Many people criticized our decision to interview an undead Wallachian count whose most well-known contribution to society was impaling hundreds of peasants. But we believe it’s important for journalists to ask public figures the hard questions, like “What size stake is best for ramming through the viscera of your enemies?” and “Who should pay for the border wall built out of skeletons?" and “I think you dropped your eyeball.”
We’ve heard the voices of our subscribers who believe it’s ill-advised to give a platform to the bloated maggot-infested body of Vlad the Impaler and have canceled this event. But we still believe strongly in letting ideas be debated in the public square, even when one side of the debate just wants to be alive and the other side wants to hunt them down and spear their earthly carriage with a metal spike and decorate the palace with their entrails.
Many people have mentioned that it was pointless to interview the crusty, rotting, reänimated carcass of Vlad the Impaler because it is no longer an adviser to President Nosferatu. However, Vlad’s ideölogy is evident throughout the president’s reign of horror, so we’ll definitely be interviewing its festering zombified remains in the future and writing sympathetic portrayals of its supporters.
The primary argument for not engaging with someone like the bloody-handed mummified meat sack of Vlad the Impaler is that we are lending legitimacy to its views that a strong central government should be maintained by stacking dissenters on a skewer like kebabs and then eating them for dinner. Which, of course, we are. Yep, we’re opening the Overton window and jumping right through. Because as journalists, no one cares about the right to free speech more than us, even when that free speech is used to gain power and then take away the free speech of others by boiling them alive in a metal cauldron.
Some have pointed out that we media elites have a mutually beneficial/parasitic relationship, which is completely true. We’re pretty cozy with impalers. In fact, our masthead is mostly made up of people who themselves have impaled a few serfs here and there.
But anyway, we have listened to the concerns of our audience and other featured speakers, none of whom wished to be disemboweled. We’re canceling the event. So purchase your tickets today for our Literary and Cultural Festival, where we’ll be featuring many non-murderous people as well. Seriously, please buy tickets. We’ll even throw in a free tote bag. This has been embarrassing and we need bodies in the seats — warm bodies, that is.