By Ann Cooper
Once upon a time, I reviewed restaurants for the Louisville Times’ weekend magazine. One week, the owners of a popular steakhouse took umbrage when I panned their food. How do you suppose they fought back? There was no Twitter/X, or even an Internet where they could launch a social media campaign to denounce me and my review. But the restaurant did have a towering billboard, planted right by the busy city street where you turned off for the parking lot. And a few days after my review ran, that billboard carried this message, in very large letters:
THANKS ANN COOPER
@%#* YOU
Two things trigger memories of that sign for me. One is reading about viral social media campaigns – the kind the restaurant might have launched in the wake of my review, if they’d had more powerful messaging technology than a billboard. The other trigger is reading the passionate comments on WSR about most any food-related article.
The food commenters are not only passionate, there are many of them. We can quantify it, to some degree (with the caveat that comments are not a public opinion poll, but they can reveal something about the zeitgeist).
Last Saturday, for instance, we registered 26 comments on a column about the hottest of recent hot-button issues, pro-Palestinian campus protests. That was a good response, but not nearly as big (or as passionate) as the 68 comments on our Monday Bulletin — every one of them revisiting the controversy over the new PopUp Bagels branch that requires a three-bagel (plus cream cheese or butter) minimum purchase. And our piece on the new Eater listing of top UWS restaurants was even hotter: 70 comments. Most touted restaurants that didn’t make the list, but there was this complaint about a perennial UWS favorite, Barney Greengrass:
Ped Estrian
1 day ago
Greengrass: the only restaurant where you have to mortgage your condo to eat breakfast.
Another commenter offered an alternative perspective:
Carmella Ombrella
1 day ago
Reply to Ped Estrian
But if you eat breakfast at BG you don’t need lunch and maybe not dinner. So it’s actually thrifty. 🙂
The news that two UWS subway stations will get elevators (eventually — the target finish date is 2026) prompted one of my favorite, world-weary comments this week:
Amelia
1 day ago
wonderful news!! am hoping to still be alive when they actually complete it.
But nothing thrilled us more than your responses, including comments, marking the Rag’s 13th anniversary, and its first time asking for “another kind” of support. Here’s what a few of you told us in comments:
Trish
1 day ago
Love the Rag! I’m glad to kick in a little cash to help you do this important work.
first name unknown
1 day ago
We’re glad you’re here.
And from the commenter who suggested a Barney Greengrass breakfast might take you through the whole day:
Carmella Ombrella
5 hours ago
Done happily. WSR is a treasure that deserves our support
Read all in our Commenting on the Columns series — HERE.
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I am honored, and humbled, to have been selected for “Comment of the Week” with my commentary on the $40 bagel and lox place. I’d like to thank my mother for teaching me the value of a bagel and lox, but most of all I’d like to thank God for teaching me what lox is and how well it goes on a bagel with cream cheese. 🏆 :exit music plays:
I think this comment make you a repeat candidate for the next ‘Comment of the Week.’
The absence of mention of either Gail Brewer or Alvin Bragg, the bêtes noires of so many irrelevant comments, needs to be corrected. So here is my comment.
Where do we send a contribution to WSR?
You can use this link, which is also accessible from the purple “support the Rag” button on the left hadn side of the home page. https://www.westsiderag.com/support-west-side-rag
I am a huge fan of WSR and greatly appreciate all of your work. Gus has been an excellent addition. There have been some great features and follow-ups on past stories.
That being said, your censorship policy is highly arbitrary, and I think many of your best comments end up on the cutting room floor. If someone is almost verbatim saying something that has been said several times, leave it out. But otherwise, err on the side of including comments. Thanks.
It’s called “moderation,” not “censorship.” One doesn’t have a right to have one’s comment published on another private blog.
I’m not being snarky, just curious: Unless you have access to the Rag’s email account, what makes you think that “many of the best comments” go unpublished? BTW, I think you’re using the word “censorship” somewhat loosely. Oxford defines it as “the suppression or prohibition of any parts of books, films, news, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security.” That seems to me a far cry from the Rag’s practice of selecting which comments to publish from what must be a large number of submissions.
A Martian crash lands on Earth in his small spaceship whch has busted a wheel. He hides it in the bushes. He looks up and sees the 59th Street Bridge and all the tall buildings in Manhattan, and figures he can find a replacement wheel there. So he wanders across the bridge and eventually finds himself at Zabar’s where he sees (what he thinks is) a basket of wheels in the window. So he goes in (and takes a number, of course) and when it’s his turn at the counter, says “I’d like one of those wheel, please,” and points to the basket in the window. The counter man laughs and says, “those are bagels – here – try one” and gives him one. The Martian takes a bite, pauses, and says “You know, this would be great with lox and a shmear.”
I agree. Best comments are the ones that get deleted for no real reason. I innocently stated you need a tetanus shot to enter that store where the front looked like a shanty. That apparently was deleted. Why? Did you see the pic of the storefront? Saying one might need a tetanus shot too risque for West Siders? Snowflake alert. I guess I’m just typing this to myself, as, gulp, this comment will be deleted.
Comments get approved that I think wouldn’t be approved and comments get deleted that I don’t think should have been deleted. As long as I have not been banned and continue to be welcome and don’t get a warning from WSR, I am happy to be here!