Gawker Thinks Its Bilge Water Tastes Better Than TMZ’s…It’s All Still Bilge
VS.
The only thing more unsavory than writing about celebs, is writing about sites who write about celebs. It’s a well known fact (at least to us) that Glosslip thinks Gawker is force-fed on over-priced wine and cheap pate. Just because they own a thesaurus, this has somehow given them the impression they are cooler than the rest of us “hacks.” The reality is, their parading themselves around like the school valedictorian is just a sham to cover up for the fact, that they like all of us in this business, want to be the slutty cheerleader who gets to toss off the quarterback. It’s a blog eat blog world.
Some background to this sissy-fight. TMZ, the brain-child of Harvey Levin did something tasteless yesterday, and this got Gawker all in a tizzy. The original post has been edited, but according to Gawker, TMZ reported American Idol finalist Elliot Yamin’s mother died, and they used the opportunity to make a tasteless joke. Gawker says:
“They made fun of someone’s dead mother. In a piece posted yesterday afternoon they wrote: “The mother of ‘American Idol’ contestant Elliott Yamin died last night in Richmond, Va. She was 65. Claudette Yamin had been hospitalized over the weekend… Yamin finished in 3rd place in 2006 on ‘Idol,’ behind Katharine McPhee and Taylor Hicks — who, like Mrs. Yamin, will never be heard from again.” Commenters were upset in their usual thoughtful, Socratic way and TMZ eventually acknowledged the thoughtless remarks toward the end of the day. Mind you I say “acknowledged,” not “apologized for.”
Yep, that’s tacky. Then again, this is tabloid journalism, decorum is a rarity. Gawker postulates on why they are in fact BETTER than TMZ:
You know what’s funny about TMZ? No, I’m… uh, I’m actually asking. The site is so screechy and repugnant that I always have to click away before I can remember to look for anything remotely amusing. The way they eagerly roll around in pop shit and gleefully smear it everywhere, because it’s so campy and naughty, reminds me of the dumb queens from high school and their haggish friends who would shriek and think they were hysterical because they said “cum dumpster.” I can find nothing entertaining or redeeming in any of the site’s content. It’s all just base and poorly written and arbitrarily amoral. I’m just as complicit in the whole awful celebrity-industrial complex as they are, but good god let’s try to have a little style while we ruin people’s lives, eh? Shut this thing down, please. Oh, and the wretched TV show too. There is no reason to see and hear Harvey Levin and his army of smug little shits every goddamn day.
They easily could have reported the debased incident and left it at that, then again, Gawker really is the tattle-tailing type. When I picture Gawker in my head, (really a collective of writers) I picture the class suck-up who does extra-credit to boost their already weighted 4.25 GPA to cover up for the fact they masturbate constantly to pictures of Hillary Clinton (old school style). You just know they were the kid the teacher put in charge when she left the room, and while everyone else was drawing penises and boobs on the chalkboard, they were taking detailed notes to hand in assuring detentions for everyone. Lulzkillers, that’s Gawker.
Maybe it’s a NY vs. LA thing, but there’s something very ironic and sort of sad when a site which prides itself on being some sort of intellectual standard for “tabloid” journalism starts wagging its finger at the trouble-makers.
Not only is Gawker not qualitatively different from TMZ, both shoving and pushing to bring you their own brand of tawdriness, but with Gawker you are forced to swallow the stagnant air of pretentiousness they blanket their reporting with.
At least TMZ doesn’t pretend to be something more than they are: a greasy pork sandwich served in a dirty ashtray. Whereas Gawker thinks if you dress it up with sprig of parsley you suddenly have yourself a picnic al fresco.
Hey, does that make Glosslip a palette cleanser?
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There’s a Scientology-Harvey Levin connection you may not know about.
Levin was the creator and head honcho of a syndicated celeb “news” show called Celebrity Justice. You might remember it.
I couldn’t help but notice that CJ made a habit of running stories planted by Scientology front groups without telling viewers of the Sci connection. They’d run sound bites of celebs denouncing psychiatric drugs, for instance, and never mention that the CCHR organization whose logo I saw in the backdrop is a Scientology group and the celebs are Scientologists.
I e-mailed the show a few times to point this out, and the later e-mails were angry as it was clear Levin’s team just didn’t give a mouse’s fart that they were helping Scientology. Or then again, maybe some of them knew it and were more than happy to help their church.
One more thing, this one (sort of) in Gawker’s defence: I’ve never noticed Gawker running hit pieces on Al Gore. Can’t say the same for TMZ.
And still another thing to be said for Gawker: It did keep that Cruise KSW video online when other sites caved.
Comment by Narcissus — April 2, 2008 @ 5:14 pm
Yes, but also know one thing about the Gawker/KSW story, they did for one reason and one reason only: hits.
I think they are both the same, and we are no different, the only caveat is we aren’t trying to pretend to be anything more than gutter-dwellers trolling for celeb dirt, although I think we offer more insight and value-added content than a site like TMZ.
Gawker’s great, for sure, they are well written and interesting. But I could do without the condescension if you know what I mean. I like my celeb news to be straight forward without all the pomp and circumstance.
As for the Harvey Levin thing, well that is very interesting…….
Comment by D — April 2, 2008 @ 5:23 pm
Well, it’s a cinch GlossLip adds more the stories than TMZ does. I’m not a big fan of either Gawker or TMZ, but I’d have to say Gawker is the better of the two. And I visit GlossLip more than both combined.
Comment by Narcissus — April 2, 2008 @ 5:40 pm
should be “… more to the stories …”
Comment by Narcissus — April 2, 2008 @ 5:40 pm
I rarely go to TMZ or Gawker anymore. Glosslip is my prime destination for celeb craziness. Dawn & K are fantastic writers. It’s always a fun read.
Comment by S.Rod — April 2, 2008 @ 6:02 pm
ditto #5:)
Comment by curious — April 2, 2008 @ 10:04 pm
You people RULE! Well, I know we have the smartest (and might add most attractive) readers on the web at least.
Comment by D — April 2, 2008 @ 10:26 pm
I just masturbated to that picture of Hillary Clinton.
Does that make me a bad person?
Comment by Anonymous — April 4, 2008 @ 7:19 am