Noam Chomsky, tribalism, social media herd behavior, friendship and self-owns

Well, it looks very much like Noam Chomsky is not dead yet.

And, per all the things in the header above after his name, that's what happened.

A herd of Twitter blue check types, many rushing to show just how close they are to Noam Chomsky, rushed to get pieces out online before somebody else did, as proof of closeness.

And then had it blow up in their faces. (I bit a degree myself, after I saw enough of these claims, but by the time Wiki had posted a "cautionary note" at the top of Chomsky's page, I was already pulling back, as I'd not seen an official newspaper-type obituary. And, to be honest, the reason I bit was because I was posting a "takedown" obit and didn't want to get lost in the blizzard of hagiography before it was too late. And, I've reposted that actual takedown to a date ahead [hopefully I will remember to push it back again if needed] and already added yet more information to it.)

And, the "blow up in their faces" is made more schadenfreud-ic (I'll invent that) by Glennwald, the odious and oily Glenn Greenwald, presumably obsequious enough to Chomsky to suck him in, was one of the first pushbacks against the largely leftist contingent of eulogizers. Posted at r/Chomsky, in case Glennwald has you blocked like me. (On the r/Chomsky subreddit, there was a fair chunk of comments about how he, Chomsky, not Greenwald, was always good about defending right-wing authoritarians. I think that overstates the case, but isn't necessarily totally off the mark on reality, and certainly not on the empirical basis of such perceptions.)

Oh, reminder for people at r/Chomsky and elsewhere? Glenn ain't a leftist, but in Brazil, he and David Miranda are/were not only economic elite 1 percenters, they're almost surely real elite 0.1 percenters. And, yes, Glennwald's fanbois will try to spin that one, too.

It's kind of sad on two counts. First, of course, the "sadly" of Chomsky and Greenwald cozying up, surely enhanced or exacerbated by his second wife, Valeria Wasserman, getting him to move to Brazil after their 2014 marriage. Indeed, after he was "stable" after his 2023 massive stroke, as soon as possible, she got him moved back out of US medical care. So, that Glenn-Noam "coziness" only increased, AFAIK, after he moved to Brazil and his second marriage.

Sidebar: Is Wasserman acting like Clarke Abbey to Ed Abbey, a "gatekeeper" to his legacy (and possible bucks off that)?

So, do NOT "bring out your dead" if they're still alive.

Sad on the other part is people like former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis rushing to publish encomia online as if to prove that they were in Chomsky's inner circle and ..

If anything, prove they were not.

And, while Varoufakis might himself try to run and hide on Twitter, the Wayback Machine makes sure his New Statesman piece is still there for all of us to see. Will Jacobin and others also have been captured? We shall see. I left up my original "I bit," along with most of the content, and added a NOT in front of the header and moved on. Jacobin appears to have edited its original, but did it do so soon enough?

Worse? This gives the Glennwalds of the world and, even more, their fanbois, another cudgel of "fake news" to swing. They're already doing it.

And, per paragraph No. 4 above? When Chomsky actually dies, we'll probably, to riff on The Holy Grail, get a non-ironic Brave Sir Noam, a la Brave Sir Robin but meant seriously.)

And, the Varoufakises and Jacobin publishers of the world probably still won't peek behind the curtain. Just as nobody who was responsible for claiming, then spreading the claim, of Chomsky's death is going to fess up. Professional leftism is incestuous.