Though if they can get the term changed to one of respect; perhaps my friends will stop making fun of me for buying Vanilla Ice’s cassette tapes (but he keeps coming back on reality TV to haunt my life).

So, a video game that has so many players, computer companies began producing laptops just for them (“gamming”); the judicial system of the USA; fraternities and High Schools across the country (which includes not only students, but faculty, staff and parents as well); the movie “Pecker” whose director comes wiith a cult following….

It seems that the *only* people who were not aware of, or without social skills required to be aware of, were the teabaggers themselves.

Think of this from a business point of view, which is how I am seeing it. Your point is to bring in more to your cause. Unless we change political systems you arenot going to effect change with a small group, which is smaller then the gay rights movement. Your group is currently spending time trying to justify and claim ownership of a term that has people laughing at you or think your nuts just because of the term you adopted (humor is not the only reason to drop the term). You could spend less time taking on a new term (with research) then trying to restructure the term to your use. Its been a year, how many more do you think your cause should waste their time trying to restructure an established term. The use of the term should not be more important then the you have formed. People have been laughing at fart jokes for atleast 2 decades, crude humor (dare I say vulgar) that has no end in sight.

As I said, my argument isn’t about how widely the term is known, but about how soon it goes from funny to dumb, to joke about the protesters in this manner.

However, after googling “teabagging, video game” and learning that in video games it’s defined as the action where a winner crouches over a defeated foe in order to rub his crotch over the face of the corpse, I readily admit that anyone capable of that mentality, even in fantasy, probably WILL always snicker at the term teabagging.

I don’t think anyone else IN THE WORLD should be concerned about people like this, other than feeling relief that there is some fantasy outlet for their aggressive impulses.

Otherwise, they’d be acting them out by drowning puppies in bleach…

Checkmate.

another red herring: the immensity of the “online gaming community”.

Another non sequitur: that an argument that teabagging jokes will fade into boredom is tantamount to “trying to change the meaning of the slang” and to trying to “turn it into a powerful term that will make people respect your cause”.

Another pronouncement that’s nothing more than inflammatory rhetoric as substitute for actually thinking: “…two things that the far right conservatives fear mos is change and sex.”

And I suppose for the sake of variety you’ve now added a myth.

http://www.snopes.com/business/misxlate/nova.asp

“BTW– I have it on good authority that gays and straights in Britain take no offense at being offered a fag. Neither does it send them into fits of boyish laughter…”

Yes and try and sell a car called a nova in Spain, they will not buy a car with a name that translates into no go. Point of the matter is what teabagging means here not in another country.

My finale thought: My suggestion is to change the name. You will have more success in a name change then sticking with a term that is the equivalent of “a kick me” sign on your back. Don’t just continue to wear it because you think people will join you in wearing “kick me” signs as a fashion accessory. The term was already in the mainstream of online gaming (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teabagging). Trying to change the meaning is not going to turn it into powerful term that will make people respect your cause. Especially when that reference is of a sexual nature, you might as well try and stand in front of a train to stop it. Also the examples of supposed insults that Nordlinger gives were not made before those given the actual term existed. I also doubt that Nordlinger has any scope of how big the online gaming community is, had he I am sure he would consider a name change.

I imagine those calling themselves teabaggers will stick with it given whatever divine reason. Because there are two things that the far right conservatives fear most is change and sex. Apparently your group fears change more then sex.

There were teabags before there was a slang term called teabagging.

Human nature may always reach toward humor, but the power of humor lies its freshness of perspective.

I suppose there are some people in the world who guffaw when someone says “nut” or “screw”, but I feel sure that they aren’t the majority of the populace.

As to the n-word, I’ve already talked about Nordlinger’s statement about it. Though he says being called the slang definition of the word teabagger is meant to be offensive, he was not claiming that teabagger is as incendiary an epithet as the n-word, nor as persecuting. Rather he was making an observation about the dynamics terms can take on AMONG MEMBERS OF THE SAME GROUP.

And no, there’s been no memo issued from Rush Limbaugh, telling teabaggers, republicans, conservatives (name your poison…) that gays or African-Americans enjoy being called racial or sexual slurs. I let you know if one is sent out…

BTW– I have it on good authority that gays and straights in Britain take no offense at being offered a fag. Neither does it send them into fits of boyish laughter…

Your argument does not make a bit of sense. You’re saying its ok to use a term with sexual tones is going to change it to your own meaning. When your own argument gives reason to believe people are going to continue to point and laugh at you.

Bottomline:

teabagging = male sex organ to the head

versus

teabagging = a poor misconception of the Boston tea party

Which do you think has the lasting power, and don’t underestimate the power of human nature to lean towards the funny. Also it was already main stream as ingenieux has shown before your little group had hold of it, hence the video game references, it was already rather rampant. It just was not in the main stream news, but it was defiantly there. Hence the humor. The f word is also mainstream, care to adopt that to your party as well?

As for the n word, why not compare yourselves to faggot and offensive term for gay people. Tea bagger does not compare to either word. Gay people and those of African decent did not choose the term. Perhaps some in the groups have adopted it, but that does not mean of the bulk of either approve, though I am sure that’s what you are told.

The fact is that because of its frequent and accepted use via exposure to the broader pubic from the hip-hop culture, many people actually DO worry that the n-word WILL lose its pejorative status and come “just another word”.

African-American leaders routinely appeal to young people to take care NOT to mainstream the term, preferring that it stay an incendiary expression as an illustration of historic racism.

Contrary to your argument, suppressing words or making them taboo only tends to give keep alive their meaning and their power to offend.

It’s the MAINSTREAMING of taboo words that erodes their significance and their edge.

Hence Nordlinger’s argument.

Your facility for throwing up straw men and red herrings is surpassed only by your talent for non sequiturs.

That people may continue knowing the meaning of the slang teabaggers (duh, sherlock…) in no way contradicts the argument that relentless commenting upon it, chortling over it, and using double entendre at the sound of it, will soon get as old, tiresome, and superfluous as the old comic standby “take my wife…please…”

You own argument should inform you that relentless snickering at anything in wide use does have its shelf life (no where is that more evident than in video games)… as more and more people of your company get over the joke, roll their eyes, and say “yeah, we get it, dude…whatevah….”

Next non sequitur: It does not follow… that my venturing the opinion that the teabaggers should continue using the word until jokes about its slang application grow as silly as snickers over expressions of “ho…ho…ho” at Christmas time….therefore makes me a teabagger protester. It merely makes me someone with a particular opinion on Mr. Coscarelli’s blog at Mediaite.

As for more than 50% of people not agreeing with conservatives (About what precisely? Bailouts? Lower taxes? Abortion? A public health care option? Escalation of troops in Afghanistan? Gay marriage?), that’s a red herring that has nothing to do with the subject at hand. ( I’d venture that you’re probably getting the terms “conservative” and “Republican”, as regards public opinion, interchanged too.)

But even if we take as gospel, a percentage that you very likely pulled out of the air, you have no way to conclude that 10%, 20%, 30%, or 49.9% of these people, even if aware of the slang meaning, would bother to snicker. You have no way of knowing what percentage would bother to do anything other than perhaps think for a split second “These folks sure picked a loaded name”, and then move on in considering the information that had brought the group to their attention in the first place.

So that means you are a tea bagger?

That’s the tea bagger problem more then 50% of the country does not agree with conservatives, a fraction of conservatives are tea baggers. Hoping that the slang dies just because you don’t like the innuendo humor (which is prudish) is like sticking a fork in an electric socket hoping the shock will not happen eventually. Unless you forget to pay the power bill, its not going to happen, unless your dumb enough to focus on trying. In which case it would probable be labeled an act of god I am sure. Almost every online video game out there has someone talking about teabagging, this term was highly prevalent before the tea baggers took it on this year. Going after news commentators is not going to stop the use. I suggest playing halo or any game that has pvp (player versus player) to see what I mean. The chances of it becoming Dead-On-Arrival are as likely as peeing your pants not being embarrassing. After all the n-word is still around and many Americans (both liberal, conservative,or independent be they black or white) would love to never hear it again.

Now while your group will not be able to get rid of innuendo of teabagging, it does not mean it can not take on another meaning such as uninformed astroturf movement. Even with a second meaning those of us that are not teabaggers will have the original meaning stuck in our heads as we snicker in our heads or laugh out loud upon hearing someone calling themselves a proud tea bagger.

I’m of the camp( that Nordlinger mentions) that feels that teabaggers should continue using that word until the slang meaning of it and the double entendre (like yours) become little more than a Henny Youngman joke- Dead-on-Arrival.

Nordligner opines upon whether tea party protesters should jettison the term or stick with it and ride out its connotation in the same way that has been done with other terms that started out as appellations (Nordlinger mentions many such them)

In the midst of this, Nordlinger then wonders if teabagger isn’t like the n-word in that tea party protesters don’t mind being called that by each other, but not by someone who is not one of them (in the way African-Americans use the n-word towards each other).

Now, I don’t know how you can call such discourses into the nature of terms and social dynamics (as they relate to how tea party protesters should handle the connotation of teabagger) as being on par with “whining”.

I don’t know how one can suggest that Nordlinger’s little sideline on the n-word was a suggestion that both it and teabagger are terms that are equally derisive.

I just assume that some people see the National Review banner at the head of the page and lose all sense of tone and context.

Let me address the sticking areas you mention that actually apply to Mr Coscarelli’s blog and to the Maddow Show segment and ignore the bevy of straw men you’ve thrown around in an attempt to support some underlying contention that Tea Party Protesters aren’t worthy of professional treatment from journalists.

If “blaming” journalists means that you expect them to behave professionally and in the way that they would with other groups, no matter what, then yeah…Ben, I am blaming them.

Am I blaming them for the fact that teabagging is a slang term. No. Am I blaming them for pouncing upon this fact, using it to demean (on national tv) Americans exercising their right to protest their govt…and generally acting like they are not journalists, but the junior high section at the Daily Kos, yes, again, I’m “blaming” them.

If it’s “blaming” David Shuster to suggest that it was in the worst of professional practice and the worst of taste to launch in double entendre and puns about “Dick Army”, “having a ball”, “going nuts”, etc …etc… Yeah, I’ m blaming them.

What brought this up was the segment where Maddow and Shuster attempt to justify this behavior by suggesting that the tea party protesters where fair game for this because they chose the name.

Not only is this craptastic justification for their own unprofessional behavior illogical and disingenuous, it’s also so paper thin that it’s obvious this pair would NEVER attempt such a relativistic argument on ANY OTHER GROUP.

It’s not every day that one sees a full week of television hosts engaging in snickering puerile puns and double entendre that makes a comedy appearance by Andrew Dice Clay seem cerebral in comparison.

And because of that it’s fairly easy to surmise that MSNBC hosts did it because they were given the green light to do so by the network.

More than that, it’s not every day that you see virtual silence in the industry over the sort of behavior. I doubt Ann Coulter could have called anti-war protesters or pro-immigration protesters scrotum-sucking parasites to the delight of the tv host, without said host having to hear some cries of outrage from industry watchdogs.

The social and political dynamics of this fodder for the annals of journalism go far beyond any definition found in the Urban Dictionary and beyond how ever many ‘mean placard’ or ‘ignorant bumpkin’ straw men you prop up for professional people who ought to be held to some standard of accountability.

At the same time, do you even watch Rachel Maddow and other news shows that you call vulgar? Or are you getting your opinion from the places that are saying they are vulgar. Are you one of those conservatives that hates moderate conservatives, and if they don’t take the conservative side 100% of the time you call them a liberal? Do you call independents liberals? Btw not a liberal I am a independent. One at this point I have a hard time justifying voting for republicans.

No the post did not owe up to it. It reads like a pity party, “we are the victims of our own lack of foresight dam the liberals for having fun this year over it”. Worse of all the bs about comparing the teabagers to the N word. These are the same people that want to return us to the way things ran when our founding fathers were around. Remember some of the founding fathers including our first president had slaves, and it was legal. Nothing funny about that, nor is any where near the n word in terms of an offensive slur. Does he think people who read have no knowledge of history, or is it he has no knowledge of history? This is the same man that says he loves Ronald Regan more then Nancy, which I sincerely doubt (after all look at the causes she is championing in Ronald’s name). He blames the liberals for bringing it forward, and yes making fun of them. It been almost a whole year, and now they are catching on. These are the same people that do not have the intelligence to understand the difference between a Muslim, fascist, nazis, and socialists. Who carry signs about killing people. I guess its ok to defend them regardless of what they say. But if it comes from someone that does not support a so called conservative view then they are dirty liberals.

When I make a mistake I don’t blame other people. I make amends if due, but I don’t blame people even if I do not agree with their thinking when I do something stupid or wrong. Though I don’t continue to make the same mistake over a year while people are pointing it out. This has nothing to do with social and poltical bias, as I am certain you and I would be laughing at liberals if they choose to call themselves something stupid and took a year for them to catch on.

The republican party will not move forward unless they adapt and stop blaming everyone for their mistakes. United we stand, divide we fall..

Cecelia, just out of curiosity when you make a mistake do you blame those that you hate, or do you own up to it?

————————————————————————————————————————————-

Ben if you have bothered to read the piece above, you’d see that National Review’s Jay Nordlinger’s does “own up to It” and says tea party protesters should stop using it.

My point is that the fact that such slang exists in no way excuses Rachel Maddow or David Shusters from turning their shows into demeaning vulgar double entendre fests as Rachel Maddow suggested in her segment (again…the subject of this discussion) that it did.

I gave the illustration of Code Pink, a woman’s protest group, as an example that had anyone on FNC used the urban slang for pink in order to demean these women, Shuster and Maddow would have been outraged. They would not have been mollified by any argument suggesting that these tv hosts were only pointing out that these anti-war hicks had been stupid enough to chose a name for female genitalia, and therefore fair game.

Frankly there’s not a soul at MSNBC who would have bought for one second the argument that the use of the term “pink” by women gave carte blanch for journalists and news analysts (supposedly responsible people) to turn their shows into Animal House.

No, Shuster and Maddow did what they did because they could. They could because of the network that they work for encouraged it and because their peers encouraged and delighted in it.

This is about social and political bias. There’s no other group that these supposedly serious journos could have treated this way and not have been roundly condemned.

“Teabaggers” isn’t a twisting or a perversion of a given name. It’s the name the movement originally chose for itself.

And it may well be petty if I continue to call them that after they’ve decided they don’t like what they named themselves anymore — but so be it. I don’t have a show on MSNBC (or anywhere else), and what passes for argument from the tea-party camp is so off-the-wall, unfocused, and just plain loony that I don’t mind being petty toward them.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself. (I am large, I contain multitudes.)

(Actually, I think the teabaggers would HATE Walt Whitman. He was literate, a newspaper editor, an Easterner, and he wasn’t straight. Everything they love to condemn!)

This became an issue because of people in conservative circles that lost touch with modern America (not all conservatives, just those in the far right). The same group that wants things to be like our founding fathers set it up (some of which had slaves). Never mind in over 200 years we have made social advancements as a country. Also this is the same group that wants the government to stay out of their lives, yet want a constitutional band on gay rights.

A person who wasn’t aware of what teabagging meant before this whole political movement started, then they were obviously born in the wrong decade.

Anyone who’s played Halo knows what teabagging is.