LA Times' Scheer replacement, Joel Stein: "[M]ost of what I know about poor people comes from watching 'Good Times' "
In a recent editorial shake-up, the Los Angeles Times removed liberal columnist and 29-year Times veteran Robert Scheer and replaced him with Sunday columnist Joel Stein, who, in his second offering in the Tuesday slot Scheer formerly held, wrote the following about poor people:
I know the high cost of energy takes an unfair toll on the poor because it's a much bigger percentage of their income. Those people are always getting screwed: checking account charges, easy-credit rip-offs, hangin' in a chow line. OK, most of what I know about poor people comes from watching 'Good Times.'
Stein had been writing a regular entertainment column on Sundays but ascended to the Tuesday slot after Scheer's departure. New editorial page editor Andrés Martinez, who succeeded Michael Kinsley in September, announced Scheer's departure and Stein's move into the Tuesday slot on November 15.
Stein has already begun generating a strong reaction from Times readers. In his first Tuesday column -- from November 15 -- titled "Voting for Stupidity," Stein asked readers, "You weren't one of those suckers who voted last week, were you? Wearing that dorky sticker on your chest all day like you just got named school safety guard?" He declared: "The first clue that you've been tricked into helping people in authority keep their power is when you're given a badge. It wasn't as though the bus driver slapped an 'I Rode in the Front!' sticker on Rosa Parks." The column prompted one reader to question Stein's move to the editorial page, "[I]f this is the type of writing we can expect from your Robert Scheer replacement, I am disappointed. ... I hope we can expect more substantial work from Joel Stein in the valuable space he takes up on the Op-Ed page."
In a June 12 column, Stein wrote of his style:
People don't seem to like it when I joke about race. They have no problem when I make fun of their mothers, their deepest insecurities, Darfur, even Tom Hanks. And yet when my friends in the Council on Foreign Relations talk about how China is a growing threat and I suggest installing urine shields at our Coca-Cola factories, I've suddenly gone too far.
Stein also mentioned the poor in a July 3 column (reprinted on the Jewish World Review website) condemning PBS:
There is no other station so obviously aimed at rich, well-educated, white people. Should our government be responsible for providing Edith Piaf documentaries, 98-hour histories of jazz and baseball, Broadway shows, discussions between Charlie Rose and Yo-Yo Ma and rich people figuring out how much their antiques are worth? This is a demo that was clamoring for Alan Alda before his gig on "The West Wing."
Sure, there must be some poor people who don't have basic cable and really enjoy "Sesame Street" and "Nova." But for $400 million we could have Big Bird fly to their houses every morning and teach their kids how to count in Spanish.
According to a November 1, 2004, New York Observer article, Kinsley hired Stein to write about entertainment -- not politics -- and offered him a freelance position indefinitely. Notwithstanding his hiring of Stein, Kinsley told the Observer he had reservations about Stein's previous work: "I really had problems with the column he wrote for Time." An LA Weekly article excoriating Kinsley for hiring Stein provided Stein's rebuttal, in which he pointed to a generation gap between his editorial style and Kinsley's: "I call it a generational difference of opinion. I think people under a certain age like the honesty of the solipsism, and people over a certain age think it's obnoxious."
Joel Stein is being politically incorrect, which is a style that all of the great comedians (Robin Williams, Sam Kinison, Bill Maher) adhere to. MM is getting aloof with this unnecessary post.
aloof ?
MMFA is getting a loof? How can I get one?
Stein: "OK, most of what I know about poor people comes from watching 'Good Times."
Ugh, Good Times? Minstrelsy, and I am not talking about the medieval art form, at its finest! So many people praise this show, but as the show progressed it turned into a sterotypical "coon" fest reminiscent of the characaters black actors portrayed in early American films. I remember my parents forbade my brother and I from watching the re-runs. They didn't want us to believe or watch the stereotypes of our culture presented on this show.
It's pretty stupid of him to write something like this in a newspaper. Not being familiar with his work, I'm wondering if he intends to give level-headed opinions on important issues and expect people to take him seriously, or just babble and make stupid jokes about himself and ethnic groups?
With this ridiculous little remark, I've pretty much lost any interest in reading anything important he may have to say.
"People don't seem to like it when I joke about race. " --- Well, Joel, people getting mad about race jokes isn't anything new, so welcome to reality.
Stein on PBS: "There is no other station so obviously aimed at rich, well-educated, white people." --- Race and education aside, I'm anything but rich, and watching a good Frontline documentary often makes a hard-working tax payer like me pretty angry, most notably, "Private Warriors".
it's a joke obviously, but i think the real point is that this guy is replacing the great robert scheer. content and analysis replaced by fluff. not surprising though. we can't offend the republican party and bush. the joke's on the american public.
Most of what I know about poor people comes from watching [Little House on the Prairie.]I also learned about ignorance and fake Christian religion, and race relations.
It may be fair to criticize the LA Times decision for replacing Robert Scheer with Joel Stein, but that does not translate into a fair criticism of Joel Stein on his own (de)merits.
As far as the article and prior writings referenced here, I think politically incorrect humor is something the mainstream media needs more of, if anything. The desire to not offend anyone is a large part of why the media won't ordinarily publish things that the public really does need to know about.
As far as the article and prior writings referenced here, I think politically incorrect humor is something the mainstream media needs more of, if anything. The desire to not offend anyone is a large part of why the media won't ordinarily publish things that the public really does need to know about.
by defending the indefensible - ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Your correct,However,I notice that theres more and more of this politically incorrect humor,but theres another little fact that noone wants to talk about and that is this:Not everyone has the "moral authority" to even crack one single joke because they are so associated heredically with those who have "caused" the circumstances that we are "joking" about today.I notice that it's only when these people who look like the decendants of the "evil oppressors or target of the joke" participate in the joking around,there is an all-out war.I guess what I'm saying is,there is a reason why a certain group of people have the desire to not offend, while everyone else is having a fieldsday.It's like that saying,"One day,we will all look back at this and laugh" only,..... not ALL of us, because this is a "victims only" club.
The desire to not offend anyone is a large part of why the media won't ordinarily publish things that the public really does need to know about.
back up that claim with some evidence.
and then tell us how stein's idiotic "good times" reference is validated by your claim ... would stein have not told us something that we need to know if he had not used the reference ? don't think so.
Excerpt of:
The phone rings and a guy in my office says, "It's David Horowitz." I haven't spoken to David Horowitz since the end of the '60s, when we both worked at Ramparts. Since then, with another former Ramparts editor, Peter Collier, this little creep has written a series of best-selling portraits of ruling class families--The Rockefellers, The Fords, The Kennedys--and boasted in print about voting for Ronald Reagan. Horowitz and Collier say they once believed fervently in left causes and institutions (from the Soviet Union to the Black Panther Party), and when they discovered these institutions to be corrupt and murderous they had to denounce them and come out for the other side.
There are many flaws in this "logic." For openers, there aren't just two sides in this world (the fake left and the cruel right). And sure it's demoralizing to learn that the party that supposedly stands for equality is run by opportunists and actually stands for privilege. But that wouldn't lead a real radical to endorse the all-out pursuit of privilege. It should lead you to call for a movement that's serious about establishing equality. Horowitz and Collier were never radicals for a minute. Their goal was and is personal success. It's no coincidence that they were "left" in the '60s and "right" in the '80s.
"What's up, David?"
"We're doing a book on the Fondas and we want to interview you." I had known Jane Fonda around 1970, when she was getting involved in the antiwar movement.
"Is this an authorized biography?"
"No, Peter Fonda's doing his own autobiography, and Jane has commissioned Scheer to write a book about her." That would be Bob Scheer, the Ramparts editor, a glib name dropper who used to fly first-class in 1968 and stay at the fanciest hotels while pretending to be some kind of "movement" spokesman. Scheer invariably got lower-ranking people to do his work for him as "research," etc. and then took all the credit. Now he's an LA Times writer and Playboy interviewer.
I really don't know that Joel Stein is a conservative. If he is the same guy who used to write for entertainment weekly he is absolutely hilarious. The LA Times is better for having him.
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His writing is not really so political as it is just funny. If Stein was really a conservative, I don't think he would ever admit that all he knows about poor people comes from Good Times. I am a liberal and a great supporter of MMFA 99% of the time, but MMFA is way off here.
I think there's something here that most everyone is missing: The point being made by MMFA, which I thought was pretty clear, was not Stein's writing per se but his writing in contrast to that of Scheer.
The LA Times, that is, has unceremoniously dumped a man who - whatever you may think of his politics - is an experienced and respected political columnist with someone whose entire shtick is to treat politics as just another source of entertainment. That is, unlike, for example, Molly Ivins, he doesn't present politics as entertainment in order to argue a point, he just wants to use it as an excuse to show off his wit.
It was well said that "sometimes a bit of humor contains more inner truth than the most serious seriousness." Here, the bit of humour seems to contain only a bit of humour. That's fine if you're Dave Barry. It's not if you are presuming to be a political columnist.