05.09.12
The badge of stupid
One of the badges of the stupid right wing bigot, in other words virtually all of the modern Republican Party, is the pass around e-mail joke.
It begins something like this:
Over five thousand years ago, Moses said to the children of Israel, “Pick up your shovels, mount your asses and camels, and I will lead you to the Promised Land.???
Nearly 75 years ago, (when Welfare was introduced)Roosevelt said, “Lay down your shovels, sit on your asses, and light up a Camel. This is the Promised Land.???
I was startled to get this in my e-mail on Monday. I patiently explained to the friend who’d sent it that I knew he’d probably received it in e-mail from one of his Republican friends, someone not even around when FDR issued in the New Deal.
The e-mail ends with an attack on Muslims in Pakistan. Between slurs on those on welfare, a complaint about too much taxation and Obamacare, plus a blanket condemnation of Muslims as suicide bombers, it contains all the sweets the Tea Party loves.
I did a quick Google search and it’s published in lots of places. They all have one thing in common: They’re chat boards and sites for right wing or Tea Partiers who believe it’s hysterical. It also goes well with the idiot wish to wave or display the Gadsden flag so that everyone knows how patriotic you are.
The people who pass it don’t see themselves as bigots. They really do believe it’s a bit of smart wordplay, not something dreadfully dull and telegraphed.
It’s like Rick Santorum’s wealthy sugar-daddy, Foster Friess, on television laughing and smiling at what he thinks is a fine attempt at humor — that women practiced contraception by holding an aspirin between their knees — while everyone else sees someone who’s just sprouted a third eye on a stalk.
It also indicates big differences in the brains of right-wingers and progressives.
I never get jokes in e-mail from my progressive friends. It never happens. All I get from progressive groups are solicitations to contribute or alerts when Occupy Wall Street is planning something in my area.
However, the right wing mind works in lockstep. They religiously use e-mail lists of friends to pass things around. They immediately go viral, having a quality hitting all the right buttons, one in which the recipient always feels his world view reinforced by the like-minded.
I noticed this first when viewing Tea Party music or tunes devoted to mythologizing Ron Paul on YouTube.
No matter how risible, everyone in the tribe works together to immortalize such things.