(or, as they say, an UPDATE to my post right below)
Well, the Plato of St. Francisville wasn't content with the episode of self-abuse I just posted about below, so he went for a double here.
In both posts there is a conspicuous commenter you may recall not only from my post about her here, particularly since many of you gallantly came to her support and defense.
Why is Erin significant here? Because what still hasn't happened to her shows us that our perception of Plato SF isn't just an aberration from having chased that egg salad and kosher dills with shots of a suspect tequila but is instead a real thing that continues to stink up the real world.
Many of you will remember that Erin has been with Dreher since back in the Beliefnet days, loyal as a dog. He even had her fill in for him there when he went on vacation and may or may not have covered her efforts with some babysitting pocket change. You know her most recently with respect to Dreher as one of the namesakes of his Evans-Manning award, a prize he awards, as far as I can tell, to keep commenters coming back in the hope that they may not only receive one but may also be so lucky as to have a new award named for them, too.
Well, as it turns out, Erin is a book writer in her own right, and even before she took issue with Plato's platitudes here and here, she had already self-published two young adult science fiction novels of her own, The Telmaj and her most recent A Smijj of Adventure.
Here she solicited honest reviews for her newest book from her friends (yo, Plato, flush the rest of the sammich down the toilet; that's you, dude) and family.
Now, what does the world know about Rod Dreher's family from his unbridled oversharing? That's right: they're young kids, all under 14, and geeky science fiction types - the ideal market for Erin's YA series. But no David Brooks generosity for Erin from Rod. Nope. Nada.
There are two types of people in the world: the self-annointed Platos and the hoi polloi, and, really, no one expects the former to consume the pathetic discharges of the latter, I mean, do they? There's a reason Dreher worships Downton Abbey the way he does: it reminds him never to dirty his hands by associating too closely with the help, so whatever Rod Dreher considers Erin, his blog bitch or his blog fluffer, it's unmistakeable from what he could easily do but has demonstrated now, twice, that he won't that the one thing he doesn't count her as is his friend.
We can see that even he recognizes what an exploitative little worm he is in all that he contritely doesn't say in the epic, Odyssey-length NFR he felt compelled to attach to Erin's comment here.
Now I don't have any kids and I don't read the sort of stuff Erin writes for them myself, but I bet some of you out there do have or know some kids who might like her stuff. So why don't you do Erin a solid, do what the Great Man, too busy stuffing buttered steak in his tum-tum, who only has the use for her a pimp would, won't do: spring for the $20 bucks or so to buy her books for your kids and review them for her. Even if you find something flawed in them, I'd bet she'll appreciate the feedback to help her improve in the future.
Given all the attention Dreher extorts from the world for himself, it's the least we could do for his unfortunate tool Erin: recognize her for the effort she's made and for whatever value she provides as a writer in her own right.
I read Erin's comment but couldn't bear to wade through the NFR.
ReplyDeleteWhat struck me is that Erin is a hell of a better writer than Rod is. Judging by her comment, at least.
And, of course, every word she writes is true.
I read Erin's comment but couldn't bear to wade through the NFR.
ReplyDeleteWhat struck me is that Erin is a hell of a better writer than Rod is. Judging by her comment, at least.
And, of course, every word she writes is true.
I read Erin's comment but couldn't bear to wade through the NFR.
ReplyDeleteWhat struck me is that Erin is a hell of a better writer than Rod is. Judging by her comment, at least.
And, of course, every word she writes is true.
I have no idea why that comment showed up in triplicate! Sorry!
ReplyDeleteTo your point, Keith: Why doesn't Dreher use his clout and network reach to put Erin in touch with agents and publishers who could help her get her stuff published?
ReplyDeleteI think thr answer's simple: He's a narcissistic control freak. And narcissistic control freaks feel threatened by other people who may have as much talent as they do (or more). They do not assist those people; they squash them flatter than junebugs. Believe me, after so many years in the corporate world,I know the syndrome well.
Diane, are you indulging in paranoid silliness?
DeleteKeith
Actually, that comment was mine. (I think I'm one of the "banned" now, too.)
DeleteKeith: "Diane, are you indulging in paranoid silliness?"
ReplyDeleteRD: "If you want to write for free, bully for you. I address people who want to make their living at it."
After looking at the NFR, I wondered in amazement. Is there anyone there in his family who can honestly tell Dreher just how pompous he sounds? I almost feel embarrassed for the guy. If I was coming off like a jerk, I would hope my family would at least tell me.
The first thing I though was:
"Man, you're stuck deep in a hole. The first thing you have got to do is stop digging!"
My other thought was "who would even want his advice?"
Rod says he writes for those who want to make their living at it. What on earth would he have to say to them that is of any value? Clearly he failed as a journalist (by his own admission in another NFR), and the sales of CC or TLWORL are certainly nothing to brag about.
DeleteIs he speaking to those who wish to succeed in writing by demonstrating how *not* to do it?
Oengus, Rod Dreher likes to paint himself as the quintessential anti-Enlightenment, pre-Modern religiously seeking man, but the greatest irony (besides his contempt for any generation older than his) is that Dreher is peculiarly and uniquely the creature of the age of the internet and could not possibly exist as we know him without it. Maybe Pauli or Pik can substantiate this even further, maybe even in a post, with some Dreher references I don't have.
DeleteBut here's my take: any pre-internet Enlightenment culture would subject Dreher to rational scrutiny, which he could not escape by his own reality-editing as he does with his comments and which his casual, daily self-contradictions continue to fail consistently. OTOH, and pre-internet pre-Enlightenment "Benedictine" sort of religious shame culture would subject him to own particular conformity which he would fail for the basic reason Pik identifies, namely, that Dreher is ultimately driven, not by any sort of principle, religious or otherwise, but only by his ongoing idiosyncratic tastes.
So a Rod Dreher can flourish only in a market broad enough to approach infinity - which he can regulate. And the planet-wide English-speaking blogosphere uniquely offers him that opportunity and the only reason he's visible today.
Out of 6-7 billion people, I think it's safe to say that probably at least a billion are both on the internet and can read English. All he has to do is connect with enough of those people who are both hungry for the verbal comfort food casseroles he slops together and are also acceptable to him and he has his blog flock, or spiritual cult, or Facebook likes, or whatever post-internet age social network option he wants. And, as his tastes in audience change, he can change them out to follow.
In no prior age of communication could that sort of mass amateur/failure connection be possible: everything prior was limited by standards more significant than "clicks".
But like any aging little Debbie taking her Secret Diary scrawlings global, there's absolutely nothing non-New-Agey about Dreher, Lord of the Clicks. Except of course his pretensions.
Keith
What a stupid post by Dreher, with of course his arrogance and narcissism piled on. That's before mentioning that he stupidly misses the most important rule:
ReplyDelete0. Write something that someone is willing to pay money to read.
More broadly stated, write something of value.
I dunno, Pik & others. Right here Rod explains why he'd be one of the most respected and widely read columnists writing today is he wanted to be.
ReplyDeleteAnd you know he's financially better off than most, because he linked to a fee-based CFP.
Keith
Once again the Working Boy demonstrates why he is an abject failure as a journalist or "thinker". His statement in this post can only be interpreted as the whine of an intellectually lazy person.
ReplyDelete"I told them quite honestly that I didn’t have an opinion, because I hadn’t researched the details of the bills, which were being widely denounced as the second coming of Jim Crow. I had — and do have — serene faith that were these bills passed into law, the courts would overturn them, because that’s what the Cathedral’s canon law tribunals courts do these days on gay issues. Why bother learning about a bill that will not withstand court scrutiny anyway, no matter how carefully drafted and precise? It may have been a sound bill, it may have been a terrible bill, but the point is, the fix is in. None of this matters anymore."
In other words, it might require him to motivate his Ambien-addled self to actually look into what Arizona (and Georgia, and Tennessee, and several other states) is trying to do legislatively to protect religious freedom. Rather than investigate and give an informed opinion one way or another he chooses the lazy way out.
And he gets paid for this...amazing!!
In this case I think you may be mistaking congenitally dishonest intellectual power bottom Dreher waltzing across stage in his best organdy frock lip-syncing Hillary's "What difference, at this point, does it make?" for his Ambien-drugged laziness.
ReplyDeleteHis Ambien-drugged laziness is why mowing the lawn has been added to all the rest of Mrs. Dreher's household chores while Working Boy tackles wolfing down buttered steak and sitting in his cozy corner.
But Dreher's resistance to gay marriage has never been anything more than the most tepid, dry, abstract peripheral references to religious liberty he could choke out. Anything more would jeopardize his relationship to the big bareback bear Andy Sullivan and to the probably third of his audience who is gay and to NPR, which he desperately needs to sell anything outside the relative ghetto of small-niche-micro-genre Christian publishing, like death/grief&bereavement/southern/sibling/sister/younger/tomboy/firstnamebeginswithr. Much easier to point dramatically - for his TAC readership especially - and say "The Republicans failed us on religious liberty! The capitalist Cathedral fix is in! Now where is the towl with which to dry my freshly washed hands?"
No, on this subject Dreher's cheeks are stained with a muddy mix of mascara and a liberal helping of crocodile tears.
Keith
Dreher Agonistes, or How Dante Saved My Life.
ReplyDeleteYou know, here's a fascinating if farfetched thought: I wonder if Allison is grooming Dreher to be the sucker he eventually unloads TAC on to cut his losses. That way everybody gets what they want: Allison gets out, TAC becomes Dreher, and Dreher and his temple virgins get all Dreher, all the time. Take that, Templeton!
DeleteKeith
Meanwhile, Erin seems to be more than happy in the role Rod has chosen for her - just being noticed by the Great Man over there seems to bring a girlishly giddy verve to her comments - so who am I to rock that boat any further? People inevitably find the level they really want to occupy in life, and she seems happy with hers.
ReplyDeleteKeith
Speaking of hometown blogging, it looks like Dreher pulled down the Bonnie Blue Review.
ReplyDeletehttp://westfeliciana.blogspot.com/
Having his hat handed to him by a local politician must have been too much for our Working Boy to deal with, or let stand on the Internet for eternity.
Rod's BFF, Vlad Putin, has decided he wants some land in the Ukraine. Can't blame him, really. There's a lot to like about that region.
ReplyDeleteToo bad Plato doesn't understand this.