Nope, still just you. Screenshot : YouTube

Another day, another media horror: the New York Times’ worst columnist, Bari Weiss, announced on Wednesday that she’s got a book deal.




If you, like me, simply cannot fathom waiting until winter 2020—again, as if the season where everything dies off and the sun goes away isn’t brutal enough—you’re in luck: Weiss waxed on and on about her take on George Carlin’s seven words during a talk in July. As The Chautauquan Daily reported:

So while Carlin’s “7 Dirty Words” have lost their luster and invaded the mainstream, Weiss proposed a new set: the I-word, H-word, the other P-word, E-word, J-word, R-word and D-word. Imagination, humility, proportion, empathy, judgment, reason and doubt. These words, while they may seem “square,” pose a threat to society. The threat, Weiss said, is a response to President Donald Trump, who exemplifies callousness like no one else.


What follows is Weiss evoking Abraham Lincoln “as a powerful rebuke of identity politics,” arguing that the way the internet responds to things it finds offensive—like, perhaps, her awful columns—“is a moral menace,” and something about how smug liberals don’t give themselves over to “doubt” often enough.

The only remaining question is: What staggering sum did Weiss’ publisher offer as an advance on this no doubt provocative project? If you know, I’d love to hear from you.