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Do not ask Rosie DiManno about her weekend. On Saturday, the Internet took aim at one of the Toronto Star columnist’s recent pieces, and the scathing and hilarious critiques included one from the takedown specialists at Gawker, who awarded her the prize for “Worst Lede of All Time.” At least DiManno can take comfort that she’s not the first of Toronto’s writerly class to run afoul of the site. Below, we rounded up Gawker’s most angry screeds and memorable jabs at Toronto media.
All stories relating to Jonathan Kay
Gawker Gotchas: the snarky site’s top six takedowns of Toronto journalists
What do Conrad Black and Lindsay Lohan have in common? Permission to enter Canada
Coming soon to a country near you (Image: United States Marshals Service)
When Conrad Black leaves jail and his Mafia buddies behind at the end of the week, he’ll be welcomed back to Canada (or at least will be legally allowed to reside here), because the government has granted Black a one-year temporary resident permit. Not cool, says NDP leader Thomas Mulcair, who thinks “the British criminal Conrad Black” is getting special treatment since the country often denies permits to other foreigners with criminal pasts. (Though the Globe and Mail helpfully points out that Canada doled out 11,000 such permits last year, of which 6,500 were issued to people with criminal records). More compelling, or at least stranger, was Jonathan Kay’s argument in the National Post that Lindsay Lohan has had scads of run-ins with the law but didn’t have any issues being allowed into the country. We’re not sure it’s the same situation (Lohan was only here to film a movie, while Black likely plans to live in Toronto), but it makes us giggle to see Lilo and Baron Black of Crossharbour (can we call him CoBla?) occupying the same sentence. [National Post]
Jonathan Kay responds to Gawker’s taunts over his Toronto Life feature “Almost Rich”
When you argue that a household income of $196,000 is “positively middle class,” as Jonathan Kay did in an essay from Toronto Life’s February edition, you expect a little backlash. After the story went live on the Interwebs on Wednesday, first Twitter users and commenters offered their (often choice) thoughts on Kay’s piece, then Torontoist and BlogTO both pounced, before Gawker’s Hamilton Nolan posted a characteristically witty screed that summed up Kay’s argument as “Money: once you spend it all, you don’t feel rich any more.” Kay responds in kind in the National Post, maintaining that his essay is more a look at a growing debt phenomenon among the upper classes than an apology for whiny rich people. That said, Kay admits he understands—and even kind of enjoys—the criticism: “If I didn’t know that the ‘Jonathan Kay’ [Nolan] savages is actually me, I’d have joined the ranks of the Tweeters and Gawker commenters echoing his bon mots.” Read the entire story [National Post] »
