No good will come of a fulsome litigation of Singal but it's fair to say that he doesn't go out of his way to avoid these controversies. Sort of like Fredrik deBoer, he's one of journalism's answers to the concept of edgelordery. People who vocally wish he was less influential would do well to remember how much juice they've been giving him.
> he doesn't go out of his way to avoid these controversies.
Science journalist covering the science of perhaps the most salient social issue of our time?
Don't get me wrong -- there are other really important stories which aren't being covered as well as they should be, but Singal's beat would seem to be at least as important as... most anything linked from HN on a daily basis.
> People who vocally wish he was less influential would do well to remember how much juice they've been giving him.
I totally agree. By turning Singal into a boogeyman he almost certainly isn't, people are only feeding his social and journalistic capital. Singal is just someone who disagrees with you (in that classically liberal 90s American sense). Efforts to cancel or ban him have made some look like they don't have actual arguments to contribute.
That's how Singal makes those with opposing views look ridiculous.
> That's how Singal makes those with opposing views look ridiculous.
Quite frankly, he didn't have to do anything. They did that allll on their own.
> he's one of journalism's answers to the concept of edgelordery
either the term "edgelord" means something very different from what it did 10ish years ago or you have a very misinformed understanding about how timid Jesse approaches online conflict. I haven't seen him initiate any form of edgy engagement in forever .. maybe ever.
I followed him long after he was declared persona non grata, sort of uncomfortably agreeing that he was getting dogpiled unfairly (I don't think I agree with him about much, but at the time, it didn't seem like he was saying anything more than a stddev from the media consensus). I don't follow him anymore, after it became very clear that he's steering right into personal conflicts with people, and reciprocating all the weird grudges. I've also had reason to listen to his podcast within the past year (they did an episode covering our local library system), and feel comfortable with the decision to yuck out of paying attention to him.
(Not over the library coverage itself, just over ancillary stuff I heard on the podcast).
I'll put it this way: I had reason to tip our local politics Facebook off to the episode he did, and when I did that, I wrote a paragraph long disclaimer about what he's like. Not because I have any animus towards Singal, but because I didn't want anybody to associate me with some of what he's said.
So yeah, I'd push back on this.
Singal is a lot less interesting a subject (aren't we all exhausted of debating Singal at this point) than whether Bluesky is going to be a viable mainstream competitor to Twitter, and he's interesting to me only in what this drama says about that question.
> Singal is a lot less interesting a subject (aren't we all exhausted of debating Singal at this point) than whether Bluesky is going to be a viable mainstream competitor to Twitter
I 100% agree with you on that part. As for the rest, it seems you and I have a vastly different experience with him and his views. Cheers!
edit: oh yea, I don't know whether you'd be comfortable sharing it here but I'd be fairly curious about that Jesse 101 you wrote for your facebook group. Not to criticize it or anything just to get a better idea of your POV.