UPDATE: Just to be crystal clear, this is the main reason I wrote this post:
None of the BBP2006 judges made a call on their own work. No one judge had power over all the nominations from any given writer. Mark Bahnisch had nothing to do with the judging. Ken Parish made any final calls. Do I agree on all the finalists? No, of course not. Do I think the selection is representative of bloggy goodies? Yes, I do. And I think people on this blog will agree that I know just a teensy weensy bit about good writing. Youngest Miles Franklin Awardee and all that.
I dislike being misrepresented, which is what occurred.
There’s been irritation in various quarters about Best Blog Posts 2006. Accusations have been various. There’s this, from Mr Blair (who hasn’t picked up on the fact that owning your opinions is actually a good thing):
All but two of these pieces employ the Dreaded I:
* “I recommend you begin …â€
* “I don’t mean for this post …â€
* “When I arrived at work today I began …â€
* “I have to admit to having been shocked …â€
* “I did actually turn 30 …â€
* “Some time ago, I wrote an item …â€
* “I was fascinated to read the decision …â€
* “I think it’s fair to say …â€
* “Sometimes I think …â€
* “I’ve never met Judy …â€
* “I assume the subtext …â€
* “I have met many different refugees …â€
* “I doubt that the restorative powers of Tim Tams are recognised …â€
* “I know it’s difficult for you to understand …â€
* “I am taking a sojourn in the country …â€
* “I have a connection …â€
* “I should add …â€
* “Yesterday I went to a funeral …â€
From random Blair commenters:
Ugh. Reading through a few pushed me back to the dreary days of Comp 101, where we had to read dreary “important†essays by vegetarian feminists about their teenage abuse at the hands of Oppressive, Patriarchal society.
And:
The headlines on the Lucy Tartan piece summarise all of the articles far better than I can:
1. “Pretentious and illiterate verbal sludgeâ€
2. A farrago of sexist claptrap thinly disguised as religious mumbo-jumbo
3. Stupid about pictures
4. Ecological desertification in the bookshops
5. It’s crap and will rot your brain!
From Mr Beck:
Not surprisingly (since this is a lefty dominated competition) almost half of the posts deal with gender issues or the trials and tribulations of womanhood.
And from Mr Beck’s commenters:
I have met young women like Cristy Clark. They are self-centred pains in the ass who never shut up. Beats me how they get a self-respecting man to hang around. They are very into social justice and green issues.
These kvetches have all been nicely dispatched over at LP, which irritated one RWDB so much he decided to make a number of demonstrably untrue statements, viz:
Club Troppo’s Best Blog Posts of 2006 was announced on 16 December by Nicholas Gruen. Mark Bahnisch (Larvatus Prodeo) promoted the competition the same day. Skeptic Lawyer (aka Helen Dale, catallaxy) promoted the competition on the 17th. A subsequent Gruen post says seven blogs advertised the competition but mentions only Larvatus Prodeo and catallaxy by name.
Mark Bahnisch has at least two posts in the finals; a number of other finalists blog at Larvatus Prodeo or are frequent LP commenters. Helen Dale also has at least two posts in the finals and is on the judging committee.It is therefore no surprise that the strongest reactions to criticisms (see here and here) of BBOP06 have come from some of those with a personal interest in the competition: Bahnisch, Dale and the crew and commenters at Larvatus Prodeo.
He then goes on to accuse Mark Bahnisch of coordinating the competition, and ends with a nicely immature sexual reference:
Gummo Trotsky (Larvatus Prodeo; also a BBOP06 finalist), inspired by Nicholas Gruen, was the first to suggest (10 December) the “best blog posts” idea. Gruen, no doubt inspired by Trosky (almost certainly Gummo, not Leon), proposed (11 December) an anthology of “best blog posts.” Fifty one minutes later Mark Bahnisch offered to co-ordinate the project. (Collaboration between Bahnisch and Gruen is no surprise: they once discussed cross-posting between Larvatus Prodeo and Club Troppo.) Helen Dale quickly volunteered assistance.
There is nothing wrong or even improper with a few mostly like-minded bloggers grouping together to promote their writing. It is more than a little misleading, however, for this anthology of blog posts to be billed at On Line Opinion as the “Best Blog posts of 2006.”No matter who ultimately gets the best blog post gong, Mark Bahnisch will be the ultimate winner. He has high aspirations for Larvatus Prodeo and can now add numerous best blog post nominations to his ever more impressive list of accolades.
Note: BBOP06 is incorrectly referred to above as a competition. A daisy chain is not a competition.
Interestingly, Catallaxy is by inference once again a lefty blog, simply because Mark Bahnisch and yours truly happen to be civil to each other.
However, here’s the straight dope for the record: none of the BBP2006 judges made a call on their own work. No one judge had power over all the nominations from any given writer. Mark Bahnisch had nothing to do with the judging. Ken Parish made any final calls. Do I agree on all the finalists? No, of course not. Do I think the selection is representative of bloggy goodies? Yes, I do. And I think people on this blog will agree that I know just a teensy weensy bit about good writing. Youngest Miles Franklin Awardee and all that.
282 Comments
In fact, Mark didn’t even nominate any of his own work. Kim and I did.
Then SL how can you explain the pregnant woman’s post getting into the finals. It had to be the most self aborbed, self interested, self focused, conceited piece I have read since I gave up reading Fairfax dailes.
How did hers make it and yet one person’s who I think is the best on the street didn’t. I’m dubious, very, but somewhat ameliorated by your presence.
I’m not sure which pregnancy piece you’re talking about, but I have to say I was responsible for selection quite a few of the ‘women’s issues’ pieces. That said, once each individual judge was allocated nominations from which to make a shortlist, we had no control over what anyone else chose. Ideally, everyone should act as a check on all the others, but we simply didn’t have time.
And pregnancy is kind of central to the experience of 51% of the population, particularly now - in Western countries - we can choose to give it a miss.
Well, I dunno. I thought they were a bit of a mixed bag. Some good, some not so. I’ve seen better posts around the Ozblogos, and I think J F had a point. Maybe the nomination process was bad.
FWIW, I think Tim B unusually dudded with his “I” cannonade.
Oh yes, he’s getting paid out on big-time for that - open mouth, insert foot.
Of course they’re a mixed bag, and I do accept that it’s harder for blokes to get into some of the more ‘girly’ posts. It’s even hard for me, as a woman who’s childfree by choice. I do make the effort, though.
It’s not the point, SL. It belonged in the drivel section for the awards, not because of the subject but how it was discussed. It was’t the only one, though and maybe I shouldn’t have singled that one out. However, it seemed that only lefty group think pieces made it.
Which really gets to the point. If most of the people on the panel were lefties and most of the pieces were opinion pieces which way is the wind going to blow?
No, sl, I liked some of the “girly” posts. I don’t have a problem there (I don’t think). I just thought some of the winners were bad posts from the standpoint of what makes a good blog post as opposed to what makes a good essay. I’ll bow to your better judgement, but I still have my opinion.
Blogging is opinion. You can’t have bloggers vote on other bloggers’ opinions. There were lots of stoushes last year between various blogs. How could that not come into the decision making process?
It reminds me of the way the commies run their elections. You have a choice but they’re all the same party.
I am not saying people like say Ken Parish aren’t honest, as I really think he would do his best to make it as fair as possible, same with you and Mark B, but it appears rigged and biased to be honest.
mark b … should read … sorry.
To be fair, my main reason for writing this post was to set the record straight. I didn’t choose any of my own work (had I done so, I would have made different selections). Nor did anyone else. And Mark had nothing to do with any of the selections - he just agreed to promote the whole thing.
Everyone should have a go at girly posts.
Beck is being petty in seeing this as a left-right thing. I do have my aesthetic differences with many of the selections. This personal blogging schtick doesn’t do it for me and I found them intellectually light, though I wouldn’t discriminate on political grounds - Don Arthur has written some fantastic stimulating posts which would belong in any selection but even the one of his which was chosen wasn’t representative of his best. Similarly Andrew Norton (and I’m not talking about his psephologcal posts which may be a little too ‘current’) but his more philosophical ones.
I’m happy to confess it’s definitely a lack of interest in the ‘personal life’ posts for me, which tend to correspond to the ‘girly’ ones.
At the end of the day it’s just a bunch of people choosing what they think are their favourites so don’t take it all too seriously.
That’s fair enough, Jason. No-one objects to criticism like that. And everyone has their own views. It’s when the whole thing is construed as some sort of conspiracy that gives me the irrits.
As an aside:
CL
It’s a policy plank of that party CL.
Jason
Of course it was a left/right thing. It couldn’t be anything but.
SL,
Please specify exactly what I wrote that is unture.
I did not at any point indicate catallaxy is a leftist blog.
My post contains not sexual references.
Duh.
Where is the Bird of prey in all this? I’m sure he’ll have an opinion. He’s far too occupied with global warming these days.
‘Daisy chain’?
And Mark had nothing to do with either judging or nominating anything.
None of us made calls on our own work.
The eagerness of some bloggers for “awards” reminds me of the blokes who used to be actually keen to pick up their indoor cricketing “trophies” in the half-arsed comp I used to play in during the Rugby pre-season.
SL, please don’t be offended by all this, but how is it that righties didn’t get much of a showing?
It reminds me of the time the frogs were teaming up with the Russians in the olympic figure skating contests. They didn’t vote for each themselves but were “fair” with the other’s contestants.
There’s still a fair few more posts to go, JC. I think you’ll find it’s pretty balanced by the end.
Seriously, how is it that CL’s work never scored much of a mention.
Who did the nominating and submission in all this?
Or Soon’s for that matter.
It goes without saying that if your work wasn’t up there it would really have been rigged even more than it was, SL.
SL,
Where did I say Bahnisch had anything to do with nominations and judging?
One thing’s for sure, one of us isn’t being truthful.
What I find funny is that Beck was careful to avoid the use of “I” in his post, and his post suffered as a result.
JC, I don’t think we nominated anyone. Our bad if so.
Here:
And Rob’s right, you needed to nominate people. I tried to advertise the thing pretty blatantly, but obviously that wasn’t enough. I do agree the whole thing got dreadfully telescoped towards the end - just before Xmas and all.
Rob
Huh. Me take some of it back then. Me thought that it was a closed shop in that the panellists decided what was going to be judged.
Trying to avoid “I”, Tim.
Hey Lambert I find you funny in all circumstances.
Care to discuss DDT or the poor Tuvaluans being forced to flee rising seas? Scamper on back to Dulltard where it’s safe.
SL
Those are the demonstrable untruths? That’s it?
Have you followed the links? Are the timings I give incorrect? Where do I get it wrong?
Boys, boys. there’s enough stoushes here without you two adding to it. And we’ve had a belly full of DDT, figuratively speaking.
What are the Tuvaluans out of curioristy?
Gruen at 9:34 PM — So why don’t we produce an anthology of some of the best blog posts for 2007? Missing link would be a great place to start. If you can be bothered Ken, may I suggest that you present us your loyal readers with a shortlist and appoint a group to choose the ‘best’ twenty or thirty?
Bahnisch at 10:25 PM — Ken, I’m sure that we’d be happy to help co-ordinate such a project. I’ll forward on your comment to the LP bloggers’ list.
Dale 8 comments down at 6:24 PM the next day — I’ll throw my hat in the ring and offer editing and publishing assistance.
Becky
To be honest it does sound spontaneous and you couldn’t fault anyone deciding to go ahead with it from the conversation. It just looks like bunch of people who hit on an idea and went ahead with it. From that perspective, I can’t really fault them.
However the result still would end up getting skewed just by the fact of what they are. However I don’t really think it was some sort of dishonest set up.
Becky, you state that we chose our own work. This is untrue. You state that Mark was a judge. At the time he made the comment you quote, he was happy to take a judging role. He then withdrew due to work commitments. If I have to I’ll forward you the relevant email. That’s why he wasn’t named in Ken & Nick’s introduction.
Nomination was also up to everyone, and we broadcast our requests far and wide. Nick and Ken knew that some people would have missed these announcements, however. They were upfront about that fact from the get-go.
JC,
I stand by my post, which notes the following:
“There is nothing wrong or even improper with a few mostly like-minded bloggers grouping together to promote their writing. It is more than a little misleading, however, for this anthology of blog posts to be billed at On Line Opinion as the “Best Blog posts of 2006.â€
I’m just calling it like I see it.
SL
The unintended conseqence in my mind is that due to the time of year and all that the results are skewed. It’s unfortunate, possibly unintended but that is the end result.
Maybe bloggers never leave their post, but lots of readers possibly aren’t around.
Becky
And that’s a fair enough comment too.
“Becky, you state that we chose our own work.†No, I do not.
“You state that Mark was a judge.†No, I do not.
This is getting silly.
Riiiiight. So me, Ken, Nick and Meika are all like minded. Meika’s a poet, ffs. He wouldn’t know what politics was if it leapt up and bit him in the arse, and more to the point, I don’t think he cares. I’m a Hayekian libertarian. Ken’s a lawyer who specializes in jurisprudence and used to be in the Labor Party. Nick runs a brokerage firm and to be honest seems to change his political views every other week.
And anyone could nominate.
I agree with Becky, too. J F is a good blogger and commenter and IMHO has been misrepresented.
The time of year was a problem, JC, we knew that. If nothing else we can guarantee that it won’t happen again. People can nominate stuff through the year - which Ken & Nick also pointed out in their introduction.
Becky, I am now going to blockquote your entire post so that everyone can read it. I realise you weren’t aware that Mark withdrew, although his absence from Ken and Nick’s introduction should have alerted you to that fact. Apart from that, you have my email address and could easily have asked.
What annoys me is everyone seems to be really excited about the “oh my god im a girl and I’m having a baby!” posts, but If I was to post “So, on saturday night I banged this random chick”, I wouldn’t get any recognition at all.
This competition is terribly sexist.
SL,
How about you put down that spade and specify my untruths?
You can call me a liar all you want, I really don’t care; but if you don’t want to look the fool you should either prove me a liar or recant.
Thanks for the lighten up, Yobbo. Mind you, I think if anyone in the Ozblogosphere could get away with a chick banging post, it’d be you.
Becky, I your post clearly indicates you thought Mark was involved in the judging (’co-ordinating’), in fact. To read your post, it appears as though Mark is the only beneficiary, despite the fact he had zero input. This is simply false. And you lied about not including a sexual reference, which I find personally offensive. Why don’t you stop digging?
You also imply we selected our own work; once again, much of the snark is directed at Mark. Mark didn’t even nominate anything of his. Other people had to do it. You seem irritated that two of my posts finished up in there. They were in there because other people thought they were good enough. Not because of anything I did.
Yes, the system had its flaws - we couldn’t cross check each others’ shortlisted work for a start. This was wholly due to time of year - on which I take JC’s point. Pulling this in the lead-up to Xmas was always going to create difficulties, which we’ve acknowledged.
And so that next year’s collection has more ‘balance’, why don’t you nominate some posts you like?
Yobbo
hahahahaha
And did you?
Yobbo does have a point though. If he wrote a piece about his obsession with banging Asian chicks he would probably get arrested rather than get the best blog post of the year award.
He’s right. The whole thing is skewed against those who don’t play by the rules.
He made my point better than I did. A chick gets pregnant and we’re all going ga ga about it.
Next time round have Yobbo, Bird or me on the panel. That’ll even things up a bit.
Yobbo’s a good writer. I’m sorry no-one nominated his Elephant & Wheelbarrow post, actually. If he wrote to a good standard on being a root-rat, I’d fight for it. Good writing doesn’t have to be edifying. It just has to be good.
(This coming from someone who has written a fair bit of unedifying stuff in her time).
SL,
Bahnisch offered to co-ordinate; I did not say he was a judge. Co-ordinating is not judging (try a dictionary).
Bahnisch will benefit.
I made no sexual reference.
I have to keep digging because you’re throwing so much dirt at me.
Yes, I am often snarky.
No, I am not irritated.
The BBP06 system worked as designed.
I am not competitive.
Yes, one of us is a liar.
Are you running a modified Chewbacca defense on me, or what?
SL
You might, but could you imagine the rest of the panel actually voting for Yobbo’s random fling on a saturday night? Yea, right. Friggen hell would have to freeze over first…. in summer.
Personally I would have voted for Yobbo’s post on the valid reasons why he hates Euro Chicks compared to Asian chicks. That would have got as much chance of winning as me taking a liking to Trailor Trash Ted.
Luckily I’m a gentleman and don’t kiss (or root) and tell. On the other hand, if I banged a famous person like SL I would probably blog about it for weeks.
Unfortunately I haven’t banged anyone famous lately. When I do, however, I expect it to be the lead story on onlineopinion.com.au….
Unless it’s Kate Ritchie or Paris Hilton, in which case everyone on my street has already been there, done that.
Yobbo , You’re being inconsistent here. You’re favouring Euro chicks, when you’ve told us the reasons you think Asian gals are better. Which is it?
Easy on the smut talk, Yobbo. Some of us are easily offended.
Now, if we follow the nice daisy chain linky you so generously provided, we come across this little gem:
Last time I looked, oral sex was, ahem, sexual in nature.
At no point did you indicate that Mark’s role was anything other that ‘picking winners’. Subjectively, you may have meant differently. Objectively, what you wrote indicated he had a major role.
And LP won’t benefit. Club Troppo - if we’re going to be brutally honest here - is the only real beneficiary, because it’s linked at the bottom of every single post selected. Not LP. Not Catallaxy. Not Mark.
I don’t HATE euro chicks, anyway. I just prefer asian chicks, in the same way that some guys prefer blondes.
And it’s funny. You know how your elders tell you if you eat too much of something (like chips) then you will turn into one?
Well, the amount of times I’ve been in asia and one of the locals has asked me if I am part asian is amazing.
The funny thing is I’m not at all (as far as I know), but epicanthic eye folds run in the male half of my family.
Blah blah blah. The moral of the story is I feel pigeon-holed by my yellow fever. But I like Jessica Alba and Angelina Jolie too, and they aren’t asian at all!
In other words I am much more complex than people tend to give me credit for.
Simpletons!
Yobbo, you’re a star. You’re also making me laugh lots, so keep it up
JC: The reason I think Asian chicks are better pretty much comes down to looks. Despite the prevailing stereotypes, I have been there enough to know that most asian girls aren’t submissive lotus petals like the movies would lead you to believe.
They are, however, ridiculously cute.
BTW Becky, If you are easily offended go home and watch play school. I don’t care.
“In other words I am much more complex than people tend to give me credit for.”
Not at all Yobbo. It’s a complex business being a yobbo. I get shit all day for it. I’m older than you are it appears from the Youtube thingo you did, but I still do my best at yobbing around despite wifeys protests.In fact I get called that most days.
SL,
If the daisy chain link offends you, take it up with wikipedia. In any event, that was not the citation I was referring to — you picked out the oral sex meaning, not me.
I made not mention of Bahnisch having anything whatsoever to do with picking any winners.
All participants hope to benefit in some way from BBP06. Participants will benefit unequally.
You are still calling me a liar but have shown me no lies? Over to you.
Looks like Yobbo’s been to Northbridge again; he’s having problems following the discussion.
Sorry Yobbo, it’s one of our hosts who’s easily offended.
“The moral of the story is I feel pigeon-holed by my yellow fever. But I like Jessica Alba and Angelina Jolie too, and they aren’t asian at all!”
Hummmm I think you need to stick with the Asian variety after seeing your choice of Euro chicks.
Angelina is a dipshit. I would imagine it would be hell for the poor idiot stuck with her. She thinks she’s intellectual now ,with a social conscience. A big worry for an actress.
Jessica Alba isn’t euro. She is mexican as far as I know. And for bonus points she played an asian girl in “The Sleeping Dictionary” (The best movie ever made btw, shits all over Citizen Kane.)
Easy on the smut talk, Yobbo. Some of us are easily offended.
I was replying to that. So maybe I am not following the discussion. If you were referring to Mark, I am already aware he is a girl’s blouse.
Your link goes to ‘human sexual relations’, Becky. Picked out from a variety of others. (Everyone, go to his site, since that’s what he so clearly wants, and click on the daisy chain link).
Yobbo’s being funny, Becky. Something I appreciate. So leave him alone.
I always thought a daisy chain was a bomb. You girls are way too worldly for me.
Alba.
Born in Pomona, California, on April 28, 1981, Jessica Alba and her family moved to Biloxi, Mississippi, when she was an infant. Three years later her Air Force father brought the family back to California, then to Del Rio, Texas, before finally settling in Southern California when Jessica was nine.
I think she’s 1/2 white, 1/2 black
They never tell you if she’s part black because they’re so uptight about this black/white thing in the US and it may be considered racist to raise it. It’s really fucked up. If she was 100% black it wouldn’t be a problem.
Yeah
That’s the first time I ever heard of a mutliple sex partner routine being described that way.
Her father is Mexican, her mother is of French and Danish descent.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004695/bio
I knew it was a sexual reference (I guessed along the lines of ‘circle jerk’), but had to follow the link to find out exactly what he meant.
“Despite her Mexican ancestry, she isn’t fluent in Spanish. She hardly understands anything in that language.”
Yep you’re right. Took the extract from the same page page didn’t read further down page.
SL,
If you check you’ll find that the last five links on the wikipedia page go to the same place on the page. I’m usually very careful when linking and checked that out in advance to ensure ambiguity.
As for wanting people to go to my blog and click on the link, I think you overestimate the size of your readership.
Do you think Yobbo needs you to defend him when he’s not even under attack?
Where are the big lies you keep huffing and puffing about?
Huh, Yobbo?
Your wit is so subtle and erudite that your no doubt deeply wounding arrow has failed to hit its target.
I was going to defend Angelina against your unkind slurs, but hey…
This is actually nonsense. You don’t know me from a bar of soap, son. I don’t make any personal slights against you but if you get your jollies from doing so, that’s your business I guess. I was happy to post a link to your post about the outrageous treatment that you received at the hands of the WA cops, and to highlight the ludicrous laws in force there. If I’d known any civil liberties lawyers in WA, I’d have been happy to refer you and to put in a good word for a pro bono case.
You know absolutely nothing about me, and vice versa. If you enjoy taking personal potshots at people on blogs, that’s your right I guess, but I can’t personally see what you get out of it. You’ve pissed me off - have you achieved anything by that? Do you feel all rosy inside? Do you feel like you’ve proved some point? Do you get satisfaction from abusing people? I don’t think it has much to do with politics with you does it? You just feel better about yourself when you’re slagging off at someone else.
Whatever, dude.
Let me just clarify something to J F Beck. I have no idea what you’re on about. I think highlighting good writing in the blogosphere is a good thing. If I’d had time, I’d have followed up on my offer to help out with co-ordinating it, but I had too many work commitments. The process of selecting and judging was quite time intensive, and insofar as I saw some of the emails before I withdrew from the process I saw no mention whatsoever of politics.
You seem to get some satisfaction from constant negativity. I’m completely unable to find anything on your blog which sets out what you believe, or refers to anything whatsoever other than your quibbles with left wing bloggers and some “left wing media” of your imagination.
A lot of the people who were selected rarely write anything about politics at all. These bloggers are among the women that you diss - apparently, as I think Darlene commented, there are no right wing women at all.
Your posts say a lot more about you than anyone who participated in this exercise. They show that your only interest is in knocking others, based on their (perceived) political affiliation.
I have no idea what you mean with your obsessive refrain “Bahnisch will benefit”. I refused to nominate any of my own posts, and I haven’t linked to the two that others selected and that were published on OLO.
I think you should give some consideration to how the time you invest in blogging benefits anyone at all.
If I’d been Helen, I’d have ignored your meanspirited and nitpicking post altogether. She recognises that blogging is a legitimate forum for creative work, and has posted fiction of her own on this site, and generally benifitted the blogosphere through her participation and enthusiasm. Her literary credibility and standing, and also the civil manner in which she conducts herself in these fora are an asset to the process and the selection of posts in an entirely voluntary enterprise.
She’s got no need to justify herself to you, and it’s to her credit that she’s felt obligated to engage with your criticism as if it had any basis rather than being a combination of partisanship and spite, which if you had any self-reflexivity, you’d realise it is.
I do apologise to Yobbo. It was actually JC who was having a go at Angelina. She’s the hawtness, Joe. I don’t know why she bothers with having that Brad character as a handbag.
ROWR! Not the eyes! And let go of my hair!
A pretty strangely defensive post from someone who obviously considers overt masculinity to be a BAD thing.
And with that, I am now going to bed. And don’t forget your root-rat story, Yobbo. No names, no packdrill, but I am expecting a piece, and I will hold you to it if I can
Some of us have to work in the morning, yer know.
Not me!
SL,
I’ll take your exit as an admission you were wrong in claiming my post contains demonstrable untruths.
Thankyou.
“JC who was having a go at Angelina. She’s the hawtness, Joe. I don’t know why she bothers with having that……..”
I stopped right there because I couldn’t write his name I am so disgusted. I read somewhere that he’s worth around $300 mill. Which makes me hate Hollywood even more. No talent while he gets the great looking gals and tons of cash. That’s a good reason to hate America.
I’d bet his life is a misery with Jolie though. Hope.
Maybe SL has a job and has to go to sleep and get up and work in the morning, J F, and doesn’t have all night to spend on this most fascinating discussion.
I reckon that’s probably right, Joe!
Anyway, have to go to work tomorrow morning myself. So goodnight all, and I hope the J F Becks of the world are enjoying or benefitting in some way from this slagfest. I think Helen’s quite right to take it personally. Attacks on the integrity of the judging process are attacks on her by implication. As I said, I’d have advised her to ignore them. They were only made in the first place to make some trivial political point.
#21
JC, I received an email from Parish (I think) soliciting a self-nomination. I thought it was infra dig to do so and that was that. Didn’t respond.
Hate to tell you this, Yobbo, but I spent my evening having dinner with my (Chinese) ex-girlfriend and then going out for drinks afterwards. You spent yours proving your masculinity by posting stuff on blogs.
But if it makes you happier, I’ll stipulate that you have a big swinging dick and that even Arnie Schwarzenegger is jealous of your really really really overt if not overtest masculinity.
Cheers maaaaaaaaate!
MB,
Maybe so.
Two things are for certain, however: I’m not a liar and don’t much appreciate being called one.
I didn’t call you one, J F.
Goodnight then.
Angelina is dreadful.
If you want to see… oh, y’all know where this is going…
It doesn’t have to be a contest, C.L. The world is big enough for Angelina and Nigella both
Each to his own…
Though neither have anything on my girl, Beth:
http://musica.hispavista.com/imagenes/4197b.jpg
Just sayin…
MB wrote: “Attacks on the integrity of the judging process are attacks on her by implication. As I said, I’d have advised her to ignore them. They were only made in the first place to make some trivial political point.”
I did not attack the integrity of the process. The process worked as intended — it’s about self-promotion. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. It is misleading, however, to claim that the processselected the best blog posts of 2006.
Lighten up, dude. We’re talking about which celebs are hot now. It’s a subjective judgement, you know, just like which blog posts are best…
And like Kim just said at LP, I really liked your work in Bladerunner.
Do feel free to give us the benefit of any goss about what it was like to work with Daryl Hannah…
I liked your claim to have the best read political blog in the universe, along with the most prominent lefty blogger. Oh wait…
Actually, I spent my evening getting drunk at the cricket club and then came back home to post a few drunk comments. Imagine my surprise when Australia’s girliest man-blogger threw a hissy-fit and embarrassed himself all over the place? I couldn’t have asked for a more enjoyable evening!
By the way, there’s nothing special about Nigella Lawson at all except for the fact that she’s on TV. She’s the female equivalent of David Reyne.
I’m sorry that replicants only have a short life span, J F. Next time I’m at the Tyrel Corporation, I’ll see what I can do for you.
It’’s also pretty cool that an LP thread that you felt reflected badly on you personally was unceremoniously deleted.
Shit, Yobbo, millions around Australia are envious of your exciting social life. You’re such a he man! Fuck me dead, dude. How do you do it?
Wouldn’t have a clue what you’re on about, J F. Is there some fault in the programming somewhere?
Seriously, who cares? What do you possibly get out of all this bitching and whining?
You’re only partly right if you think you’re Philip K Dick.
Well I’ll pay that one at least.
Goodnight. You shouldn’t get so steamed up about all this, honestly.
Gee, it’s amazing how you have a lapse of mental function when confronted with recent reality. You pulled the same amnesia guff when your boy Sheil was stealthily deleting comments and couldn’t work out what I was talking about when links were tampered with.
Surely your remember the LP thread taking comments from Tim Blair’s readers and attaching them to photos. You know, the thread that you deleted.
Yep that’s LP, the home of civilized discussion.
There is humour all around us.
Yob, if you’d be as happy on a cold winter’s night with David Reyne as Nigella I think questions have to be asked.
JF has been accused of lying - which is the nuclear option insofar as these debates are concerned. He is not a liar.
Yeah, I deleted it because it should never have been posted in the first place. We’ve discussed this. Got anything new to say? I thought we were going to segue into a promising discussion about Philip K Dick.
Don’t call Yobbo a girlie man by implying that he’d be happy with David Reyne, C.L.? Sheesh, we might see a masculinity assertion meltdown. Yobbo will have to go and get rooly rooly pissed at the Cricket Club or something else uber blokey to wash this stain off his super blokey true blue such a man rep.
Whatevs.
I genuinely couldn’t work out what you were on about with that. Take it up with Chris.
I’ll ask you again - what is the point of your constant harping about this stuff? A crusade for blog niceness? Really? I don’t understand. They’re blogs, dude. It’s not that big a deal. Is there anything at all else that you’re interested in that we could discuss? Anything?
MB,
I find it hard to understand that a really bright guy like you couldn’t understand it when I tried to explain what had happened with Sheil, that’s all. It’s weird how you can suddenly go all dumb. I still have all the emails; they’d probably make an interesting post. Maybe someone would nominate me for BBP2007.
Take it up with Sheil? Isn’t LP your blog? (I’m being a bit silly here because you’re on record saying it is your blog.)
I have no problem with you deleting a post but think you should have put up a post explaining the situation rather than just quietly removing it. A very sneaky way to minimize embarrassment, no?
Oh yeah, when did you become SL’s mentor? Did you pick her or did she pick you?
Ken ought to have recused himself.
I flagrantly nominated some of my own stuff when his thread made it clear that it was a leftist ankle-biters convention.
Then he wiped everything I said and called me a troll.
And then for no good reason at all once the nominations were cut off so suddenly and out of a clear blue sky I found myself able to post at Troppo?
Like I was being bought off.
Skeptic I wonder if you should have had anything to do with these clowns.
Without your cache we could just laugh at all their attempts to tell eachother how brilliant they all are.
And how being a leftist confers on one a poets sensibility.
This issue seems to have got out of hand in 24 hours and I think life is too short to get on top of all the arguments at this stage. The thing that impressed me on a brief scan of some commentary on LP was the mean-spirited attitude towards Tim Blair and people like him which is a feature of LP, along with longwinded personal banter. That makes LP almost a waste of space from where I sit and it is a worry that so me of that stuff is coming onto Catallaxy.
We can all cut each other some slack on our personal foibles and quirks, but I hope I am not the only person who comes to Catallaxy for the ideas, mixed with a bit of repartee and gossip but not too much. And don’t ask me to define what is too much:)
Weird directions this thread took.
Sorry Mark, it’s going to take a lot more than that to get me to throw a tantrum to equal yours of last night. You’ll have to try harder.
My god Rafe, fancy been mean to the nice people at Tim Blair’s place, who are uniformly pleasant to LP!
However I agree with you this interblog partisan snark fests are really really boring.
People are taking this waay too seriously.
Jason, Rafe and Mark are all correct. People are taking this too seriously, and I shouldn’t have written this post, and apart from the limited appeal of pointless stoushing, the whole thing is boring. And Nigella is the hotness.
Unless we can get onto something more pleasant and less negative (like Nigella being the hotness), then I’ll probably close the thread.
If “too seriously” was directed at me, you’re wrong. Believe me, in the scheme of my life this little brouhaha is of no importance at all. That’s not to say it wasn’t entertaining.
If important, I’d be demanding a retraction. Rather, I simple don’t care.
Yes, I simple, and simply don’t care.
Oh yeah, thanks to Rob for throwing me a bouquet way upthread.
Lessons to be learnt:
Everyone’s a critic. Next year Ken Parish will have write that the Best Essays of 2007 are as good as can be expected, and that he was unable to get a better gig going with blog posts. While his ‘missing link’ is very good, the best blogs of 2006 has been disappointing - but who was to know until it was tried. Indeed, if it runs again there might be a better selection to choose from now that the concept is known.
J F Beck simply doesn’t care but he was up most of the night not caring about it.
J F Beck doesn’t like the BBP2006, well, good for him. I don’t like what he writes (he’s a prime example of someone who is a blogger and not a writer).