Denis Finley, the former editor of the Burlington Free Press who was fired this week for posting a series of offensive tweets, found himself in more amenable surroundings Thursday night: on Fox News’ primetime “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”
Carlson served up a series of softball questions designed to portray the ex-editor as a victim of leftist intolerance, and Finley accepted the martyr’s role gladly.
In his introduction, Carlson referred to Finley’s firing on Tuesday (it was actually Monday, sir) “after he tweeted questions about a Vermont proposal to create a third gender option for driver’s licenses.”
Well, the tweet that touched off the firestorm was not a question but a plain statement: “Awesome! That makes us one step closer to the apocalypse.”
Carlson’s first question to Finley wasn’t a question either. It was a statement expressing puzzlement at why he was fired.
“There’s a powerful contingent of speech police out there,” Finley replied. “This is an extremely liberal state, progressive state, and I kind of galvanized them unwittingly … and they didn’t want to stop until they had my head on a platter.”
The former Freepster then asserted that those dastardly liberals “think it’s a feather in their cap if they can get rid of someone who disagrees with them.” He continued to wrap himself in the victim’s mantle.
“They’re asking me to toe the line. They’re asking me to agree with them,” Finley said. “They’re holding my feet to the fire to make sure that the orthodoxy wins out.”
Referring to Gannett, the Free Press’ corporate parent, Carlson posited that “big companies have become the heavies for the cultural left.”
“I think a lot of big media companies are more or less encouraging the left,” Finley responded. “I think they want us to conform to the prevailing ideology that’s out there, and the prevailing ideology that’s out there is leftist.”
Carlson closed the interview with a lovely Christmas Carol invocation. “They take your job away, and here we are in the middle of winter in Vermont, you got no job,” he said. “So our prayers are with you, Denis. Good luck.”
All that was missing was a swell of violins.
A few notes about this mutual love-fest: Finley betrayed a profound ignorance of Vermont by trafficking in stereotypes. That’s unbefitting a person who was trying to reflect the community his former employer serves. He apparently arrived with a closed mind and departed the same way.
He and Carlson misled viewers on the substance of the dispute. Finley was deliberately provocative at best, downright intolerant at worst. He wasn’t just “asking questions.” He was poking his community with a stick.
As conservatives often do, he ascribed far more power to the leftist hordes than they actually possess. Finley wasn’t a victim of liberal hegemony. He lost his job because he worked for a cautious organization that knows it can’t afford to alienate any of its remaining readers. Just ask Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) if Big Media is an arm of the left. It’ll give him a good laugh.
I suspect this is the first in a series of Finley appearances and Fox News program segments. Perhaps a Donald Trump tweet is in his future. Almost certainly a book deal, so he can rail against political correctness and the imagined conspiracy between Big Media and the far left.
Awesome!
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A bigoted journalist who didn’t have enough self control to adhere to the ethical precepts of his employer and his profession found a friend on Fox News? Now there’s a surprise! LOL!
Suggest that ‘I give up’ be limited in the number of ridiculous comments he is permitted to make. You’d think that Seven Days was his own personal website.but then, maybe it is. I can take only so much of the braying of a mule or is this case as ass.
This is a pretty dishonest news story: neither of these correspondents acknowledges the journalist’s “apocalypse” statement that triggered the whole thing. This was not a “question” but a prejudicial statement.
I am old enough , but still much younger then Walters, to remember when it was right wing intolerance that was worry some . Now , at least in this blue state, it’s the left wing zealots who will lynch you . Ain’t that ironic .
Poor Denis: easier to play the victim card and blame those big bad leftists than to accept responsibility for your own ill-thought out actions. Seriously, there’s no way he could have not seen this coming.
He was a hack as an editor at best anyways. Good riddance.
Emily McManamy, you are spot on. John Walters, i disagree with your statement, “He lost his job because he worked for a cautious organization that knows it can’t afford to alienate any of its remaining readers.” (Besides, how do you know?) Read the code of ethics, read Gannett’s social-media policy. I would expect (hope!) that had he tweeted favorably about the issue he also would have been let go. It’s just not acceptable. He was a journalist and an editor, not an editorial columnist. He should have known better. The fact that he didn’t tells me he never should have been in that position in the first place.
He “poked his community with a stick”? That’s dangerously close to freedom of expression. Thank goodness we have newspaper columnists advocating for his censure. After all, failing to ostracize those who express unpopular ideas might result in an unfettered marketplace of ideas. Apparently that violates what now passes for journalistic ethics. Thanks for setting us all straight, John.
Why are the people of Vermont allowing themselves to consider an X category on drivers licenses for people who comprise a mere .001% of the population? Is no one willing to consider the rights of 99.1% of the people who are not suffering from this affliction(40% suicide rate), and deserve to have their quality of life upheld instead? Wouldn’t that make much more sense? Now the normal folks must put up with this unfortunate debate.
This condition known as gender dysphoria is going to grow now that states are recognizing it and catering to it! Any consideration of special status for these suffering folks should be rejected in favor of loving care and counseling so that these people can accept rather than contend with their DNA. They are going to lose the struggle as one cannot fight against who and what one is in the biological sense. You are the sex you are for a reason, to a very great purpose. You MUST accept it people!!!
The point is, however, this effort by the LGBTQ movement to legitimize these abberant lifestyle choices,is the next step in the further legitimization of ill-advised alternative lifestyles which have been tried countless times before in the history of man; and each time the result was legislation put in place to make such deviations from the cultural norms of the time, illegal; to protect society, and mostly the suffering people themselves from a disastrous fate.
The ones who oppose this transgenderism effort are the ones who are truly loving these people. They want to save them from their own disastrous destiny if left unattended.
Can Seven Days amend this article to include an explanation about a journalists code of ethics? That is at the core of this editors dismissal. Journalists are required to remain neutral and report without bias. Regardless of the content of his tweets, to comment publicly like Finley did places a shadow over the fair and balanced reporting of his newsroom. In this era of fake news, that is not something that can be taken lightly.
Nothing you quoted was inaccurate or stereotypical. Vermont is an extremely liberal state, and he was fired because his opinions were deemed unacceptable to express publicly. But I get it; if you gin up outrage you get to fight their outrage with your own. We all get to be red in the face and yell at each other, and maybe someone gets hit by a car.
It’s all just lovely.
No, wait. Wrong word. Tiresome. Yeah, that’s it. You’re tiresome, John.