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Comment by ab_testing | Hacker News Reader

Why do they despise substack? Did Substack do something to piss them off ?

The internal woke mob at the NYT bullied Bari Weiss out of the organization, now she’s making way more money writing over at Substack. Glenn Greenwald was also strong armed out of the media company he founded, retreated to Substack, and is prospering.

Beyond being a direct competitor to aspects of the NYT’s business, their platform and pro-free-speech ethos are an existential threat to the corporate media (like NYT) monopoly on the Overton window.

Claiming Weiss left because she was bullied out of the organization papers over leaves out the fact that there was obviously a significant pull factor to get her to jump ship, as you point out, leaving led her to make significantly more money.

But yes, there’s clearly a resentment from within elite media (WaPo/NYTimes) that people they don’t like have an avenue for editorial independence that is beyond their reach.

It may be true that there was a pull factor, but your comment appears to be trying to let the NYT staff off the hook for what would be considered abusive behavior in any other circumstance.

Reference, straight from the horse's mouth:

https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter

Quote:

> My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist; I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m “writing about the Jews again.” Several colleagues perceived to be friendly with me were badgered by coworkers. My work and my character are openly demeaned on company-wide Slack channels where masthead editors regularly weigh in. There, some coworkers insist I need to be rooted out if this company is to be a truly “inclusive” one, while others post ax emojis next to my name. Still other New York Times employees publicly smear me as a liar and a bigot on Twitter with no fear that harassing me will be met with appropriate action. They never are.

This is one person's statement, but it's consistent with the way many people have written about the NYT's internal culture and internal cultural shift over the last 5-10 years.

Again, I don’t doubt that there wasn’t a tense environment for her in that newsroom.

But your “from the horses mouth” citation comes from a newsletter that dedicates a significant amount of its virtual ink towards the anti woke/cancel culture run amok beat. Weiss has literally made her living on this subject for years now, she isn’t unbiased*

*that said, I do want to note that biased does not mean wrong, even though it is often portrayed that way.

"Leaves out the fact that ..." she basically deserved it (or it was otherwise necessary)?

That seems to be the innuendo you're making. Either way, I'd like to hear some substantiation as to this "significant pull factor", please.

> Either way, I'd like to hear some substantiation as to this "significant pull factor", please.

> now she’s making way more money writing over at Substack.

> she basically deserved it (or it was otherwise necessary)?

Deserved what? She quit.

Deserved what?

The bullying.

Never said she deserved to be bullied.

I'll admit to being confused by your innuendo. But your post definitely seems to be trying to minimize the abuse she suffered at the NYT -- by implying that her departure was really all about the money. And in another post you basically discounted the abuse claims entirely, saying it was merely a "tense environment".

Clearly we both take the seriousness of her claims differently, yes.

I don’t doubt that it was an unpleasant environment for her to work in, I do not read it as though it was horribly abusive as you seem to though.

So, reading her description, you would think that let's say Fox News had a similar environment for e.g. a member of protected group, it would not be "horribly abusive", and if the company refused to punish it and the victim quit, we should discount their claims of abuse and look for alternative explanations of why they quit?

Writers who develop a name can leave a lower salary for higher pay directly selling newsletters and articles. NYT makes writers famous. It creates a natural friction once a person has a "brand" and can leave for more money and less overheadaches

Is that really so though? No idea about Weiss, but journalists like Greenwald and Taibbi made the name for themselves. And even if people "become famous" while working for NYT, how much of it is really attributable to the person versus the newspaper? Major newspapers are full of people who might have name recognition but (as Greenwald often points out) never do any real journalism; and so would probably have nothing to offer as independents. Not even speaking of complete no-names.

Substack's pitch to high profile journalists and columnists is "come here, bring your fans, get supported directly, and make way more money". This is bad for the NYT and low profile journalists.

From the horse's mouth- https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/11/business/media/substack-n...

Substack is an existential threat to the NYTimes business model and ultimate existence.

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