Let's all take Blindboy seriously now...

He's just a grifter, plain and simple. Even has a merch site. He is to the left what the likes of Jordan Peterson and Russell Brand are to the right. I've zero time for any of them.

Curious that I had absolutely no idea there was a merch store. He has never mentioned it in the select few podcasts I have listened to. Unlike for example Jokko Willink who is a podcast I listen to all the time. And he ends every single podcast with at least 20 minutes going on about his products. Supplements, clothing, drinks, boots, and more.

I did a quick google for "Blindboy merch" just now and about 10 different sites came up with all different merch. Which one is actively actually Blindboy's? And which ones are just people trading on his name/product and have no affiliation with him?

I think this is a good example though of the "Hate the person first and think of a reason to hate him second". There are any number of public figures out there and they all sell merch. Think of your favorite band - they likely have merch. But magically when you already decided you hate someone - the fact they have any merch to sell is somehow proof of how awful they are.

It's called confirmation bias. You decide something is true first and then fit the world around that decision second. Ignoring - usually - the countless 1000s of cases where the same thing applies elsewhere but you do not reach the same chosen conclusion there. Blindboy has merch? The git! My favorite band has merch? Oh wow I'd love a new Tshirt as it happens. Take my money!

Quite often too people who create merch stores are not doing it for the money. But because their fans and followers have been on and on at them to do it because THEY want products they can get their hands on. Strange isn't it that this "grifter" appears not to mention his merch store all that much on his primary medium (assuming if and are even his in the first place) while many other podcasters do at great length. Makes you wonder, as the user above, if certain people even know what the word Grifter even means or did they just hear it and thought they would sound smart if they regurgitated it.

He's hardly going to do it for free

He’s a clever guy who noticed a niche in the market in Ireland to take advantage of the weak minded. He tells people what they want to hear, but thesauruses it up to sound high and mighty.

He's basically Andrew Tate for sad, lonely losers as opposed to “bro’s”.

I'd be interested to see the Venn Diagram of the people who get enraged by BlindBoy and the people who get enraged by Greta Thunberg. I'd imagine there is quite a bit of cross-over.

Heh. I can not decide whether to take the optimistic view that we must live in a society containing a remarkable lack of suffering that something or someone so innocuous and irrelevant can cause such "suffering" in someone. Or the pessimistic view that the level of resilience has dropped so low in our populace that they are that easily tormented by almost literally nothing at all.

Hard not to take the latter view on a forum where only yesterday I was told that children capable of cooking their own dinner are somehow remarkably resilient. If that's the current bar for resilience then I am surprised Blindboy's mere existence is not sending people into ructions of suicidal despair at the sheer torment they are expected to suffer in their lives :)

It would be the most circlest circle that ever circled.

the bag means he attains the best of both worlds.. anonymity and he can walk into his local shop, pub, doctor surgery, airport, restaurant etc without recognition plus he can spout whatever absurd bòllocks as he does almost daily and isn’t ever publicly in person accountable… the bags wernt ever part of the act… him and the other one like most people who make a living on a stage and in the public eye, don’t require any bags, quite simply a well thought out method of them being able to say any old scutter and then not needing to be accountable… cowardly. they take off the bags and away for a meal / pint / whatever… it’s now David Chambers and he doesn’t have to endure criticism…

I see he has criticised Jordan Peterson. A psychologist with much experience and expertise, awards internationally and a multitude of qualifications…. a doctorate for example… yet here is blindboy (who doesn’t have a degree) because Peterson doesn’t subscribe to Blindboys woe is me, soppy bôllocks unqualified makey up sneering victim narrative…. Blindboy lets him have it. 😁. You couldn’t make it up…. It was probably an attempt to get a reaction from Peterson and get more international notoriety.

imagine an amateur physical therapist who read few books and did the odd course, slagging off an orthopaedic consultant surgeon with 20 plus years experience of helping people and attaining meaningful, measurable and documented medical results 😅 ….. hip replacements, knee reconstructions etc…. That’s exactly the equivalent to Blindboy mouthing off in that manner about the work done by healthcare professionals…

Was wondering that myself. He does not use a lot of unusual words that often. And when he does it seems to generally be because that word(s) are the particular focus of that podcast which means he has explained quite deeply what the words mean first.

You would want to be someone who has a personal small vocabulary in particular to be bothered by the words Blindboy uses. I would recommend someone like that not listen to Sam Harris who really does talk very eloquently indeed. He uses a lot of uncommon words but uses them quite well.

Contrast that to someone like Russel Brand. I never really had a problem with Brand over the past many years. But I always felt he was using words just for the sake of using them. Whereas Harris would use words to communicate more effectively and be understood, I had a gut feeling Brand was using them more to obfuscate and make his monologues appear deeper and more meaningful than they actually are.

Oh no looks I used a big word starting with a vowel. I guess I had a dictionary in my cereal this morning to some of these people :)

I do not think there is anything cowardly about any public figure who chooses to go on media in a character - or who writes books under a pseudonym - or similar. A few people I have seen have just declared it to be cowardly. But I have not seen a single one of them construct an end to end coherent argument as to why it is cowardly. They appear to just think shouting that it is so - makes it so.

As for Peterson I would make a few points there in general rather than make any argument specific to Blindboy. Mainly because since you did not mention what Blindboy said, what the context was, or provide any citation or reference it is impossible to evaluate whether the criticism was valid or not. Blindboy is far from perfect and if he says or does something below par it should be called out. As it should for anyone! But it seems the people who hate him will use any single flaw or failure not in isolation but as proof that their blanket hatred overall is justified. As if it has to be perfection or nothing.

But the general point would be that I too have criticized Peterson in the past. With good reason. He has come out with some absolute nonsense. I would push back on this "Appeal to Authority" fallacy that his qualifications put him beyond critique from anyone, let alone people who are on paper less qualified than he. Arguments are either good or they are not. Critique is either valid or it is not. The qualifications - or lack of them - of the people offering a critique or receiving one are absolutely irrelevant.

What I do not do is suggest that overall Peterson is awful and use single cases of him saying or doing something wrong as if it proves I was right all along. Actually despite the numerous criticisms I have leveled at him in the past I think overall he is genuine, actually cares, and on balance is a positive force in a world that is better off for having him active in it than not. Which I would say about Blindboy too. I do not demand perfection of public figures. That's the stuff of cults and world religions.

How did he come up with the nickname, "Blindboy Boatclub"?

Given Peterson's descent down the disinformation rabbit hole in recent years he's more than fair game for criticism by anyone.

There's several entertainment show threads on here are dominated by people who detest the shows it appears like whenever I drop in to them.

OTB one in particular is 80% the same people saying for last 3 years they've stopped listening.

Some of Blindboys hot takes are really excellent podcasts. They're unique, in depth and coupled with his style and an Irish sense of humor that makes them stand out. He did one on an Irish salad a couple years ago that I enjoyed immensely. His description of 'Ballymaloe Relish being tomato sauce with notions' made me laugh for weeks after it.