{"id":3100,"date":"2014-12-16T10:00:08","date_gmt":"2014-12-16T16:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/?p=3100"},"modified":"2014-12-16T10:28:06","modified_gmt":"2014-12-16T16:28:06","slug":"of-barristers-and-baristas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/2014\/12\/16\/of-barristers-and-baristas\/","title":{"rendered":"Of barristers and baristas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ophelia Benson is a better blogger than I am. She has <a href=\"http:\/\/freethoughtblogs.com\/butterfliesandwheels\/2014\/06\/a-new-level-of-motive-attribution\/\" target=\"_blank\">claimed as much<\/a>, and I pretty much believe her. There is no shame in this. For me, writing is strictly avocational, something I do on lunch breaks and in the evenings after tucking the kids into bed. For her, writing is a profession, so it makes sense that she would be far more prolific and professional about it than I am.<\/p>\n<figure style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.onlyimage.com\/photo\/chocolate-slices-coffee-grain-1598644\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: #ddd 1px solid\" title=\"Chocolate, Slices, Coffee, Grain\" src=\"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/files\/2014\/12\/chocolate-slices-coffee-grain-300x187-1598644.jpg\" alt=\"Food &amp; Drink\" width=\"300\" height=\"188\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Via <a href=\"http:\/\/www.onlyimage.com\/photo\/chocolate-slices-coffee-grain-1598644\" target=\"_blank\">OnlyImage.com<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>With that in mind,\u00a0even professionals behave unprofessionally some of the time, and it was an act of extraordinary insensitivity to use the phrase &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/freethoughtblogs.com\/butterfliesandwheels\/2014\/12\/hostages-in-the-window-with-their-hands-up\/\" target=\"_blank\">privileged rich coffee sippers<\/a>&#8221; in reference to the siege in Sydney, in\u00a0which <a href=\"http:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/news\/worldnews\/australiaandthepacific\/australia\/11295658\/Victims-of-Sydney-siege-hailed-as-heroes-after-they-die-protecting-hostages.html\" target=\"_blank\">two people died<\/a> yesterday.\u00a0One of them was the manager of the Lindt cafe, and the other was a\u00a0well-off legal professional (and mother of three) who had showed up to meet with a colleague and, yes, sip coffee.<\/p>\n<p>How utterly shameful to imply that the lives of those who sip coffee are worth less than the lives of those who serve it.<\/p>\n<p>Ophelia has, to her credit, apologized and at least partially walked back this bit back. While I remain an inferior writer, I&#8217;d like to give her a small piece of advice for the future: <strong>When lives are on the line, do not denigrate those who are actively at risk.\u00a0<\/strong>Whether you do this in the name of waging class warfare or for some other &#8220;social justice&#8221; cause, the ends will not justify the means, and you will end up looking like someone who values\u00a0ideology more than people. Needless to say, this is not a good look.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ophelia Benson is a better blogger than I am. She has claimed as much, and I pretty much believe her.&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3100"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3101,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3100\/revisions\/3101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/backgroundprobability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}