Barbara Amiel responds to Steubenville.

[Ginger Tea]

Sometimes you can have fun with "who's this guy?"

Images of this man pop up occasionally on either zero punctuation or UK based TGWTG contributors

Resulting in people asking who this hansome respectable looking guy is and someone will post a trolling comment (perhaps the video producer) about his great work within the elderly community.

Instead one Harrold Shipman got himself written into the wills of dozzens of elderly women whom he was their GP and then gave them a lethal injection that he managed to cover up for a fair old while.

[Aethian]

That's one of the ones I found out about by one of my FB friends bringing it up when I was talking wills with him. Man that guy was sneaky and ruthless. I think a book is being written about him or has been written about him now?

[Ree]

To take those statements and call Greenday and myself out as Shadow has is beyond rude. Something that you have also come close to Ree since your backing Shadow's position, as a fellow Canadian I believe. Just because another country person doesn't know a who's who doesn't mean we're banging our chests and declaring ourselves correct in the matter.

Excuse me?
I don't see anyone "being called out or degraded".
In fact, I believe Shadow actually said that none of the comments were personally directed at you or Greenday.
Yes, Shadow quoted both of you, but there was clarification that it was not meant personally, and your comments were only used to illustrate Shadow's perception that many Americans aren't aware of, nor care about some things if they don't pertain to their country.
To have someone simply post and say, "Who the hell is she?" and then have another person quote that and say, "That's my question," I see it as both people saying the same thing, "Who the hell is she?"
If I had seen a reply saying, "I am not familiar with this journalist. Who is she anyway, and why should anything she writes really matter?" in my opinion, is less offensive than, "Who the hell is she?"

People are certainly allowed to have differing viewpoints.
After all, this is fratching.
People are allowed to disagree, and people are allowed to point out what they see as flawed arguments as well.
The important part that many people forget is that how those things are expressed is the key to all of it.

It's probably not a huge deal that some people didn't know who she was.
Where I have the problem is how that point was expressed, and the fact that even a simple "Wiki" search would have answered that she is a writer for the National Post as well as McLean's magazine in Canada. (Both of which are far from "tabloids".)

Now, if Greenday's actual "Who the hell is she?" was more of a comment on the fact that her opinion piece is drivel, that's one thing, but obviously, it was taken to mean something else.

[Aethian]

Excuse me?
I don't see anyone "being called out or degraded".
In fact, I believe Shadow actually said that none of the comments were personally directed at you or Greenday.
Yes, Shadow quoted both of you, but there was clarification that it was not meant personally, and your comments were only used to illustrate Shadow's perception that many Americans aren't aware of, nor care about some things if they don't pertain to their country.

My comments were directed towards Greenday and Aethian. To me their comments represent a brand of American chauvinism / a U.S-centric mindset that's common in the U.S and that irritates a lot of Canadians (and other nationalities for that mater).

Sorry but saying that the comments were directed towards another and myself then later being taken back means nothing. Shadow was being insulting and degrading to who/what is known about others.

You may not see her as a tabloid writer, the major papers in your area may not see her as a tabloid writer. To me and from a few other articles I read, she is a tabloid writer. Not one of the trash tabloids but a tabloid that is passing itself off as a reliable news source.

[Ree]

And, if you read down further in the same quote that you have used, Shadow says:

My comments were directed towards Greenday and Aethian...
... I'm sorry for offending. I'm well aware that there a lot of Americans who are very knowledgeable about Canada. My remarks were not directed at them and certainly not you personally.

[Aethian]

And in saying it that way that's like going out and beating someone up and then standing there and going "Oh golly gee I'm so sorry." The apology that Shadow put at the end is meaningless, to me. It looks to be there just to say look Mods I apologized for a previous post I put up where I attacked someone so no one can be mad at me anymore. Let me pull up that post and show the original offending statement;

I'm going to guess that you and Greenday are both American. That would explain why you're both surprised by the fact that you've never heard of her. After all, everyone knows that the USA is the only important place in the world and if someone's not American, then they're irrelevant and don't matter.

That's quite a slap in the face. Even the OP took it as a slap in the face. That statement along with the second post part that I quoted earlier is why any apology now, snuck in at the end of the insult is, in fact, meaningless.

[Jaden]

Yeah, I'm with Aethian here. All they did was muse about how they didn't know who Barabara Amiel was. so what, if they don't know who somebody is and wonder about it they're dumb nationalist Americans? If someone were to post a topic about, let's say, a well-known German columnist, and a Canadian were to say "Who's that?" would it be alright for me to then say "Well, I'm not surprised you don't know who it is. Canadians so egocentric that if you're not from Canada, you're not important. No offense to you, of course." Of course not. That'd be rude and untrue, and saying "no offense" at the end would be meaningless, because it IS offensive.

[siead_lietrathua]

if we follow the posts, shadow said something directed to aethian and greenday, and hyena commented that it was offensive. shadow then apologized that hyena was offended, that the comment was meant for aethian / greenday and was not ment to offend hyena. then aethian responded.

i am also with aethian. if someone puts you in a post directly with an insult, you have a right to be insulted. expecially since the reason for the insult was stupid. i don't know this author ya'll are talking about either, though she seems like a dumbass, and i AM canadian. so to claim that only people from the states would be ignorant is...well.. an ignorant thing to say!

[Ree]

If someone were to post a topic about, let's say, a well-known German columnist, and a Canadian were to say "Who's that?"

I can't speak for The Shadow, but, as I stated, if it were worded in the way you have mentioned, I wouldn't have been quite so defensive.
It was the "Who the hell is she?" by Greenday, with Aethian obviously echoing that stance, that I found to prove Shadow's premise.
To me, that was negating the OP's posting of this thread to begin with.
To me, that was saying, "She's a nobody anyway, so why bother?" rather than, "I haven't heard of her, so what difference does her arrogant view matter? Just how many people will she reach?"
Again, it's all about the wording.

[linguist]

And, if you read down further in the same quote that you have used, Shadow says:

Originally Posted by The Shadow
My comments were directed towards Greenday and Aethian...
... I'm sorry for offending. I'm well aware that there a lot of Americans who are very knowledgeable about Canada. My remarks were not directed at them and certainly not you personally.

I took that to mean that his comments were not directed personally at OP, who he was actually apologizing to (not Greenday or Aethian) nor at those Americans who are knowledgeable about Canada, but were still directed (in a rather condescending and insulting fashion, IMO) toward Greenday and Aethian.

[Kheldarson]

I can't speak for The Shadow, but, as I stated, if it were worded in the way you have mentioned, I wouldn't have been quite so defensive....
Again, it's all about the wording.

I think a big part, for me, at least with Shadow's statement, though, was the fact that he assumed that they were American. It makes it seem like the rest of us don't care.

Now, like I said earlier, I don't care about politics except in very very broad strokes, here in the US or elsewhere. I could care less about "major" political figures and all the drama that goes on in our media circus and would rather just look at what is being said in terms of political topics. So the laws and issues. I generally only look up people if I need to know if they have written a piece and I need to know if it's biased, valid, or reliable.

And an opinion column obviously is just an opinion.

So I'll admit, too, that my thought process went on with that article: "Who's this? Never heard of her. Oh, Canada. That's why. Blurb says she's kinda big there. Guess I'll wait and see what others on fratching say about her overall track record since they probably read her."

Is it because I don't care about what goes on in Canada? No. It's because of my overall view of politics and celebrities. So it's a little unfair to say "You're American so you only care about what happens in your country."

[Ree]

I took that to mean that his comments were not directed personally at OP, who he was actually apologizing to <snip> but were still directed <snip> toward Greenday and Aethian.

I admit, in reading it again, I can certainly see how I could be mistaken for the way I interpreted it, and The Shadow was not saying it wasn't personally directed at Greenday and Aethian.

[Gravekeeper]

I don't mean to blow a whole in your theory here, but...

I'm Canadian and I had no idea who the Hell she was. I thought we were talking abut an American journalist this whole time. I imagine most Canadians don't have any idea who she is either. She's not "well known" up here at all. Neither Maclean's nor the National Post have much in the way of circulation in Canada. Golfing magazines have larger customer bases than MacClean's. Hell, Guns & Ammo has more circulation in Canada than MacClean's so that should give you a decent idea of how much we give a shit about it. Nevermind the National Post, which has half the circulation that Maclean's does.

[Rapscallion]

She's not that well-known over here, quite frankly. Mind you, we exported her and husband dearest a while back and didn't notice.

Rapscallion

[Ree]

I don't mean to blow a whole in your theory here, but...

Ah, but, in fact, by saying that, you do mean to blow a hole in the theory, and that's fine.

When I read the post, I admit to thinking, "Half the board probably won't even know who she is."
While I do agree with Shadow's opinion that many Americans are "US-centric", I am not faulting anyone for not knowing who this writer is.

Where I have my major issue, and I have already repeated it, is that, instead of actually doing a quick Google or Wiki search, we had people saying, "Who the hell is she?"

That added nothing to the discussion. There was no comment on what she had written about. It was simply, "I don't even know her."

As for someone posting about a German author, and me, as a Canadian, not knowing who they were, I have to say, again, I would do a quick search to familiarize myself with the person so I could offer an informed opinion to the discussion rather than simply asking who that person was.

The thing is, the US and Canada are actually very close, and certainly much closer to each other than to Germany. The likelihood of an American being aware of a Canadian journalist would be higher, even if several Canadians have posted stating that even they don't know who she is. (I find that a sad little comment in itself when Canadians are also not aware of their own journalists, even if they are absolute twats such as Barbara Amiel.)

And, as for assuming that the members in question were from the US, well, they are both long-standing members and it is already well known what country they are from, so it really was not an assumption.