After reading only a handful of her virulent, totally disrespectful insults towards people of faith, I can safely say that, even as a feminist, socially-progressive liberal, I have no sympathy whatsoever for this woman and her predicament. She got what she had coming to her, and any Democrat with aspirations of appealing to any but the most extreme of left-wingers would be smart to distance themselves from someone so divisive and mean-spirited.

Donohue may be a masochistic jackass, but this go around he actually managed to hit someone who seems to have deserved it.

Go cry to someone who cares, Amanda. I'll reserve my compassion for those who deserve it.

As many commenters at Pandagon noted, we're far from living in a postsexist era where feminism is not needed, if one can't be an outspoken young feminist and work for a campaign without producing waves of outraged commentary.

Donohue is a jackass, but he did not attack you for your feminist writing, or are you saying that you speak for all feminists when you write so virulently about religion?

You still cannot accept any responsibility in this, can you?

the crux of this issue is fairly straightforward, seems to me.

You wrote some pretty provocative stuff over on Pendagon. If you had been willing to stand up tall for all of it, and really take on the right-wing grease-bags and religious cultists who didn't like what you wrote...then the story is over and you might still be working for Edwards.

I can understand why you resigned...it's hard to withstand the kind of barrage you received..

but, good god, what did you expect? You write stuff like that, you think people like Donohue and his ilk are going to just roll over? Nope. They're gonna fight much dirtier than you ever would. That's their style.

I gotta tell ya, though, if you thought no-one would be offended by the kind of stuff you were writing, you were being a little naive, doncha think?

Remember, most wing-nuts have no sense of humor, especially about themselves.. and religious cultists are even worse.

I find you to be morally bankrupt. Nobody deserves threats of violence. The incident reveals that Donohue's followers are a criminal (it's illegal to make such threats, much less carry them out) bunch of thugs. Since Donohue believes one should be held to the statements of those they associate with (why else would he care about the personal blogs of Edwards' staffers), by his own standards he's condoning these threats. However, the hate Donohue cultivates is not necessary to prove that he is scum. His long litany of bigoted comments like claiming the problem with Hollywood is that it is full of "secular Jews" prove he's demagogue and a bigot.

As for those that claim they were offended, too damn bad. Free speech means someone will offend you. If you think a violent mob response is justified, virtual or otherwise, because your faith is offended, you are a pathetic excuse for an American. This country was founded on the ideal of freedom and if you don't like it, you should find somewhere else to live.

Before Edwards hired you, I had never heard of you. In the blogosphere, I avoid blogrolls and I'm pretty loyally provincial about the few corners I choose to hang out in, so you were a stranger.

But my reactions to your story from the time you came under fire have been completely emotional and personal. When you first were attacked, I was so pissed. I got up a head of anger about what the smear machine was trying to do to you. I joined my voice to those of others who swore I'd disown Edwards if he fired you. And then he didn't fire you, and at that point I felt so much hope and pride that finally there was an unapologetically progressive political force in this country that I support and participate in (netroots grassroots), and that was powerful enough to push back against the smear merchants and keep you in your place in the Edwards campaign.

At that point you became a symbol, representing something real and important and valuable and needed. Your fate (if you will) didn't just belong to you anymore. Alot of people shared in it.

And then you quit, and by doing so gave away your power (and ours) to the rightwing nutters who had attacked you. And I feel so angry and frustrated toward you now.

And you did it because you said you just had to come out and defend yourself. All the threats and sex-violence invective were just so much turgid purple impotence, and you chose engaging with that over real power. All that pure mysogyny was like magnetic north to you—it validates your worldview and was just too tempting for a feminist activist not to wallow in. And it all leaves me feeling depressed, angry and has rekindled my resentment of feminism as a movement that's easily distracted by it's need to seek conflict, controversy and validation over real power and real resolution.

I hesitate to see why Edwards is at fault here. He didn't fire either staffer; they each resigned on their own after he had declined to fire them. In a political campaign, it would have even been understandable for him to want to sever ties with them if they were seen as dragging down the momentum of his campaign, but he didn't. I still haven't seen any proof that he doesn't deserve our vote.

Sure...in an ideal world our next President would be named Dennis Kucinich, but we could do a whole lot worse than John Edwards. He's sure preferable to Hillary (which has nothing to do with her gender!)

If anything, I think this experience brought a lot of people to Pandagon who will be forever grateful to have found that particular forum. This whole situation disheartens me, but I'm now a regular Pandagon reader, and I know I am not alone.

Wow, usually when I'm told to move somewhere else, it's from people on the other side of the fence. This, perhaps, is further evidence that the far-left ideologues are as logically bankrupt as the far-right they so enjoy mocking.

Obviously we are not saying that Marcotte deserves to be threatened, harassed, or physically attacked. We are saying that she deserved to be fired/forced to quit, and she deserves to be criticized for her attacks on faith. Especially if she's supposed to be working for a presidential candidate. It's not just offensive, but just plain stupid, to cling to such intentionally hurtful anti-religious beliefs on a national level. Whether secular, urban liberals, sheltered as they are, realize it or not, there are a hell of a lot of moderate and liberal people of faith (Christians and others) who vote Democrat every fall, and we hardly appreciate it when you paint us with the same brush that you use on hacks like Donohue.

Marcotte has the freedom to insult the religious however she likes... Donohue has the right to insult her however he likes. And Edwards has the right and obligation to exercise his good judgment in getting both of them out of his hair by letting go of her.

Secular liberals may be trying to prove a point, or pat their own egos, when they insult, mock, deride, or otherwise act like children when it comes to people of faith. They're just shooting themselves in the foot by alienating a lot of good, ideologically moderate people who cannot be pigeonholed by radical conservative stereotypes.