Damian Barr

[AbsintheFriends]

I know there's loads going on at the moment, and Damian Barr is just one bearded misogynist in an increasingly dystopian world, but he's the one who kicked up a huge self-righteous fuss about Baroness Nicholson and got her ousted from her position at the Booker Prize on the grounds of homophobia and transphobia. Who would have imagined that such a zealous icon of ideological purity would turn out to have said things like this??

twitter.com/MLagouste/status/1278345389150662658

(Oh yes. Any one of the several million of us on FWR who has seen a bearded misogynist hiding behind a trans-rights banner...)

[merrymouse]

And let's all note the very special stunning bravery of issuing the nonpology at what, just after midnight??

Where did he issue the apology?

[justanotherneighinparadise]

We all know it’s a game of Top Trumps.

Homosexual white male and trans ally will always trump white lesbian or white heterosexual female. Now if there were other factors at play then he’d have gone down. If he’d have made racist comment for example and a collection of people from the BAME community had campaigned to get him cancelled then that would have trumped his homosexuality/trans card and he’d have been plunged into the abyss.

Let’s hope he spent a productive night deleting anything that could be misconstrued and let’s also hope this has given him a large dose of humble pie and a note to self to be more careful in the future. Everyone is watching. Speech is not free anymore darling.

[AbsintheFriends]

Where did he issue the apology?

On twitter I think, though obviously he's locked his account now so all I'm seeing are screenshots.

A statement at midnight from a locked account, blaming those who dug out the tweets for hurting transpeople. Such courage and integrity on that side of the debate, always.

[twoHopes]

Fucking hell - that is some spectacular DARVO in that apology! So we're the ones hurting trans people by circulating disgusting tweets that he wrote?! And the ones about "Thai whores" were just banter then I guess?

I remember when I first joined this debate a couple of years ago seeing people writing "TRA = MRA" and thinking that was a bit of a loony thing to say. But here we are. There's no denying it anymore.

[ScrimpshawTheSecond]

Well, I don't like the 'cancel' culture, so I don't really care what happens now. Because Damien 'double standards' Barr knows, if he has a shred of decency inside him, that the things he said were cruel, vicious, unnecessary and wrong.

He also knows, I daresay, that the women he has organised mobs to take down have NEVER used words like that to express sentiments like that.

I'm not trans, so I can't really speak to historic offensiveness or otherwise of the word 't' , except to say it's not a word I've used or would use. What bothers me more is the gleeful mocking of someone who was, obviously, at absolute rock bottom;mocking a suicide for failing is about as abhorrent a thing as I can imagine. I just can't see how someone can do that and still claim the moral hight ground.

[RufustheRowlingReindeer]

if he has a shred of decency inside him

I think this might be a bit of a stretch

[merrymouse]

On twitter I think

So he only apologised to his followers.

How very 2020.

[doublehalo]

That is an exceptionally well worded apology - genius level construction.

He didn't even admit to writing the tweets. And of course the person who highlighted them is transphobic and anti LGBTQ+.

Whoever wrote it (and judging by his earlier work it wasn't Barr!) should be very happy with themselves today.

[littlbrowndog]

What he did to the baroness was unforgivable

She did not know what would happen to her if she dared to speak out for women and girls in the UK

For such a humanitarian woman to be labelled homophobic racist and transphobic was unbelievable

And yet Barr is still there calling women bitches and whores

This is not hate towards Barr.

This is what he did

[littlbrowndog]

In his past tweets

[AbsintheFriends]

^if he has a shred of decency inside him

I think this might be a bit of a stretch^

Yes, I think one of the things this shows about Mr Barr is that he'll say whatever he thinks will make him popular in the playground. Laddish banter about whores and bitches and tr**s one year, pious parroting of woke mantras another.

Women's rights, experiences, safety and need to be heard are of the utmost irrelevance to him. It's all just about adopting the fashionable viewpoint du jour and accessorising with the right language. It's as flimsy as a sweatshop crop top and decency doesn't come into it anywhere.

[AgentProvocateur]

I’m SO disappointed in Damian Barr. We have slightly overlapping social circles and I’ve met him a few times He did a very good job of disguising who he really is.

[Fanthorpe]

I think DB used Twitter to build his career, and has made lots of friends there in really useful circles, particularly women. He has built great connections and made use of them, this is going to be really difficult for him. Twitter has changed incredibly, I’ve always been very cautious about posting things knowing who might be looking. Making ‘jokes’ to a group of friends that you were trying to impress that were ill-advised but now look horrific framed by current events is going to lead to some terribly painful soul-searching.

Glass houses and throwing stones.

[Helmetbymidnight]

i was just going to say im sure he's a nice guy in real-life, but no, why would he be- those tweets reflect a very callous side- and his chasing down of baroness nicholson reveal such self-righteousness, ego and authoritarianism.

i know a couple of other TRA snitches right now, and yes, they're very nice socially, but woah, theyve been taken over by this crusade.

its very like mccarthyism.

[merrymouse]

I hope the Booker Prize is suitably embarrassed.

Mark Damazer claimed on the Today program that they don't care how Baroness Nicholson voted (must protect David Willets), and they were only concerned about the tweet about Munroe Bergdorf.

However, given the lack of concern from various quarters about a genuinely nasty tweet, its very clear that all they did was respond to a pile on.

[RufustheRowlingReindeer]

merry

Did someone bring up willets tweets when talking to the booker representative?

[littlbrowndog]

Sandy who draws badly sums it up

[crumpet]

The result was a foregone conclusion, so no real surprises there. A useful example of the double standards which are being applied, however.

[littlbrowndog]

I think the baroness said that she meant wild not weird. A reference to Shakespeare

[Fanthorpe]

Indeed @littlbrowndog that’s it!

[littlbrowndog]

Will go have a look see if I can see what she said later

[merrymouse]

i was just going to say im sure he's a nice guy in real-life, but no, why would he be- those tweets reflect a very callous side- and his chasing down of baroness nicholson reveal such self-righteousness, ego and authoritarianism.

I am sure he thinks of himself as a nice guy. The problem is that he can't conceive that his tweets could be harmful, because he is nice therefore he was just joking.

Chasing down of Baroness Nicholson is similar. He doesn't have much cause to think about issues that affect women, therefore these issues aren't important. It doesn't cost him anything to tweet (and he clearly doesn't think much about tweeting) so he tweeted.

[justanotherneighinparadise]

I love it when a cartoon just sums it up without the need for lengthy prose.

[merrymouse]

Did someone bring up willets tweets when talking to the booker representative?

No. He was very quick to downplay the importance of her voting record, however, the initial statement from the Booker was about homophobia.

[justanotherneighinparadise]

@AbsintheFriends

^if he has a shred of decency inside him

I think this might be a bit of a stretch^

Yes, I think one of the things this shows about Mr Barr is that he'll say whatever he thinks will make him popular in the playground. Laddish banter about whores and bitches and tr**s one year, pious parroting of woke mantras another.

Women's rights, experiences, safety and need to be heard are of the utmost irrelevance to him. It's all just about adopting the fashionable viewpoint du jour and accessorising with the right language. It's as flimsy as a sweatshop crop top and decency doesn't come into it anywhere.

In one of the videos he spoke about being bullied at school so I suspect that’s learned behaviour that he’s probably not aware of. The need to people please and fit in, to find acceptance within a community. It’s probably quite sad and I suspect if I heard the whole story he’d garner my sympathy, but he’s treatment of others with a baying mob behind him just pisses me off and makes him no better than the kids that did it to him at school.