Remember those days? When you could say something seemingly harmless, certainly with no ill intent whatsoever, but someone, perhaps because they live in a world of their own, becomes offended? Try as you might, no apology is sufficient. None will ever be acceptable and the offended clearly prefers to wallow in victimhood. If the offended has an entourage you will be summarily excommunicated from your world. Your life is over. Gone. Disappeared. You might even say "86-ed."
Those days are over.
Apparently some former D.C. hotshot posted something offensive, intentionally so, but it was interpreted as a threat. A serious threat. On life and limb. Directed towards someone who, not that long ago, has suffered attacks on their life. Bullet whizzing past the head kind of serious. This hotshot wasn't just flashing an OK sign (which would have lots of folks up in arms), he made a threatening post targeting someone who might have reason to be a bit sensitive about these things.
My how times have changed.
In the good old days, this hotshot would have been immediately canceled. Vilified in the media, social and legacy. Shunned by all right-thinking folk with an ounce of moral integrity. Today we can expect this hotshot to be immediately forgiven. It was just a misunderstanding of a term, a slang term, whose meaning is malleable and has been transformed at a rate this hotshot cannot fathom. He didn't know it would have that meaning, that his intent would be misunderstood, and after all it is his intent that is paramount, not the interpretation of the bloke he targeted. Right? Right. We can expect the hotshot to be defended, if not glorified, while his target will be vilified.
We've come full circle.
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