In 2003, Barbra Streisand — an artist I have long admired — made a ridiculous mistake, one that has echoed through the years.
Annoyed that her cliff-top mansion in Malibu had been photographed from the air, and that the resulting photo had been posted online, she decided her privacy had been invaded. So in a fit of pique that we mere mortals can never hope to comprehend, she sued the photographer for $50 million.
Never mind that the photo was one of many in an arcane technical collection that was documenting the erosion of the Malibu cliffs. Never mind that if you look at that photo today you wonder how the mansion hasn’t collapsed into the Pacific by now. And never mind that the lawsuit was quickly thrown out of court by a judge who then dinged Streisand for $177,000 in attorney’s fees. Forget all that.
What matters about this incident is that before she filed the lawsuit, the photo had been viewed exactly six times online. Once the lawsuit went public, that number jumped from six to roughly 420,000, almost overnight. If Streisand had wanted to keep her mansion hidden from the world, she accomplished exactly the opposite. And paid dearly for the privilege.
This particular sort of ironic blowback has since come to be known as the “Streisand Effect.” It has been cited all over the world to describe instances of people or parties trying to suppress information, but instead calling massive attention to it.
In 2013, Buzzfeed posted an online article about Beyoncé’s “fiercest moments” in concert. It featured a series of still shots, several of which either she or her publicist deemed “unflattering.” The publicist asked that they be taken down, which was a rookie mistake. Buzzfeed quickly posted an article titled “The Unflattering Photos Beyoncé’s Publicist Doesn’t Want You To See,” and the Streisand Effect kicked in. Those same fierce stills have been repurposed millions of times since — in memes, remixes, samples, and mashups. And while one could argue that the heightened visibility actually helped Beyoncé’s career more than hurt it, the instant virality was a predictable, if unintended, consequence.
There are plenty of other cases of the Streisand Effect, which you can look up, but you get the idea. Once the public gets wind of an act of censorship, natural curiosity about what was censored will quickly take over the narrative.
I’m not the only one pointing this out lately, mostly in the context of CBS News, which is now under the thumb of the remarkably inept Bari Weiss. The word ‘News,’ of course, is now a misnomer in this context — ‘propaganda’ is more like it. Which is sad, especially to those of us who remember when ‘CBS’ and ‘news’ were virtually synonymous.
Now, thanks to the deft incompetence of Weiss, CBS has given us, in the space of two months, two spectacular examples of the Streisand Effect in effect.
We all remember at the end of December, when 60 Minutes was ready to go on air with its gut-wrenching exposé of the atrocious conditions at CECOT prison in El Salvador. Sharyn Alfonsi’s reporting from the scene was a scorching indictment of the Trump-Miller-Noem war on immigrants. Too scorching, apparently, for the newly-hired Weiss and her masters at Paramount.
Drawing on her weeks of experience in the TV news business, she pulled the plug on the story at the last minute — talk about rookie mistakes. When the story of the censorship went viral, and the segment became available on the internet, Alfonsi’s report became one of the most-watched pieces in 60 Minutes’ history, even though it never ran on 60 Minutes. It was a major embarrassment for the administration, and an astonishing own goal for Weiss. Sort of like the opposite of beginner’s luck.
Now, as she grows into her new job, Weiss appears to be presiding over the dismantling of CBS News, and remaking it into something more in the mold of Hannity than Cronkite. It is no secret that she is doing the bidding of the tech oligarchs who own her, and that CBS News will, for the foreseeable future, focus on the wonderfulness of the Trump regime.
This is why veteran newspeople have begun quitting in disgust, leaving hacks and ideologues in the chairs of Walter Cronkite, Edward R. Murrow, Dan Rather, and dozens of other stellar journalists who tried, for seven or eight decades, to keep us informed as a country, even as they were thwarted at every turn by our deep commitment to ignorance.
The exodus of old pros from CBS is a feature, not a bug. But Weiss’s demolition project has been slowed down a bit by legacy contractual obligations, most famously to Stephen Colbert.
Colbert’s contract ends in May, and he knows it won’t be renewed. As a “lame duck” host, therefore, Colbert has a short window of opportunity to speak truth to power, and to do it with a megaphone louder than reality-based voices generally get these days.
He has indeed, it seems, stepped up his game. He has always enjoyed poking the bear, and he has little to lose by using this borrowed time to put some more weight behind his political punches.
There is little Weiss can actually do about this except wait for Colbert’s exit in three months, but that hasn’t stopped her from trying. Last week, when Colbert taped a segment interviewing Texas senatorial candidate James Talarico, she once again pulled the plug shortly before the show was to air. This time, Colbert went on the air and told the world what had happened. He then invited the world to watch the offending interview on YouTube.
It quickly went mega-viral, of course, generating over 8 million views, many times more than it otherwise would have. But the real significance wasn’t the viewership, it was the interview itself. Because right then and there, Talarico’s profile was raised through the roof, just in time for the upcoming Senate primary. And Weiss, still in her rookie year, stumbled into making that happen.
James Talarico is something Democrats have needed for a long time: an evangelical Christian who can talk to religious nutjobs in their own language and make them feel guilty about “a head full of scripture and a mouth full of hate.”
Campaigning while studying for the ministry, he takes aim directly at the toxic hypocrisy of the religious right. He has harsh words for Christian nationalism, which he says isn’t Christian at all, and he spreads all sorts of seditious ideas, roughly along the lines of “love thy neighbor.”
Talarico is taking a populist line, going after the dumbshit vote that has been lost to Democrats for decades. He focuses on the evils of the billionaire class, which apparently strikes a chord with that demographic, and his messages resonate in those parts of Texas where Trump voters are getting exactly what they voted for, and are furious about it. He was already getting the kind of traction that got him a spot on Colbert’s show, but once Weiss did her Streisand thing, he was instantly a household name.
He’s running for John Cornyn’s Senate seat, but first must face Jasmine Crockett in the Democratic primary, at a time when we all, once again, dream foolishly of a blue Texas, fully prepared to have it not come true.
I have mixed feelings about this matchup. I relate better to progressive bomb-throwers like Crockett than to the righteous piety of a Talarico. But this is Texas, and I’m not the only one wondering if Talarico is the better fit. For Crockett, the dumbshit vote might just be a bridge too far.
But win or lose, Talarico, at 35, looks to be a real presence in Texas for some time to come. And if it turns out he gets nominated and elected — two big ifs, I know — then Bari Weiss will, ironically, have played a significant role in his ascent.
If she had simply let Colbert’s show go on as planned, Talarico would be just one more political hopeful among many. But now, thanks to Weiss — and, in a way, Streisand — he’s a rising star.
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