The Not-The-Onion news of the day
Look, I take my humor wherever I can find it these days.
Even if it’s in the real, live, very unfake news. And even if that unfake news sounds like the sort of fake news that used to air only in the satirical Onion.
But this Chick-fil-A-as-creepy-alien-invader-of-NY story doesn’t seem to contain all that much that’s tongue-in-cheek. What is Chick-fil-A’s horrible failing, according to the New Yorker article? Seems to be that the owners are Christians and don’t hide that fact, and that although they treat gay people just fine, they sometimes donate to causes that are against gay marriage for religious reasons.
Oh, and then there is their ad campaign, which seems to feature the joke (it’s a joke folks, so lighten up!) of cows saying to eat more chicken:
… [Chick-fil-A] franchises still hold an annual Cow Appreciation Day, offering free food to anyone dressed as a Cow. Employees dance around in Cow suits…They’ve been inducted into the Madison Avenue Walk of Fame, and their Facebook following is approaching seven figures. Stan Richards, who heads the ad agency that created the Cows, the Richards Group, likened them to “a guerrilla insurgency” in his book, “The Peaceable Kingdom”: “One consumer wrote to tell us the campaign was so effective that every time he sees a field of cows he thinks of chicken. We co-opted an entire species.”
It’s worth asking why Americans fell in love with an ad in which one farm animal begs us to kill another in its place. Most restaurants take pains to distance themselves from the brutalities of the slaughterhouse; Chick-fil-A invites us to go along with the Cows’ Schadenfreude.
The essay begins with this:
New York has taken to Chick-fil-A. One of the Manhattan locations estimates that it sells a sandwich every six seconds, and the company has announced plans to open as many as a dozen more storefronts in the city. And yet the brand’s arrival here feels like an infiltration, in no small part because of its pervasive Christian traditionalism. Its headquarters, in Atlanta, are adorned with Bible verses and a statue of Jesus washing a disciple’s feet. Its stores close on Sundays. Its C.E.O., Dan Cathy, has been accused of bigotry for using the company’s charitable wing to fund anti-gay causes, including groups that oppose same-sex marriage. “We’re inviting God’s judgment on our nation,” he once said, “when we shake our fist at him and say, ”˜We know better than you as to what constitutes a marriage.’ ” The company has since reaffirmed its intention to “treat every person with honor, dignity and respect,” but it has quietly continued to donate to anti-L.G.B.T. groups. When the first stand-alone New York location opened, in 2015, a throng of protesters appeared. When a location opened in a Queens mall, in 2016, Mayor Bill de Blasio proposed a boycott. No such controversy greeted the opening of this newest outpost. Chick-fil-A’s success here is a marketing coup. Its expansion raises questions about what we expect from our fast food, and to what extent a corporation can join a community.
One response:
https://twitter.com/seanmdav/status/984888495230644225
The other story about which I had some trouble initially telling satire from reality involves James Comey. Oh, how the mighty have fallen—and this latest fall from grace was accomplished by Comey’s very own hand, in the writing of his very own book (assuming it wasn’t ghostwritten; one never knows).
But I had to look twice to understand that this excerpt from Comey’s book was not a spoof (please also scroll down here and read the responses):
Truly can't tell the parodies from the real reports on Comey. I think this is real, even though it appeared in Rolling Stone. https://t.co/AGPkP3rtZr pic.twitter.com/jp0n56pV0S
— Mollie (@MZHemingway) April 16, 2018
I really hardly know what to say about this, except that it’s another example of giving people enough rope. When Trump supposedly called Comey a nutjob, it sounded like enormous hyperbole. But as time goes on and we see more of Comey unplugged, it appears that if not a nutjob then he’s certainly eccentrically and exaggeratedly full of himself (in that department he makes even Trump look comparatively modest).
In addition to the revelation about the all-important blue shirt, there’s this, which is an all-too-real excerpt from Comey’s book (which I haven’t read and probably never will read):
[Trump’s] face appeared slightly orange ”¦ with bright white half-moons under his eyes where I assumed he placed small tanning goggles, and impressively coifed, bright blond hair, which upon close inspection looked to be all his. ”¦ As he extended his hand,” Comey adds, “I made a mental note to check its size. It was smaller than mine, but did not seem unusually so.”
The style reminds me of nothing more or less than a women’s romance novel; I half expect for someone’s bodice to be ripped off by the end of the chapter. It’s hard to spoof something that already sounds satirical, but Alexandra Petri gave it a go in the WaPo:
I have been called a human humblebrag. I certainly couldn’t speak to the truth of that statement, except to say that where I come from, we don’t like bullies and their mean words. Bullies are mean and small, not like myself (I stand 6-foot-8, with a head of lush dark hair and eyes that pierce into the souls of everyone I encounter, like the eyes of a hawk who has read Reinhold Niebuhr (I wrote my thesis on Reinhold Niebuhr.)).
I would venture to say that I am the protagonist of my own life and perhaps the lives of many others. Certainly, no one else has as yet stood up to take on this grave responsibility, and it was my honor to rise to this challenge. It is a little embarrassing to describe myself: I stand, as mentioned, about 6-foot-8, like an oak with a firm sense of right and wrong and large, capacious hands. When I first seized Donald Trump’s, I took a mental note (and later, a physical note; I maintain scrupulous contemporaneous notes) that they had vanished into mine, like a dormouse curled up inside an oven mitt. But most hands do that when confronted with mine, except President Barack Obama’s, and ”” I hope ”” Reinhold Niebuhr’s, if we ever meet, in this life or the next.
[NOTE: Again with the Reinhold Niebuhr.]
Stand down, contestants–the 2018 Bulwer-Lytton Contest has already been won….
This schmuck, this drama queen Comey, with his way over-inflated, bloated ego, is the guy who ran the FBI?
Sophomoric lovebird Peter Strzok was the FBI’s Chief of Counterintelligence, and his lady love Lisa Page was the lawyer at the FBI who was counselor to Andrew McCabe–he of the faulty memory and many lies, who was the FBI’s Deputy Director?
According to reports, Lovebird Strzok has a wife, and lovebird Page has a husband; they have families.
What do you think their respective spouses are feeling, reading the sophomoric crap these two lovebirds spent their days at work exchanging in over 50,000 emails?
These two immature, incompetent idiots–who apparently had no trade craft at all–were the people we trust our security to?
These were the best people that could be found to fill these supposedly very responsible, critical jobs?
Oh, yeah, our security is in the best of hands.
Picture the kinds of well-trained, ruthless adversaries, from just the KGB alone (who, I assure you, do have trade craft), that Strzok was charged with ferreting out and defeating.
The mind reels.
James Jesus Angleton was not available for comment, since he was too busy rolling in his grave.
James Comey, not John.
History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.
–Karl Marx
So is this the Watergate tragedy, replayed as farce?
This time with the Democrats and Media as Nixon?
7:29 pm
Good lord, these people!
Comey is a 14 year old “mean girl”…
I would have said 15, but my 15-year-old daughter is less a pain in the ass than Comey seems to be.
In fact…my daughter is no pain at all. Hell…she could run the FBI better than this oxygen thief.
I can see Comey being very well-paid NOT to write. Ever. Again….
Chick-fil-A is pro-human, not anti-transgender (e.g. homosexual, bisexual, transvestite, crossover, etc.). The latter characterization is why we have CAIR (Catastrophic Anthropogenic Immigration Reform), and native people are marginalized for social justice and redistributive change. The problem is that political congruence (“=”) has progressed as a movement that is unprincipled, opportunistic, and selective (i.e. Pro-Choice). Is the real problem that Christians support equal, not “=”, rights, and that they are anti-abortion rites (i.e. life deemed unworthy)?
Comey is a pajama boy, who serves at and for the pleasure of his political mother and father. He’s part of the Water Closet cover-up, which includes Obama spying, Clinton colluding, and the DNC denying the nomination to the Jew, the male Jew, the masculine male Jew, albeit left-wing.
TooManyLabels. SelectiveJudgment. Civil unions, or, perhaps incorporation, for all.
Ripple:
Will fix, thanks.
This confirms my wisdom in never paying attention to Reinhold Niebuhr.
Snow on Pine,
Presumably, they were the most partisan people that could be found. Clearly, competence wasn’t even a distant condideration. Nor was concern for National Security.
Which makes perfect sense, considering that they are “apparatchiks”… loyal to the Obama administration.
The fish rots from the head down.
parker:
🙂
It must be dreary to be so doctrinaire.
Just a couple of thoughts from the (not) intelligentsia.
The Chick-fil-A billboards are a hoot. For those who drive down I-95, there is a hint of the “South of the Border” billboards that broke the monotony of a long drive; or the old Burma-Shave classics. Anyone who cannot enjoy them as they are presented, needs to hit reset. Same for the TV commercials. Get a grip folks.
Secondly, Chick-fil-A is not a sophisticated dining experience. On the other hand, they offer tasty food, and cheerful service. By chance, my wife and I were out shopping today and she offered to buy lunch. After giving me the fantasy opportunity to choose among the various options in the vicinity–she chose Chick-fil-A.
We stopped in to assess the scene. Since school was in session it was not completely over run with urchins–although there were a smattering of younger cuties. I had my usual, the Market Salad. She had hers, the Cobb salad. Both are delicious, and come with plastic utensils, and smiling staff. You get exactly what you expect.
The New Yorker magazine, the Mayor of NY, and Progressives in general are simply out of step with the country.
This Reinhld Niebuhr thing keeps popping up. In the David Brooks piece I thought that it was an example of how Brooks was so starry eyed with Obama that he didn’t realise that he was getting a lecture about a small Midwestern college in Obama’s basketball bracket.
Oldflyer. I remember Burma-Shave ads! When I was a kid my mother and I would memorize them when we went on vacation. My dad was no good at this though thoroughly amused.
Henry the Eighth had lots of trouble,
Short term brides and long term stubble!
Burma-Shave.
Anyone who can get into a lather (Burma Shave?) about a silly cow versus chicken ad is not someone one should take seriously.
A silly ad is just a silly ad. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. 🙂
At least he got a lot of attention- negative though it may be- for his article. I wonder if he wrote the article with that intention. I suspect not. I see him as an earnest, humorless soul who is unable to see how his piece could be considered satire on the libs.
“So is this the Watergate tragedy, replayed as farce?”
It’s far, far worse than Watergate.
Nixon did not suborn the FBI, nor did he suborn the DOJ. Nor did he have the media protecting him like Secret Service agents (there’s a superb Ramirez cartoon about this —
http://www.solidprinciples.com/blog/political-cartoons-michael-ramirez-36/ ).
Nixon did wrong, tried to cover up, and was suitably punished for both.
This stuff is not even being reported by the media (which is astounding, if not surprising: “Stand by your man”, etc…); while all the focus is being spent on the “Enemy of the People” in the WH and all those “Enemies of the People” who support him (but this, too, is being done to shield Obama et al.).
It’s no farce. It’s disturbingly, frighteningly Orwellian.
And Obama, Clinton, et al. continue to be teflon-coated. Until, until…
Watergate is where the FBI sub director set up Nixon with a break in that the FBI usually does in COINTELPRO. Nixon takes the blame, panics and tries to go after his enemies list, and they catch him on recording when Nixon thought the White House surveillance system was turned off.
NSA, Pentagon, Deep State spying doesn’t turn off when the US President pushes a button. That’s not how it works.
That’s not how it works for Trum either. Trum wasn’t taking the bait as easily as Nixon, but they got him in the end anyways.
This stuff is not even being reported by the media
Why are people under the impression the media reported the truth on Watergate? They didn’t tell you people what actually happened.
I loved those Burma Shave signs. That’s how I learned to read long before I entered first grade. If you could read all the Burma Shave signs, you had a pretty good reading vocabulary. When I entered first grade they used those stupid Tom, Dick and Jane reading books. Oh, oh, oh, dumb, dumb, dumb.
In 30 years of working with all sorts of sources of information, doing research, and especially looking back at contemporary reporting on this or that issue, I realized that quite often the truth of what had actually happened–the received truth–was usually much more complex, was often different, often quite different, or even the opposite of what we had been led to believe, and what had become the accepted truth of the matter.
Bottom line–you can’t really trust that the “news” you are receiving is “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth,” because, it can be deliberately “simplified” until it really isn’t true any more, essential, key details can be left out through incompetence or deliberation, this “news” can be truncated and partial, spun, turned on it’s head, or just fabricated; the MSM can deliberately ignore any “news,” or slice it and dice it anyway they want, to fit their leftist agenda.
The idealistic model of Journalism and journalistic ethics that I, as a naive high school student was taught in English class, many decades ago is, with rare exceptions, no longer practiced, and real “journalism” is dead.
I was taught that the task of a “reporter” was to diligently search out and, then, to report the news.
Today’s “journalists” have apparently been taught that they have a duty to be “agents of change,” that they should report things in a way that will influence policy, influence events, and actions–to the benefit of a Leftist agenda.
Therefore, in all cases, when receiving “news” through the MSM, skepticism should be your default mode.
P.S. –Just who has taught what used to be called “reporters,” and now style themselves as “journalists” that they should be “agents of change”?
Well, it turns out that it was likely unrepentant (said Ayers in a 2001 New York Times interview, ”I don’t regret setting bombs. I feel we didn’t do enough.”) urban terrorist and Communist (he says with a small “c”) Bill Ayers, who got a quickie educational degree, and went on the write the textbooks, model curriculums, lesson plans, and reading lists that are very popular, and widely used in teaching colleges and teaching training institutes all over the U.S.
What is Ayer’s teaching philosophy?
How does Bill Ayers view the U.S., its culture, and politics?
Take a look at some of the articles on this that have been published at City Journal, which says that Ayers is working every day to “bring down American capitalism and Imperialism,” and that he is teaching that “…prospective K—12 teachers need to “be aware of the social and moral universe we inhabit and . . . be a teacher capable of hope and struggle, outrage and action, a teacher teaching for social justice and liberation.”
Ayers is apparently a great fan of the late “educational philosopher” Dr. Maxine Greene of Columbia Teacher’s College, a champion of “critical pedagogy” who was very big on “social justice.”
From the City Journal 2006 article by Sol Stern titled, “The Ed Schools’ Latest–and Worst–Humbug,” which quotes both Ayers and Greene:
Said Greene, “There are vast dislocations in industrial towns, erosions of trade unions; there is little sign of class consciousness today,” Greene had proclaimed in the Harvard Education Review. “Our great cities are burnished on the surfaces, building high technologies, displaying astonishing consumer goods. And on the side streets, in the crevices, in the burnt-out neighborhoods, there are the rootless, the dependent, the sick, the permanently unemployed. There is little sense of agency, even among the brightly successful; there is little capacity to look at things as if they could be otherwise.”
“Greene told future teachers that they could help change this bleak landscape by developing a “transformative” vision of social justice and democracy in their classrooms. Her vision, though, was a far cry from the democratic optimism of the Founding Fathers, Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther King Jr., which most parents would endorse. Instead, critical pedagogy theorists nurse a rancorous view of an America in which it is always two minutes to midnight and a knock on the door by the thought police is imminent.
Thus, the City Journal says that, to Ayres’ way of thinking “…the mission of all progressive teachers is to take back the classrooms and turn them into laboratories of revolutionary change…” directed at an America that Ayres sees as almost irredeemably racist, prejudiced, unfair, oppressive, rapacious, and violent.
What are the chances of this conception of America to have migrated to Journalism schools?
I’d say pretty good.
Given this migration what, then, are the chances for Journalists in training being taught that they have to be “agents of change”?
I’d say pretty good again.
Snow on Pine Says:
April 17th, 2018 at 11:52 am
….
The idealistic model of Journalism and journalistic ethics that I, as a naive high school student was taught in English class, many decades ago is, with rare exceptions, no longer practiced, and real “journalism” is dead.
I was taught that the task of a “reporter” was to diligently search out and, then, to report the news.
Today’s “journalists” have apparently been taught that they have a duty to be “agents of change,” that they should report things in a way that will influence policy, influence events, and actions—to the benefit of a Leftist agenda.
Therefore, in all cases, when receiving “news” through the MSM, skepticism should be your default mode.
* * *
There was one, brief, shining moment when Real Journalism was celebrated in the abstract, but it never happened in reality.
Newsmen* have always looked for and published whatever supported their agenda.
If we had been living back then, we would know that.
The history of the news business is among the simplifications that have distorted truth.
And yeah, never trust the MSM – or much of the anti-MSM either; at least their counter-spin shows that there is something underlying both sides that we get to see.
*(very few newswomen in the past, still not very many today, but they are some of the best, and many are fighting against the Dark Side where Democracy Dies)
Ayers is old news by now. Welcome to the real world outside of the matrix.
Polls are propaganda disguised as reflecting public opinion when it actually determines public opinion and public reaction.
As for journalism:
http://www.civilwarbummer.com/shermans-media-mindset-or-the-reporters-rue/
There are serious problems with modern cosmology and geoscience, the things the Authorities told you was true but had certain little fundamental issues they neglected to include in your public education/indoctrination.
When humans tell you something, people will believe it based on a scale of Authority and Confidence. That’s what a con job is, it’s a confidence art and technique.
That is why I have learned long time ago now not to trust in whatever you humans have to claim. Only certain sources like the Holy Ghost are 100% credible and believable. Although not even all the elohim and Sons of God, are credible necessarily.
I can’t help but think that Carly Simon’s song – You’re So Vain – surely needs some airplay over Comey’s apprearances.
yara Says:
April 17th, 2018 at 7:02 pm
🙂
The more I find out about Comey, the more Trump’s decision to fire him over Twitter makes sense. Probably averted a workplace shooting.
What is sad about that New Yorker Chick-fil-A story is it is NOT satire.
I find that many (thankfully not all) New Yorkers think exactly like that; and they live in such a bubble that they can’t imagine how blind they are to the rest of the country’s viewpoint.
Oldflyer Says:
April 16th, 2018 at 9:40 pm
It must be dreary to be so doctrinaire.
* * *
https://libertyunyielding.com/2018/04/17/cartoon-day-sour-grapes-wrath/
Not firing Comey led to Mueller.