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This FawningNew York TimesProfile of Violent Proud Boy Bigot Gavin McInnes Is Next-Level Complicity BS

ByVivian Kane Oct 17th, 2018, 6:08 pm

加文•麦克因尼斯alt-right,骄傲的男孩,纽约蒂姆es, nyt, bigot, hate speech, profile, normaiize

If you saw one of the world’s leading media outlets describe someone as a “hipster” and a “provocateur,” who would you think they were describing? Banksy? Shia LaBeouf? The description sounds innocuous, if mildly insufferable. It sure doesn’t sound like a way you’d describe the leader of an actual gang, let alone a hate group. But that’s how theNew York TimesdescribedGavin McInnes, co-founder of the alt-right, misogynistic, racist group the Proud Boys.

It’s not exactly clear what the point of the profile is. In its 1500+ words, it uses mostly McInnes’ own to describe him and his group. By doing so, I suppose the author (Alan Feuer) is able to shirk any responsibility to paint the hate group with the gravity they warrant.

Instead, the article leans into McInnes’ path fromViceco-founder to the man who brandished a plastic sword at Antifa protestors outside a GOP headquarters last week. Of course, even that description heavily downplays what actually happened. Feuer calls the incident a “brawl” between McInnes’ “allies and a crowd of shouting protesters.” What actually happened, and what presumably led theNYTto write this timely profile, was a large group of Proud Boys jumping three protestors, shouting homophobic slurs as they severely beat them. There’s video available. I don’t recommend watching it.

McInnes did show up with a sword, which turned out to be plastic. TheNYT’s对事件的描述使它听起来像something out of a child’s birthday party, not the brutal, bigoted attack it was. The storied newspaper has done much to empathize with Trump voters–with their endless “What do they want” profiles of the white working class voters who came out ahead in the last election yet somehow still need to be studied and mourned–has also worked to normalize violent pro-Trump, anti-everyone else groups like the Proud Boys.

Again, the article goes extremely easy on the group, using their own words to describe themselves, rather than depicting them honestly. Luckily, Twitter was here to do that today, to do the job that we would normally expect theNew York Timesto do before publishing such a near-fawning profile of a bigot. It’s not hard to find any number of clips of McInnes advocating for and bragging about violence. (Content warning: violence, hate speech, transphobia.)

The article quotes McInnes as saying he is an “Archie Bunker sexist,” as in “I don’t like Gloria Steinem, but I’d take a bullet for Edith.” But his words about even the women in his own life go far beyond playful sitcom sexist banter.

Warning: extreme racist language. (Repeated use of the N-word.)

TheNew York Timesdescribes McInness’ “egghead glasses, pocket-protector and heavy-drinking, angry-nerd aesthetic,” his “aggressive rhetoric,” and his willingness to “get physical.” They do not call him out for his actual inciting of violence, his celebration of violence, or his racist, misogynistic, homophobic, or transphobic propaganda. It’s hard to imagine the outlet using this sort of framing for any other form of extremism. Yet when it comes to Trump-supporting bigots, men like McInnes and their followers seem to get not just a pass, but full justification.

(image: Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)

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Vivian Kane - Politics Editor

Vivian Kane (she/her) has a lot of opinions about a lot of things. Born in San Francisco and radicalized in Los Angeles, she now lives in Kansas City, Missouri with her husband Brock Wilbur and too many cats.