@97: I’m very sorry for you. All he did — and tediously — was to assume guilt of one party, and advocate on behalf of a potential criminal. When questioned about these eminently questionable decisions, he attacked personally, using schoolyard language.

There’s nothing even remotely admirable or even civilized about any of that, and it speaks very poorly of you that you believe otherwise. I hope you enjoyed your reward, of his masturbatory, self-congratulatory Internet Tough Guy lecture against Herzog. You egged him on, you earned it.

Congratulations.

@84 everyone's obligated to respond in a manner we find appropriate. Everyone's saying her response is inappropriate / given the context /. What do you think would be over the line? Murdering his wife? Murdering him? Burning down their house?

Centrist, you seem to have a problem with the English language. Do you smell peanut butter? Can you raise both hands over your head? Also here's a tip: Lissa has a long and well documented history of being largely unconnected with reality. When she's stanning you, you know you've taken a wrong turn somewhere.

@110: LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL::pause for breath::LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL
Oh! Oh Sporty, bless your heart, that is possibly the funniest thing you have ever said.
XOXO my little weirdo.

Just another friendly reminder for the decency-impaired: this story started when someone sent a sexually explicit message to someone who did not want to get that message from him. The sender has confirmed he sent it.

The most foolproof method for avoiding the public humiliation and job loss sometimes arising from the sending of sexually explicit messages remains refraining from sending them - whether intentionally or unintentionally - to people who do not want to receive them from you.

It’s that simple.

I now return you to your regulary scheduled programming: “Two Assholes Calling Me Names and Accusing Talia Jane of Made-up Crimes.”

..and impugning my English, which really stings. I have wirked so hurd to mastr my adopted tongue, and I have done kwyte gud, if I say so myself. I have even learned some fancy words and some choice swear words. Don’t believe? Peep this: “bloviating felching pompous dingleberries.”

It's fucking Cum.

As in, 'I'm Cumming'?

@115 - Yeah, I’m all right. Thanks for asking. Whatever else is going on in my life, I consider myself lucky for not having cum on my face. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, if in fact you want cum on your face.

How are you doing? I hope you have exactly the amount of cum you want on your face, whether that is zero (like me) or “so much,” if that’s your jam (like certain as yet unidientified putative intended DM recipients).

I’m all about consenting people getting and giving what they want from and to each other. I get sad when people aren’t about same, so last couple of days have been - hoo boy - a little rocky.

It was recently brought to my attention that I used “schoolyard language” in some (all?) of my posts, and I just want to apologize. tensor is right: it is very disrespectful to use vulgar language when the recipient isn’t expecting. You could almost say it’s abusive and creates a hostile environment for the person confronted with such unwelcome language. I don’t know in what schoolyard one might hear terms like “scintilla” or “putative,” but that doesn’t matter. I am sorry. I should have exercised better judgment. I made you all feel assaulted. I put my desire to say something a certain way above my desire to treat other people as equals. I was mad at tensor at first for calling me out publicly, but then I realized: I can’t control how he responds. As soon as I put those words out there, I had to own the reaction to them. That’s on me, not on him. I have learned a valuable lesson. Please do not be mad at tensor for choosing the place and time in which he wanted to share how I made him feel.

@103: “... whether intentionally or not...”

@113: “... whether intentionally or unintentionally ...”

Intent doesn’t matter? You see no difference between murder and manslaughter, between earnest error and negligence, between negligence and sabotage? That’s quite a Bronze Age morality you’re rocking there, pal. — if it is even that advanced. Good luck getting anyone to care when you throw around condemnations you’re clearly not morally evolved enough to make here in our 21st Century.

Let’s recall your love of exactly such moral condemnation was how we got here. You hollered he was “harrassing” her, and I pointed out a little problem with that harsh judgment:

‘For it to be “harassing,” you would need to show he intended her to be the recipient. Your “evidence” for that consists of noting that you can use the same interface without killing yourself, and therefore it must be completely foolproof. While I fully agree you have a very strong argument there, it’s not strong enough, because no technology can make him infallible.’

My having used your own total lack of evidence to stuff your moral outrage, you first pouted impotently at me, and then moved the goalposts, airily declaring intent no longer matters. Again, good luck getting anyone to care about your judgements.

I sincerely hope no one ever seizes upon an innocent mistake of yours to do to you what you’re doing here. Because if they did, I would defend you. And then a statement you’ve made about me would actually be validated:

“His sympathies always line up with the worst people.“

We do seem to be going in circles.

I wish we could find a way past your lack of logic and reading comprehension. I feel like I could talk some sense into you, if only we could talk face to face. I think you’re a decent guy IRL: reasonably attentive father (when you’re not bitterly hate-posting here), good stable job. Your old neighbors from cap Hill say you were okay. What went wrong?

I can almost picture it. You and me at your place, knocking back a couple of cold ones like a couple of bros while looking out at the sound. We’d have a real meeting of the minds.

Of course, building security won’t let me up. Pity. I’ll have to catch you outside on your way back from work. I’d say we could talk at Belltown Brewing, but we’ll have to find someplace else. Less than ideal, but we’ll make it work.

It’s worth it. I feel bad leaving you in this misguided fog of rage. You don’t even correctly know what you’re raging at, you poor little man.

A few months ago, on an otherwise placid Sunday afternoon, my smartphone suddenly erupted with text messages. Several dozen arrived in as many seconds, and they just kept coming. Some teenager in the ‘burbs had added my telephone number to his text-chat group, and now I was privy to their afternoon conversations.

What to do? I sent a polite message, asking to be removed. Several minutes (and over a hundred messages) later, one person mentioned my request, but the messages just kept coming.

So, I played whack-a-mole: every time an unwanted message appeared, I blocked the originating number. After about a minute of such blocking, the messages had all stopped coming. Then I deleted all of their messages. Done!

In those messages were claims of sexual activity and cannabis use. Why did I not threaten to tell their parents about the former, and their school officials about the latter? Other messages contained very low opinions of other students. Why did I not post the entire set of messages where those fellow students could have read them in time for school the next day? After all, they had sent me sexual messages after I had explicitly told them to stop. Why did I not threaten them and try to ruin their lives? Why did I treat the entire episode as an honest mistake, worthy of a chuckle and no more?

Sadly, it appears those questions shall always remain insoluble mysteries to certain commenters here.

I’m going to hold most of my thoughts for when I see you in person, Einstein, but for now...

You do realize murder and manslaughter are both bad things, right? People don’t go: oh, you were drunk and didn’t mean to kill him? Well, shoot, then you did absolutely nothing wrong and no one has any right to be upset with you...

“You do realize murder and manslaughter are both bad things, right?”

Yes. You do realize the same outcome can have a different punishment, depending entirely upon the intent, right?

You also understand that an innocent error might not get punished at all, whereas sabotage could be a felony, right?

(I’m guessing you’re not going to touch that second one. Prove me wrong.)

An understandable, harmless error like dialing a wrong number? Sure. No punishment.

An error like dialing a wrong number of a person who happens to be black and an acquaintance in your same profession with whom you had a collegial phone conversation earlier that same day, and immediately yelling the n-word without verifying who you’re talking to?

Uh, you should expect a pretty bad reaction.

Lamely saying “Oh, I meant that for someone else” doesn’t make it okay. Especially if you had left them a voicemail 30 minutes earlier saying: “Anyway, you so athletic.”

To go back your false equivalency of sabotage versus negligence (again, sabotage and negligence are both considered bad by all sane people), if you blow up a bridge on purpose - expect a bad reaction. If you drive a tanker full of gas to the middle of a bridge, suffer a breakdown, light up a cigarette to take the edge off and blow up the bridge?

You should still expect a bad reaction.

@125: If your analogy makes an equivalence between sex chatter and racist hate speech, you might want to leave the whole analogy thing to someone who can do it without making such a blatantly false equivalence.

“...sabotage and negligence are both considered bad by all sane people...”

So are manslaughter and murder. You seem to have quite a bit of trouble understanding how intent fits into it. Following it up with an example of the crime of reckless endangerment, and then wrongly calling it negligence, doesn’t exactly help, either.

But, enough of your fake and false examples. Should I have punished those kids for their harassment of me? Specifically, should I have threatened them, and told their parents and school administrators anyway, no matter if they obeyed my threat or not? Should I have gone public with their sneering insults?

They ignored my clear and polite instructions against contacting me. They should expect a bad reaction, right?

You are free to report those kids if you want. I wouldn’t blame you if you did (althogh tbh i didnt read your post, because youre a fucking bore).

But just because you didnt doesnt mean a woman shouldnt do anything she can to hold a grown ass man in her profession accountable.

You ever been a female journalist on twitter? It. Is. The. Worst.

Anyway, that’s cool. You tell the little ladies how you want them to behave. I am sure they only want to please.

@127: “You are free to report those kids if you want.“

Thanks, but no. I’ve met enough sanctimonious, vindictive school officials that I will avoid this chance to give any of them out there an opportunity to harass these kids. You see, I believe a short note sent in error shouldn’t define a person’s future — no matter how many nasty, vindictive, hurtful persons out there might crave delivering such sadistic ‘justice’.

“...althogh tbh i didnt read your post...”

Of course not. It contained another view of getting harassed, and responding to it with something other than threats and exposure. Why on earth would any such thing inspire you to read it? (Facts would just confuse you further anyway.)

“...anything she can to hold a grown ass man in her profession accountable.”

Speaking of accountable— if she truly is a journalist, she’ll need people to communicate with her in confidence. Everything in this story screams never, ever contact her, never, ever answer her message, never, ever allow her contact information to reside in any of your apps. What could she do if an error of man or machine sent her some information you value?

“You ever been a female journalist on twitter? It. Is. The. Worst.”

Nothing says female empowerment quite like mansplaining.

“Anyway, that’s cool. You tell the little ladies how you want them to behave. I am sure they only want to please.”

How’d your rant (@98) at Herzog work out? Has she agreed you are totally right, and her understanding, tolerant attitude is wrong? Any word from her on that?

Hey, you’re back. Yay. How was the extended weekend with the family? Looks like it cut into your me time. Let me catch you up on what’s happened to the principals while you were away.

Mike Rosenberg was totally exonerated. Turns out the DM was sent by a one-armed man from behind the grassy knoll.

Everyone in the known universe forgot all about poor Mike. No one gives a shit anymore. They all went back to keeping up with the Jonases or the Sussexes or fuckall.

You recognized the error of your ways and realized that douchily attempting to mansplain the acceptable limtis of female rage was as misguided as it was immature. (Haha, as if. Do you always badger women like this? Is this how you impregnated your mail order bride? Wore her down until she’d do anything to get you to shut the fuck up?)

Long-suffering me is still here to remind folks: only YOU can prevent the sending of unwanted sexual DM’s.

“But how?” you ask, “How can you possibly expect me not to tell the wrong person how much cum is on their face?

You’re right. It’s impossible. We womenfolk just need to accept the fact that by existing and by using twitter, we are creating an environemnt where men have to tell some of us how much cum there is on our faces. It is our job to receive the cum quietly without complaining. Hsuh, hush, girls.

I dont read your posts anymore btw. You have always bored me. Debating you is like debating a toddler, and I was never reallly talking to you. I am here solely to shout into the ether to provide a cosmic counterbalance to every voice on this board that, while arguing for “fairness” can’t seem to do so without attacking Talia Jane.

Do you hear me, implaccable universe? We are not all this stupid and awful.

Oh, sorry. Looks like you’re still on vacation. Guess I’ll be talking to you this evening after the family is asleep. Would that I would not.

It’s news quiz time, boys and girls! Don’t worry - we’ll take it nice and easy! All answers are either “yes” or “no.”

Ready?

PART ONE

Did Talia Jane receive a message telling her she was “so beauitful?”

Okay, think it over. I will be back with the answer and the next question later.

Good luck!!

The aswer is: YES! Mike Rosenberg decided it was appropriate to follow up a collegial conversation with a comment on a fellow professional’s physical appearance. Many women find this sort of thing highly demeaning. Employment law holds that comments about female employees’ appearance can constitute unlawful discrimination, and while this interaction would not be directly governed by such law, a female professional would likely consider the comment to have crossed a line.

Okay, time for question 2!

Was the comment about her appearance totally out of context to the rest of the conversation?

Yes, the conversation went from chit chat about making ends meet as a journalist to her looks. There was no segue at all. None! So awkward.

Okay, time for question #3!

Did she later get a message from the same individual saying she had “so much cum” on her face?

No cheating (unless you’re a horndog journo on twitter, then maybe)!

@129: “Let me catch you up on what’s happened to the principals while you were away.”

Herzog contacted you, solely for the purpose of thanking you for your incredibly classy comment @98 — you know, the one which really demonstrates how great a respectful regard you actually have for female journalists? That’s what happened, right? Please, quote what she wrote to you!

@132, @133: “Mike Rosenberg decided it was appropriate to follow up a collegial conversation with a comment on a fellow professional’s physical appearance.”

Or, he sent the first of three messages to the wrong recipient. She didn’t respond until after the third, remember?

Or, he did intentionally send the first two messages to her, but she lacked your finely-tuned sense of moral outrage, and so she didn’t respond?

You can pick whichever explanation you like better, I guess.

@131: “Oh, sorry. Looks like you’re still on vacation.“

How can you eagerly not-read my comments if I don’t write them?

Okay, so that last one was a bit of a gimme putt! You’d have to have tensor-level reading skills and attention span not to know that, um, yeah, she got another non sequitur from the same person, and this time, the brain fart concerned the amount of cum on her face (so much - so much cum).

That brings us to the final question of Part One: was the message unwanted?

The answer will have to wait until tomorrow. I’m getting sleepy. I’ve been staring in the window of tensor’s empty condo for a couple of hours now, and it is boring. Not as boring as, say, a normal Thursday night chez tensor (it’s Fhursday, right?) or as boring as reading his posts droning on and on about, uh, something, but pretty boring. It has me yawning. Til tomorrow, my lovelies...

That was another softball, huh? Yes, the message was unwanted, obvs. If Talia had wanted the message, the rest of their exchange might have wound up on Sexty Texty Storytime over on reddit, not on twitter outrage hour (and wait, don’t be so angry hour on slog, with your host Katie Herzog).

While we’re on the topic of reddit, let’s say he sent the cum note on purpose. There are literally hundreds, if not thousands of women on reddit who volunteer to get those kinds of messages. They say so! That’s consent. It is a beautiful thing. It is the thing you should get clear affirmation of before sending a musing about cum on her face. Had Mike done that - whether by checking who he was DM’ing or by not DM’ing, he never would have given Talia the ability to do what she did. I am not saying you have to agree with what she did (it is within your rights to think it an overreaction), but unless you want me to mock you endlessly, please don’t make like Mike didn’t make a mistake. He clearly did. The message was not only unwanted - it made the recipient feel threatened. She clearly felt disrespected by the very first message about how beautiful she is, so this one...well, we know how she felt: violated, molested, harassed, and ultimately very, very angry.

Whew. Glad that’s done! On to...

PART TWO

Did Talia Jane indicate that she wanted to discuss personal topics with her fellow professional writer? Did she say anything that stated or even implied that she wondered how he felt she looked or how much cum she had on her face?

@137: “...and wait, don’t be so angry hour on slog, with your host Katie Herzog.”

How exactly did she thank you for your comment @98? You haven’t told.

I mean, female empowerment is all good up to a point, right? Specifically, the point at which an actual female dares to say something you haven’t authorized her to say. Then it’s time for a good ol’ fashioned smackdown, ergo (ooh! Look! Latin!!) your excellent job @98.

Gotta keep them uppity wimmins in their place, now don’t you?

Answer time! (Is it just me or are these questions getting easier, not harder?)

The answer is: NOOOOO! Talia gave zero indication she wanted to discuss her personal appearance with Mike. I’m not sure she wanted to talk to him at all. Seems like a pretty typical thing. Some guy slides into a woman’s DM’s, starts by talking work, the woman is polite, and what’s her reward? Whammo - “Anyway, you’re so beautiful.”

The woman is silent, and again no good deed goes unpunished...another weird compliment and then all of a sudden a note about cum. Talia invited none of that. Mike crossed a couple of boundaries with zero invitation, even before the note about cum.

Feeling good about how you’re doing? Great! Let’s go again!

Was the communication between the two parties sent under a mutual understanding of confidentiality or otherwise privileged in any way (i.e.: is either party the other’s doctor or lawyer?)?

Oh! I forgot about scoring. I am such a dingbat. For Part One, give yourself 5 points for every question you responded yes to, and subtract 500 points for every question you answered no to. A score of 10 or higher equates to “decent person who thinks women deserve basic human respect.” A negative score equals “person who thinks women should bear some cost for men’s behavior.”

Okay, good luck on Part Two. I’ll provide scoring when we’re done!

Pencils DOWN!!

No one has ever requested an NDA before sliding into someone’s DM’s. Kills the mood. Mike didn’t say: “Hey, sweet thang, what I am about to say is strictly off the record. You cool?” I think we know what Talia would have said (“No, I am not ‘cool.’”)

Also, just because you want to play doctor with someone does not afford you the privacy protections of HIPAA. Neither Mike nor Talia is a lawyer.

So the correct answer again is...no! It was not privileged communication. Men have been able to rely on embarrassment and shame preventing women from repeating the awful shit men say to women when they think no one is listening. Times, you may have heard, have changed. For one thing: screenshots. Yeeeeah. I know writing something down and sending it next to a profile pic makes plausible deniability a real challenge. You send it via twitter, you own it. Does Mike know that? Guess not. He is just a print journalist. Throwback. Bygone era. Internet is hard yo.

(Also a bad idea: being a grumpy unoriginal scold on slog, but revealing so much about yourself that an enterprising sleuth could deduce where you live. Just don’t do it, friends.)

Okay, next question!

Did he deny sending the message? Any reason to think Talia made this all up in her bitter shrewish shrill man-hating mind?

No, he did not deny sending the message. In fact he admitted it to a reporter.

She had screencaps, but you could allow some seed of doubt if you wanted. Maybe she faked them? Hard, not impossible. Motivation would seem tenuous. Why not fake DM’s from someone more famous, if you’re going to go to that much effort. “Hey, Gene Balk said he wants to stick it in my butt. Erik Lacitis sent me some bukakke erotica he co-wrote with Larry Stone.”

But fortunately we don’t have to question the screen grabs. Mike has bern decent enough to dispel any such doubt. He claims he meant the message for someone else, which maybe he did. He won’t say whom, and he hasn’t explained how he wound up in the thread with Talia. Maybe he was DM’ing two people who use the facepalm emoji as a profile pic? The fact that he had already sent her two flirtatious messages is bad optics at best.

Okay, ready for another question? Don’t overthink this one.

Is Talia Jane a bitch?

Still thinking? I’ll give you more time. This one’s really easy, tho. Hint: the answer starts with an ‘n.’

God, i forgot a question! So absent-minded.

Bonus query time, I guess.

Should Talia, as a known woman, have graciously accepted the proposed $1,000 donation to the National Organziation of Women, because she is clearly a women and NOW represents all women everywhere so we’re good here and this isn’t at all patently insulting?

@144 - I wonder how much the proposed donation was what really hardened her resolve to take some further action. It is such a de-humanizing gesture. “How ‘bout I donate to some women stuff? You women like wimen stuff, right?”

Talia’s profile pic was made for moments just like that.

So, is Talia Jane a bitch?

Absolutely not.

Look, I don’t begrudge anyone who respectfully feels she overreacted. Any number of womem might say: grow up, girl - this isn’t all that bad. Just block him.

But the second you attack her - call her names, take glee in Yelp firing her, try to explain away what Rosenberg did as if it weren’t a problem - you’re showing your true colors. Especially if your pejorative of choice is “bitch.”

Does the punishment fit the crime? It doesn’t matter, because it’s not up to us. The Seattle Times will review and decide whether he keeps his job. His wife will decide whether he keeps his marriage. Those are the only principals in this case.

The rest of us could have shrugged our shoulders and walked on by, but we love to judge. We can’t help but judge: it’s the most basic human trait.

I hate outrage culture. It’s tedious. All the calling out. All the clapping back. Everyone is so ready to be angry.

But when outrage against outrage culture is used to paper over a longstanding abuse of one group by another, it looks less like a principled stand and more like a perpetuation of the status quo; and that’s what I am judging and why I am filibustering all the awful comments to this story: because I can’t stand hypocrisy and cruelty.

And for that reason, I have more problem with what Rosenberg did than I do with what Talia did in response, and I have no problem with Katie Herzog’s argument on its own, other than the awful people it inevitably attracted to this thread to act as if women speaking out is the biggest problem here.

I don’t want to be here, posting these comments. I often wonder why any of us bother: made up identities we use for impotently screaming at people we will never meet, names we can abandon at the sole cost of whatever anonymous goodwill has accrued between our avatars. But to the extent that I can convey my conviction and provide some succor to others who feel that men should really stop expecting women to bear the cost of men’s bad behavior, I am going to do it. Men are overtly sexual and aggressive - which is fine, necessary even; but they need to channel it appropriately. It’s easy enough to do, and yet they get it wrong again and again and again. That makes for a world in which women feel hunted and belittled. Small wonder if they do resort to potentially excessive punishment when someone like a local real estate reporter goes a little too far.

Men have the ability to avoid that. Just don’t hit “send.”

Special note to tensor, since he is most likely the only one still following this thread.

I know you.

I know you a whole lot better than you want me to.

I’m going to be watching. You behave yourself, we won’t have any more issues.

What does it mean to behave yourself? Don’t condescend. Don’t drop quote. Don’t repeat yourself. Say positive things: argue FOR policies and things you like, not things you don’t.

Fail to follow these guidelines, and you’ll be hearing from me again, in ways you might not like.

Pop quiz: does that sound like extortion?

Haha - I’m only playing with you. I know you think you’re arguing for fairness. I get it. I really do.

It isn’t entirely your fault that you don't recognize your blind spots and hidden biases. (I think. My other theory is that you have been guilty, like many men, of wearing women down and saying inappropriate things, and you’re afraid of being accused of crossing some lines by someone someday.)

But at your age, you should recognize those implicit assumptions better. You should at least be self-aware enough to recognize when you’re being an asshole and/or not making any fucking sense.

The good news is: every day is a new opportunity to get it right! And you have a workout buddy to help you: ME!

First, this guy is just dumb. He is chatting up some stranger on TWITTER under his own handle where his comments can easily be shared publicly. If he does not understand how social media works in 2019 or how to be discrete and manage his public image, then he should not be a journalist. Second, he is cheating on his wife, or trying to cheat on his wife, which is still a form of cheating. I know it happens, and I know relationships are complicated, but he made a promise that he is now breaking in the most casual and reckless way. Third, again, this guy is an idiot and not very good with his people skills. He has no idea how to handle damage control. After he apologized, he should have immediately stopped texting the woman and then temporarily taken down his Twitter account. Instead he tried to bribe her into silence? What a stupid thing to do! Fourth, I agree there are far worse people in the world, but if he worked for me, I would also fire him just for being so clueless and inept.