The Antisocial Socialist

I can't seem to remember to write 2011 on anything. It isn't just that it's January and I have this problem every single year. It's that it's 2011 and there's still a monarchy* and I don't have robots that do my laundry for me.

ETA: I showed zingerella Steampunk Palin and she retaliated with an incredibly WTF production of Purcell's The Fairy Queen. (Warning: bunnies, Uncanny Valley, furry, your brain can probably not handle it, and it's certainly NSFW.)

* Several, in fact, but one in particular annoys me.

I am one of those people with the terrible habit of reading over people's shoulders on the subway. Yes, I know that it's a terrible habit. And besides, they are seldom reading anything interesting—usually just one of those free subway papers.

Anyway, someone was reading a free subway paper, and I caught the headline: T.O. to Host Tea Party.

I got so excited. I was on my way somewhere, but I thought: Really? A Teabagger rally in my own city? That's even better than the G20. As my long commute continued, I fantasized about an excellent protest. We'd all show up in suits and ties with placards reading "Kill the Poor" and "Billionaires Against Social Responsibility" and so on. We would outnumber the actual Teabaggers like that time that the Objectivist Society tried to hold a March For Capitalism.

I was all ready to enlist y'all, too. We'd have been a movement.

On my way home, I finally found a copy of the paper, frantically flipped the article and—oh. It was another article about Rob Ford and how he's bringing Teabagger-like politics to Toronto. There's no event at all.

I guess that's good. Well, not that Rob Ford exists. You know what I mean.

This article on the links between old school anti-Semitism and modern Islamophobia has been making the rounds, so you should read it too. I still can't believe the community centre thing is a Thing. Of course, a mosque was a Thing in my home town, but I foolishly didn't believe that widespread ignorance and smallmindedness extended to New York City.

Anyway, contrary to Beck's assertion that there are black people in his movement, check out the most monochromatic rally in NYC ever and what happens when a black guy gets caught in it:


On a related note, apocalypsos brings us this hilarious set of instructions for Teabaggers deigning to ride the DC Metro with the unwashed masses:

If you are on the subway stay on the Red line between Union Station and Shady Grove, Maryland. If you are on the Blue or Orange line do not go past Eastern Market (Capitol Hill) toward the Potomac Avenue stop and beyond; stay in NW DC and points in Virginia. Do not use the Green line or the Yellow line. These rules are even more important at night. There is of course nothing wrong with many other areas; but you don't know where you are, so you should not explore them.

Today I saw a guy in a Teabagger t-shirt (this slogan on the back, with the Don't Tread On Me snakes and some babble about the New World Order on the front).

Shopping at The Big Carrot.

Wonder what he was buying. Macrobiotic baby food? Gluten-free, organic sweet potato loaf? Maybe he was a tourist.

Via apocalypsos: This post has some real gems, though mostly what you'd expect from a Teabagger function (though, amusingly, Boston has so few homegrown Teabaggers that they had to roll them in on the Tea Party Express). The commentary is pretty good too.

My favourite, though, were the photographs showing a confrontation between what appear to be steampunk-esque LARPers and the Teabaggers.

( cut for huge )

Cutest. Counter-protest. Ever.

A Flickr collection of teabagger signs.



On my less-happy days, I don't know how I stand living in a world that spawns people like this.

P.S. Not because of the spelling and grammar fail. Just because I can't cope with knowing there are human beings so devoid of empathy.

Via fengi, a video that fails harder than any rap has ever failed, up to and including that particularly shameful whiteboy rap period in the 90s.



This analysis says most of it, but doesn't point out the Red Dawn reference, so I will.

WOOOOOOLVERIIIINES!

Best line: "Public education made me dumb, man." Truer words were never spoke.

It's been a good few days for me, emotionally as well as politically, by which I mean that I've won every fight I've picked and that's put me in a hell of a good mood. And I've picked a number of fights in unusual places for me. Granted, with people far below the level to which I was accustomed (I was called a "Canuck faggot," "commie fascist," and "traitor," none of which are effective counter-arguments to the points I was raising)—and let's be honest, I didn't so much as win arguments by rational discourse as the people I was—ahem—debating kind of couldn't figure out what the polysyllabic words meant.

And there was another issue, which struck me as I was groggily impersonating a CSIS agent at 6 am before I had my morning coffee (these things happen). Which is that the sorts of arguments I've been getting into with people who hold reactionary political beliefs are simply not winnable by any party, owing to radically different character alignments.

( cut for flippancy and possibly the dorkiest thing I've posted besides the steampunk pictures )

Via terry_terrible: I have no idea who this George Hutchins guy is but his website is a work of art. And by that I mean that before you click on the following link:

1. Make sure that you are sober. In particular, refrain from the use of hallucinogenic drugs, as you will almost certainly have a bad trip even without them.

2. Have a cup of coffee. I tried looking at it without the benefit of caffeine and—let's just say you need all your wits about you.

3. Put on some sunglasses.

4. If you have epilepsy, a heart condition, or a moderately developed aesthetic sensibility, this site is probably not for you.

Okay, here it is. Keep your hand on the back button of your browser at all times, just in case.

The forum is probably my favourite part, as it's 99% anonymous trolls making the lulz, 1% George Hutchins responding in ALL CAPS, and 1% George Hutchins responding under a different username in third-person.

( Highlights! )

P.S. He also advocates "more better jobs" and moving Hollywood to North Carolina.

Via apocalypsos: Watch Rachel Maddow try to not crack up while describing the newest conservative strategy for sticking it to Obama.