Bad Art Friend

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kolker's followup just demonstrates what a inveterate sexist he is. I'm never going to read anything of his again.

Same. NYT is good for crossword and cooking at this point

I am out. I hit "cancel subscription" and am now in some kind of chat waiting room to chat with an "advocate".

You don't have to chat. The other option is doing it thru your account or something like that. It does allow you to explain why you are cancelling and the process only takes a minute. Cancel waiting to chat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is anyone else really depressed by this followup? I’m a reader and an artist and a DCUM-elite-liberal-arts-educated-person (lol) and even my most jaded, cynical, suspicious self is STILL just sad and let down by these mean grub street writers, by the nyt, by kolker, by his editors, all of it.

Yes. Me too.

I'm not the hysterical woman he wants to paint me as. I'm just worn out from the drumpf years of hate and misogyny. I live in Loudoun where the crazy extremists seem to winning. There is so much sexism and racism here that I can't believe it's 2021. Seeing a major respected news source misrepresent in such an damaging way a story about a woman being bullied so extremely and in a way that completely surrounded her
is so hard to take. I'm so fed up with the bullying that it hurts to see one of my preferred news sources joining in in the destruction of an innocent person's life and insulting the readers who are offended.

[Anonymous]

This really is a story of power. Who among the blue checked writers would dare call out the NYT for blowing this? It’d be against their career best interests. Ugh.

[Anonymous]

I made a critical comment six or seven hours ago, and it was never approved. NYT is real defensive today apparently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Lots of comments criticizing Kolker. Good. This is outrageous.

But not on the NYT website. Because I guess they block them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For those of you that cancelled your subscription, did you tell them why? I am trying to figure out how.

When you go to cancel, you can chat with an advocate. You can tell them why. I am engaged in the chat with them right now.

Please report back and let us know how it goes.

[Anonymous]

There are many comments critical of Kolker on the NYT website in response to this new article.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This really is a story of power. Who among the blue checked writers would dare call out the NYT for blowing this? It’d be against their career best interests. Ugh.

that's exactly it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are many comments critical of Kolker on the NYT website in response to this new article.

Ok but it is more than Kolker’s failing - it is the failing of the guardrails that are supposed to be in place at the NYT via layers of editors; it is Grubstreet, blue check Twitter — all these groups and individuals failed. And they were supposed to be better than this; we rely on them to be better. People in power should have and could have called out the lies about Dorland, and they … didn’t.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is anyone else really depressed by this followup? I’m a reader and an artist and a DCUM-elite-liberal-arts-educated-person (lol) and even my most jaded, cynical, suspicious self is STILL just sad and let down by these mean grub street writers, by the nyt, by kolker, by his editors, all of it.

Yes. Me too.

I'm not the hysterical woman he wants to paint me as. I'm just worn out from the drumpf years of hate and misogyny. I live in Loudoun where the crazy extremists seem to winning. There is so much sexism and racism here that I can't believe it's 2021. Seeing a major respected news source misrepresent in such an damaging way a story about a woman being bullied so extremely and in a way that completely surrounded her
is so hard to take. I'm so fed up with the bullying that it hurts to see one of my preferred news sources joining in in the destruction of an innocent person's life and insulting the readers who are offended.

This is such a good comment, PP. I can’t stand the completely needless bullying and complicity. Gosh isn’t journalism supposed to hold the people in power accountable? Or is that too circa 1990s of me?

[Anonymous]

I can't stop thinking about that Arthur Chu thread about why giving up on this and agreeing to "apologize" to Larson might be worse for Dorland than continuing to pursue a resolution that feels just to her. Even if her odds of getting it are slim.

I have some events in my past that are similar in some way to what Dorland is going through right now. I chose to let it go. I didn't apologize (I had nothing to apologize for), but I chose to walk away and give up on ever getting justice. I was just tired of feeling terrible all the time and having to relitigate these events, and I was tired of being told what a terrible person I was and how I had deserved to be treated as I was, or that what had happened to me was "normal" or that it was all my fault for being too sensitive and not getting over it. I was just tired. I wanted to spend my life with people who didn't treat me like garbage and stop thinking about this awful thing that had happened and the awful people who had done it.

It's hard. I'd love to be able to say that I have gotten over it and it doesn't impact me anymore. This would not be true. This continues to be something that comes up in therapy. I definitely have trauma from not only the original events that harmed me, but from the subsequent gaslighting and fighting about it. I do sometimes think the aftermath was worse that the original events. The main issue is that when my memory of those events are triggered, it makes me feel the way I did when these people were shaming me and telling me I didn't deserve an apology or to be treated better. Even though I know, intellectually, that everyone deserves to be treated better than that, there is still a part of me that can feel worthless when I am reminded of what happened. Because, like Dorland, I was treated like someone without worth.

And that's why I'm still following this story and why I feel so angry at Kolker and Larson and Ng. The worst part to me is that if Larson just admitted "Yeah, I should not have copied that letter and the way I handled this situation was unethical and very hurtful and I regret it," it could change everything for Dorland. And it would cost her nothing. It would make her look like the bigger person, her powerful friends would forgive her instantly, and everyone would forget about this. But if Dorland had a record of acknowledgement that what happened to her was wrong, it could save her from having this event define her for the rest of her life. It would be a true kindness.

That Larson can't see this and will never give it is crazy to me. Especially because Dorland would obviously do this in a heartbeat -- it's a lot easier than donating a kidney.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is anyone else really depressed by this followup? I’m a reader and an artist and a DCUM-elite-liberal-arts-educated-person (lol) and even my most jaded, cynical, suspicious self is STILL just sad and let down by these mean grub street writers, by the nyt, by kolker, by his editors, all of it.

Yes. Me too.

I'm not the hysterical woman he wants to paint me as. I'm just worn out from the drumpf years of hate and misogyny. I live in Loudoun where the crazy extremists seem to winning. There is so much sexism and racism here that I can't believe it's 2021. Seeing a major respected news source misrepresent in such an damaging way a story about a woman being bullied so extremely and in a way that completely surrounded her
is so hard to take. I'm so fed up with the bullying that it hurts to see one of my preferred news sources joining in in the destruction of an innocent person's life and insulting the readers who are offended.

This is such a good comment, PP. I can’t stand the completely needless bullying and complicity. Gosh isn’t journalism supposed to hold the people in power accountable? Or is that too circa 1990s of me?

DP.

I feel like this is just one more nail in the coffin of my childhood faith in investigative journalism, and I don't think I am alone. I think there are a lot of us who are gen x and early millennials who were raised with the idea of journalist as defender of truth, post-Watergate, post-My Lai. We aren't old enough to remember Watergate or the Vietnam War ourselves, but our teachers and parents were, and they taught us about the brave journalists that spoke the truth. And that framed our childhood. I remember books about Nelly Bly and Ida B. Wells, and high school history classes where the reporter was the truth teller, the force for moral good. We grew up in a world where we saw reporters as defenders of the weak and exploited.

But then we got to the 2010s and with the rise of Black Lives Matter and Me Too, we realized just how often those same reporters that we had lionized did not choose to tell certain stories. We looked the glowing articles that the NYT wrote about Weinstein and asked ourselves, surely they'd heard? Surely someone had whispered to them at some point, had passed on a tip? Similarly, did the NYT just not find the number of young Black men who died at the hands of police worth questioning for years? Why wasn't sexual harassment deemed newsworthy, or police violence, but there was time and positive energy devoted to Woody Allen?

Of course the NYT proactively choosing to distort the story of a kidney donor with a working class background is nowhere near a broad societal impact as its failures on MeToo or BLM. But I think watching this play out in this one small example is simply crystalizing a growing sense that the investigative journalism we used to admire just can't be trusted, that the NYT is simply one more corrupt institution that protects the interests of the already-powerful. And yes, for those of us raised with the idea of investigative journalism as a force for good, this is saddening.

[Anonymous]

PP here. I meant to add that the unique thing about the this is that we can all see the distortion by Kolker and the NYT up front, because of the court case. Normally we don't get that opportunity to independently fact check the NYT, but here, unusually, we do. And what happens, the one time we can fact check a piece of investigative journalism? We see just how overtly misogynist the NYT is. We see the classism. We see the institutional pass that the NYT gives other institutions with power. Why did Kolker, an investigative journalist, never once ask GrubStreet who handled Dorland's complaint? Why, with all the evidence of institutional failure, did Kolker turn this into a misogynist cat fight article, in the process smearing the reputation of at least one person who didn't deserve it?

And that is what is unusual here, because it raises questions about what happens when we can't fact check ourselves. What else does the NYT distort? What else can't we trust?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP here. I meant to add that the unique thing about the this is that we can all see the distortion by Kolker and the NYT up front, because of the court case. Normally we don't get that opportunity to independently fact check the NYT, but here, unusually, we do. And what happens, the one time we can fact check a piece of investigative journalism? We see just how overtly misogynist the NYT is. We see the classism. We see the institutional pass that the NYT gives other institutions with power. Why did Kolker, an investigative journalist, never once ask GrubStreet who handled Dorland's complaint? Why, with all the evidence of institutional failure, did Kolker turn this into a misogynist cat fight article, in the process smearing the reputation of at least one person who didn't deserve it?

And that is what is unusual here, because it raises questions about what happens when we can't fact check ourselves. What else does the NYT distort? What else can't we trust?

YES — YES — YES.

— depressed and sad PP from a few pages back

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can't stop thinking about that Arthur Chu thread about why giving up on this and agreeing to "apologize" to Larson might be worse for Dorland than continuing to pursue a resolution that feels just to her. Even if her odds of getting it are slim.

I have some events in my past that are similar in some way to what Dorland is going through right now. I chose to let it go. I didn't apologize (I had nothing to apologize for), but I chose to walk away and give up on ever getting justice. I was just tired of feeling terrible all the time and having to relitigate these events, and I was tired of being told what a terrible person I was and how I had deserved to be treated as I was, or that what had happened to me was "normal" or that it was all my fault for being too sensitive and not getting over it. I was just tired. I wanted to spend my life with people who didn't treat me like garbage and stop thinking about this awful thing that had happened and the awful people who had done it.

It's hard. I'd love to be able to say that I have gotten over it and it doesn't impact me anymore. This would not be true. This continues to be something that comes up in therapy. I definitely have trauma from not only the original events that harmed me, but from the subsequent gaslighting and fighting about it. I do sometimes think the aftermath was worse that the original events. The main issue is that when my memory of those events are triggered, it makes me feel the way I did when these people were shaming me and telling me I didn't deserve an apology or to be treated better. Even though I know, intellectually, that everyone deserves to be treated better than that, there is still a part of me that can feel worthless when I am reminded of what happened. Because, like Dorland, I was treated like someone without worth.

And that's why I'm still following this story and why I feel so angry at Kolker and Larson and Ng. The worst part to me is that if Larson just admitted "Yeah, I should not have copied that letter and the way I handled this situation was unethical and very hurtful and I regret it," it could change everything for Dorland. And it would cost her nothing. It would make her look like the bigger person, her powerful friends would forgive her instantly, and everyone would forget about this. But if Dorland had a record of acknowledgement that what happened to her was wrong, it could save her from having this event define her for the rest of her life. It would be a true kindness.

That Larson can't see this and will never give it is crazy to me. Especially because Dorland would obviously do this in a heartbeat -- it's a lot easier than donating a kidney.

I don’t think it is wrong for Dorland to want justice. I don’t think people would judge a man the same way and tell him to let it go. They would laud Steve for working to protect his good name!