Hunter Biden, Fox News, and ‘Revenge Porn’

I’m not even a full line into this report and there’s already so much to unpack.

First, shame on Fox News for trying to paint Hunter Biden in a false light. Hunter’s skin tone is way more “Zombie Gray” than False White – and everybody knows serious character assassination-portraiture calls for the use of a carefully considered color palette.

Second, while I’m normally against using the term “revenge porn” to characterize an act far more accurately described as “image-based sexual abuse,” it occurs to me that in this context, “revenge porn” actually might be appropriate.

Typically, when we hear about revenge porn, the context is some asshole humiliating his ex-girlfriend – or a celebrity he has never met and who wouldn’t date him if her life depended on it – for the unforgiveable sin of no longer being his girlfriend, or never having been his girlfriend in the first place.

The word “revenge” has no place in describing what the asshole has done, because the woman whose life he’s out to ruin hasn’t done anything wrong for which he could reasonably claim to be taking revenge. At worst, she’s hurt the asshole’s feefees by telling him to pound sand.

The word “porn” shouldn’t be in there, either, because porn is supposed to be entertainment and sure as hell had better involve all parties involved giving explicit consent, or there’s likely to be a host of other crimes afoot, beyond whatever some asshole might later choose to do with the sexually explicit images in question.

In this instance though, Fox News must be trying to provide its viewers entertainment, because these images don’t have any news value that a description, as opposed to a display, of the images might offer. For that matter, considering that the images were used in a “docu-drama” of sorts, they could have just paid some consenting adults to pretend to be Hunter Biden and whomever it is Hunter Biden gets naked with, or whatever it is that happens in this sexually explicit footage with which I have no intention of ever scarring myself.

How “revenge” comes into it isn’t quite as obvious, but if you understand the mindset of the viewer to whom Fox is trying to appeal, the rationale reveals itself. Hunter Biden, you see, was a crucial part of the international plot to steal the 2020 election from Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins.

Wait, no… sorry; totally the wrong conspiracy theory there.

What I meant to write was Hunter Biden was a crucial part of the international plot to funnel money from Ukraine into his own pockets, as well as his father’s pockets, so his father could then steal the 2020 election from Howie Hawkins by buying off voting technology companies, Italian military satellites and Nest thermostats, among others.

Anyway, as the Money Man behind the very obvious Ukranian/Italian/Chinese/Venezuelan/ Tralfamadorian plot to steal the 2020 election, Hunter Biden is a natural revenge target for Fox News, because in a sort of indirect way, he not only filled his own pockets with money, but also emptied Fox’s pockets of about 787 million bucks. After all, if his father hadn’t stolen the election, then Fox never would have run all those laughable, provably false segments about how his father stole the election.

So now Hunter is threatening to sue Fox, which sounds like the reverse of what might happen following an illegal rural hunting excursion held somewhere in the United Kingdom.

Specifically, Hunter’s lawyers assert that, via a miniseries on Fox Nation, a streaming platform popular with people who grew up eating paint in art class, Fox “unlawfully published and continues to publish intimate images of Mr. Biden depicting him in the nude as well as engaged in sex acts in violation of the majority of states’ laws against the nonconsensual disclosure of sexually explicit images and videos, sometimes referred to as ‘revenge porn’ laws.”

In response, Fox complains Biden’s lawyers have “belatedly chosen to publicly attack Fox News’ constitutionally protected coverage regarding their client.”

“Mr. Biden is a public figure who has been the subject of investigations by both the Department of Justice and Congress, has been indicted by two different US Attorney’s Offices in California and Delaware, and has admitted to multiple incidents of wrongdoing,” Fox’s response continued. “Consistent with the First Amendment, Fox News has accurately covered these highly publicized events as well as the subsequent indictment of an FBI informant who was the source of certain claims made about Mr. Biden.”

To demonstrate just how confident they are in the bulletproof, unquestionably First Amendment-protected status of the miniseries, The Too Hot for TV Trial of Hunter Biden, Fox News has since yanked the series from Fox Nation.

Fox says the program has been removed “out of an abundance of caution.” It might also have been made to avoid an abundance of legal fees, but we won’t know for sure until or unless Fox later streams the previously planned sequel, The Further XXX Adventures of Hunt-Her Biden.

Laptop image by Craig Dennis from Pexels