"Controversial" is a word that has long been used by the press to cover all manner of sins — and to maintain an illusion of objectivity by not taking a side on the "controversy," as though not condemning abuse is a neutral position. But its current service to bothsideserism is exponentially gross.
Donald Trump and the various members of his vile administration are not "controversial figures." His policies of malice are not "controversial." People in power who perpetrate abuse and the people who object to it and/or are harmed by it are not two sides of a "controversy."
Using "controversy" (or "debate," or variations thereof) to affect neutrality is bullshit. There is no neutral in Trump's vast abuses. There is only condemning and resisting it, or abetting it, either actively or passively.
It takes some hefty denial to manage to convince oneself that weasel words like "controversy" are somehow superior to the complicity of silence.
[Also on Twitter, beginning here.]
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