I guess I had higher expectations of so-called liberals not to get into the d!ck swinging/d!ck discourses, since both the Clinton impeachment/Starr Report and the “manly characteristic” talk was all Republican-generated. My mistake! It will never happen again.

Mark, thanks for the additional info. I was unaware of people from the right referring to “tea-bagging”–most of the people on the right who were publicizing the events called them (very primly) “tea parties.” But, you point to some exceptions. IMHO, people on whatever side who used that term should get their mouths washed out with soap.

What is it, every 10 years American political culture becomes d!ck-obssessed? Yuk.

Taking no position on the appropriateness, or lack thereof, of lefty jokes about tea-bagging, it isn’t true that they were the sole originators of the label. For example:

http://washingtonindependent.com/31868/scenes-from-the-new-american-tea-party (picture of a protest sign, posted 2/27/09)

http://www.yesbutnobutyes.com/archives/2009/03/fox_news_report.html (Fox News clip from 3/18/09)

http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2009/03/21/ (daily conservative comic, uses the baggin’ joke on 3/21/09) [this is actually where I first saw/heard it, fwiw]

Yes, liberals ran with the meme with gleeful abandon, far outweighing its usage on the right. Critique away on that. But the right is not innocent in the matter.

Maddow may not care. It may not be on her radar. She may have thought about that and dismissed it. She may feel she acted appropriately re: “tea bagging” and that people using it against her wouldn’t be acting appropriately so she would be justified in calling them out without ever questioning her own behavior. Or she may feel that the argument I’ve made is homophobic because it gives in to the hostility toward gays/lesbian in this society.

And all those arguments may be right and I may be wrong. But I don’t believe I am. I sincerely believe that Audre Lorde is right: the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house and p*rnification is the masters’ tool. And I’m not going to ratify that tools so that it can be used against me with a patina of legitimacy because “she did it too!”

Moreover, the cause in which Maddow was using this tool is not worth the dangers created by Maddow in using it. Was there some more noble, wonderful purpose or goal she was pursuing? Hardly. Her T.V. ratings and her status as the hippest, coolest, most guy friendly lesbian/woman on T.V. is simply not something worth what she had done to attain that goal and continues to do to maintain it.

As for “discrediting” the tea parties, I’m pretty sure their lack of credibility was built right in and there was no need to pull out this particular tool to make them look as politically foolish as they were.

YMMV.

And not to pick on Emma, but I’m not sure that what Maddow is doing and someone else’s potential response to a lesbian relationship can both be classified as pornification. Again, I raise this as an opportunity for further discussion and not to flame Emma.

I don’t think p*rnifying anybody (or anybody’s relationship is a good idea). And I think Maddow would be well advised of two maxims:

1) People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones; and

2) The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.

But, since Maddow seems intent on living in the master’s house, the first is probably more apropos.