April 21, 2005
Dear UNH Community:
After having an opportunity to meet with several college educators and parents of UNH students, as well as parents of young children, I feel compelled at their urging to share the following information.
Since September 2004 I have been the recipient of abusive and threatening emails. My response was to initiate a community dialogue on what I deem sexual harassment.
However, in light of information I have discovered recently, herein enclosed, it came to my attention that I was no longer dealing with a case of sexual harassment. The situation now rises to the explicit threat of sexual violence against educators, parents with young children, and women students in the UNH community.
Please know that I have notified the UNH administration, UNH Police, Durham Police, FBI, and local and regional media.
Sincerely:
Whitney Williams
Quotes from Kenneth Gagnon's Online Blog (all currently now off-line)
www.livejournal.com/users/kengagnon/
January 6, 2004
Crow left of the MURDAH
"And who knows. Maybe someday I'll kill a lot of people, and you can all be character witnesses at what promises to be the most fun criminal trial in history. If they admit this stuff as evidence, it'll almost be worth the near-constant raping I'll be receiving in prison afterwards. Maybe I should just go kill someone right now. Yeah."
March 9, 2005
Ain't Dat a Bitch
"I had my midterm exam in retardville extravaganza that is my 519 class today, and one fo the first questions on the short answer portion was the following (it may or may not have been written in my professor's shit. That being said, the text has not been altered. I swear.):
"Read the pdoem and offer up to four (4) points of interpretations. Include literary devices." So, I calmly read that, scribbled an answer, finished the rest of the test, and strolled up to my professor, who sat at her desk with a smile so complacent and utterly vacant that even a cow would say, "CHRIST, you're so dull."
Ken's Professor: Oh, Ken, are you done with the exam?
Ken: *silently hands exam over*
Ken's Professor: Excellent, well have a great brea-
Ken: *thrusts penis through her eye socket*
One of the first things you learn when you come to college is that sometimes, when an idiot is in charge of your English class, there's nothing that can be done about that besides a penis to her goddamn brain. And rest assured, if I impale people's brains with my dick for a living, I would goddamn drop everything right now and do it. Sorry, friends and family, but I have a motherfucking CALLING."
November 7, 2004
Headbanging, baby.
"Whitney Williams is unquestionably my favorite target of personal hatred, though. She writes consistently about how insanely unfair it is that men control everything in the world and get away with raping women and things of that nature. And, sadly enough, while I do agree that women don't have it the way they probably should, I also have a penis, and am thus inclined to defend my unfair position of power. I'd fucking rape the face of Whitney Williams and deny her a job just because she's got a vagina if I could. I wouldn't do this because I hate women. I'd do this because I hate Whitney.
This is the fundamental thing she can't seem to get; the people who write into the newspaper week after week to criticize the stuff she writers don't hate females in general. They hate Whitney because she's annoying and speaks for people she has no right to pretend she voices the concerns of. Yes, violence towards women, sexual assault, and inequality in the workplace are all issues worthy of discussion, but not by someone who's a fucking tool. Fuck you, Whitney."
March 24, 2005
IMPRESSIVE TITLE
"Hey, everyone, and welcome back to the livejournal of Kenneth Gagnon, the only publication on the internet that's endorsed by the federal government as appropriate source material for both literature and sex ed classes for youngsters all over the nation. As such, I'm going to be spending the next few months traveling the world and teaching out of the "The Ken Gagnon Has Sex With Kids Reproductive Guide." I don't know about you, but when I was a kid, I certainly could've used a little more quality sexual education like the kind my journal could provide to 1st graders in this country.
Ken: Okay, kids, now let's go over the material one more time. Now, Tommy, what's the safest form of sex?
Tommy: Anal?
Ken: *rubs eyes* For the millionth time, Tommy, no. You're close, but the rest of the class could probably tell you that it's not really safe until you pull out at the last second and bust your load of man-juice on that bitch's face, now couldn't they?
Tommy: I'm sorry, Mr. Gagnon.
Ken: If you were really sorry, Tommy, you'd be having more anonymous unprotected anal sex.
Tommy: Please stop touching me, Mr. Gagnon.
And contrary to popular belief, I'm not spending all my time slithering my way into quality time with impressionable kids who don't have nearly enough muscle mass to defend themselves from sudden attack by a trusted authority figure; I've been keeping a close journalistic eye on the goings-on in the entertainment world. Now, if you'll allow me to cease with jokes about how small and useless the flap of skin I call my penis is (because they are just jokes, I swear. I have a massive, pulsating beast in my shorts and it's hungry for vaginas constantly. I swear)..."
November 20, 2003
New Developments Which Aren't Actually New At All
"What I'm saying is that I sort of wish I had caused more trouble, and since I didn't, I'm going to have to find a topic for whatever I do next that is extra offensive to everyone. Is there any way I could get away with writing a detailed plan for kidnapping and raping a college girl? The Hell with that. Is there any way I could get away with actually kidnapping and raping a college girl? Not that I would."
"I feel bad about wanting high school girls, for the first time in my life. I watched them up there wiggling and dancing around and actually shifted around in my seat a little bit. I know they're all fuckin' hot little girls, and by all rights I should be having some sort of cheesy porn fantasy in which I saunter to their apartment door to fix their cable or something, but all I felt like doing was taking them all back to their houses and maybe making them tea and helping them with their homework. This raises an important question... If it comes down to a situation where sex with a high school girl is imminent, then I will very calmly do several dozen body shots off of the aforementioned woman and feel much better."
September 18, 2004
THIS FIRE IS OUT OF CONTROL GONNA BURN THIS CITY BUUURN THIS CITY
"The single most incredible potential development at my new job with UNH's Media Relations Department became clear to me during a talk I had with Erika Mantz, a news editor who seems to be perfectly nice, genuine and cool, which is quite unfortunate, because I don't think she has any idea that she recently hired a wanted sex offender."
March 8, 2004
I'm going to leave you. I'm going to leave yooooouuuu.
"Hi kids, and welcome back to the livejournal of Kenneth Gagnon. This little piece of semi-annual writing remains the only publication on the internet that consistently leaves you covered in more bodily fluids than a slip n' slide party in the sex offender wing of a maximum security prison. Plus, the members of my staff will even provide you with a towel afterwards to clean off some of the semen and the blood and the drool, which is a much better option than the forced
anal sex the prison would provide"
"And when I say stretch, I obviously don't mean stretch in the sense of a vagina during childbirth. I mean stretch in the sense of a two year old's vagina during the birth of three elephants. Simultaneously. That's fucking stretching."
"Instead, I'll be shoving my balls into the face of my new girlfriend Kristen while she's asleep."
"Don't be shocked by how easy it is for me to commit to killing the girl I've fallen in love with; it's in the interest of the common good.....So I'd like to say once more that I'm very much in love with my girlfriend, but I will not hesitate to kill her in the interest of my state's safety. It's like if she was a zombie. I'd sure still wanna have sex with her (perhaps even more so. Zombies are sexy and aggressive), but I'd have to shoot her in the face with a sawed-off shotgun to be safe. It's just how things go."
June 12, 2004
SAME AS IT EVER WAS.
"Oftentimes a the very moment I see a woman, semen will explode out of my pant legs, sending me flying upwards like a fucking Rocketeer."
"Now in any other time of my life, I would meet the arrival of five attractive and likely intoxicated girls with my penis, exposed and clutched in my hands, so painfully erect that blood spurts out of my ass every few seconds to relieve pressure. Unfortunately, these days I have a SINGLE woman I'm interested in regularly boning, so when Lilly, Shush, Koren, Becca, and Kristen (Hahn) arrived, the only thing I was interested in using my erect penis for was stabbing the lot of them in the face."
October 5, 2003
What am I doing? Shouldn't I be out prowling the campus, like Laura said?
"I have a Politics and Society class that brings me tantalizingly close to taking a razor blade to both my eyes. The professor has this way of talking (which he does for an hour and a half every class) which is infuriating, I can't quite explain what it is about the rhythm of his speech that makes me want to kill him...."
January 1, 2004
You should be careful what you wish FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR!
"I could look at it like I'm acquiring quite an extensive library of useful books, but then again, I could also look at it like I'm acquiring an extensive collection of flammable material to set ablaze and toss through the Dean's window."
April 13, 2004
WAAA-AAAAHH-OOWWW!
"And while normally I would giggle at the idea of someone's brain bleeding, this is starting to annoy me."
"I like to think I can handle hearing dirty words on television and in music without automatically wanting to murder babies or something; I am, after all, essentially grown up now."
"Classics 400-something or other--Greek Civilization: I took this just so I could sit and stare at the brilliance of my professor, Steve Trzaskoma. I know his name, but we're nowhere near a first name basis. The only sort of first name basis we'll likely ever be on is when he reports the name of the student stalker he's been enduring for the last few weeks to the police."
"I've always generally been interested in Russia; however, this interest has transformed into a general interest in popping the eyes out of my two professors and then seeing if my penis will fit into their faces anywhere."
September 16, 2003
College life is the life of living life that you love to live.
"Here's to taking advantage of sorority girls!"
October 10, 2003
It just keeps coming
"Hello again, everyone. Welcome once again to the live journal of Kenneth Gagnon, the only place on the internet that will welcome with open arms both you, your children, and your basement dwelling immigrant workers. We'll even welcome the children you've likely produced with said workers, provided that you bring the saran wrap for us to spread over all of our important office furniture. We have a commitment to family here at the live journal; this means, of course, that if one of my staff members doesn't do what I tell them, I get to kill one of their family members. I don't keep an ice pick around for nothing, you know."
"Ken: *grabbing a little girl around the neck* LOOK AT ME! PUT YOUR COLD, DEAD EYES ON ME AND SHOW SOME FEELING, BITCH! DON'T YOU HAVE A SOUL?"
"Don't overuse the dead hooker routine. Eventually the authorities will get curious and actually start DIGGING out near the Vegas railroad. And we don't want that, do we? No, no we don't."
December 7, 2003
Numba Fifty, baby.
"UNH Administrator: I know! Let's NOT give them a place to park! The more inexperienced bad drivers out there, the better!
Ken: *cocks shotgun* Wrong answer. "
"I feel like I should be doing some retrospective on how far I've come. How much I've changed as a person. How many gullible women I've tricked into bed by telling them they're the only one for me. How many times I've used the word "fucking" in the history of my journal."
September 4, 2004
I thought she was eighteen! She said she was old enough...
"That's right, kids, I'm back at the University of New Hampshire for another semester. This means that I get to stare from afar at a whole new, unsuspecting, defenseless class of Freshmen college girls..."
"And thought it would be cool to take a sawed-off shotgun to the undead faces of every freshmen in my dorm, it'd be much more satisfying to get my kill on inside Holloway Commons....The dining hall just isn't meant to do deal with it. It's like trying to force a sorority girl with only three orifices to handle more than three penises."
Comments
George Bush of chauvenists
24 Apr 2005
I read your article after seeing this in an old friend's away message (she goes to UNH and to my knowledge someone somehow alters her away messages/profile):
"basically what my night came down to is sucking BIG FAT FUCKING COCK..... and i love every bit of it in my ass after i'm done sucking him dry"
Stuff like this makes it seem almost comical that people at UNH refuse to talk about the fact that their rape culture is thriving on the chauvenistic equivalent of Miracle Grow. Then again...maybe Ken's and others refusal to even bow to the subtlety of good taste pushes the obvious destructiveness of their ways even further underneath the assumptions and insecurities of the campus/our culture. After all, if you put yourself off as not afraid of being "politically incorrect" then the average superficial onlooker is going to believe you've been victimized by someone trying to "restrict" you to "political correctness" (he was just being himself!) If not because they're incapable of seeing the abuse inherent in chauvenistic postering then because they themselves are afraid to question their own complicity (either as enablers or perpetrators). This is called DENIAL. And it's pretty strong, if not unbreakable from without (and capable of co-opting any torment from within).
Not only as a man, but as a member of our culture, I've used this strategy of abdicating responsibility for my own words and actions by taking advantage of others' insecurities and identification with our culture.
"I was only kidding! (you're down, right?)"
-----
Throw the book at him Whitney.
Maybe this will discourage the other casual Joe Chauvenists from "spouting off" assuming full protection from the state (if not from the culture).
Though I have a feeling this will not make much of a difference except to bring the abusiveness to a deeper level of privacy. After all, the state wasn't designed to modify the culture of domination (it shares the same roots) but only to mask and transform its symptoms.
But hey, it's a start. And someone has to have the balls/ovaries to get things started. Luckily, the world has you.
As a man you humble me and as a human you inspire me.
on second thought
24 Apr 2005
Our culture is clearly unwilling to make Ken responsible for his actions of its own accord, so it's going to take someone who recognizes this abuse to hold him accountable.
As a real - not abstracted, general - instance of abuse this should trump any strategic attack against the culture at large. Or should it? This is not rhetorical, I am actually unsure.
Any thoughts/feelings?
Re: on second thought
04 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
29 Apr 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
30 Apr 2005
Ken makes very bad jokes. I am a woman. Sometimes I am offended. I tell him. He apologizes.
Ken Gagnon has a soul. I hope, through all of this, you do not forget that one thing.
The response to Ken's livejournal is ridiculous
30 Apr 2005
Ken wrote with sarcasm. It's painfully obvious. Whitney Williams is blowing this up out of proportion. What Ken wrote in his Livejournal may have been tasteless and juvenile, but so is painting Ken as a rapist and tattling to the authorities to get them to shut Ken up and to get attention.
Re: Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
Ken Gagnon has not been forced out of his classes because of "hurt feelings." He's been given the boot, as well he should, because women feel threatened. And not just because he threatens women at large, but because HE MADE SPECIFIC THREATS AGAINST INDIVIDUALS. Do you think his English professor should tolerate him in her class after he said he wanted to thrust his penis through her eye? Every student, faculty, and staff member on the UNH campus has a right to participate in that community without working with someone who threatens people this way.
Ken Gagnon, and others like him, need to understand that there are consequences, that men need to take responsibility for their speech. Words don't just hurt feelings, they do violence. Ken is not harmless.
Re: Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
05 May 2005
Not to say that his soul is not important, but I find it telling that you think ONLY his soul is important.
The proof is in the pudding. Mmmmm...pudding.
Don't Cop Out Behind "he was just kidding"
01 May 2005
What kind of sick bastard would even THINK things like that, then actually think it was funny, and then feel the need to write it down and share it with his friends. (and anyone else reading livejournal). The fact that there are those who either a) thought it was funny, or b) "don't see what the big deal is, it was just writing, he wasn't serious" make me concerned about what kind of people they are as well. Anyone who would defend Ken Gagnon is just as guilty as him.
And as far as having "talent", he certainly wasn't using it when he wrote in his livejournal, and if he cared about being able to use his talent in class and out in the community, he should have exercised better judgement. We all have the right to speak freely, but we also must take responsibility for that speech. That is why members of hate groups have been found guilty of inciting violence when their speech results in the injury or death of a member of a group they don't like.
Speech or writing like Gagnon's creates an environment in which violence against women is no big deal; something to be laughed at. When we joke about something we normalize it, make it ok. Violence against women and children should never be okay. It is and should be reprehensible. But Gagnon's statements de-sensitize it for us. When we laugh at something, it is pretty hard to then make an about face and take the same thing dead seriously.
I, for one, think Gagnon deserves everything he gets. Ken Gagnon clearly only cares about Ken Gagnon. He showed no restraint in his writing and doesn't seem to care who he offends. He's not sorry. He's sorry he got caught.
On Copping out.
01 May 2005
The KKK has a website. The North American Man/Boy Love Association. Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptists also have a website. I believe it's www.godhatesfags.com. These people are threats. Serious threats. But America says that it's okay for them do talk about what they do and what they think. And America says it's okay for Ken Gagnon to make jokes about his penis and the genitalia of others. Maybe it's time that we start focusing on more important things. Like real rape, and real murder, and real harrassment.
I'm sorry if offended you.
Ken has offended lots of people in his journal. It wasn't very friendly of him. But there's no law against being crude. He, very obviously, was not making any real threats and certainly never intended to hurt or rape or kill anyone. They were bad jokes. Disgusting jokes. Offensive jokes.
But jokes.
So...I take back what I said earlier. Come on, guys...Chill out. It's okay.
He was just joking.
Re: On Copping out.
05 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
02 May 2005
Jailed for a speech act
03 May 2005
sorry I was responding to the "Jail Ken" posts
04 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
02 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
03 May 2005
wow...
07 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
03 May 2005
Look Whitney, in the end, what has been accomplished? A talented journalist is being denied a degree, his name is being smeared (I saw the Faux News report this evening) Have you considered the effect this might have on Ken's family? How about attending a joint counceling meeting with Ken? a little mediation? How about meeting Ken? Sit down and speak with him before sending off these emails. obviously you both have something to say. I have so many thoughts in my head right now I cannot get them all out in text. I'll be back to comment more once my head is cleared some. If you want to respond to this, feel free to contact me at 11am (-at-) mail.com
Regards-
Blake Holt
Re: Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
05 May 2005
I'll give you a hint. It rhymes with sexual harassment.
what is ken guilty of? i'll give you a hint NOTHING
05 May 2005
here's what i think ken was doing in his badly written satire on a livejournal that about a dozen people read before whitney williams got google happy. ken agrees that in general women in the world are oppressed and writes, "I do agree that women don't have it the way they probably should" but ken thinks whitney is exaggerating campus problems among others at the expense of the real problem s. he reads whitneys responses to letters like these and realizes that whitney would respond by saying that ken is just writing from a position of privilege and just defending the patriarchy like she said of other letter writers who criticized whitney's columns. but ken doesn't see himself as a rapist or asdefending the patriarchy.
anticipating whitney's response, ken wrote that stupid satire thing to his friends to say "your right, whitney, though i think women in general are oppressed i must be a a rapist defending my male power because i disagree with you. but i am also not a woman hater, so it isn't hating women that motivates me being a rapist, as you say i am. instead, it's a personal thing between you and me that makes me a rapist, and not me and women in general." it was a stupid thing to write , but it wasn't a threat. his whole livejournal is filled with a bunch of stupid sarcastic comments, but they aren't rape and murder threats.
The onus of responsibility is on Ken
05 May 2005
And furthermore, maybe a more important question to ask is: Doesn't it deeply disturb Ken Gagnon's family that they raised someone who would think and write such misogynistic garbage?
Talent?
27 May 2005
A "talented" journalist? Are you fucking kidding me?
Posting dick jokes and rape fantasies (OH MY GOD BUT THEY'RE NOT REALLY VIOLENT EVEN THOUGH I NAME NAMES) on a LiveJournal is not a "talent."
His livejournal is not the journalism cited
27 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
I remember reading about a feminist activity on the UNH campus of many women caring scissors threatening to cut off male genitalia. Now take Kens private online blog with no motivation to do any of the sarcastic remarks he made, to a bunch of women actually threatening men to their faces. I think we have the wrong person on the roasting stick ladies and gentlemen. If I was Ken and had to deal with the man hating radical threats of physical abuse I would have a few choice words to say about those individuals as well. I believe Miss Whitney and her big self righteous bubble needs a good popping because it appears to me people don’t hate her for being a feminist, they hate her because she is a horrible spoiled kid without a brain.
-kamui
Re: Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
get your facts straight
05 May 2005
"If I was Ken and had to deal with the man hating radical threats of physical abuse I would have a few choice words to say about those individuals as well."
The activity you are referring to, is the now infamous Patriarchy Slam in which women wore scissors around their necks which they used to pop balloons which spelled out the word PATRIARCHY. They were worn and used as a SYMBOL. No threats were ever made towards anybody, and most certainly no threats were launched at individuals. "Man hating feminists" didn't give a shit about Ken Gagnon until we realized that he has been making threats against people, so Ken was not "dealing" with threats of physical abuse anymore than anyone else was. He may be angered by some feminists on campus, but he does not have the right to threaten them.
This has got to be a joke comment. No one can be that stupid.
04 May 2005
B-b-but they were just jokes!
B-b-b-but don't you know he has a soul?!
re: This has got to be a joke comment. No one can be that stupid.
04 May 2005
Re: re: This has got to be a joke comment. No one can be that stupid.
07 May 2005
You probably think he looks like a cherub with little wing-a-lings on his back because YOU ridiculed MY post. Yes, that must be it!
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
-kamui
is this the onion news?
04 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
Incidentally, how can saying "he was just kidding" be a cop out? It's the truth. He was joking. He's not a stalker or a rapist or a pedophile. So nice work. You just destroyed an aspiring writer's career because you're so paranoid all men are out to crush women's rights. Congratulations.
Re: Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
07 May 2005
I agree with this one.
Hey, that's great that YOU know Ken personally
08 May 2005
You are on the losing end of this argument. Here's why...
04 May 2005
1. Gagnon is not going to act on his threats.
Prove it. Go ahead, prove it. Just because you know someone and they appear a lot like Gandhi to you, doesn't mean either jack or shit. "Good guys" are the problem. Why is it that acquaintances account for such a large number of rapes, hmm? Maybe it's because it's the people you don't expect, not some creepy stranger lurking in the dark. The fact that you met him once, or hang out with him all the time, is entirely unconvincing to me. After they catch serial killers, it's the neighbors that always say, "He seemed like such a nice guy." This doesn't mean that Gagnon necessary has raped anyone, but it does mean that he harbors violent, rape fantasies. And you can't deny it, because he fucking wrote it, okay?
2. Gagnon's good name has been ruined.
Gagnon's good name was ruined by Gagnon. If he didn't want people to read the most vile, misogynist shit he could come up with, he shouldn't have posted it to a public forum. But he did, because he wanted people to read it, yes? And it is a public forum, because it's called LIVEjournal, not PLEASENOONEREADTHISjournal. Those already exist, they're called regular journals. And you act all shocked when his shit comes to light and people want nothing to do him, in their classes and at their jobs? It evidently didn't take much "digging."
3. Gagnon shouldn't be investigated by the police.
Well, I'll tell ya', I'm an anarchist, so I think the police do more harm than good in this world. Nonetheless, Williams has received a death threat. Might we think it worthwhile to see if the man that claimed he wanted to rape her face knows something about it? It doesn't seem too outside the realm of fucking possibility, you know.
4. They were just jokes, they aren't real harassment.
The fact that you find them funny does not magically make them non-threatening or not part of a violent culture towards women. People laugh at racist, homophobic, or anti-semitic jokes, and that doesn't stop them from being hate speech. He might have had the best fucking intentions in the world, but it's not about intention, it's about impact.
And what does harassment mean anyway, if this isn't it? Telling the world that you want to rape women, and naming specific individuals, is harassment. Go ahead, come up with a definition of harassment in which Gagnon's comments fall outside it. You won't because you can't.
Ken Gagnon deserves every sanction he gets. The UNH community does not need to tolerate him, because he creates a hostile work and learning environment.
It doesn't take long...
04 May 2005
Re: It doesn't take long...
07 May 2005
So let's hunt down and jail every single person who makes dead baby jokes, or those Helen Keller jokes, while we're at it. It's like McCarthyism, only instead of getting all the communists, we're getting all of the satirists!
"Do you sympathize with the satirist party?"
If we jail them all, there would be a dramatic decrease in jail rapes, at least, because instead of jailing all the REAL rapists, we'd have a bunch of comedians filling the cells. There SHOULD be more people like Ken Gagnon in jail! It would make doing your time a hell of a lot nicer.
This is all bullshit. Go address some real problems.
-- belle
so you have never said or written anything ironical/satirical/comical?
04 May 2005
Together at last...
04 May 2005
It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms...I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom a very great additional grievance; and, therefore, whoever could find out a fair, cheap, and easy method of making these children sound, useful members of the commonwealth, would deserve so well of the public as to have his statue set up for a preserver of the nation.
...I shall now therefore humbly propose my own thoughts, which I hope will not be liable to the least objection.I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.
I do therefore humbly offer it to public consideration that of the hundred and twenty thousand children already computed, twenty thousand may be reserved for breed, whereof only one-fourth part to be males; which is more than we allow to sheep, black cattle or swine; and my reason is, that these children are seldom the fruits of marriage, a circumstance not much regarded by our savages, therefore one male will be sufficient to serve four females. That the remaining hundred thousand may, at a year old, be offered in the sale to the persons of quality and fortune through the kingdom; always advising the mother to let them suck plentifully in the last month, so as to render them plump and fat for a good table. A child will make two dishes at an entertainment for friends; and when the family dines alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish, and seasoned with a little pepper or salt will be very good boiled on the fourth day, especially in winter.Ken Gagnon: a Swift for our time

Ken: Okay, kids, now let's go over the material one more time. Now, Tommy, what's the safest form of sex?
Tommy: Anal?
Ken: *rubs eyes* For the millionth time, Tommy, no. You're close, but the rest of the class could probably tell you that it's not really safe until you pull out at the last second and bust your load of man-juice on that bitch's face, now couldn't they?
Tommy: I'm sorry, Mr. Gagnon.
Ken: If you were really sorry, Tommy, you'd be having more anonymous unprotected anal sex.
Tommy: Please stop touching me, Mr. Gagnon.
...the kings of satire.
Re: so you have never said or written anything ironical/satirical/comical?
05 May 2005
really now.
07 May 2005
I apologize for my ignorance. I'm 100% certain that Gagnon is actually going to stick his penis in someone's eye. C'mon, you can't be serious. Look at how ridiculous this guy's stuff is. Besides, you're right. We can't be sure he won't act on his "threats". But then, we're not sure that the moon won't suddenly shatter into a million spheroids and hurtle towards the Earth spontaneously. All I'm saying is, the contingency is a remote one and you need more evidence than a weblog to call the police.
2. Gagnon's good name was ruined (or as you say, was ruined by Gagnon)
The Livejournal is in a public forum, yes. The Internet. The place where everyone in the world is going to search for "Ken Gagnon's livejournal" on google. Seriously though, if someone had just stumbled across this journal (aside from Whitney Williams) they probably would have been no more disturbed than if they'd accidentally stumbled on an episode of "South Park". It's Williams' insistence that she is being stalked and her screaming of bloody murder that's ruining Gagnon's name. She called the friggin' "local and regional media" over this. Now the man's face is being plastered over news broadcasts, quotes are taken out of context, and now the name "Ken Gagnon" is synonomous with "crazy boogyman rapist who steals your children, the bad man".
3. Gagnon shouldn't be investigated by police.
This is one point I actually will fold on. If Williams wants the police to check him out because she feels threatened, she does have that right. But that's the extent to which the trouble should go. He shouldn't be prosecuted because there's no evidence, and he shouldn't be fired from his job for the same reason.
4. They were just jokes.
You can blather on all you like about chauvenism. The fact remains that they were just jokes, and there is simply no better way to argue this point. Oh and incidentally, I don't find all of it funny. But the fact remains.
As for them being part of an anti-women conspiracy, that is complete and utter bullcrap. He says distinctly that he doesn't hate women and he thinks they don't always have it the way they should. In the meantime, it seems everryone still rails on him for having a rather common male malady called "liking women".
In the end, if Gagnon is getting a such crap for writing material that Jack Black, George Carlin, the "South Park" writers, and the Wayan brothers are making large amounts of money from, then we might as well repeal the 1st amendment right now.
Re: really now
08 May 2005
really? now?
10 May 2005
You say, "you need more evidence than a weblog to call the police." And then, "If Williams wants the police to check him out because she feels threatened, she does have that right." You'll have to forgive me for pointing out your glaring contradiction here, but you'll need to come up with a coherent position. That's how this whole arguing thing works.
Still, you say that he should be allowed to remain at his job, but the university has a responsibility to create a work environment which isn't hostile to women. Even if we know for sure that Ken is not going to act on his threats, and I don't think this is the case, his writing does constitute the creation of a hostile work environment for Williams, a TNH co-worker. She should be able to work for a student newspaper without having to be amongst people that publicly post fantasies about raping her face. The fact that I have to write that makes me sorta sad and a whole lotta angry.
The difference between misogyny in South Park (or any other show) is that they're not mentioning the specific people that Ken Gagnon did. I don't know, I don't watch South Park all that much, so I might be missing the episode where they mention some random college student in New Hampshire. In this case, please enlighten me, but somehow I don't think you will. (Not that these shows don't necessarily contribute in their own way to a misogynistic culture in general.)
Regarding your defense of "jokes" about rape, you have failed to show how things people find funny aren't contributing to a misogynist culture or to the fears of specific women. Again, people make racist and anti-semitic jokes all the time still, but the fact that people find them funny doesn't change their effect on people of color and jews. How many people need to laugh at what Ken Gagnon wrote to off-set the amount of fear that a student or professor feels at having to face this person the next day?
Look, the first amendment doesn't mean that you get to say whatever you want without consequences. Ken Gagnon posted whatever he wanted, and then a community of people (Williams and the people defending her, those condemning Gagnon, his co-workers, other students, local and national news media) took an interest in his speech and said rather collectively, "that shit's fucked up, yo." It's not like the first amendment trumps all other concerns, like creating communities where people don't live in fear of violence. Shocking! There are consequences to speech! People condemn stuff!
Re: You are on the losing end of this argument. Here's why...
07 May 2005
Anne Lawing and "Kill All Humans"
04 May 2005
This is somewhat funny, but Anne Lawing, VP of Student Affairs (I think) who is certainly not a fan of Ken, is a member of the group- #file_1#
Now, um....why is she there? Sorta funny, if you ask me.
Kill All Humans
04 May 2005
Argh
04 May 2005
Wow. Anne has only one friend...
05 May 2005
Figures her only friend would be a fratboy.
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
Thank you for that informed opinion
06 May 2005
There is an acronym I would like you to look up. It serves as a general rule for what you should do before commenting in discussion forums on articles like this one. That acronym is RTFA. Since Google is also hard, I have already done the searching for you.
Um
06 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
04 May 2005
Security at Dining's Cinco de Mayo
05 May 2005
ha. ha. ha.
05 May 2005
Oh, burn!
05 May 2005
Ken has got to be stopped before he kills the undead
06 May 2005
The school blocked from eating at dining halls because his journal described killing zombies in Holloway Commons. Apparently the university is concerned that Ken might go after some of the UNDEAD, BRAIN EATING MEMBERS OF THE STUDENT BODY.
Ken Gagnon is the victim of a PC witchhunt
06 May 2005
Simpler explanations are best
07 May 2005
You
a.) receive anonymous threats
b.) get scared and try to counter those threats by taking safety measures such as having your information removed from the student directory, etc.
c.) you start surfing around the internet to see what people are saying about you so as to get a handle on this scary situation
d.) you find a livejournal that mentions raping you in the face
e.) you don't know anything about the author. You don't know that he is the nicest kid that everyone just loves to death, etc. etc. You have almost no knowledge of this guy, and certainly not enough knowledge to judge that he is just a joker and not a threat.
All you know is that this kid wrote to his buddies about raping your face. Why would you contact this kid? Why would you let the threatener know prior to letting the people who can protect you know?
f.) You contact the authorities. But you worry the authorities might not be taking this seriously enough and that there's still a danger to you. Still scared, you go public once the authorities know in order to make sure that there's community pressure to protect you.
Re: Simpler explanations are best
07 May 2005
Bullshit.
08 May 2005
another forgery
10 May 2005
(2.) But that has nothing to do with whether I can prove it. I can’t prove it. So what? That, doesn’t mean it’s not true. Personally, I don’t care whether you believe me or not. If you don’t believe me, then you’re not who I’m talking to. I’m talking people smart enough to know that when something that is inconsistent with the bulk of my writing comes signed with my name, it’s a forgery. Anybody who’s not smart enough to grasp that, wouldn’t understand what I was saying, anyway.
(3.) Besides, who it was that wrote something is irrelevant. Only content counts. If it’s true, it doesn’t matter who says it, or why. The truth is the truth, period.
(4.) Later, when you encounter something with my name on it, posted somewhere else on the internet, consider that it may be a forgery. If it is consistent with what you know I have actually written, then I wrote it. If it is not consistent, then it’s a forgery. If you can’t tell the difference, you’re too stupid to understand what I’m saying, anyway, so don’t waste time trying.
*snip*
It's not about the writing. It's about the name.
*snip*
But remember, if only the content counts, and if it's true, and if it doesn't matter who says it or why, then is it really a forgery? Educate yourself. Start today.
*snip*
My signature can only be trusted here:
sf.indymedia.org/
here:
www.transbay.net/~nessie/
and most of here:
www.sfbg.com/nessie/
Re: another forgery
11 May 2005
"My name isn’t nessie."
15 May 2005
www.sfimc.net/news/2002/12/1555696_comment.php
(snip)
Sometimes they take something that an anti-Zionist has written, subtly alter its meaning by changing a few words, and post it under the name of the original author.
(snip)
Re: "My name isn’t nessie."
18 May 2005
Whitney Williams, Instigator.
10 May 2005
She even ran to IMC to tar him. She calls NH IMC the UNH Community.
Well THIS UNH alumnus is also a member of the UNH Community. I paid $19,000 to be one. I officially set up a soapbox for people who are to big for UNH. If Ken wants to send me a column to my magazine in Boston, he is welcome. Assuming he doesn't ultimately rape his opponent, then I empathize. I was once too big for UNH too, and am now too big for Boston. They even say so. A poison pen letter was sent here about me once.
signed,
Flipside
www.contextflexed.com
It's published on NHIMC but addressed to the UNH community
11 May 2005
As for the rest of your comment: grow up, Flipside. I don't agree with much of what I've read from Williams, but I can't agree with calling her a "feminazi" and a "pink-triangle socialist."
Your comment was asinine. I tried to find an argument in your post, but all I found was name calling. Name calling can't be substituted for arguments. So leave the name calling on the schoolyard the next time you want to join the big kids in rational discourse.
Who's the instigator?
11 May 2005
Re: UNH Student Threatens Faculty, Students, and Children with Sexual Violence
11 May 2005
Furthermore, tell the twin brother head you have growing out of your shoulder that it is not legitimate discussion to use the internet to amplify a harassment campaign against a UNH student, regardless if it is backed by a tiny number of other UNH students. Stop pretending you are journalists and theorists when you are punks adding to a front merely because UNH is a boring place. You can't con me.
Flipside
UNH Class of 1995
Who's the instigator?
Current rating: 0
11 May 2005
by garden gnome
Reply to this comment
The only one around here I see instigating is you. You have nothing important or meaningful to say, and as moononite 11 said, no argument in your comment. Don't come to a website where we attempt to have legitimate discussions to throw your pejorative excrement around and then use it as a forum to promote your magazine.
No one is forcing you to construct your comments rationally
11 May 2005
You dislike Williams because you think she is hysterical and irrational. You write: I don't think she gets to be hysterical, while the rest of us have to put on professorial glasses and act objective. Again, you don't have to use rational judgment when constructing your comments. But if you fail to use rational judgment, don't expect me to take your comments on the irrationailty of others seriously.
To address your less (if at all) relevant comments: this Moononite is on the record for being a libertarian capitalist not a "libertarian communist." NHIMC, to the best of my knowledge, has not formally affiliated itself with any political philosophy, except for vaguely employing the term "democratic" to describe their activities. So try harder next time not to stereotype your audience.
Also, you can continue to flame away at me as to the quality of the site. I won't feel the burns. I am not a member of the group that runs NHIMC. I am a someone who frequently enjoys flaming on this site, much like yourself (though unlike you, I do not try to use the site to promote any of my ventures.) And since the flames are flying, on the issue of pretending at journalism, you speak confidently for a guy who makes frequent use of the marquee in his online magazine.Reality Check
11 May 2005
It is rather absurd for a group which is on record for being libertarian communists to appeal that we have "legitimate discussion." One does not grant legitimate (e.g. groupthought) status to ultraleftist wackos. One merely ridicules them.
One also does not return hysteria and rabid man hating with bespectacled objectivist critiques. To do so would be to allow one psychopath all the fun and deny it to ourselves. But what reasoning other than weakness of ethos do you claim I should handicap myself in this way?
Finally, all interested parties are throwing excrement and self-promoting. That includes Whitney Williams who began this and spread it to IMC, it includes the siamese twins from Moononite, who are flaming themselves into view, and it includes myself. Of the three clearly I am the best organized, since I own a publication.
You are kidding no one. UNH is boring and smells like cow feces on off days. For this reason you engage in such buffoonery. There is no social issue at stake.
Flipside
Class of 1995
The original point
12 May 2005
To clarify: to be taken seriously by people I do not know ranks exceedingly low on my list of priorities. Consequently, I only ever "play" the rational objectivist. (As you have done.) While I respect this talent, I seldom bother to display it.
My original point was, and I restate: Whitney Williams considers herself a Radical Feminist, and while being a member of an unrecognized student organization would appear to be reckless, defiant and revolutionary, the situation reduces to a girl with a big mouth who believes herself ugly, and vents her anger by creating hypes which in her mind, she hopes will lead to mass castrations.
plsdiekthnx
18 May 2005
We're runnin' alright.
Anyone hear what happened to Ken?
22 May 2005
PLEASE DON'T LET THIS STORY DIE!
05 Jun 2005
94 comments on this page! There should be like, I dunno, a bajillion million fafillion! I mean, THAT'S NOT EVEN A NUMBER, DAMN IT! I'M ANGRY!
Re: PLEASE DON'T LET THIS STORY DIE!
15 Jun 2005
If you want more comments on stories, it seems, get a bunch of right-wingers to start defending Senator Gregg. No doubt that'll get things going.
So close, but so far
16 Jun 2005