familiarity breeds contempt and other eggshell proverbs
Here's the thing. I know some of you on my flist were involved in that site, so I've been reluctant to say anything at all, for fear of saying something that'll make it worse. I know you're hurting right now (or laughing hysterically at the giant joke you've pulled on everyone, I'm still not 100% sure). But I've been thinking and reading the posts and asking myself questions and I feel now like I have to write this down, if only for myself, to work out my own thoughts on the subject.
First of all, and this is more in reaction to the posts and comments I've read than to the subject of them, the word is libel. Not slander. Slander is word of mouth. Libel comes with a paper trail. Or, well, in this case a trail of various web pages, vids, email messages and other electronic media. Just to clear things up.
Personally, what I had seen of that PETJA stuff made me very uncomfortable. I know it's supposed to be funny, but I couldn't help cringing at the thought of other people seeing them. Not just Jensen. Not even Jensen's family or lawyer or manager or whoever. I cringed at the thought of fans with learning disabilities seeing them - and people with developmentally challenged relatives and friends. I cringed at the thought of strangers or casual fans coming across this material on YouTube (where I know I saw at least one of the videos) out of context and associating it with Jensen. Because either way it comes off badly, come to think of it: an outsider can look at this and think the creator of the vid is poking fun at both Jensen and the large number of functionally illiterate people in America at the same time, or they can look at it and think Jensen's involved in the poking fun at people who can't read.
In any case, although I wasn't comfortable with that material and fully support Jensen's right to request it be removed from the internet, where anyone can find it and interpret it however they wish, I understand how scary this is for the people involved, and I feel bad that they're upset.
I thought I had more stuff to say, but I keep deleting it, so I'll just leave it at this for now.