[I’m posting this update here, because I wish it to be stated up front. It has come to my attention that Dr Haggerty wrote the following on his site with respect to our debate on interpretation and how it works:
My sense was that JG had one theory and was overcommitted to it, and wasn’t aware of other approaches to the issue. His response to that post confirmed that, so I used Bourdieu, who provided a lot of the theoretical framework for my dissertation on modern Irish censorship. Mean, yes. Oh well. No, I wasn’t playing nice. Oh well.
my emphasis.
This is, not to put too fine a point on it, one of most shameless pieces of revisionism I have ever seen.
My course notes, which Thersites referenced and criticized as his entry into this whole kerfuffle, exploredâ€â€juxtaposed against intentionalism â€â€just about every other conceivable approach to interpretation, once the variously named “schools†(which are legion) are stripped to their basic linguistic assumptions. And pace DB or Haggerty, I don’t think of intentionalism as “an interpretive apparatus,” but rather as the default state of affairs with respect to how we engage texts, which is very much in keeping with Knapp and Michaels, though I break with Michaels (and Scott Kaufman) with respect to just what we should do once we recognize this)
Haggerty, though, tries to parlay DB’s assertion that I view intentionalism in a way that I don’t into the suggestion that, because I view it in such a way, it leads to “ludicrous results”—none of which, conveniently, are cited. He also (selectively) quotes John Holbo, who, to my way of thinking, draws a false distinction between sentence meaning and speaker meaning (see here, for instance). For his part, Holbo thinks I am arbitrarily and artificially limiting the scope of “meaning.”
But these are theoretical disagreements, and I certainly wouldn’t think to call Holbo “insane” or a “clown” or a “fucktard” or “pasty,” etc., for having made his case (nor would he I). It is one of the points on which I disagree with Searle, as well—who most assuredly is not any of those things.
Laughably, Haggerty tries in his post to tie his responses to me during our debate to the far more sensible objections made by people like Holbo. But Holbo’s views are informed—nowhere NEAR the simplistic pap about the primacy of convention that Haggerty was stuttering his way through. And I note that Haggerty doesn’t reference Scott Kaufman’s opinion that I was indeed doing the intentionalist argument justice, either—another example of how he is willing to pick and choose what he reveals to his readers in order to save face.
The fact is, in my notes I not only dealt with hermeutics, deconstruction, new historicism, and other sociological manifestations of response theory, but I did so at great lengthâ€â€taking care to factor in several ideas of the sign and how it functions. I extended my arguments through historiography and into the larger field of semiotics, and then applied them to literary (and historical) texts.
It is simply mind-boggling that Haggerty would make the claim that I am unaware of other approaches to interpretation, or that he would cherry pick disagreements with my positions to suggest that they are somehow uninformed. For those truly interested in these matters, read through the entirety of this thread at the Valve, a site dedicated to discussions concerning theory, and you’ll get some idea about how academics are supposed to be discussing these matters.
With the exception of Geoduck, Nate, and D.B—all of whom come over from Haggerty’s site—there is very little in the way of belittling invective. If that is suggestive, so be it.
On the shelf above me as I type this, I have a copy of Bourdieu’s Language & Symbolic Power. I’ve had it for over a decade. And I have elsewhere discussed what I believe to be its theoretical deficiencies—and indeed, during our debate, I made passing reference to them. So Haggerty’s suggestion that I am finally up to speed on Bourdieu is, like most of his arguments, based on nothing.
“Mean. Yes. Oh well. No, I wasn’t playing nice.†Actually, Haggerty was barely playing at all.
He made a fool of yourself, and now he is trying to revise the entire debate in a new light. Convenient that his earlier posts and comments are gone.]
*************
I would have objected over at firedoglake, but just after this comment by Broome Community College’s Dr Andrew Haggerty, the site administrators closed the thread. That way you see, I can’t respond. Which is a shame, because had they not shut down debate I wouldn’t have felt the need to respond here in a separate post.
Now? Everybody suffers!
Writes Dr Haggerty (in his typical world-weary fashion):
Sigh.
Not that this isn’t well known, but Jeff G is full of shit.
See here, here, here, and here.
For extra giggles, observe Tac catching out Jeff in a direct lie here, but getting petulant at me because that’s the kind of a fellow Tac is.
In a new wrinkle, Jeff now deliberately confuses the timeline. His decision to solicit information on me (and my WIFE, who had nothing significant to do with the argument we were having over literary theory, of all fucking things), PRECEDED all that Frisch business by at least month  so this comment is pure fabrication and victim-playing: “Having been subjected to an attack on my kid by some sick twist made me particularly eager to help out in that regard.â€Â
The notion that my personal info or my wife’s was “publicly available†on NTodd’s blog is a lie. Go check.
A coward? Jeff solicited information about me AND my WIFE because the way to get my information was through her blog. Brave fellow.
First things first. Dr Haggerty is right about one thing: this whole ordeal did, in fact, precede both the Dr Debbie cycle and the comment by Lo Ping Wong. My run-ins with Haggerty seem to have ended on May 30-31; both Lo Ping Wong and Dr Sousse left their comments in early July (the 1st and 6th respectively). So I misremembered. And so when I wrote that my “[h]aving been subjected to an attack on my kid by some sick twist made me particularly eager to help out in that regard,†I erred—though a quick scan of the Lo Ping Wong comment reveals how they may have become conjoined in my mind.
Still, does it follow, then, that because I misremembered the chronology I wasn’t eager to help Dr Haggerty out at the time the comment was left about his little girl? Because that is what Haggerty is trying to suggest here by noting the “fabrication.” It’s a cheap rhetorical trick, but one that I suspect he is able to slip by most of David Ferguson’s readers.
So I’ll let you decide. But from my perspective, what my misremembering of the chronology means is that I conflated my reasons for wanting to help out Haggerty with later attacks on my wife and son—attacks that, thanks to ongoing litigation, I’ve been dealing with daily ever since they began, and which color my memory with respect to internet attacks on infants and toddlers.
But does Thersites deny that I showed concern? No. Does he deny that I requested the IP address from the offender? No. Does he deny that I offered to send him the information of the offender should that IP address match any on my site? No. Does he deny that I was willing to post that information on my own site, and signal out one of my readers if it turned out that one of my readers had, in fact, left the comment? Of course he doesn’t.
Instead, he seizes on what is substantively insignificant—my having misremembered precisely when it was, in relation to all this, that both Lo Ping Wong and Dr Deb attacked my son—to suggest…what, exactly? That I like playing the “victim”?
Well, okay, sure. I’ll accept that—although having accepted that, I’d like to point out that Dr Haggerty doesn’t seem to couch his very public concerns over comments made about his daughter as “victim-playing.” But then, such are the pitfalls of engaging in selective outrage.
Be that as it may, though. What has Dr Haggerty—who has the rather unique ability in his arguments to highlight details that end up making him look ever more silly—exactly proven here? That, despite the fact that my son had yet to be attacked, I was still very willing to help him out? That, after his having mocked me as a “paste-eating” “idiot” “dick” espousing alternately “insane” and “dull” ideas about interpretation theory—even as I continued to debate substantively on the underlying hermeneutic principles—I was nevertheless willing to separate all that out from the equation, and agree to help him, to the extent I was able, find the person who attacked his daughter?
Wow. Boy, do I ever feel ashamed. I mean, imagine that—I was willing to help out the guy who had treated me in a demonstrably unprofessional manner in whatever way I could, and I didn’t even have a personal stake in doing so! How anti-realpolitik of me! What a fucking heel I am!
But anyway, let’s backtrack. Here’s what NPR’s David “TRex” Ferguson wrote the other night in an effort to scrub history and replace it with a version meant to rehabilitate the reputation of Dr Haggerty, who—let’s face it, knew next to nothing about what it was he was pretending to debate me over (and sadly, was more than eager to show as much):
Goldstein went so far as to publish Thers from Whiskey Ashes’ real name and home contact information, giving his readers something to do with the time each day that they aren’t spending whacking off in their moms’ basements and scouring AP photos for signs of Photoshop “kerning”. Goldstein’s readers deluged Thers with hate mail and threats, and one found a photograph of Thers’s infant daughter and opined charmingly that she had “dick-sucker lips”.
[my emphases]
Now, as anybody who was following this whole thing at the time knows, there are a host of outright lies in this one paragraph. But with Dr Haggerty having taken down his old site, the chronology becomes difficult to establish with any certainty.
First, I never posted Dr Haggerty’s home contact information, and I only used his name after, having first redacted it, I decided that it wasn’t private—nor was his position at Broome Community College.
Haggerty, after all, emailed me from an address that contained his name, and the Community College information—along with his academic information—was available through a simple Google search, and was revealed long before I’d even seen it. And as I wasn’t the one who posted this information (it was posted by commenters while I was offline), I take no responsibility for “outing” Dr Haggerty or his wife. Further, not only did I not publish his home address, but I in fact went back and redacted that kind of information (which turned out not to be his, anyway) when I woke and saw it. For an account of how the information was found, see here.1
As I noted at the time, I believe that, given the nature of the debate we were having, it was perfectly fine to lay out Dr Haggerty’s credentials—particularly after he went through such trouble to point out, again and again, what he was arguing were the deficiencies in mine. Which is to say, Dr Haggerty was the first to appeal to credentials as a point of art in our debates (he denies he did this, but I certainly seemed convinced at the time that he’d done so, as did others; and now that his site is gone, there is no way to prove it one way or the other); I simply complied with the terms he established—and in fact was more than willing to do so without bringing his name into it. This is what Haggerty is getting at in his comment at firedoglake when he writes, ominously, that I made the “decision to solicit information” about him.
This “solicitation,” he fails to tell you, initially took place on both our sites, where I asked him what his credentials were, given that credentials seemed to be important to his refutation of my argument. I wrote, too, that I didn’t even need to know his name—just his area of study, what he did his dissertation on, etc., so that I could have some understanding of where he was coming from with respect to his academic presuppositions. After all, he had assumed a position of professional superiority; why then, was he loath to substantiate with a note about his credentials what he clearly wasn’t able to substantiate with his performance during our “debates” on interpretation theory?
2. If my readers “deluged Thers with hate mail and threats,” why haven’t we seen them? Cite them. Give names. Else, how are we to know such “hate mail” exists—or even how Dr Haggerty and Mr Ferguson choose to define ”hate mail” or “threats.” Again, we have seen recently that some of their ideological comrades see as “hate speech” having their own words quoted and cited, and “threats” as anything that makes them feel uncomfortable. So until I see some evidence of this kind of thing—and it is curious that Dr Haggerty never provided any, after having been quite willing to reference in detail the comment made about his daughter—I am, let’s say, reluctant to accept such claims on their face.
3. Again, where is the evidence that it was one of my readers who “found a photograph of Thers’s infant daughter and opined charmingly that she had ‘dick-sucker lips’”? I mean, if you follow the link in Ferguson’s post that takes you to this claim, you’ll read this:
Evidently, an anonymous Goldstein supporter was so worked up that he told Thersites that his two-year-old had cocksucking lips. [Correction: Turns out the cocksucking insinuations preceded the meaning of meaning dustup. My bad. I’m told that while I left the house to see Al Gore’s movie, JG reposted Thersites’ personal info on his blog. His bad.]
[my emphasis]
Is this what passes for proof over at firedoglake? Or is it more likely the case that Ferguson relied on his readers’ perceived willingness to believe just about any slander without even bothering to click through—making the fact of a link itself sufficient to prove my and my readers’ perfidy? I mean, does Ferguson believe his readers are that lazy?—or does he believe they are either too stupid or too intellectually dishonest to note his sleight of hand.
I made it perfectly clear to Dr Haggerty that, were it one of my readers who made the comments concerning his daughter, I would pillory them on my site and provide him with the information, which he could do with as he pleased.
He never sent me the IP address—nor does he acknowledge here that I made the offer, which is itself a slander by omission—but instead, he continues to allow the story to circulate that I provoked the attack on his child, or that one of my readers was known to be responsible.
Talk about victim-playing.
This is cravenly and opportunistically dishonest—and were you able to read through the entirety of our “debate” exchange (something you cannot do, unfortunately, because Haggerty removed his posts and comments), you’d see very clearly that it was I who was arguing in good faith, and Haggerty who was trying to incite his readership into ad hominem attacks, so willing was he to engage in them himself.
I know—you mustn’t believe such unbiased accounts because, well, by virtue of seeing things the way he did, Scott Eric Kaufman gave up his rights as an “authentic” lefty academic. That his version of events tended to support my recollections, that is, counts as prima facie evidence that he is NOT TO BE TRUSTED. QED!
Now then. Let’s proceed to the links Dr Haggerty provides to show, without doubt (so sure is he about this that the comment thread is closed right behind his post. THE TRUTH MUST NOT BE CHALLENGED!), that I am a liar and he is but a poor, put-upon educator forced to deal with someone presumptuous enough to challenge his bona fides.
First, he links to a comment on Balloon-Juice from someone noting that Haggerty had tried to find the offending IP address from Blogger, where his comments evidently were hosted, but that he had been unsuccessful. Does this prove that I wasn’t willing to help him? Nope. Just that some Balloon-Juice commenter claims he made the attempt and failed. Again, this shows I’m “full of shit” how, exactly?
The second Haggerty link goes to yet another Balloon-Juice comment, which notes that “Despite what Goldstein says, Thersites did update that post twice at Jeff’s request to clarify that Thersites didn’t think that Jeff was responsible or at fault in any way. Thersites also said in that thread that the person who posted the comment was not necessarily a commenter from Protein Wisdom”—which, given that he’s offering this link as proof that I’m “full of shit” in the comment thread to a post that claims, again, that
Goldstein’s readers deluged Thers with hate mail and threats, and one found a photograph of Thers’s infant daughter and opined charmingly that she had “dick-sucker lips”
—I’m not exactly sure why he didn’t direct this comment Mr Ferguson’s way rather than mine.
Haggerty later qualified his statement thus:
Upon final thought I do think it was one of his commenters who said it, but that’s not reflective of anything or anyone beyond the fact that whoever said it is a sick little bastard who deserves scorn. And I have no desire to think about this any further.
Not “reflective,” eh? Then why, pray tell, isn’t Haggerty berating Ferguson for using it in just such a way—definitive proof of my dastardly character, earning me a spot in the UNHOLY TRINITY OF EVIL RIGHTWING BLOGGERS?
I’ve said, simply, that Haggerty allows the story to circulate uncorrected. And by directing this comment to me rather than correcting Ferguson, he is continuing this practice. He just doesn’t like to get his hands dirty.
The third link Haggerty offers takes you to a comment he left at Feministe, where he gives his version of events. Proving, I guess, that he believes his own version of things. Ditto his fourth link, in which he claims he never brought up the fact that he was a university professor. Again, I can’t prove or disprove this, because I don’t have his original posts—but if he didn’t introduce this information into the debate, I’m certain one of his commenters or defenders did—and as a way to try to cow me into bowing before his credentials—else where would I have gotten the idea, and why would I have referred to it in my commentary at the time? And further, why, if this was not an issue, doesn’t Haggerty ever say—anywhere at any time during our initial debate, that I’m aware of—that credentials aren’t at all relevant to the substance of the debate? That is, even if it isn’t he who pumped up his own credentials, he doesn’t seem to mind that his defenders were doing the dirty work for him.
Leave aside for the moment that I have linked to the actual threads in question (hell, let’s relive the whole thing, shall we?) And leave aside, too, that Thersites is offering as “proof” of his own version of events his own version of events—which is like a fundamentalist proving the truth of the Bible by pointing to the Bible’s claim to truth.
Because beyond all that, what we are left with here is precisely what I claimed at firedoglake—namely, that David Ferguson’s post “repeat[s] lies that I’ve taken great pains to disprove over and over again.”
Dr Haggerty offers nothing to disabuse anyone of that. He points to an earlier comment where he claims to have disabused people of the notion that I was involved—but the post where he does so, along with the whole of his earlier blog, is gone.
And here—given the opportunity once and for all to put this lie to rest—he decides, instead, to seize on a chronological error, claim that I’m “full of shit, and tiptoe around the fact that the post he’s commenting under repeats the very slander that he points out, by way of several links, that he himself doesn’t believe.
As for his info NOT being available on NTodd’s site, I don’t know what is available there now (his link proves nothing of what was available back in May of last year). I do know, however, that I emailed him noting that I broke a link to his picture on that site—and were you to read the comment threads in the posts that I linked, you’ll find that his story doesn’t seem to jibe with contemporaneous accounts.
Incorporate that into your judgment as you see fit. And please, do click the link he provides to “Tac,” and see if you giggle at “Tac” having “caught me out in a direct lie.” Because again, the mere fact of a link doesn’t make it so.
At the end of the day, Andrew Haggerty is, for all his pretensions, nothing but an associate professor at a community college—one who pretends to great erudition but who, when challenged, resorts to launching juvenile ad hominem attacks from behind a pseudonym that he argues should shield him from responsibilty for his own words.
I don’t happen to share his belief—but I can certainly understand why he would go out of his way to hide his blog identity from his professional colleagues.
After all, he has shown himself to be incapable of putting together a reasoned response to those who criticize his very superficial understanding of subject matter that is relavent to his field of inquiry; and the example he sets for his students—that it is okay to launch personal attacks in lieu of substantive responses—is one that I’m certain both he and the community college for which he works find particularly embarrassing.
Similarly, at the end of the day, David Ferguson is still a late-night NPR music show producer in North Georgia who couldn’t find intellectual honesty if it were standing above him in a gimp suit offering to rub flavored oil on his belly. It is a shame that public funds finance the leisure time he uses to attack personally those who don’t happen to share his political views. But then, there’s no law saying you can’t work for the government and still be a lying, weasely asshole.
Just look at the vast majority of politicians.
At any rate, I am tired of these silly “blogwars”—so much so, in fact, that I went out of my way to speak personally to a couple of people from a site with which I’ve had some run-ins recently. Both conversations were congenial, and I think both yielded the desired results.
Which is why it saddens me to wake up to this nonsense. Not only did I have to waste a good portion of my morning setting the record straight yet again, but such displays as the one put on by Haggerty and Ferguson make it less and less likely that those on the receiving ends of such slanders will be willing to allow them to go attributed solely to some internet persona who, by virtue of remaining hidden, can target people with impunity.
*****
update: As Slart says, Whee!
Still, not good enough. Dr Haggerty needs to refamiliarize himself with events, and correct the record fully. And second, somebody should forward Haggerty’s admission along to David Ferguson. To read while he’s sunning himself in the patches of sun. That—like no other patches in the history of patch-hood—somehow manage to “stream through his window”…
I nominate Dr Haggerty as messenger. Or perhaps he could just get that firedoglake thread re-opened long enough to link to this important bit of information. For the children™
****
1For whatever reason, the comment anchors linked to in the thread where Haggerty was “outed” are not working. But you can find those comments on page 2 of the comment thread of the linked post. For my purposes, though, I’ll post the full text of one of them below. The “WhoIsThersites comment” alluded to contained some bad info, and is heavily redacted by me. And the final bracketed note is my interpolation problem now corrected, but I’ll leave the text to the comment earlier referenced here below:
Since Jeff has disclosed his personal info on this page it’s appropriate that Thersites is equally exposed since he has made this as personal as he has. This is easily done running with the information in WhoIsThersites comment
[“NYMary” – REAL NAME REDACTED] is listed as an adjunct instructor at [REDACTED] Community College in [REDACTED] NY.
[REDACTED]
If you take a look at the picture in the post by WhoIsThersites:
http://dohiyimir.typepad.com/photos/atriots/xxxx
and then this url:
[LINK TO PUBLIC WEBPAGE TO COMMUNITY COLLEGE WHERE “THERSITES†AND WIFE WORK REDACTED]
you are looking at the same fellow.
Thersites is XXXXXX [REDACTED], an Associate Professor at the same community college.
[LINK TO PUBLIC WEBPAGE TO COMMUNITY COLLEGE WHERE “THERSITES†AND WIFE WORK REDACTED]
While each does have a Phd, Jeff was indeed on target when he suspected that Thersites was no University professor.
[I’d still like to know what he did his PhD in, and what his area of speciality was. Perhaps he’ll stop calling me a paste-eating moronic dopeheaded haus frau dick fucktard long enough to share? While he’s at it, maybe his adjunct instructor wife can add her info, since she’s been supportive of Thersites efforts to call me such names, and indeed has joined in with frequent reminders that our favorite “professor†is “no deconstructionistâ€Ââ€â€which of course advances the debate not one whit. But hey, when you’ve only got one bullet…]
See also, here.
****
update 2: Comment anchors now fixed. Evidently, the pagination of comments invalidates the permalink unless another variable is physically placed into the individual comment URL. I’ve done them all by hand for this post, but I will contact Expression Engine and see if they can offer a less time-consuming fix.
Why, why, why do underachievers like Haggerty EVER think cherrypicking an existing, archived series of comments would EVER work? Are his readers such passive blobs that NONE of them would consider looking at the original source themselves? Postmodern blogging in action?
Now I know why you want to quit.
It’s never ending, really.
Although I’ve taken some action recently that I hope will help, so that I can get back to posting “insane” things about lit theory and identity politics, as well as more bloodthirsty calls for carpetbombing of orphanages and the wholesale nuclear destruction of anyone who doesn’t enjoy NASCAR or pork.
GMGhost, I don’t know why it is, but several years ago I noticed a Marketing Concept involving the Web: Your writings MUST be true if they have LINKS embedded within them; and it really doesn’t matter if the links support your writings or not, because the Average Web User is a dull-witted clot who isn’t going to follow them anyway.
It’s not unlike Bait And Switch marketing, really; it’s based entirely on the concept that Nobody Reads The Fine Print. I never cease to be amazed at the number of people who have never read a Microsoft EULA, in which you agree—literally, else the computer won’t start—to surrender all rights to the use of your computer to Microsoft, because They Own the Software and You Don’t, and They Can Do As They Damn Well Please With It.
I certainly didn’t follow any of the links JG put into this essay; but then, I was sitting here lurking as the whole mess(es, if we include Dr. Doobie) unfolded anyway, so I really didn’t need to. But I’m certainly not surprised that Thirsty, LiarDogFake, et al, expect their readers to conform to the Marketing Concept: I’ve seen Truthiness Links in leftist shred that “lead” to nonexistant sites. Pretty damned obvious that the writer didn’t expect anyone to actually follow THOSE links….
And, JG, I sincerely wish you strength and courage in dealing with these imbeciles.
Not for the least of which reasons that I haven’t had any pie yet.
eh, blog war?
I am pretty sure that is complete bullshit. Granted my memory isn’t the best, but I seem to recall that being the complete basis of his critique.
One of the reasons I sometimes miss PIATOR was it would hastily link to all kinds of tidbits that often disprove its own point, if you bothered to click and really read them. Was great sport.
Thersites and NYMary prove an old adage about relationships:
Every Crackpot has a lid.
Every year or so, it turns out that a scholarly book (Bellesiles comes to mind, but he’s neither the first nor the last) had a bunch of footnotes citing sources that, when actually followed up, demonstrate more or less the opposite of the book’s thesis. People saw the footnotes, and assumed, “surely some editor checked those out; and even if nobody did, surely the author wouldn’t have included them if checking them out would catch him in a fabrication.”
I think links work the same way, except that they’re easier to verify than a reference to a 70-year-old issue of a journal nobody reads.
They declared victory and went … well, they were already home. Why do I get the feeling SteveXX is their admin?
wasn’t there a line in one of his responses about grading papers and needing to drink a pitcher of margaritas?
Not that I wan’t to go digging back- but maybe that helps someone else find it?
It was a Daquiri, he was going to dissect JG’s work over a Daquiri someday. I am certain because I remember literally laughing out loud at that.
Hmmmm.
@ Jeff
1. Moral of this story is:
If you spend your time kicking idiots in the ass, don’t be surprised when you’ve got stupid shit on your boots.
2. If you’re going to get into substantive debates on someone else’s blog it might be a good idea to setup an automated spider to copy those threads and replicate them on your own hardware.
Not everyone deletes or edits at will, but I think we’re going to see a lot more of that happening. It’s like the sock-puppetry that’s going around. The relative anonymity of the internet leads some people to think that there aren’t any limits and that not only does anything go but also that anything is acceptable.
Particularly if you’re liberal.
3. Frankly there is no real anonymity in the internet. Everyone has certain writing styles that they naturally fall into. Plus if you look hard enough you’ll find many people leave behind clues to their identity because hiding our identity isn’t the primary purpose but simply something tangent to the principle purpose of discussion.
While I’m certainly not in favor of “outing” the residences and workplaces of anyone the reality is that doing so isn’t the big problem. The big problem are the twits that use that information to make themselves into major nuisances. Or worse.
But as far as anyone having a right to anonymity in blog discussions. Fat chance.
I didn’t know Thers was undercover for the CIA.
ed —
You are right, and I think I did end up quoting just about all of Haggerty’s posts so that I could address his arguments, such as they were, one at a time.
What I don’t have are copies of the comments on his site, where he and his commenters extended the debate. Still, we have plenty of contemporary allusions to them which, while not dispositive, are nevertheless suggestive that my version of events is perhaps the more accurate of the two.
I remember this incident like it happened yesterday. I was proudly one commenter who challenged Thers and NTodd at their sites, not hatefuly, but with the very reason Jeff exhibited generally during the whole incident. And I recall that this made them apoplectic with rage in my direction.
Yet I too am sick of blog wars, and can only imagine how Jeff is affected by it all. People like Thers and his wife should get the attention in the blogosphere that they should receive in general; they should be treated like children, and with a drop of empathy for suffering through adulthood as “weasely assholes”. There are too many good voices out there to be bothered by buffoons like Thers biting at our ankles.
Kick ‘em in the nadds, Jeff!
Not to be a threadcrasher here, but I’ve been a little outta the loop lately. Could someone bring me up to speed on the The Great Beclowning Controversy of ‘07? Are we in imminent danger?
First, you’ve spelled “firedoglake” “firegodlake” three times in this piece. If you meant this as a joke, it’s only (not very) funny once; if it was only a typo, the idiots there are going to mock you for it.
Secondly, Thersites says, in the fourth link:
…I never claimed to be a university professor…I mentioned my credentials once before the bruhaha started on another blog, but made no claim to be a university professor.
I hope not, since he’s not a university professor. He’s a community college professor. If he’d said “college professor”, that might’ve meant Harvard or BCC. Are you remembering it as “university” when he said “college”? (He also goes on to say that he doesn’t know how his possession of a PhD and the theory courses he’s taken matter to the discussion, at which point I must conclude that we have gone through the looking glass.)
Thirdly, I can believe in quarks, the Dirac sea, superstrings, cosmic strings, dark energy, dark matter, the Great Attractor, the Higgs boson, Nemesis, and, hell, unicorns, but I CANNOT believe the amount of time, energy, and money that goes into teasing virtual meaning out of “texts” and then engaging in dharma combat to determine which fabricated meaning will dominate. Ptui.
Doesn’t suprise me that he’s re-writing all that shit now, they were re-writing it as it went on.
If you remember it went from “Goldstein is a pedophile” to “one of Goldsteins commenters is a pedo” to “probably wasn’t one of Goldsteins commenters but Goldstein put him or her up to it” to “all of Goldstein’s commenters are pedophiles.” I think I actually lost my shit on some bitch from over there here on this very blog due to that charge.
And, by the way, he could have gotten the IP info out of Blogger, all he had to do was report the threat. I think I mentioned this back then.
wow, so much with doing my taxes today. and to think I gave up booze for lent.
.
Well, I Do have a taste for NASCAR, what with the crashes and hotties.
But I’m still working on the pork thing.
Apparently only if you are a progressive, generic, socialist Democrat propoganda ninja stealthily operating undercover in the wilds of Arkansas academia.
It was a typo.
Thanks for pointing it out. So publicly.
I am remembering university. But I could be wrong. And at no time during our exchanges did he ever note that his credentials were unimportant—and in fact made it quite clear that mine marked me as somehow unworthy of being taken seriously. Even were he only to have made the second claim, he would have been guilty of the same offense. And his having an opinion on the subject, too, would have suggested, by extension, that he did have the appropriate credentials, else wouldn’t his criticism apply equally to himself?
However he slices it, his denial doesn’t hold up.
Sure. Let’s let give each and every meaning equal validation. I can’t see anything problematic coming from that…
This alleged “professor” has a fellow traveler that continuously puts up similar crap on various blogs using the name of “Tina.” Where do they grow such morons as these, and how on earth can such a dimwit hold a job of any kind at a university/college?
For some reason this Haggerty reminds me of Michelle, the Internationalist Interactor. *sigh*
I wouldn’t give it too much thought, Jeff. He is not plausible.
Bill Richardson endorses this approach here:
Myself, I think we should continue ratcheting up the sanctions. Nothing should be taken off the table.
You will never hear the end of this Jeff. The folks you are up against are too invested in their take on the world to ever let it go. They have identified you as a bogeyman and take great pride in recounting over and over how they slew you. The fact that they must lie to do so means nothing to them.
The upside is that back here on planet earth they are nothing more than ill tempered clowns who are engaged in a constant battle to see who can smear themselves the most with their own feces and then persuade their cohorts that it is the finest art. These are exactly the type of folks who would convince themselves that their misery is due to all the darkies in their midst and that the best course of action would be for them to put on the white sheets and ride out to make them pay.
You are nothing like them. When they make you angry, please remember that.
Eh, blog war or not? Wake me up ven zee Germans blitz-post dein blogenspiel, fur deez iz dee time on Shprocketz ven vee dance!!!
Danse, Madchens und Herr Boosch-Kristianist-Nazis! Ver ist dee kleine Armadillo?! Danse!!! Kein pie oder Danse!
Ummmm…..paste.
Jeff, I know it’s tedious to wade back through all that nonsense, but just remember…
Thirsty sits to pee.
Justice is blind but the old gal has a helluva sense of humor.
Children. Intellectually unserious children.
And sheep, too.
Sorry you have to deal with this shit, Mr. Goldstein. Guess they’re too immature to tolerate anyone who is smarter than them at what they’re supposed to be good at.
Truly, this was one of the classics of the blogwar genre, as tiresome as they are now. Allow me to revel in the memory. I recall that Thers’s uncivil critique of “Jeffy’s” or “Pasty’s” lit theory boiled down to an accusation that it was a failed academic’s insane and disingenuous effort to justify his fascist right-wing political views. Jeff responded by requesting Thers’s credentials, which seemed to entitle him to dismiss Jeff as a “failed academic.” This got some commenters looking around the internet for Thers’ background. It wasn’t difficult to link Thers to his wife, his picture, and his real name, as disclosed in some pictures from an Atrios conference. A google search of his name identified him as a professor at BCC. Needless to say, this was a hoot–a community college potty mouth calling the kettle a failed academic.
At about this time, the obscene comment about the kid appeared. Clearly bested in the substantive debate (which Jeff engaged in seriously, while Thers condescended and mocked) Thers latched onto the obscene insult like a lifeline to the moral high ground. Rather than delete the offending comment, Thers devoted a post to the horror of it all, and used it as evidence of “Pasty’s” evil insanity. He claimed persecution on a massive scale, citing also his “outing” in Jeff’s comments. Jeff scrubbed the identifying info in the comments, warned his commenters about reposting it, but resented being blamed for the kid comment. Having a kid himself, he recognized that attacks on family were out-of-bounds, and he wanted no part of it. While doubting that any of his regular commenters made the statement, he offered in Thers’s comments to ban any commenter who posted it, if Thers would provide the IP address. Thers responded with another post about the horror of attacks on family and Pasty’s shamelessness. Jeff again denounced any attacks on family, offered to ban the offender from his site, and demanded that Thers provide proof or immediately stop smearing him and his commenters. He warned that his patience was wearing thin and that he was growing tempted to “reveal” Thers’ embarrassing academic identity, which he had to this point removed from his comment threads. Again, Thers wielded his newly-found “victimhood” as a cudgel and sobbed out a post about persecution and the inhumanity of Jeff and his minions. Jeff snapped and let fly with the “outing” of the esteemed community college academic. No doubt Haggerty and his employer received plenty of embarrassing, mocking and insulting emails as a result. Death threats? Seems unlikely. By the next day, Thersty’s site was down, replaced by some advertising bot. So was a martyr of the left born.
Thanks for pointing it out. So publicly.
Sorry. I’ll email next time.
Sure. Let’s let give each and every meaning equal validation. I can’t see anything problematic coming from that…
You misunderstand me. If I recall correctly, Thersites’s position is that one can interpret literary works pretty much as one sees fit; yours is that the author had a specific intention, and we should stick to discussing that. I agree with you. I can see why people would want to twist an author’s meaning to validate some pet theory; what I can’t fathom is why they are encouraged to do so with jobs and tenure.
Jeff, you know what you have to do.
You must pen an elaborate polysyllabic missive which illustrates in multi-poly-clause sentences just how dicked up the little princesses are and of course copy and paste from their “about” section on their very own homepages, thereby “outing” them as complete fucking retards for penning completely fucking retarded posts and then not realizing that the cult of reichwing nut-psychos who have passed down for generations the sacred rites of the arcane sect that is “google” can find that they’ve conveniently “outed” themselves complete with “first name” “web handle” “last name” and pictures and confirmation of imagined poor hygiene.
When in doubt, brother, ATTACK!!! Ambush? ATTACK!!! Retreat? Fuck no, we’re going to ATTACK in another direction!
I don’t want to hear anyone say they are holding their positions. Bullshit! The only thing we are going to be holding is the enemy! We are going to grab him by the lapel and kick him in the ass!
Where was I again? Oh yeah. Blog war. Just do it. Put that Jewish ham suppository deep inside another librul sacred cow. YOu know you want to!!!
Sorry, Angie. Meant to put a
after the bit about the typo.
And I thought, mistakenly, that you were belittling the value of the profession itself—which, when it is practiced by those not interested in using it to pursue their own interests, is quite valuable, teaching students how, exactly, to read carefully and to make a substantive case for their arguments.
My recollection of Jeff’s point about textual meaning is that one shouldn’t try and graft dumb-ass meanings into an author’s text for one’s own gratification.
What constitutes ‘dumb-ass’ is the subject of the debate.
–
Haggerty’s actions after the comment about his duaghter was made were dumb-ass, in the objective sense of the word.
For further inspiration to start the Blog war, I give you cold-killing to Johnny Cash.
You may be tired of blogwars, but this stuff makes great reading for me. I’m entertained and usually educated at the same time.
Thumbs up here.
Which reminds me, why are the taxpayers subsidizing the likes of Ferguson to the tune of $400,000,000 per year?
The answer to this question speaks volumes as to the state of the (post)modern academy.
Indeed he did. Couple that with the fact that Thers refused to provide the IP address, and it seems truthier to suggest that the source of this obscene insult originates from Thers’ side of the debate.
It could be true.
“…the site administrators closed the thread.”
Closing threads, editing/deleting comments… is there some sort of *bleeping* blog virus going around that’s causing this sort of thing?
Not to mention that just recently, elsewhere, we had another liberal completely edit & change another’s comments & flat out deny it at first & then mockingly admit to it as a joke. Why we would ever accept Thers’ word when the real proof or a good part of it is not available or solely under his control?
Gosh it seems like it was so much longer than just a few months ago that this all occurred. WTF is it about recycling the same tripe, same points, same ideas that really turns progressives on?
I wasn’t able to get a reasonable explanation for closing his site, he said at the time it was because his anonymity was blown. But then he loudly opened another site under the same name. Either it is further proof he isn’t very bright, or he was seeking to destroy something specific on the other site.
Or both, I suppose.
Editing comments is what Firedoglake folks know best. If you write a sentence in the comments about Drunk Orca Kennedy, don’t be surprised if it ends up reading that DOK is the GREATEST!!
It’s best to not even bother going over there, except to see what the nut cases are up to.
That’s Greenwald’s stock in trade, and those morons suck it up like mother’s milk.
As I recall, it was to “protect his daughter” because it was easier to delete the site than remove her pictures. What he really wanted to do was protect himself from his own words, something Marcotte ought to have considered before trying to blog for a presidential campaign.
Jeff,
You can still do it, Jeff. Just send him a mirror. The comment left on his site was a transparent ploy to make himself a victim in fight he started and was losing badly. It also gave him the excuse to delete the entire thing, and then cry to his moron friends about the tragedy that had been visited upon him.
And yes, he is that cowardly and sick. Bank on it.
Crushing leftist fanatics in a debate is very easy. It is scarcely a challenge.
See here for some powerful techniques to defeat Iraq War opposition/BDS sufferers in 1-2 quick sentences. It is great for the office or for social gatherings.
It’s comforting, and easier for them than thought.
I guess if they can’t win in the arena of ideas, then its time to just personally attack him and his “ilk”. Just change the subject and wear him the hell out with all of this irrelevant garbage that is at best dishonest, at worst libel.
It is clear that they are afraid of JG as he so affective at handing them their own ass every time they experience diarrhea of the mouth. I mean honestly, who in academia wants to be laid bare as a fraud in a public forum. Hence the clever nicknames and the faux outrage at being “outed”. Soundly defeated and unable to muster a counter argument, they degrade themselves even more by reverting to flinging poo at the wall and hoping something will stick. Sad. What’s more sad are the ideologically clouded minds that buy right in to it.
I do question the timing of this though. In other words the poo seems to be getting very deep as of late. Did the nutroots catch wind of the possibility of a PW free summer? Did they decide that now was the time to fill the blogosphere with dishonest bile hoping that he will throw his hands in the air and quit blogging when his PJM contract expires? Or are they simply tired of real debate on real issues and simply want to change the narrative to something a little more manageable for mental midgets?
Either way, I feel for you Jeff. You are a good writer and you have a solid grasp of current events even though I may not agree all the time. I even like some of the guest posters as well as the commenter’s. I hope that you keep blogging and I hope that PW remains at least through 2008 election cycle. But I can certainly respect and understand why you are growing tired of cleaning the rhetorical poo off your shoe.
Hell, you probably wearing hip-waders by now.
As for this reader, I will enjoy it as long as it lasts.
So Mr. Goldstein outs bloggers and commenters at his liking. Honestly, that’s pretty old news. One of many reasons to stay away from this site. Considering the banality of the content, it’s somewhere towards the end of the list of reasons not to read this site.
How bad must it suck to be this lame? I mean, talk about banality, just damn!
He says on this site.
And yet you dimwits lose your freaking minds trying to pick that content apart. Do you usually argue against yourself so effectively? What is it like being such a self-inflicted zero?
And what is this “outing” you speak of? Are you Mark Foley or something?
Easy, Pablo – we don’t want to lose jpe forever.
Cry havoc and let slip the savage intertubes of war!!!
(to paraphrase Will Shakespeare)
So you’re here because . . .
Pablo: No, no, he didn’t mean HE had to stay away from the site, just all of us other people who have to take his word instead of, oh, looking up what facts they can find to make a decision on their own.
Will these people ever grow up? They are a waaste of everybody’s time.
“we don’t want to lose jpe forever.”
Meh…as long as we don’t lose Al-Fee.
Hmmm.
@ Jeff
Well all I can add is just some pithy ole down home New Hampshaw logic:
If Thers didn’t have a great incentive to hide the evidence of his whupped ass (i.e. his old blog site) then he’d have them available as part of the archives of his new blog site.
That he does not have them available even when he tries to reference them as “proof” of the validity of his position shows how intellectually corrupt he is.
Like those old bastards speaking for Pepperidge Farms used to say:
“This is an ass whupping that schmuck is going to remember!”
Ayup.
Good. God.
This is still going on?
Do any of those people have lives and such?
My sympathies, Mr. Goldstein.
Pasty and his supporters are in desperate need of lives.
How fucking full of integrity thou art. Jesus, man, up your goddamned dose and let it go.
Unlike, say, , who is spending her Saturday evening in the comments of my site calling me “Pasty.” Like she might have done in elementary school. At which point I would have twisted the strap on her training bra until she squealed like a stuck pig.
MAKE EMMIE PROUD, MA! TEACH HER HOW TO INTERACT WITH STRANGERS!
And look, it’s NTODD, playing the “Pasty is CRAAAAAZZZY” card!
Jesus. Doesn’t a cargo plane ever fly over you people and drop you care packages filled with new material? Because this stuff is really kind of stale.
By the way, Pritzky / NTodd, thanks for all the info about Haggerty and his wife!
Has Dr. Andrew Haggerty of Broome Community College ever fully thanked you for your part in his “outing”?
Oh good Lord. The “outer” himself is in the hizzouse.
What’s your problem today, Todd? Aside from your ongoing deficiencies, that is.
Jeff, please let it go with grace and goodwill. It can only get worse. Don’t take the bait, and move on.
It really pisses me off when anybody is called a paste eater. Hell, I’m a glue taster in a duct tape factory and it’s might fine work!
Are you offering that same advice to Dr Haggerty and Mr Ferguson, cynn?
Or did you try, only to have your comment “moderated” away into the ether…?
Well, my comment just got eaten. I blame Al Gore and his intertubes.
As my dear old grandpappy used to say, if you can’t stand the heat, quit stoking the fire, dumbass!
fwiw, NTodd’s photography manages to be non-commericial and, well, not very interesting.
http://www.windingroadsvisarts.com/
… which is to say, NTodd blogs the way he takes pictures.
You guys go ahead and police this thread for a while. I want to go play with my kid.
North Georgia’s late night NPR music show producer David Ferguson, meanwhile, will likely be dreaming of tomorrow, when he’ll be “lying around the house and sunning himself in patches of sun that stream in through the windows.”
Sunning himself. In patches of sun. Patches that stream.
How evocative!
Why do you rail against these guys, when they don’t play fair? Why bother; it should be obvious to anyone who cares to look that the linkslingers twist things just as much you do to cement your position. So don’t be offended if you’re challenged.
He’s dappled and drowsy and ready to sleep.
By the way, Pritzky / NTodd, thanks for all the info about Haggerty and his wife!
First, learn to spell my fucking name. It’s ‘Pritsky’.
Second, I outed nobody. You did, solely because you didn’t like what Thers said. But do please continue to tell yourself and your pasty patsies whatever you need to so you might feel better about yourself.
fwiw, NTodd’s photography manages to be non-commericial and, well, not very interesting.
Odd that you think it’s non-commercial since I sell quite a bit. And those who buy it think it’s interesting. Regardless, your constructive crit has been given the due consideration it deserves.
Yeah, Jeff. You’re just as bad as they are.
Apart from the lying. But otherwise . . . just as bad!
Haggerty is obligated to remove , revise , redact and erase all the text referencing the alleged provocation towards his child because he understands that once the facts are presented (as done here) there might be ramifications of applying convenient “interpretations” to text. If someone were to apply Haggerty’s “interpretive” theories to Haggerty’s post , a person could easily see how someone could make a case that the man was simply projecting his psychopathic leanings towards his own child. Interesting .
Jeff, for the record I am glad you took the time to post your side of the story. There were some serious allegations and challenges to your credibility. I appreciate you taking this seriously.
Jeff,
I, for one, am glad you’re fighting back. I spent more hours than I’d care to admit reading what was going on in the comments over at S/N last night. And I was hoping when you dropped out of sight that it meant you were on the phone.
But, here’s the thing… I’m not so sure you need to protect your name in the eyes of the folks who visit those other sites. I mean, people whose intellectual capacity is so stunted as to be moved by the tripe on most left-wing sites are never gonna be swayed by any logical argument you or I or anyone can make.
It’s like I’ve found with mosquitoes… once they stick that barb in, it’s best to pretend you don’t see it. Smacking it will only make it itch more.
Please don’t take this wrong… I’m really in your corner on this, and I’m not sure which kind of smiley-face to use to indicate that.
TW: I’d never26 presume to tell you how to employ pesticide.
Ooooh, that’s not coming anytime soon, is it?
Hey N., the information WhoisThersites found and posted in the comments was from your site, right? Perhaps you should take a tip from the esteemed Professor Haggerty:
Heh.
Oh, is your name spelled P-R-I-T-S-K-Y? My bad. But you have to admit, I wasn’t as far off as “Goldstein” v. “Pasty”.
And all you have to do is read the thread and follow the links. It’s clear it wasn’t I who “outed” Thersites—that the info was posted in the comments thread well before I knew about it by somebody not me.
Just because you insist it is so doesn’t mean it is. Try as you might, Todd, the universe just doesn’t give a shit about what you want.
And that’s precisely why I provided ALL the links. It is them you have to argue against, not me.
So have at it. Go ahead, NTODD. TAKE ON HISTORY AND SLAY IT WITH YOUR WILL!
Well, the great thing about Jeff’s having made this post is that he need simply link it wherever this BS is being peddled. And NTodd, I suppose you told Haggerty to down another daquiri and let it go?
What in the fucking fuck are you yammering about?
Yes, P-R-I-T-S-K-Y.
215 Bog Rd
Cambridge, VT 05444
802.849.9836
Do drop a line anytime. I’ll give you syrup.
Hey N., the information WhoisThersites found and posted in the comments was from your site, right?
Uh…no?
Don’t worry about Cynn, Jeff. She’s our very own little passive-aggressive troll. Now she’ll apologize and then insinuate she’s been victimized by our interpretation.
NTodd, I suppose you told Haggerty to down another daquiri and let it go?
No, I told him to have another whiskey. Jesus, you’re stupid.
Funny how it’s Thersites who keeps bringing the whole idiotic episode up, again and again, but who does NTodd blame?
Possibly there’s some neurological disorder that keeps cause and effect maximally distanced from each other; if so, NTodd’s got it in spades.
Uh, yes. Yes it was.
Oh, you’re going to Hell for that, boy.
tw: indeed67
See?
I just tried calling you for that syrup, NTodd, and the number wasn’t working.
I was gonna really bitchslap Todd for calling us all pasty patsies!!
But then… looked in the mirror. Ah, well, can’t win ‘em all.
TW: That’s my response41.
Jesus swept (but unfortunately missed Broome County Community College).
It’s too bad you have to be so hostile to a fellow Vermonter, NTodd. I was going to invite you for a beer next time you were around Burlington.
Uh, yes. Yes it was.
Uh, no.
Oh, you’re going to Hell for that, boy.
I don’t believe in Hell. But I appreciate your concern.
Uh, yes. Now cut that out.
That’s okay, N. Hell believes in you.
It’s too bad you have to be so hostile to a fellow Vermonter, NTodd. I was going to invite you for a beer next time you were around Burlington.
Oh, boofuckinghoo. I’m so sad that I won’t get to have a beer with somebody who supports a dick like Goldstein. Damn, and I have nobody else to drink with in town…
You support a dick, Dan? How utterly jockstrappy of you!
Find out who thinks N. Todd is interesting, would you? And take pictures. I can sell them!
Jesus, you’re stupid. What’s your phone number?
Uh, yes. Now cut that out.
What’s great is you keep asserting things, which clearly makes it so.
That’s okay, N. Hell believes in you.
No it doesn’t. I’m a Quaker, and I’ve got a direct line to The Big Man. He says yer full of shit.
Argue with the links, N.
Jesus, you’re stupid. What’s your phone number?
Scroll up.
Find out who thinks N. Todd is interesting, would you? And take pictures. I can sell them!
[sobs]
You’re on to me!
And thus he innocently summarizes the problem for so many on the left. If you don’t believe it, how could it possibly exist? Erso exto no facto (or some Latin sh*t like that).
Argue with the links, N.
I’m really trying to find all the info you guys assert is on my site.
Talking to yourself again?
Nah, a Quaker wouldn’t be such an asshole, nor so pretentious.
And thus he innocently summarizes the problem for so many on the left. If you don’t believe it, how could it possibly exist? Erso exto no facto (or some Latin sh*t like that).
Oh yeah, that’s the problem with the left. We don’t believe in Hell. And you don’t believe in global climate change. Bravo.
Nah, a Quaker wouldn’t be such an asshole, nor so pretentious.
Nah, I’m a Quaker. Birthright. I’m sure you understand what that means.
[…] think maybe that link should have been to here, […]