Patrick Wit

IT en Telecom advocaat. Partner en lid van het Dagelijks Bestuur. Specialist Outsourcing, IT-projecten, Privacy, IT geschillen

[NPO Radio 1 @NPORadio1]

Normaal maakt @DiederikSmit een komische bijdrage, maar deze week is hij serieus. Waarom we beter op de hoogte moeten zijn van moraal. 'Je kunt wel degelijk Jodenhaat veroordelen, zonder dat je daarmee een kant kiest in een politiek conflict.'

[Erin Remblance @remblance_erin]

This might be my favourite 2 minutes of tv ever.

@GeorgeMonbiot getting straight to the heart of what we need to do: system change.

#degrowth

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

A British writer penned the best description of Donald Trump I’ve ever read:

“Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface. Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created?' If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

-Nate White

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@janwillemwits @lammert @bashoogland Wat treurig. Mooie herinneringen

[Elsschot🌍🇳🇱🇪🇺 🇺🇦 @marcelbar8]

(1/2) Behoorlijk vernietigende recensie van Sander Wieringa over het boek #Stikstoffuik van Arnout Jaspers.
"Het heeft met wetenschap niets te maken en gaat voorbij aan zaken als wetsgeschiedenis, jurisprudentie en de trias politica."

[NicolienvVroonhoven @Nvanvroonhoven]

Mag je een debat screen recorden? In ieder geval: dit was het allersterkste stukje van gistermiddag:

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@cthijm @r_westerdijk Wellicht zijn onze vrouwelijke collega’s zo verstandig geen luchtvaartmaatschappijen bij te staan

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@boswachterRB @jjvpeperstraten Is onderdeel van een offer ritueel uit het heidendom ( zie wikipedia)

[PG Kroeger @PGKroeger]

Stem @BoerBurgerB voor extra BBBevingen!

[PG Kroeger @PGKroeger]

Als u populisten als JA21, FvD, BBB, PVV en Haga hoort toeteren over #aftreden en #Groningen, bedenk dan dit even. 👇

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@janwillemwits @Remco1981 De heilige mis in een gebouw op een bedrijventerrein in Veenendaal……

[Dirk Vreugdenhil @dirkvreugdenhil]

De vraag voor 1 miljoen: voor welk doel heeft de Rijksoverheid sinds 2019 de meeste stikstofruimte gekocht?
-> https://t.co/mzJGyn6yGY

[ITechLaw Association @itechlaw_assn]

📷 Day 2 of the ITechLaw European Conference was another success!

Today attendees enjoyed several informative sessions and a highly interactive round table discussion.

Click here to see more pictures: https://t.co/pvWvzXciRC
#ITLzurich22 #ITechLaw #TechnologyLaw #TechLawyer

[Vincent Bijlo @vincent_bijlo]

Nee mensen, dit kan natuurlijk niet. Mangiare, het enige culinaire radioprogramma bij de NPO mag natuurlijk niet verdwijnen. Teken, voor een smakelijke ether. Red het radioprogramma Mangiare! - https://t.co/JQsc0frnJy https://t.co/KwqeAZ8fji

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@StijnFens @Eurostar Zelde euvel hier. 4,5 uur vertraging. Keurige mail van @Eurostar dat er compensatie gevraagd kan worden. Helaas weigert het formulier de door @Eurostar zelf aangeleverde gegevens over het ticket en de reservering. Wat nu @Eurostar #eurostar

[JW Wits @janwillemwits]

Op radio 1 kabbelt het ene lookalike format door in het andere lookalike maar @RadioMangiare is anders, origineel, een culinair instituut en wordt vooral ook met zo veel aanstekelijke lol en passie gemaakt. Dat mag niet verdwijnen!

[Patrick Wit @witpatrick]

@JensvandenBrink Goed werk @JensvandenBrink

[NPO Radio 1 @NPORadio1]

‘Die vlag is van mij, van u en van iedereen, die is van 17 miljoen Nederlanders. Het hoort niet dat je die dan kaapt voor een specifiek doel’, zegt historicus Han van der Horst in @DitisdeDag, over de omgekeerde vlaggen die worden opgehangen als steun voor de boeren.

[New York Times Opinion @nytopinion]

“Seriously I can just come out and say it? Call him a liar?” asks @JonathanPieNews, a fictional broadcast reporter created and performed by comedian Tom Walker, in a satirical video about Britain’s Prime Minister.
“God bless America.” https://t.co/Hu6Q6q8TBp