Today, Senior says, “I always marvel at the huge gulf between the Bari who’s this Twitter bogeyman and Bari the actual person. “She was the first person to put in my head that I could write an op-ed,” says the Zimbabwe-born writer. “She was so adorable! I wanted to wrap her up in tissue paper and take her home with me.” Young writers, such as Tariro Mzezewa, who’ve worked under Weiss in her capacity as editor, attest that she’s consistently enthusiastic about ideas she may disagree with, even nurturing. Jennifer Senior, an op-ed columnist for the Times, disagreed with some of Weiss’s political opinions (she’s to the left of Weiss on Israel, for example) but was curious about this new co-worker, who was, as Senior puts it, “steering the aircraft into a cloud of flak.” So Senior introduced herself. Given the current climate, in which everyone seems to be retreating to angry and angrier corners, those who meet her find this expansiveness refreshing. After listening to someone else’s point of view, she’s been known to do something amazing-change her mind. According to friends, she loves to spar not just to hear the sound of her own voice but because she might learn something. Though most of her friends are liberals, she sometimes socializes with conservatives too. This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from. As she sums up her outlook, “I just want to gobble the world.” Weiss seems genuinely fueled by curiosity, the desire to connect, to cross boundaries and try out new things. This isn’t some dopey act intended to charm. “Should I do it now?” she asks, sincerely searching for an answer. Also, I’ve been sweating a lot.” She says that her father has been urging her to freeze her eggs. I was like, ‘I’m going to meet a Vanity Fair writer and I have pen on my boob.’ I was really embarrassed. Her minor insecurities are blurted fodder for making a connection. She’s effusive and warm, immediately popping out with one eager question after another before I can successfully steer the conversation around to her. When she walks into Cafe Luxembourg on the Upper West Side, blocks from her fifth-floor walk-up, you might peg her as a kindergarten teacher-she’s petite, with hair parted down the middle and pulled back in a low ponytail, big glasses framing a cherubic face. Therefore it’s disorienting to meet Weiss and discover that she’s neither an aspiring sex symbol/bomb thrower, à la Ann Coulter, nor a defensive Ivy League know-it-all. She’s become a somewhat unwitting avatar for the knee-jerk flash-bang of social media, a poster child for the polarization of the chattering classes. Her newfound fame has transcended her platform.
That’s the word, anyway, about the 35-year-old star opinion writer for The New York Times, from a very loud and increasingly influential corner of social media. She’s a traitor to her gender, and she should be “sterilized.” In short, “Bari Weiss can fuck off.” Meet Bari Weiss, “alt-righter,” “fascist,” “the Jewish, female version of Kanye West.” She doesn’t like immigrants.
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