Comments
Please wait...
Comments are closed.
Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.
Editors' Picks
is a proud member of the
network
network
All contents © Noisy Creek, Inc.
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
If anything, this underscores how the word bully/bullying is misused. It seems ANY personal attack is bullying, never mind what the target might have done to attract it.
Now, that's not to say that, perhaps, you're not hitting below the belt. But all's fair in politics.
You know, it's amusing where Slog's software will cut off link names. The full title of the article: Marcus Bachmann Speaks Out, Confirms He Would Perform Ex-Gay Therapy Upon Patient's Request
...before y'all start happily and hilariously speculating on what he confirms. (On second thought, don't let me stop you.)
If you feel disheartened by the article itself (I doubt you will, but still . . .) simply look to the comments to be reassured the vast majority of people understand the situation and agree with the need to call out Bachmann for his ridiculousness as a terrible human being.
I guess that just shows what worthless pieces of shit you pinheads are.
You can't bully someone who has declared that you have no right to exist. You beat the ever living shit out of enemies that make such statements and take such actions. That's called defense, not bullying. And sometimes the best defense is overwhelming offense.
That said, I agree that speculating about Mr*. Bachmann's sexuality--while hilarious--is mostly counterproductive.
*I happen to have a real PhD from a real university, and I'll be damned if I recognize one from a diploma mill that is already out of business.
It's like the Barney Frank Rule: it's morally OK to out closeted politicians if they make a career out of promoting laws against homosexuals. Call it the Dan Savage Rule: it's morally OK to mock flamers if they make a career out of trying to convert homosexuals.
June Tully, the author of the piece - has a point. Not that Mr. Bachman doesn't deserve any and all smackdowns from a political, social, and moral standpoint - but don't see the podcast in question and your tactics therein being particularly helpful.
The traditional analysis would go something like this. True, there is a feeling of joy from seeing a bad guy take some of his own medicine. But still, if it's true that stereotypically gay features aren't wrong, then it's wrong to mock people for having them as if they were wrong no matter what -- the act of mocking for reasons that are not 'mockable' is wrong, no matter who the target is.
I think there's an ideal of a future society in which everybody would be nice to everybody else (I think I once heard Catharine MacKinnon saying that this is what she wants for the world). Going towards this ideal is what powers the mocking-the-wrong-features-is-wrong idea.
Me, I'm a bit more pragmatic, I suspect there are things we don't know. It's not simply because a society in which everybody is nice to everybody is probably never going to happen; it's more than that. Aggression, mockery... these things didn't come out of nowhere; they exist for a reason, they have a function. There may be something 'good' in the 'nasty'. They play some sort of role, with some importance, in our psyches and societies. I'm willing to bet that, if they disappeared, something good about us would also disappear.
So, even though I can sympathise with the feelings of that Slate article, I ultimally disagree with it, and with those who think it's just sheer hypocrisy to do what Dan is. There may very well be some hypocrisy; but it's more. It's not that simple. It's deeper than that.
Also, is it not possible that he is straight, that he received homophobic bullying as a child for being perceived as homosexual, and his pray away the gay bullshit is a reaction to that? Not to defend his bigoted, demented views or anything.
Please let Bachmann win the nomination. Please let her husband have a gay sex scandal surface. Please please please.
How anyone sees this any other way is beyond me as it is plain as day =)
i still think that Marcus Bachmann is totally fair game. Michele is part owner of that business, and she claims to believe everything that he believes. Totally fair game.
If Hillary and Bill had a law firm together and either one did something in that law firm that was skeezy, I'd hold both accountable. Especially if the other professed full servitude to the skeezy perpetrator.
While I agree with the substance of Ms. Thomas' concerns, fact is that Marcus Bachmann is putting himself into the public sphere as a shrink while at the same time remaining more or less in the closet as a reparative "therapist." This makes him both a hypocrite AND a public figure, making name calling and innuendo more than fair play. While I don't think it's particularly insightful discourse to mock him for exhibiting stereotypical gay behavior as proof of his gayness it sure is fun and more than warranted.
Also read June Thomas's series of articles on gay bars it's great, my favorite line is, "Gay bars are my cultural patrimony and my political heritage."
http://www.slate.com/id/2297604/
June Thomas is a useless twat...
Hey, that guy who says he's straight has a lisp! Dances weird! He's more flamboyant than he should be! Fuck that. Let me know if he's falling in love with or having sex with men. Then I'll be ready to call him out for hypocrisy.
Fucking pathetic.
Marcus Bachmann is closeted self-hating douchebag who may be a separate twin bed away from our next president and he has destroyed peoples lives and if given half the chance will destroy thousands more lives.
Yeah. Maybe the Dakota Sioux should have just written sternly worded letters to Custer? I guess the French Resistance in WWII were terrorist bullies, right? Poor SS.
What the fuck is wrong with you people? Have you no sense of context and proportionality? This is a fight your in. Sometimes moral superiority isn't enough to win.
Dan is 100% right here. Fuck Bachmann. All you pussies don't have the stomach for this just get out of the way and shut up. you can tell us how we're "just like them" after we've won your rights for you.
Drawing attention to the obvious is not "hurtful" unless you despise what is obvious.
The only people that despises gay mannerisms and think of them as something bad are people like Bachmann. Which Dan doesn't.
Not sure what's so hard for people to understand here. Or. Maybe people are reacting to these statements BECAUSE deep down they still view being effeminate as something bad and that we shouldn't even point out.
"I'm sorry, Slate, but how in the world is it "bullying" to call someone out on their homophobic bigotry? Do you also think it's bullying to stick up for the kid on the playground who is getting beaten up and called names? Yeah, Dan made fun of Bachmann's lisp, so what? Maybe Dan Savage isn't as sweet and nice to the "opposition" as he could be, but considering how the homophobes treat homosexuals, I don't think they deserve an OUNCE of civility. I'm all about do-unto-others, but when the others barely recognize your humanity, I think it's time to draw the line."
And as for the posters in that thread who jumped to the Slate writer's defense saying things like two wrongs don't make a right and it's not okay for Dan to dish out the same things he complains about... I just think it's ridiculous. Some bullies can't be reached with kindness and reason. If his own holy book isn't teaching him to "do unto others" and "judge not" and that there's neither male nor female and neither Jew nor Greek for all are one through Jesus Christ, then no amount of civility and reason from homosexuals is going to make him stop treating them like shit.
If another person had such a lisp, do you think Dan would be saying anything bad about it? Even if that person was straight? Even if that person was miserably stuck in the closet? I hope not. There's nothing bad or funny about lisps--in fact, they're usually kind of cute. But it's hilarious when the lisper is someone who spends his life fighting everything he considers stereotypically gay!
The bigots on Slog are totally blind to the towering irony that Mr IGB is himself a homophobic bully.
Dan's attack on Bachmann's mannerisms is
EXACTLY the same and uses
EXACTLY the same language and
EXACTLY the same tactics that high school bullies use to torment kids who are gay or perceived to be gay.
EXACTLY.
The fact that Dan claims to be gay is no more excuse for his behavior than it will be an excuse for Bachmann if he turns out to be gay.
It matters not what Bachmann has done or what a terrible person he is.
People behave morally and civilly and ethically because they are civil ethical moral individuals.
If one is nice to his friends but an asshole to his enemies HE IS AN ASSHOLE. (a two faced asshole, actually...)
There are terrible people in prison for unspeakable crimes.
Do we torture them to death because they are really bad people?
Or do we treat them humanely because WE are humane ethical moral people?
Dan and the Fanboys seek to defend being a bully asshole homophobe because the target is a bully asshole homophobe.
It is not an excuse.
Some fights have no good guys and no heroes.
Just two homophobic asshole bullies wailing away at each other.....
She's missing the point of course that Savage and many others are not making fun of Bachmann for being gay, they're making fun of him for pretending not to be. If Savage and everyone else who is guessing that this guy is gay are all wrong, then they're guilty of making a mistake, not of bullying.
Look at it this way: if someone accused someone else of being Brazillian, or Catholic, or a fan of baseball, if the person was wrong would you say that he had been "bullying" by guessing wrong? Of course not, unless you thought that being Brazillian or Catholic was such a terrible thing that anyone accusing someone of being so was slandering and bullying.
"In other words, the man who launched the “It Gets Better Project,” an effort to stop the bullying of gay teens, was acting like a big bully. As Savage always notes, the kind of smear-the-queer taunts that can cause so much pain to young people aren’t aimed only at kids who are gay, they’re often aimed at boys who don’t live up to some mythical standard of masculinity and girls who just aren’t girly enough. I can only imagine how listeners who happen to have the kind of lisping, effeminate speech and affect that Savage was ridiculing felt upon hearing the attack."
If Savage is free to indulge his hatred of someone in homophobic terms it is hypocritical to expect high school bullies to behave any better.
about.
probably not long.
the Truth isn't very popular....
My opposition doesn't mean I think effeminacy or homosexuality is bad/wrong and therefore an insult. It means that I have a problem with taking someone's self-categorization and telling them that I know better because they're too A or too B. (I also don't think it's okay to make fun of a gay man for acting "too straight," if that clarifies things.)
We are concerned for your safety, health and happiness.
The Truth will set you free.
Nope. For example, I don't think being a man is a bad thing. but I know that calling a transwoman a man is in fact a tactic often taken by bullies.
God, people are so dense here.
Nobody is saying that Dan has a right to say what he's saying because he's gay. I'm not gay and I find it freaking hilarious, just like #73 observes, that someone who has very narrow standards of acceptable masculinity, who tries to brainwash people into abandoning effeminate traits, nevertheless can't meet his own absurd standards. It's about Bachmann being a hypocrite--and this is true even if Bachmann is straight. He stereotypes gays and tries to wipe out their very existence, even as he does things that fit the stereotype!
"It matters not what Bachmann has done or what a terrible person he is."
He doesn't deserve bullying because he's a bad person; you're getting this all mixed up. He deserves to have HIS OWN hypocrisy pointed out, with glee. If anyone else here wants to lisp, without trying to pray away the gay lispers of the world, they're welcome to do it with warm appreciation.
Okay. So if someone then points out that those very bullies seem awfully feminine, especially for people who are so damn concerned about cruelly imposing gender rules, is that "bullying"? Nope, it sure isn't. And is that mocking women or femininity in general? Nope.
The whole case for Bachmann being gay, as far as I can tell, is that he doesn't conform to the stereotype for straight male. This actually diverts attention from the important issue, which is his attempt to cure the gay in others.
We live in a world where no one seems to understand context, or thinks no one else is smart enough to understand context.
Bullying high school homophobe taunting a vulnerable gay kid DOES NOT EQUAL openly gay equal rights activist making fun of a man who makes a living teaching vulnerable gay kids to hate themselves.
We can see the difference clearly, right?
Poor Marcus Bachmann is not in need of an "It Gets Better" hug. He's one of the reasons "It Gets Better" is necessary, and in a world where half the anti-gay bigots turn out to be gay themselves, Bachmann does not get the benefit of the doubt when it comes to his gay voice.
Marcus Bachmann is married to a woman who is running for president and has openly declared her opposition to gay rights. That puts Bachmann in an even greater position of power. If he's a self-hating closet case turning that hate outward on the rest of the gay community, he's fair game. And if he really is just a straight guy with a case of gay-voice and turning his hate on the gay community, he's still fair game.
When a homophobe attacks someone for perceived gayness, it's bullying. When the openly gay proudly make fun of the hypocrisy of those who would like to rid us from existence, it's self-defense.
Really, what is difficult to understand about that?
Come, now. Unload. Something like that. Call her a piano-string uptight homophobe who can't possibly figure out what the rest of us already know: More than the question of whether he can dance is how viciously, stupidly, and breathtakingly homophoobic Marcus Bachmann is. And we all know what such thoughtless homophobia means ....
And then point out that someone who claims to know "what women really think" is obviously overstating her qualifications, since she can't spot a decent shopping partner when she sees him.
To start with, only a tiny number of honest, out gay men act gayer than Marcus Bachmann. He's like a walking parody. Not only is this, as Jon Stewart pointed out the other night, impossible-to-resist humorous bait, but it's something immediately accessible to a general audience. And, I think it's fair to say that that general audience is largely shocked by the apparent collision of his professional homophobia and his aspect. I think it might even get the public to think critically about the possibility of some homophobes being self-hating closet cases. Yes, it's using stereotyping, but so what? In this particular instance, it's a handy tool to discredit an evil and loathsome person in the eyes of people who might otherwise support the Bachmanns. I doubt it has the same effect on anyone who wouldn't. It's a powerful tactic, and I think we should be careful not to walk away from it in this particular instance.
Besides, it's funny as all fuck.
Marcus Bachmann is a self-loathing gay man who has made a career out of psychologically abusing other self-loathing gay men (which are a dime a dozen). This can be demonstrated beyond a *reasonable* doubt, even if his exact location on the Kinsey scale is debatable. That he is married to a woman should not present any reasonably intelligent person with cognitive dissonance. He is a gay man who hates his sexual orientation.
This is newsworthy, and it's worth pointing out publicly. Doing so is not victimizing Marcus Bachmann. Doing so is not tantamount to bullying gay or effeminate men, young or old. He is an illustration of what self loathing does to gay men, what the closet has in store for them.
The author of the Slate article is clearly unacquainted with gay history and social developments of the last 50 years. She also seems to harbor her own stereotypical perceptions that come out in her bullshit closing argument that no gay man could possibly dance that badly. She doesn't get it. On any level.
Perfect response to this. Dan should quote it verbatim.
Does she really say that? Wow, that's horribly offensive. I'm 100% gay and I can't dance worth shit. Granted I'm white, but still.
I'm a longtime fan of yours, and I agree with Slate's June Thomas on this one, and I left a comment on the podcast to that effect, because you were going after Marcus Bachmann for the wrong thing. You didn't criticize him for harrassing gay people. You made fun of him for sounding effeminate - and a lot of your listeners probably talk the same way. You made fun of him for being, as far as you could tell, gay - and an enormous part of your regular audience is gay.
AND you did all of this based on nothing more than a tired stereotype of gay men.
You fumbled this one, Dan. Please, please just admit it. You're usually so good about admitting your offenses, especially when your own fans point them out to you.
That he might be gay is definitely NOT off-limits for mocking. Not because he's gay and acts as he does--and not because being flamboyant itself is worthy of ridicule--but because he's a such slave to this homophobic evangelism that he's harms his very kind, which I find worse than any straight person doing the same stuff. Being anti-gay and showing gay markers will get you made fun of by gay supporters; I don't see what's so hard to understand about that.
And was Dan did offensive? Please. I should hope any regular reader/listener of Savage knows better than to pull the "offensive" card to a simple flouting of stereotype, you thin skinned pansies (coming from a thick-skinned pansy). Bitching about Dan's use of stereotype but ignoring the author's comment about gay men dancing shows me that you're not sensitive about misportraying the gay community but rather that you just simply don't like Dan Savage and are eager to discredit him at every turn.
I agree with you that Dan shouldn't be a slave to political correctness the way HRC spokespeople are, and that he should make fun of Marcus Bachmann's disgusting hypocrisy. Marcus Bachmann deserves to be mocked. I just think the kind of mockery Dan chose in the podcast was the wrong approach. As @61 said, he appropriated the tactics of homophobia, and he didn't do anything particularly smart with them. Normally Dan is really good at getting at the bad guys' REAL failings when he makes fun of them. This time it was just "ha ha, you're so queer and girly." He went too far in his reliance on stereotypes (I'm aware of how often they're reliable markers; that doesn't make them less annoying here), and not far enough with anything about Bachmann that actually matters.
As I said in my original comment to the podcast, the joke was funny for the first couple of minutes. I was hoping
Dan would turn it on its head and do something really incisive with it. Instead I kept hearing the same flat, unexamined, homophobic bullshit over and over. Big disappointment.
insightful.
it appears that our Danny is in full meltdown. a very public meltdown.
pimping adultery as the new marriage normal is a really poor tactic when victory on homosexual marriage is not secure.
and, as you note, he seems to be unable to restrain the droll clumsy homophobic attack on Bachmann.
and now wishing all Republicans were fuckin' dead.......