Current Events > Larry David attacks Elmo, Wil Wheaton has a nuclear meltdown

(+) Yeah! (+)

Costanza is literally a caricature of Larry David, he has always been this way.

Given how you think racist jokes are funny, I'm not surprised at your take over his reaction to David's bullshit.

Wil Wheaton literally said he got triggered because that's the way his dad used to beat him as a kid (plus he loves the muppets). You may not agree with him, but it would take a complete lack of empathy not to recognize why this would be difficult for him to watch. Wil Wheaton has been pretty open about his abusive childhood, mental health struggles, and so forth. I think he gets a pass on this to feel however he wants.

That's the thing about mental triggers though. Calm rational responses tend not to follow something that is so deeply affecting as child abuse. Wil was triggered, had a gut reaction that brought him back to his childhood, and used a widely available platform to post his immediate thoughts. Plenty of people use social media to post their immediate reactions and hot takes, whether well-thought or not. Wil is no different. Sometimes, it's ok to let people you disagree with have a moment, recognizing that they are coming from a completely different place than you. I stand by my point. Name-calling and attacking him for posting his initial reaction based on his own history of abuse shows a lack of empathy. Recognize he has a different view and drop the visceral hate.

i think when people say that it's the news so kids wouldn't be watching it -- what if they advertised elmo being on it though, and maybe that lead some parents to go ooh. i can watch this shit with the kid and then they tune in and elmo is getting just thrashed to bits.

Holy shit. I had no idea Wheaton was such a gigantic baby-back bitch.

I am so Torn. Ibhate Larry David and I find Wil annoying. But honestly I want to side with Will but that was just way over the top. Also fuck Louie for not doing anything when his son was attacked.

Actually, I completely agree. It doesn't give him free-reign to lash out, to name call or anything like that. I also agree, he would benefit from better coping strategies or counseling. These are extremely valid points! What I take issue with is people lashing out in response with their own hateful responses. I think there's a difference between recognizing that someone has a trauma-based reaction and disagreeing with it, saying he went too far, versus straight up belittling him, name-calling, and otherwise being hateful. There is plenty of space to disagree with someone and not resort to hateful attacks. Wil Wheaton chose not to do this. But that doesn't mean he deserves all the hateful comments right back at him. One reaction is coming from a place of trauma and need for therapy. Another reaction is coming from being an anonymous online persona and hating on a person (Wil) who's popular to hate on. I'm gonna go back to my first comment. Let Wil have his moment, recognizing it's based in trauma, and be the bigger person and not resort to hateful comebacks.

I think the main thing is that it's so insanely overblown in proportion to the "incident" that it's comical in its own right, irrespective of the reasoning behind it. You can give some leeway when someone has an emotional episode, but that only goes so far.

Man, that's a whole lot of typing over literally nothing.

Yes I'm sure Larry David and the Today Show planned this out to attack him specifically.

Isn't that the nature of a triggered response though?

In essence, Wil called Larry a tone-deaf a-hole, disclosed his own trauma, said Larry's actions were unforgiveable, name-called again, attacked him for potentially harming children who would watch the segment, said Larry's show was bad, and said people would remember Elmo more than Larry. Is it overblown? Sure. Does he make some points? I think objectively he does. Was it delivered in the best way possible? No. Could it have been worse? Probably.

Again, I'm not excusing Wil's comments. I'm just saying, recognize a trauma reaction when you see it, call it out if you must, but do it in a more reasonable way than what you're accusing Wil Wheaton of doing. Or just ignore it and move on because one person's trauma response shouldn't get people so hate-filled and riled up.

I have difficulty believing the today show planned to have someone attack a children's show character

Right. Like, I get that Wil had a rough childhood, but it takes a special kind of main character syndrome to believe they planned this out to target you specifically.

Ok, but I read the tweet and Wil didn't suggest that. It was someone else in this topic who said they think the Today Show must have planned for Larry David to do that, and I wasn't even mentioning it as having been directed at Wil Wheaton.

To be fair, Wesley is right. It's kinda odd that anyone would attack a children's character on live TV. I don't understand why he did that.