Hold up. The kid docked his bike. At that point it was no longer his bike. I have no doubt he was waiting until he could use it again. But if he docked it, how was it his anymore? Am I missing something?
Also. Why does the kid need money for fundraising,? Was he charged with anything?
I was glad Katie had the good sense to do some extra digging on NewsOne. If she hadn't have pushed back I think a lot of listeners might have figured Jesse was correct to file this in the "it's complicated" bin.
The kids get government assistance and can ride the bikes at a discounted rate for 45 minutes. Then they have to dock them. Then they have to wait a given time to recheck them out at the same lowered rate. It’s gaming the system, just like it was to record this woman and release the footage in a way that made the group of teenagers look like the victims. For a guy who says it’s complicated all the time, the NewsOne story Jesse parroted did not complicate anything. The woman reserved that particular bike. The teenagers sat on them because they wanted to continue riding around at a reduced rate. This is a New York City story of someone putting a garbage can out to hold a parking spot and someone moves the garbage can and takes the spot. The person who puts the garbage can there is an asshole. There’s nothing complicated about it.
Just squeezing in here! My name is Karen. I work at a very left leaning org. It’s been so shocking - I get the joke - but man, hearing people spout the name with such venom and then preach acceptance and kindness has been so disorienting.
Introducing myself gave me such anxiety. I thought I was totally losing it at one point (there was so much anger out there around this time) that I called a therapist who laughed and told me to get comfortable with white privilege (honestly I had already attended workshops and read so many books).
The only person who understood was the IT guy who changed his name too to fit in (I eventually started going by something else - ppl were mad at me for doing that too but it wasn’t good for me). He told me not to worry, it’ll become normal soon, give it time.
I’ll never ever forget that type of kindness - he totally could’ve shat on me.
That is a fucking awful therapist. Like it’s not that you’re white - there are plenty of non-white Karens after all — it’s that literally everyone hates your name and is shit talking your name constantly. It’s like if you have the same name as someone who suddenly becomes infamous.
What a fucking awful therapist. I would have reported that person to their licensing board. It was completely unprofessional and based only on their own beliefs. And I think it's terrible that you've had to use a different name, but I understand. For the record I've known many a wonderful Karen.
It’s been so strange. I waited a year before talking to another person. The next therapist - actually they were all social workers, if that makes a difference - said that she totally believed me as she had gone back to school late in life and was terrified of the new ideology. She was nice but really just wanted to chat about that issue. I tried another social worker (we were lucky to be given this help for free from our work). When my name shame came up, she advised me to read White Fragility bc her white friends said it was helpful. I told her I read it and something didn’t sit totally right with me… but I couldn’t explain it. So we talked about different things. The final person I paid for was out of my own pocket, who was/is great and really helped. Incidentally, I learned five sessions in that a senior admin in the school board she works for doesn’t feel safe with her counsel as she’s a white woman. By the way, I know I sound crazy going to all these people but I’ve really never been like this before. At first it started with my own issues but then I was like - are they crazy or am I crazy?
At one time I shared a very common first and last name with a despicable criminal, which gave me an excuse to revert to my maiden name. If I hadn't wanted to do that anyway, I would have really resented the person who ruined that name for the hundreds of us who shared it.
We had a brainstorm about what values mattered to us and “kindness” and “inclusivity” were the top ones. I’m like seriously? All you guys talk about is punishing people... you are like the audience around a guillotine. I’m not sure if they are meaner than anyone else but their purported values make the actual lack of them really obvious.
My wife is a teacher and hears little boys call little girls (of all races) Karens for annoying them in whatever way. Soon enough it will have lost whatever political valence it once had and will be little more than a G-rated version of "bitch."
I think asshole is my gender neutral pronoun. Anyone can be an asshole, and I think you are right that men who tell inconvenient truths or just express a difference of opinion get similar dismissal to what we bitches get. The ad hominem attacks are one way you know your disturbing the group think waters.
And even if those little girls called themselves NBs, or trans, those same fucking little boys would still call them Karens... because everyone knows who the females (and males are).
I'm pretty sure in the UK it acquired that meaning within 5 minutes of people learning it. It's only the US where it still carries the original racially inflected meaning in some instances. I mean it still kind of means 'bitch' in all scenarios.
I swear I had heard it used as a race-neutral term of misogynistic abuse before 2020 and the claim that it was a anti-racist thing so I never believed it was anything else.
And/or racist. It’s all the exact same shit. Someone calling someone a “boomer” is literally doing the exact same dehumanizing garbage someone using a racial slur is.
If one is verboten the other should be too. End of story. If people cant see that they are moral and mental midgets, whose concerns aren’t worth caring about.
It's a dismissive, ageist term. "Baby Boomer" is the technical term ( nickname) for the generation. Shortening it to Boomer and calling someone that is a way to mock them for being old and out of touch and clueless.
I've definitely seen it used in the context you mean. I think it's more the attitude behind it than the word though. I can think of dismissive uses of 'millenial' for example, and then 'snowflake' tends to be used to mock younger generations. Although, that does seem to be more case specific.
Do we have to do the thing like when I was growing up and classes were full of Jennifers? We can have a Randolph and a Randy (or a Rand if one of you leans Libertarian).
Boomer has definitely evolved into a generally derogatory term for anyone older than the speaker. I’d wager that most people who get called boomers these days are actually Gen X.
You guys have really lost it. A woman is entitled to behave more or less any way she pleases when she’s surrounded by a group of young men who are antagonising her. This is especially true for women who are 6 months pregnant, and completely understandable of women who have just got off a 12 hour shift at the hospital.
This idea that white women have a responsibility to never attempt to involve police in a situation with black men is insane.
It kind of feels like sometimes Jesse has a hard time understanding behavior related to personalities different from his own. Some people are not so conflict avoidant that they’d just let the kids, who were obviously trying to game the system, dictate what they do or don’t do. Yes, I understand Jesse wouldn’t ever get in the same situation because he would avoid the conflict, but he’d also never try to “dibs” public bikes for 40 minutes or accost a pregnant woman when she tried to take a bike she was perfectly entitled to use. Different personalities react to situations differently, and at the end of the day she was perfectly within her rights to do what she did, and the teens were not in the right to do what they did. It doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.
It can be difficult to imagine yourself in someone else's shoes. Although, I wouldn't think being so tall wouldn't mean being surrounded by 5/6 people can feel very intimidating. I think Jesse just hasn't had that life experience yet.
Nah bruh. 5-6 little shithead assholes high on their own farts would absolutely surround and/or beat the shit out of a bigger guy. Happens all the time. Basically getting jumped. 1 big guy has little defense against half a dozen smaller guys. It’s just a pack mentality thing at that point. I guess it only depends on the reason, if there is any at all.
Ah OK, Sorry I didn't realise that. I actually think I have heard of tall victims of bullies - they can struggle particularly because the optics shift quite quickly if they try to fight back at all.
However, you may have a point that Jesse's heigh would definitely be a factor that would cause 5/6 teens to maybe think twice about when starting a confrontation.
I’m a little over 6’4. I generally don’t get shit from the average personas much as usual but I also exist in this weird place where people I think like to try and make an example of the tall guy. I’ve had some really bullshit interactions with bouncers who get in my face when I’m not doing anything wrong.
Stealing it from Destiny because he said it best. Progressives believe men are a perpetual danger to women but they pump the breaks the moment the male happens to be Black.
Pretty sure you need to edit this immediately, or take it down. You’ve completely botched the Citi Bike story. Pretty inexcusable being that there was a thread in the Wednesday comments that understands it better.
The hack website actually subtlety but probably unintentionally reveals the kid was in the wrong. The kid cops to “doing it all the time” as an excuse for normalizing his shitty behavior with Citi Bike. The excuse is an inadvertent admission.
I don’t know how he could have read that article and not realized that the kids were clearly in the wrong. Holding assets hostage that you don’t own and haven’t paid for so no one else can use them is simply wrong. There’s no wiggle room here.
Yeah they’ve had quite a few of these “drop the ball moments” recently, bit surprising and, as you say, disappointing.
The whole reason their pod has been interesting is because they actually try to get to the bottom of a story by learning all about it without fear nor favour, but they seem to be doing more and more throat clearing recently
I’m unsure if Jesse was caught in a weird place between rapidly changing & conflicting narratives or if he was a harder-hit victim of poor reading instruction than previously surmised.
I understand where Jesse is coming from . The article that purportedly exonerates the kid - with a quick read it does seem like the kid was fucked over. It was only when I read it a second time that I realized the kid DID fuck up ,- he returned the bike, therefore it was no longer his. It is also clear he really thought the bike was his.
Honestly I hope that he has misled his mother about how the bike program works (always a strong possibility with teens & their parents). Otherwise she is enabling shitty, entitled behavior about this and who knows what else.
In 2023 non-white kids are told nothing they do is wrong, and that the entire world is stacked up against them. (Which I think sucks because it's disempowering a generation.)
Seemed well written to me. Just giving the kids story and finally cleared it all up. Wasn’t editorializing. Got facts right. The kid admits he was wrong without knowing it.
I hope Jesse doesn't just do his usual, snickering correction. He needs to acknowledge that there's something off about his worldview that has him constantly erring on the side of leftists.
Time to reevaluate his priors; he can start with Gamergate, which he got completely wrong.
He really did botch it pretty badly. Some people did behave abominably, but that is true of both sides on most politicized issues.
Meanwhile the actual interesting angle on the story got ignored by everyone (games themselves to some extent, and to a huge extent games journalists rapidly moving left at a pace that was leaving the vast majority of the actual consumers of the genre behind).
It got so bad you had say realistic games about professional racing have half the drivers be women, and when fans would complain they would basically get told “this hobby isn’t for you misogynist”. Except the people saying that and driving that narrative were the outsiders.
“Wah wah wah, why is this hobby that is dominated by young men so catered to young mens interests!”
It’s like people showing up to the Westminster dog show and saying it isn’t fully inclusive unless there are dogfighting events for all the people into dogfighting. And then those people being taken extremely seriously.
I don’t understand how Katie and Jesse had a discussion about the ethical issues of calling women Karens, criticized NewsOne’s Karen backlog, and then Jesse buys the NewsOne story as credible or somehow dispositive of the other narrative which is incredibly clear and uncomplicated. In ten minutes, Jesse made these leaps: “It’s kind of fucked up to call women Karens for these ten reasons...this paper delights in Karen narrative and is incredibly slanted...yeah she’s pretty much a Karen because this news outlet said so.”
The story is a fireside chat positioning them as a Gold Star family or some shit. It boiled down to “We pull off this Citibike scam all the time and no one else has had a problem. People are calling me names now. My family is poor. Why is everyone so racist? This is crazy.”
When Jesse was trying to figure out where he stood on the issue he called the teenagers “immigrants,” which for him tipped the scales of sympathy towards the teenagers, and I don’t understand how or why. For one, their entitled and manipulative actions place them firmly as American Zoomers. Two, the admirable drive and work ethic immigrants bring with them usually don’t last through generations. Three, Jesse doesn’t weigh the teenagers telling the woman her baby is going to come out retarded; any sympathy or nuance gets thrown out the window when that’s an off the cuff comment.
What would happen in West Africa, which is where the teenagers’ families originate, if a pregnant woman is trying to get a bike and teenagers wouldn’t allow her? This country is pretty pants-on-head stupid about identity, and this podcast is supposed to be a bulwark to these poisonous narratives; this time they are part of it and it sucks.
Dignity and sympathy can’t be tied into protected or marginalized classes. That was the origin of this podcast. The hosts were on the wrong side of a culture war issue, stuck to their guns, made a podcast examining similar instances of identarian nonsense, and for that they have my respect. With takes like these, along with the subway bullshit from last week, they are losing it.
I found this thread interesting. The guy is a lefty YIMBY that got closer to the truth than a lot of knee-jerk reactions like from Nikole hannah-jones and the like. I haven't listened to the episode yet so I can't compare it to B&R episode.
That guy gets it wrong. The teens have no right to block bikes from being used. They are violating multiple Citi Bike rules, which would be bad enough but they are part of a discounted program so that just makes it even worse because they are taking advantage of a program to take advantage of the bikes.
I expect teens to have good manners! My son and his friends wouldn't have acted like this when they were teens ( they are all around 22 now). Their parents and coaches would have come down on them for behaving like that.
The only reason it became a national news story is the kids tried to hurt the woman (potentially ruin her life, get her fired) by posting the video. That's so disgusting. And that there are so many people on the left still claiming she's a racist bitch with no evidence is a huge part of the problem. It wasn't those supporting the woman and pointing out that the teens are manipulative jerks who made this a story.
I don't think that's an excuse. Deliberately blocking a pregnant woman from her commute because you want to mess around on an e-bike for free is really shitty behaviour. A 17-year-old is plenty old enough should know better. And I think most countries and previous generations would not tolerate that.
That said, we don't know all the details. For instance, if she was rude to him from the outset, I could understand why he might respond obstinately.
Tired people don't necessarily act rationally and we have no idea what her day was like.
Also, I don't think there's conclusive evidence to show she wanted to fight anyone. We haven't seen the start of the confrontation and we only have one version of the start.
This is a bizarre take, you want teens who are old enough to drive to make the city worse for stressed out adults? I don’t know why you’re cheering on chaos?
Seriously? The woman was pregnant and getting off shift. She could have handled things with more grace. The kids were bigger jerks and ok, fucking over CitiBike is not the worst. But preventing other people from using bikes they had docked? That is a jackass move.
The kids should not be in trouble. The adult should not lose a day of work.
I’m almost with you but I think this is just not a story and it doesn’t mean anything. She was tired and pregnant and mad. They were young and entitled. Perfectly understandable from both sides.
She'd just worked a twelve hour shift, was pregnant and wanted to ride the bike. We have no way of knowing to what extent he was holding on to the bike. The sister said his hand was on the handlebars, but she also said they'd gotten frozen yogurt. I think they were sitting around eating froyo and hording the bikes. In the end they didn't even ride them home so they broke the rules, horded the bikes for no other reason than they were feeling territorial towards them is how I read that.
I don't think "they're just kids" is an excuse. If a 17-year-old boy blocks a pregnant woman from using an electric bicycle to commute, because he wants to ride it for fun and won't pay 17¢, then he's an arsehole, and plenty old enough to know better.
Though it also depends how she approached the situation. If she was rude and demanding from the outset, I could forgive him for reacting obstinately.
1. He and his friends were squatting on the bikes not paying for them but blocking others from using them. This has been proven. This breaks the terms of service for Citi Bikes.
2. They were docking them and then undocking to cheat the proper fares.
3. He and his friends are a part of a discounted program and used his privileged membership to break rules 1 and 2.
And they just accepted without investigation the story from biased parties and a bad journo that she basically grabbed the bike from him to scan it, which does not explain how she got on it. Seems more likely that he had actually walked away from the bike to get the frozen yogurt. At the least they should investigate or admit they don't know.
I know y’all are loathe to play identity politics, but I wish you’d address the Karen thing more honestly: it’s not used to disparage or dismiss “people,” as Katie repeatedly says; it’s used to disparage and dismiss *women.* Sexism actually exists, Katie. For centuries women, not men, have been punished for complaining. Calling a complaining woman a “Karen” and shaming her on social media is simply a slightly more civilized version of putting a “common scold” in the stocks.
Thanks, Avocational, I was thinking just that as well! Everybody needs to read Victoria Smith's book Hags - deals beautifully with this history and its current relevance
Everyone gets the "Karen" thing wrong. "Karen" is a misogynist weapon that's only very tangentially about race. Calling a woman "Karen" is a socially sanctioned way to tear a woman down for not womaning correctly: not being accommodating, not being attractive, not being young. The only way race comes into it is that woke leftists don't use the word against black women because they're afraid of being called racist.
That's a great point. I was just talking about this to my (male Gen X) spouse and he brought up the age thing about "Karen," because it's the part that resonates with him. (He does mostly understand the misogynist bit I think, but that's just not going to hit as hard on a male person, because male.)
Wait can we make the deal right now to ban child beauty pageants in exchange for also banning child drag shows?
I’d like to just take each group aside and say “I know what you’re doing is totally innocent but these other people… wow you know, you’re really sacrificing something heroic for the team here. You’re helping a lot of kids here.”
Then bring them back together and toilet flush these deeply weird fucked up practices.
I would like to use my authority as a commenter in this podcast to approve this
Lately, I’ve noticed people using “but cisgender teenage girls get cosmetic breast surgeries all the time“ as a gotcha when trans mastectomies for minors are criticized. Some Guy, please use your authority as a commenter to ban all of this shit too!
But seriously, I love when people come back to you thinking that something is fucked up by saying “oh yeah?!?!? but what about this other fucked up thing?!?!?!”
And every time it’s like they can’t even imagine that you also genuinely think that the second thing is also fucked up.
“I have a principled position that children shouldn’t be involved in any sexualized performance of any kind for any group.”
“Isn’t that just both siderism!?!??!”
We now live in the Worlds of Nazis vs Pedophiles and we are all being forced to choose a side.
THIS. I posted a photo of a dude holding a poster saying "if pedophilia is just sexuality then burying them all is just gardening," and I got the usual "But what about pedophile priests?!?!?!?" And I reply, "them, too." I don't see why anyone with a brain would think that one child abuser is less awful than another because he happens to be a priest.
Which is of course the whole point. Divide and conquer. Polarize the population. Make it so that you HAVE to pick a side and be treated accordingly. Distract us with petty divisiveness and spotlight our differences so we can’t band together over what we have in common.
Yeah I have no idea how that door got opened but it needs to get shut. Imagine being the demon in a teenagers shoulder saying “oh you’re unhappy with how you look? You must be ugly. No other teenagers feel that way.”
It must be coming from a belief that all opponents are some kind of stereotyped Southern Christian conservatives who naturally endorse beauty pageants and, uh, I guess breast implants for their… all-American blonde teenage daughters?
Which, first, I’m none of those things, and neither are most of the GC people I follow, and second, I doubt there’s anything close to unanimous support for beauty pageants and boob jobs for teenagers among conservatives, because those things are gross and weird.
Thank you X! This is just what I was thinking: the hosts completely ignored another source of critique against DQST, which starts off with 'drag is a grotesque parody of femaleness and femininity, and deeply insulting to women'. Accept that for the sake of argument, and then see if it's OK for it to be normalised to children (with or without parental consent).
Alternatively, imagine a woman dressed that way, and made up that much, turning up at a library to read books to kids. We'd find it weird and inappropriate, and we'd discourage it. So why do men get a pass? Oh hang on ...
As someone who grew up in the south I can confirm that almost everyone found those beauty pageants creepy. They were also a niche thing most people didn't realize existed in their town. The southern conservatives considered breast implants for anyone--but especially kids--as a thing coastal liberals did (maybe this has changed since I moved away 20 years ago, but I doubt it).
FYI, the Southern Christians you are referring to--the ones the left hates--they don't even like the high school dance teams uniforms & suggestive dances.
I've seen people defend these cosmetic mastectomies on minors because "cis women get them for cancer treatment." And I'm thinking, "Do you honestly see no difference between women having to have a mastectomy to save her life and an elective cosmetic mastectomy? Are you THAT stupid?"
Or the "Minors aren't getting genital surgery." To which I reply with the Reuters piece that searched the Komodo insurance database and found dozens of them happened on minors. So then it's "well, that's not A LOT!" 🙄
My impression is that the majority of Conservatives don't even like child pageants, and that there aren't even that many of them anymore (I could be wrong), because people realized they're creepy.
Get rid of them both, I doubt any Conservatives would raise a fuss.
I mean can you imagine how that bike scene would be interpreted if the races were reversed? Pregnant black woman trying to get home after a 12 hour shift, rents a bike so she can finally get off her feet. A group of white 17 year old boys refuse to let her take the bike she paid for, mock her, physically intimidate her and call her baby retarded. The boys film the whole encounter and then post it online for clout. It would be Covington Catholic all over again! Tomes would be written about the boys’ toxic masculinity and white entitlement.
Couldn't disagree with Jesse more. The women's reaction is totally proportionate and the guys were in the wrong. The group of guys were sitting on three e-bikes in order to exploit a loophole to make some cash at the expense of people trying to get from A to B which is the whole point of Citi Bikes in the first place.
I hope everyone here appreciates how difficult it is to find 5 electric Citibikes at the same time in NY. Now I understand why, and why I see kids just sitting on them constantly.
Do parents of black teenagers really think police are going to shoot their kids? It feels exaggerated based on the data (to put it mildly), but is this what they believe?
As I always love to repeat, during the Floyd unrest you had MPR reporters uncritically repeating claims of activists that police in Minneapolis were “killing black people every day”. Just in off hand comments like it was something everyone knew.
Meanwhile in reality land police in Minneapolis kill about one person a year, and about half the time that person is black.
Obviously not, otherwise they wouldn't raise such entitled, aggressive and disrespectful kids as that group. People's belief systems are demonstrated by what they actually do rather than what they say. Those who actually fear for their kids' lives usually teach them not to antagonize others and follow the rules. But a lot of black parents seem to believe (and are not wrong) that a fat payday is only one viral video and a good race victim performance away.
Are you suggesting that most black parents are purposefully teaching their kids to act badly in hopes of viral video fame and gofundme money? Cuz that seems like maybe you took a thought thread a few inches too far.
A lot of Black people think this. I hear em say it all the time. Which is…odd because it doesn’t seem to keep anyone from going out to do the things they want.
Yes, a lot. It’s actually seeming to cause us to not like each other. I’m ADOS so from my perspective it seems they are far too eager to take stolen valor from slavery and are just as racist toward us as any other group. I admit ADOS have been mean to them in the past but I mean you eventually have to get over being called an “African booty scratcher”
When my company had its mandatory DEI training, this black woman said that every time her black husband leaves the home, she is scared he will be killed by the cops
I find it interesting to compare and contrast the central park Karen story with the Citi bike story. While I am sympathetic to the fact that Amy cooper basically had to go underground and the social consequences were too severe, I could understand why she was seen as the aggressor since she was breaking the rules of the park and called the cops on someone she merely due to finding him suspicious which does fit the Karen archetype. Sarah Comrie on the other hand was actually following the rules and did not escalate by calling the police she doesn't to me follow the script of being a Karen but I guess the definition changed again, as it tends, to do to suit the circumstances.
A Karen is any woman over the age of twenty that complains about anything, right or wrong. Bonus points if she is not conventionally attractive or dares not to be nice and accommodating.
One of the problems with the ACAB narrative is what are people supposed to do if they feel threatened?
If you can't or won't get the cops involved, then it's down to US Marines or social media to solve problems. Neither of these things has ever gone wrong before.
And while I am sperging, I would be interested in how many of these "Karens" come from much smaller towns than NYC. I have lived in big cities and small towns, and the rules are way different. I can see genuinely not knowing what the etiquette is in a particular situation feeding into some of these stories.
I feel like women aren't supposed to call the cops if they feel they are being threatened, especially if they are white and the person they feel threatened by is not.
I've been ACAB from my teens but there are times there really isn't any other option other than involving police-- like when you're a woman and just about any man from teens onward can overpower you and, well, it's threatening. Especially if you are alone or with your child.
You're right though leaving protecting people to marines or social media isn't the answer.
I listened to the Bari Weiss episode and remain unconvinced. Calling the cops should not be seen as a reasonable way to solve disputes that could easily be solved by just talking and using reason. Obviously police can be called if she was a victim of stalking or if things seemed like they could get physical (presence of a knife or gun etc.) but it clearly never escalated to that extent.
If she was genuinely afraid of him, not sure what talking would do. The issue really was how she would have handled things if he had been white..
People on my neighborhood blog absolutely complained about his behavior - the way he offered the dogs treats freaked them out. At the exact same time, she could have just put the dog on a leash and walked away .
Yeah I guess just walking away would solve it as well would have saved her a lot of issues in the future. I find the defenses of amy cooper's actions generally on here to be really strange though? She did not behave in a commendable manner and she mentioned race first in the phone call making it very easy to tar her as a racist Karen not doing herself any favors.
I think the defenses are because Amy Cooper did not deserve the level of condemnation she received. I want to defend her as well but the dog should have been on the leash. She was in the wrong.
Well, technically so was he, since he is not a cop or employee of the city and has no authority to enforce park regulations. He was acting as a vigilante.
I remember Amy Cooper very well. That story was way more complicated, and it was covered in my neighborhood blog. A lot of people posted that day about how they had encountered him, and he scared them, offering their dogs treats.
But yes. She 100% was breaking the law. The citibike lady did everything right.
Curious about how many people posted that Christian Cooper had threatened them? Are we talking about three or four, which would line up with Kmele‘s reporting? I believe he had one on the record - willing to speak on the podcast - and a couple others in his pocket who were not willing to come forward publicly for fear of retaliation. Were there significantly more? And did the posters say anything about how he spoke to them? Was he using a calm tone, or was he raising his voice?
In retrospect, I find it sinister how little reporting was done on Christian Cooper’s threats to Amy Cooper, which he practically bragged about on his own Facebook. Most articles didn’t give it even a passing mention. We know he threatened her because HE TOLD US. He parlayed his fame into a TV show, while she remains in hiding abroad.
I initially was 100% in his corner. I still don’t condone her playing the race card, and she should’ve kept her dog leashed. But he created a situation that was threatening to her. His sister was ready to immediately post the clip to Twitter and portray Christian as having narrowly escaped a lynching. Charles Blow compared Amy to Carolyn Bryant in his NYT column. That’s been the playbook for the past three years. It’s really ugly.
I cannot recall exactly but it was at least 2 people possibly 3. You can look it up on the West Side Rag.
I do think race played a role in that it was more likely she would have put the leash on if he were white. I also imagine that she felt more threatened because he was black.
Mentioning he was black in the phone call - either it was to make him see more threatening. Or maybe because he was a black man and the police would need to know his race.
"I do think race played a role in that it was more likely she would have put the leash on if he were white. I also imagine that she felt more threatened because he was black."
Sorry, but that's just pure speculation and rather bizarre as well. What leads you to believe that she would have been more likely to fulfill his request if he was white? And why would she have felt more threatened because he was black? Was there even the slightest evidence that race was a factor here, other than the way the story was covered by the media?
She should feel more threatened if he is black! That is sadly a brute fact about our society. black men are hugely more dangerous than any other type of person you encounter.
It isn’t by some small amount either. I want to say for violent crimes if you are a white woman walking and encounter a random black man he is 70! Times more likely to commit a crime against you than if you swap the races (black woman and white man).
That is seven zero! If it is Asian versus black the numbers are even more wild.
To a first approximation almost all the “interracial violence” in this country is coming out of the black community at other races. Until you are also willing to include that in the litany of “uncomfortable facts about race” you want to talk about, well there isn’t really much to talk about.
People behave differently around black men for extremely reality driven and sensible reasons.
Similar to how the black community rails any of the rare times an unarmed black man is killed by police, but totally ignore the black people, including children, who die as a result of gun crimes committed by black people. "Say their names!" ... unless they were killed by someone of the same race and it makes us uncomfortable remembering that.
One of the great points the hosts made (I think it was in this episode) was that stereotypes have a basis in reality. They're not myths, which kind of makes them even harder to dislodge. But we do need to have a conversation about when it's OK, and when it's not, to make assumptions about an individual based on that person's membership of a particular group. I would say a woman wanting to be safe is one situation where it just might be OK
And I think I heard in the episode J & K did on this (It actually might have been Bari Weiss) that Amy Cooper is a survivor of sexual assault. When a man says "you're not going to like what I do." she will feel that at a visceral level that No One has a right to question. No one.
Now you're a mind reader and you know that she would have put the dog on leash for a white man? Wow. You don't even realize how awful that sounds, speculating like that.
I do not know that. But given that she mentioned race first in her call to 911, I do not think it is unreasonable to speculate she may have reacted differently if he were a white man
Also. Our society IS racist and of course plenty of white people behave the same around black and white people. I am not sure if that is true for the majority of white people..
She wasn't following the original script of being a Karen, but the brief has broadened considerably (and quickly). It's now something like 'white female expressing displeasure about anything a man or a person of another race does'. Brace for scolds' bridles all-round
That still doesn't read to me as a reason to call the police. We can solve problems like this with words without the cops. I know cops aren't evil but calling them is an escalation because you think a crime is being committed or is about to be committed.
She is a survivor of sexual assault. Her reaction is totally understandable. When will women be justified in feeling fear?
Men in dresses get to colonize our bathrooms because they're scared of other men, but when we're scared of men and don't want them in our bathrooms we're the bigots.
Really fucking tired of people expecting women to be emotionless zombies and take whatever shit men do in stride as long as they're not actively in the process of beating them to death. And in both cases it's Men of the Left telling us we have no option than to accept the situation because it's what we have to Be Kind.
Yeah in the same way we have “the talk” with kids about sex they need to pull boys aside and say “I know you were eleven five minutes ago but you can genuinely scare the shit out of a woman if you approach her while she’s totally alone and there’s no one around.”
I speak for the majority of women when I say I don’t give a shit, a man threatens me I am calling the cops. I’d rather be called a Karen by 12,000 than carried by 6.
Men who threaten women on their own deserve no benefit of the doubt.
I take literally no position on the woman's behavior in the Citibike story, but it seems like even if you take the kids' story at 100% face value (1) they're clearly in violation of Citibike's terms of service for the bikes, (2) they definitely had no legal claim to deny anyone else the right to use the bike, and (3) they didn't even have a particularly valid moral/philosophical claim to the bike beyond might-makes-right.
Maybe it’s my stage of life, but I have more sympathy for the pregnant health care worker trying to get home after a twelve hour shift than the teenage boy “sitting on” a bike he didn’t pay for. I don’t think the kids are monsters either, they’re kids. No one involved deserves to have their life ruined over this. I’m not sure what is wrong with the kid’s mother though - if one of my kids treated a pregnant woman or any physically weaker person like this, I would feel like I failed utterly. Jesse, no offense but you got this one wrong!
They're probably not monsters. But they are little shits who need to be taught a lesson in basic courtesy. Whereas I can't see that she did anything unreasonable.
Well, she kind-of did though. As I understand the situation: There were a bunch of boys blocking access to the bikes for a long time. They told her they were not available. So she snuck past, scanned one, sat on it, tried to ride off, and refused to move when they stopped her.
She could've just walked away at any point. But she decided to meet their intimidation with physical resistance. And I say good for her, standing up to bullies.
So renting an unrented bike is provoking a fight? This is like saying trying to enter a gas station some thug is outside of was basically asking him to punch me.
Well, kind-of, yes. If that thug was standing outside the gas station saying "This gas all belongs to me now. Just try and take it, I dare you." And you decide to walk in out of principle, then you are making the decision to engage in physical conflict.
But in that sort of scenario, I think there's a strong argument that engaging in physical conflict is the right thing to do. I'm not a pacifist. And I wish I more often had the capacity and courage to stand up to people who are physically threatening.
Maybe I've misunderstood the order of events, but it sounds to me like she made a conscious decision to wade into the conflict rather than shrink from it. And if so, I think that's admirable.
I think big cities have rotted the brains of people that live there. If the kids checked in the bike they shouldn't be able to stand there on it and claim it's theirs. Everyone is just taking that claim at face value. I'm sorry, if you checked in the bike then somebody else should be able to check it out.
Yeah there’s people arguing that people do it all the time! Which somehow makes it acceptable. Also people seem to think you’re only screwing over Citi Bike like its stealing a Snickers bar from Wal-Mart. The problem is, there’s not an infinite amount of bikes let alone e-bikes and by squatting on them and abusing the service you’re preventing people from using them to get home or go wherever for far more legitimate purposes than joy riding. These bikes are mostly for Public Transport, not fucking around.
Hold up. The kid docked his bike. At that point it was no longer his bike. I have no doubt he was waiting until he could use it again. But if he docked it, how was it his anymore? Am I missing something?
Also. Why does the kid need money for fundraising,? Was he charged with anything?
You’re not missing anything. They got this one wrong.
Jesse got it wrong, as usual.
I was glad Katie had the good sense to do some extra digging on NewsOne. If she hadn't have pushed back I think a lot of listeners might have figured Jesse was correct to file this in the "it's complicated" bin.
The kids get government assistance and can ride the bikes at a discounted rate for 45 minutes. Then they have to dock them. Then they have to wait a given time to recheck them out at the same lowered rate. It’s gaming the system, just like it was to record this woman and release the footage in a way that made the group of teenagers look like the victims. For a guy who says it’s complicated all the time, the NewsOne story Jesse parroted did not complicate anything. The woman reserved that particular bike. The teenagers sat on them because they wanted to continue riding around at a reduced rate. This is a New York City story of someone putting a garbage can out to hold a parking spot and someone moves the garbage can and takes the spot. The person who puts the garbage can there is an asshole. There’s nothing complicated about it.
Calling people a Karen or a TERF is just a way for people on the left to be viciously sexist.
Just squeezing in here! My name is Karen. I work at a very left leaning org. It’s been so shocking - I get the joke - but man, hearing people spout the name with such venom and then preach acceptance and kindness has been so disorienting.
Introducing myself gave me such anxiety. I thought I was totally losing it at one point (there was so much anger out there around this time) that I called a therapist who laughed and told me to get comfortable with white privilege (honestly I had already attended workshops and read so many books).
The only person who understood was the IT guy who changed his name too to fit in (I eventually started going by something else - ppl were mad at me for doing that too but it wasn’t good for me). He told me not to worry, it’ll become normal soon, give it time.
I’ll never ever forget that type of kindness - he totally could’ve shat on me.
Anyway, I’m confused by everyone now.
That is a fucking awful therapist. Like it’s not that you’re white - there are plenty of non-white Karens after all — it’s that literally everyone hates your name and is shit talking your name constantly. It’s like if you have the same name as someone who suddenly becomes infamous.
That IT guy sounds awesome.
What a fucking awful therapist. I would have reported that person to their licensing board. It was completely unprofessional and based only on their own beliefs. And I think it's terrible that you've had to use a different name, but I understand. For the record I've known many a wonderful Karen.
It’s been so strange. I waited a year before talking to another person. The next therapist - actually they were all social workers, if that makes a difference - said that she totally believed me as she had gone back to school late in life and was terrified of the new ideology. She was nice but really just wanted to chat about that issue. I tried another social worker (we were lucky to be given this help for free from our work). When my name shame came up, she advised me to read White Fragility bc her white friends said it was helpful. I told her I read it and something didn’t sit totally right with me… but I couldn’t explain it. So we talked about different things. The final person I paid for was out of my own pocket, who was/is great and really helped. Incidentally, I learned five sessions in that a senior admin in the school board she works for doesn’t feel safe with her counsel as she’s a white woman. By the way, I know I sound crazy going to all these people but I’ve really never been like this before. At first it started with my own issues but then I was like - are they crazy or am I crazy?
It's not crazy going to different people. You have to find a therapist that is a good fit, and sometimes that's what it takes.
This is what therapy has become so reporting her probably would change nothing. I have a wonderful cousin named Karen. I really feel for her.
At one time I shared a very common first and last name with a despicable criminal, which gave me an excuse to revert to my maiden name. If I hadn't wanted to do that anyway, I would have really resented the person who ruined that name for the hundreds of us who shared it.
Ava Dahmer?
Ava Kazcynski?
Bundy?
Gacy?
Manson?
Trump?
We had a brainstorm about what values mattered to us and “kindness” and “inclusivity” were the top ones. I’m like seriously? All you guys talk about is punishing people... you are like the audience around a guillotine. I’m not sure if they are meaner than anyone else but their purported values make the actual lack of them really obvious.
My wife is a teacher and hears little boys call little girls (of all races) Karens for annoying them in whatever way. Soon enough it will have lost whatever political valence it once had and will be little more than a G-rated version of "bitch."
I wild argue it’s already a slightly more polite version of “bitch.” A bitch and a Karen are both complaining women.
And a bitch and a Karen are also women who tell it like it is. I have been called a bitch simply for telling the truth - proud to wear the badge!
A few years back I had a wall calendar called something like ' You call me a bitch ... like that's a bad thing?'
"Asshole" is less gendered, but the same thing does happen to men.
I think asshole is my gender neutral pronoun. Anyone can be an asshole, and I think you are right that men who tell inconvenient truths or just express a difference of opinion get similar dismissal to what we bitches get. The ad hominem attacks are one way you know your disturbing the group think waters.
And even if those little girls called themselves NBs, or trans, those same fucking little boys would still call them Karens... because everyone knows who the females (and males are).
I'm pretty sure in the UK it acquired that meaning within 5 minutes of people learning it. It's only the US where it still carries the original racially inflected meaning in some instances. I mean it still kind of means 'bitch' in all scenarios.
I swear I had heard it used as a race-neutral term of misogynistic abuse before 2020 and the claim that it was a anti-racist thing so I never believed it was anything else.
And/or racist. It’s all the exact same shit. Someone calling someone a “boomer” is literally doing the exact same dehumanizing garbage someone using a racial slur is.
If one is verboten the other should be too. End of story. If people cant see that they are moral and mental midgets, whose concerns aren’t worth caring about.
Even Swedes can be taught to behave like human beings. There is no reason to treat anyone, even Italians, like they’re less than the Irish.
Well Boomer is a technical term for a generation. Not quite the same as a derogatory term like Karen
It's a dismissive, ageist term. "Baby Boomer" is the technical term ( nickname) for the generation. Shortening it to Boomer and calling someone that is a way to mock them for being old and out of touch and clueless.
It is, but plenty of people will apply that term to themselves ("I'm a boomer"). Nobody says "I'm a Karen". That's how you know which is worse.
Well, nobody except Katie
I've definitely seen it used in the context you mean. I think it's more the attitude behind it than the word though. I can think of dismissive uses of 'millenial' for example, and then 'snowflake' tends to be used to mock younger generations. Although, that does seem to be more case specific.
Wait a minute you're not me
No you're not me
Well it looks like we got an old fashioned standoff
Missed opportunity for the best line from "Shanghai Noon":
It's a Mexican standoff, only we ain't got no Mexicans.
(Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzQzyKAUqxM)
Do we have to do the thing like when I was growing up and classes were full of Jennifers? We can have a Randolph and a Randy (or a Rand if one of you leans Libertarian).
It’s not generally used that way, and knowingly so. Baby boomers are quite old these days.
Boomer has definitely evolved into a generally derogatory term for anyone older than the speaker. I’d wager that most people who get called boomers these days are actually Gen X.
Yes, and to completely dismiss us wholesale in every way. As a friend of mine said recently, who is a total liberal, sometimes Karen has a point.
Correct.
You guys have really lost it. A woman is entitled to behave more or less any way she pleases when she’s surrounded by a group of young men who are antagonising her. This is especially true for women who are 6 months pregnant, and completely understandable of women who have just got off a 12 hour shift at the hospital.
This idea that white women have a responsibility to never attempt to involve police in a situation with black men is insane.
It kind of feels like sometimes Jesse has a hard time understanding behavior related to personalities different from his own. Some people are not so conflict avoidant that they’d just let the kids, who were obviously trying to game the system, dictate what they do or don’t do. Yes, I understand Jesse wouldn’t ever get in the same situation because he would avoid the conflict, but he’d also never try to “dibs” public bikes for 40 minutes or accost a pregnant woman when she tried to take a bike she was perfectly entitled to use. Different personalities react to situations differently, and at the end of the day she was perfectly within her rights to do what she did, and the teens were not in the right to do what they did. It doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.
But also he is a very large man. It doesn't hurt that he is white. So a lot of shit like this would not happen to him
It can be difficult to imagine yourself in someone else's shoes. Although, I wouldn't think being so tall wouldn't mean being surrounded by 5/6 people can feel very intimidating. I think Jesse just hasn't had that life experience yet.
I'm sure when he was younger he could've been stuffed into a locker, too, as slender as he is.
I meant that due to his size, 5 or 6 teens wouldn't surround him
Nah bruh. 5-6 little shithead assholes high on their own farts would absolutely surround and/or beat the shit out of a bigger guy. Happens all the time. Basically getting jumped. 1 big guy has little defense against half a dozen smaller guys. It’s just a pack mentality thing at that point. I guess it only depends on the reason, if there is any at all.
Ah OK, Sorry I didn't realise that. I actually think I have heard of tall victims of bullies - they can struggle particularly because the optics shift quite quickly if they try to fight back at all.
However, you may have a point that Jesse's heigh would definitely be a factor that would cause 5/6 teens to maybe think twice about when starting a confrontation.
I’m a little over 6’4. I generally don’t get shit from the average personas much as usual but I also exist in this weird place where people I think like to try and make an example of the tall guy. I’ve had some really bullshit interactions with bouncers who get in my face when I’m not doing anything wrong.
Stealing it from Destiny because he said it best. Progressives believe men are a perpetual danger to women but they pump the breaks the moment the male happens to be Black.
Or trans
Yeah...the contradictions make it all feel very disingenuous sometimes.
THANK YOU.
Pretty sure you need to edit this immediately, or take it down. You’ve completely botched the Citi Bike story. Pretty inexcusable being that there was a thread in the Wednesday comments that understands it better.
Agreed. Jesse, dude... what the hell? He trusted this weird article written by a hack journalist. He’s better than this.
The hack website actually subtlety but probably unintentionally reveals the kid was in the wrong. The kid cops to “doing it all the time” as an excuse for normalizing his shitty behavior with Citi Bike. The excuse is an inadvertent admission.
It took me two reds of the article to understand what he had done.
I think the issue is that the kid truly thinks the bike was his, as all he did was dock it. And every other time he just kept using it.
The fact that the publication had a Karen archive should have pointed to a very potential lack of objectivity in this case.
Progressives: I won't read an article at (Conservative Outlet) even if it links to source documents backing up the story.
Also Progressives: Let me rely on this article from a random website that has an archive of Karen stories.
I don’t know how he could have read that article and not realized that the kids were clearly in the wrong. Holding assets hostage that you don’t own and haven’t paid for so no one else can use them is simply wrong. There’s no wiggle room here.
I'm disappointed that if they were going to cover the citbike incident, they didn't do their own journalistic research.
Yeah they’ve had quite a few of these “drop the ball moments” recently, bit surprising and, as you say, disappointing.
The whole reason their pod has been interesting is because they actually try to get to the bottom of a story by learning all about it without fear nor favour, but they seem to be doing more and more throat clearing recently
I’m unsure if Jesse was caught in a weird place between rapidly changing & conflicting narratives or if he was a harder-hit victim of poor reading instruction than previously surmised.
I understand where Jesse is coming from . The article that purportedly exonerates the kid - with a quick read it does seem like the kid was fucked over. It was only when I read it a second time that I realized the kid DID fuck up ,- he returned the bike, therefore it was no longer his. It is also clear he really thought the bike was his.
Honestly I hope that he has misled his mother about how the bike program works (always a strong possibility with teens & their parents). Otherwise she is enabling shitty, entitled behavior about this and who knows what else.
In 2023 non-white kids are told nothing they do is wrong, and that the entire world is stacked up against them. (Which I think sucks because it's disempowering a generation.)
The one thing BARpod never used to be was hot takes based on a “quick read”
Seemed well written to me. Just giving the kids story and finally cleared it all up. Wasn’t editorializing. Got facts right. The kid admits he was wrong without knowing it.
I hope Jesse doesn't just do his usual, snickering correction. He needs to acknowledge that there's something off about his worldview that has him constantly erring on the side of leftists.
Time to reevaluate his priors; he can start with Gamergate, which he got completely wrong.
He really did botch it pretty badly. Some people did behave abominably, but that is true of both sides on most politicized issues.
Meanwhile the actual interesting angle on the story got ignored by everyone (games themselves to some extent, and to a huge extent games journalists rapidly moving left at a pace that was leaving the vast majority of the actual consumers of the genre behind).
It got so bad you had say realistic games about professional racing have half the drivers be women, and when fans would complain they would basically get told “this hobby isn’t for you misogynist”. Except the people saying that and driving that narrative were the outsiders.
“Wah wah wah, why is this hobby that is dominated by young men so catered to young mens interests!”
It’s like people showing up to the Westminster dog show and saying it isn’t fully inclusive unless there are dogfighting events for all the people into dogfighting. And then those people being taken extremely seriously.
if you hate the host so much, unsubscribe.
I don’t understand how Katie and Jesse had a discussion about the ethical issues of calling women Karens, criticized NewsOne’s Karen backlog, and then Jesse buys the NewsOne story as credible or somehow dispositive of the other narrative which is incredibly clear and uncomplicated. In ten minutes, Jesse made these leaps: “It’s kind of fucked up to call women Karens for these ten reasons...this paper delights in Karen narrative and is incredibly slanted...yeah she’s pretty much a Karen because this news outlet said so.”
The story is a fireside chat positioning them as a Gold Star family or some shit. It boiled down to “We pull off this Citibike scam all the time and no one else has had a problem. People are calling me names now. My family is poor. Why is everyone so racist? This is crazy.”
When Jesse was trying to figure out where he stood on the issue he called the teenagers “immigrants,” which for him tipped the scales of sympathy towards the teenagers, and I don’t understand how or why. For one, their entitled and manipulative actions place them firmly as American Zoomers. Two, the admirable drive and work ethic immigrants bring with them usually don’t last through generations. Three, Jesse doesn’t weigh the teenagers telling the woman her baby is going to come out retarded; any sympathy or nuance gets thrown out the window when that’s an off the cuff comment.
What would happen in West Africa, which is where the teenagers’ families originate, if a pregnant woman is trying to get a bike and teenagers wouldn’t allow her? This country is pretty pants-on-head stupid about identity, and this podcast is supposed to be a bulwark to these poisonous narratives; this time they are part of it and it sucks.
Dignity and sympathy can’t be tied into protected or marginalized classes. That was the origin of this podcast. The hosts were on the wrong side of a culture war issue, stuck to their guns, made a podcast examining similar instances of identarian nonsense, and for that they have my respect. With takes like these, along with the subway bullshit from last week, they are losing it.
https://twitter.com/IDoTheThinking/status/1661989925112414211?s=20
I found this thread interesting. The guy is a lefty YIMBY that got closer to the truth than a lot of knee-jerk reactions like from Nikole hannah-jones and the like. I haven't listened to the episode yet so I can't compare it to B&R episode.
That guy gets it wrong. The teens have no right to block bikes from being used. They are violating multiple Citi Bike rules, which would be bad enough but they are part of a discounted program so that just makes it even worse because they are taking advantage of a program to take advantage of the bikes.
Yeah. Teens are assholes. The kid was not a victim of anything. That is the problem
I expect teens to have good manners! My son and his friends wouldn't have acted like this when they were teens ( they are all around 22 now). Their parents and coaches would have come down on them for behaving like that.
I do too but it’s not a national news story if they’re not. I think people are mapping other stuff onto this.
The only reason it became a national news story is the kids tried to hurt the woman (potentially ruin her life, get her fired) by posting the video. That's so disgusting. And that there are so many people on the left still claiming she's a racist bitch with no evidence is a huge part of the problem. It wasn't those supporting the woman and pointing out that the teens are manipulative jerks who made this a story.
I don't think that's an excuse. Deliberately blocking a pregnant woman from her commute because you want to mess around on an e-bike for free is really shitty behaviour. A 17-year-old is plenty old enough should know better. And I think most countries and previous generations would not tolerate that.
That said, we don't know all the details. For instance, if she was rude to him from the outset, I could understand why he might respond obstinately.
You sound like a teen
How would she get home?
Tired people don't necessarily act rationally and we have no idea what her day was like.
Also, I don't think there's conclusive evidence to show she wanted to fight anyone. We haven't seen the start of the confrontation and we only have one version of the start.
Yeah, pregnant women generally don't want to take on a group of older teenagers for kicks.
Adults be mad at shitty teen behavior is new? Are you like 12 years old?
What's new is that said adult loses her job for getting mad at shitty teen behavior
This is a bizarre take, you want teens who are old enough to drive to make the city worse for stressed out adults? I don’t know why you’re cheering on chaos?
Seriously? The woman was pregnant and getting off shift. She could have handled things with more grace. The kids were bigger jerks and ok, fucking over CitiBike is not the worst. But preventing other people from using bikes they had docked? That is a jackass move.
The kids should not be in trouble. The adult should not lose a day of work.
So I guess you're not too concerned about the actual facts of what happened? You have your narrative that she's a Karen, so end of story...
Why so dickish, Mike? Whenever I see a white man being a dick, I'm going to call him a Mike. She was penalized at her job, FFS.
*rolls eyes* Another Mike.
I’m almost with you but I think this is just not a story and it doesn’t mean anything. She was tired and pregnant and mad. They were young and entitled. Perfectly understandable from both sides.
She'd just worked a twelve hour shift, was pregnant and wanted to ride the bike. We have no way of knowing to what extent he was holding on to the bike. The sister said his hand was on the handlebars, but she also said they'd gotten frozen yogurt. I think they were sitting around eating froyo and hording the bikes. In the end they didn't even ride them home so they broke the rules, horded the bikes for no other reason than they were feeling territorial towards them is how I read that.
I don't think "they're just kids" is an excuse. If a 17-year-old boy blocks a pregnant woman from using an electric bicycle to commute, because he wants to ride it for fun and won't pay 17¢, then he's an arsehole, and plenty old enough to know better.
Though it also depends how she approached the situation. If she was rude and demanding from the outset, I could forgive him for reacting obstinately.
I haven't listened to the episode yet, so I would just like to know what they got wrong.
I’ll edit my original comment but I’ll add here:
1. He and his friends were squatting on the bikes not paying for them but blocking others from using them. This has been proven. This breaks the terms of service for Citi Bikes.
2. They were docking them and then undocking to cheat the proper fares.
3. He and his friends are a part of a discounted program and used his privileged membership to break rules 1 and 2.
And they just accepted without investigation the story from biased parties and a bad journo that she basically grabbed the bike from him to scan it, which does not explain how she got on it. Seems more likely that he had actually walked away from the bike to get the frozen yogurt. At the least they should investigate or admit they don't know.
I know y’all are loathe to play identity politics, but I wish you’d address the Karen thing more honestly: it’s not used to disparage or dismiss “people,” as Katie repeatedly says; it’s used to disparage and dismiss *women.* Sexism actually exists, Katie. For centuries women, not men, have been punished for complaining. Calling a complaining woman a “Karen” and shaming her on social media is simply a slightly more civilized version of putting a “common scold” in the stocks.
Thanks, Avocational, I was thinking just that as well! Everybody needs to read Victoria Smith's book Hags - deals beautifully with this history and its current relevance
Kathleen Brown's book Good Wives, Nasty Wenches and Anxious Patriarchs covers this history in a lot of detail also.
This is correct.
Everyone gets the "Karen" thing wrong. "Karen" is a misogynist weapon that's only very tangentially about race. Calling a woman "Karen" is a socially sanctioned way to tear a woman down for not womaning correctly: not being accommodating, not being attractive, not being young. The only way race comes into it is that woke leftists don't use the word against black women because they're afraid of being called racist.
Best Karen insights ever. It is a new socially sanctioned way to attack women for all the same old things.
"Karen" is misogyistic, yes. It's also ageist. Race is tertiary, in my analysis.
It’s often an opportunity to make fun of a woman’s look, as was originally pointed out. Karen is never hot, according to the current standards.
Remember all the Karen haircut jokes?
That's a great point. I was just talking about this to my (male Gen X) spouse and he brought up the age thing about "Karen," because it's the part that resonates with him. (He does mostly understand the misogynist bit I think, but that's just not going to hit as hard on a male person, because male.)
Wait can we make the deal right now to ban child beauty pageants in exchange for also banning child drag shows?
I’d like to just take each group aside and say “I know what you’re doing is totally innocent but these other people… wow you know, you’re really sacrificing something heroic for the team here. You’re helping a lot of kids here.”
Then bring them back together and toilet flush these deeply weird fucked up practices.
I would like to use my authority as a commenter in this podcast to approve this
Lately, I’ve noticed people using “but cisgender teenage girls get cosmetic breast surgeries all the time“ as a gotcha when trans mastectomies for minors are criticized. Some Guy, please use your authority as a commenter to ban all of this shit too!
Step 1) Gonna block it Step 2) Gonna report it.
But seriously, I love when people come back to you thinking that something is fucked up by saying “oh yeah?!?!? but what about this other fucked up thing?!?!?!”
And every time it’s like they can’t even imagine that you also genuinely think that the second thing is also fucked up.
“I have a principled position that children shouldn’t be involved in any sexualized performance of any kind for any group.”
“Isn’t that just both siderism!?!??!”
We now live in the Worlds of Nazis vs Pedophiles and we are all being forced to choose a side.
THIS. I posted a photo of a dude holding a poster saying "if pedophilia is just sexuality then burying them all is just gardening," and I got the usual "But what about pedophile priests?!?!?!?" And I reply, "them, too." I don't see why anyone with a brain would think that one child abuser is less awful than another because he happens to be a priest.
Which is of course the whole point. Divide and conquer. Polarize the population. Make it so that you HAVE to pick a side and be treated accordingly. Distract us with petty divisiveness and spotlight our differences so we can’t band together over what we have in common.
People batted eyes, Your Name. They were called feminists. And nobody listened to what they were saying.
But that would be quite a different statement
Yeah I have no idea how that door got opened but it needs to get shut. Imagine being the demon in a teenagers shoulder saying “oh you’re unhappy with how you look? You must be ugly. No other teenagers feel that way.”
It must be coming from a belief that all opponents are some kind of stereotyped Southern Christian conservatives who naturally endorse beauty pageants and, uh, I guess breast implants for their… all-American blonde teenage daughters?
Which, first, I’m none of those things, and neither are most of the GC people I follow, and second, I doubt there’s anything close to unanimous support for beauty pageants and boob jobs for teenagers among conservatives, because those things are gross and weird.
Thank you X! This is just what I was thinking: the hosts completely ignored another source of critique against DQST, which starts off with 'drag is a grotesque parody of femaleness and femininity, and deeply insulting to women'. Accept that for the sake of argument, and then see if it's OK for it to be normalised to children (with or without parental consent).
Alternatively, imagine a woman dressed that way, and made up that much, turning up at a library to read books to kids. We'd find it weird and inappropriate, and we'd discourage it. So why do men get a pass? Oh hang on ...
Excellent question, Hard Man
As someone who grew up in the south I can confirm that almost everyone found those beauty pageants creepy. They were also a niche thing most people didn't realize existed in their town. The southern conservatives considered breast implants for anyone--but especially kids--as a thing coastal liberals did (maybe this has changed since I moved away 20 years ago, but I doubt it).
FYI, the Southern Christians you are referring to--the ones the left hates--they don't even like the high school dance teams uniforms & suggestive dances.
I've seen people defend these cosmetic mastectomies on minors because "cis women get them for cancer treatment." And I'm thinking, "Do you honestly see no difference between women having to have a mastectomy to save her life and an elective cosmetic mastectomy? Are you THAT stupid?"
Or the "Minors aren't getting genital surgery." To which I reply with the Reuters piece that searched the Komodo insurance database and found dozens of them happened on minors. So then it's "well, that's not A LOT!" 🙄
My impression is that the majority of Conservatives don't even like child pageants, and that there aren't even that many of them anymore (I could be wrong), because people realized they're creepy.
Get rid of them both, I doubt any Conservatives would raise a fuss.
Yeah I’ve not ever met a fan of them in real life.
Deal!
Done.
Same.
I mean can you imagine how that bike scene would be interpreted if the races were reversed? Pregnant black woman trying to get home after a 12 hour shift, rents a bike so she can finally get off her feet. A group of white 17 year old boys refuse to let her take the bike she paid for, mock her, physically intimidate her and call her baby retarded. The boys film the whole encounter and then post it online for clout. It would be Covington Catholic all over again! Tomes would be written about the boys’ toxic masculinity and white entitlement.
It would be way worse. Way way worse. A pregnant black woman - that would be that "white boys attempt genocide."
Couldn't disagree with Jesse more. The women's reaction is totally proportionate and the guys were in the wrong. The group of guys were sitting on three e-bikes in order to exploit a loophole to make some cash at the expense of people trying to get from A to B which is the whole point of Citi Bikes in the first place.
Can’t recommend this comment enough
I hope everyone here appreciates how difficult it is to find 5 electric Citibikes at the same time in NY. Now I understand why, and why I see kids just sitting on them constantly.
Do parents of black teenagers really think police are going to shoot their kids? It feels exaggerated based on the data (to put it mildly), but is this what they believe?
Seemingly a fair amount of people seem to think at least hundreds if not thousands of black men are shot by the cops every year 🤷🏻♀️. https://www.skeptic.com/research-center/reports/Research-Report-CUPES-007.pdf
As I always love to repeat, during the Floyd unrest you had MPR reporters uncritically repeating claims of activists that police in Minneapolis were “killing black people every day”. Just in off hand comments like it was something everyone knew.
Meanwhile in reality land police in Minneapolis kill about one person a year, and about half the time that person is black.
It's like Oprah Winfrey claiming that *millions* of Black Americans were lynched in the South.
https://parade.com/58556/katherineheintzelman/oprah-winfrey-forest-whitaker-talk-lee-daniels-the-butler-racism-and-the-n-word/
Note that Parade Magazine printed her statement without questioning it.
(See Wikipedia for more credible numbers about how many people were actually "lynched" during this admittedly awful time in American history:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States#:~:text=The%20Tuskegee%20Institute%20has%20recorded,increasing%20political%20suppression%20of%20blacks.)
Obviously not, otherwise they wouldn't raise such entitled, aggressive and disrespectful kids as that group. People's belief systems are demonstrated by what they actually do rather than what they say. Those who actually fear for their kids' lives usually teach them not to antagonize others and follow the rules. But a lot of black parents seem to believe (and are not wrong) that a fat payday is only one viral video and a good race victim performance away.
Are you suggesting that most black parents are purposefully teaching their kids to act badly in hopes of viral video fame and gofundme money? Cuz that seems like maybe you took a thought thread a few inches too far.
Where did I say "most"? Seems like maybe you're taking a thought thread too far.
The amount of resistance during police stops would suggest otherwise.
A lot of Black people think this. I hear em say it all the time. Which is…odd because it doesn’t seem to keep anyone from going out to do the things they want.
Do you think there are differences between American descendents of slaves and the American children of African and/or Caribbean immigrants?
Yes, a lot. It’s actually seeming to cause us to not like each other. I’m ADOS so from my perspective it seems they are far too eager to take stolen valor from slavery and are just as racist toward us as any other group. I admit ADOS have been mean to them in the past but I mean you eventually have to get over being called an “African booty scratcher”
Yes. Absolutely yes.
Yes, because it's one of the most ridiculous conspiracy theories but also one of the most believed.
It also doesn't help that the disparity in literacy rates does have a consequence when it comes to critical thinking.
When my company had its mandatory DEI training, this black woman said that every time her black husband leaves the home, she is scared he will be killed by the cops
She meant it.
I find it interesting to compare and contrast the central park Karen story with the Citi bike story. While I am sympathetic to the fact that Amy cooper basically had to go underground and the social consequences were too severe, I could understand why she was seen as the aggressor since she was breaking the rules of the park and called the cops on someone she merely due to finding him suspicious which does fit the Karen archetype. Sarah Comrie on the other hand was actually following the rules and did not escalate by calling the police she doesn't to me follow the script of being a Karen but I guess the definition changed again, as it tends, to do to suit the circumstances.
A Karen is any woman over the age of twenty that complains about anything, right or wrong. Bonus points if she is not conventionally attractive or dares not to be nice and accommodating.
Correct.
Bari Weiss had a good interview with Amy Cooper.
One of the problems with the ACAB narrative is what are people supposed to do if they feel threatened?
If you can't or won't get the cops involved, then it's down to US Marines or social media to solve problems. Neither of these things has ever gone wrong before.
And while I am sperging, I would be interested in how many of these "Karens" come from much smaller towns than NYC. I have lived in big cities and small towns, and the rules are way different. I can see genuinely not knowing what the etiquette is in a particular situation feeding into some of these stories.
I feel like women aren't supposed to call the cops if they feel they are being threatened, especially if they are white and the person they feel threatened by is not.
I've been ACAB from my teens but there are times there really isn't any other option other than involving police-- like when you're a woman and just about any man from teens onward can overpower you and, well, it's threatening. Especially if you are alone or with your child.
You're right though leaving protecting people to marines or social media isn't the answer.
I listened to the Bari Weiss episode and remain unconvinced. Calling the cops should not be seen as a reasonable way to solve disputes that could easily be solved by just talking and using reason. Obviously police can be called if she was a victim of stalking or if things seemed like they could get physical (presence of a knife or gun etc.) but it clearly never escalated to that extent.
If she was genuinely afraid of him, not sure what talking would do. The issue really was how she would have handled things if he had been white..
People on my neighborhood blog absolutely complained about his behavior - the way he offered the dogs treats freaked them out. At the exact same time, she could have just put the dog on a leash and walked away .
Yeah I guess just walking away would solve it as well would have saved her a lot of issues in the future. I find the defenses of amy cooper's actions generally on here to be really strange though? She did not behave in a commendable manner and she mentioned race first in the phone call making it very easy to tar her as a racist Karen not doing herself any favors.
I think the defenses are because Amy Cooper did not deserve the level of condemnation she received. I want to defend her as well but the dog should have been on the leash. She was in the wrong.
Well, technically so was he, since he is not a cop or employee of the city and has no authority to enforce park regulations. He was acting as a vigilante.
Yeah I said that in the first comment yet people in the replies still think I was too harsh on her.
Nah. They have all been living in NYC. They aren't visiting.
I remember Amy Cooper very well. That story was way more complicated, and it was covered in my neighborhood blog. A lot of people posted that day about how they had encountered him, and he scared them, offering their dogs treats.
But yes. She 100% was breaking the law. The citibike lady did everything right.
Curious about how many people posted that Christian Cooper had threatened them? Are we talking about three or four, which would line up with Kmele‘s reporting? I believe he had one on the record - willing to speak on the podcast - and a couple others in his pocket who were not willing to come forward publicly for fear of retaliation. Were there significantly more? And did the posters say anything about how he spoke to them? Was he using a calm tone, or was he raising his voice?
In retrospect, I find it sinister how little reporting was done on Christian Cooper’s threats to Amy Cooper, which he practically bragged about on his own Facebook. Most articles didn’t give it even a passing mention. We know he threatened her because HE TOLD US. He parlayed his fame into a TV show, while she remains in hiding abroad.
I initially was 100% in his corner. I still don’t condone her playing the race card, and she should’ve kept her dog leashed. But he created a situation that was threatening to her. His sister was ready to immediately post the clip to Twitter and portray Christian as having narrowly escaped a lynching. Charles Blow compared Amy to Carolyn Bryant in his NYT column. That’s been the playbook for the past three years. It’s really ugly.
I cannot recall exactly but it was at least 2 people possibly 3. You can look it up on the West Side Rag.
I do think race played a role in that it was more likely she would have put the leash on if he were white. I also imagine that she felt more threatened because he was black.
Mentioning he was black in the phone call - either it was to make him see more threatening. Or maybe because he was a black man and the police would need to know his race.
I really don't know. They were both assholes
"I do think race played a role in that it was more likely she would have put the leash on if he were white. I also imagine that she felt more threatened because he was black."
Sorry, but that's just pure speculation and rather bizarre as well. What leads you to believe that she would have been more likely to fulfill his request if he was white? And why would she have felt more threatened because he was black? Was there even the slightest evidence that race was a factor here, other than the way the story was covered by the media?
It is speculation.you are right. It is entirely possible she would have behaved the same regardless of race.
She should feel more threatened if he is black! That is sadly a brute fact about our society. black men are hugely more dangerous than any other type of person you encounter.
It isn’t by some small amount either. I want to say for violent crimes if you are a white woman walking and encounter a random black man he is 70! Times more likely to commit a crime against you than if you swap the races (black woman and white man).
That is seven zero! If it is Asian versus black the numbers are even more wild.
To a first approximation almost all the “interracial violence” in this country is coming out of the black community at other races. Until you are also willing to include that in the litany of “uncomfortable facts about race” you want to talk about, well there isn’t really much to talk about.
People behave differently around black men for extremely reality driven and sensible reasons.
Similar to how the black community rails any of the rare times an unarmed black man is killed by police, but totally ignore the black people, including children, who die as a result of gun crimes committed by black people. "Say their names!" ... unless they were killed by someone of the same race and it makes us uncomfortable remembering that.
One of the great points the hosts made (I think it was in this episode) was that stereotypes have a basis in reality. They're not myths, which kind of makes them even harder to dislodge. But we do need to have a conversation about when it's OK, and when it's not, to make assumptions about an individual based on that person's membership of a particular group. I would say a woman wanting to be safe is one situation where it just might be OK
And I think I heard in the episode J & K did on this (It actually might have been Bari Weiss) that Amy Cooper is a survivor of sexual assault. When a man says "you're not going to like what I do." she will feel that at a visceral level that No One has a right to question. No one.
Now you're a mind reader and you know that she would have put the dog on leash for a white man? Wow. You don't even realize how awful that sounds, speculating like that.
I do not know that. But given that she mentioned race first in her call to 911, I do not think it is unreasonable to speculate she may have reacted differently if he were a white man
Also. Our society IS racist and of course plenty of white people behave the same around black and white people. I am not sure if that is true for the majority of white people..
He's got an article in the NYT today and a TV show so it turned out super great for him.
She wasn't following the original script of being a Karen, but the brief has broadened considerably (and quickly). It's now something like 'white female expressing displeasure about anything a man or a person of another race does'. Brace for scolds' bridles all-round
That still doesn't read to me as a reason to call the police. We can solve problems like this with words without the cops. I know cops aren't evil but calling them is an escalation because you think a crime is being committed or is about to be committed.
I would have called the police in the same situation.
She is a survivor of sexual assault. Her reaction is totally understandable. When will women be justified in feeling fear?
Men in dresses get to colonize our bathrooms because they're scared of other men, but when we're scared of men and don't want them in our bathrooms we're the bigots.
Really fucking tired of people expecting women to be emotionless zombies and take whatever shit men do in stride as long as they're not actively in the process of beating them to death. And in both cases it's Men of the Left telling us we have no option than to accept the situation because it's what we have to Be Kind.
You call the cops to convince the person threatening your dog to leave. It's a de-escalation.
Yeah in the same way we have “the talk” with kids about sex they need to pull boys aside and say “I know you were eleven five minutes ago but you can genuinely scare the shit out of a woman if you approach her while she’s totally alone and there’s no one around.”
The 'please call the police' line should be an indicator that he's not really interested in hurting her and makes her look worse.
I speak for the majority of women when I say I don’t give a shit, a man threatens me I am calling the cops. I’d rather be called a Karen by 12,000 than carried by 6.
Men who threaten women on their own deserve no benefit of the doubt.
I take literally no position on the woman's behavior in the Citibike story, but it seems like even if you take the kids' story at 100% face value (1) they're clearly in violation of Citibike's terms of service for the bikes, (2) they definitely had no legal claim to deny anyone else the right to use the bike, and (3) they didn't even have a particularly valid moral/philosophical claim to the bike beyond might-makes-right.
OMG you guys got the Citi Bike thing all wrong, Come on.
Maybe it’s my stage of life, but I have more sympathy for the pregnant health care worker trying to get home after a twelve hour shift than the teenage boy “sitting on” a bike he didn’t pay for. I don’t think the kids are monsters either, they’re kids. No one involved deserves to have their life ruined over this. I’m not sure what is wrong with the kid’s mother though - if one of my kids treated a pregnant woman or any physically weaker person like this, I would feel like I failed utterly. Jesse, no offense but you got this one wrong!
They're probably not monsters. But they are little shits who need to be taught a lesson in basic courtesy. Whereas I can't see that she did anything unreasonable.
How many will be convicted of a crime before 25? 20%, 40%?
Jesse got the bike story so wrong.
Under what circumstance is a 6-month pregnant woman going to pick a fight with five teenagers?
Well by the sounds of it, that's exactly what she did. But I think she was probably in the right to do so. It was a bold move, albeit risky.
No, she did not.
Christ cocksucking Jesus, what a stupid thing to say.
Well, she kind-of did though. As I understand the situation: There were a bunch of boys blocking access to the bikes for a long time. They told her they were not available. So she snuck past, scanned one, sat on it, tried to ride off, and refused to move when they stopped her.
She could've just walked away at any point. But she decided to meet their intimidation with physical resistance. And I say good for her, standing up to bullies.
So renting an unrented bike is provoking a fight? This is like saying trying to enter a gas station some thug is outside of was basically asking him to punch me.
Well, kind-of, yes. If that thug was standing outside the gas station saying "This gas all belongs to me now. Just try and take it, I dare you." And you decide to walk in out of principle, then you are making the decision to engage in physical conflict.
But in that sort of scenario, I think there's a strong argument that engaging in physical conflict is the right thing to do. I'm not a pacifist. And I wish I more often had the capacity and courage to stand up to people who are physically threatening.
Maybe I've misunderstood the order of events, but it sounds to me like she made a conscious decision to wade into the conflict rather than shrink from it. And if so, I think that's admirable.
You’re victim blaming. That’s not how any type of society beyond apes act.
No
I think big cities have rotted the brains of people that live there. If the kids checked in the bike they shouldn't be able to stand there on it and claim it's theirs. Everyone is just taking that claim at face value. I'm sorry, if you checked in the bike then somebody else should be able to check it out.
Yeah there’s people arguing that people do it all the time! Which somehow makes it acceptable. Also people seem to think you’re only screwing over Citi Bike like its stealing a Snickers bar from Wal-Mart. The problem is, there’s not an infinite amount of bikes let alone e-bikes and by squatting on them and abusing the service you’re preventing people from using them to get home or go wherever for far more legitimate purposes than joy riding. These bikes are mostly for Public Transport, not fucking around.