(no subject)

[eirias]

For a long time it's seemed to me that Ann Coulter is best understood as performance art. She reminds me of a high school student, the kind who likes to think he's bravely standing for Truth, Justice, Et Cetera, but who, deep down, is just in it for the attention you get for being loud: the laughs and cheers from people who are on your side or who just like big drama; the excitable disapproval from the people who aren't on your side and are too dumb to know your shtick for what it is. So after I got this picture I pretty much stopped paying attention to her: if she's just in it for the attention, the stuff she says stops being outrageous or surprising at all. A person yelling "PENIS"¹ stops being surprising once you know the game.

This interview, on the other hand, makes me a lot less sure that Coulter is really about performance art. It just isn't funny, from any perspective -- her tone is quite serious -- and she actually tries to back off in a weird, half-mealymouthed way when she realizes how much she's offended her interviewer.

Hat tip to jpfed.

¹or, if you prefer, "SEMINIFEROUS TUBULES"

Comments

[tla]

I still just don't understand why people like CNBC give her airtime. Yeah, there's the cynical argument of "she gets attention, and all attention is good attention", but to bring her on to insult a Jewish host? When she's famous for being famous, and got that way by being bigoted? What are they playing at?

[eirias.livejournal.com]

It's a good question. Maybe they didn't know she would choose this interview to cross that line? Maybe they did, and someone was hoping she'd jump the shark so we could move on?

The whole concept of being famous for being famous confuses me, honestly. I guess I see it as a good reason not to care about fame for yourself.

[kirin]

FYI: your link for "the game" appears to be seriously borked.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I'll fix that.

[kirin]

Having read the article now, the feeling I get is that she's gotten so used to getting money and attention for whatever ludicrous BS comes out of her mouth that she honestly has no idea where the lines are.

[dmw7.livejournal.com]

Hee. Seminiferous tubules. Now there's something I haven't thought of in years.

[rms10.livejournal.com]

Are you saying that Ann Coulter has approximately the maturity level of an eighteen-year-old? I'll buy that.

SEMINIFEROUS TUBULES! Ah, that felt good.

[feuervogel]

18? Are you sure she's got that much maturity? I was thinking more like 12.

[eldan.livejournal.com]

yeah, the penis game had definitely got old already by the time I was 18. And that's in spite of having gone to an all boys school....

[cognative.livejournal.com]

For a long time it's seemed to me that Ann Coulter is best understood as performance art.

Definitly. She clearly will say anything that will get here attention.

[blimix.livejournal.com]

It doesn't look like she backed off at all. She's saying exactly what she says that she said: That that's what Christianity is "about". (i.e., start with Judaism, then let Christ take away all the bad stuff.)

It's not hateful, just very disrespectful. She's done hateful, and this isn't it. It is, on the other hand, a very poor word choice, very open to interpretation.

[blimix.livejournal.com]

Oh, and check out an interesting take (http://mistress-nomad.livejournal.com/142606.html) on Ann Coulter.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

This was the interchange that I thought was mealy-mouthed:

First:
COULTER: No, we think -- we just want Jews to be perfected, as they say.

And then:
DEUTSCH: You said -- your exact words were, "Jews need to be perfected." Those are the words out of your mouth.

COULTER: No, I'm saying that's what a Christian is.

It sounds like she's trying to weasel her way out of having said what she said. I don't know that I've heard her do that before.

The link you put up to the analysis of Coulter as a closet liberal is cute :) It's not the first time I've heard that hypothesis; I don't entirely buy it myself, but I also don't buy that she is what she claims to be, so I have some sympathy for your friend's view.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

And here's where I half-shamefully confess that I was enjoying a variant of the game at least as late as freshman year of college. I think I remember a story involving some CWRU folk playing our variant at Cedar Point, though I wasn't there myself...

[eldan.livejournal.com]

oh it got revived several times after initially getting old, but I think that reviving something puerile and harmless from to time is mildly amusing, whereas reviving Coulterish behaviour after it got old the first time is at turns ridiculous and disgusting.

Oh, and where I grew up it wasn't "penis". It was BOLLOCKS. Or occasionally LEMON, just for sheer randomness.

[leora.livejournal.com]

I don't read it as mealy mouthed, because I've faced this viewpoint a few times before. It's what Jews for Jesus is all about, and why I hate Jews for Jesus. Jews for Jesus is a scam to convert Jews to Christianity. I call it a scam because if they truly believed what they say, they should be trying to get Christians to follow the laws of Judaism as well, but they don't, they only try to get Jews to follow the laws of Judaism + tack on Christianity on top.

And she's basically right that Christianity is supposed to be about taking Judaism and perfecting it by God giving a second round of information. She's just bad at saying it in a non-offensive way. I think she was trying to clarify that her view isn't radical, it's more or less the heart of what Christianity is about and Christians are supposed to be - Jews who got the message of Jesus and followed it. Obviously they believe that message is right so all Jews should download the upgrade and switch versions.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

trygve said:
I'd never even heard of the game until I met E and some others at Case.

(screened to keep out my real name)

[trygve.livejournal.com]

Sorry 'bout that.

[kirin]

IJWTA that at the Bodyworlds exhibit in Charlotte this weekend, I actually saw a display of SEMINIFEROUS TUBULES and thought of this post.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

*laugh*
Wow, glad to have infected an unsuspecting bystander with a ten-year-old memory of mine. :)

(scary that my involvement with DaP is nearly as old as that memory!)

[cos]

Ann Coulter is best understood as a media troll. She plays the same role in the mainstream press as typical Internet trolls do on online message boards.