down by the river by the boats, where everybody goes to be alone
First I heard of anything wrong was when a quick video dropped from a fellow I follow on YouTube named Logicked, who's noticed a sudden marked decline in people subscribing to his Patreon. He offers a series of alternatives, which I think is an excellent idea. I'm not part of his Patreon, as my resources are limited, but I am on his mailing list and I do enjoy watching his videos. He mentioned something involving Sargon of Akkad, however, which was slightly confusing.
So I went searching off YouTube. I didn't find anything on Google--my Googling skills are not always accurate--so I went back to YouTube, and found this fellow's rant. Who again mentions Sargon of Akkad.
Here's where I may get a little political. I don't like Sargon of Akkad. I think he's a petty, opinionated, homophobic, bigoted, extraordinarily misogynistic, racist jerk. And if he got banned on Patreon for saying things like what's quoted here--which includes Sargon using highly offensive terms to refer to the owners and operators of Patreon--then they made the right decision.
But apparently it's having a backlash effect on people who are not racist homophobes? Why?
In the comments to that tweet, I found a commentary video from Sargon himself, wherein he bleats that since he didn't commit any violations of Patreon's terms of service on Patreon, that his ban is unwarranted. UNWARRANTED.
Let me get this straight. He was banned for commentary he makes on his YouTube videos, right? Or not right? Because if so, then all they had to do was watch a few of his videos and get the clear idea that this was a reprehensible human being who deserved, rightly, to be kicked to the curb. But there was a previous video listed before this, that had this description underneath the video:
And personally, while I could care less if Southern and Defend Europe lose their Patreon access--because personally, I think that's justifiable completely for any group or creator of content who believes diversity and equality begin and end with white people--there was a comment down in the comments stream beneath that comment that gave me an inkling of the level of this problem:
Now, later on in the video--around the 7:22 mark, for anyone following along--he (Sargon) mentions that the content that got him banned, apparently, was not from any YouTube video. Having watched many of his videos (since a lot of the skeptics I follow take on his videos with other videos on occasion, and it helps to watch the original videos through before their responses), I find that hard to believe, but let's take that as a tenuous given. His racist, bigoted, repugnantly homophobic, misogynistic Nazi-leaning self was not on display in any of his YouTube videos that were used to mention his Patreon crowd-sourcing links. This is very hard to swallow, knowing him, but okay, let's take that as our given. *coughs*
He is still an artist on their platform, using their platform to solicit funds to support making further content. Can people at Patreon not, then, respond to complaints from onlookers that he is misbehaving elsewhere? James Gunn is both a good and a terrible example here, because while the Twitter comments that got Disney to boot him were repugnant and awful in every way, Gunn also came to the realization that he was wrong. He apologized. He moved on from those reactionary days.
People are allowed to change, and, if they have, should their pasts be thrown in their faces vindictively? That is the prime philosophical question with cases like Gunn's, and the continual tracking down of very old men who used to be guards in various German concentration camps in their youth. There are both good reasons and bad reasons to do these things, I fully grant that. But is there the same philosophical query with Sargon? Because if anything, he's only gotten worse since he decided that "political correctness" meant suppressing him from being as vile, racist, homophobic, bigoted, and misogynistic as he apparently deeply desires to be.
Which brings us back to the original point--how many people are just hearing that Patreon was mean to one of their creators for no good reason and are cancelling their accounts? Because according to Logicked--by all definitions, a fairly level-headed fellow whose only desire is to encourage everything to think clearly--he's losing a ton of patrons. This is grim.
I don't have a Patreon. While I have a Ko-Fi, nobody contributes to it. I used to have a PayPal link in the sidebar, I took it down because again, no one was contributing. So blogging is something I do because I have things to say, not because I expect to be paid.
But if I did? Worse, if I relied on blogging to help pay my bills? Or worse still, if I had a YouTube channel that I was, say, just for argument's sake, starting to consider uploading more often to, investing (somehow) in a mic that's better than the headset attached mic I have now, and had been toying with the idea of, after seeing how that goes, perhaps starting a Patreon?
Yeah, that'd be real bad for me, wouldn't it? Thankfully, I'm not in that position, but it's kind of scary to contemplate that I was at that point, and now am considering simply...not. (I mean, I may still...but I doubt it will be with the end goal of getting paid for anything, because...that's sounding less possible every month that goes by.)
Tom Luongo, another YouTuber I know zero about, mentions in a video that Sam Harris, Dave Rubin and Jordan Peterson are leaving Patreon over Sargon of Akkad's treatment. As far as I know, while I don't watch him, I don't have any beef with Sam Harris, and only a partial one with Dave Rubin, but Jordan Peterson? Peterson's a menace, Peterson is a raving misogynist with a flawed mindset and a fetishistic devotion to the Christian God as a replacement father figure. Please, kick him and his warped daddy issues off Patreon, we'll all be happier.
And apparently there's a whole bunch of that ilk declaring they're leaving because of boo hoo, injustice and oppression--not considering for a moment how their words and actions have oppressed others. Are they kidding? A guy with a following of slavish incel fanboys and a bizarre desire to be a lobster thinks Patreon is doing bad things? I won't say Patreon hasn't done bad things in the past, because they have, but just considering the caliber of this month's enemies of Patreon? Just with Peterson and Sargon, I'm thinking Patreon is coming out on the side of the angels here.
I'll keep looking, and follow up if I find anything that leads further than someone who thinks anyone who argues with him is a member of Antifa, and someone who has SERIOUSLY STATED IN PRINT that women should be governmentally coerced into marriage with dateless men (I'm not even kidding; Peterson may not actively be burning puppies alive and kicking babies, but he's very, very close to my definitions of 'actively evil'), then I'll post something else on this, but right now...this seems like a tempest in Sargon's teapot that has now gone way out of hand for ridiculous reasons.
So I went searching off YouTube. I didn't find anything on Google--my Googling skills are not always accurate--so I went back to YouTube, and found this fellow's rant. Who again mentions Sargon of Akkad.
Here's where I may get a little political. I don't like Sargon of Akkad. I think he's a petty, opinionated, homophobic, bigoted, extraordinarily misogynistic, racist jerk. And if he got banned on Patreon for saying things like what's quoted here--which includes Sargon using highly offensive terms to refer to the owners and operators of Patreon--then they made the right decision.
But apparently it's having a backlash effect on people who are not racist homophobes? Why?
In the comments to that tweet, I found a commentary video from Sargon himself, wherein he bleats that since he didn't commit any violations of Patreon's terms of service on Patreon, that his ban is unwarranted. UNWARRANTED.
Let me get this straight. He was banned for commentary he makes on his YouTube videos, right? Or not right? Because if so, then all they had to do was watch a few of his videos and get the clear idea that this was a reprehensible human being who deserved, rightly, to be kicked to the curb. But there was a previous video listed before this, that had this description underneath the video:
"The Great White Saviours of Silicon Valley are actively looking for ways to deplatform anyone who is not politically correct, as Patreon did to me."Yeah. No, Sargon, that's not what seems to have happened. It seems to me that they are blocking from their, personally-owned, corporate site, any content that would give them a distinct black eye--like rebranded white nationalism, extreme bigotry, people who see anyone not white and start crying injustice...Sargon, you yourself say, at :57 into the video, that Jack Conte, the owner of Patreon, had used the same phrase he used to describe your misdeeds with Lauren Southern, when they killed her Patreon access. And why did they do that? Not out of "political correctness", no--they clearly had the goal of removing yet another neo-Nazi racist idiot from their site.
And personally, while I could care less if Southern and Defend Europe lose their Patreon access--because personally, I think that's justifiable completely for any group or creator of content who believes diversity and equality begin and end with white people--there was a comment down in the comments stream beneath that comment that gave me an inkling of the level of this problem:
From: Critical Role HighlightsRight, remind me never to watch that YouTube channel again, much as I love Critical Role itself, because that's a completely stupid thing to say. And I'm going to include the reply to that comment, because I think it's relevant:
1 day ago
Cancelled my patreon support for all creators and disabled my account.
From: Mc EarlYes, that, exactly. If people are mass-canceling their Patreon accounts, then they're hurting not just the company they want to 'send that message' to, but a lot of innocent, worthy creators who potentially aren't racist homophobic bigots who throw around repugnant terms just to 'make a point' by being rude. Right?
21 hours ago
Critical Role Highlights I would make damn sure, if [you] actually did that, that you go and contact all the creators who are no longer receiving money from you and tell them why. Patreon won’t really care if they lose your few sheckles but if creators start leaving in droves that’ll send a message.
Now, later on in the video--around the 7:22 mark, for anyone following along--he (Sargon) mentions that the content that got him banned, apparently, was not from any YouTube video. Having watched many of his videos (since a lot of the skeptics I follow take on his videos with other videos on occasion, and it helps to watch the original videos through before their responses), I find that hard to believe, but let's take that as a tenuous given. His racist, bigoted, repugnantly homophobic, misogynistic Nazi-leaning self was not on display in any of his YouTube videos that were used to mention his Patreon crowd-sourcing links. This is very hard to swallow, knowing him, but okay, let's take that as our given. *coughs*
He is still an artist on their platform, using their platform to solicit funds to support making further content. Can people at Patreon not, then, respond to complaints from onlookers that he is misbehaving elsewhere? James Gunn is both a good and a terrible example here, because while the Twitter comments that got Disney to boot him were repugnant and awful in every way, Gunn also came to the realization that he was wrong. He apologized. He moved on from those reactionary days.
People are allowed to change, and, if they have, should their pasts be thrown in their faces vindictively? That is the prime philosophical question with cases like Gunn's, and the continual tracking down of very old men who used to be guards in various German concentration camps in their youth. There are both good reasons and bad reasons to do these things, I fully grant that. But is there the same philosophical query with Sargon? Because if anything, he's only gotten worse since he decided that "political correctness" meant suppressing him from being as vile, racist, homophobic, bigoted, and misogynistic as he apparently deeply desires to be.
Which brings us back to the original point--how many people are just hearing that Patreon was mean to one of their creators for no good reason and are cancelling their accounts? Because according to Logicked--by all definitions, a fairly level-headed fellow whose only desire is to encourage everything to think clearly--he's losing a ton of patrons. This is grim.
I don't have a Patreon. While I have a Ko-Fi, nobody contributes to it. I used to have a PayPal link in the sidebar, I took it down because again, no one was contributing. So blogging is something I do because I have things to say, not because I expect to be paid.
But if I did? Worse, if I relied on blogging to help pay my bills? Or worse still, if I had a YouTube channel that I was, say, just for argument's sake, starting to consider uploading more often to, investing (somehow) in a mic that's better than the headset attached mic I have now, and had been toying with the idea of, after seeing how that goes, perhaps starting a Patreon?
Yeah, that'd be real bad for me, wouldn't it? Thankfully, I'm not in that position, but it's kind of scary to contemplate that I was at that point, and now am considering simply...not. (I mean, I may still...but I doubt it will be with the end goal of getting paid for anything, because...that's sounding less possible every month that goes by.)
Tom Luongo, another YouTuber I know zero about, mentions in a video that Sam Harris, Dave Rubin and Jordan Peterson are leaving Patreon over Sargon of Akkad's treatment. As far as I know, while I don't watch him, I don't have any beef with Sam Harris, and only a partial one with Dave Rubin, but Jordan Peterson? Peterson's a menace, Peterson is a raving misogynist with a flawed mindset and a fetishistic devotion to the Christian God as a replacement father figure. Please, kick him and his warped daddy issues off Patreon, we'll all be happier.
And apparently there's a whole bunch of that ilk declaring they're leaving because of boo hoo, injustice and oppression--not considering for a moment how their words and actions have oppressed others. Are they kidding? A guy with a following of slavish incel fanboys and a bizarre desire to be a lobster thinks Patreon is doing bad things? I won't say Patreon hasn't done bad things in the past, because they have, but just considering the caliber of this month's enemies of Patreon? Just with Peterson and Sargon, I'm thinking Patreon is coming out on the side of the angels here.
I'll keep looking, and follow up if I find anything that leads further than someone who thinks anyone who argues with him is a member of Antifa, and someone who has SERIOUSLY STATED IN PRINT that women should be governmentally coerced into marriage with dateless men (I'm not even kidding; Peterson may not actively be burning puppies alive and kicking babies, but he's very, very close to my definitions of 'actively evil'), then I'll post something else on this, but right now...this seems like a tempest in Sargon's teapot that has now gone way out of hand for ridiculous reasons.
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