Letters to the Editor
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A correction
Rebecca wrote "diffusing the issue" when I believe she meant "defusing the issue".
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OTF_Wank said it best.
When this was originally posted on the wank community at http://www.journalfen.net/community/otf_wank :
"Either way, I think I did a good job of turning the "satire" right back at them, don't you?"
Survey says? No.
I don't know that this is really worthy of a Salon article, much less any kind of interview with the guy. Morons are not exactly rare online.
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I would argue...
that this is what satire *precisely* is for. For every person like Pete, there are a vast hoard of folks who kinda, sorta agree with him, but haven't cogitated it well. Seeing this kind of thing helps gel out their thoughts.
They may not post about it, but they are affected. It's the 'lurker' hypotheses: for every 1 poster, and every 3 responders, there are at least a dozen folks who just read. This response lets people see what Pete - and people like him - are really like. These chances where people show themselves as what they truly are are precious gifts.
In a similar fashion, in the few instances nowadays that I engage in online debate, I'm not trying to convince or change the opinion of the poster. More often then not (and there are always exceptions), they are there to trumpet their values. I'm there to hopefully poke holes in their logic & let the lurkers judge.
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I'm totally psyched about this humiliation!
"You can't fix stupid."
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Satire
See Johnathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal". Morons, all of you. All of you.
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Fertility clinics, IVF, and PL hypocrisy
Whenever I encounter strongly "pro-life" people I ask them about how they feel about fertility clinics and fertility treatment. In-vitro fertilization generally yields something like ten viable embryos, of which all but one or two are culled before implantation. Most pro-lifers seem OK with this sort of abortion. Based on that, I tend to believe most hard-line anti-abortion advocates are actually prudes in disguise, resenting the idea of consequence-free sex rather than the idea of early-term abortion.
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Religious Right
This piece is indicative of the insular nature of the religious right. My guess is that Pete, like many others, received The Onion article in an email from another religious right person. I’ve seen many of these emails, and most appear to be either satire or urban legends. Checking the “facts” in the emails inevitably proves they are nothing but propaganda.
That saddest part is that otherwise intelligent people not only believe the letters, but some can’t even let go once it’s been shown to be false. Like Pete, they try and link the subject back to some real life event. I’ve heard, “but it could be true” so many times my eyes are sore from rolling.
The religious right is no longer concerned with veracity, they are only concerned with what they want to believe.
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I'm laughing...
Is today April 1? I can't tell what is real and what is fake anymore.
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I read that piece in the Onion when it was first published
And my first thought was that it was satire about the flippant attitude towards abortion by many pro-choice people (whom I walk with). Given how the Onion refuses to discuss its articles in the same vain way that the Coen brothers refuse to discuss their movies, we'll never know. But given the political slant of most of the Onion's satire, it's probably now safe to say that the gist of the article is anti-anti-abortion. Either way, it's funny.
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talk about stupid
For every person like Pete, there are a vast hoard of folks ...
Yeah, and where would this "hoard" be hoarded? The cupboard. The back closet?
Yeah, there are hordes of illiterates who criticize others for their alleged stupidity.
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Pete and the immigration debate
Maybe rather than worrying about whether immigrants will come here (from Mexico) and take our jobs, we should worry about whether they'll come here (from Germany or wherever) and make asses of themselves.
Seriously, Pete is one small example of what I think is the defining fact about America, and certainly the reason our politics are so far right compared to those of all other modern democracies: "America: Proud Refuge for the World's Humorless Religious Fanatics Since 1620."
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Not just stupid, he's a stupid liar
"I come across these people all the time in the field."
He's not just stupid, he's a stupid liar, too.
This guy needs to head back to the briar patch, so he and Tony Snow can play with the tar babies.
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What is happening in your country?
Seriously?.I try not to comment on America and the religious right, etc... I figure it is a case of your house, your rules. I live in Canada and we have our own brand of whack-jobs here. But this reminds me of similar Onion articles that get taken for legit news in the MSM (ie: Jesus converts to Islam, US House of Reps threatens move to Canada, etc...).
When are the adults going to step in and tell the children to settle down? You're making the neighbours nervous!
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Satire is an "American humor?"
Satire is "an American humor?"
I'm sure Swift, Pope, Aristophanes, Juvenal, Rabelais, Voltaire, Wilde, Hasek and Jarry would all have something contentious to say about that.
Not to mention Elmar Brandt, who is very German and very satirical.
This "Pete" guy doesn't know anything, does he?
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I'm sure he meets plenty of women like that in the field
So Pete found out it was satire but went full-bore with his arguments because the satirical article meshed with what he'd heard from the "pro-abortion" folks in his field work picketing abortion clinics and whatnot. He even posts his recollection of a conversation with one of these women he meets in the field...
(copied and pasted from his first follow-up post)
> An abortion is just killing a child at an early age right?
Right
> And that's ok with you?
Might be
> "Ok, let me pose this scenario to you, let's say there's a woman standing in front of you. Her young daughter is yanking at her dress pulling on it saying "mama" over & over, let's say she's a real pest.
Ok
> Then, suddenly, her mother reaches down & strangles that child to death. Is that okay with you?
Might be
It seems pretty clear to me that the woman he met in the field, if he recorded this conversation in any way faithfully, just stopped taking him seriously and started saying things to really tweak his pointy head. It's kind of the same as my friends who greet Jehovah's Witnesses at the door and politely, with a straight face, tell the JW that they worship Cthulhu.
If that's the basis for his "I hear similar things in the field" canard, it's just another brick in the wall of his cluelessness. Sadly, more evidence that there are some people out there who, by nature or nurture, are just missing out on entire levels of meaning in life.
By the way... I've seen those "God is pro-life" bumper stickers... God put that naughty tree with the fruit of knowledge in the garden. He's pro-choice above all.