I had to look at that image for a few seconds before I realized that the “Help! We’re being oppressed!” speech balloon was coming from the pie chart. I thought maybe she had talking breasts.

“Woe is me! Now they are attacking me for my new boobs! Will this persecution never end?!”

What? There’s no hypocrisy. She’s homophobic, not nudeophobic!

Shame on the photographer for taking racy pictures of a 17-year-old, though.

intolerant and offensive

She would be an expert in this field

See, those of us in the reality-based community see the hypocrisy of someone claiming to be uber-Christian posing for racy photos.  We on the left don’t care what kind of pictures she takes, and if she embraces our tolerant attitudes, it wouldn’t be news.

But she’s Holy St. Miss USA now, who only lost her crown b/c she Speaks For Christ and His Oppressed Majority.  When you take that tack, you really shouldn’t have secrets that blow you off your high horse.  Glass houses?

However, the “I’m a sinner; I’m not perfect” crap plays really well with fundies, so don’t expect to see them recoil at her hypocrisy the way we would if someone on the left did the same thing.  They will have to slut shame her a whole bunch, and she should really grovel a bit more if she wants to keep drinking out of the Evanfungical font.

What cracks me up, is that even if she had won, these photos would have forced her to resign.  She really didn’t deserve to win—she couldn’t give a coherent answer and she had topless photos floating around.

Vanessa Williams, anyone?

not try to silence them

I like how right-wing douche-bags always fall back on this shit. Because you point out how full of shit they are and what a huge hypocrite they are you are somehow stopping them from vomiting up hate in the MSM. Poor Miss Cali she took some nude shots and now is getting spanked with them. I would feel bad for her but I am too mean to feel bad for a hatemonger I guess.

However, the “I’m a sinner; I’m not perfect” crap plays really well with fundies,

Yup, that’s basically they’re whole shtick [sp?] what they’re pissed with gays about is that they’re living their lives in the open and they’re not apologizing or feeling bad about who they are and *gasp* they’re not being smited down on the spot which, for fundies either means a) sky daddy tolerates the homos or b) the sky daddy doesn’t exist.

I feel to counter either of these terrible thoughts they take it upon themselves to punish people for doing what they think is sinful. Meanwhile, they can “sin” all they want as long as they say they’re sorry at some point and it’s all good.

This was one of the millions of reasons I couldn’t wait to get out of MO.

She says she was seventeen when the photos were taken.  We have no idea.

Man, you’d think these Xtian fantasist stone-throwers would learn, but they never do, “God bless ‘em” (and their glass houses).

I’ll bet our trolls have some interesting skeletons in their moms’ basement closets.

we should show respect for others’ opinions and not try to silence them through vicious and mean-spirited attacks

I really don’t understand she gets this idea that free speech should mean freedom from criticism of your speech.

As for mean-spirited attacks, I see nothing more mean-spirited than Miss California’s attempts to keep loving couples apart.

At least Vanessa Williams has talent.

I imagine things would go rougher for Prejean with the right-wingers if she’d been photographed at anti-war marches or pro-choice rallies. The patriarchy may not always want its daughter posing nude or semi-nude, but it sure as hell wants to look at such photos.

Except she didn’t even win.  She was the 1st runner up, and she’s upstaging the winner . . . . erhm, whatshername?

I think this whole fiasco is a huge publicity stunt.  “Now we out the pictures . . . ”  Ms. Prejean was SUPPOSED to have won, until (I guess) she hosed the gay marriage question.  Then again Trump (who owns the show) and Perez Whatzisname seem work very closely together, or so I’m told by a commenter at my site who follows these things (I typically don’t), so it’s possible that even the gay marriage comment was a part of a huge publicity stunt.

At any rate, I’m ready for the POSTjean now, where she goes away forever.

There’s a difference between Ms. Prejean and Ms. Williams.  It was something obvious, but I just can’t put my finger on it!  Something about melons?  Melanoma?  Damn.  That’s gonna bug me all day.

At this point, I’m out of anger towards Ms. Prejean, not that there ever was much.  It just seems like she’s had damned little agency in any of this.  Women and girls tend not to get into the pageant thing without a lot of parental encouragement/coercion, the pageant suggested strongly she get breast implants, and she’s been delivering half-formed versions of what she’s been told to say since this whole thing erupted.  A bunch of people and organizations are using her as their pawn, and the shine may be beginning to wear off it for her.

Though given that she’s probably going to make a bunch of money being a pawn, I don’t feel that sorry for her.

Boooooooooooooooooooobies!  Sorry, what?

Again, remind me why the runner up in Miss Pretty Spokesperson of the Year Award is still getting her face splashed on television.  Isn’t there a missing girl in Aruba they should be covering?  Doesn’t anyone have new information on John Bennee? 

Here.  Anna Nicole Simpson.  Anna Nicole Simpson.  Anna Nicole Simpson.  You just got another 30k page views.  You’re welcome.

Longtime reader and fan, only just registered,

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

The woman was asked her opinion on live TV and she gave it.

Glad you’re here, moron—we need an expert opinion. What’s the official Xtian fantasist take on posing nude or topless? Is it “immoral” as they claim same-sex marriage is?

If not, there’s an opportunity here: Sunday morning nudie bar services at the mega-church might draw more attendance (and collections!)

You know, I *didn’t* see this coming. Every time I try to give the right wing and their shills the benefit of the doubt they go right ahead and surpass even my generally low expectations.  having said that this whole thing makes me laugh out loud, almost as much as hearing about Larry “wide stance” craig and his various explanations for why he was caught in that restroom.  As for the argument some have advanced that Prejean will be given some kind of latitude by her fundy backers—I think you have to realize that “I was a sinner once” is certainly a very powerful argument with that crew, but you can exhaust it. Frankly, to true blue evangelical fundies her very participation in the pageant was already sin enough. They may have forgiven her enough to allow her to speak at their churches about how she is now standing up for marriage and all that crap. But they were already making an e xception for her. If she can’t control her image sufficiently she will lose them. Controlling her image means, probably, making a public plea for forgivenness for the sexy photos and throwing the blame for her having allowed them to be taken on the evils of modern society *and the pageant/model system* itself. In other words, she’s going to have to go full blonde burka. Making any kind of public argument that this is what “models do” and saying that the release is due to those evil gays isn’t going to cut it (although it was a clever attempt).  If she could have denied the ppictures were of her at all she would have been better off. Second best is arguing that she’s seen the light and will no longer consider herself a “model” at all. Third best and not very good—saying “I had a perfect right to have those pictures taken and sold and I blame the gays for outing me over it.”

aimai

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.

If you publically proclaim one thing is immoral by the dictates of your religion, and then engage in separate behaviour that is also immoral by the dictates of your religion, then you are indeed a hypocrite.

The opinion is “unpalatable” only in that she’s suggesting that the state should impose the dictates of her religion on the rest of us. People who respect the Establishment Clause tend to find that sort of thing distasteful.

Yeah, I can feel your outrage at the president already.

From Obama’s welcoming into events of Donnie “Down-Low” McLurkin to the Purpose-Driven fascist Rick Warren, and due to statements like the one you quote, the owners of this site and most commenters have done nothing except express outrage and attempt to achieve some redress.

You sure you’re on the correct site? Or are you drunk again?

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

The bible clearly instructs women to “dress modestly”:

1 Timothy 2:9: “I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearl or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.”

So, Prejean professes that she’s only following what the Bible (and her parents) taught her to believe when it comes to homosexuality and marriage. However, by virtue of being in the pageant alone she’s not dressing modestly and then add to that posing nude and semi-nude in photographs, which is in violation of her “beliefs”. However, she whines about not being “perfect” and that we shouldn’t judge her on this, and yet she’s judging other people because of what she believes in the bible. That there is a hypocrite.

And no one is saying she’s a bad person for taking the photos, or that she should be embarrassed because she took the photos. She should be embarrassed because she’s a goddamn liar and, say it with me kids, she’s a goddamn hypocrite.

Now I’m confused, are the boobs new or were they bought when she was still in high school? Because they’re clearly there in that photo. And she says the pictures were taken when she was a teenager. That means the shots could be kiddie porn and WAY more controversial than we originally thought.

Gracchus,

Look, I’m in favor of gay marriage and I see where you’re coming from.  I’m not above a certain degree of schadenfreude about conservative sexual hypocrisy.

This blog frequently criticizes serial adulterers and nastily divorced lawmakers for going after gay marriage, and rightly so.  But I think that’s a significantly different case.  First of all, lawmakers are people in positions of power and authority whom we can assume are not subject to undue pressure.  Second, adultery is not just against their code it’s objectively harmful to other people, and while divorce isn’t immoral per se it tends to be evidence of some degree of personal failing, at least the way republican senators do it.

Ms. Prejean, however, is a young woman in no position of authority who is being criticised for things she did *as a teenager*.  Furthermore, she’s being criticised for actions which harm no one.  Nude pics or lingerie shots are just not comparable with adultery, prostitution and harassment perpetrated by people like Foley, Gingrich, and Vitter.  Finally, I don’t take your word for it that it’s against her code.  the bible has *very* specific and strong condemnations of adultery that anyone who professes to be a christian should take seriously.  Lingerie shots?  Not so much—there’s discussion of sexual immorality in general but what that means is up to the congregation to figure out.  She says that her christianity doesn’t rule out lingerie shots and I don’t see why that’s illegitimate.

Finally, I don’t think condemnation of hypocrisy is an ironclad defense, nor that every comment here is sticking to the hypocrisy.  Several commenters have inserted their judgments of her body or their opinions of breast implants in general to the conversation, where it really doesn’t belong.  But beyond that, I’d say that *no* woman, no matter the circumstances, deserves to be criticised for racy pictures she had taken as a teenager.  I’d rather keep working for a world where those pictures don’t matter.

The woman was asked her opinion on live TV and she gave it. It just wasn’t the “correct” thought to have.

That’s right. She’s entitled to her opinion. We are entitled to tell her what a poor opinion it is.

As I said above, free speech does not mean freedom from criticism of your speech. That is the bedrock of liberty.

So, now we have the thought police that has nothing to say other than HATE.

Disagreement does not turn you into the thought police. Powers to torture and imprison people for having the wrong thoughts DOES make a thought police. But we lack those powers here. We merely point and laugh and vulgarly abuse people. That is not the same thing as a thought police.

Next time you whine about ‘intolerance’, you should look in the mirror.

This from the man who yesterday was throwing the word queer around? Calling liberals batshit insane?

We can take that kind of abuse and shrug it off. But apparently neither you nor Miss California can?

You are like many internet denizens it seems. An eggshell armed with a hammer…

Shorter Franklin:

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah

There’s a difference between Ms. Prejean and Ms. Williams.  It was something obvious, but I just can’t put my finger on it!  Something about melons?  Melanoma?  Damn.  That’s gonna bug me all day.

Actually, their melons are quite different.

Heads! I mean their heads!

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

For starters, Ms. Prejean wouldn’t even have a platform if not for her body.  So calling her out on her plastic looks goes to her credibility as a spokeswoman.  If your only speaking credential is, “I look hot in a swimsuit” and its determined that she had someone throw a few hundred grand at her body to improve her appearance, what we’re really talking about is, “I’m rich.  Listen to me.”  At which point… do with that what you want.

Secondly, yeah, her platform revolves around gay bashing on biblical grounds.  And yet she’s clearly running around without a burkah on, forcing good God-fearing men to covet her.  :-p The ridiculousness of it all is that she’s demanding we adhere to her religion’s Puritanical beliefs on same sex marriage, but cut her a pass on her religion’s Puritanical beliefs on nudity.  If she gets to pick and choose her own moral code, why can’t a prudish gay couple S-Chip their TVs while enjoying marital bliss?  This, again, comes back to her being (2nd) Fairest of Them All, which is what gives her statements weight (and TV time) over a generic gay couple not offered an equal platform.  And then we come down to the body bashing, which is really just an attack on her only claim to legitimacy.

Ultimately, however, you’re absolutely right.  Picking at Miss California over boob implants and naked photos is silly because it has nothing to do with the debate at hand.  Of course, the teenager from Malibu (or Orange County or wherever) really doesn’t have the education or expertise to be waxing academic about religion or marriage rights to begin with.  In the end, she shouldn’t be on TV at all.  Her opinions are without value.  And the only reason anyone is giving her attention is to check out her rock’n clevage.

So, the reflexive retort is to fire back, “That clevage ain’t so rock’n” thus delegitimizing her as a spokesperson.  If this sounds banal, superficial, and generally stupid… I’m not going to argue with you.  But that’s life.

Oh, c’mon people, I’m sure somebody in the bible was naked therefore nudity = biblically okay.

amirite?

The internal contradiction of the American beauty pageant has always mystified and fascinated me.  The women are supposed to be wholesome but the swimsuit competition to highlight sex appeal have always been a part of them.  The Miss Universe version, of which Miss USA is a part, has always been sexier than Miss America, the former consistently showing more skin. 

The Miss America pageant always embraced the contradiction and the conservative folks loved it.  The same mentality persists in the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, who have all sorts of restrictions to keep them from being too  sexy. 

The Vanessa Williams scandal smacked the pageant officials right in the face with the contradiction.  They might have been able to let her slide with pics like Prejean’s, a side boob shot in underwear, but Vanessa had her tongue up her modeling partner’s butt.  That was a bit too much for the pageant officials to take, even with only a month left on her reign. 

The Christian conservatives will let her continue because redemption is part of their theme, as long as Prejean is properly remorseful, or can hint that she was taken advantage of (only 17 after all).  Maybe she will see a different light, though, if she wants to join a larger world which will pay her for her physical beauty, if she can learn some talent.  Jessica Alba tossed them aside, as this quote from her at IMDB points out:

“One of the reasons why I chose not to be a devout Christian is because a lot of people gave me a lot of grief for just being a woman and made me feel ashamed for having a body because it tempted men. I didn’t understand what that meant because I was like, “God created this . . .” That was a hard time in my life.”

Alba famously has a no-nudity clause in her contracts (so far) but she shows some awareness of the nature of her industry in this quote I also found on IMDB:

“It’s not always so great to be objectified but I don’t feel I have much of a choice right now. I’m young in my career. I know I have to strike when the iron is hot. I look forward to the day when I can do a small movie and act and it’s not about me wearing a bathing suit or chaps.”

Its important to remind Raines and other Prejean “defenders” that it is a blatant falsehood to say that she “lost” the title *because of what she said/thought*. There is zero evidence that her comments about gay marriage had anything to do with her not winning the title. If you have a complaint about her title status you might want to bring it up with the judges and ask them whether they flunked her on her presentation, or her looks, or her swimsuit. There were lots of portions of the contest, after all.  But in addition none of her commenters here, who oppose her stupid personal opinion on the private lives of others, have called for her to be penalized in any way for her comments. We didn’t, and don’t, support her “losing” the contest she entered, or oppose her making money selling her body, or even oppose her making money selling her image for christ and mammon as a spokesperson for NOM. We’re *just making fun of it* and her, and her opinions, because they are as blatantly moronic and ill informed as those held by beauty queens who aspire only to be models tend to be.  Here’s something else I’d make fun of—if she had gotten up and told us she was a flat earther during the science portion of the contest and then gone to work for the flat earth society.

aimai

“Sunday morning nudie bar services at the mega-church”

I am SO there. They will be worshipping Satan, right?

Oh, c’mon people, I’m sure somebody in the bible was naked therefore nudity = biblically okay.

Well, Noah got butt naked but then his son Ham saw him and got all cursed. So, being naked (if you’re a guy) maybe not but seeing someone naked may be where the sinnin lies?

Ms. Prejean, however, is a young woman in no position of authority who is being criticised for things she did *as a teenager*.

No, she’s a young woman who’s been placed in a position of authority by NOM, a lobbying organisation. Granted, she did nothing to really earn it, but she accepted the position as the org’s public face.

And the things she did as a 17-year-old? Not a big deal from my point of view, but where were the Christian “family values” she likes to go on about when she discusses her upbringing?

Furthermore, she’s being criticised for actions which harm no one.

Again, just as she and her organisation criticise others for actions which harm no one. Sauce for the goose and all that…

Nude pics or lingerie shots are just not comparable with adultery, prostitution and harassment perpetrated by people like Foley, Gingrich, and Vitter.

According to mainstream evangelical Xtianity, participating in pornography is a sign of wanton depravity unbecoming of a good Xtian woman.

Finally, I don’t take your word for it that it’s against her code.

Well, then, it looks like her church will also be taking donations inside thong straps from now on.

Finally, I don’t think condemnation of hypocrisy is an ironclad defense, nor that every comment here is sticking to the hypocrisy.

My condemnation of her hypocrisy is indeed ironclad. If she hadn’t taken a stand against the harmless behaviour of others, she wouldn’t have to be defending her own harmless (by our standards, though illegal by civil standards) behaviour.

I’d rather keep working for a world where those pictures don’t matter.

So would I. However, she and her fellow Xtian fantasists are working assiduously against such a world.

Ismone;

And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard:
And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent.
And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without.
And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father’s nakedness.
And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.
And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.

Biblically, Carrie Prejean’s children should be sentenced to slavery for her nudity.

I am SO there. They will be worshipping Satan, right?

The muscular blonde, blue-eyed gun-totin’ Jeebus. So yeah, same diff.

but Vanessa had her tongue up her modeling partner’s butt.  That was a bit too much for the pageant officials to take, even with only a month left on her reign.

MiddleagedLiberal,

Did she really? I was young when her scandal broke but my grandmother, who was curious to see what all the fuss was about, had my mother buy the penthouse and they looked at the photos. I only saw a few but I remember my grandmother, of all people, remarking that they weren’t that bad, they were more “artsy” than graphic and I just remember a shot of Williams back to back with her partner. Were the photos that explicit?

No, Miss California is no slut. However, she sends out a mixed message: nudie pics are okay, at least if you repent it; bigotry against gays is fine; and as a Christian she can be as selective with her interpretation of the Bible as she (or her pastor) wishes.

I think she’s fair game to point at and laugh. She seems to be sufficiently hypocritical to be called out on it. We can be rude about her ugly views.

Her whingeing about this situation boils down to the same ignorant one our trolls regularly make: “The First Amendment lets me say whatever I want to—how dare you use your Freedom of Speech to call BS on it?”

Furthermore, she’s being criticised for actions which harm no one.Again, just as she and her organisation criticise others for actions which harm no one. Sauce for the goose and all that…

Being denied equal protection under the law—to wit, the rights and benefits conferred by the state on married persons—I contend, does real harm, and is the stated purpose of NOM and its cohorts.  I have yet to hear even a coherent argument that granting equal protection under the law to all citizens (and to foreign-born partners of citizens) harms anyone.  It is a false moral equivalence to suggest otherwise.

“The woman was asked her opinion on live TV and she gave it. It just wasn’t the “correct” thought to have. So, now we have the thought police that has nothing to say other than HATE.”

Apparently, and unsurprisingly, Franklin is yet another Reichwinger who is incapable of understanding the 1st Amendment.

Let’s look at the text, shall we?

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

...so where exactly does it say that once an opinion is rendered it is immune from another opinion being rendered against it?

And since when is Pam Spaulding a member of Congress who has a law controlling hate speech named after her?

The 1st Amendment is about controlling The Government, to keep The Government from stopping you from expressing your thoughts, you idiot. 

The Thought Police from 1984 were an explicit arm of the government of Oceania, charged with detecting and eliminating not just the expression of “subversive” thoughts, but suppressing the actual “subversive” thoughts altogether.

In that regard, it should and could be argued that the handling of protesters at the 2008 Republican National Convention was a direct violation of the 1st Amendment.  But there were no wingnut blowhards on the tube decrying the unfair treatment Americans were receiving there.

Ms. Prejean, as you said, was asked her opinion and she gave it.  We’re entitled not only to mock an opinion of hers we consider ignorant and hateful, but also to point out her obvious hypocrisy when it’s shown she’s nothing like the sweet, innocent, Christian girl she claims to be in defense of her remarks.  Not only that, but in light of the fact she’s being willingly used as a tool by the Religious Reich / AmTaliban to promote their agenda of hate, she’s earned even a larger share of our scorn.

Amanda/Pam/Jesse/Aguste have so far been very tolerant of your ignorant droolings, and for that you should be grateful, not throwing a tantrum because Pam criticized your fantasy girl…

“Were the photos that explicit?
UltraMagnus”

They were black and white, a sure sign of being artistic.  Actually, they really weren’t all that explicit, since no crotch shots were visible.  I rather liked them.  They did include women being sexual with each other, though.  In ten minutes of googling I found a few of them, one with the unidentified model kneeling on a simple wooden chair and Williams kneeling on the floor leaning forward with her lips getting ready to kiss the model’s pubis.  The one I recalled had Williams behind with her tongue reaching up into the other model’s ass.  A few shots was clearly sexual and clearly lesbian, which probably freaked out the pageant officials even more.  This was 1984, after all.

Oh, c’mon people, I’m sure somebody in the bible was naked therefore nudity = biblically okay.

The crucifix sure seems to show about as much nipple as anything Prejean has to offer…

Last I checked, lying is double plus ungood in Christian theory at least.  High school?  Unless she had implants in high school and had them removed later, these photos are recent.

I have no problem with the nudity here - but the woman is a rank hypocrite if she thinks that her religious values should dictate the laws that govern others, but not apply to her.

Fighting homophobia with misogyny is like fighting fire with gasoline. You know, stupid.

You want to get on her for hypocrisy, find a hidden love affair with another woman; that would actually be hypocritical.  Right now, insulting her tits makes it sound like your issue is, “ha ha, she hates gays, but she was a woman the whole time!” Pam, you are a smart person but this line of attack brings along all the guys who like to titter about hate-f*cking Michelle Malking and Ann Coulter. People who want a progressive excuse to publicly revel in misogyny should not be encouraged to find one. People who are really, really glad to find that a dumb pretty woman is a bigot because it lets them feel good about contemplating her sexual humiliation are not good people, and are not liberals.

In any event, focusing on “hypocrisy” with regard to homophobia is stupid to begin with, of course, because it reinforces the presumption that homosexuality is a failing, a minor sin, a way in which gays are “only human” like the rest of us cheaters and gamblers—it’s a bad tactic. 

Hypocrisy is a distraction. Bigotry is the issue.

Uhm, considering the Vanessa Williams hullabaloo, how dumb are you to run for a pageant with that floating around in your past? Even if you’ve repented and are now trying to proselytize to other women in the naked industry, that is a kind of glaring problem. I get concerned about a situation like this (ie, ex-boyfriend may still have less than modest photos on a hard drive somewhere, since I’m not a teenager anymore and have concerns about professionalism, etc, but it is much less likely for me since you know, I’m not in the public eye A LOT and there was that past scandal and all…

Anyway, yeah, I’m getting to the point of ignore her and maybe she’ll go away.

Pam seems to be the thought police now.

The woman was asked her opinion on live TV and she gave it. It just wasn’t the “correct” thought to have. So, now we have the thought police that has nothing to say other than HATE.

Next time you whine about ‘intolerance’, you should look in the mirror.

Franklin Raines on 05/05 at 02:07 PM

Oh, oh, Irony of the Wing-nut thought police!  When speaking out against bigotry is bigotry! 

Look troll-boy, nobody said she couldn’t say it…  Only what she said was hateful, stupid and hypocritical for a vast array of reasons; plus she has no business claiming to be a victim when she’s a spoiled, pampered snot.

She’s a model? I thought she was a college student who spent her spare time ministering to the fallen in the porn industry.

Maybe this is her fallback for when the NOM gig goes sour.

Longtime reader and fan, only just registered,

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

Boolean on 05/05 at 02:12 PM

Let me explain…  No, let me sum up:  When you live in glass houses, don’t throw rocks.  Miss Hypocrite took the offensive and became part of a group who pass their bigoted judgement on others through various means, one of which is the “more moral” high-ground which includes many high-ground issues about personal conduct.

If you violate your own “moral high-ground,” in multiple ways, do not expect a free pass fro what you do, or have done…  Those whom you would victimize have every right to show the world what a hypocritical, self-righteous ass-clown you are…

Shorter version:  If you can’t be consistent with the requirements of your morality, STFU about mine.

Tenya, what’s so dumb about it? Being a pageant queen requires making a calculated decision that a certain amount of money and exposure is worth the sacrifice of your human dignity and whatever feminist ideals you might theoretically have held. Naked pictures coming to light isn’t a horrifying punishment in that respect, it’s just more of the same. It’s an unpleasant price to pay for a reward that really doesn’t appeal to me, but hey, different people have different priorities. I could easily see tolerating a different kind of sexist humiliation for a different set of career rewards; people do stuff like that every day. Compromises, patriarchy, blah blah etc.

Why is it so hard for Franklin to get it through his thick skull that nobody worships Obama?  I’m betting that it’s either brain injury, or he’s just barely old enough to type.  Any other ideas?

Anyway, the reason that some types of biblical immorality are bad and others are just fine and dandy* is that breast implants and those photos directly benefit conservative men, whereas obsessing about buttsecks makes them feel icky.

Someone should send this woman that bible verse about getting the plank out of your own eye before you worry about the mote in someone else’s eye. 

*I think that anything done by consenting adults is fine and dandy.  I just don’t like hypocrisy.

...which is not to say that choosing to be undignified is morally equivalent to someone else forcibly humiliating you. As I hope is obvious. But running the risk that someone may humiliate you can be a considered, intelligent decision, even though that act of humiliation is still unacceptable. Just in case there seemed to be any inconsistency between my posts.

They were black and white, a sure sign of being artistic. 

Yup, yup, nothing says “classy” like black and white;) (though, being an amateur photographer there is something in the lighting of black and white photos).

You want to get on her for hypocrisy, find a hidden love affair with another woman; that would actually be hypocritical.

Once more with feeling: She’s using the bible to dictate certain behaviors when she herself is indulging in behaviors the bible says she shouldn’t do, that is HYPOCRISY. 

am, you are a smart person but this line of attack brings along all the guys who like to titter about hate-f*cking Michelle Malking and Ann Coulter.

As far as I’ve read she’s been attacked for being a liar and a hypocrite, not for being sexual and as far as I’ve read no one’s said anything about the look, shape or desirability of her body/breasts.

In any event, focusing on “hypocrisy” with regard to homophobia is stupid to begin with, of course, because it reinforces the presumption that homosexuality is a failing, a minor sin, a way in which gays are “only human” like the rest of us cheaters and gamblers—it’s a bad tactic.

No, it’s not because it shows the regular people that, whether or not they believe homosexuality is a sin, the bible says a lot of shit that NO ONE FUCKING FOLLOWS ANYMORE. So, by pointing to the people who scream and yell that the “bible says this” when they themselves aren’t following what their own bible says, it shows them to dishonest and the more we do it the more they loose credibility in their “bible” arguments. To anyone who tells me homosexuality is a sin because of Leviticus I tell them I’ll take their beliefs seriously when they’re picketing a Red Lobster.

Prejean is basing her beliefs on “how she was raised” which already is highly subjective and the bible which tells her that marriage should be between a man and a woman. Well, the bible also says women should dress “modestly” which, by being in the pageant to begin with is a violation of that passage and then she’s got nude photos which should further violate her “beliefs” if she had any true conviction. But she doesn’t, she has “rules for thee and not for me” and that is what makes her a fucking hypocrite.

If the bible can be cherry picked so easily it has no place being used in a debate let alone an example for government policy.

Sorry, that first quote is from MiddleAgedLiberal.

Yeah, I can feel your outrage at the president already.

Franklin Raines on 05/05 at 02:15 PM

First of all, I’m not an Obama fan.  I only voted for him because there was no sane alternative left in the General Election after the Green Party gave me a clown.  Second, I think he fails in many areas:

Church State Separation
Supports the Death Penalty.
Sold out on FISA
Screw Gay Marriage

And I could go on for quite a bit longer over things like breaking his anti-war promises, supporting Bush legal opinions, telecom immunity, his crappy health-care reform policies (at least through the election).  Seriously, he’s just not my cup of tea.  I spend a lot of time criticising him.

But he’s so much better than anyone else who ran in the General, or is available at any level from the Republicans, my irritation is tempered with the joy some idiot wing-nut beloved ass-clown isn’t President.  For all his many flaws, Obama is better than all the Republicans put together.

UltraMagnus, let me try again in a different way. Talking about hypocrisy instead of bigotry is stupid for two more reasons than the ones I already mentioned. First, because it makes this about personalities, not issues. If homophobes had two brain cells to rub together, they would be shouting about how Perez Hilton, who got this all started, is an airheaded misogynist (this is true, by the way) and how dare he criticize someone for hating gays when he hates women and writes about it all day long on his internets. What a hypocrite that guy is!

I pause to reiterate that the above is all true, just as it is true that whatshername posed naked or whatever.

But you see why that would be a terrible argument, even if an attention-getter, just like the implant story is an attention-getter. It’s a bad argument because homophobia isn’t wrong because Perez Hilton is a nice person or a non-sexist or a non-hypocrite, none of which he is. It’s wrong, period. Making arguments that can be justly flipped around on you that easily is not smart.

Secondly, with respect, I don’t think you understand how this woman’s brand of Christianity works, and when people who don’t get crazy evangelicalism try to call out internal hypocrisy, it falls flat and they look like buffoons. This kind of Christian puts great store in grace and God forgiving whom he pleases and nobody knowing what goes on in your heart of hearts. Her co-religionists would say to you that you have no way of knowing whether she’s a hypocrite because you can’t see into her heart. And when you start arguing with that, you are well into the crazy zone. Her religion has nothing to do with literal readings of Leviticus or anything like that, nothing. If you don’t get that, you can’t fight it on its own terms and come out of it looking clever, and frankly, you shouldn’t, because its own terms are stupid.

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

An interesting point.  I feel, when someone starts preaching against civil rights for others on the grounds of family, or, tradional values, then posing nude for a bunch of old men to jerk off on, does speak to hypocrisy.  It’s valid, to an extent.

Her breasts not being real are not an issue for me, and I thought that when Olbermann, who I have to first say I totally love, went on and on about them…it bordered on slut-shaming. 

It really depends.

Secondly, with respect, I don’t think you understand how this woman’s brand of Christianity works, and when people who don’t get crazy evangelicalism try to call out internal hypocrisy, it falls flat and they look like buffoons.

But I DO know about this woman’s brand of evangelical christianity, sophonisba, I grew up in Southeast Missouri, where we had four churches surrounding our high school, and monthly “prayer” meetings for students on campus grounds. It was the fucking belt buckle of the “bible belt”. I grew up with these people so I know their hypocrisy in and out and I’ve found the best way to shut them up is to point out biblical fallacy and their ignorance of their own faith.

I know they pick and choose what they want to believe and it can be effective for OTHER PEOPLE, who aren’t crazy religious zealots, to see how fucking insane and contradictory their actions/beliefs are. I know there’s no amount of logic or reason that will ever convince an evangelical they’re a hypocritical asshole but it’s good to show moderates exactly what kind of assholes they are.

there’s a reason we’re chasing down her for showing titty and not fat white preacher-dudes for eating shrimp.

Yes, there is purplesoes, she said something stupid against civil rights and based it on her “beliefs” in the bible, which is where she apparently gets her morality and then it turns out she’s a fucking hypocrite who’s not following all the rules of the book where she supposedly gets her “morality” and now the extent of her hypocrisy is coming to light and Pam’s discussing it and pointing it out. I don’t know how often you read Pandagon but Pam, along with Amanda and Jesse are constantly calling out fat white preacher dudes (and in Pam’s case, black preacher dudes) for their bullshit and hypocrisy so no, I’m not seeing this as a case of sexism.

I complain about homophobes eating shrimp constantly!  I bring it up with every homophobe I meet.  I don’t care that she has implants or that she had nude photos taken.  Who hasn’t had nude photos taken of them?  It can be quite fun among consenting adults.  The problem is her hypocrisy.  She’s basically saying that it’s OK for her to ignore some parts of the Bible, but it’s not OK for others to do that.  I don’t think anyone here has said she’s a bad person for doing those things.  What’s bad is that that she’s a hypocrite.  If you see this as slut-shaming, then you are missing the point.  No one should preach about morals that they don’t personally feel the need to follow.

I just don’t see how it’s hypocritical to be in favor of soft porn and opposed to gay marriage.  The two issues really don’t have more than a tangential connection.

I think it’s a wrong-headed and bigoted set of values to have, *because opposing gay marriage is wrong*.  Being pro-soft porn is completely beside the point.

The bible really has very little to say about soft porn and what it would does say is not always clear or consistent.  This is of course true of homosexuality as well.  My point is: there’s no reason to say that a christian qua christian *must* oppose soft porn, and in fact I would tend to think it would be a good thing if christians would give up on the modesty thing.  That’s completely different from a biblical prohibition on divorce which is much more biblically grounded and has legitimate reasons.  (Not that I’m opposed to divorce, I think divorce on demand is one of the most important social advances etc. etc. but there are legitimately negative aspects to divorce more than to lingerie IMHO)

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.

Oh, she can do whatever she wants with her body - in the privacy of her own home. I’m tolerant like that. I just don’t think she should flaunt her toplessness in public, or try to claim special rights to protect her topless lifestyle, or think that she has a full and free right to enter into any social covenant that anyone else in society can.

(I trust my snarky point has made itself clear.)

Actually I think it she should be shamed… for bowing to pressure and letting someone buy boobies for her.  I don’t think we should pat her on the head for it or give it a free pass.  It’s a bad, bad, thing for a “role model” for young girls to do.  It would be different if she did it for herself (and I know many people who get it done for their self esteem or because of breast cancer) , but she did it to win a stupid contest.  I’m not going to treat her boobies as a “omg we can’t talk about boobies” kind of thing because 1) no one says they are making her slutty and 2) someone has to point out it’s stupid to go through major surgery to fix something that was perfectly fine to win a stupid contest.

I’ve found the best way to shut them up is to point out biblical fallacy and their ignorance of their own faith.

With public figures, really? I mean I too enjoy arguing the random person to a standstill face to face, and I grant you that it is both easy and fun, but I have not seen it work in this kind of situation.

But the problem is, supposing she shuts up and goes away, how will you know that she was humiliated into a laughingstock because she’s a hypocrite, rather than because she’s a slutty slut with fake tits? What, really, is the likelihood of that actually being the reason? I think it is very low.

I just don’t see how it’s hypocritical to be in favor of soft porn and opposed to gay marriage.  The two issues really don’t have more than a tangential connection.

Try looking at it not from your viewpoint or from mine, but in the context of the typical Xtian evangelical family values which Prejean claims for herself and which she’s supposed promotes as a spokesperson for NOM.

Question 1: do they approve of gay marriage in their public rhetoric?

Question 2: do they approve of young Christian women posing topless in their public rhetoric?

If the answer to both questions is “no,” then she’s a hypocrite.

The bible really has very little to say about soft porn and what it would does say is not always clear or consistent. This is of course true of homosexuality as well.

Which is why it’s beside the point in this discussion of Prejean’s hypocrisy. What matters is whether the Xtian family values that Prejean espouses interprets the Bible, to which I’d refer you to the question above.

My point is: there’s no reason to say that a christian qua christian *must* oppose soft porn

Again, no-one is claiming that. We’re claiming that the Xtian “family values” that Prejean and NOM publically espouse and represent oppose pornography. I’ve bolded that bit so it’s crystal clear.

Am I crazy, or is the issue of context really that difficult to grasp?

someone has to point out it’s stupid to go through major surgery to fix something that was perfectly fine to win a stupid contest.

But it isn’t! It isn’t stupid otherwise than as the contest is itself stupid. Boob jobs win pageants. Criticize the disease, not the symptom, or you’re just telling girls sure, the patriarchy game is rigged, but the important part is not fixing it—the important part is making sure you lose.

Sure I would like a world in which nobody got boob jobs, but it is infinitely more important to work on a world where nobody is rewarded for getting them. And to get there, you have to go after the people with power who hold the rewards.

The well deserved destruction of the Right continues.  No sooner do they pick a spokesperson than she turns out to be less pure than Polyanna.  Giggle, chortle.  This proves there’s a God and he’s pissed at them taking his name in vain all these years.

RickMassimo, do you know how many people in the right wing absolutely believe that it’s fair game to punish her if she flaunts her bare body in public? Most of them, really. Oh dear, we’re arguing for them now.

(It looks like RickMassimo’s snarky point did not make itself clear.)

Purple, try replacing “topless” with “homosexual” in his post and you’ll get it.

Gracchus, arguing that they shouldn’t attack and shame Group A because it’s just like shaming and attacking Group B when it’s well-documented that they enjoy shaming and attacking Group B just isn’t that clever.

It’s well-documented that they enjoy shaming and attacking both groups. There’s equally ample documentation that they regularly engage in hypocrisy, to which Prejean has added another high-profile example. This is the point of the original post, and RickMassimo’s point as well.

(try replacing either A or B with “queer people” or “women” and you’ll get it)

Really, purple? That’s the kind of move I’d expect from Frankie, but not you.

Let me take one last crack at it and then let it go.

Pretty much the only time, actually, that I hear or think about beauty pageants is when a beauty queen is being shamed for these pictures.  It seems to happen to all of them (of course, selection bias—those are the only ones I hear about).  Anyway, I don’t have anything invested in pageants or pageant culture in general.  But I think it’s an injustice and a travesty and feel that our role in this kind of media event should be as defenders against the slut-shaming. 

I’m going to be opposed to making a big deal of beauty queen’s nudie pics, and I’m going to be opposed every time, every girl, regardless of my opinion of her as a person or any other political disagreements we might have.

I have no interest in informing evangelicals that they’ll just have to crack down harder on women who have breasts in order for them to get away with homophobia, because there are a terrifyingly large number of evangelicals (Quiverfull, anyone?) who will consider that a handy bonus incentive to crack down on ladies with breasts.

But that’s the thing now isn’t it, they don’t need the excuse. And, if a woman who believes in the bible wants to cover up and have as many babies as her god (uterus) will allow, then more power to her and there’s nothing you can do or say about it because that’s her right. It’s once she and/or her husband start telling ME (or you) how to live, based on their beliefs is when we’ve got a problem. And, if they’re trying to use their bible to justify how I should live, then unless they’re following the bible to the letter, I’m gonna call them on it (and yes, I know that this is near impossible in this day and age which only comes to my point that the Bible is outdated).

With public figures, really? I mean I too enjoy arguing the random person to a standstill face to face, and I grant you that it is both easy and fun, but I have not seen it work in this kind of situation.

Once again, I’m saying that this is for OTHER PEOPLE, for moderates or for other, more tolerant christians to see the rank hypocrisy of these people and for the fuckers to be raked over the coals in public, especially for younger people who are turning out to be more progressive. The more we call bullshit and they see it, then the less traction the evengelicals have in public discourse and policy, because, let’s face it, they’re either using the bible or outright lies to try and dictate the law of the land and it needs to stop. We differ on this but I am of the opinion that publicly calling them out on it takes their power away. Of course, THEY won’t change, they’ve got too much riding on it, but other hearts and minds may be.

As it so happens, there was a study done where evangelicals found out they were losing young people.  Why? Because young people considered their brand of christianity as “judmental and anti-gay”. I’d like to think that’s because people are finally publicly calling these assholes out on their bullshit, much like Pam is doing. It won’t change their minds but it seems to be reaching rational minds and in the end will make them look like the crazy nut jobs they are and eventually we won’t ever discuss anyone like Prejean again because her attitudes/comments will just be outright dismissed. I look forward to that day.

Oh, I hate that hate-fucking ann coulter or michelle malkin crap.  There used to be this website “I fucked ann coulter in the ass, hard”.  I personally felt fucking assaulted by that shit, and it is just an excuse for “liberal” men to engage in public masturbation over violent and degrading sex. 

But I don’t believe that this is comparable to that.  Her breasts being fake should not be an issue, or even talked about in my opinion.  I completely disagree with the post saying that she should be shamed for having implants.  I don’t like that.

But, after reading all of the pros and cons here, most of which were really thought-provoking, I still come down on the side of; shut your damn mouth about morality if you are parading your naked ass around.

Oh wait - due to my recent discovery of Naomi wolf having gone off the deep end and freaking out over anal sex, I want to stipulate that I have nothing against it, and do not believe it is degrading or violent, inherently.

However….the site “I fucked ann coulter in the ass, hard” was both those things, and meant to be.

Let me take one last crack at it and then let it go.

Sure, if you wanna take “one last crack” at a totally different subject than Prejean’s hypocrisy.

I’m going to be opposed to making a big deal of beauty queen’s nudie pics, and I’m going to be opposed every time, every girl, regardless of my opinion of her as a person or any other political disagreements we might have.

I’d generally agree, except in cases where the nudie pics provide a clear indication of hypocrisy (regardless of political disagreements).

But I’m sure Ms. Prejean and her organisation appreciate your concern.

People can be members of one group of people (let’s say straight ladies) that are oppressed and still go on to oppress other groups of people (let’s say gay people). Tactics for dealing with homophobic women can still be sexist and stupid and perpetuate the oppression of women. And of course, just because a homophobic person is a woman doesn’t make them any less wrong than a homophobic man.

I agree with everything you have said. I don’t see how it invalidates what I said in any way.

I agree with everything you have said. I don’t see how it invalidates what I said in any way.

That’s because it doesn’t. She simply misread your earlier post—no big deal.

But I’m sure Ms. Prejean and her organisation appreciate your concern.

No. No, they don’t. But I do.

Do you really not understand that the women who are fighting this futile comment battle are fighting first for feminism and secondly for ourselves?  I have to suspect that you do understand that.

On a related note—Ultramagnus:

for other, more tolerant christians to see the rank hypocrisy of these people

you are sure that these moderates and tolerant people will see only the contradictions that you tell them to see, that they will not, instead or in addition, see the rank hypocrisy of a bunch of progressives using the easy club of societal misogyny when it suits their purposes and appears to (but doesn’t actually) bolster another of their causes. I do not share your faith.

Ultramagnus, I am tempted to derail this and suggest that you spend some time reading accounts by Quiverfull survivors and contemplate how it’s bad to go to or push people to extremes. But instead I’m going to try to resort to discussing one kind of intersection of oppression in tiny tiny words

purpleshoes, don’t ever assume you are smarter or more versed in something than anyone else. I’m well aware of what life can be like for these women especially women like Andrea Yates.

However, and I’ll just come out as an asshole, people have the right to live as they see fit, complete with beliefs that I don’t agree with. I wish it were easy for women to get out of certain lifestyles (FDLS polygamy being one of them) and we should work towards helping them and give them the support they need. But, in cases like Michelle Duggar, there are women who CHOOSE to live this lifestyle as it fits their beliefs. If so, bully for her, she wants as many babies as “god” gives her and she and her husband follow a sect of christianity that believes women should’nt be educated and their highest calling is motherhood. I hope that if there are any of their daughters who aspire to more then there is some support system for them. But if their daughters believe and follow that path, I’m not going to criticize them personally, (though I don’t see anything wrong with discussing and debating WHY someone holds or follows this belief and why we still have it today). Like it or not, you can’t force these people to live how you think they should live, some of them honestly want to live like this. The only thing you can do if offer support and aid to women who manage to escape.

There are plenty of black people, religious black people, who have been persecuted and discriminated against. When they turn around and do it to gays and lesbians I offer them no sympathy, these black people are still hypocrites and assholes and I’ll call them that till the cows come home (and I bring this up because I am a black woman). Just because someone has hurt you doesn’t mean it’s right to turn around and do it to someone else, though I know that’s been the repeating mantra of human history. Still doesn’t make it right. Amanda herself has shown plenty of examples of self hating women who’ve probably been discriminated against and yet when they in turn try to shit on other women they’re still called out for it.

My parents had every right to try and instill their beliefs in me, some of them took, some of them didn’t. But I can’t make my personal beliefs public policy or use them to take away the rights of others. I force the Duggars or anyone like them on birth control, no more so than they should have the right to take mine away. And it’s only when they start trying to curb my civil rights, and use the Bible to do it, do we have a problem. And that’s still what this issue is about.

Prejean doesn’t believe that millions of gay Americans deserve the same rights she has. She believes this because the “bible” told her so. The bible has told her lot, and I’m sure she’d have serious issues with her daddy selling her into slavery. There is a passage in the bible dealing with women and modesty in their dress and how they present themselves. If Prejean wants to use the bible to discriminate against the gay community we have every right to point out that she’s not following her own code.

Do you really not understand that the women who are fighting this futile comment battle are fighting first for feminism and secondly for ourselves?  I have to suspect that you do understand that.

I do, but we’re fighting different battles—mine is simply calling BS on a specific public figure’s anti-feminist (admittedly more repressed than oppressed) and anti-gay hypocrisy (in the context of her own professed values). But then, I’m neither a woman nor am I gay, so it’s understandable that I’d take a more identity-neutral view in this matter.

</blockquote>If Prejean wants to use the bible to discriminate against the gay community we have every right to point out that she’s not following her own code. </blockquote>

Nice and pithy. I emphasise the key part, since people keep missing it. No-one here (except perhaps for Frankie) shares Prejean’s anti-feminist Xtian family values.

I like the way John Aravosis puts it at Americablog:

“Why does it matter? Because holier-than-thou religious fundamentalist Bible-thumpers don’t get to flash their breasts for profit and shrug it off as just another youthful indiscretion. You don’t get to lecture me about my morality when your morality is the equivalent of a Playboy centerfold.”

http://www.americablog.com/2009/05/christian-right-spokeswoman-miss.html

you are sure that these moderates and tolerant people will see only the contradictions that you tell them to see, that they will not, instead or in addition, see the rank hypocrisy of a bunch of progressives using the easy club of societal misogyny

If they do, great. And, as the study I cited earlier points out, it does seem that some of this is reaching younger people. And, as for the sexism, I’m just going to echo Gracchus’s sentiments above mine and probably call it a day because it doesn’t seem that you’re listening to what any of us are saying.

This has NOTHING to do with shaming Prejean for doing the photos, NOTHING. Pam doesn’t shame her and, once again, as far as I’ve read none of us have shamed her either. What the problem is is that she was using the bible as some kind of moral litmus test for “standing up” against teh gays meanwhile she’s not practicing what she preaches and, if we’re supposed to live and let live with her, then why can’t she do the same for the gay community? The bible has dictates for women’s behavior, it does, whether or not any of us agree with them. The bible also has dictates against homosexuality. If she’s going to use one then she damn well better adhere to the other.

She’s using the bible to try and legitimize her bigotry and discrimination while she’s making exceptions for herself. If she’d left it at, “My parents taught me that was wrong and I don’t believe in it,” and her parents taught her that nudity in public was a-okay none of us would have a leg to stand on. That’s not the case. She used her upbringing as it pertains to THE BIBLE. That’s what we’re trying to discuss and that’s where the hypocrisy comes in.

No one is saying she’s a horrible person for posing. We’re saying she’s a hypocrite.

I can’t see how Ms. Prejean’s body or what she does with it become fair game for criticism just because she has unpalatable opinions.  I don’t see how any of this makes her a hypocrite, and I don’t see how dogpiling on her breast implants is anything better than slut-shaming.

Well, I’ll weigh in with Boolean to some extent (once I get that image of dogpiling on breast implants out of the way).  There’s the issue of the boob job and the issue of the nude pictures, and only the latter seems worth criticising as hypocrisy.  The worst that can be said about the boob job is “tacky”, and I think all of us better be careful about throwing *that* around (*).

Can we try to ensure we’re only talking about the pictures (to which, I might add, the “young and stupid” defence carries a lot of weight in my opinion)?

(*) He says, thinking about the lime green sweatsuit pants hidden in his closet…

Piator, the people pointing out the boob job as hypocrisy may be coming from the evangelical childhood that boob jobs are a sin, if not of vanity then of elective scarring, something akin to tattoos.

I don’t remember anyone specifically saying that in MY church, but it wouldn’t surprise me. We though toe rings were sinful, for god’s sake.

john aravosis seems to be taking the “you can’t tell me what’s moral when you’re a dirty dirty slut” route.

Was he? Skimming it again I can see how his words might be taken like that, but when I first read it, it seemed to me that he was suggesting you don’t get to moralize about my views when you have done something that clearly fails to meet the moral standards of your own constituency.

I don’t think her nudie pictures are a big deal to us evul librals.  There is definitely a bit of slut shaming going on both sides, but it IS a valid argument to point out her hypocrisy.

The only reason for denying some people their rights is religious.  There is no legitimate, secular reason for forbidding GLBTQI people from marrying.  None.  NONE.

There are religious objections, but again, the First Amendment protects them from having to perform marriages for anyone who doesn’t hop through the hoops they demand of their flocks.  Their religious objections are simply not good enough to deny human rights.

Didn’t work for miscegenation, not gonna work for gay marriage.

But since the only argument against some people marrying is a religious one, they need to argue from their text, the Bible.  Ms. Prejean does.

But she also violates the same text that she’s arguing from.  Some sins are BAD, and others are forgivable.  What’s the difference? LGBTQI people are subhumans deserving scorn.  Naked blonds are fun to look at!  But we must shame them for their sluttiness!  But we’ll keep these pictures for you.

Pointing out that even her lame religious ‘defense’ against gays is hypocritical is a valid stance.  The Bible shouldn’t be used as a sole basis of civil law—especially since not even members of the same faith interpret it the same way.

Again, I think it’s funny that she claims she lost the pageant b/c of her opinions,  b/c even if she’d won, she’d be giving that crown back about now—and because of the same people who prop her up now.  The Fundies who are using her as their spokesperson would have ripped her to shreds had she won and these pictures shown up.

As long as Ms. Prejean sets herself up as a martyr for her beliefs, and she most certainly is claiming that she’s been oppressed for being a Christian, then pointing out her hypocrisy in following that faith is perfectly valid.

Her bigotry is supported by her religion, which she only follows when it’s convenient.  That’s relevant.

————-
Olbermann is an ass.  As much as I enjoy his attacks on W’s crimes, I don’t watch him b/c he’s a jerk about women far too often.

I have to wonder if the whole “pictures taken when she was 17” even though she has boobjob boobs in them is an attempt to force them out of the public arena under the presumption that they are underage pron??

I call her a hypocrite because lying about the provenance of those pictures is a sin you know.

UltraM, don’t waste breath arguing with that troll sophonisba.  He or she doesn’t read very carefully, takes obvious snark out of context, drops in to tell us we are all going to progressive hell for our imperfections that he or she lacks, and then disappears.  Trust me.

purple shoes and sophonisba, I wish I could add additional supportive comments in this discussion.  I’ve seen it all too often when people make discriminatory comments and others rightfully call them on it.  They’re too emotionally invested in what they’ve already said to look at the situation rationally.  Intelligent people understand your points and are already ignoring the nit-picking temper tantrums of your opponents.

Let them dig the holes deeper, you’ve said your part.

Ursula, the problem is that the two of them have so far equated “mentioning implants as a way to date photos” with “slut shaming” and made several other big fucking errors of comprehension so they can shoehorn the entire discussion into their own twisted framing of what we all us imperfect and sexist racist etc. progressives who just don’t get IT must “really must be saying” - even when there is NO EVIDENCE that ANYBODY said ANYTHING of the sort in proper context.  This is par for the course for Sophistnibblet, and purpleshoes got sucked right into it.  The only person repeatedly talking about “progressive men wanting to rape michelle malkin” on this thread or on this site is THEM.

I personally don’t give a shit what she does with her body - what I call out as hypocrisy is her ferverent attempt to make her religion into law and then crying and whining that questioning her choices is so unfair when she is called out on it in the context of a flagrant violation of her own religion’s dictates.

Hey, the fucking bigoted bitch is a hypocrite two times over, she’s violated her contract as Miss California both in the bare titty department and because she’s become a full-time paid fundy hack on their dollar:

“The directors of the Miss California USA pageant are looking into whether title holder Carrie Prejean violated her contract by working with a national group opposed to gay marriage and by posing semi-nude when she was a teenage model….

The detailed document prohibits the titular Miss California from making personal appearances, giving interviews or making commercials without permission from pageant officials. In the last 10 days, Prejean has made televised appearances at her San Diego church and on behalf of the National Organization for Marriage, a group opposed to same-sex marriage.

The contract also contains a clause asking participants to say whether they have conducted themselves “in accordance with the highest ethical and moral standards.” As an example, it asks if they have ever been photographed nude or partially nude.”

http://www.americablog.com/2009/05/miss-california-could-lose-crown-over.html

Isn’t there some sort of Christian philosophy about shitting on the ones who brung ya?

Caren - I don’t think Olbermann is usually an ass about women.  He has asshat moments, but they’re few and far between.  Charles Pierce wrote on Altercation about something in Olbermann’s past that I didn’t know about.  It was when he was at ESPN, and a group of female office-workers were being sexually harrassed, and Olbermann threatened to quit if they weren’t taken seriously and addressed. Caveat:  I don’t remember the exact details and may have something wrong, but it was definitely a situation of him putting his job on the line for basically powerless employees of the female gender.  It was pretty impressive.

I think he’s a pro-feminist male who sometimes gets a little veered off track by an ass or a set of boobs.  I remember his behavior during the whole “OMG Britney Spears sang off key, and worse, she’s FAT” bullshit story.  And I didn’t like it.  I wrote him an email about it.  Not that he gives a shit about my emails, but, I did.  So yeah, he’s got his moments, but I think that broadly speaking, he’s an ally.  At least, he wants to be.

Ms Kate: and then disappears.

It is true that I try to stop talking once I’ve finished making every single last one of the arguments I’ve got, rather than repeating them endlessly in slightly different orders and arrangements. [1] Often I fail, but I do try. I carry on a conversation, answering people who answer me, until I am repeating myself or my interlocutor is repeating herself, or until a bystander starts making up fake quotes and affectionate pet names, and then I stop. It’s a good thing.

[1] maybe I am wrong to strive for this—maybe there really are people who would be convinced the fiftieth time I say something, even though they disagreed the first five times. If anyone thinks they are such a person, they are more than welcome to take one of my comments and read it fifty times. Feel free to report the results, for science.

I don’t really care for calling women fucking bitches, regardless of how fervently I may disagree with them, or even, dislike them.

It’s probably because in my own experience on political message boards, men have always tried to shut me up this way:

I might write:  Why is our society so eager to go to war with so little debate?  With so little evidence?  What are we afraid of?  That someone might come up with a compelling reason to not go to war?

And a right wing war-supporter, would think about that, and offer this compelling counter-point:

“You fucking bitch, close your legs I can smell you from here.”

Or, I might post:  Look, we don’t know that Iraq has WMD’s, because there is no evidence that they do.  But let’s just say that they have them.  What in hell are they going to do with them?  What is this nonsense about a mushroom cloud over a major American city?  Why would Saddam Hussein launch a nuclear weapon at the United States, when it would mean the complete destruction of his country and of himself?  Oh, and also, how would he do this?  They are not capable of launching anything that could reach our shores. 

And a right wing war-supporter would think about that, and offer this scintillating, well-thought out, deep thinking:

“Suck my dick you fucking whore.”

And that’s before they get really incoherent and in one entire stream-of-consciousness rant, say:  “You fucking fat whore I know you’re fat You fucking smelly liberal whores are always fat Tell the truth, you’re fat, aren’t you, fatty ADMIT IT, ADMIT IT BITCH You’re fucking FAT YOU FAT FUCKING BITCH!”

And after years of that, I left political message boards for sporadic posting on blogs like this.  Not because of that though, I had gotten used to it, and how sad is that?  Mostly because I’m just tired of right wingers and they appear to have been rendered moot, at least temporarily.  But anyway…I don’t see any reason to call a woman a fucking bitch, period.  But that’s me.

I’m sorry. I have to take the hypocrisy and bigotry angle together, and I’m not going to apologize for that. If you promote the agenda of a culture that shames people for sexual display, you are a hypocrite for engaging in sexual display yourself. For the majority of women, getting a boob job is mildly silly at worst. But if you’re going to go around associating yourself with sex-negative people, goddamn right getting a boob job makes you a hypocrite, just as Jenna and Barbara Bush’s drunken college antics made them fair game when their father was publicly promoting alcohol abstinence.

And yes, she’s a bigot. But we already knew that.

To clarify “mildly silly”—I don’t mean to say that applies in most cases, only that it’s a worst case scenario. Women get them for many reasons, and I certainly can’t argue self esteem or professional considerations are silly.

Um, how old is Prejean now?  I believe she’s 21, and if she just had the boob job 6 weeks ago (per the pageant officials who admit to paying for them), that would mean she’s LYING about these photos being taken when she was “a teenager”.  She would at least be 20, if her birthday landed within those 6 weeks. Nice try with the “I was young and foolish” line, though.

It does seem inappropriate to use sexist language on a mostly-feminist blog.  Especially when there’s so much chewy substance to talk about.  But no, we’re talking about her breasts.

Notice I didn’t call Miss California a cunt, a dirty whore, talk about the smell between her legs, and so on and so forth, none of the sexually derogatory crap you went through, for simply stating a reasonable opinion.

However, sometimes a bitch is a bitch, and a fucking bitch at that, if she’s a bigot.

I have a gay brother and sister, neither of whom feel they have a say over Prejean’s civil rights, and each of whom made their way in the world without exploiting their dermis or inserting plastic bags in the chest area, so that means they don’t get the world stage that bitch gets to spew her bigoted, hypocritical cant and can’t possibly defend themselves on that world stage.

And despite the fact that each has been in a committed, loving relationship for over thirty years, my siblings can’t hold hands on the street with their partners for fear of being killed, nor will they be able to collect Social Security benefits if that partner dies, among the hundred horrible ways their lives will continue to be affected, at least in part because that superficial bitch gets a world stage to spew her bigoted crap.

Oh, and in addition, she’s screwed over the employers who sponsored her, paid for her fun bags, and gave her that world stage. If that’s not a bitch, hey.

In contrast to my sister the doctor, my brother the business executive who has served the same company for nearly 15 years, surviving three corporate takeovers because he gave his employers value for their money.

Quite a contrast to that fucking bitch.

So, the pissy-ass baby gets caught with titty pix and the only thing she can do is whine about “they hate me cuz I luv teh Jebus”????

Talk about your classic misdirection technique.  This woman needs help—and not on her chest.

Carrie Prejean is wrong about gay marriage.  Dead fucking wrong.  She would be no less wrong about it if she had worn a burkha at all times since puberty, if she were born with DDD breasts, if she had no breasts to speak of or if she practiced satanism every Sunday night after going to church in the morning.  Okay, that said . . .

Wow, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills.  There’s a post on Pandagon about how an opinionated woman should be ashamed because someone dug up some pictures of her boobs.  And there are 100+ comments below it, most of which defend the post on the grounds that being photographed nude impugns the opinionated woman’s claim to morality.  That’s fucking ludicrous.  Amirite, Amanda?

I’d add that none of us know the circumstances under which these pictures were taken or released (or the intent with which they were made), but let that pass.

To the charge of hypocrisy, I say feh.  The allegation of hypocrisy is used to impeach someone’s credibility or qualification.  In this case, we can all concede that the speaker has no credibility or qualification on the subject without ever examining her consistency.  The sitting Miss California has no credentials as an expert in civil rights or traditional religion, nor does anything else about Ms. Prejean that we know recommend her as an authority on either subject.  The only reason we listened to Ms. Prejean in the first place, frankly, was sexism.  She was a pretty young woman on television, and that was reason enough to cover her opinions as news.  Now a different kind of sexism is being used to shut her up: She’s a dirty dirty girl who should be ashamed to show her face in church, much less address the faithful.  That’s not how anyone should be treated in this country today, no matter how wrong they are. (And to reiterate, she is dead fucking wrong about gay marriage.)

It’s a shame that this is happening here.

But these attacks on me and others who speak in defense of traditional marriage are intolerant and offensive.

So what, exactly has she done to defend traditional marriage? All I’ve heard is that she made TM a scapegoat for denying the rights and privileges of marriage to those she deems politically incorrect. I should think that’s the motivation for 99% of her critics as well.

It’s as if they caught one of the false alarmists in Oliver Wendell Holmes’s famous line about shouting fire; saying they’re being punished because they care about theater safety.

on the grounds that being photographed nude impugns the opinionated woman’s claim to morality.

Just a pedant point: I don’t believe that people are asserting that, but rather that “being photographed nude impugns the opinionated woman’s claim to morality using the terms and conditions of the morality which she purports to serve”.

So what, exactly has she done to defend traditional marriage?

You mean, besides buy into and promote the false “zero sum game” thinking that gay people marrying somehow destroys opposite marriage?

Not much.

There’s a post on Pandagon about how an opinionated woman should be ashamed because someone dug up some pictures of her boobs. 

BZZZZZT! Wrong answer, but do try again.

To the charge of hypocrisy, I say feh.  The allegation of hypocrisy is used to impeach someone’s credibility or qualification.  In this case, we can all concede that the speaker has no credibility or qualification on the subject without ever examining her consistency.

Sorry, but as a consolation prize you get this fabulous velvet painting of the last supper, complete with special Guest Elvis, as our parting gift.

100+ posts - think you could read a few next time before telling us we all must be stupid because you can’t comprehend some basic stuff?  Mebbe?

Sure sure, I can’t read.  If the overwhelming sentiment here is not that Carrie Prejean should STFU because we’ve got naughty pictures that prove she’s a bad Christian, then I will happily take my velvet last supper painting and go away provided there is in fact a guest Elvis.  Otherwise, I’d suggest we get off this Cotton Mather shit, and stop bullying people about Old Testament sins. 

ZOMG, I saw Mike Huckabee touch the skin of a dead pig!  Leviticus 11:7!!!!

Let me just put this another way for people who think this does not relate to her gay marriage stance:

Carrie Prejean’s choice to express herself through photos in that way is hers, because her body is hers, and, assuming she was 18/had parental permission/whatever, there is nothing wrong with this act per se. But she did something that many right wingers and conservative christians consider to be an explicit display of sexuality, the kind some of them wish to ban entirely, even though it hurts no one. We only wish that she would understand the parallels here. And while I am against slut-shaming, pointing out the disconnect between “straight female sexuality is so great we should take topless pictures as a matter of course” and “we don’t want you forcing your (homo)sexuality on our precious children and destroying families by giving you marriage rights and letting you live in peace as a couple,” may in fact be germane to the discussion. I grant you that it’s not been phrased that way in the mainstream media, largely because Entertainment Tonight isn’t much on cultural analysis, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a relevant issue.

Southpaw’s wrong but right, I think, Ms. Kate.  No, the post isn’t about how she should be ashamed, but why do the pictures really matter?  Her hypocrisy isn’t going to change any minds on either side.  In fact, I honestly think Miss CA is right; whoever released these photos probably did so as a reaction to the SSM tiff—whatever their circumstances, their function, regardless of who released them, is to shame her.  The pics don’t affect my opinion of her one whit, nor to they affect the content of her ideas about same-sex marriage. 

True, most of the comments here seem to be that the pictures aren’t the problem or, if they are, because they affect her credibility, but let’s imagine for a moment that she’d said the opposite: that marriage equality for everyone is the best way to be free.  We’d all be more inclined to agree with her, but she wouldn’t be any more credible.  She’s a beauty queen, which, whatever else you can say about it, is a full-time job with overtime, and she’s only 21.  Even if she wasn’t as dumb as she clearly is, it’s staggeringly unlikely that she, in preparing to be a Miss America contender, had time to do anything that would make her a credible source on civil rights, sociology, family psychology, human sexuality or any of the dozen or so other relevant fields to the social benefits and consequences of legalized same-sex marriage. 

She, like most of us here, is just a douchebag with a platform and an opinion—douchebaggier than some—so she has no credibility to impugn.  The only reason this matters at all is the right’s desperate search for a compelling enough martyr to be hung on the cross of liberal politics; she’s a prettier, smarter Joe the Plumber.  How do a couple of nudie pictures actually impact this story?

Addendum to my post: the cultural belief that “straight female sexuality is so great we should take topless pictures as a matter of course” is actually the belief that “straight MALE sexuality is so great we should take topless pictures as a matter of course”. Just wanted to make that clear.

If the boob job isn’t the issue, why the post title?

Well Judi, none of what you said here makes it necessary or right to use the term.  Worse, it’s not the way to effect change, in my opinion.  As I"m sure you know, the tide is turning and people with these kinds of bigoted attitudes are on the wrong side of that tide.

<blockquote>If the overwhelming sentiment here is not that Carrie Prejean should STFU because we’ve got naughty pictures that prove she’s a bad Christian, then I will happily take my velvet last supper painting and go away provided there is in fact a guest Elvis. </blokquote>

Prejean shouldn’t shut up.  She’s a wonderful illustration of the small-minded bigotry behind the “opposite marriage” movement.

She shouldn’t be ashamed of her nudie pictures, but they are relevant b/c they show that her Bible-based morality isn’t really Bible-based.  It’s bigotry-based, and she’s using the terms “Christian” as a cover so she can claim she’s being oppressed by airing her Christian views.

They are relevant again b/c had she won the crown, she’d be giving it back.  Her claim is that she’d be Miss USA if she weren’t discriminated against is bogus.  Not only did she fail to answer Perez Hilton’s question coherently, but she had nudie pictures floating out there.  If she’d won, if she hadn’t invented “opposite marriage” those pictures were still coming out.

Pointing out the hypocrisy is not going to change the fundies, but it used to be a part of journalism—asking follow up questions.  Seriously, her Bible-based religion tells her marriage should be between a man and a woman?  But the Bible talks about polygamy and the abomination of shrimp.  She herself seems to pick and choose, so why should her religious views be a basis for legal discrimination, when others—even other Christians’—religious views completely disagree?

Valid points.  Important, since she is using and being used to deny human beings their legal rights. 

That said, there is definitely slut-shaming on both the left and the right.  Prejean is not wrong b/c she’s a dirty slut.  She’s wrong b/c discrimination is wrong, and her claim that her religious views should dominate is shown to be weak by her own failure to follow it and her failure to censure herself over her failure to follow it—that’s the hypocrisy: GLBTQI should be denied legal rights b/c her religion says so, but she shouldn’t face any denials or criticism even when her religion calls for it b/c…b/c…b/c she’s pretty?

If the boob job isn’t the issue, why the post title?

I dunno, perhaps she’s referring to the fact that Miss “Family Values” Prejean (Miss California) shows everyone (posed for professional photos) with her breasts—enhanced or otherwise—exposed (what God, er, the pageant gave her).

Seems to be a description of what happened, with a reference to whether she’s also lying about the timing of the nude photos. But then, I have more than an 8th-grade reading comprehension level. Your mileage obviously varies, Boolean.

“We don’t think she’s a slutty slut slut with breasts but SHE should totally think so and be derided by people who aren’t us” is still not an appropriate tactic.”

How about: “We don’t think she’s a slutty slut slut with breasts but the “family values” SHE claims to represent (the same ones that consider gay marriage immoral) do totally think so and should therefore be derided by us”?

Better? I ask because that’s what most of us (Pam included) are actually saying.

Everyone: we freaking get that you think you’re on a level with pointing out Baptists eating shrimp.

It seems that you don’t “freaking get” the point. To use your example:

Lots of holy-roller Baptists eat shrimp—no-one makes a big deal about the pick-and-choose hypocrisy, because Baptists as a group don’t generally make a big deal about its “sinfulness”. Some outspoken Xtian fantasists pose for nude photos—we do make a big deal about the pick-and-choose hypocrisy because Xtian fantasists as a group make a big deal about its “sinfulness”.

I dunno, perhaps she’s referring to the fact that Miss “Family Values” Prejean (Miss California) shows everyone (posed for professional photos) with her breasts—enhanced or otherwise—exposed (what God, er, the pageant gave her).

Apologies—the above should actually read:

I dunno, perhaps she’s referring to the fact that Miss “Family Values” Prejean (Miss California) posed for professional photos (shows everyone) with her breasts—enhanced or otherwise—exposed (what God, er, the pageant gave her).

Boolean has enough trouble without me changing things up mid-paragraph.

Actually, I’m a dude on a feminist blog joining other dudes and ladies in telling two specific women (and perhaps one remarkably dense man, although Boolean may be female) that they’re consistently missing the point of the post. If that kind of blatant misogyny a banning offense, I invite Amanda, Pam, Auguste or Jesse to bring down the hammer in a very public way.

But seriously, I can understand why you don’t want to address the last two points I addressed to you. So I’m not gonna keep ribbing you about them.

Hmmm…  Let me explain, again, to those who are “professionally not getting it.”  When you seek the public spotlight and seek to influence public policy by way of your “sincere” religious virtue and belief system the sincerity of your entire conduct vis your religious virtue and belief system becomes relevant.  According to, ironically, your very own belief system you wish to impose on others.

And no matter how much you want to change the debate on whether people should put you up for the “virtuous life test” after you hold them to this test, you need to accept you have opened yourself for this scrutiny.  And, if you have failed the virtuous life test, do not whine, moan, or complain about the charges of hypocrisy.

Or, as your bible says:  And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?  Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye. 

This isn’t the only place her bible rants about hypocrites.  Matthew.  Luke.  Psalms.  Proverbs.  Job.  Act.  Frequently in multiple places within these books.  Why does your bible rail on and on about hypocrites?  Simple, because it is well understood by the men who wrote the Bible, that hypocrites will seek to use the commandments and proscriptions of the bible as weapons to enforce their nominal, but not actual, beliefs as a means of control rather than spirituality.  There are many other lessons in the New Testament about keeping your nose out of the business of others.  Something that the average Bible-Bigot refuses to learn or apply.  (I just prefer this one in Matthew because I’m a sci-fi buff and love “The Mote in God’s Eye…” so it has a pleasent association that helps reduce the stench of hypocrisy for which I am rebutting.)

So when we speak to your hypocrisy, it is not directly to the act of hypocrisy.  It is to show how you do not, really and fully, believe all you say you believe.  But, instead, are acting on something else much more mundane….  Bigotry perhaps.  Or the desire for power and control.  Or, in cases like the Miss California, you’re just a tool that has been brainwashed by the memes of your narrow social environment, lack the broad-based adult experience , lack broad-based social perspective.  Which tends to indicate that your thoughts not really your own and you lack what it takes to break out of your narrow-minded conditioning and offer real opinions.

“you are a dude on a feminist blog telling a bunch of ladies they’re too stupid to understand your point.”

And you’re a woman on a feminist blog telling other women they’re just too stupid to say what they mean and telling them what they REALLY mean.  How is that better?

The point is not that she posed this way or that she got a boob job.  The point is she cowered behind her (supposed) religious piety after she outed herself as a bigot, despite the fact that her religious piety is apparently only applicable when convenient for her.

NO ONE on this thread shamed her for posing or for getting the boob job.  It’s been all about her hypocrisy, mockery for which she absolutely deserves.  She can believe whatever she wants to believe, she can do whatever she wants to. The posing and the boob job are in and of themselves not at issue.  And for us they would never have been, had she not first decided to pretend her bigotry was piety-based.

it is to show how you do not, really and fully, believe all you say you believe.  But, instead, are acting on something else much more mundane….  Bigotry perhaps.

Yes, this is the point.  She claims that she is not a bigot because she has some specific non-bigot reason to be homophobic.  But, this demonstrates that she doesn’t care about that specific reason as much as she says she does, implying that her homophobia is not based on her religion at all.  It shows that she’s just a plain old bigot and she needs to called on it.

Actually, I came back to this post to complain about all the recent anti-gay advertising that I have seen from NOM.  First it was a bunch of commercials.  Now they are advertising on a popular lolcats site (appropriate considering their acronym).  Plus, this one person got to say her opinion on national television during primetime.  Yet all the ads are about freedom of speech.  They’re free to air their views on TV, pay for additional TV coverage with commercials, and pay to spread their ads all over the internet.  Yet they still act like their freedom of speech is being repressed.  The only logical conclusion is that they have absolutely no idea what “freedom of speech” means.  I hate to resort to the level of insulting someone’s intelligence, but is it really so hard to read a freaking dictionary?

Now a different kind of sexism is being used to shut her up: She’s a dirty dirty girl who should be ashamed to show her face in church, much less address the faithful.  That’s not how anyone should be treated in this country today, no matter how wrong they are. (And to reiterate, she is dead fucking wrong about gay marriage.)

It’s a shame that this is happening here.

southpaw on 05/05 at 10:50 PM

The use of orthodoxy and psychology of projection.  Read up on them.  Then stop using them to browbeat others.  It’s really disgusting and I see it used a lot to quell legitimate discussion by issue-religious fundamentalists on both sides of the aisle.  “OH, UR HATING ON HER FOR HER BEWBIES!!!!  UR A MYSOGINST!!!111!eleventty-one!!11!” 

No, I don’t care about her boobies.  Or that she posed nude.  I really don’t give a shit at all about the issues that exposed the hypocrisy and bigotry.  Only that they were exposed.  OTOH, I do care that she presents an offense and a defense that is an obvious hypocritical cover for her bigotry.  And I do care that the PC police are using their PC Police stereotypes and insults to try to control the debate.  Again. 

The bottom line is that I don’t care if Miss California made bondage-snuff-porn movies with dwarfs.  The actual acts are irrelevant to the point of hypocrisy being made.  Really, get over the pictures and your offense that people think they’re hypocritical.  The issues of Miss California’s hypocrisy, shallowness and bigotry are germane to the meta-subject of rights, morality and our sources for determining both. 

Miss California uses her religion to justify her bigotry.  She then hides behind the shield of her religion to escape from the consequences of her bigotry and claim persecution.  To the extent one shows Miss California does not believe in the precepts to her religion, one pierces her defense-through-religion act and exposes the core bigotry underlying her “justifications” for her attacks and negates her persecution claim (mocked in the graphic btw) and allows a robust discussion of her positions; those that are expressed and those that are implied.

“To the extent one shows Miss California does not believe in the precepts to her religion, one pierces her defense-through-religion act and exposes the core bigotry underlying her “justifications” for her attacks and negates her persecution claim (mocked in the graphic btw) and allows a robust discussion of her positions; those that are expressed and those that are implied. “

You’re really reaching here.  The nude pictures are neither necessary demonstrate Prejean’s bigotry nor sufficient to demonstrate her lack of faith.

First of all, The objection to gay marriage originally asserted by Prejean in and of itself showed her to be a bigot, it would not have been less so if she had been conclusively shown to never have violated a provision of the old or new testaments.  I could go on at length about why her statement was obvious bigotry, but I don’t think anyone disagrees with me.  Are we seriously promoting the idea that objections to gay marriage have some greater validity if they are offered by utterly non-sinful Christians?

Secondly, these photos are not sufficient to prove that Prejean’s Christian faith is insincere.  While that’s not something I personally would ever set out to prove, I think the task would require a great deal more than evidence of one venal sin.  She was naked in front of a camera once, so we should conclude she “does not believe in the precepts of her religion?”  That’s absurd.  The commission of sin and the process of repentance are part of the Christian faith.  And in any case, if people say they belong to a religion we should grant them the assertion (viz. Obama, Muslim rumor).

Gracchus, I just don’t believe that this is an acceptable tactic for demonstrating how someone is a hypocrite because of how easily it feeds into uglier narratives in our culture about women.

No, it points out the uglier narratives in their culture about women—the same misogynist narratives that inform their homophobia. If there’s an over-riding theme to this blog, it’s that.

You’re arguing that we shouldn’t acknowledge that slut-shaming is an integral part of the Xtian fantasist worldview—even in cases where they fail to meet their own screwed-up but “deeply held” standards.

I just don’t think it’s going to be the central point in how this plays out in the press.

That’s a very real problem with the MSM, but not with this blog or most of its commenters.

also, Gracchus called me stupid three times and it made me cranky

No, I said you misread one snarky statement (despite the snark disclaimer) and missed Pam’s general point. The arse-covering “more feminist than thou” tactic was a bit silly but, having read your other comments, “stupid” is not generally an adjective I’d apply to you with any degree of sincerity.

“Boolean”, on the other hand…

No, it points out the uglier narratives in their culture about women—the same misogynist narratives that inform their homophobia. If there’s an over-riding theme to this blog, it’s that.

It seems optimistic to state that these narratives apply only to the Christian right-wing.  A lot of self-identified lefty types often see a woman presented as attractive saying bigoted stuff as an opportunity to bring out a whole lot of really ugly misogynistic crap.  They’re fine with fantasizing openly about <strike>raping</strike> hate-fucking people like Ann Coulter, about having their balls in Michelle Malkin’s mouth, u.s.w.  They get to throw around words like bitch and cunt and it’s all just peachy because they’re on the other side.

It probably is hypocritical for someone describing herself as a deeply committed Christian woman to get implants, to pose for semi-nude pictures.  Maybe I’m missing something critical, but I don’t see how attacking a woman for doing things that lots of women do to try to cope with living in a patriarchy (plastic surgery, tasteful nude photography, beauty pageants) and attacking trans women for getting plastic surgery or for dressing in a stereotypically patriarchy-approved way (skirts, floral prints, panty hose, makeup) are all that different.

The bigoted things she said, the bigoted things she continues to say, her joining force with a group dedicated to denying people like me our rights, and especially the world championship level poor loserdom are all nice big juicy non-misogynistic targets.

Which is a long way of saying I’m personally uncomfortable with it.  Mileage, as demonstrated in the above one hundred forty-one posts, varies.

It seems optimistic to state that these narratives apply only to the Christian right-wing.

I’m not saying that. I’m perfectly aware that the MSM panders to those same narratives. But in the context of this post, on this blog, on this topic, I think we’re safe in the assumption that most of the commenters (trolls aside) do not buy into these bigoted narratives.

It probably is hypocritical for someone describing herself as a deeply committed Christian woman to get implants, to pose for semi-nude pictures.

I don’t think the implants would be seen by Xtian fantasists as hypocritical—it ranks somewhere around eating shrimp. Posing for nude or semi-nude photos, on the other hand, goes against their standard-issue slut-shaming—it ranks closer to “abominations” like engaging in homosexual acts.

“We don’t think she’s a slutty slut slut with breasts but SHE should totally think so and be derided by people who aren’t us” is still not an appropriate tactic.

And why the fuck not? Are we all supposed to be so stupid that context means nothing? The only difference between this and outing a hard-right-wing Congresscritter who happens to be a massive closet case is that the stakes are a lot lower.

Speaking of context, methinks I’d best clarify. The message of mocking Carrie Prejean’s boob job and topless pic has nothing to do with slut-shaming as such. It boils down to “You should be ashamed of partaking of that which you’d deny others. NOT YOURS.”

“Secondly, these photos are not sufficient to prove that Prejean’s Christian faith is insincere.” - southpaw

But that isn’t what’s being shown. I haven’t heard anyone claiming that her faith is insincere. They are complaining that she is being sincerely hypocritical.

Speaking only for myself, I don’t doubt in the least that she is completely sincere in believing that gay people are icky and our relationships are not similar in value to straight relationships. She is sincere in believing that gay people should not be allowed to get married. She is sincere in believing that the Bible is the basis for her condemnation of gay relationships, and in her belief that if the Bible condemns gay relationships, they should not be legally supported.

I also don’t doubt in the least that she is completely sincere in her belief that whether or not there is anything “wrong” in posing for the pictures she did, that it is something models do, that she is or wants to be a model, that since she was paid for it, it was a professional thing rather than a moral thing and that it isn’t anyone else’s business. I also don’t doubt for a second that if she gave a moment’s thought to the fact when she signed an affadavit saying that she had never posed for nude or semi-nude pictures, that some variation of “but it was no big deal” was her driving motivation for that lie.

The point lies in the fact that the sole defense for her anti-gay views is that the Bible supports them. I cannot speak directly for her, but I have more than enough direct personal experience with people holding this view that I am confident. She feels (likely without ever researching it herself) that the Bible condemns gay marriage, and therefore it has to apply to everyone, even those who do not hold the same religious views. The fact that other people don’t find them immoral, find that it would make their lives happier, that it fits neatly into their lives, is immaterial. The Bible says no, and there is therefore no possible further discussion.

However, when it comes to HER life, the fact that she has done and continues to do, things that the Bible far more explicitly condemns is immaterial. When her life, her happiness, her morality come into play, she gets to be the one who decides, and people who say she is wrong are simply mean and spiteful. She can lie on legal documents (false witness), she can dress immodestly in public (by Biblical standards, a swimsuit in front of millions has to apply, not to mention tons of personal appearances - Miss California, swimsuits, do the math), she can judge others, - and add some of the fiddlier ones, she doubtless prays aloud in church with her head uncovered, eats seafood, doesn’t follow the various ritual hygiene and dietary laws, and so on.

In short, for gay people, a literal interpretation of the Bible must be the basis for civil law. For her, she is allowed to make her own moral choices and insists that pointing out that they aren’t Biblical is mean-spirited and inappropriate.

It isn’t about the swimsuits or the nudity, though that is what got her in the headlines. It would be the same if she ran a Shrimps-R-Us franchise. She is not applying the same standards to herself that she does to others. That is hypocrisy. She is doing it in support of hurting others who never did anything to her. That is mean-spirited, and for what it is worth, counter to Biblical principles.

purpleshoes, I’m a straight blond female in my late 20’s with a rack like Miss California’s post-implants. But I don’t see what that has to do with anything. While you are right that the MSM coverage of this has been sensationalistic, and Perez Hilton is that strangest of creatures, a gay misogynist, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a valid discussion to be had about Carrie Prejean’s lack of self-awareness when it comes to her actions versus her pronouncements. Her expression of sexuality is not the issue. Her denial of other people’s expressions of sexuality is. And granted, similar arguments could’ve been made without these photos, and if they were released for political purposes, I have a problem with that. But the fact remains that she seems to be holding inconsistent positions, and as a spokesperson for a major anti-gay marriage organization, she’s fair game, just as Maggie Gallagher or Orson Scott Card would be.

Perez Hilton is that strangest of creatures, a gay misogynist

Granted I’ve avoided more than passing familiarity with him, but isn’t he a misanthrope in general, albeit one who hides it behind snark and juvenile graffiti?

I think her positions are fair game and her body is not.

But why not? A boob job is like a tattoo—it’s a form of self-expression, a proclamation that the owner wishes to be seen as a sexual woman. It’s like someone displaying racist tattoos at an NAACP rally—how are we supposed to take that person seriously if they haven’t made even a token effort at covering them up? (Same goes for the pictures. At the very least there’s some major cognitive dissonance going on, and she deserves to be called out for it, preferably without her responding with a lame Dr. Lauraism blaming it on sin.)

Why does she deserve that?  And why are we empowered to “call her out” for anything.  It seems to me that she’s a private person acting in a foolish and bigoted manner.  Our role is to ignore her or respectfully disagree, not give her a public pantsing.

I do, but we’re fighting different battles—mine is simply calling BS on a specific public figure’s anti-feminist (admittedly more repressed than oppressed) and anti-gay hypocrisy (in the context of her own professed values). But then, I’m neither a woman nor am I gay, so it’s understandable that I’d take a more identity-neutral view in this matter.

This was way up there, but I have to call Gracchus out on this because I didn’t see anyone else do so.  The fact that you can call your position identity-neutral reeks of privilege. It’s the same argument we hear so much: “well, women are too emotional about lady issues so yall have to let us mens decide.”  You are NOT the default identity (biologically speaking, actually, women are).  Of course the white mens will have the default (read: logical) opinion to you, because you have no “special” interest.  Accept, you know, maintaining dominance over the other half of the species. 

Personally, getting mad at her for posing nude and getting implants seems so goddamn stupid, from a feminist stand point.  She’s obviously been conditioned to care about her appearance more than anything else.  The patriarchy is BUILT on hypocritical messages: if you have sex you’re a slut, if you don’t you’re a frigid bitch.  She’s been indoctrinated in hypocrisy, and now we’re calling her out for that?  The people mad at her for getting implants especially piss me off.  Yes, it’s stupid that she got implants, etc, hypocritical biblically.  It’s like saying it’s stupid for an anorexic or bulimic to “give in” to the pressure to be thin, because she should pull herself up.  Or that someone who didn’t fight a man’s touches or advances is to blame if she “gives in” to sex.  When we, as women, are told our whole lives we’re ugly and never good enough..but there’s this surgery that someone will pay for you that might make people care about you more and make you beautiful and the self-hate, who could REALLY say they wouldn’t take it?  The human mind is a lot less resistant than people want to believe.  I’m not saying she’s helpless, but I AM saying that we should protect her from further patriarchal harm-which includes shaming her for what she does with her body.

I understand calling out her homophobia and how stupidly she phrased her opinion, but really, this is just sick.  I’m going to side with the other women here and say that this IS a form of slut-shaming and liberal-dude misogyny.  It creeps me out.

purpleshoes, we are in agreement on the story’s trajectory through the mainstream media, and yeah, there is some slut-shaming happening. I just don’t think it’s necessarily happening here. I think here most of us are reacting to the “Sex bad, Yahweh good”, aspect of the movement with which she has aligned herself. It’s hard to say, “My benign expressions of sexuality are awesome, but yours are icky and should be banned by law.”

Tokidoki, we’re in agreement on most of what you say, inasmuch as this can all be traced to inherent contradictions within and tremendous pressure from the patriarchy. We just disagree on the remedy. I’m not for shaming her, I’m just for holding up a mirror and pointing out the inconsistencies in her position. Also, the “identity-neutral” thing. You’re right on that one too.

BrianX, Perez Hilton does seem to be especially awful to women. And I don’t think Prejean said anything in her answer to warrant being called a cunt. Stupid, yes. Bigoted, yes. Incoherent, yes. Just not a cunt.

It seems to me that she’s a private person

I don’t think so. She consciously made the decision to enter a beauty pageant, thereby putting herself in the public eye. The fact that she went on to sign on as a spokeswoman for a fragment of the religious right (formally or otherwise) more or less tosses that over the side completely.

A boob job is like a tattoo—it’s a form of self-expression, a proclamation that the owner wishes to be seen as a sexual woman. It’s like someone displaying racist tattoos at an NAACP rally—how are we supposed to take that person seriously if they haven’t made even a token effort at covering them up?

A boob job is like racist tattoos. And women who wish to be seen as sexual shouldn’t be taken seriously.

What. The. FUCK.

Nobody:

Are you completely incapable of reading comprehension?  I didn’t mean a boob job was like a racist tattoo. I meant that a conservative Christian with a boob job is like a racist tattoo at an NAACP rally—in other words, exactly what I said, if you’d taken the time to actually follow what I was writing and what I wrote before that. If you really need the specifics to be spelled out for you, go back to the sandbox. You’re too dumb to play with the big kids.

At least she could have gotten some bigger implants.  What are they, like b’s?

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