By David Futrelle
Yesterday, Twitter was filled with heartfelt tributes to Anthony Bourdain, the outspoken chef-turned-author-and-television-personality who had taken his own life the night before.
Some shared stories; some expressed gratefulness for the solidarity he showed to women and the #metoo movement and his sincere appreciation of cultures other than his own; some shared screenshots of his pointed takedowns of moral monsters like Henry Kissinger, the man he hated above all others on planet earth for what he and Nixon did to Cambodia.
Others on Twitter talked about suicide and the depression that too often triggers it, sharing their own experiences and offering support for those battling their own darkness.
Today, I thought I would see what people were saying about Bourdain on Gab. the so-called “free speech” Twitter alternative that has become a haven for literal Nazis, ironic Nazis, conspiracy theorists, and assorted other terrible people.
Paging through the past ten hours or so of Anthony Bourdain talk on the site, I found little more than batshit conspiracy theories and over-the-top hate.
The only commenters who felt any sadness at his death, it seemed, were those convinced he had been “Hillaried” — murdered or forced into suicide — because he had been preparing to release damning information implicating the “satanic” pedophile Jewish cabal that they have convinced themselves runs the world. I found only a tiny handful of posts from those troubled by Bourdain’s death or concerned about suicide.
As you read through the following comments, bear in mind that these aren’t outliers; they are in fact rather typical of the response to Bourdain’s death on Gab. Many if not most of those I didn’t screenshot expressed similar if not identical sentiments, if sometimes a little less colorfully.
It’s difficult to get screenshots of Gab comments with text large enough to read comfortably, so I will follow most of these comments with their text.
“He was PC…That is trash! He was subhuman filth! Humanity is better without him!”
“degen druggie jew killed himself. hopefully they all follow his example.”
“what if and just what if all these suicides are not suicides but scoop ups and being put in witness protection ?”
“He was an anti-White Jew.“Bourdain promoted White Genocide:”
“Bordain Murdered? islamonazi Minions like Mike Loser @WolverineTongueStreudel Piss @StreudelHiss are out in force smearing & preventing light of truth to shine. Boudain got red-pilled of late and created an episode to air on his CNN show which was sent to and in the possession of Alex Jones. This will air in good time.”
“HOW COME NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT THIS CONNECTION???
Anthony Bourdain girlfriend was member of the “red witches” society.
Yes, Israel-Firsters &/or Jew-Firsters, Jews actually DO practice black magic.
They call it ‘Kabbalah’.
Tell me again how Satanic sorcerers are ‘Gods Chosen People.
I need a good LOL.”
“The more baby boomers who die off, the more we can progress towards fixing this world and creating a Final Solution for the J Question. Baby boomers, can you hurry up and drop dead?”
“Just another white hating kike. Nothing of value was lost. His death is a net positive. Shame he was able to go on his own terms and not shot in the spine on his way to the store. Would have been nice to see that shit stain linger for a while. Oh well, at least he died.”
“How would this Jew know about this if he wasn’t in on the scam? How does he know what private intelligence agencies do?”
Sorry, I have to interject here: BECAUSE ALL OF THIS WAS WIDELY REPORTED IN THE MEDIA. Which you would know if you paid attention to real media instead of Fox News or 4chan or Alex Jones or wherever the hell you get your “news.” Or if you had taken three seconds to Google.
They really can’t decide if he was a murdered “red pill” hero on the verge or proving all their conspiracy theories correct, or “just another white hating kike” they’re glad to see dead.
Oh, apparently (at least in the fevered brains of alt-right assholes) he also had AIDS — or, as many on the far-right insist on calling it, GRIDS, which stands for Gay-Related Immune Deficiency Syndrome, a phony acronym based on what AIDS was originally called before anyone really knew what it was.
“He gleefully celebrated your demise… don’t be afraid to celebrate his.”
“Did Anthony Bourdain Off Himself Thinking About His GF Fucking Harvey Weinstein?
“‘But imagine being Bourdain and finding out that your gf had sex on purpose with Harvey Weinstein.’
“note: I thought Bourdain was one of the gays?”
I don’t even know what the fuck this guy is talking about:
“No doubt it was a satanic blood ritual sacrifice by the degenerates at CNN to help save their platform. It wouldn’t surprise me if wasn’t placed in a cartoon or film for predictive programming of the event.”
Meanwhile, Gab admins and their apologists continue to insist that the site isn’t all about monetizing hate. Yes somehow every public conversation I look at on the site seems to end up just like this one.
This is too disgusting to even read, so instead: Are we going to get a thread about Canadian Trumpists’ and BernieBros’ (but I repeat myself) responses to Trump declaring war on Canada? That’d be hilarious.
Bernie himself has been tweeting very disapprovingly of Trump’s G7 behavior (which according to Larry Kudlow was mostly to impress Kim Jong Un) so I don’t know that the Bernie bros will take Trump’s side here. Unless you’re just referring to the ones that aren’t progressive at all but just supported Bernie to oppose Hillary Clinton?
Yeah, whenever I say BernieBros, I mean them.
WWTH:
Well, I already knew Trump is deluded, but now I know Kudlow is too. This doesn’t make Trump look strong!
On a lighter note: that photo by Jesco Denzel (the one with Merkel leaning on the table) is terrific, and will probably be one of the defining images of this presidency.
Well, Kudlow is a supply sider, so we already knew he was willfully deluded. I’m not surprised by this at all.
I’ve already asked my Friendly Local Comic Shop to pull me a copy of “Hungry Ghosts” when it comes out in trade in Sept. Time to reread “Get Jiro” in the meantime.
And then we have the ambassadors of good cheer posting to Asia Argento’s Twitter account to blame her for Bourdain’s suicide.
Is this “Hungry Ghosts” thing based off Buddhist mythology?
It’s doing that just fine to itself all on its own. I think its entire membership would fit in a few phone booths, and its been stuck at those numbers for over a year.
@sister bat’leth and the real cie
I find it odd that a chef would hate fat people
I believe you, but I find that very odd
@Surplus to Requirements, Observer of the Vast Blight-Wing Enstupidation
I’ve not read it so I’ve no clue how far eastern the stories actually get, but this was Dark Horse’s solicitation text for it and it promises “very”:
Also what critics thought about it (link to review aggregator site):
https://comicbookroundup.com/comic-books/reviews/dark-horse-comics/hungry-ghosts
Good lord, how ugly!
I think the contradictions, the illogic, the let’s say distant relationship with anything like a fact, is all part of the alt-right thing.
Like scam emails seem to have become less convincing and with more errors: it weeds out the people who can spot when something is not right, as they are far more likely to ask the odd inconvenient question (like: do I really have a billionaire cousin I’ve never heard of who wants to send me money?) Because you want to focus on the people who won’t notice – or, with this hate-fuelled bunch, don’t care if it’s true, or plausible, or contradictory, so long as they get their hate hit.
A few decades of this kind of mental training, weeding out people who ask questions or even just say “steady on!”, and constant reinforcement of the worst possible impulses, and what do we get?
Gab, seems to be what we get.
With most of these being boiler-plate anti-Semitic trash, I did find that first post to be worth drilling down into.
This is the long game with these guys. To conflate basic human decency with being “PC” and then make being “PC” into a threat to freedom grave enough to be opposed with violence. This is the past week we saw David Hogg “SWATted” after all.
The article that Dave posted in the previous post by Sady Doyle touched on the way online harassment is used for narrative control. These people really do think that there are no bounds for narrative control; it’s not so much the message they care about, it’s their power to control it. In online spaces, it’s the ultimate means of asserting dominance.
And I really don’t know what to do about it. The quote-unquote “free market” will tolerate it, anonymity means they can’t be exposed (not that I would condone doxxing) and they’re entirely without shame. Short of a wholesale cultural awakening or some kind of epiphany on the part of the unaccountable heads of social media companies… all I can think of is settings a better example than these jokers.
Christ, is this depressing. An excellent, talented man with the kind of family tree which could furnish plots for six or seven epic novels dies and all these skulkers and squirmers can think to do is to spit poison on his memory. Rarely do I feel the need to take my brain out and wash it but I feel the need now. Eueuchhhhhhh.
I can’t find anything across the internet about Bourdain hating fat people. I tried looking up those sentiments with various wording but nothing came up. I did find his comments about not liking vegetarians and vegans, at least in the context of exploring other cultures and feeling it was narrow minded product of the first world.
Miss Cobalt said
Maybe so, but I seem to remember that Alton Brown (who had a very good show called Good Eats) was the same way.
@Sam – Here’s a video clip of Bourdain discussing obesity with Ted Nugent, of all people: https://www.travelchannel.com/videos/tony-chews-the-fat-with-ted-nugent-0141516
@Miss Cobalt:
I guess you could say … he doesn’t know what side his bread is buttered on!
badum-TISS
You say that like bigotry is rational.