hysterical slackbastard

A Twitter War broke out recently concerning the use of the term ‘hysterical’. In brief, Justin Shaw of The King’s Tribune wrote an article on pornography in which he referred to the “hysterical screeches” made by the “Anti-Pornography Activist, Lecturer, Author, Professor” Gail Dines during her appearance on an episode (May 23, 2011) of Q&A. Justin’s use of the phrase was criticised by blogger Michael Brull and the rest, as they say, is History — documented in some detail by Tammi Jonas in her post ‘Using my privilege to interrogate yours’. In any event, a quick search of The Interwebs reveals that the ensuing controversy has generated a good deal of disco in the local blogosphere (Ben Pobjie writes about his tweeting on the subject here and Billablog collects a few moar refs here) but as an experiment, I thought I’d search my blog for instances of the term ‘hysterical’.

I gots:

The year ends with a hysterical encyclical from Pope Leo XIII on the “deadly pestilence of Communism.” (Mike Davis)

5,000 500 maybe 50 or so quasi-hysterical bigots gathered in Sydney on Saturday to wail about the Muhammadization of Australia. (slackbastard)

Chris Kenny’s reprise of the tweet — that Bess Price … well you got the idea — was simply a sycophantic, hysterical hatchet job, tipping into the self-parodic… (Guy Rundle)

In separate incidents in Paris, faulty electrical wiring on a streetcar and the collapse of some scenery at a theater sent people rushing about, screaming hysterically because they were fearful of impending explosions. (Richard Jensen)

And then, after a few hysterical and old-maidish articles in the press (Eek–a Nazi!), Irving is told that his contract is void. (Christopher Hitchens)

In 1894 Lombroso had argued in a famous, although very controversial, book that anarchists, and in particular anarchist assassins and bomb-throwers, were epileptic, insane, the victims of congenital disease of various sort, degenerate, hysterical, and often suicidal. (Richard Jensen)

Their resistance seemed to unnerve the storm troopers and a handful of hysterical pansies and angry dykes proceeded to bitch slap them out of the room. (John Birmingham)

Duffy does counter-spin as a matter of habit, but as usual, his insights are driven by his bete noirs (the hysterical left as opposed to the rational libertarian). (loon pond)

Which action would also, presumably, eliminate pesky journalists interested in investigating further the rampant — and occasionally genuinely hysterical — bigotry formerly on display on his blog. (slackbastard)

Rather, this action will encourage a repressive climate of hysterical condemnation, backed by the threat of prosecution. (Alison Croggon et al)

His writing, abounding in self-glorification and grandiosity, replete with histrionics and hysterical, incontinent outbursts, was the product of a person of unsound mind. (Russell Miller)

My outrage at the actions of the New Zealand Police and their political masters, and the way in which media feeding-frenzies and sensationalism has ensured that the words “terror” and “Maori” get bandied hysterically throughout the country and the globe, is tempered with a sense of how pathetically predictable this operation has been… (Aziz Choudry)

In the interests of ‘balance’, here’s another, slightly less hysterical article; an interview with an anarchist from New Zealand… (slackbastard)

On my reading, such an hysterical reaction suggests that Mick’s party-building exercises are in reality as fragile as the ideology which endorses it is threadbare. (slackbastard)

Day after day, hysterical exchanges such as the following occurred on morning radio… (Fergus Michaels)

The demonising [“Crazies! Foreign crazies!”] of Arterial Bloc by other sections of the Left (a demonising that only seems to have escalated in the last few days) has been cowardly, hysterical and, in the deepest sense, uncomradely. (Gertrude and Fuchsia)

Finally, another terrific example of the confused and hysterical (in more ways than one) commentary which the corporate media has produced in response to protest at the G20 may be found in Mark Dunn’s scribbled thoughts on the ‘Hard-core gang intent on violence’ (Herald Sun, November 19). (slackbastard)

G20: A less hysterical account (slackbastard)

All have escaped punishment for broadcasting the story, but in an hysterical outburst, Peter Meakin, Channel Seven’s news and current affairs chief, has accused the prosecution of being “starstruck” for going after some of the network’s biggest names. (slackbastard)

Kromlek opened his note with the assertion that this editor works for a state sanctioned and controlled media and goes on to accuse me of being hysterical on the issue. (Toowoomba Chronicle)

In a (typically hysterical) letter to The Australian in response to Paul Kelly’s article on how ‘Howard and his haters miss real migration story’, Thompson denounces Kelly as a ‘neo-Stalinist’. (slackbastard)

By my reckoning, whatever its etymology, in contemporary usage the term ‘hysterical’ is used as a rough synonym for ‘highly irrational’.

(Also ‘extraordinarily humourous’.)