Barrett Brown Twirls His Handlebar Mustache in Robert Stacy McCain’s Direction
Barrett Brown (accused recently by Robert Stacy McCain of “sucking Charles Johnson’s c*ck”) has a new piece up at True/Slant, responding to McCain’s latest series of condescending excuses for his neo-Confederate and white supremacist writings: My Response to Robert Stacy McCain. Great stuff here — funny and very much to the point.
Robert Stacy McCain has written a lengthy and generally civil epistle with regards to my various attacks on him, and I promised that I would address each of his concerns today. So, here’s his message, interspersed with my reply.
A rare occasion, Mr. Brown, when any of those who’ve chosen to attack me even bother attempting to contact me. Of course, no one ever contacts me in advance: “Hey, did you actually write X, Y, Z? If so, why? What did you mean? What are your opinions about these things?” Instead, they leap to assumptions (if it’s on the Internet, it must be true) and the fact that certain things have been endlessly repeated online leads to the assumption that these things are true.The fact of the matter is that you did indeed write X, Y, and Z, and in fact you do not even dispute writing X, Y, and Z, and X, Y, and Z happen to consist of such things as you writing bizarre apologies for the institution of slavery, jokingly proposing bumper stickers with messages such as, “Have you whipped your slave today?”, and claiming that viewing mixed race marriages with “revulsion” is a natural thing. The rest of the alphabet continues in a similar vein.
How often, since Charles Johnson began attacking me, have I emphasized that, during the years I was at the Washington Times, I was not permitted to address these allegations? And how often have I remarked that “white supremacy” is quite contrary to my observed conduct among those who actually know me?I don’t know. Twice? More than twice? That is between you and The Washington Times. Insomuch as that publication is owned by the self-proclaimed king of the universe, I can understand why you followed their orders on this. “Pick your battles,” my dad always said.
You are, I gather, a young man, and quite arrogant.This is true, unfortunately.
Not an unusual combination, really, but neither should you mistake your own arrogance for knowledge. Try Googling my name in combination with the phrase “Hayekian insight.” There are in the near-infinite number of things you don’t know certain facts that may, I suspect, be far more important than those tacts you know. And it may be that you are mistaken about some things you accept as facts.Very well.
Well, I’ve had more time to study all this sort of thing than you could imagine. You desire to make me look like a villain, for whatever selfish motive, and therefore assemble a prosecutor’s case — the Ransom Note Method. This you present with a lot of noise and clamour: “A-ha! I have exposed the dangerous villain, whose stealthy evil had never been fully known until now!”And then I twirled one end of my handlebar mustache in satisfaction and took a pinch of snuff, the single vice I allow myself.
Read the whole thing. It gets even better.
Frank says:
