Marc Lynch vs The Game
Humboldt Mountains, South Island, New Zealand (cc photo by kiwinz)
The Game is heading to New Zealand, and commenting on the growing body of international relations theory centered around his spat with Jay-Z:
Wellington, Aug 7 NZPA – American rapper The Game doesn’t know much about New Zealand, except that “it’s pretty new”, and says if he comes across any sheep, “maybe I’ll make me a jacket”. [...]
In a recent Foreign Policy article, George Washington University Professor Marc Lynch, likened the feud to the battle of global hegemony — with Jay Z in the role of the United States, and The Game as the “erratic wildcard”: Iran and North Korea.
The Game asks for an explanation of why that’s not a favourable comparison, before likening Lynch to Greenland — isolated from the top writers in the world — and Jay Z to Iceland “coz he’s gone cold”.
Now as Spencer Ackerman observes this seems to be a serious blunder. Lynch wasn’t trying to diss the guy, he likes his work and was just making a general observation about his strategy. But by lashing out, The Game has, I think, illustrated Lynch’s general point about the dangers of this kind of erratic behavior:
In other words, The Game is treating a reconcilable as an irreconcilable. He’s like Abu Musab al-Zarqawi! Marc Lynch is a middle-class, fence-sitting Sunni Iraqi — surely an academic — in Diyala or Anbar or Baghdad, judiciously able to see both sides of the U.S. and AQI feud and not particularly inclined to throw his lot in decisively with one or the other. And here’s The Game, trying to humiliate Marc in public for apostasy or cut his fingers off because he enjoys a cigarette. Defeat sets in right there. Soon will begin Marc Lynch’s Awakening. Which is a good name for a mixtape.
I’ll just also point out that Greenland is much colder than Iceland.
18 Responses to “Marc Lynch vs The Game”
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August 7th, 2009 at 11:36 am
before likening Lynch to Greenland — isolated from the top writers in the world
But the more well-known foreign policy writers of the realist school probably agree with Lynch. Which can only mean one thing: Game is throwing his support behind the neocons (whatever their flaws, the neocons are unquestionably more gangster than the realists).
August 7th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Welcome to Tard Talk, with your host Matt Yglesias.
August 7th, 2009 at 11:42 am
The idea isn’t to convince the ‘fense sitting Saudi’, the idea is to make it so that being a ‘fence sitting Saudi’ is unthinkable to younger Saudis. Thus the humiliation.
Never bother to convince the person you are arguing with. It is extremely unlikely that they can be convinced. If they can, direct confrontation of any type should be abandoned for a more socratic method. Pick who you really want to convince, and tailor your arguments to them.
The Game is trying to convince young males, often lower income males. His approach is the right one when you’re taking that into account.
August 7th, 2009 at 11:51 am
But did Lynch help the Game by giving him more press?
When I think of Lynch I don’t think of Greenland but rather think of an apologist for the Syrian dictatorship of the “realist” school.
As Zizek said “it’s a realist world” and we’re all soon by like China. Obama is against the grain, but we’ll see what happens after him.
August 7th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
From the first link:
*facepalm*
August 7th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Lynch wasn’t trying to diss the guy
Huh? Lynch apparently likened The Game to “the “erratic wildcard”: Iran and North Korea.”
Only in liberal la-la land would being compared to Iran or North Korea not be a diss.
August 7th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Hey – speaking of Iceland – didn’t they very famously sell off their entire country’s DNA just a couple of years ago?
Did they burn through all that money already???
August 7th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Are we gonna talk about hip hop and international relations again without mentioning Ron Artest’s recent trip to China to promote the newest artist on his label, Shin Shin? Also, can we mix in the triple (quadruple? quintuple?) threat of Shaq (baller-rapper-thespian-professional wrestler-reality TV star)?
There has to be a wealth of analogies/metaphors/parallels in that mess of crazy.
August 7th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
[...] Matthew Yglesias [...]
August 7th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Oh shit! Aardvark’s got beef with The Game.
August 7th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
Is “jacket” slang for “prison wife” or “butterfly face tattoo”?
August 7th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
So, instead of our foreign policy centering around “The Great Game,” it centers around “The Game?”
Great!
August 7th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Only in liberal la-la land would being compared to Iran or North Korea not be a diss
Al, please. Most people would not want to be compared to Iran or North Korea, but surely even you can see that an self-styled outlaw might, probably would, be flattered by the comparison.
August 7th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Why doesn’t the Game just “pop a cap in his ass?” Yes, I know all about this stuff from reading the Boondocks.
August 7th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
I would very much like to see the process of The Game seeing a sheep and, using only his wits and the equipment on his person, converting it into a jacket.
August 7th, 2009 at 4:01 pm
So how do Dr. Dre and Snoop fit in to all of this?
August 7th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
Did The Game read Lynch’s post? Definitely not. Who knows why some quasi-reporter from New Zealand thought it’d be useful to ask The Game about it. The Game could care less. It’s the first and last time the issue will cross The Game’s mind.
Why do all of you bloggers think its so cool, hip, AND intellectual to talk about this? If nothing else, it’s yet another excuse to play one another up. Blogger shout-outs and stroke-jobs are getting old. I can’t wait until the day that the “blogosphere” becomes irrelevant. You guys will have no idea what to do with yourselves. The day is near, my friends.
-abu sharmouta
August 9th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
It doesn’t strike me as a blunder at all. Marc Lynch is not the fence sitting populace that the Game and Jay-Z are trying to capture. He’s an upstart provocateur intervening in an existing power struggle; the Game needed to smack him to maintain a credible deterrent.