Because Peter Thiel is gay and Hulk Hogan is a racist. Because rich people can ruin what they want.
Following a lengthy court battle started to exact vengeance and financed by Thiel, Gawker closed shop on Monday. The other Gawker sites like Jezebel and Deadspin live on, after being auctioned off to Univision.
While some believe Gawker and its founder Nick Denton got their just desserts, I am bothered by the fact that a rich asshole can use the courts to bankrupt a media company because he didn’t like its coverage of him. For all its faults, bad judgment, and creepiness, Gawker was an amazing place. I loved it. I loved the authors (some) and commenters (also some), and I will miss it dearly.
I’m old enough to remember when you had to audition to be a commenter on the Gawker websites. There was a bouncer at the door, and you had to permission to enter before anyone ever heard your voice. You had to be smart and canny. Your words had to be astute, and it didn’t hurt to be amusing. I don’t recall the exact comment, but after lurking for years, I finally went for it circa 2006 and got approved on my first try by then- Jezebel author Slut Machine. I think I said something about not having to wash your nursing bras because of the anti-bacterial properties of breast milk. Brilliant stuff.
Sure, I spend most of my time reading and commenting on Jezebel, but Gawker was my favorite to browse because it was a little less nice. The commentariat had an edge. It felt less like a junior year women’s studies class at Oberlin (not that I wouldn’t love to take that class). I’m a far left liberal, but Gawker was a less axiomatic than Jez is. Less echo chamber.
Gawker is gone, and many of the writers are moving to the other Gawker sites but it will not be the same. Something is lost. My favorite time suck is lost. I need some new ones, and I’m taking suggestions.
Here are some potential new time sucks I have considered:
Working
I have a full-time job. I should be doing it. But I’m a business writer by trade, and I cannot write for 8 hours straight. I need a distraction. I need a distraction about every five minutes.
Spend More Time on Reddit
Hahahahahaha. No.
Finally Read Written in My Own Heart’s Blood
I’ve owned this book since it dropped over two years ago. I might start Outlander Book 8 as soon as I’m done reading Field Notes from a Catastrophe, a book about how climate change is real, not political, and should worry us all.
Make More Gifs
I’m going to take clips of my favorite TV shows and put some slick closed captioned font on them and create my own gifs. Then I’m going to tell everyone my gifs are free for the taking. Steal my gifs. Steal the gif I made and I won’t complain about it. Promise. Why? Because I made my gif by stealing someone else’s visuals and words. That’s how gifs work. You stole the content to make your gif. STEALING GIFS IS NOT A THING.
Learn to Play Another Sport
I can’t run right now because my knee is busted and because I have walking pneumonia. I’m not supposed to run (or fast walk). And I can’t play tennis because they found out I had walking pneumonia by taking a chest x-ray after a tennis injury. What luck!
So I need a new sport. One that requires little effort or breathing or chest muscles. Bridge? Competitive oyster eating?
Drink More Rosé
The summer is almost over so I need to get my rosé wine drinking done. But shoot! I’m on narcotic cough syrup. I’m a risk taker, but I’m not stupid.
Go Back to Old School Sites
At my friend Dave Davy’s suggestion, I should go back to the sites I loved in the early aughts. (Yes, his parents named him that. His mom’s a bitch** and she knows it because I told it to her face after the Chicago Marathon in 2012. I keep it real.)
I should go old school with sites like Fark and Metafilter. And since Bravo killed Television Without Pity, I can get my TV recap fix over at Vulture. One of my fave former Gawker writers, Brian Moylan, does the best Real Housewives recaps there. His metaphors are like a Linda Vanderpump’s closet made a baby with a free dim sum buffet. Perfection.
Were any of TN girls Gawker readers? How sad are you? What other time sucks do you ladies enjoy? Help a girl out! Spill! Unless your fave time suck is reading Donald Drumpf erotica. Keep that shit to yourself.
**ETA that Dave Davy’s mom is a total sweetheart and a retired public school teacher who takes a joke well. And Dave is a Junior, so his parents were not the first to come up with the name David Davy.
