We don't always agree with Keith Olbermann, but that doesn't mean we don't respect him. The dude landed some solid tail back in the day. He still does, probably, and good for him. But that's not why he's being honored as a Washington Free Beacon Man of the Year. Not exactly.
We chose to recognize Olbermann for speaking his truth after years of suffering in silence, and for highlighting a very real but much-forsaken segment of the population: Battered men.
We are often quick to dismiss them. We stigmatize and scorn them with mockery. That needs to change, and maybe it will now that a celebrity of Olbermann's magnitude has outed himself as a male survivor of domestic abuse.
Olbermann was understandably disgusted after watching his sort of attractive ex-lover, MSNBC anchor Katy Tur, bully her husband into getting a vasectomy and turning it into a feminist publicity stunt. He had to speak out. "Bringing this up is obviously painful for me," Olbermann confessed on his Countdown podcast. "That's why I have not done it over the course of 15 years, but I've just had enough." He was beaten by a woman.
"I have remained silent even though six days after my emergency appendectomy in 2007, [Tur] started punching and slapping me, with real intent to do harm, because the living room wasn't clean enough," Olbermann testified on the airwaves. He went on to describe how Tur, his live-in girlfriend from 2006 to 2009, exploited his professional success to advance her own career. Female sociopaths often behave this way toward their victims. It is commonly known as "reverse grooming," "ambition grinding," "C-suite slopjousting," or simply "pulling a Kamala."
Olbermann explained how Tur continued to exert coercive control over him long after the relationship ended. He paid her rent for a year after she moved out so she could stay in New York. He paid off her student loans. He introduced her to all the right people. He got her booked on shows. He edited "nearly every one" of her scripts for MSNBC, sometimes rewriting them from scratch. He contributed intellectual research for her book about Donald Trump.
At long last, Olbermann stood up for himself. She asked him to write the entire book for her and he refused. And though few would argue that Keith's courage in that moment was commensurate to that of the American boys who stormed the beaches on D-Day, they are in fact no different. Because until society starts treating battered men with the dignity they deserve, predators like Tur will never stop.
We believe you, Keith, because men deserve to be believed. We already knew Katy Tur was a talentless dimwit. MSNBC wouldn't have hired her otherwise. We applaud your staggering bravery, your willingness to face down demons and confront your abuser. Now we know what a heartless monster she really is.
May his story be an inspiration to all men who suffer in silence under the yoke of female tyranny, yearning to breathe free. Thank you, Keith Olbermann, you're a Washington Free Beacon Man of the Year.
