Can Ann Althouse be offended about reaction to her ridiculously fitting engagement story every day from here until the wedding?
There are more certain things in this world, certainly. Like gravity.
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(Shrugs.)
We knew this was coming. I’m with Sullivan on this one.
Jesse, let’s face it, you’re just envious of Ms. Althouse’s coming nuptials, and upset because she could have been Mrs. Jesse Taylor but chose not to.
Jealousy is not pretty…
Oh, I get it. She’s offended because you took the Lord’s name in vain! It has NOTHING to do with her own narcissism. Thanks for clearing that up, Ms. Althouse.
(snrk). So he posts a really reasonable response:
I’m all in favor of the right of straight bloggers to marry their straight commenters. It’s a civil right. And more than I am currently allowed after living with my husband for almost five years.
And we get this foot-stamping drek?
This isn’t about legal rights. This is about how individuals treat each other, and I want to know why you disrespected me. Explain why you linked to Pandagon’s scurrilous OMFG, which, as you know, means “Oh, my fucking God.” Is that the way you mean to speak to me? Is that the way you talk about God?
The woman is a perpetual outrage machine. How DARE you talk to/about her that way? How DARE you talk about GOD that way? How DARE you make a political point about a political blog when IT IS MY MAGICAL WEDDING, ASSHOLES!
Shorter Althouse: This isn’t about PEOPLE, it’s about ME!
It’s so wonderful and funny. Thank you, Jesse.
Oh man. Andrew Sullivan made the mistake of trying to make Althouse outraged about something other than herself. WE WON’T STAND FOR THIS!
“The woman is a perpetual outrage machine.”
That’s it. That’s the phrase that I was looking for but couldn’t put my finger on. Thanks, Essie.
It’s a bit like that debate between Dan Savage and Fundie Perkins*: Savage drolly noted Perkins seemed to think that being interrupted was a far greater wrong being done than he and his type stripping fellow citizens of their rights. Sullivan and his husband reduced to second-class citizen status? Unimportant! Althouse’s snit? Important! (Note, too, how she takes on Sullivan, who is generally very polite and often too respectful, rather than Jesse and those commenters, who will snarl back effectively.)
* - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2und1kmLxwA&feature=related
I especially liked the sanctimonious way she addressed the vileness of some of her commenters, while pretending that deleting the worst of it would be deleting for “viewpoint.” Yeah, right.
Np, seeker6079. For me, it reminded me of a piece Jesse did about…was it Peggy Noonan?
It was “shorter” piece that basically boiled down to the fact that Teh F-Word made all the diference in whether something was appropriate or not. Hilarious, as Jesse’s stuff always is.
Am, it was Ham: http://pandagon.net/index.php/site/comments/utter_vulgarity/
Mystery solved.
Damnit! Gravity is a theory!!! The truth is God is pushing us down to Earth with His Omnipresent Thumbs. We are all under God’s Thumb!!!!111!!
If Althouse has developed a perpetual outrage machine, does that mean she’s legitimately allowed to go Galt? And, if so, will she? Please? Soon?
I’m tempted to click the link and find out what all the fuss is about, but I’ve already had my RDA of Hot Burning Stupid. A few sentences from Althouse might put me in peril of an overdose, and Oh My Fucking Godlessness I don’t need that.
This isn’t about legal rights. This is about how individuals treat each other, and I want to know why you disrespected me.
Sigh. I suppose I should have guessed that she’s one of those people who never learned that respect is earned, not demanded. If you’re going to say stupid shit for a living, best prepare yourself to be called out for the stupid shit you say. Otherwise, stick to running a Hallmark franchise. Politics ain’t for you.
Explain why you linked to Pandagon’s scurrilous OMFG, which, as you know, means “Oh, my fucking God.” Is that the way you mean to speak to me? Is that the way you talk about God?
Yes. Because adopting passive-aggressive crypto-solipsism as your sole mode of interacting with the world isn’t deserving of respect. It’s cute in a toddler. In an adult, not so much.
You know, the saddest thing about Althouse’s blog is how obvious it is that even her own regular commenters recognize her for the navel-gazing narcissist she is. But she re-enforces all of their worst opinions of humanity, so they play along just to keep her talking.
Shit, I missed this the first go around but now my new life goal is to be in a blogger-commenter relationship. (This is complicated by the fact that I’m marrying a non-blogger. Dang, what’s a girl to do?)
Geesh, and here I thought getting laid more often and more dependably made people less likely to flip out over every little thing.
I guess it just gives here another excuse to advertise her <strike>heteronormativity and successful conformity to societal expectations</strike> troll for congratulations.
the upshot, Damnedyankee:
Althouse is marrying one of her regular commenters. Who she had never met in person until this past January. Who she’s spent under two weeks with, all told.
The whole blogosphere is mocking this (probably rightfully?). Althouse cannot handle this mockery and is using it as Moral Outrage Fodder.
The end.
And, ElleDee, clearly the only answer is to convince your intended to start a blog.
before you know it, they’ll be letting box turtles comment on blogs!
OK, this lady is annoying, but I can’t really see laughing at her because of the circumstances under which she met the guy she’s marrying. That’s her business.
Why do you care what she does in her love life? Why does she care about what the blogosphere says about her love life?
Sheesh.
That’s not why we are laughing at her Bitter - it is the way she announced it, promoted it, and is now throwing tantrums over it that is so funny.
Opoponax, true, but it wouldn’t be the same as being blogger/commenter first and then lovers. That’s the only way to catch the true OMFG-ness of it all.
The whole thing is just so burningly stupid. She clearly has neither a sense of humor/perspective nor any empathy at all. If she had, she would recognize that Sullivan’s point wasn’t that he’s a jealous shrew, but that it’s just so ridiculous to claim that a 5-year monogamous-cohabitating-steady-relationship is worth less, legally, than marrying a commentator (power dynamics!) that you’ve only met in person once (sharp leaning curves ahead, I don’t care how much you’ve talked from afar, I speak from experience, and yeah, I’m generalizing and there are always exceptions so I don’t need to hear about your perfect parents, Althouse).
Actually, the “my mom was a war bride and she was perfectly happy” (or does she mean that her mom was in the army too? I suppose it’s possible) thing IS interesting. There’s a little too much shrill there, a little too much “protests too much”. It may just be me, but “I love this person and we know what we’re doing” always sounded more confident than “Someone else managed to make it work, so why can’t we??”
I don’t really care how she met her intended, or how long they have consorted IRL - but this isn’t about the personal side of her marriage. This is about the public flaunting of her privilege and conformity, trolling for congratulations and attention, and putting a new spin on the whole Bridezilla shtick by tantrum throwing in the direction of other bloggers rather than your sister, best friend, and caterer. Her response to Andrew simply cements the perception that she views this as a grand opportunity for attention - why else did she say thing one about her relationship, the specifics of the courtship, her engagement, and upcoming wedding at all otherwise?
marrying a commentator (power dynamics!)
I think it’s perfectly fine for a blogger to end up marrying someone she met as a commentor on her blog. I don’t think it’s an issue of power differentials at all, since aside from deleting your comments or banning you, a blogger doesn’t actually have any power over their commentariat, and there’s nothing to stop a commenter for either taking their ball and going home (and, yup, there ARE some bloggers who get bent out of shape at a dearth of comment activity) or starting their own blog.
I think it’s more the fucked up sycophantic nature of Althouse’s commentariat, the fact that they’re getting married after knowing each other IRL for under a month, and Althouse’s behavior surrounding this whole thing has been that of a three year old who doesn’t want to hear that it’s nap time.
Bitter Scribe,
Sullivan’s point, as I understand it, is that the whole right-wing “Gays will destroy marriage” is stupid when you consider that two men in a lifetime relationship can’t marry, but Jesse could totally marry me tomorrow if he jetted down here, lured by my Uber-leet commenting skills. Sullivan is making a political point, using as a focus, a political blogger who blogs about politics.
However, here’s a few of my own cents.
A blogger-commenter relationship has some weird power dynamics at play. That much is true for any performer-fan relationship. The fan only sees a certain side of the performer, or if “only” is too strong a word, shall we instead say that the fan initially fell into infatuation with the performer’s performance. That the performance is just that, and never fully reflects reality, is an issue. Maybe Althouse and her beau moved past that hurdle, but since they’ve seen very little of each other in person, I doubt it.
Second, speaking as someone who was in an online-only relationship (daily, no less!), online relationships just don’t show the wrinkles and scars of the human personality like in-person contact does. I’m not talking about lying, I’m not talking about idealizing, even. I’m talking about simple things like “Does her feet smell from across the room?” and “Does he always forget to put the butter up in the mornings, so we come home to a rancid puddle on the counter?” type of stuff. You think it’s not important, but OMFG it is. Witness the “glasses up or glasses down” Pandagon arguments. (It never occurred to me that someone might put the glasses up. That’s fucking insane. ).
Third, you don’t get married after meeting in-person once. Seriously, what’s your hurry?
Fourth, you don’t get to post stupid coy announcements waiting for people to “guess” and gush all over you. Not without being criticized.
Fifth, you don’t get to stamp your feet and whine because people had a chuckle over your announcement, expressly so that your commentators will assuage your ego and assure you that the Black Man is Ugly and the Gay Man is Jealous.
Sixth, when it becomes clear that you ARE a drama queen who lives for the gushing comments of her commentators (You’re beautiful! You’re talented! He’s jealous!), the people who originally had misgivings (see above) and a light chuckle (also above), suddenly get a little more concerned about the TYPE of commentator that you chose to suddenly marry…....
Tune in for the melt-down: He Didn’t Tell Me I’m Perfect Today
Maybe someone could invent a little genuflecting emoticon or something to adequately assuage the biggest little drama queen in the world. Hopefully it will happen soon, as Veruca Altman doesn’t care how, she wants it now.
as i said there, re: her oh so thought out timeline: that’s SO much better than just emailing! two whole weeks worth of in person time! oy.
I don’t really care how she met the future former Mr. Ann Althouse.
What I do care about is how amusing she is when she freaks out about, oh, everything…
But, Essie, what if her batshittyness isn’t a performance? Maybe that’s just how she acts all the time, even when teaching class. The mind reels.
Well there is a purpose to AA. Where else would sycophants go to…to…syc?
bitter, how they originally met is no big deal. however, getting married to someone you’ve known in person for a few months and met a handful of times could be considered questionable judgment. could be, and i do.
That much is true for any performer-fan relationship.
I guess I just don’t see the blogger/commenter dynamic as a subset of the performer/fan dynamic. I also don’t think there’s anything particularly wrong with performers and fans intermingling, either. If you reify those kinds of statuses too much, you basically end up with a caste system where some people occupy this special status wherein the vast majority of humanity is unworthy of them. Part of what bugs me about celebrity culture is that it creates this weird set of status dynamics where someone like Kim Kardashian is “better” than us because she’s rich or photogenic or has a great publicist or whatever.
I think that a relationship between a particularly well-known blogger and a commenter who sees her the way an adoring fan sees a superstar would probably be pretty fucked up. But that’s not a power differential, that’s a matter of unrealistic perspectives. Which can happen to anyone, famous or not.
bitter, how they originally met is no big deal. however, getting married to someone you’ve known in person for a few months and met a handful of times could be considered questionable judgment.
Not to mention that the problem isn’t the choices she’s making per se, it’s the fact that if you want to shove your relationship choices into the public eye, you have to take what comes with that. I.e. the possibly negative opinions of others. She made it our business when she flaunted it on her blog, and if she doesn’t like the fact that not everyone in the world thinks she’s doing the right thing, maybe she shouldn’t have shoved her engagement ring in our faces and commanded us to be happy for her.
Opoponax, I’m not saying that a Performer-Fan can’t have an equitable relationship. I’m just saying that a Performer-Fan dynamic means that - without spending serious “face time” with them - you know even less of a person than you think you do because you really only know their performance persona.
For instance, I totally love Emma Thompson. Because, you know, Emma Thompson. But, should she ever run for president or declare her intent to marry me, I would need to set aside my feelings for her talent as an actress and my feelings for the personas she plays (both in movies and in public) and actually get to know something about who she really IS.
Or, in other words, as much as you and I “love” and respect Jesse, we’re genuinely joking when we offer to marry him (or have his abortion!) on the basis of respecting him as a witty insightful blogger.
What was the line from Murphy Brown: You can’t possibly get married until you take at least one trip involving a rental car and a map?
Did anyone watch the blogging heads video Sullivan linked to, where Althouse talks about getting married? You know, I met my bf on line, quite by accident, on a political message board. We’ve been together for years now. So I don’t think there is anything strange about how they met. But you watch even the first minute of that video and you will see what I have known since I saw her, again on blogging heads, talking about Valenti’s breasts and the Feministing logo.
She is bug-shagging nuts, okay? Let’s just say it. Out of her fucking mind.
I’m not saying that a Performer-Fan can’t have an equitable relationship.
When you use shorthand like “(Power Dynamics!)”, that kind of implies that you do think such a couple cannot have an equitable relationship. I would agree, of course, that in some situations a performer and fan really can’t have an equitable relationship (imagine John Lennon marrying one of those squealing 16 year old Beatlemania girls, for instance). And Althouse and her Commenter Love might fit that, I don’t know. The overall dynamic over there implies that you might be right. But I don’t think it’s something that can be implied by the very nature of their “statuses”. In fact, in a sense I don’t think blogger and commenter really can be called genuine “statuses” in any meaningful sense.
For instance, I totally love Emma Thompson. Because, you know, Emma Thompson. But, should she ever run for president or declare her intent to marry me, I would need to set aside my feelings for her talent as an actress and my feelings for the personas she plays (both in movies and in public) and actually get to know something about who she really IS.
And while you’re debating, my husband will run in and snatch her up without a thought.
What can I say, I find his desperate crush on Emma Thompson to be very cute. 
Could someone throw a link to the Andrew Sullivan article you’re talking about? I’m not clicking the link above because I don’t like to add hits to the crazy.
And luckily I see nothing problematic with any potential relationship with any member of the main cast of Torchwood*, so go me!
*Dude Who Plays Rhys Probably Need Not Apply, unless maybe you are super smart, charming, hilarious, good at back rubs, in possession of a snorgle-able kitteh, etc.
Does anyone know where the happy couple is registered? Because I bet if we all chipped in for a couple bucks we get them a really nice fainting couch. Or maybe a set of industrial strength clutching-pearls or something.
I can’t really see laughing at her because of the circumstances under which she met the guy she’s marrying. That’s her business.
When rock stars marry groupies, it’s funny. And kinda sad. When Althouse announces she’s to marry one of her little sycophants, it’s funny, and lotsa sad.
Does anyone know where the happy couple is registered? Because I bet if we all chipped in for a couple bucks we get them a really nice fainting couch. Or maybe a set of industrial strength clutching-pearls or something.
A vasectomy and tubal ligation?
A vasectomy and tubal ligation?
Hopefully menopause has worked its magic on Ann.
I bet if we all chipped in for a couple bucks we get them a really nice fainting couch. Or maybe a set of industrial strength clutching-pearls or something.
Maybe some matching Big Girl and Big Boy panties?
A chastity belt and a key for her father or other Responsible Male to hand her husband during the ceremony?
I don’t think that marriage will last long. Before the bubbles in the “Champagne in a Box” have gone flat, the groom will be out on his ass. And glad about it.
Same outhouse act, different theme. It’s always about her. Ick. And please don’t link directly to her site. I have no desire to see her get even a single click’s worth of self-aggrandizing traffic.
Can I add a little personal note to this thread, which just occurred to me, and which really, really puts Althouse’s behavior into perspective?
I met someone in January, we went out a few times - probably spent roughly the same amount of time together as Althouse has with her sycophant - and decided we don’t want to see each other seriously, and have had additional slightly awkward encounters in the intervening months.
What Althouse is doing is kind of the equivalent of me being engaged to the above person already. Except way weirder, because I met the above person through friends, we live in the same city, no batshit blogger / icky sycophant relationship, and all the “normal” dating stuff. At least if we’d fallen in love and eloped, it would have been based on something other than a few emails and a weekend at a B&B;.
You know Opponax, the details are really none of our business. These are grownups, and thus liable for their own mistakes.
What amuses me is the whole Brogzilla Act: instead of going crazy and throwing entitled fits in the direction of those close to her, she’s throwing entitled fits at others in the blogosphere because they aren’t behaving toward the bride in the way the bride thinks she’s entitled to.
It is as if she thinks the world owes her something because she is engaged, like she missed out on something before and now deserves it (even though nobody ever deserves it). What ever it is ...
By the way, I stand by my prediction in the last thread, and that’s all I’m saying about that this time around.
Honest-to-God, I do wish her every happiness, and I do understand that epistolary relationships can be more revealing (or revealing in different ways) than person-to-person ones.
But that said—seriously, how old is this woman? Because she acts like a two-year-old who was miraculously given the twin gifts of a law degree and blogging.
Y’know, something that happens to drunks (and other substance abusers) is they get stuck emotionally at whatever age they took up drinking and don’t continue to mature like the rest of us. (Case in point: Dubya.) Although I know of Althouse’s famous drunk videoblog (who doesn’t?), it hadn’t occurred to me that she had a serious problem until her recent engagement. Maybe her fiance can get her to dry out.
Good luck to them both.
Ms. Kate, I stand by what I said upthread, that when she thrust all our noses into this, it became our business. Some people’s disapproval of her choice to basically be in an arranged marriage is what has her in a snit in the first place. I’d probably be more respectful of a friend who chose to do something like this, but I’m pretty sure I’d still think it was dumb and feel free to say so.
Explain why you linked to Pandagon’s scurrilous OMFG, which, as you know, means “Oh, my fucking God.” Is that the way you mean to speak to me? Is that the way you talk about God?
Is there any possible light in which this rhetorical strategy can be read that doesn’t reflect badly on the writer? I’m trying, but none comes to mind. If she meant it honestly, then Jesus H. Tapdancing Christ she’s got issues. And I wouldn’t expect her to be able to read a high-school essay for comprehension, much less a legal opinion. If she didn’t, she’s got a Karl Rove kind of attitude toward public expression - when debating, excrement is to be flung in large quantity and high velocity.
Holy crap are the comments on that one foetid (“guess the HIV has finally destroyed Andrew’s brain,” etc.).