Your Last Word on the Roger Ebert/Ryan Dunn Flap
"Leave Roger Ebert alone! He's missing half his face!" [@michaelianblank]
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Comments
Fuck. That's cold.
I used to think he was cute, but I have officially gotten over it. I'd rather hear Tracy Morgan make anti-gay jokes then hear some R-list celebrity make fun of people who have survived cancer. What a class act Mr. Black must be. It's funny because Ebert condemns drunk driving while Black condemns people who have cancer. What a dick.
We're not perceiving this the same way; I wouldn't have even posted it had I thought MIB meant this maliciously. It transcends pure jokedom. I read it as an expression of exasperation not at someone's expense, but rather with the indirect complicity of a subject who became fair game the minute he laid out his own insensitive (or not) tweet. Ebert has no doubt suffered, but I think MIB is invoking that as an equalizer, not a target.
Anyway, it's reached funhouse-mirror levels of refraction at this point, wherein no matter how far or to how many characters we distill our language, we simply aren't communicating what we intend to communicate.
So you read it as a defense of Ebert's original tweet? Thank you for that. That makes me feel a lot better. I don't know that I agree with that evaluation, but I'd very much like to believe that is exactly what was intended. And I completely agree: this has reached ridiculous "Alice in Wonderland" levels. Roger Ebert could have and should have phrased his tweet better, or more importantly, waited a day or two before posting it. But the "half a face" remark makes no sense to me. It's not funny. So I'm going to choose to believe that, just as Ebert made a statement that I think was trying to be funny but came across as distasteful, Black did the same thing.
S.T., I love reading your posts and your opinions. That will not change.
S.T. Vanairsdale, I love reading your posts. If I comment negatively on a particular post, it's the post, not your opinion of the post. One of the reasons I love Movieline is that it welcomes comments that may differ from the official posts. I also love the fact that you and the other writers report what you think is noteworthy. I have NEVER thought that anyone was talking down to me. I love the fact that you give your views and let me decide whether I agree with them or not. That's pretty much the best thing ever.
I read it as a snarky defense of the original tweet. I don't care if he's your friend or not, he was drunk-driving, he killed himself and, even worse, a friend, and he's lucky he didn't kill people that were innocent bystanders, so Bam just needs to shut the bam up!
I unfollowed Michael Ian Black, Josh Malina and Norm McDonald all in one night, after their caustic jokes about the gayness of the Tony Awards. The only one who still seems able to walk the contextual tightrope of bitter, drunken rant humor is Steven Weber.
Thanks, Tommy! The feeling is mutual. And I'd never want us to agree on everything, what fun would that be?