I'm not thrilled about joke policing from any side. Some jokes work, some jokes don't. His joke was in poor taste and his apology was bullshit, but the reaction is way over the top as well with his various employers are scrubbing his existence off their sites and billion RTs about what a turkey he is:

according to reddit's kotaku in action

---------------------

https://www.reddit.com/r/KotakuInAction/comments/6crm9v/drama_freelance_games_journalist_david_leavitt/

Freelance games journalist David Leavitt makes fun of the Manchester Arena explosion. Publications that have published him scrubbed his articles

I was questioning whether or not to make a thread about this guy due to how awful of a post he made on Twitter but after noticing the repercussions, I don't really think this thread would do anymore damage than what has already happened.

So, freelance games journalist David Leavitt, writer for CBS, AXS, Yahoo!, Examiner (merged into AXS), posted this as response to the tragic incident at Manchester during an Ariana Grande concert:

MULTIPLE CONFIRMED FATALITIES at Manchester Arena. The last time I listened to Ariana Grande I almost died too.

Honestly, for over a year I thought an Ariana Grande was something you ordered at Starbucks.

He eventually apologized... Two hours later. But the damage has already been done, as so far CBS PR had to tell people that he didn't work for them, AXS scrubbed his contributions to the site (before, after), and I cannot find any articles on Yahoo written by him. If anyone else can find one by him on there let me know.

It's horrible what happened in Manchester. Its even worse what some random games journalist says on Twitter. But let it be said that the consequences were necessary in this situation.

Edit1: Clara Jeffery, the Editor-In-Chief of Mother Jones, is throwing gamers and games journalists under the bus for what Leavitt did. http://archive.is/fAbEz
If you scroll down you see Sky Williams calling her out. Gotta love Sky.

Edit2: Now CBS Boston WBZ, which was the affiliate he wrote for, has released a statement saying that he is not an employee and denounced his statements. AXS has also said that Leavitt was never an employee for the site. That's also important to note. He's a freelancer. Never an employee.

Edit3: And now the Daily Mail has an article out on this. Expect more to come tomorrow.

It seems he's decided to double down rather than apologize.

I'm going to post this Kotaku comment from within my software (since it has four links in it, which will send the rest of you to my spam filter).

Bottleroach
He's a freelancer. That isn't a career. And the guy really, really pushed it. His tweets after the joke:

http://archive.is/EXWD5

http://archive.is/ZvKHT

http://archive.is/Hf1YE

Fresh tweet after he should've known that the places he freelanced for scrubbed his work off and denounced him: http://archive.is/imDvD
He doesn't give a fuck. He seems to think it's hilarious that his world is crashing down, so fuck him.

Or maybe he just figures he's fucked either way.

I doubt he would ultimately be if he hadn't doubled down like this. And maybe he'll find his way back.

There are a lot of assholes out there and we've all been them. Maybe not in this way, maybe not this ugly.

The truth is, if we each had all of our behavior examined under the jury of Twitter, we'd all likely have a thing or two we'd said that people might want to hang us for. Most of us just had the sense -- or lacked the platform at the time -- to do the number this guy has.

Another thing to bear in mind when people say outrageous things on the Internet is that there are often mental health issues involved. I have a few friends who are typically brilliant and good who can say profoundly unwise or even offensive things online when they are having a mental health episode. Having a blue tick doesn't make you immune to such issues. We never fully know what is going on with other people and should treat people with care.

"there are often mental health issues involved."

I think that's a good point.

Some people are socially inappropriate (without being terrible people), and it only comes out in a terrible way when they start tweeting from that place.

In looking at this, I hope this guy has some friends who are helping him. Assuming I'm not facing an armed mugger in an alley or the like, I'd rather think better of people and be wrong than think worse of them and be wrong.

It used to be that an idiot with a three-dollar can of spray paint could only offend a few people.

Now millions can make his offense their very own Most Favorite Thing Ever!

Thanks, technology!

jerry at May 22, 2017 8:44 PM ✓

Partly Raddy, too.

The internet is size-hyooge now, and almost sexually fast and intimate. We can communicate to enormous swaths of our civilization with little more effort than a blink. The internet is the street... Not just of rude and uncouth personalities from parts of town you don't spend time in, it's the traffic from those minds at their most coarse and offhand.

You can't be too surprised there are hurtful things on there. I knew the name Arianna Grande but wouldn't have recognized her in the restaurant yesterday... And I wouldn't have known any of her fans at that concert. Do we owe them more sanctimony than the riders of a bus plunge in India, or the victims of any of a thousand other distant tragedies this year?

A dear person in my life made the Starbucks joke this morning. I might have too, if I'd talked to enough people. This young performer has probably heard it 100,000 times.

Maybe this guy's position as a professional communicator demands that he be responsibly punished for these messages... That's okay by me.

But anyone who moves out into the world to be offended, or who combs the internet for offenses to take, will shortly find their own pearl-clutching virginity too soiled for public deployment.

There are just too many freelance "journalists" out there for me to care about the fate of this one dude's career because he's proven himself an asshole. I've never heard if him, probably would't read his work anyway, and don't feel one lick of sympathy for him. I mean, we're talking about this boor instead of the little girls who just got bombed.

Is there something you wanted to say about the little girls?

Is there something you wanted to hear which has been muffled?

" but wouldn't have recognized her in the restaurant yesterday"

I would have cuz she is known for licking and spitting in peoples food and giving it back for them to eat.

Can't be *that* well know for it...

AHW, I forget, are you the one from a different country, or is that LTW?

I am from Texas.
Were you planning to disparage my take on this if I were foreign?

Look, I work in government relations for a large corporation. If I publicly post inappropriate snarky crap about public tragedies I lose my job. This guy wanted attention, and he got it. We all live with the consequences of our actions. If it weren't for technology, Leavitt wouldn't be in the line if work that he's in. So he wouldn't have been able to make an ass of himself the way he did, but he also probably wouldn't have work.

Notice how you never heard of this guy before today, and now he's front-page news? Yeah, that's what he was looking for.

I don't care if the joke was in poor taste. It's wrong to try to go after him and make it difficult for him to work again. He was fired from his job and he might not get another one. What's the endgame? To drive him to homelessness or suicide? I don't want to live in world were one bad joke or tweet can ruin your whole life.

I am disgusted by the people who went after him. My personal guess is that they love to see people suffer but they mask their cruelty under the pretense of fake concern over the Ariana Grande concert tragedy.

Also I have a question. you write:

"For example: When you're about to joke about a concert massacre on Twitter, think of your 13-year-old Ariana-crazy cousin and how your family would react if she went to a concert and never came home."

Okay well if you're about to joke about suicide think about if your brother committed suicide. How would your family react?

And don't joke about cancer. What if someone's mom had cancer?

Your line of reasoning taken to it's extreme would result in the self censoring of a great amount of humor.

But that's a minor point of disagreement in an otherwise great article.

He's like Mana from Heaven by these news outlets. They were in urgent need for a pasty-looking villain to deflect the identity of the culprit of the bombings.

So of course they are exaggerating this out of proportion.

After all, Mean tweets are literally worse than murder.

Oh, on a side note. There are worse verified people on twitter that fly under the radar:

http://archive.is/bhMDH

"Your line of reasoning taken to it's extreme would result in the self censoring of a great amount of humor."

As it should be. The joke was crap and he should have written five more before posting that particular wad of tripe.

I mean, he's a communications professional, right?

Right.

Gog Magog:

"I mean, he's a communications professional, right?"

Yea, but, "communications" professional means that he learned how to use the software; but, it doesn't mean that he learned how/when to use the proper words. That would be the ability to relate to people. Some folks just don't have that skill set.

> Were you planning to disparage
> my take on this if I were
> foreign?

I was certainly going to scrutinize it for opportunities to do so!

It's been a problem on this blog. It's gotten out of control a few times.

I agree with Gog & AHW and maybe others, but maybe not Charles:

> it doesn't mean that he
> learned how/when to use
> the proper words.

It ought to. It OUGHT to mean that he can handle the how and the when.

Twitter isn't going away... For a thoughtful person who shares public ideas for living, it's sharp edges should be easy to manage, no matter how young the person is.

I agree with Gog & AHW and maybe others, but maybe not Charles:

> it doesn't mean that he
> learned how/when to use
> the proper words.

It ought to. It OUGHT to mean that he can handle the how and the when.

Twitter isn't going away... For a thoughtful person who shares public ideas for living, it's sharp edges should be easy to manage, no matter how young the person is.

The Law of Probability is: The likely thing to happen is the likely thing to happen. So if something happens, it's likely it was the likely thing. It's unlikely it was the unlikely thing.
So, by the Law of Probability, this is who he is. An asshole.
OTOH, we've all met people who try to be clever and it doesn't work, never works, because...they don't know how to make it work.
Perhaps he suffers from something like Aspergers/Autism or some unknown relative of such. In that case, he merits sympathy, but, by definition, this won't be the last.

The Law of Probability is: The likely thing to happen is the likely thing to happen. So if something happens, it's likely it was the likely thing. It's unlikely it was the unlikely thing.
So, by the Law of Probability, this is who he is. An asshole.
OTOH, we've all met people who try to be clever and it doesn't work, never works, because...they don't know how to make it work.
Perhaps he suffers from something like Aspergers/Autism or some unknown relative of such. In that case, he merits sympathy, but, by definition, this won't be the last.

The Law of Probability is: The likely thing to happen is the likely thing to happen. So if something happens, it's likely it was the likely thing. It's unlikely it was the unlikely thing.
So, by the Law of Probability, this is who he is. An asshole.
OTOH, we've all met people who try to be clever and it doesn't work, never works, because...they don't know how to make it work.
Perhaps he suffers from something like Aspergers/Autism or some unknown relative of such. In that case, he merits sympathy, but, by definition, this won't be the last.

No idea how that happened. Sorry.