As you’ve no doubt heard by now, a tragedy unfolded on a New Mexico film set last week when cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed by a bullet from what was supposed to be a harmless prop gun.
The gun was fired by Alec Baldwin, and insiders say the screen icon has been inconsolable in the wake of the accident.
Baldwin has apologized for his role in the incident and expressed his grief publicly, but because we live in a time when monstrous cruelty is rewarded by "likes" and subscriptions, the worst people alive love to use moments of tragedy to try and boost their public profiles.
This leads to a situation in which the most hateful and incompetent grifters are elevated to the level of public intellectuals, simply because they offer up heaping helpings of steaming confirmation bias for the perpetually enraged.
There are many examples of this phenomenon, but the most obvious these days is Candace Owens.
In case you’re unaware, Candace is a former liberal who switched sides when she realized there was more money to be made from pandering to the Right.
A smart move, but intelligence is decidedly not her defining trait.
Because there’s no zealot like a recent convert, and Candace needs to cash in before her marks wise up, she issues the hottest takes of anyone on Twitter — which is really saying something.
Despite the fact that this story involves the tragic death of a young wife and mother, Owens gleefully pounced on the situation, erroneously claiming that Baldwin had “murdered innocent people."
Apparently still enraged about a series of SNL sketches, Owens claimed that the situation was “poetic justice," a form of payback for Baldwin spending “four years dedicated to painting Donald Trump and his supporters as evil murderers."
Again, that didn’t happen, but on Twitter, being inflammatory is far more important than being right.
Alec didn’t clap back at Owens, probably because unlike the pundit, he’s not looking to score cheap internet points off of a tragic death.
Fortunately, his daughter Ireland Baldwin took up the important work of reminding the world that Owens is both evil and a moron.
In a series of tweets, Ireland blasted Owens as “the most disgusting, hateful, cancerous human being I’ve ever come across” for using an innocent woman’s death in a cheap attempt to drum up attention and salvage what’s left of her ailing career.
“I respect people’s opinions… but if you support these absolute clowns… please don’t follow me any more,” Baldwin continued.
We respect her efforts here, but clearly, Ms. Baldwin didn’t go far enough.
There are idiot con artists on both ends of the political spectrum, and until all of us start calling out vile trolls like Candace Owens, our current climate of divisiveness and misinformation will only continue to fester and stink.
At moments like this, it’s important to bear in mind that the only thing Candace Owens cares about is her career, as evidenced by the strategic flip-flopping that has defined it.
In the future, Owens will likely once again transform into a completely different type of firebrand, if that’s what the market dictates.
Whatever the case, she’ll still be trying to build a brand with her shameless opportunism and painfully smooth-brained takes, which means she’ll never be worth paying attention to.
And like all bullies, without attention from others, Candace will simply dry up and blow away.