When I was a boy I had to put up with a nick-name that I didn’t much like. Like many of my generation I didn’t get to choose a complimentary name but I learned to live with what I got called in the playground. It was no worse than what many other children endured, and Fatty Noakes, Tubby Weisman, Gabby Lavis (protruding ears), Sambo Hill (very dark-skinned) and Squeaker Groves (high-pitched voice) come to mind. For some, the nick-names have stuck through life and become an endearing part of a well-liked personality.
We had a saying that was both true and fortifying. “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.”
I was reminded of all this when the Media-orchestrated storm broke over Ann Coulter’s remarks to a conservative audience. It seems that the word ‘faggot’ now causes some people to get hysterically outraged. Coulter was referring to the Democrat Presidential hopeful John Edwards and she was implying that she couldn’t use the ‘F’ word in connection with him without being required to go into rehab. For those not familiar with the latest celebrity fad, going into ‘rehab(ilitation)’ is what our master class does when a personal vice leads on from publicity to embarrassment or some other unpleasant consequence.
Edwards gives the impression of being a man who looks in the mirror a lot, combs his hair frequently and spends a lot of time in nail spas. When I was a boy, this kind of vanity often attracted snide remarks about effeminacy, even when it was obvious that the man was not homosexual, but in fact, a ‘ladies man’.
I don’t think for one moment that Coulter believes that Edwards is homosexual, but she was digging at his vanity and taking a swipe at ‘rehab’. Edwards is clearly not truly upset by her remarks as he has gone on to capitalize on the resulting publicity. The outrage that is being manufactured by the Media people and their homosexual Leftist constituents is over the word ‘faggot’.
I don’t visit homosexual websites or read homosexual magazines, but I have come across enough such material by accident to know that vulgarity, obscenity and use of words like ‘queer’ and ‘queen’ is the norm amongst a large and vociferous section of the self-styled ‘Gay Community’. People who dress up as nuns and perform obscene acts of entertainment in order to make a political point against the Catholic Church are surely unlikely to be genuinely wounded by any word. I am not sure how the word ‘faggot’ originated but it cannot be any more ludicrous in its usage than the word ‘gay’. On this website we avoid using slang words because we think that good English is both accurate and unambiguous and better stands the test of time. However, we also support free speech and believe in robust debate. The enemy of these is the notion that certain groups of people should not be offended by what is written or said.
The truth is that the homosexual activists and their Leftist allies in the Media and elsewhere are not offended by words but are offended by dissenting opinion from the Right. Ann Coulter must be the top of any Media Class and Leftist hit list for she is outspoken, articulate and frequently devastating in her arguments. To make it worse, she is sexy and glamorous in a gothic sort of way. She is one of the few Talk Radio personalities who are willing to venture beyond the ever-expanding line drawn by the PC brigade.
The campaign that has now been unleashed to drive her off the airwaves and off the Fox TV channel has little to do with a single word and everything to do with tightening the noose around conservatives who dissent from the Media Class agenda.
I hope Miss Coulter will not retract one word or apologize in any shape or form, for to do so will strengthen the enemies of free and robust speech and destroy her credibility. She might consider using this ‘F’ word in every public appearance in order to show that she still means business.
Many conservative commentators and politicians are distancing themselves from her for they fear the Media Class upon which they depend for scraps. I am reminded of dogs that crouch submissively before the masters that whip them.
Moving to another topic but still on free speech and the Media, there is an organization in the US that calls itself ‘Free Press’. It presents itself as a grass roots organization of activists concerned with media regulation. Launched in 2003 and claiming to have 300,000 members, it is currently marshalling supporters to appear at FCC public hearings. It is a Leftist front organization with some 24 full-time employees and an annual budget of several million dollars. Last year it received over $5m dollars in funding, mostly from the George Soros Open Society Institute and the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy, whose past president was the Leftist journalist Bill Moyers. You can be certain that the ‘free press’, ‘open society’ and ‘Democracy’ envisaged by these people will not have room for people like Ann Coulter.