Thursday, June 6, 2013

CENSORED AGAIN: Two drag queens have more courage than the entire staff of The Stranger. A Review of Seattle's Establishment "alternative" newspaper.

[Note:  This review was removed by Yelp about ten days after its publication on June 1, 2013, no explanation given.  So much for free speech:   You write the reviews for Yelp, Yelp removes them if the review doesn't please Yelp or isn't in accordance with their high standards of cowardice and intolerance].


The perfect newspaper to use to line your cat's litter box.

O.K., it is probably no secret that I am not the world's biggest fan of this newspaper.  But there are, after all, certain limits to patience.

The politics and contents of The Stranger is what I call conservative liberalism:  liberalism that is, at heart, conservative in its willingness to change and evolve.   (Actually, The Stranger came into being, like some cosmic goo, in Seattle in the early-'90's.  This fact may be lost on the majority of its current readership, who were in diapers at the time).

What's this constant blathering about "the (3) spicy HImalayan tarragon-flavored yogurt-dipped calamari fries were so cheap!  Only $12!  What a bargain!"  

For people who decry income inequality, they have pretty deep pockets.

* * * * *

On the other hand, I do believe their sincerity about being an S&M newspaper.  For liberal white guilt, that is.

I also get this other thing now, too:  The Stranger does not practice journalism at all.  It has no intention of being objective and fair.  Its purported purpose is to promote the progressive philosophy of "party till you puke."  With plenty of piss and paraphernalia.

(I'm all for paraphernalia but none of the others).

In the marketplace of ideas, don't buy The Stranger (even if it is "free" to the unsuspecting).  Just go straight to the club listings (or to Dan Savage's usually more than tongue-in-cheek humor is a source of unrepentant mirth).

The Stranger finally admits that there is violent crime in idyllic Seattle!!   (Anyone else been mugged or threatened?)

http://www.thestranger.c…

The writer of this article goes into detail about his horrific experience, noting the physical appearance  of the thugs:   age, gender, number, what they were wearing ("black hoodie"), speech ("Do you want to get shot, motherfucker?").  

But he puts a fig leaf on the race/ethnicity belly button.

A couple of weeks ago DRAG QUEEN Robbie Turner had more courage in identifying the race of her attacker on Capitol Hill.  So did Danny Vega (another cross-dresser) in Rainier Valley a year ago.

http://sgn.org/sgnnews41…

Auto-censorship or editorial censorship.    Call it what you will.  The Stranger is to free-thinking Seattle what Vichy France was to Free France during World War II.   (O.K., a  hyperbole, but you get the point).

If 80% of the violent crime in Seattle is committed by (members belonging to) 12% of the population, we must be silent.  Community means accepting some level of responsibility for the actions of its members.

The auto-/editorial censorship does not change the fact that there is a crippling fear in Seattle (and elsewhere) about naming the race of the persons who have attacked and/or threatened you, as in

"I cannot tell you the race of the person who sucker-punched me because I don't I don't remember.  It would be racist if I did. The police came too late."

If a certain senior writer at The Stranger had been mugged in Wedgwood, you can be sure that he would have decried the race of the perps.

In the following week's issue, The Stranger publishes a series of cartoons decrying harassment of women in Seattle.   All the perps (perpetrators) are  Cro-Magnon Caucasians, the victims either white or African-American.







Pretty racist.

(Notice, too, how Asian-Americans--who are the largest racial minority, not blacks, in Seattle,m as well as HIspanics and Native-Americans are treated as if they simply did not exist.  How literally and figuratively true it is that The Stranger sees things in black-and-white).

If you see a group of young black men on the Ave. (University Avenue) in Seattle and instinctively feel anxiety, that is not racism.   Most of the young African-Americans are loitering and not exactly what I would describe as warmhearted and respectful of others.  I have not noticed any gangs of Caucasians, or skinheads, on the Avenue or elsewhere in this city.  (Not to say that they don't exist in other cities). 

* * * * *

If only The Stranger were truly willing to investigate the stories that mainstream newspapers refuse to touch.

Instead it idolizes President Barack Obama, the man who submitted John Brennan as the new director of the CIA.  The covert CIA operations using drone (unmanned) planes to assassinate presumed and approved terrorists in Pakistan, Afganistan, and other places from bunkers in New Mexico receive scant attention from the media.

Granted, Obama is a vast improvement over GBW, but the fact that he is African-American does and should not mean that he gets an automatic pass.

* * * * *

Would that this newspaper fold and another take its place--with a whole new set of editors and writers!

No comments:

Post a Comment