Live from the Arrogance Ballroom: George Will tooting his own horn

Earlier this month, Washington Post columnist George Will wrote a piece in which he claimed being a rape victim has become a “coveted status” that women actively seek. (Think about that for a moment. If that isn’t prima facie insulting and absurd, I don’t know what would be.) As if that wasn’t bad enough, he asserted that claims of rape on college campuses are overblown and suggested women claimed to have been raped are “delusional.”

Will’s column was, to be charitable, an epic face-palm moment. There’s simply no way to excuse or explain away such epic stupidity and world-class arrogance. One of the Washington Conservatives who hold themselves above mere mortals (and certainly Liberals)- see Kristol, William- Will has made a career out of being wrong…but doing it with erudition. Despite being roundly and accurately skewered by Garry Trudeau for years in Doonesbury, Will has turned arrogance and factual inaccuracy into a lucrative career. You’d think there would be consequences for so frequently being on the wrong side of so many things, but it wasn’t until now that karma has come calling for Will. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has dropped Will from their stable of syndicated columnists…and apologized for running his arrogant and offensive tour de farce. Not that Will’s going to be wondering where his next Big Mac is coming from.

I suspect Will is aghast that a newspaper has had the gall to think they can hold him accountable for his columns, but the truth is that their should be consequences for so arrogantly (and wrongly) dismissing a significant problem. Conservatives will undoubtedly claim that Will’s being persecuted by the Liberal PC Elite, but no one should have consider themselves above reproach after producing something so patently offensive. I have no idea where George Will gets his information, but fact-checking clearly isn’t part of his process. To simply dismiss a very serious problem because it doesn’t dovetail with male-centric Conservative propaganda and talking points is ludicrous.

No member of the media should get a free pass to say whatever they think appropriate regardless of facts and human decency. Too often, Conservatives with a platform have taken liberties with the truth and with the dignity of others. No one- regardless of which side of the ideological divide they fall on- should have carte blanche to insult, degrade, and deny the suffering of others. Why George Will is still published anywhere is beyond me, but it seems that being a Conservative pundit means never have to say you’re sorry.

Or having to concern yourself with fact checking.