There was an op-ed by a Legal Aid Society lawyer, a public defender, in the New York Post. These are words I never expected to write, but there you are. Strange days, indeed. The public defender, Maud Maron, is a mother, president of Community Education Council District 2 and a candidate for the City Council. And she has no intention of sacrificing her child or yours to the new fad, white self-loathing and flagellation for failure to be a good enough anti-racist.

No one is ever a good enough anti-racist.

I am a mom, a public defender, an elected public-school council member and a City Council candidate. But at a city Department of Education anti-bias training, I was instructed to refer to myself as a “white woman” — as if my whole life reduces to my race. Continue reading →

At Vox, Zack Beauchamp offered the woke rebuttal to the Harper’s Letter, or as Cathy Young delightfully called it, he “voxsplained” why the voices for free speech and open debate should “shut up.”

The latest rebuke to critics of progressive illiberalism comes from Vox’s Zack Beauchamp. While he ostensibly examines the arguments on both sides and grants some valid concerns to “free speech” defenders, Beauchamp concludes that there is no assault on free expression. Rather, he asserts, we’re having “the kinds of difficult conversations that every liberal society (maybe even every society) grapples with all the time” — about the boundaries of socially acceptable speech amidst changing cultural norms.

It is not, as noted conservatives like Noam Chomsky allege, a matter of silencing speech that fails to comport with the latest permissions from the Secretary of Social Justice, but merely a trifling matter over where the lines of socially acceptable speech should be drawn. Folks like Zack are trying to “change cultural norms” to suit their tastes, and anyone not adhering to those norms is wrong and deserves whatever they get. Continue reading →

It’s not unusual for multiple bad things to occur at the same time and to be done by both sides, or all sides assuming there are either more than two or the sides are indeterminable, but in the midst of physical and intellectual confusion, the narcissistic sense of entitlement becomes a significant burden. The problem is that the people doing the harm are incapable of realizing they’re in the wrong, because they are of the belief that they are a law unto themselves. If they do it, and they’re good people, then what they do is good and they’re in the right.

While Portland continues as a litmus test between the the right, cheering on the feds exceeding their jurisdiction and using force indiscriminately, the left, apologizing for those trying to burn down a federal courthouse for no cognizable reason, and those unaligned who say a pox on both their houses, protests and riots are blooming elsewhere,* whether in sympathy or because people need something to do with their time. These pop-up protesters have decided that they are the good guys so they are entitled not just to shut down city roads, but to command other city residents to turn away and, well, just get lost while they seize the city. Continue reading →

Ed. Note: This is a guest post by Lee Keller King, a civil litigation attorney in a two-person shop in the Houston, Texas area, who practices in business litigation and family law.

Although nothing new to readers of our esteemed host’s blog, Cancel Culture has, until recently, been relatively unknown in Texas. That has changed and in a big way. Cancel Culture has now afflicted the Texas State Bar Association, including an effort to depose our current Bar president, Larry McDougal. The controversy has now reached national note. Can a sitting Bar president be cancelled because of a few comments on social media? This Monday, July 27, we hope to learn the verdict.

Larry is a former police officer, prosecutor and municipal judge who has been ably representing criminal defendants in Fort Bend* and surrounding counties since 1994.  However, despite his yeoman service representing people of all colors, nationalities, genders and sexual orientations, the Mob is coming after him with tar and feathers. Larry’s crime? He deviated from the Narrative and had the temerity of questioning the virtue of Black Lives Matter. He has therefore been labelled a racist and thought criminal (as have any who dare defend him on social media). Continue reading →

It was unexpected, and definitely a break from the banal images of nightly fence fires, but what was it?

PUSSY POWER pic.twitter.com/qMlmWxrX2Z

— Donovan “It was the blurst of times” Farley ?? (@DonovanFarley) July 18, 2020

She was dubbed “Naked Athena,” her identity unknown, but her image was striking. It naturally went viral and then came the confusion, the doubts, the internal failing of an ideology due to one derriere. Is she a heroine or not? Should we adore her or hate her. Continue reading →

Like many people of a certain age, when someone says “bully,” I picture the old Charles Atlas ad in the back of comic books, where the muscular clod kicks sand in the face of the 98 pound weakling. What made him a bully was that he behaved that way and there was nothing the 98 pound weakling could do about it.

Today’s bully is the 98 pound weakling with a twitter account.

A critic – even a forceful one – does business in the proper currency of intellectual discourse: presenting evidence, providing reasons, making arguments; a bully questions people’s motives and calls them names.

A critic wants to discuss an issue—to try to persuade you to change your mind or see things in a different light; a bully wants to shut down discussion.

A critic appeals to reason—your mind and conscience; a bully tries to induce fear–resorting to threats and shaming to frighten you into submission. Continue reading →

Mixed Martial Arts, or MMA, is a uniquely American sport developed in our lifetime. It’s a billion dollar business these days, and the biggest name in the game is the Ultimate Fighting Championship, or UFC. Today’s fight cards, however, are a far cry from the batshit insanity that was the first Ultimate Fighting Championship.

The idea of a used car salesman turned ad executive, the Ultimate Fighting Championship was envisioned as the ultimate test of various fighting styles. Art Davie loved the idea of seeing who would win an actual fight between a boxer and a wrestler, for example.* Everyone he pitched the idea to turned him down. Davie’s idea finally caught on with a guy who had a vested interest in making such a tournament happen. Continue reading →

Can anyone define the parameters to be characterized as a journalist anymore? Am I a journalist? I have this blog, but is that enough? Are you? You “report” on Facebook or twitter, or even here, so why not? It might have been argued in the past that a reporter was someone who worked as a reporter for legitimate media, but even that doesn’t quite cut it, as a silly blog like SJ has many times more readers than the Podunk Gazette.

The First Amendment protects the press, whatever that may be, and with excellent reason. One of the worst aspects of the protests and riots, whether peaceful or destructive, has been the handling of journalists by law enforcement. Shooting reporters in the face, arresting them despite their “credentials,” official press passes prominently displayed, dispersing them along with the masses and the occasional beating, have happened with regularity. Continue reading →

Day 55 of the Games saw a crowd estimated at 2000. And then it was 2001, as Portlandia mayor Ted Wheeler made an appearance to show his solidarity with rioters, who he was hoping they would welcome him with open arms.

Mr. Wheeler, who scrambled to put on goggles while denouncing what he called the “urban warfare” tactic of the federal agents, said he was outraged by the use of tear gas and that it was only making protesters more angry.

“I’m not going to lie — it stings; it’s hard to breathe,” Mr. Wheeler said. “And I can tell you with 100 percent honesty, I saw nothing which provoked this response.”

While the crowd mocked him as “Tear Gas Teddy,” at least on supporter tried to help his discomfort by offering Wheeler some water from a small distance. Continue reading →

Human beings are amazingly adaptable, and the pandemic has given parents cause to come up with ways to address the conundrum of education, or lack thereof, for their kids. There is no doubt that keeping public schools closed will have a deleterious impact on the education. Kids are only twelve once, and they don’t get a pandemic Mulligan. Miss that year of education, of socialization, of living, and it’s a big deal. Then again, dying or killing grandpa isn’t good either.

And despite the rosy schemes of teaching kids riding on unicorns, there is no plan that doesn’t either defy Newton’s Third Law or require an acid-trip level belief in fairies. On top of it all, parents are constrained to stay home with their kids unless they’re of the “lock ’em in the closet under the stairs” view. So inventiveness is kicking in, for everyone’s sake. It may be a very pale effort compared to the real deal, but it’s better than nothing.

Meet the Pod Kids. Continue reading →