Curiously (not at all), Maxim always had a strong female editorial team and women writers.

How to cook I guess?

if it dropped all the incessant backslapping, quit performing maleness .. In short, if it grew a pair.

The problem is that Chait is not making quasi-helpful general points about tumblr feminism or anything like that, at all. He is reacting in a personal way to two very specific things that took place recently. First he got beaten like a red-headed step-child by Ta-Nehisi Coates in an argument about racial prejudice…

Yes, because if there is one thing this world is lacking, it is the voices and opinions of white men. I mean, it's almost as if they have a say in what women do with their bodies, pass laws to create a new Jim Crow via the prison industrial complex, blather on about how rape actually impacts women and how our bodies…

I think you hit the nail on the head...

"..I feel like the whole point of academia (at least when it comes to the liberal arts) is to be exposed to all sorts of thoughts and viewpoints and the like. "

I'm really really sorry that happened to you. It's so fucking ignorant and infuriating when I ever see someone say "kill yourself" or anything threatening or violent in the alleged name of social justice, esp. considering the irony of relationship between mental illness and the politically/socially marginalized.

Fucking THIS. Also periodic reminder that the people who usually write in favor of identity politics or call out racism/sexism etc probably receive far more death and rape threats than the majority of people who have erred. Did anyone hear Lindy West's This American Life story from the other day? Jesus Christ.

I agree with you that there is a fundamental layer of truth underneath his obnoxious preaching, but it's really hard to see it while your eyes are rolling like crazy.

I'm sorry that that happened to you, it sounds awful, and those people were assholes. But I think Jia makes a point of differentiating between harassing assholes on Twitter and legitimate calls for self-correction. The former = a serious problem that is not limited to leftists or "pc", the latter = constructive…

If you find out how to prevent disingenuous asswipes from co-opting the language you use to deconstruct and critique problematic things we will rechristen the internet in your name.

"Outrage farmer" is a fantastic phrase to use for this.

Good points, but I think one of the problems with Chait's article is that he conflates silencing with disagreement. Like, the kids who harassed the Omar Mahmood kid who wrote the article about "left-handydnyss" (hilarious, by the way) were attempting to silence Mahmood through harassment and intimidation. But that's a…

Not over a "verbal faux pas," but over a personal essay that I felt very strongly about - I wrote an essay about what it's like to be a woman with an eating disorder trying to navigate body-positive spaces and how complicated it can be and ended up getting a TON of suggestions to kill myself and messages about how I'm…

There is, undoubtedly, a conversation to be had about the shit that goes on in social justice-y, identity politics-y circles, and I'm upset that this bonehead had to be the one to write this essay, but... there are still some valid points

The problem isn't people who make boneheaded mistakes. The problem is that when they're called on it they pull the "I'm sorry you were offended." rather than "I'm sorry. I made a mistake and I won't do it again." When/if you say something offensive to a large swath of people, own it, apologize for it. Fix it. Don't…

Can we agree that death threats are always wrong but that doesn't necessarily lend any value whatsoever to Chait's article? Just because someone sends you an Internet death threat for saying something doesn't mean that the thing was worth saying or inherently valuable in any way. People get Internet death threats for…

Hey, I'm sure he doesn't hate anyone. He just wants all the women and minorities to shut the fuck up and focus on real priorities, as defined by him, for their own good.

I think another part of it is a misunderstanding (or willful ignorance of) what it means to be a bigot. People like Chait seem to think that because they don't literally hate all women/minorities that they are necessarily not bigoted, which is utter bullshit.