While the ultimately successful campaign to get John Scott into a 3-on-3 format All Star game was intended to make a league that needs no help looking stupid on its own look even stupider, all it proved was just how self-congratulatory everyone could be in the process from the fans, to the League, to Scott himself, along with proving just what a clown act 3 on 3 overtime deciding games of consequence is by virtue of the fact that Scott could score twice among the league’s best players.

And if the choice is doing that for $550K a year for five or six years or jockeying a cash register at a Tim Horton’s drive-thru in Swift Current, then the choice is obvious, even if Ryan O’Reilly is driving around both jobs share the same physical risks.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

Seconded.

I don't like white rappers.

Seconded.

I am not a legal expert, how many times do I have to say it?

On paper, it’s surprising that what’s become very clear as the vocal majority of Hawks fans aren’t more nakedly jealous of Kings fans. With basically an equal amount of success as the Hawks, Kings fans have been able to enjoy the organization from management to players being unrepentant pieces of since the summer of 2012 (when Drew Doughty was also accused of sexual assault and no one even to this day still seems to give a shit about) without having to mansplain themselves to Social Justice Warriors out to ruin the good times of white men everywhere.

Whether that’s a function of no one giving a fuck about the Kings on a national level even after winning two of the last four cups and leading their division for most of this year, or that Kings fans as a whole merely think it’s funny when it happens to other people without the slightest bit of self-reflection, their loyalty remains largely unquestioned to this point. The option of being able to enjoy their shit SPORTS franchise in uninterrupted complacency without being made to ask larger questions is certainly an option most would take.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

On paper, it’s surprising that what’s become very clear as the vocal majority of Hawks fans aren’t more nakedly jealous of Kings fans.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

Dear Your Sorry Ass,
I’m becoming increasingly concerned that my Facebook friend is a performative male feminist. Like me, he believes that women are disadvantaged in our society and that it is essential we fight to rectify that injustice; unlike me, he goes on about it all the fucking time. Just today he shared a Venn diagram equating Men’s Rights Activists with human excrement, and on this recent International Women’s Day past he was pretty much all over the joint praising women for their courage, picking fights with MRAs, and telling all cis straight white men to shut up and listen for once. (He is a cis straight white man.)

I’m not sure what our mutual feminist female friends think of all this, but I’m becoming increasingly concerned for his mental well-being and wondering if I ought to take him aside, man to man, and gently suggest that he take a chill pill. (No, not the red one! Gah!) I don’t want him to stop caring about women’s rights; I just don’t want to lose him forever to the dark side of performative male feministing. What should I do?

Sincerely, Non-Performative Male Feminist

Dear Male,
First of all, my sympathies for the loss of your friend to online sanctimony. It’s always a tragedy to see someone you care about going down the dark path of self-righteous self-flagellation, and that pain is only compounded by an increasingly insufferable online presence that you’re expected to respectfully support—or worse, vocally endorse. But all is not lost, my merciful male! Interventions are difficult, but surprisingly effective when deployed with care.

The first thing to remember is that performative anti-sexists generally fall under at least one of two major categories—but keep in mind, these aren’t mutually exclusive, and one often overlaps the other.

First, there is the earnest new male feminist, who is often young and only recently aware of the error of his earlier ways. He has taken to evangelizing as hard as possible because he feels guilt or perhaps even shame at his past behavior. His performance is an attempt to repent, and he hopes it will redeem him, perhaps in the eyes of women, but perhaps only by his own new standards of morality or politics. This is a noble intention, and while it’s compassionate for you to assume that your friend is proceeding in good-faith solidarity, I’ll leave it to you to suss out whether he’s primarily preaching from a pulpit of sincerity or not.

If however, you suspect a prominently self-serving motive to this grandstanding, you might just be dealing with the other type of performative male feminist, colloquially known as “a fucking sleaze.” This unctuous character might be trolling for the affections of women under false pretenses—or he might just get a high from the production of piety. Either way, it’s worth considering the possibility your friend is just a gross dick and muting or even unfriending him.
Again, you’ll likely need a Venn diagram to plot out all these tangled incentives, and you can, in turn, contort yourself into all kinds of existential knots trying to figure out whether good deeds are inherently self-serving at their core or whatever. Still, the main thing to look for is intent: Is this person really trying to be a good guy? If so, great! They should be amenable to some friendly criticism . . . eventually.

You seem to have a good sense of the delicacy of the situation. It is never wise to criticize the zeal of the recently converted—they’re quite literally getting a chemical high off of their ecstasy, and people don’t generally respond well to declarations that their new supply of adrenaline and serotonin is, in fact, incredibly annoying to everyone around them. I also commend your instinct for discretion. “Call-out culture” is the way of the performative male feminist, while pulling a friend aside—thereby eliminating all potential “likes” and “faves” that you might be rewarded with for doing so—is the kinder, more comradely, more effective, and dare I say, more feminist thing to do. You want him to be a better person and a better feminist, and potentially embarrassing him obviously wouldn’t help.

May I suggest a work-around? If I were you, I’d consider consulting a woman feminist, a mutual friend whom you both trust. You’ve said you’re not sure what your female feminist friends think of all this, but without even knowing your friends, I’m 99.9 percent confident in telling you they probably hate it. They’ve very likely seen the performative male feminist shtick before, and they’re annoyed by it. If it’s mostly unctuous, they find it transparent and histrionic. If it’s mostly heartfelt, they find it mawkish and rabid. I honestly think that if you open up a conversation with one of these women, she will be relieved by your identification of the problem and offer to help. She may even talk to the friend herself if she thinks he’d be more inclined to listen to a woman, and that would conveniently let you off the hook for stressful emotional labor, which I know you men love to avoid. (Kidding!)

My final suggestion to you is to perhaps consider the timeline here. How long has your friend been this dreadful? Is it possible that he’s simply going through a passing phase? It’s one thing to intervene to assist a friend losing their grip, but we all deserve some space to make silly mistakes and get a little too rabid about our latest passions now and then. But if this seems like a more permanent lifestyle change? Knock that disgraceful behavior right out of him . . . gently.

I wish you the best of luck, merciful male, and from one feminist to another, thank you in advance (and on behalf of women) for seeing to the problem—even if the work itself ends up, as is so often the case, getting outsourced to the fairer sex.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

"Check it out, honey, I'm gonna be the Dan Bernstein of hockey, all the way down to forgetting which sentence I added too many words to."

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

You think he talks like he writes? "Repugnantly, I'm disgustingly going to have to because of idiots like you beat shit you!"

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

It will be imperative for all wingers to not evacuate the defensive zone as well to assist in breakouts, as there will be space behind those Blues forwards. This is especially true for Panarin and Fuckface, who have been feasting on terrible teams lately and might feel the urge to get into party mode at the other end a little too quickly.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

fuckface

What's Billy Ripken got to do with any of this?

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.

The full magnitude of the Sharks’ skill at forward has been on display all post season on their power play, which we have sung the praises of over and over again throughout the years. And in what figures to be such a low-event series, every opportunity on the man advantage is sacred, which is why Peter DeBoer wasted no time in planting the seeds in the officials that the Blues were getting away with clutching and grabbing in an effort to get his superior power play unit more looks. Of course Hitchcock responded in true Blues form saying they weren’t going to whine to get calls, just like Doug Armstrong wasn’t going to “circumvent” the cap to make deadline deals even in spite of their rash of injuries. But it’s probably pretty easy to take a principled stand when a person is as intractable in their respective job position as those two are in spite of years of hilarious futility. Though on a certain level, it would absolutely serve this dumb fuck entitled Hawks fan base right to have to suffer through a Blues Cup win after how everyone has shown their ass for the last 10 months.

I still do not get the strategy of insulting the vast majority of Hawks fans to get at the tiny "show your ass" faction.

Our hotel smelled like dead hooker vagina (before you ask I had gotten a detailed description from beardown)

He's a hockey hipster. He loved when they sucked because no one else cared. Now he's just a miserable fuck that wants them to be terrible again so he can go back to thinking he is the only one watching.