David Frum Suggests Serena Williams Used Steroids

The Atlantic Senior Editor & Tweeter David Frum

Yesterday I briefly mentioned the outcry on social and mainstream media over the snarky "body shaming" comments leveled against Serena Williams by an assortment of people including tennis players who've been physically outplayed by her on the court, and even the president of the Russian Tennis Federation who called her "scary".

You can add David Frum, the Senior Editor of The Atlantic to that list of people.

According to an article by Jedd Legum that was posted on ThinkProgress.org earlier today, Frum (a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, senior foreign policy adviser for Rudy Giuliani's presidential campaign and author of eight books) tried to delete some Tweets he posted insinuating that Serena Williams won Wimbledon because she's on steroids.

You can't make this stuff up folks. Well Frum obviously did, but you get my point.

What is it with some people and Serena Williams' body? It's almost as if there are people who are obsessed with attributing her success to something they see as "wrong" with her body because it's not like Maria Sharapova's. 

Given that Frum is a Senior Editor of a major intellectual magazine and an established journalist and author, I'm not really sure what he was thinking throwing out a wild and totally unsubstantiated accusation about steroid abuse like that based on his own narrow-minded perception of Serena Williams' body.

When he was brought on board as a Senior Editor at The Atlantic back in 2014, the magazine's Editor-in-Chief James Bennet described Frum as "a gutsy and heterodox thinker...", which I respect.

This is America after all where the right to free speech and the open expression of opinion is part of our DNA; after all, not everyone agrees with the opinions that I express here on my blog, nor do I expect everyone to.
 
But given Frum's lofty position near the epicenter of the media universe, it strikes me as a bit klutzy of him to just casually toss out a steroid use accusation like that into the maelstrom of social media.

Tennis writer Ben Rothenberg

Especially given the fact that frequent freelance contributor Ben Rothenberg was getting all kinds of flack for his New York Times piece published last week, which (in part) juxtaposed Serena Williams success on the tennis court with an analysis of the "ideal" woman's athletic build/body type.

Whatever Rothenberg's intentions, his article essentially came off as a group of white tennis players (whom Rothenberg interviewed for the article) pointing their fingers at Williams as if she was some kind of unfeminine Creature from the Black Lagoon of Tennis simply because she has a body type that's different than theirs.

It got so bad, the Times, still reeling from the infamous September 18, 2014 Alessandra Stanley piece which equated Shonda Rhimes with being an "Angry Black Woman", dispatched the Public Editor Margaret Sullivan to assess the damage and analyze the fallout from the article.

In her well-written editorial, Sullivan shared a few choice samples of the kinds of angry responses Rothenberg's piece generated, including a quote from Claire Potter's observation of the article in a post on outhistory.org: 

“I don’t know why I am surprised that The New York Times would publish a piece that supports female body hatred, that a male reporter would support such a narrow beauty standard for women, or that women’s tennis players would be proud of their endless willingness to be gender police for each other. But I am.” 

Ouch.

The interesting thing is that Frum has gotten himself into hot water for shooting off his mouth on Twitter before.

Real photo David Frum called "Hamas propaganda" in 2014

Like back in July of 2014 when he posted Tweets to his 100,000+ Twitter followers leveling accusations that the New York Times, AP and Reuters all used a fake photo (pictured left) taken by Sergey Ponomarev of two Palestinian brothers in a Gaza hospital covered in blood after bringing their wounded father there for treatment after he was injured in an Israeli airstrike.

Frum suggested it was Hamas propaganda but it turns out the photo was real and Frum was forced to issue a half-ass apology in which he discussed (drum roll please...) the history of the use of fake photos as war propaganda.

Frankly it's kind of pathetic that this "analysis" of Williams' body has morphed into this pseudo-intellectual pursuit of "the truth", when in fact it's based in fear and ignorance and reeks of sexism and racism.

It also seems tainted with the kind of loony eugenics theories that equate black people with being animals or possessing super-human attributes.

Serena Williams is a beautiful, intelligent, world class athlete who trains hard, plays hard and is one of the greatest tennis champions in history.

She's not "blond-haired and thin" in a way that fits neatly into the Western European archetype of female beauty; why can't people just get over that?

And frankly, with all due respect, David Frum should probably stick to politics.

Was Hitler Really a Meth-Addict? - Stepping Out on 'The Gray Lady'

A young Hitler next to a photo of a Fuhrer-like cat (Photo - Atlas/London Media)

Confession: I've been cheating on my lady with an old flame since last month.

The media furor that erupted last month over New York Times critic Alessandra Stanley's article calling show runner/writer & producer Shonda Rhimes an "angry black woman" sparked a slew of well-written op-eds, articles and insightful reader responses.

The remarkably misogynistic tone of Stanley's piece and the casual reinforcement of ignorant racial stereotypes made me step back and take another look at the New York Times; and do some critical thinking about the make-up of their editorial staff, reporters and the content they produce.

The Time's response to the uproar was so tone-deaf and lackluster, I decided to divorce myself from "The Gray Lady" for awhile and select some other news outlets to "get my news on".

While I miss her, it led me back to an old flame: The Washington Post. Having grown up in Bethesda, Maryland, the Post was on our doorstep every morning (delivered by a neighbor's son from across the street who was a good friend of mine) and spread out about the house throughout the week.

I can still smell that combination of ink and paper. In the pre-cable days of the 1970's and early 80's in the suburban Washington area, the Post's weekly television guide was a highly-coveted and indispensable section of the fat Sunday edition of the Post in our house.

While the Post initially lagged behind the NY Times in developing a strong online presence during the digital transformation, these days the layout and functionality of the WaPo Website is much improved from just a few years ago and with Amazon co-founder Jeff Bezos on board as the new owner, the online content and experience is bound to get better with time.

Now I'm something of a history buff; I'm currently slogging my way through "The 900 Days: The Siege of Leningrad", author Harrison Salisbury's 635-page meticulously-researched and exhaustive analysis of the three-year siege of the Russian city of Leningrad by the Germans starting in 1941 that eventually led to the deaths of some 632,000 Russians - including 4,000 from starvation and cold on Christmas Day 1941. Salisbury was also a long-time editor at the New York Times.

So when I visited the Washington Post's Website after work today to scan the headlines, the eye-opening title of Ishaan Tharoor's article, "High Hitler: Nazi Leader Was a Meth Addict" immediately caught my attention.

According to the WaPo article as well as a piece in The Independent, a new documentary on the UK's Channel 4 airing this weekend, "Hitler's Hidden Drug Habit", the Fuhrer had a quite a drug habit.

Including Pervitin pills containing meth-amphetamine (crystal meth), a barbiturate called Brom-Nervacit, and also morphine - three of the cocktail of 74 different drugs he took according to details from a 47-page American intelligence document.

At first glance such an article might seem gimmicky; after all I did capture the above photo of a young Hitler next to a cat that looks suspiciously like him from an article in Rupert Murdoch's The Sun (UK) entitled (wait for it...), "Mein Furrer" (really) about cats that look like Hitler, but I won't be posting a link to that tabloid jewel of the Murdoch empire. Even I have standards.

Some might consider an article about Hitler's drug use irrelevant given the current Ebola virus, the state of affairs in Syria and Iraq and the ongoing economic stagnation affecting the 99% in this country. But I think the insanity gripping this world (Boko Haram kidnapping school girls?) demands that we step back and reexamine history.

Plus, given renewed interest in the fascinating story "Is Paris Burning?", the book and 1966 film detailing Hitler's efforts to have his army completely destroy the city of Paris before the allied invasion could reach it (Salisbury's book "The 900 Days" also details how Hitler insisted his generals completely level the city of Leningrad as well), a better understanding of how extensively Hitler's mind may have been warped by his drug addiction may help historians gain new insight into the horrific loss of life and catastrophic destruction of World War II.

Maybe someone should drug-test Syrian leader Bashar al-Asaad? And Putin too while they're at it.

Perhaps a better understanding of the horrors of that war may help the world find ways to avoid slipping into another one in the mid-east.

I'll always love the NY Times. It's exceptional journalistic analysis, expansive coverage and insight have helped to expand my intellectual understanding of the world. But their handling of the Alessandra Stanley article (and the fact that they actually printed it) makes me and many others wonder if the editorial board may have gotten just a bit too cozy up on the pedestal.

Perhaps "The Gray Lady" has become a bit too gray. I'll come back to visit her for Paul Krugman and Maureen Dowd but for now, I'm giving The Washington Post another chance; especially with the critical November elections coming up and the Nation's Capital once again preparing to take center stage.

Plus I've got a daily friends-with-benefits thing going on with the BBC and NPR too, so I won't lack for company or excellent content. Please don't tell the Gray Lady; she assumed we were exclusive.  

Can a Sister Get a Break? Rihanna & Shonda Rhimes Wrestle With Big Media

Chris Brown's erie tattoo (L) Rihanna after being beaten by Brown in '09 (R) 

With flat wage growth, a hiring rate that is steadily inching up but still sluggish and millions of people chronically under-employed or stuck in jobs that don't pay living wages, the lingering after affects of the Great Recession are making these tough times for many average working class people in the US.

But Department of Labor statistics released two weeks ago show that black American women are a  particularly hard hit demographic when it comes to economic recovery.

The study shows that the unemployment rate amongst black women remains high at 10.6% - that hasn't changed since the same period 12 months ago. Compare that to the overall unemployment rate which has dipped to 6.2%. One reason?

The study suggests that as a percentage of employees, women of color were over represented in federal, state and local municipal jobs - so when Republican lawmakers began slashing government jobs across the nation, black women suffered disproportionately. The reality is that many working class sisters are finding it much more difficult to get back into the workforce; much more so than their white, Hispanic or Asian counterparts. Don't look for that on the Tea Party's agenda, it doesn't even seem to be on the Democratic Party's radar at the moment. 

Last week the media was also tough on some high profile black women at the top of the economic scale too.
 
The Website Color of Change.org launched an online petition demanding that the New York Times retract a controversial Op-Ed piece written by Alessandra Stanley that took highly successful television producer/writer Shonda Rhimes to task for writing characters that are "angry black women".

Rhimes is best known for television shows like Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice and Scandal featuring strong female characters who are confident and outspoken, but also multidimensional, sensitive and compassionate. If Stanley had watched more than say, five episodes of Grey's Anatomy, she would realize Rhimes' characters are ethnically diverse and ALL of them deliver opinionated rants on a range of topics at various times - but only the black female characters are "angry"? Hmmm.

Rhimes took to Twitter on Friday to deconstruct Stanley's arguments in typically eloquent fashion and created something of an online backlash against Stanley, who obviously picked the wrong target and got called out for a sloppily-written Op-Ed.

Speaking of highly publicized Twitter responses, singer Rihanna also took to Twitter to express her anger at CBS for pulling the Jay-Z song "Run This Town", which features Rihanna's vocals, from the television intro for its Thursday Night Football broadcast.

The media dust-up began the week before last when CBS decided to pull the intro in light of the public outcry over the release of the elevator footage of Ray Rice punching his then-fiancé in the face.

CBS pulled "Run This Town" from the televised intro prior to the September 11th national broadcast of the Baltimore Ravens - Pittsburgh Steelers game and replaced it with different theme music. Given that Ray Rice was the Ravens starting running back before he was suspended indefinitely by the NFL, the CBS decision to pull the song does make sense because of the potential risk to the brand.

The possibility of unforeseen media blowback from associating both the CBS and NFL brands (and their advertisers) with a celebrity who was herself a highly-publicized victim of domestic abuse could have very easily been taken in the wrong way and had unintended consequences.

While I respect Rihanna as an artist, global fame and stardom came to her at a very young age.

She's been ensconced within a retinue of managers, lawyers, handlers and publicists
(her own family has complained publicly of not being able to contact her at times) for years, so I'm not sure she actually realizes just how deeply shocked many people were by her decision to rekindle her relationship with Chris Brown in 2009 not long after the vicious beating he gave her. She also reunited with him again in 2011.

While one might certainly express a degree of admiration for her capacity to forgive someone as emotionally disturbed as Chris Brown, many people ultimately viewed her choice as immature and foolish; one reflective of an almost juvenile determination to date a "bad boy" and "fix him".

Rhihanna didn't catch heat because she tried to make her relationship with Chris Brown work, but because she came off as young and dangerously uninformed on the realities of domestic abuse.

Her decision flew in the face of volumes of credible data on the patterns of domestic abuse; one in four women has been a victim. She seemed unaware of the four phases of domestic abuse as described by Lenore Walker in 'The Dynamics of Domestic Violence - The Cycle of Violence' .

As documented on the Family and Child Abuse Prevention Center Website, Phase 3 follows the actual physical violence that takes place in Phase 2 and is known as the "Honeymoon Phase" where the abuser expresses deep remorse, apologizes profusely and:

"Many abusers will buy gifts, flowers, etc. so that the victim will forgive the abuse. Oftentimes the abuser will promise to go into treatment voluntarily, that the violence will never occur again, and that he or she will "Change"." 

I read that quote and think back to the famous photos of her and Brown jet-skiing around Florida together not long after he'd pummeled her; look at the picture above, would you even consider going jet-skiing with some guy who did that to you?

Personally I can't imagine how frustrating it must be for Rihanna to be put into the position where she's still having to deal with the repercussions of being a victim of domestic abuse five years after her violent encounter with Brown.

But the reality is that she is also dealing with the repercussions of the message that her choice to reunite with Chris Brown sent to the public. On one hand she remains defiant about wanting her personal life to remain private. Yet, look at any issue of Rolling Stone in the past couple years.

I'm a subscriber and I can tell you that more often than not, the "Random Notes" section which features color photos of famous musicians, has a photo of Rhihanna in a swim-suit with a drink in her hand hanging out in Ibiza or some other exclusive sunny vacation spot hanging out.

For instance, look at page 34 of the September 25th issue of RS with Taylor Swift on the cover. There's Rhihanna (with a drink in her hand...) floating in the waters off the island of Ponza, Italy celebrating the end of her Monster Tour. The photo caption reads: "RiRi and her entourage snorkeled in old pirate caves on the island of Ponza."

Now I'm not judging her personal life at all. If Rihanna wants to party on a yacht off Monaco with her friends, hey more power to her. She's a successful adult artist who's entitled to recreational down time and she can do with her time and money whatever she wants. 

But you don't get to saturate the media with images of yourself to promote your career as an entertainer then complain about the public prying into your private life.

When CBS pulled the song from their national prime time broadcast, they were just trying to be sensitive to the issue of domestic abuse, because they couldn't predict how the public would react to Rihanna's voice promoting a game involving the Baltimore Ravens with video of Ray Rice punching his fiance in the face making headlines and overshadowing the game itself.

The images of Rihanna's beautiful face all bruised, battered and swollen after Chris Brown attacked her are stuck in the public sub-conscious; like it or not she always WILL be linked to the issue of domestic abuse.

I can understand Rihanna being angry at CBS for having distanced themselves from the trauma she suffered. But maybe she should remember that domestic abuse affects millions of people, and many of those people simply still have a hard time understanding why anyone would willingly go back into a relationship with someone who would hit, and bite you like that.

And then get a tattoo of the photo of what he did drawn on his neck? I don't even want to know what that is about.

Can Rihanna really blame CBS for not wanting any part of that? I don't think so; her being a victim of Brown's violence wasn't her fault but it certainly wasn't CBS's decision for her to get back in a relationship with him either.