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Come on, She's Good for a Laugh: How to Talk About Ann Coulter (if We Really Must)
What Would Ann Coulter Do?. On campus, a new conservative women's anti-feminist group is rising, and both their liberal counterparts and conservative mentors are taking notice [TIME Magazine Online: Top Nation Stories]
The answer to that question is, "Write a book of fulminations by the pot against the kettle," e.g., Godless. Ann Coulter may be many things to many people but she certainly does not exemplify the spirit that will inherit the earth.
She is not an 'anti-feminist'; rather she's the apotheosis of the right wing version feminism. In a world where feminism did not exist, Ann Coulter would be relegated to her broom. Put together all the atavistic male fears evoked in the breast of right-wing males by the word "feminism" and what do you get? You get Ann Colter: hollow-eyed, gaunt, and hungry looking, scary, brimming over with free-floating vitriol, castrating, humorless, seeking whom she may devour.... She's Lilith, not Eve, and if she were really as powerful as she aspires to be, she'd eat alive any conservative who dared to challenge her world view with the same gusto as she would devour a Liberal.
I am sure that many puffy pink Republican men who read her books must be simulataneously terrified and ecstatic to find their views and misgivings "confirmed" in her writings.
I can only hope that any network of young conservative women that may be "arising" on college campuses will read the comments that have been attributed to her before deciding to follow in her footsteps. For them, the solution to Ann Coulter is "critical thinking." I am not yet at the point where I believe that all conservatives (and particularly the young ones) are incapable of it.
The problem with these articles---Why Coulter Matters and James Love: Freakshows, Ann Coulter, and Politics---is that both attribute to her more power than she actually has. Nobody could possibly take her seriously except the sort of people who could take Ann Coulter seriously. We don't want them on our side anyway. We don't want her either. She's a mouthpiece for the far right, not a fountainhead of conservative thinking. She exists to tell people who already hold certain views what their views should be, e.g., How to Talk to a Liberal (if You Really Must). If she did not exist, some other right-wing fury would emerge to fill the ecological niche she occupies.
In his article (here) James Love suggests that she could be a very useful Republican icon ---for the Democrats. In pertinent part, he writes:
"Andrew Sullivan says she is a "form of camp . . . The minute you take her seriously, you lose grip on her reality. She's not a social or political commentator. She's a drag queen impersonating a fascist. I don't even begin to believe she actually believes this stuff. It's post-modern performance-art."
Who else with much media viability says plainly they supported apartheid in South Africa, or claim that slave trading is the "only" African institution "America" adopted, and offer countless insults to Arabs, Muslims, moms, widows and just about anyone else who might be useful in generating shock....
Maybe she will be useful mascot for the Republican party - if the Democrats were willing to use her in that way. "As your apartheid supporting friend said......" "Does Ann Coulter speak for the Administration on the need to convert the heathens in the Middle East?" ...."
He's right. So come on, guys. Stop clutching your pearls and start laughing loud and long. She may look like the bad fairy from your worst nightmares but just dump a cauldron of water on her and get on with your Liberal life of sloppy good will and gooey concern for others. The only way to marginalize her is to stop expecting her to make sense and (especially) to stop reacting with horror when she doesn't.
As to anything else she has to say on religion? A few months back, a conservative college took a lot of heat for removing her from their list of scheduled speakers after a student sent them a list of choice Coulter opinions. See: Tim Grieve, An Ann Coulter Speech? Thanks but no thanks at Salon.com.
She is the exemplar of contemporary "Christianity" (as opposed to Christianity) and the Church of God without Christ. Praise the Lord and pass the Constitution!
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Secret Left-Wing Coulterphiles Alert: Coulter “Praises” Senator Lieberman
Christianity, “Christianity,” and Ann Coulter
“Christianity” v. Christianity [Christianity v. Christianism]
Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Dogs of War!—The Sayings of Ann Coulter
Overturn the Constitution in the Name of the Lord!
Wendy McElroy, Stop Making Sense! Oh, wait.
I Know You Are, but What Am I?
Suffering Fools Gladly: The Consolation of Mockery
Image drawn by Mr. Tenniel; painted by Damozel!
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