didn’t. I was talking about the extreme leftists and Commies that were called the “Republicans” or “Loyalists”. Go read the history of the Spanish Government in the months before the Franco Revolt.
rcocean (2e1c02) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:26 pmDer Fuehrer a SauerKraut?!!:
‘To increase its appeal to larger segments of the population, on the same day as Hitler’s Hofbräuhaus speech on 24 February 1920, the DAP changed its name to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (“National Socialist German Workers’ Party”, or Nazi Party). The word “Socialist” was added by the party’s executive committee, over Hitler’s objections, in order to help appeal to left-wing workers.’ – source, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party
DCSCA (797bc0) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:32 pmanton drexler would be very surprised,
http://www.journal14.com/2020/06/30/the-democrats-want-to-impose-new-costs-on-your-life/
remember that german nationalism was suffused with wagner and moller’s dirigisme, that’s what von mises and hayek were rebelling against,
narciso (7404b5) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:37 pmBut there were moderate rightist/Conservative factions in all the situations you cite, and they didn’t “stop the extremists” either. In Germany they eventually actively collaborated with (and joined) the extremists.
So what is the relevance of your observation? Sometimes extremists succeed in gaining power. By definition that implies that moderates (of whatever stripe) failed to stop them.
In fact moderate leftists/Liberals stopped extremists from coming to power in America, Britain, France and many smaller Western countries before and after WWII.
Dave (1bb933) — 7/1/2020 @ 12:41 pmWhat Marxists, or if you want Marxist-Leninists, attempt to control is the means of communication.
Sammy Finkelman (70b0bc) — 7/1/2020 @ 1:31 pm