Thursday, September 29, 2011

Barbara O'Brien

Gawd, I used to like her blog, The Mahablog, I really did. Now I'm afraid I have to admit to a certain lurid fascination with reading it. Was she always this snide, or did I only just notice it after she deleted one of my comments? Am I seeing her only through the lens of injured pride, and is that distorting? Probably, but nevertheless, take a gander at this latest post of hers and tell me if it isn't the most pompously bitchy thing you've read about, of all things, The Wall Street protesters!

Whew. Where to start. I love how she brushes off an early commenter with:
I’ve probably done more effective protest against the system in the past 24 hours than you’ve done in your whole life.
Uh huh. The gist of her post appears to be that the protests are "counterproductive" because they aren't "organized". Or something. I read through the thing a couple of times, and I couldn't find any explanation of specifically how these protests are "counterproductive". If I have any readers left (!) who care to read through it, I'd love to hear your reaction. I think the woman is unhinged. I was glad to see that she at least acknowledged this excellent post by Glenn Greenwald, but of course she ends up haughtily dismissing him too. Now that's downright funny!

Finally, a bit of cattiness of my own: At one point she snips at another of her commenters whom she deleted:
[If you can't express yourself without being vulgar, please don't bother. And FYI, I am 60 years old and self-supporting, thanks. -- maha]
Yeah. Except, you know, not quite. I distinctly remember a time when she was begging her readers to send her money to help her pay her rent. I remember at the time feeling bad for her, but I was having money issues of my own, so I didn't send her any. Now I'm glad I didn't.

P.S. I should also point out that Barbara lives in New York City. The protests are happening in her own town. To me, this makes her petty sniping all the more egregious, given how relatively easy it would be for her to lend a little support to them. Sheesh.

P.S.P.S. It' heartening to see her getting pretty well trounced in the comments, though to one commenter who pointed out that her repeated use of the word "dear" sounded "extraordinarily condescending" Barbara replied:
It’s intended to be condescending. I guess it’s working. Thanks.
You know, it would be tempting to admire her self-confidence if it didn't seem so terribly unwarranted. She reminds me of GWB in that regard, I'm afraid.

5 comments:

Julie said...

It doesn't seem productive to me for Barbara to be haranguing us about the protesters. Remember "solidarity?" She seems to have her panties in a bunch over ego issues.

AnnPW said...

Thank you Julie! I'm glad I'm not the only one to think that she has "ego issues"!

heydave said...

Her conviction that they (the OWS crowd) are not doing it right by her experience, standards or whatever, she does go on to decry them... for what reason?

So I don't like the way you protest, and evil shit is happening to you while you do it, I have the right to...

To what? Rant? Her vast wealth of presumably effective protesting doesn't really offer much tha tI can see, except possibly asking her next time to sit on the organizational committee.

AnnPW said...

Hey Dave! Thanks for stopping by! I know I've been remiss in doing any posting, so I'm that much more appreciative of those of you who hang in there with me!

Yes, I'm afraid Ms. Been-There-Done-That O'Brien has jumped the shark. Her latest post is even loonier, and I'm wondering if the increasing attention (aka, what some of us lowlies would call "Success") of the protests isn't driving her over the edge.

AnnPW said...

For example, this must be driving her nuts.