David Dubrow

Author

  • About Dave
    • Interviews
  • Dave’s Blog
  • Dave’s Fiction
    • The Armageddon Trilogy
      • The Blessed Man and the Witch
      • The Nephilim and the False Prophet
      • The Holy Warrior and the Last Angel
    • Dreadedin Chronicles: The Nameless City
    • Get the Greek: A Chrismukkah Tale
    • Beneath the Ziggurat
    • The Ultimate Guide to Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse
  • Free Stories
    • Hold On
    • How to Fix a Broken World
    • The Armageddon Trilogy Character List and Glossary
  • Social
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • Google +
    • Amazon
    • Goodreads

Red Flags and Ginger Nuts of Horror

February 22, 2016 by David Dubrow 19 Comments

For about eight months I was a staff writer for a horror website called Ginger Nuts of Horror. I spent many long, unpaid hours reading books and writing reviews of those books, sharing the site’s social media posts, and generally supporting the site and its writers. And then I was kicked off the staff for expressing, on my own social media outlets, the same political opinions that millions and millions and millions of other people have. You probably share many of those opinions.

When he kicked me out, site owner Jim Mcleod didn’t tell me, “Look, man, I disagree with your political beliefs, so you’ve got to go. You’re out.” That would require courage. Instead, he simply ousted me from the various accounts and processes available to writers of the site, ignored my courteous request for an explanation, and hoped that I would quietly disappear. It’s not the first time he’s engaged in this pusillanimous unpersoning process, and it will no doubt not be the last. Leftists love purges.

Whenever anything unfortunate happens, my go-to thought is, “Well, it’s bad that it happened, but it would be worse if you didn’t learn anything from it.” There’s value in failure, in setback, in even a stubbed toe. Getting kicked off of Ginger Nuts of Horror rates at around the stubbed toe level on the Life’s Setbacks Meter, but it’s worth discussing because you can learn from my mistakes.

My biggest mistake was ignoring the red flags. Those red flags, the feelings in your gut that tell you something’s wrong: they’re there to protect you. Red flags never disappear: we just paper over them and tell ourselves that they’re unimportant, or even worse, not really there. A good example in my case is when Jim Mcleod posted on social media, “If you share memes from places with titles like RIGHT WING……please be advised that you will receive an automatic unfriending[.]” While I’m not one to do such a terrible, proscribed thing myself, I am a right-winger. Still, I ignored the (literal) writing on the wall, and as such allowed myself to be put in the position of getting purged. What made this bizarre social media post even more unfortunate was the number of people who approved of it through Likes and comments, many of whom are writers themselves. Imagine how they feel about those readers who don’t share their politics.

Another red flag was the site owner’s enemies list: he has a digital list of people who are considered persona non grata for reasons that range from the personally petty to the virtually nonexistent. The irony of someone who hates the right wing so much having a Nixonian enemies list was not lost on me; I kept a screenshot of it for amusement’s sake. Nevertheless, I ignored the character-defining importance of this red flag, which I shouldn’t have.

The third and last of the important red flags I papered over was the prevalence of leftist social commentary on the site under the guise of book and movie analysis. The lack of ideological balance wasn’t troubling; this wasn’t a news site, after all. The inclusion, however, of social justice boilerplate into the discussion of genre fiction bothered me, and I foolishly ignored it.

When it comes to red flags, the important lessons to take away are:

1) When they tell you they don’t like people like you, take them seriously. Even if they don’t know you. Life’s too short to work for people who don’t like you. Don’t feel like you have to hide who you are to please people who don’t like you.
2) O’Sullivan’s Law has yet to be broken. Radio Free Europe’s John O’Sullivan famously said, “All organizations that are not actually right-wing will over time become left-wing.” If they’re not left-wing already.
3) Your forbearance is weakness. You don’t get plaudits for keeping quiet when you disagree. Not swinging the bat every time someone throws the ball used to be a prized quality, a sign of manners and reserve, but no longer. Silence equals consent. Speak up for yourself and your beliefs.
4) The work you did with them, the work you did for them doesn’t matter: what matters is that you have the right opinions. And if you happen to have the wrong opinions, you’d better keep quiet if you know what’s good for you.

See, to the SJW, your differing opinion is HATE. And hate of any kind can’t be tolerated…unless they hate you, which is justified because you’re hateful. That I kept my hateful political opinions carefully separate from the writing I did for Ginger Nuts of Horror didn’t matter, because I had the temerity to have such hateful opinions and express them in my own space.

This of course begs the question: if Jim Mcleod didn’t bother telling you why he kicked you out, how do you know it’s because you’re a conservative?

I always knew. Always. What else could it be? I had never disagreed in public or private with site owner Jim Mcleod or any of the other site’s writers on any issue at all, but I did express my thoughts about current events on my social sites. Like this, for example, which I suspect was the beginning of the end for me. (The linked Facebook post was a reaction to comments made by pacifist, left-wing media personalities in the wake of the Paris terror attacks.) What really confirmed it was when Jim Mcleod, in a subsequent social media posting aimed specifically at me, called me a Nazi.

Consider that for a moment: I spent hours of my time contributing to his site for no pay, asking for nothing at all, and, from the safety of a computer keyboard hundreds of miles away he called me a Nazi. We’ll ignore the appalling torture of logic that would cause someone to refer to a Jewish man like myself as a Nazi; I can only assume he’s not familiar with actual Nazis, in which case it might be valuable to put him in touch with those kinsmen of mine who have had personal experience with Nazism. Those, that is, who weren’t murdered in concentration camps by real Nazis.

I understand that name-calling, especially nasty name-calling, is the hallmark of the SJW; in many respects the Nazi label no different from a toddler calling someone a “poopyhead,” and has the same quality of thought behind it. Still, it’s troubling: by referring to everyone or everything you disagree with Nazis or Nazism, it robs meaning from the term and serves to mitigate the horrors of the Holocaust. It’s a soft form of Holocaust denial.

I know it’s a small thing, and spats like this don’t end a career. They don’t even harm it. If they didn’t make you, they can’t break you. Just don’t ignore the red flags like I did. Know who you’re working with. Even if you don’t hate them, Social Justice Warriors hate you. Anyone who calls you a Nazi is full of hate. It doesn’t matter that you don’t put ideological constraints on who you should associate with: they do. If you don’t share their politics, you’re the hateful one.

To quote Milo Yiannopolous, “[H]ere’s the dirty secret about social justice warriors: nothing bad happens when you tell them to go fuck themselves.”

Make sure you say it first, is all.

Facebooktwitterredditpinterestlinkedinmail

Filed Under: Uncategorized

Comments

  1. Scott says

    February 22, 2016 at 8:40 pm

    Check to see if you retain copyrights, if so, demand everything you wrote be removed.

    Reply
    • David Dubrow says

      February 23, 2016 at 8:23 am

      I’d be surprised if everything I wrote hasn’t been removed already. It’s not a proper purge until you’ve been completely erased.

      Reply
  2. James Solbakken says

    February 23, 2016 at 12:48 pm

    Glenn Reynolds the Instapundit talks about “preference cascades.” I think there is such a thing as “consciousness cascades.” In the case of SJW’s, the dawning awareness of just what horrible monsters they really are is fixing to burst forth like a busted damn, er, I mean, dam.
    Normal people with normalcy bias kept trying to treat SJW’s like normal human beings. The problem is, SJW’s are not normal people with normal shortcomings. SJW’s are, “literally,” to use one of their pet terms, monsters. Normal people of any sort need to utterly and completely and totally reject them, without mercy and without apology. They should get judgment without mercy who showed no mercy, God said, and God was correct when He said that.

    Reply
    • David Dubrow says

      February 23, 2016 at 4:20 pm

      I wish I could disagree with any of that.

      What’s frustrating about this is that SJW behavior and attitudes do nothing to advance culture, society, or civilization, and in fact destroy all three. Effort, then, must be spent toward eliminating this mindset from our common culture, which takes away from building things of value.

      Reply
    • Brian says

      January 27, 2019 at 1:38 am

      Had an interesting experience with a reviewer from Ginger Nuts. This individual, who shall remain nameless, spontaneously replied to a sale link for my novel and proceeded to (wrongly) accuse me of plagiarism while making it obvious he had never read my work and was going solely off of a brief book blurb which he also obviously did not read carefully. I (probably foolishly) replied by offering to let him read a complete copy and suggesting that he read my work before attacking it to which he responded with still more attacks. I did eventually convince him to at least read the first two chapters. And, wonder of wonders, now he remains silent. I am not now nor was I at the time seeking a book review from this individual. Rather he sought me out to hurl abuse at my work. My reasoning in offering to provide him with a copy was basically that I wanted to show anyone else that might read his invective that I am confident he is wrong and illustrate his failure to read my work before disparaging it. Seems to me that if you’re going to run your mouth about someone else’s work when your opinion was not asked for you might at least try READING the book first.

      Reply
      • David Dubrow says

        January 27, 2019 at 7:09 am

        Hi, Brian:

        It’s a shame that you’re choosing to not name your accuser. People like that will continue to make those kinds of accusations until they learn that there’s a cost to doing so.

        Reply
  3. Badger says

    February 24, 2016 at 2:39 am

    are you going to repost your articles and reviews someplace else?

    Reply
    • David Dubrow says

      February 24, 2016 at 6:51 am

      Hi, Badger:
      I considered it, but it seems like a lot of work for a minimal return. I produce new material every week here and elsewhere, so that’s where I’ll keep my focus.

      Reply
  4. JudgeDeadd says

    February 25, 2016 at 3:15 am

    OK, I went through Google Cache and recovered some 23 of your blog posts from Ginger Nuts.

    I’d like to know, if you don’t intend to republish them somewhere else, would you be OK with having them put up for download for preservation’s sake?

    Reply
    • David Dubrow says

      February 25, 2016 at 9:11 am

      Hi, JudgeDeadd:

      That’s perfectly fine, and I appreciate your doing that. It’s very kind of you.

      Reply
      • JudgeDeadd says

        February 28, 2016 at 1:08 pm

        Most of them (all but 2) are actually available in archive.org’s Wayback Machine, but for completness I put them all up for download here: https://archive.org/details/DavidDubrowGingerNuts

        Reply
        • David Dubrow says

          March 3, 2016 at 3:48 pm

          Extraordinary work! Thank you so much for doing that.

          Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Mailvox: you are in their sights | Neoreactive says:
    February 22, 2016 at 7:03 pm

    […] noreply@blogger.com (VD) DD knew about SJWs, but he erroneously believed that they wouldn’t target him:I’ve been a reader of Vox Popoli on and off for a few years now, but I was stupid because I […]

    Reply
  2. Friday Links: Stomping Ground, Whale God, and a Haunted Bible says:
    February 26, 2016 at 8:33 am

    […] and youth pastor Valicity Garris, and described the experience of being kicked off the staff of Ginger Nuts of Horror for expressing, in my own space, opinions that millions and millions and millions of other people […]

    Reply
  3. David Dubrow’s Forbidden Archives Now Available! says:
    March 9, 2016 at 6:51 am

    […] Jim Mcleod kicked me off the staff of Ginger Nuts of Horror for expressing, in my own space, opinions that millions and millions and […]

    Reply
  4. Movie Review: I Saw the Devil says:
    August 15, 2017 at 11:27 am

    […] it for the horror site Ginger Nuts of Horror. Jim Mcleod, the proprietor of Ginger Nuts of Horror, deleted all my reviews from his site and called me a Nazi for expressing, in my own space, opinions that millions and millions of other people share. As the […]

    Reply
  5. Writers, Politics, and Sales says:
    August 24, 2017 at 9:09 am

    […] you know one: me. I was kicked off the writing staff of the horror site Ginger Nuts of Horror for expressing, in my own space, a political viewpoint […]

    Reply
  6. Endless War says:
    November 28, 2017 at 7:59 am

    […] that to his cost. Masterpiece Cake Shop learned that to their cost. And I learned it also, when Jim Mcleod, proprietor of the horror site Ginger Nuts of Horror, kicked me off the writing staff and called me, a Jewish man, a Nazi for expressing, in my own […]

    Reply
  7. Book Review Resurrection: The Scarlet Gospels says:
    September 12, 2019 at 6:23 am

    […] for a horror website called Ginger Nuts of Horror until the site’s proprietor, Jim McLeod, kicked me off the site and called me, a Jewish man, a Nazi for expressing my political opinions in my own virtual space. […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

"It began to drizzle rain and he turned on the windshield wipers; they made a great clatter like two idiots clapping in church." --Flannery O'Connor, Wise Blood

"Squop chicken? I never get enough to eat when I eat squop chicken. I told you that when we sat down. You gotta give me that. I told you when we sat down, I said frankly I said this is not my idea of a meal, squop chicken. I'm a big eater." --John O'Hara, BUtterfield 8

I saw the 1977 cartoon The Hobbit as a little boy, and it kindled a love of heroic fantasy that has never left me. Orson Bean's passing is terrible news. Rest in peace.

Obviously, these young people have been poorly served by their parents, but the honest search for practical information should be lauded, not contemned.

You shouldn't look at or use Twitter, and this story is another perfect example. There's so much that's wrong here that it would take a battalion of clergy, philosophers, and psychologists to fully map it out, let alone treat the issue.

This is the advertising copy for Ilana Glazer's stand-up comedy special The Planet Is Burning: "Ilana Glazer‘s debut standup special is trés lol, and turns out - she one funny b. Check out Ilana’s thoughts on partnership, being a successful stoner adult, Nazis, Diva Cups, and more. Hold on to your nuts cuz this hour proves how useless the patriarchy is. For Christ’s sake, The Planet Is Burning, and it’s time a short, queer, hairy New York Jew screams it in your face!" This is written to make you want to watch it.

In the midst of reading books about modern farming, the 6,000 year history of bread, and ancient grains, I found this just-published piece by farmer and scholar Victor Davis Hanson: Remembering the Farming Way.

"I then confront the decreasing power of the movement in order to demonstrate the need for increased theorizations of the reflexive capacities of institutionalized power structures to sustain oppositional education social movements." Yes. Of course.

You should definitely check out Atomickristin's sci-fi story Women in Fridges.

As it turns out, there may yet be some kind of personal cost for attempting to incite a social media mob into violence against a teenage boy you don't know, but decided to hate anyway because reasons.

One of the biggest problems with internet content is that the vast majority of sites don't pay their writers, and it shows in the lack of quality writing. It's hard to find decent writers, and harder to scrape up the cash to pay them. This piece is a shining example of the problem of free content: it's worth what you pay for.

If you're interested in understanding our current cultural insanity, the best primer available is Douglas Murray's The Madness of Crowds. Thoughtful, entertaining, and incisive.

More laws are dumb. More law enforcement is dumb. The only proper response to violence is overwhelming violence. End the assault. There's a rising anti-semitism problem in New York because Jews who act like victims are being victimized by predators. None of these attacks are random. Carry a weapon and practice deploying it under duress. Be alert and aware. I don't understand why the women Tiffany Harris attacked didn't flatten her face into the pavement, but once word gets around that the consequences of violence are grave, the violence will lessen.

When are you assholes going to understand that this stupidity doesn't work any longer? Nobody gives much of a damn if you think we're sexist because we don't want to see a movie you think we should see. It only makes us dislike you that much more, and you started out being an unlikable asshole. Find a new way to shame normal people.

The movie Terms of Endearment still holds up more than 35 years later, and if you're looking for a tearjerker, this is your jam. One element that didn't get a lot of mention is, at the end, when Flap, with a shrug, decides that his mother-in-law will become the mother of his children once Emma dies. He abandons them, and nothing is made of it. This always troubled me.

You need to read this story the next time you feel the urge to complain. And if you need a shot of admiration for another family's courage, check this out.

Progressive political activist and children's author J.K. Rowling finds herself on the wrong side of a mob she helped to create. The Woke Sandwich she's been trying to force-feed others since she earned enough f-you money doesn't taste as good as it looks when she's obliged to take a bite.

I need you to check out The Kohen Chronicles and pray for this family. Their 5-year-old son has cancer.

Currently, the movie Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker stands at 55% at Rotten Tomatoes. Don't forget that these are the same reviewers who not only adored the absolutely execrable The Last Jedi, but insisted that you were a MAGA hat-wearing incel white supremacist manbaby for not loving The Last Jedi. So either The Rise of Skywalker is an objectively bad film, or it simply wasn't woke enough to earn plaudits from our movie-reviewing moral and intellectual betters.

It's easy to hate the older pop bands like Genesis for their popularity, but they were capable of genius, and it shows in No Son of Mine.

If you want to know which identity group has more clout, read this story of the Zola ads on the Hallmark Channel.

Rest in peace, René Auberjonois. I remember you from Benson as a kid. As an adult, I remember you as Janos Audron in the Legacy of Kain video game series. You made every role you were in a classic.

Elf on a Shelf Follies, Part 2:
8-year-old: I wrote the elf a note! I hope he writes back.
Me: What did you write?
8yo: I asked if he has any friends.
Me: What if he says it's none of your business?
8yo: *eyes grow dark and glittering* Then I'll...touch him.
Me: Ah. Mutually assured destruction, then.

Elf on a Shelf Follies, Part 1: My 8-year-old got an Elf on the Shelf the other day. The book it came with tells a story in doggerel about this elf's purpose, which is to spy on the kid and report his doings to Santa Claus, who would then determine if the kid is worthy for Christmas presents this year. The book also said for the kid not to touch him, or the magic would fade, and for the family to give the elf a name. I wanted to name him Stasi. I was outvoted.

Actor Billy Dee Williams calls himself a man or a woman, depending on whim; his character Lando Calrissian is "pansexual," and his writer implies that he'd become intimate with anyone or anything, including, one presumes, a dog, a toaster, or a baby. J.J. Abrams is very concerned about LGBTQ representation in the Star Wars universe. This is Hollywood. This is Star Wars. This is what's important to the people in charge of your cinematic entertainment. Are you not entertained?

The funniest thing on the internet today is the number of people angry over an exercise bike commercial. Public outrage is always funny. Always.

One of the biggest mistakes the United States has ever made since WWII was recruiting for clandestine and federal law enforcement organizations at Ivy League schools. The best talent pools were/are available from local law enforcement and military veterans, with their maturity and, most importantly, field experience. We've been reaping the costs of these terrible decisions for decades, culminating in a hopelessly politicized, sub-competent FBI and CIA.

Watching Fauda seasons 1 and 2 again in preparation for season 3 to be broadcast, one hopes, in early 2020. Here's my back-of-the-matchbook review of season 2.

Every day I try to be grateful for what I have, even in the face of the petty frustrations and troubles that pockmark a day spent outside of one's living room, binge-watching Netflix. We live lives of ease in 21st century America, making it enormously difficult to do anything but take one's countless blessings for granted. Holidays like the just-passed Thanksgiving are helpful reminders. There's a reason why people call the attitude of a thankful heart practicing gratitude, not just feeling grateful. You have to practice it. You have to remind yourself of what you have. It's the work of a lifetime.

Held Back: A Recent Conversation.
8-year-old: Oh, and Jamie was there, too. He was in my first grade class two years ago.
Me: Wasn't he held back a year?
8yo: Yeah. It's because he kept going to the bathroom with the door open.
Me: No way!
8yo: And girls saw.
Me: That's not right. They're not going to hold a kid back a whole year over that.
8yo: Well, that's what he told me.
Me: Sounds fishy.
8yo: I believe him.
~fin~

It's right and good to push a raft of politically correct social justice policies on everything else under the sun, but when social justice invades Hollywood, that's just a bridge too far, says Terry Gilliam. Sorry, Terry: you helped make this sandwich. EAT IT.

Rob Henderson's piece on luxury beliefs will have you nodding your head over and over again...unless you subscribe to these luxury beliefs, in which case you'll get mad.

I've made the Saturday bread from Flour Water Salt Yeast so often that I've memorized the recipe. It never disappoints. Never. The same recipe works well for pizza, too.

Liberty doesn't mean the freedom to do anything you want. The true definition of liberty is the ability to choose the good. Anything less is libertinism.

Archives

My Social Media Links

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Google +

Author Links

  • Amazon Author Page
  • Goodreads

Copyright © 2025 · Author Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in