THE BLOGGINGHEADS AFFAIR. I suppose I need to say something about this. Having written about politics and the internet for a good three years, I have to say I’m finding it somewhat bizarre to be on the other end things and part of a viral video moment that has made the jump to YouTube, been transcribed, and picked up by FDL, Atrios, Crooks & Liars, etc. etc. Some background to my use of the phrase “Jessica Valenti breast controversy”: Ann Althouse and Glenn Reynold and Helen Smith had a detailed discussion of various blogospheric breast controversies in Althouse’s prior episode of Bloggingheads.tv, including Althouse’s repetition of an AutoAdmit comment about how someone calling himself “Hitler Hitler Hitler” had said she had a “decent rack.” I watched this episode in preparation for our encounter to get a sense of her, since we’d never met and I mainly knew her through her New York Times columns, which I enjoyed, and the occasional persual of the cultural criticism on her blog. In that earlier episode, Althouse talked about the various blogospheric breast controversies, many of which are incredibly juvenile and stupid, with amusement and good humor and suggested laughing off criticism as the best response. She said (forward to 4:30): “They constantly talk about me and connect me to the subject of breasts. They constantly portray me as someone who, um, is opposed to the fact that women have breasts…Which is, I guess, sort of funny.”
When Althouse started talking about meanies in the liberal blogosphere, I brought up “the Jessica Valenti breast controversy” only because she had referred to this controversy in the prior episode, though without mentioning Valenti’s name, and was now talking about blog controversies n which she’d been embroiled. It was the only such controversy of which I was aware. I expected I’d be met with the same kind of ain’t no thang response she’d given to Reynolds and Smith, or perhaps mock the controversy as fundamentally ridiculous or some such. Needless to say, I got reaction of a whole different magnitude. As Althouse and I could not see each other, it was unclear to me during our episode to what extent she was engaging in standard Fox News-style theatrics and lawyerly grandstanding and to what extent she was sincere, so I chose to err on the side of interpreting her as being sincerely offended. Having now seen the video that accompanied the audio I got live, I’d say there was a bit more stagey theatricality involved than I’d initially assumed, but Althouse says she was having “a genuine response” and I have no reason to doubt that.
After the episode, Althouse brought another controversy to my attention, in the shape of a rather nasty personal spat between herself and Scott Lemieux, with whom she apparently has a long-standing beef (which includes the lovely “tiny prick” exchange) of which I was unaware. So between Ezra’s prior comments at his personal site and the thing with Lemieux, I suspect that’s what she was talking about when she raised the topic of my co-writers at this site, and then her voice.
On a lighter note, there was a funny exchange about our hairstyles in the comments over at Althouse’s place, and one commenter dubbed me a kind of “Jewish Jackie O.”
–Garance Franke-Ruta