On the hiring and firing of Kevin Williamson (1 Viewer)

[sangha]

If anything, it's increasingly accurate. During the 2016 election, they started to gain some measure of mainstream appeal, but by this point their ethnostate agenda has begun to be quarantined again. People like Richard Spencer and Jared Taylor has always been the face of the Alt-Right, but their goals for a white nation in North America weren't widely known for a good while.

Before the election, the alt-right were nowhere to be found in the Executive branch. At this point, alt-right members are part of the administration while others are being consulted with by the administration.

 

[sangha]

Facts are not in dispute in this matter. Williamson was fired for an opinion, an opinion sincerely held in good faith by many in the pro-life camp.

Wrong

Williamson was fired for lying about his opinion

Dear All,

Last week, I wrote you about our decision to hire Kevin Williamson. In that note, I mentioned my belief that Kevin would represent an important addition to our roster of ideas columnists, and I addressed the controversy surrounding some of his past tweeting and writing. I expressed my belief that no one’s life work should be judged by an intemperate tweet, and that such an episode should not necessarily stop someone from having a fruitful career at The Atlantic.

Late yesterday afternoon, information came to our attention that has caused us to reconsider this relationship. Specifically, the subject of one of Kevin’s most controversial tweets was also a centerpiece of a podcast discussion in which Kevin explained his views on the subject of the death penalty and abortion. The language he used in this podcast—and in my conversations with him in recent days—made it clear that the original tweet did, in fact, represent his carefully considered views. The tweet was not merely an impulsive, decontextualized, heat-of-the-moment post, as Kevin had explained it.

 

[sangha]

I would like to issue the following question to those here who applaud the Atlantic firing Kevin Williamson:

How many of you have heard of Kevin Williamson or read his work up until a week ago? Did any of you ever read anything he had to say, or did you just read those few select quotations that made the man appear like a monster who wanted to execute women who exercised their right to have an abortion?

A question for you:

Would you hire an opinion writer who lied about his opinions?

 

[jmotivator]

I need to look into the "right to my job". What amendment is that?

Firing someone isn't "ruining them". He can get a job like anyone else.

Coaxing someone out of their current job to come work for you and then firing them a week later for a tweet they made YEARS before you offered them a job is pretty underhanded.

 

[Felis Leo]

A question for you:

Would you hire an opinion writer who lied about his opinions?

I do not think he lied about his opinion. Williamson is anti-death penalty. He is also anti-abortion and believes that abortion is essentially murder. His statement was drawn from the logical conclusion of his position that if murder was to receive the death penalty, by that same logic, women who abort their children should be held to those same standards and receive the death penalty.

But let us say he was not drawing logical conclusions for the sake of thought experiments, and he outright believed in the death penalty AND that women who have abortions should be put on trial and punished for murder. Is the Editor of the Atlantic saying that if Williamson had been open about his views on abortion and said "hang women who abort their unborn children!" from the get-go (a position that he does not believe in) that he would have remained hired?

 

[sangha]

I do not think he lied about his opinion. Williamson is anti-death penalty. He is also anti-abortion and believes that abortion is essentially murder. His statement was drawn from the logical conclusion of his position that if murder was to receive the death penalty, by that same logic, women who abort their children should be held to those same standards and receive the death penalty.

But let us say he was not drawing logical conclusions for the sake of thought experiments, and he outright believed in the death penalty AND that women who have abortions should be put on trial and punished for murder. Is the Editor of the Atlantic saying that if Williamson had been open about his views on abortion and said "hang women who abort their unborn children!" from the get-go (a position that he does not believe in) that he would have remained hired?

But he did lie about his opinion. He told the Atlantic that it was just an impulsive, heat of the moment tweet, lacking context and did not represent his opinion. It turned out that Williamson had written extensively about this matter and it reflected his carefully considered view. In addition, the Atlantic took issue with the language he used, which they considered callous and violent.

While the Atlantic can be faulted for not researching his writings prior to hiring him, it is a well established principle that employees who lie about their previous work in the field, in order to get a job, should be fired.

Williamson was not fired because he thinks abortion is murder, or that all types of murders should be treated equally. He was fired for being dishonest about his views, and for the way he expressed those views, which the Atlantic decided is not consistent with their standard for respectful and well-reasoned debate.

 

[sangha]

I do not think he lied about his opinion. Williamson is anti-death penalty. He is also anti-abortion and believes that abortion is essentially murder. His statement was drawn from the logical conclusion of his position that if murder was to receive the death penalty, by that same logic, women who abort their children should be held to those same standards and receive the death penalty.

But let us say he was not drawing logical conclusions for the sake of thought experiments, and he outright believed in the death penalty AND that women who have abortions should be put on trial and punished for murder. Is the Editor of the Atlantic saying that if Williamson had been open about his views on abortion and said "hang women who abort their unborn children!" from the get-go (a position that he does not believe in) that he would have remained hired?

An additional note:

Since Williamson is so dishonest, it is difficult to state what he actually believes. However, we can see what he wrote and in his tweets he describes abortion as an act of great cruelty for which he holds a serious animus towards. He later said, on a podcast

But yeah, so when I was talking about, I would totally go with treating it like any other crime up to and including hanging — which kind of, as I said, I’m kind of squishy about capital punishment in general, but I’ve got a soft spot for hanging as a form of capital punishment. I tend to think that things like lethal injection are a little too antiseptic.
Read more at https://wonkette.com/632243/goodbye...-the-atlantic-now-goodbye#WWMBzLMdEPB2MBVW.99

Note that he does not say he is opposed to capital punishment and even expresses a soft spot for hanging.

 

[Jack Hays]

Wrong

Williamson was fired for lying about his opinion

We agree he was fired for his sincerely held opinion.

 

[OpportunityCost]

So when someone does screws up the job they were hired to do, they should keep their job

But when someone does something wrong unrelated to their job, they should be fired

Typical rightwing rationalization

When hired for their viewpoint, they aren't screwing up by offering it. Especially with the employer offering claims of inclusive viewpoints.

When offering your viewpoint when you aren't hired to do so and it costs revenue, there are choices to be made.

It is not rationalization, it is context.

 

[sangha]

We agree he was fired for his sincerely held opinion.

No, he was fired for lying about his opinion.

 

[sangha]

When hired for their viewpoint, they aren't screwing up by offering it. E

When someone is hired for their viewpoint, and LIES about their viewpoint, they have undoubtedly screwed up

 

[OpportunityCost]

When someone is hired for their viewpoint, and LIES about their viewpoint, they have undoubtedly screwed up

If he had lied we wouldn't be having this conversation because he wouldn't have said it.

 

[sangha]

If he had lied we wouldn't be having this conversation because he wouldn't have said it.

He said it, and it was a lie

 

[OpportunityCost]

He said it, and it was a lie

Retreating under the bridge, eh?

 

[sangha]

Retreating under the bridge, eh?

I accept your surrender :lol:

 

[maxparrish]

But he did lie about his opinion. He told the Atlantic that it was just an impulsive, heat of the moment tweet, lacking context and did not represent his opinion. It turned out that Williamson had written extensively about this matter and it reflected his carefully considered view. In addition, the Atlantic took issue with the language he used, which they considered callous and violent.

While the Atlantic can be faulted for not researching his writings prior to hiring him, it is a well established principle that employees who lie about their previous work in the field, in order to get a job, should be fired.

Williamson was not fired because he thinks abortion is murder, or that all types of murders should be treated equally. He was fired for being dishonest about his views, and for the way he expressed those views, which the Atlantic decided is not consistent with their standard for respectful and well-reasoned debate.

Whether or not any author's alleged opinion about his own opinion (in a tweet) can be even be called a "lie", Goldberg did not say he fired Williamson for lying. He explicitly gave his reasoning:

1. Williamson actually believes his views.
2. Those views employ callous and violent language.
3. It dawned on Goldberg that someone with those views and language would not a good fit and he has to go.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

Before the election, the alt-right were nowhere to be found in the Executive branch. At this point, alt-right members are part of the administration while others are being consulted with by the administration.

Steve Bannon was as alt-right as it got, and he's out of the position now. I don't know of any other ethnostate proponents among his administrators and advisors, and I certainly haven't heard about Holocaust deniers in positions of power.

Being Alt-Right is about a lot more than merely bitching about CNN and wanting tighter immigration control.

 

[OpportunityCost]

I accept your surrender :lol:

I'm not making it up as I go, you are. I am also not retreating behind something completely false.

 

[Jack Hays]

No, he was fired for lying about his opinion.

False.

 

[ecofarm]

Coaxing someone out of their current job to come work for you and then firing them a week later for a tweet they made YEARS before you offered them a job is pretty underhanded.

What's that thing about lookin' and leapin'?

 

[ecofarm]

Being Alt-Right is about a lot more than merely bitching about CNN and wanting tighter immigration control.

Alt-right is about being a deplorable; racist, sexist, homophobe, Islamophobe... It's about Jew-hating and conspiracy theoring. The altright are in the barn lookin out for the feds.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

What's that thing about lookin' and leapin'?

"Lookin' takes all the fun out of leapin'?" That's what grandpa always told me, at least when his mouth wasn't wired shut after some accident or another.

 

[Brochacholomigo]

Alt-right is about being a deplorable; racist, sexist, homophobe, Islamophobe... It's about Jew-hating and conspiracy theoring. The altright are in the barn lookin out for the feds.

It's literal Nazism, and even calls itself such in many cases. Referring to any massive swath of the American population as "Alt-Right" is inaccurate and insulting, on top of being an upgrade for the Alt-Right's current public image.

 

[AlbqOwl]

Conservative writer Kevin Williamson was hired by The Atlantic last month and was fired this week. His hiring angered liberals; his firing has angered conservatives. Here are links and various points of view:

NY Times:
The outrage over the writer, who spent many years as a correspondent for National Review, fell squarely into a burgeoning culture war over free speech, gender issues and questions about which views deserve a megaphone as prominent as The Atlantic, a magazine that relies on a heavily liberal readership.

In announcing Mr. Williamson’s new role last month, [Editor-in-Chief] Goldberg acknowledged that he had “disagreed with him more than I have agreed with him.” But he praised Mr. Williamson’s writing as stylish, witty and “ideologically interesting,” and said he envisioned The Atlantic as “a big tent for ideas and argument.” https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/05/business/media/kevin-williamson-atlantic.html

Jack Shafer writing at Politico, says that Williamson, who is an excellent writer, is not the loser here and that Goldberg’s “rapid embrace and rejection make the Atlantic a lesser place” and “Let’s be real here: Kevin Williamson wasn’t sent packing for expressing strong language on abortion but for being Kevin Williamson. The very things that made him so appealing to Goldberg were destined to lead to his exit.” https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/04/06/kevin-williamson-atlantic-jeffrey-goldberg-217831

When Kevin Williamson’s name came up during lunch yesterday, this, by David French, is what I quoted:

And so it goes, the steady, inexorable division of America into the tolerable and the intolerable — with the range of tolerable people narrowing ever-so-rapidly. There’s no grace in this brave new world. There’s no charity. It’s not enough to disagree. Now we must ruin. Now we must humiliate. Saying “you’re wrong” is no longer enough. The argument isn’t sufficient. https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/kevin-williamson-firing-by-the-atlantic-cowardly/

This is my great concern, that it’s not enough to disagree, even vehemently or savagely, that now we must ruin. And by "we," I mean "all of us" rather than just one "side" or another.

We have been seeing it for many years now. It isn't enough to call Phil Robertson out of touch or a Bible thumper or religious nut. When he expresses his politically incorrect opinion about what he believes the Bible teaches, the left organizes to demand that A&E fire him, to threaten his advertisers, and otherwise inflict as much physical and economic damage to him as the law will allow.

A conservative speaker is invited to speak on a college campus and the left immediately mobilizes to demonstrate, bar his/her passage, threaten his/her safety, and otherwise refuse him/her any right to speak on campus. The protest evolves into a full fledged riot as many of these kinds of things do. It isn't enough to simply not attend his or her speech.

The Chic-fil-a executive offers a politically incorrect opinion and it isn't enough to choose to not buy his product. The left mobilizes to stage protests at restaurants across the land to intimidate customers and threaten his suppliers. (In that case, others staged their own buy in at Chic-fil-a and as a result it had one of the best days it has had. Many of us smiled.

A Presidential candidate stages a campaign rally and it isn't enough to state disapproval with his platform and not attend the event. The left organized to block the entrances to the rally venue, shouted obscenities, threats, and vile accusations at attendees, and that too evolved into a full fledged riot with attacks on police officers, police horses, and millions of dollars in property damage.

How thoughtful people who identify left of center can condone or justify this is beyond me. An alarming number of the snowflake crowd are expressing their beliefs that they don't believe in a First Amendment that allows points of view different from theirs.

It is hateful. It is the very epitome of intolerance. It is destructive. It is wrong. And yes, it is scary.

 

[sangha]

Whether or not any author's alleged opinion about his own opinion (in a tweet) can be even be called a "lie", Goldberg did not say he fired Williamson for lying. He explicitly gave his reasoning:

1. Williamson actually believes his views.
2. Those views employ callous and violent language.
3. It dawned on Goldberg that someone with those views and language would not a good fit and he has to go.

If someone says something is not their opinion and says that it is their opinion, then they are lying about their opinion at least once

From Goldbergs email explaining the termination:

Late yesterday afternoon, information came to our attention that has caused us to reconsider this relationship. Specifically, the subject of one of Kevin’s most controversial tweets was also a centerpiece of a podcast discussion in which Kevin explained his views on the subject of the death penalty and abortion. The language he used in this podcast—and in my conversations with him in recent days—made it clear that the original tweet did, in fact, represent his carefully considered views. The tweet was not merely an impulsive, decontextualized, heat-of-the-moment post, as Kevin had explained it.

Williamson lied about his tweet. He told Goldberg that it did not represent his opinion. Goldberg later found out that the tweet did represent his opinion