Splicetoday

Politics & Media
May 24, 2016, 10:22AM

Bad People Don't Suffer

Matt Bruenig and the righteous struggle.

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One of the staple arguments of welfare reform in the 1990s was that cuts were good and necessary because people using welfare didn't actually need it. The poor were not really poor enough; welfare queens were just bilking the system. There was no evidence of a crisis of people misusing the system, and the amounts of money at stake were tiny in comparison to federal spending on, say, defense. But people don't like the idea of giving money to the poor… so they convinced themselves that the poor didn't actually need the money.

People generally recognize that they're not supposed to kick someone when they're down. But still, people want to kick—which means you've got to figure out endless excuses for why your kicking doesn't hurt the person in question. That's been one of the running, depressing themes in the recent social media controversy around writer and blogger Matt Bruenig.

Bruenig has a long history of going after people aggressively on social media—often since the 2016 campaign started, to defend the honor of Bernie Sanders. Last week, he was doing his usual schtick. In this case, he accused Clinton policy wonk Neera Tanden of the Center for American Progress of being responsible for Clinton era welfare cuts which harmed Bruenig's mother. Tanden responded, accurately, that she had nothing to do with those cuts, and had never supported welfare reform. Bruenig never acknowledged his error, and kept insulting her—until his employer, the think tank Demos, told him to stop. Demos then discovered that Bruenig had been doing this sort of thing forever; they asked him to stop it, he refused, and they fired him.

Bruenig's firing led to a massive outpouring of stories from people who said he’d harassed them online, and that his harassment had helped spark Twitter mobs sometimes lasting for months, or longer. Sady Doyle, for example, a Clinton supporter, has been getting emails from people wishing for her death since she tangled with Bruenig and his crowd of aggressive Sanders supporters.

The response to charges of abusive behavior always follows the welfare reform model: a mix of, "they deserve it" and "they aren't actually suffering, anyway." Nobody can make the case that Tanden actually starved Bruenig's mother, since she didn’t, so they've gone trolling for other quotes and signs of iniquity. She has said many dumb things in the past, but it's not clear why that justifies lying to pretend she did things she didn't. Meanwhile, there’s an argument that people like Doyle are exaggerating their distress, or don't want to be held accountable for evil opinions. "How fucking thin skinned are you lol fucking baby" as one thoughtful tweeter declaimed. If Bruenig or his followers were to admit that the people they targeted are actually in distress, they might have to change their behavior. Wouldn't want that.

Bruenig has been on the receiving end of this logic. After he was let go from Demos, he started a gofundme to try to make up for his lost income. Immediately, people online began declaring that he didn't actually need the money because he had other income, or because his wife worked. Bruenig isn't the poorest person on the planet, but when you lose a gig, you lose a gig; it's reasonable that he would have a shortfall, and that he’d try to make it up. But if he's in distress, he deserves sympathy—and no one wants to sympathize with an abusive jerk.  So the only recourse is to pretend he can't actually be in need.

He's not in need anymore; the gofundme quickly got $25,000 in donations from supporters who love the way that Bruenig fights the power by insulting people, misrepresenting them, and joining in organized harassment campaigns.

I'd like to think some of Bruenig's contributors were handing him money because they wanted to support the kind of thoughtful poverty analysis he did through Demos. But realistically, you don't get 25K in a couple of hours for thoughtful poverty analysis. You get it because you're fulfilling people's empowerment fantasies. People love to see Bruenig kick the snot out of some evil neoliberal Hillary supporter—and if he happens to lie about those supporters, or if his actions lead to people posting crude sexual insults and death wishes, well, nobody could have expected that, and anyone who happens to express support for Clinton online should be ready to accept the consequences anyway. Bad people can't really suffer—a socialist battle cry that sounds oddly like the same capitalist battle cry as ever. The old boss and the new boss aren't so different, really. They both want the same, simple thing: to hurt someone, righteously, without consequences, and without guilt.

Discussion
  • Found out a couple days ago that Sady Doyle blocks me. Had never heard of her before. She's blocked WaPo's Dave Wiegel too, the awful man. Many others too from what I can tell. Maybe she checks profiles for keywords, like you do, and then blocks preemptively so her Twitter TL can remain unsullied by any dissenting voices. Not sure what keyword she found for me though. Maybe it was "sushi."

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  • She could have seen a convo with you being a jerk (most ppl act like jerks at some point). Or she may be using a blocklist that caught you by accident.// Why do you get so upset about people blocking you? Folks don't want to listen to me, I figure that's fair enough. Not sure why it rankles you so.// People who have tons of followers and a big platform like Sady especially almost have to block people if they want their mentions to work at all. Mine become unmanageable quickly, and I've got less than a tenth of her followers, I think.

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  • Sure, just like she saw a WaPo reporter being a jerk and several other people who told me she blocked them without knowing them. It must be that. 2. Curious about why you ask why I'm "so upset." You actually read my words and arrived at that conclusion? That might explain a few things. 3. Matt Taibbi has 257k followers and has not ever blocked one person. Over 10x what Doyle has but is somehow able to manage his mentions. She blocks everyone, including WaPo reporters. She also spoke of someone who has received internet death threats as someone who "might get murdered," making herself look ridiculous.

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  • I'm surprised Noah that you don't have more respect for Bruenig since you both employ similar tactics. Is this your way of promoting/telegraphing your future gofundme page?

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  • This is refreshingly fair minded

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  • Texan, if I have a gofundme page in support of my online trolling, you'll be the first to know.// Beck, yes, you seem obsessed with who's blocking who, and touchy about the fact that you're blocked. Again, I'm not sure why. Taibbi wants to talk to everyone all the time; great. Other people would rather pick who they talk to, cool. Why is it any business of yours?// Death threats are pretty scary. I don't see why it's ridiculous to take them seriously...though maybe you have a grudge against her because she blocked you, I guess.

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  • Ok, that was helpful because now I'm starting to get you. Your problem is one of befuddlement. You literally are unable to interpret what words mean. That's a tough one for a writer, but I wish you all the best, Blatarsky.

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  • Well, I think you kind of don't know what your saying, which seems like a hindrance for a writer...or the natural state of things, Freud would say.

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  • I'd say that not knowing the difference between "your" and "you're" would be a hindrance too. You see, when you want to play this cleverness game you need to get your words right, at a minimum.

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  • Nah; spelling is just spelling; that's what editors are for!//Pointing out something like that and pretending it's actually a sick burn just makes you look kind of ridiculous...or mean spirited. This is a fun piece about how science (science!) shows grammar police are huge jerks. http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a43468/stop-pointing-out-typos/

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  • I mean, I'm sure you're not actually concerned about grammar; you're just trying to be a jerk. And succeeding! Which kind of confirms the study in a way...

  • A writer should be his/her own editor first. Besides, Noah, don't you edit stories for Hooded Utilitarian?

  • Ouch! First time I've felt the Bern here in Texas. One suggestion, a weekly installment called The NockBitch Chronicles. It would contain no article, just a comment war between these two. Your traffic will double or more.

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  • Here is yet another case where you appear unable to grasp the meaning of sentences. I was not being a grammar cop. You were trying a clever putdown aimed at me,complete with a pretentious Freud reference, but you were unable to do it in proper English. This is an obvious technical failure when you are trying to look clever, which I simply pointed out, just as anyone in my shoes would surely do. Normally I'd let that slide Sure, just like she saw a WaPo reporter being a jerk and several other people who told me she blocked them without knowing them. It must be that. 2. Curious about why you ask why I'm "so upset." You actually read my words and arrived at that conclusion? That might explain a few things. 3. Matt Taibbi has 257k followers and has not ever blocked one person. Over 10x what Doyle has but is somehow able to manage his mentions. She blocks everyone, including WaPo reporters, which you're not supposed to do if you're a writer. She also spoke of someone who has received internet death threats as someone who "might get murdered," making herself look ridiculous.. Maybe you just pretend not to understand things. I hope that's the case, for your sake.

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  • Somehow my comment got my previous comment mixed in with it. Something weird going on here.

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  • Just to stick my nose in regarding content, I think the post makes a good point. To my mind, Noah's touching on a line of division between liberals and the left, though maybe he doesn't take that angle on it.

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  • Beck, the Freud reference was a largely self-deprecating joke. sheesh.// C.T., the Jacobin left likes to make it about liberal/left...but I'm pretty far to Bernie's left, I think. At least for me, the point is that anyone can demonize their opponents...and in fact that everyone likes to.//Russ, he who is his own editor is going to have a bunch of grammatical errors.

  • Fuck you Noah, and your B.S. revisionist/rationalist justifications, for making me come to the defense of your other half. At least admit you were goosing Beck rather than copping out with some qualified, fictional, clarification. I'll let Russ handle your weak ass impersonation of Confucius. I love the NockBitch Diaries, but you can do better.

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  • What's the point of being gay? Fucking Jews.

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  • How could I have missed the obvious self-deprecation of the Freud reference, or your general attitude of self-deprecation, for that matter. Sheesh!

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  • Ah well. I'm glad to see that Beck and Texan are in accord. Harmony prevails.

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  • Yet once again, you fail to interpret written words correctly. Really quite extraordinary.

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  • I'm sure Texan agrees with you.

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  • Never heard of him. Who is he, some nasty troll?

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  • He's a font of wisdom and light.

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