Of reputation and scumbags.

Some interesting potential developments in Canadian defamation law that a few of you might find handy, so make yourselves comfortable and pay attention.

As many of you probably know, a fundamental requirement for something to be defamation in Canada is that what is said or published must, by definition, damage or injure or tarnish someone's reputation. This is not a controversial position; it's right there in the law. The group Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) explains it thusly:

"Defamation refers to harming another person’s reputation by making a false written or oral statement about that person to a third party. Defamation law is not about protecting pride; it is about protecting reputation and offering restitution to people whose reputations have been wrongly damaged."

So it's all about the reputation and, in most cases, this isn't an issue, as it's widely accepted that if you talk sufficient smack about someone, you've probably injured their widdle feewings in some suspiciously vague and vacuous way, and they get to hurl themselves onto their fainting couch and insist on large amounts of money as the only thing that will make them feel better.

But what about the occasional case where there's unlikely to be any damage to one's reputation because, quite simply, one doesn't have a reputation left to be damaged? What if one is such a vile, despicable, loathsome piece of human garbage that it's impossible to see how a reputation could in any way be tarnished or diminished even further than it already is? Now it gets interesting, doesn't it? But let's talk specifics, because that's where it gets really interesting.

We need to define the word "reputation" because, without that, we can't talk intelligibly about what it means for a reputation to be damaged, so if one checks the dictionary, one reads definitions like "what others think of you" or "the opinion that the general community has of you," that sort of thing. In short, your reputation is defined, not by you, but by others, and this is incredibly important because that is what establishes whether your reputation can be damaged. Let's start with a hypothetical, theoretical example.

Let's say someone called Rebel Media's Sheila Gunn Reid a "racist." If that happened, one might expect that Gunn Reid would throw her stereotypical hissy fit, scream "defamation" and demand reparations since her reputation has allegedly been injured. And this would typically be accompanied by screeching for proof that she is a racist, and so on. But that would, I think, be premature.

A simpler approach, it would seem, would be to suggest that if she already has a reputation as a racist, then there is no defamation, so the simpler approach would be to simply scan the Intertoobz, looking for examples of people calling Gunn Reid a "racist." And if one finds a sufficient number of such examples, then that is, by definition, part of her reputation. There can be no quibbling here; as we have already established, one's reputation is defined by what others think of you, and if, in general, people have no problem describing you as a "racist," then that is your reputation. Period. And if you have a reputation as a racist, then it is physically impossible to injure or damage that reputation by merely repeating what everyone else already says. See how that works?

INTERESTING SIDE NOTE: What's fascinating about the above argument is that, in that (hypothetical, theoretical) example, one need provide no evidence whatsoever that Gunn Reid is a racist as a defense; one need only provide evidence that she has a reputation as a racist, whether that reputation is accurate or not.

Now, I am not a lawyer, but it seems that the above analysis is on fairly firm ground, based on a simple reading of defamation law -- if defamation requires that someone's reputation be harmed, and you can prove that what you said merely matches their widely-accepted existing reputation, then, once again by definition, there can be no defamation.

(I fully expect some lawyer to leap frantically to his keyboard and pound out, "But you haven't taken into account established jurisprudence, as in the case of Kal-El v. Mr. Mxyzptlk 2008 (ONSC), wherein ..."

Shut up.)

Which brings us to one Ezra Levant, for whom every public slight, criticism or condemnation apparently tarnishes his reputation in such an egregious way that nothing but large sums of money can rouse him from his pearl-clutching, inconsolable sobbing. So let's do one more example, this time with exhibits.

Imagine someone had the temerity to publicly describe Ezra as, say, a "scumbag." This would almost certainly inspire a savage, unforgiving letter from whatever law firm had the lack of sense to sign their name to such a letter. Whatever. But rather than bow to demands to produce hard, cold proof of said scumbagitude, given the analysis above, it would seem that a far simpler defense would be to say little more than, "That is the reputation he already has; that is what the general public already thinks of your client." And by way of supporting evidence, one could use nothing more than simple online search engines to back that up.

One could, for example, produce this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

or this:

and let's just finish this off with a delightful montage, going all the way back to 2011:

I believe I've made my point but we can make a couple more observations before we leave.

First, the above is just the tiniest sample of what one can find on the Intertoobz if one searches for the delightful combination of the phrases "Ezra Levant" and "scumbag," -- after providing close to 30 examples, I believe I've made my case adequately. (And all that is just from Twitter.)

The more useful observation is that, having provided these examples, I have now paved the way for anyone to snap back with a defense if they end up in this situation. In effect, if my analysis holds up, I have effectively annihilated any possibility of Ezra suing anyone for calling him a "scumbag," as the prospective defendant can simply pop over here and print off this blog post as incontrovertible proof of Ezra's existing reputation. Isn't that convenient?

You're welcome.

AFTERSNARK: Over the next several days or weeks, we will be publishing similar searches for the very phrases that Ezra Levant claims so injured his reputation related to his 2016 Red Cross fundraiser, including:

• "grifter"
• "con man"
• "scam artist"
• "loathsome, vindictive, bottom-dwelling sleazebucket"

OK, I might be making that last one up.

P.S. Remember, this case is going to trial some year, so you're invited to help out at my fundraiser and, in return, I'll keep publishing delightful musings like this. I think that's a good deal.

You'll never believe what happened next!

Ezra: "David, we need to run another fundraiser. Go out there and get yourself arrested."

David: "On it, boss."

Rebel News' Sheila Gunn Reid: Liar.

I've written on this ugly incident before, but it's worth recapping how Rebel News' "Alberta Bureau Chief" and Connie Fournier-wannabe Sheila Gunn Reid is -- how to put this gently so as not to offend any delicate sensibilities -- a flat-out, bald-faced liar. Sure, that's sufficiently diplomatic. Onward.

It was back in April of this year (note once again, kids, how I am using the Internet's "Wayback Machine" to archive the salient content so that it can't be quietly deleted out from under me) that Rebel's self-proclaimed "oil patch arm candy" horked up the following incendiary accusation:

Wow, that's awkward ... Justin Trudeau cutting a personal cheque for $830,000 ... who would have guessed? Except that, predictably, that headline was pure and utter shash, as one discovers by simply reading Gunn Reid's rubbish.

In case the headline itself was not sufficiently provocative, Gunn Reid pounds home the point again early in the article:

OK, we get it already ... Justin Trudeau is sending our hard-earned petrodollars to people in China who want to kill us. But, lo ... what's this? Gunn Reid then provides an alleged link to official confirmation (patience, folks, we'll get there), but her excerpt in no way bolsters her claim of money being handed over:

What the above snippet reveals is only that there is a federal government grant for $828,046, and it is apparently being distributed amongst a number of parties, the Wuhan Institute of Virology being just one of them, so Gunn Reid's claim that the entire bucket of cash is going to China is, in fact, patently false on its face. But it gets worse (as it always does when Gunn Reid's style of shitty journalism is involved).

Following the link to the official Federal government grants page provided by Gunn Reid further reveals that the grant is destined for a researcher at the U of Alberta,

who appears to simply be collaborating with other parties, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology -- there is absolutely no indication that any of that money is headed for China. And, remember, this is the page supplied by Gunn Reid herself, who seems utterly uninterested in the fact that it completely undercuts her fiction. But, as always, we're not quite done here.

The last railroad spike in Gunn Reid's vanishing integrity can be found in a Globe and Mail article only a couple days later, which makes it nad-grindingly, thigh-suckingly clear that absolutely no Canadian taxpayer dollars are going overseas:

In other words, we have the outrageously dishonest and deliberately provocative headline from Rebel's Gunn Reid:

and we have the mundane reality:

Are we done here? Yeah, I think we're done here.

None dare call it "journalism." Because it's crap.

As I alluded to earlier, a large part of Ezra Levant's defamation action against me is based on the howlingly absurd suggestion that I damaged Ezra's reputation to the point where he had no choice but to hurl himself onto his fainting couch, clutching his pearls and sobbing inconsolably over the irreparable devaluation of his pristine public image of altruism, humanitarianism and saving kittens from burning buildings, whereupon it behooves me to explain the definition of the word "behooves."

No, wait, that's not right ... it behooves me to provide countless examples of how Ezra has no redeemable reputation, in particular in the area of legitimate journalism, which inspires the first in what will be a long, long, loooooooong line of examples of the wretched dishonesty that is Rebel News, from the ground up.

This example relates to a depressingly dishonest piece published by Rebel News from back in June of 2020, wherein Der Rebel insisted that nefarious Antifa forces in New York City were disguising cups of concrete as chocolate chip ice cream, apparently to use as lethal projectiles against police officers during riots; I've archived a copy of that silliness here, which opens with the breathless insistence that the concrete thing is an established fact, as you can see for yourself:

SIDE NOTE: Given that, as I have explained previously, there is no question that Ezra is quietly deleting online evidence related to this action, I am now making sure to save relevant content to the Internet Archive's "Wayback Machine" to make sure it's available when I eventually need it. In any event ... onward.

The most interesting (and embarrassing) aspect of that wretchedly dishonest Rebel piece is that, oddly, it doesn't reproduce the salient photograph of the alleged lethal projectiles, of which there is a photo in the very New York Post article linked to, so I'm going to do that for you:

I think you see the problem.

As you can read, the Rebel piece mindlessly regurgitates the idiotic speculation that, "Three portions of the concrete were poured into paper coffee cups and flecked to give them the appearance of chocolate chip ice cream."

Let's unpack this howling dumbassitude, shall we?

First, those flecks do not look like chocolate chips. They're not brown. They're ... what is the word I am looking for ... oh, right ... green. One is immediately reminded of the time Lord Edmund Blackadder returned home to a house apparently reeking of smoking dung to discover that his good friend, Lord Percy Percy, had succeeded in creating a nugget of purest green. That is the level of dumbass stupid we're dealing with here. But I grow snarky. Onward.

The next immediate observation is that the two "containers" on the right are clearly halves of the same larger container, sliced horizontally, which seems more than a little odd if one is determined to create lethal, anti-police projectiles. If a regular cup produced an overly large lethal projectile, why not just use smaller containers?

Finally, the odd writing on the containers ... oh, fuck it, let's cut to the chase, as numerous readers immediately clarified that what one was looking at was nothing more than (and I reproduce the explanation directly from the NYPost article:

The containers were nothing more than concrete test samples, with the writing on the cups explaining the composition of the concrete contained therein. And yet ... and yet ... you will find no hint of this mundane explanation in that wretchedly conspiratorial Rebel piece, which seems odd given that the Post article provided that explanation only two paragraphs below the screechingly hysterical Antifa-soaked conspiracy theory espoused by the worthless hacks at der Rebel, as you can see below:

In the end, one could, I suppose, simply assume that the person who wrote that horrid piece of nonsense was a blithering idiot, but that would overlook the fact that the author reproduced the baseless accusation while carefully averting his or her eyes from the prosaic explanation only two paragraphs further down.

Such is the lack of journalistic integrity we are dealing with here.

BONUS TRACK: That same worthless piece of journalistic Rebel rubbish also suggests that protesters were carefully stockpiling bricks around the city in preparation for imminent riots. That is also utter shash, as you can read here -- I won't waste my time eviscerating that idiocy at length.

COMING SOON: Rebel News' Sheila Gunn Reid and her execrable dishonesty regarding Justin Trudeau and his alleged funding of the Wuhan Virology Lab; you won't want to miss that.

"Execrable": Look it up.

COMMENTS: You can leave comments, but they will be ruthlessly moderated; I have no patience for trolls.

The dumbest journalists in the world.

 I came to this late after the idiocy had already been scrubbed but, apparently, Ottawa journo Glen McGregor allowed himself to be goaded into childish dumbth by Rebel News hack and self-described oil patch trailer trash Sheila Gunn Reid. As I can piece it together from indirect evidence, Reid called out McGregor for alleged conflict of interest involving McGregor's ex-wife being employed by the WE charity. Rather than knowing how to properly respond to the perpetual sleazefest and deliberate provocation that is Rebel News, McGregor apparently took the bait, made an ass of himself on Twitter, then scrubbed the evidence. Point: Rebel News.

Before I explain what McGregor should have done, first some schadenfreude. It was only a few years ago when the bottom-dwelling scavengers at Rebel News were being refused accreditation to events they wanted to attend (and crap all over) that various Canadian journalistic endeavours, boasting of their nobility and fairness and sense of journalistic solidarity and whatever the fuck they thought they were bringing to the table, stepped up and defended Der Rebel; in return, Rebel has subsequently taken a steaming dump on the lot of them ever since.

Some of us tried to warn them; for our troubles, we were ignored. So ... how's that sense of solidarity working out for you journos? Yeah, I thought so. In any event, to business, and my take on how McGregor should have responded in a way that would not have seen him getting spanked publicly.

There is always a little irony in anyone from Der Rebel accusing others of bias or a conflict of interest, given that Rebel News appears to float on an ocean of conflict of interest, driven by little more than what fills their coffers. Much of this is speculation, but I believe I can paint a compelling picture, so let's go for a stroll.

First, it's all about the mailing lists.Whenever you see an org like Rebel creating and promoting eight zillion fundraisers and twice that number of useless petitions, it's almost a certainty that the goal is to create a priceless collection of contacts that can be used for solicitation/fundraising, especially if one can rent that list out to others for the same purpose. And why do I think this?

It's because I am, in fact, on Rebel's mailing list. No, I did not sign up -- the evidence suggests I was added as a cruel joke, but it turns out that being on that list has been remarkably informative since part of what is dumped on me is clearly campaign material representing the occasional political candidate who appears to have handed over cash in order to have their nonsense spewed forth to Rebel's target demographic of mostly illiterate, racist, xenophobic, hygienically-challenged, mouth-breathing troglodytes. This material can generally be identified as it comes tagged with the phrase "Sponsored Content," which kind of gives away the game, if you catch my drift.

So what's the potential problem with this scenario? I'm glad you asked.

Speculating just a little further, if one simply follows the money (as one is always advised to do), it would seem that there is at least a little conflict of interest in:

• advertising a clearly right-wing-flavoured mailing list to right-wing political candidates,
• taking money from said candidates to promote their candidacy or fundraise for them, then
  
• subsequently interviewing those candidates, peppering them with softball questions and relentlessly touting their virtues to your viewers.
  

For Rebel News "Alberta Bureau Chief" and head screech harpy Sheila Gunn Reid to yammer on about someone else's conflict of interest if her own "media outlet" is doing the above would be just a wee bit hypocritical, wouldn't you say? And is there any proof of this? Well, apart from the "Sponsored Content" I've seen, some Rebel coverage does seem more than a little slanted, as some of the recent CPC leadership candidates got fawning coverage, while others got ripped several new orifices. Even now, after the leadership race is over, Rebel still seems to be oddly gushing over losing candidate Leslyn Lewis:

Is one allowed to ask whether this ongoing hero worship involves any quid pro quo? (And, hey, as conservatives love to say, I'm not making any accusations, I'm only asking, right?)

In any event, the next time anyone from Rebel News has the temerity to start slinging around accusations of bias or conflict of interest, it might be amusing to ask if they're taking actual money to promote the very people they end up interviewing and praising on air.

Hey, I'm only asking.

BONUS TRACK: I distinctly remember at least one "Sponsored Content" blast from Rebel on behalf of deranged wingnut Maxime Bernier and, lo and behold, look who Rebel Media is touting today:

What are the odds?

Have I made my point? Yeah, I think I've made my point.

You're welcome, Glen McGregor.

UPPITY DATE: Oh, Good Lord ... as if to prove my point, Rebel News continues to fawn all over failed CPC leadership candidate Leslyn Lewis:

Have I made my point? Yeah, I think I've made my point.

The cottage industry of right-wing fundraisers ... what could possibly go wrong?

It's encouraging to see the constabulary down south finally take a serious look at the burgeoning industry of weird, suspicious and questionable right-wing fundraisers, like the absolute fraud involving former Trump senior adviser and Cryptkeeper stunt double Steve Bannon. However, it turns out there's more here than meets the eye, which is why we're here, so make yourself comfortable and let me explain.

I like to think there are two types of problematic fundraisers -- the first is the eye-rollingly, hysterically fraudulent ones like Bannon's "WeBuildTheWall" rip-off, wherein the organizers simply helped themselves to the dosh, and it's nice to see the cops finally taking stuff like that seriously, which is as it should be.

However, there is a second type of fundraiser that I have been reliably informed is starting to attract the attention of the authorities to the south, and that's the type wherein, technically, the funds collected go to the registered recipient, but the basis or rationale for the fundraiser appears to be at least a little misleading or deceptive. For examples, one need look no further than the online begathons for conservative screech harpies and conspiracy theorists Laura Loomer and Millie Weaver, and it's Weaver's fundraiser we're going to take a closer look at, as it's more recent and it brought in a pile of cash that -- according to every bit of information available -- was totally and utterly unnecessary. But let's do this slowly.

First, the indisputable facts. Weaver, recently given the boot by Alex Jones for being too much of a dingbat even for Infowars (wrap your head around that), was arrested Aug 14, 2020. A shrieky, hysterical fundraiser was immediately registered for her courtesy of none other than Rebel News' Ezra Levant, with the relentless implication that Weaver was the victim of political persection as she was about to release an apparent "bombshell" exposing the "Deep State" "conspiracy" against "President" "Donald Trump." Predictably, this inspired rubes and marks everywhere to pour money into the fundraiser, to the point where it currently sits just north of $175,000.

The truth is somewhat more mundane -- Weaver and two others were arrested for nothing more than assault and robbery for a physical confrontation with Weaver's mother, facts which have been amply documented all over the Intertoobz. Understand: this is incontrovertible -- the indictment was released on Aug 17 and everyone who read it is aware of what happened. (Aug 17: remember that date, as it's important later.) So, how did a simple case of slapping around one's mom and stealing her cell phone transmogrify into a $175,000 windfall for a total loon? Well, let's start at the beginning, where the Millie Weaver fundraiser itself gives us all the clues we need.

The first oddity is that the fundraiser is weirdly short of details in its very title:

It seems awfully convenient that the fundraiser organizer is so maddeningly value about the rationale for this particular begathon ... "legal defense fund"? For what reason? What are the charges? One might almost suspect deliberate vagueness to keep the rubes guessing. And further down that same page, again, a lack of specifics but the definite implication that all this money is necessary in the name of journalism:

In short, while the fundraiser is maddeningly short on actual specifics, it is certainly doing its best to leave a particular impression. In any event, onward.

Here's the very first update, published the very day of Weaver's arrest (it would be impolite to speculate how quickly fundraisers like this magically appear ... so I won't):

 

And here's the main oddity related to that Aug 14 update. While the indictment against Weaver was not released until Aug 17 (again, remember that date), surely Weaver would have been told the reason for her arrest; I'm fairly sure that's required by law. And if she knew, then it would seem only logical that she would mention that to whoever was about to register a fundraiser on her behalf. And yet ... and yet ... nothing. Ezra talks about "connecting with legal counsel," yet not one word about the actual charges against Weaver. That just seems ... odd. But it gets odder.

Here's fundraiser organizer Ezra Levant the very next day, crowing over all that dosh, and yet ... still no details about the indictment. Surely, a former lawyer with years of experience fundraising and defending barking mad loons like Weaver would have, by now, asked to see the actual charges. And yet ... and yet ... nothing ... while the fundraiser happily leaves donors with an undeniably mistaken impression as to what's happening. But it's the second update from that same day of Aug 15 that is the capper, as you can read this at the very bottom:

I'm sorry ... what? After an entire day, fundraiser organizer Ezra Levant still insists he has no idea what the charges are? Even more appallingly, as you can read, he openly admits to being utterly uninterested: "I do not have any reliable information about the charges against her, but that's irrelevant to me --"

Pause with me for a second -- what you see above is fundraiser organizer Ezra Levant, being grilled by GoFundMe about the details of the fundraiser he's organized, openly admitting that he doesn't know the backstory and, more critically, he simply doesn't care.

The mind reels. But we're not done here, as here is the third update, still from Aug 15:

I draw your attention to Ezra's assurance that Weaver's family friend Matt "gave me a briefing and we talked legal strategy" [emphasis added]. Which raises the obvious question -- how in the name of Mutt does a former lawyer and current fundraiser organizer "talk legal strategy" without knowing any of the details of the indictment? How is that possible? And remember, only earlier that day, Ezra assured GoFundMe that he did not know any of the details of the indictment, but he also had no interest in them. Yet here he is the very same day "talking legal strategy." How does that work? But there is one more point worth making.

Remember that the indictment against Weaver was released on Aug 17, at which point everyone and their ferret suddenly learned about how mundane this whole case was, with many, many, many, many, many, many, many people turning on Weaver and her fundraiser with words like "scam" and "fraud". One need not take my word for it, when Twitter is always happy to help.

At which point we can wrap things up by remembering that the indictment was released to the public on August 17, 2020, which is -- in a weird coincidence -- the date of the very last update on that fundraiser. I mean, it's not like anyone would want to finally admit to all those donors the contents of the released indictment -- probably best to just walk away and let the money keep rolling in, which is apparently just what happened.

So, are we done here? Yeah, we're done here. And if you really want to support legitimate, independent journalism (i.e., me), hey, there's a fundraiser. But you knew that, right?

AFTERSNARK: It's amusing that, even back on Aug 17, people had a good idea of what was up. I'm just saying.

YOU KNEW THIS WAS COMING: Having been exposed for the huckster that she is, Weaver sobs inconsolably and plays the victim card. Readers are having none of it.

SOMETIMES, THE JOKES JUST WRITE THEMSELVES: Rebel News will now lecture you on financial irregularities. No, really.

"THE GRIFT THAT KEEPS ON GRIFTING": How delightfully descriptive.

"... and if you don't like that feeble rationalization, we have others."

Recently, my current (and only) Twitter account, "rpjday", was unceremoniously suspended by Twitter. Unsurprisingly, I was given no reason whatsoever, other than Twitter's standard "You have violated our terms of service" -- no precise alleged offense(s), no reference to the relevant tweet(s), and, therefore, no opportunity to delete anything to recover my account. In short, when it comes to giving us left-wing progressives the heave-ho, it was just Twitter being Twitter.

I made a few desultory attempts to appeal, with utterly predictable results -- a relentless and meaningless repetition of the original suspension notice, and nothing more. I was prepared to finally say, oh, fuck it, the bigots, racists and Nazis can have the fucking platform since they seem to own it already, anyway.  Until this morning when, after one more appeal attempt where I insisted on escalating this to a manager, Twitter suddenly moved the goalposts entirely, and it's that story I'll describe so that others who get shafted the same way will at least expect it, and will understand the fundamental dishonesty of Twitter as a fair and balanced social media platform.

You see, it was this morning when I received this response to my latest appeal attempt, where even a bloviating airhead like Pierre Poilievre can see what Twitter is now saying, and I'm going to screencap this since, if I didn't, you'd swear I was making this up:

So, for the very first time, this would be Twitter being a little more precise about the justification for my suspension (still without examples), but before we get into the above-mentioned "platform manipulation rules," let's pause to appreciate something critically important -- that I am being accused of "multiple or severe" violations of said rules. What this means is that, whatever these violations might be, they should be blatant and unambiguous -- they cannot be simply misinterpretations or possibilities. To describe said violations as "multiple or severe" means they had better be massively, screamingly obvious -- anything less than that won't fit Twitter's own description.  And so, to work. (And lest you suggest I am cherry-picking the facts, you're welcome to follow along here at Twitter's own page that explains "platform manipulation.")

I had never really paid attention to the concept of platform manipulation until reading the opening of Twitter's page this morning, which introduces the idea thusly:

Ah, says I, so what we're talking about are the various ways that people, quite simply, "game the system" -- that is obviously what the above is describing. But what, I ask myself, does this have to do with me, as I have never indulged in any of that sort of nonsense. On the other hand, since Twitter is making the accusation, it behooves us to look up the definition of the word "behooves." No, wait, that's not right; rather, it behooves us to go through that page to figure out what my Twitter-related sins might be and, once again, I will emphasize that those sins must be right out front and screamingly clear for Twitter to describe them as "multiple or severe," so let's wander through that page to see what fits the bill, shall we?

I feel comfortable in suggesting that I haven't been engaged in anything even remotely resembling any of the above -- I don't get involved in spam, and I certainly don't "coordinate" my commentary with anyone else in a regular way (it's not as if anyone would want to coordinate with me in the first place). So I don't think any of the above applies to me. Onward.

Here's the very next section:

I'd say I'm in the clear with respect to this section as my profile pic is mine, and all of the bio information is accurate, so I think we can conclude this part is not the problem. Moving on ...

Um, OK ... I'm fairly sure I'm safe with this section as, given that I had just the one active account until Twitter fucked me over, I don't see how I could be guilty of overlapping accounts, mutually interacting accounts or coordination. And as for the rest of that silliness, I think most people would accept that most of what showed up on my Twitter timeline was original content, with the occasional retweet of someone else's work, along with regular lambasting of people who so thoroughly deserved it. In short, I'm going to say that I'm not guilty of anything listed above in any "multiple or severe" way. Once again, onward ...

... where the next category of violations appears to involve trying to game the system in the sense of inflating metrics or analytics or some such thing:

I can safely say I have never engaged in anything even remotely resembling the above so, as before, this section again has nothing to do with me. (Are you starting to sense a pattern?)

On now to alleged misuse of Twitter product features (whatever the hell that means), which is described thusly:

You know what ... if the relentless use of the word "JUXTAPOSE" falls into this category, I might just be guilty, but I'm finding it hard to see how any of the above applies to me. So let's keep going to the very next section:

Um, no ... I'm inordinately lazy in terms of following people at the best of times, and for the life of me, I can't remember adding anyone to a list or tagging a moment. Ever. And as for the next category of alleged violations:

Jesus, I rarely use hashtags at the best of times, so there's no conceivable way this could apply to me. And, finally, we have the alleged violation:

I have never, to my knowledge, posted a link to anything other than what I wanted to use to bolster the tweet it was part of, so if you put all this together, I'm fairly confident I am not guilty of any of the above even once, much less "multiple or severe" examples, as I suspect my regular readers will attest to. But, wait ... here's the best part, as having listed in detail the alleged violations that fall in this category (none of which I am guilty of), Twitter hilariously, right after that, explains the exceptions to all of the above, and I'm sure you will piss yourselves with laughter upon reading what Twitter grants as exceptions:

That's right ... accounts that fall under the category of "parody" or "commentary" are explicitly exempted from these violations. I'm sure you can see the mouth-breathing idiocy in all of this.

In any event, it will be amusing to see how frantically Twitter moves the goalposts when this latest excuse falls flat on its face. I'm sure it will be epic.

What's the point in asking if they won't answer you, anyway?

As part of an existing update over at my fundraiser to take on Ezra Levant in court, I thought this short snippet would be enlightening. In his Statement of Claim of June 2016, Ezra explicitly called me out for not having contacted him directly to clarify the claims I had been making.

Now, this complaint is more than a little hypocritical since Ezra had already blocked me on Twitter, so it's not clear how one can explicitly refuse to see communications from someone else on social media, then proceed to complain about how those people subsequently don't communicate with you on social media but that's neither here nor there.

What is interesting is that others did in fact try to get information out of either Ezra or other Rebel Media staffers and, for their trouble, they were ignored, or simply mocked and ridiculed while being told nothing.

I present to you the case of one "Camron" who, as you can see, over the course of two days, simply wants to know if Indiegogo waived their standard 5% processing fee for Ezra's boutique fundraiser.

As you can clearly see, despite Camron's relentless quest to get a simple answer to a simple question, staffers at Rebel Media simply ridicule him, without telling him what he wanted to know.

Under the circumstances, it seems more than a little hypocritical for Ezra to criticize me for not trying to get clarification from him, when others tried exactly that, and they were sent packing.

UPPITY DATE: It's worth adding a couple extra examples of Ezra Levant's hypocrisy, wherein he insists he would have been happy to explain all of the inconsistencies and implausibilities related to his fundraiser, if only I had taken the time to ask.

As I have already demonstrated, others did go the trouble to ask, and were invariably mocked, insulted and/or ignored by various staffers at Rebel Media. Here's another example of someone asking a very precise and specific question about the fundraiser's claim to be able to fully and completely match all donations:

As anyone familiar with Twitter can tell from the above, "Justin" is asking a very specific question about the matching, and you can clearly see that, despite tagging both Ezra Levant and Rebel TV, he never gets a reply, even to this day.

As one more example, the very next day, we have exactly the same thing:

Again, despite "Real Urban Su" replying directly to Ezra and additionally tagging Rebel's Sheila Gunn Reid, there is no reply. And yet, despite this, Ezra's position is that I needed only to ask to have everything explained to me.

The evidence pretty clearly suggests otherwise.

UPPITIER DATE: It's worth reproducing a further tweet from Twitterer "RealUrbanSu":

wherein Su finally lays to rest the claim that all one had to do was ask Ezra Levant or Rebel Media for clarification and they would have provided it.