Leave it to the leftists at Salon.com to blame the victim.
Writer Scott Eric Kaufman today blasted conservative blogger and pundit Ben Shapiro for alerting police to a threat of violence from transgendered journalist Zoey -- formerly Bob -- Tur.
While Kaufman allowed that "Tur was clearly in the wrong to threaten Shapiro," Kaufman whined that Shapiro was "playing a coward's game here":
Four days after repeatedly insulting trans woman Zoey Tur on “Dr. Drew on Call,” Brietbart Editor-at-Large Ben Shapiro filed battery charges against her with the Los Angeles Police Department.
On the program, Shapiro continually insulted the transgender community by refusing to refer to Caitlyn Jenner with her preferred pronoun, then deliberately provoking Tur, asking her “What are your genetics, sir?”
Tur responded by putting a hand on his shoulder and saying, “you should cut that out now, or you’ll go home in an ambulance.” Shapiro alleged that after the show, Tur said the two should meet in the parking lot. Breitbart News is also reporting that “Tur tweeted out on Friday that he would like to “curb stomp” Shapiro, which Breitbart Editor-at-Large — who also refused to refer to Tur by her preferred pronoun — claimed is an anti-Semitic statement because he’s only familiar with the practice from the film “American History X.”
Tur was clearly in the wrong to threaten Shapiro — though whether her words and endorsement of a tweet amount to battery are a matter for the Los Angeles Police Department to decide — but Shapiro and his adoring fans utterly ignore Shapiro’s complicity in creating the hostile environment in which the threat was uttered.
[...]
Shapiro is playing a coward’s game here — doing everything he can to provoke someone to violence, then running to the police the moment anyone threatens him — but it’s of a piece with his belief, epitomized in “Liberal Bullies,” that conservatives are the victims of a violent culture of silencing and suppression that could potentially turn violent.
For their part, Salon headline editors also set the blame-the-victim tone for readers with the wording of the headline (emphasis mine):
Ben Shapiro files police report against trans woman Zoey Tur for her response to his deliberate provocations
