Vitriol Proliferates on Jewish Blogs!

Stop the presses!
Back in April, an article appeared in the Herald Tribune that discussed the lack of civility to be found on blogs. One of the people interviewed was Richard Silverstein, whose “Tikkun Olam” blog often promotes his far-left, anti-Zionist perspective on the Middle East and Israel. In the interview, Silverstein bemoaned the hatred thrown his way by his ideological opponents, especially as demonstrated by an anonymous blog called Little Dickie’s Diaper Droppings which criticizes Silverstein in a decidedly juvenile and angry manner. This week’s Forward offers a follow up on this saga and positions Silverstein as the leading victim of what they call “the below-the-belt discourse that has taken hold in the world of Jewish blogging. Scurrilous barbs and sharp-tongued insults are routinely tossed back and forth through cyberspace from one Jewish blogger to another…”

What the article fails to mention about Silverstein is that, well, he sure has no problem hurling invective while making unsubstantiated allegations. Here’s what the new poster boy for online decency says about yours truly:

June 4, 2007: “I find CK at Jewlicious to be one of the snarky, smug and more objectionable figures in the Jewish blog world.” Later, after making allegations about my involvement with the Little Dickie site, he added “I consider him to be an annoying, lying SOB.” and also “CK is an oaf…”

June 13, 2007: Here he called me “Jewlicious’ sleazy owner” and claimed that I stole an image from his site. The doctrine of fair use would disagree with that assessment – the fair use of copyrighted material is not theft. That’s the law. But when the law is not on his side, Silverstein simply invokes some kind of moral prerogative, the violation of which should cause me shame. But as he notes, “Abitbol knows no shame.” He also notes that because of my artistic assault against him, a fellow Jew, my Jewishness “is only skin deep.” The image in question, reproduced on the Little Dickie site and in TM’s post below, simply illustrated a post about a Little Green Footballs/Silverstein blog dust up. Oh my. Lock up your daughters and hide your silver away! At least he used the post to kinda, sorta grudgingly almost retract his claim that I was involved in some kind of Zionist Cabal to defame him along with the creator of the Little Dickie blog and all these other people I don’t know and have never interacted with. Mind you, that retraction should have been added to the original post accusing me of direct involvement, but whatever. Who am I to preach standards to Saint Silverstein who has never, ever posted onto his site copyright protected photos of fellow Jewish bloggers he disagrees with. Ever.

I never visit Silverstein’s non-entity of a blog anymore. I realized long ago that he is an attention whore and a drama Queen who revels in his self-made image as a victim of his ideological enemies. I had to address Silverstein’s hypocrisy because the Forward saw fit to feature him in an article, but otherwise I am content to allow him to continue to bask in his irrelevance and obscurity, fashioning conspiracy theories and hateful invective for himself and his little crew of special friends.

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ck

Publisher at Jewlicious

Founder and Publisher of Jewlicious, David Abitbol lives in Jerusalem with his wife, newborn daughter and toddler son. Blogging as "ck" he's been blocked on twitter by the right and the left, so he's doing something right.

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