Yesterday evening Matt Gallman raised the following issue:
A year ago I critiqued Kevin because he posted a link to a blog that had insulted a friend of mine (and yours?). Kevin responded with his standard “who me?” The fact is that that original blog, by this fellow Rotov, was just horrible, despicable garbage. From a guy who has no platform beyond the fact that other bloggers like to praise him. Brooks, you didn’t praise him then, but you do tip your hat to him now and then. That is your choice, but you are a celebrated historian of infinitely greater stature than this guy and you are tipping your hat to someone who deserves no respect given his repeated lies. Well, precisely a year ago I challenged Kevin for linking that. So, today, if you google the name of our mutual friend, both the original post and Kevin’s link appear within the first 2 pages of links. This is I think evidence of why this stuff actually matters. Some clown sitting in his basement can write disgusting, ignorant, lies about a serious historian, and your students and my students who google that name will find those lies. So, yeah, it would be nice if bloggers would stand up for decency. Although I also take your point that it isn’t as if you as a blogger are responsible for all other bloggers.
Let’s try not to be coy here. The historian in question is Joseph Glatthaar. The post in question is here (with a link to the original post by Dimitri Rotov concerning Glatthaar’s book). The comments sections reveals that I asked some tough questions of Kevin and raised some issues about Dimitri’s post.
Crossroads 