For Sarah Palin

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

@Starving_Artist

A point I was going to make to Finn in this regard is that it’s obvious to everyone where Fox and conservative radio is coming from, and really those are the only outlets in which the right has a voice. The liberal message however, has been coming across for decades via the news and news magazines, prime time television programming (primarily sitcoms, in which any conservative is invariably portrayed as a dolt going all the way back to All In The Family), late night talk show hosts, entertainment magazines, celebrity comments and/or speeches), etc., etc. Since these messages appear to be of one mind, it’s easy to feel that they constitute the feelings of most of the country’s liberals in general.

Sorry, but this disconnect with reality you (and many on the right) share about liberal dominance of the media makes it really hard to take you seriously.

Re your sitcom allegation, for example… the only two conservative sitcom characters I can think of are Bill Huxtable (The Cosby Show) and Alex Keaton (Family Ties). Neither was portrayed “as a dolt”.

Frankly, I can’t think of any liberal sitcom characters. Both Will and Grace, I suppose, but I’m assuming a bit. Maybe Will was a Log Cabin Republican.

Anyway, suggesting that liberals dominate the media is simply laughable. If it’s true, why are “socialist” and “liberal” dirty words in America, pray tell? How did the party whose core constituency is blue-collar workers become the party of “elites”?

How can it be possible that liberals control the media when conservatives control the message?

[wonky]

@Really_Not_All_That_Bright

Re your sitcom allegation, for example… the only two conservative sitcom characters I can think of are Bill Huxtable (The Cosby Show) and Alex Keaton (Family Ties). Neither was portrayed “as a dolt”.

Frankly, I can’t think of any liberal sitcom characters. Both Will and Grace, I suppose, but I’m assuming a bit. Maybe Will was a Log Cabin Republican.

Who is Bill Huxtable? Do you mean Cliff (played by Bill Cosby)?

Alex Keaton was supposed to be an example of a kid growing up very different than his liberal hippie-dippie parents.

There are few political sitcom characters. Being fictional, they only exist so far as the show needs them to exist, and few shows need politics. Julia Sugarbaker would be one of the few sitcom characters who made a big deal about politics. Murphy Brown to an extent.

Putting most fictional characters into a political construct is like reading tea leaves–you see what you’re looking for.

[What_Exit]

@jsgoddess

…
There are few political sitcom characters. Being fictional, they only exist so far as the show needs them to exist, and few shows need politics. Julia Sugarbaker would be one of the few sitcom characters who made a big deal about politics. Murphy Brown to an extent.
…

As I mentioned above Maude was very political. I think she is one of the biggest examples.

[wonky]

@What_Exit

As I mentioned above Maude was very political. I think she is one of the biggest examples.

I should have thrown in a “that I recall” to make clear that I am hardly a sitcom expert.

[Rubystreak]

Most of the characters on the show The West Wing were liberals, and I loved them. However, when they depicted conservatives on the show, which they did fairly often, they were shown to be intelligent and worthy adversaries. I believe they had John Goodman as the Republican Speaker of the House and he was awesome. And some of the liberals, including the Vice President character, were scumbags. This is the only show that leaps to mind as expressing an openly political viewpoint predominated by liberals.

[Starving_Artist]

I don’t think you guys understand what I’m talking about with regard to the espousal of liberal ideology in the news and entertainment media. The liberal messages, at least in sitcoms, are not overt for the most part. With the exception of shows that most people recognize as preachy, such as MASH and Boston Legal, liberal messages tend to be subtle and are generally incorporated into the lifestyles and personality of the shows’ characters. A very clear sense of sexual permissiveness; of pushing the envelope on language and subject matter; and an overall attitude favorable toward a liberal’s outlook vs. one of scorn or laughability toward conservatives are only a few of the ways in which liberalism is promoted by sitcoms and other primetime programming.

Almost all major magazines promote the liberal point of view, whether news or entertainment, though the entertainment magazines are much more overt in the promotion of liberal lifestyle choices and behavior.

Talk-news programs like Meet the Press and Face the Nation have for decades engaged in the practice of having a liberal host along with two or three liberal guests and one conservative, thus creating the appearance the conservative was out of the mainstream in his thinking. (This practice was picked up and taken to ridiculous extremes by Bill Maher with Politically Incorrect.)

And talk show hosts, to the degree they make an equal number of jibes toward Republican or Democratic politicians, tend to be collegial and lightweight in the barbs they throw at Democrats, where the humor they aim at Republicans tends to be more cutting and critical of both their character and political orientation.

And Finn, I don’t agree about Johnny Carson. He openly detested Richard Nixon long before Watergate, and he displayed the type of behavior I just described above toward both Reagan and Bush. And do you remember Floyd R. Turbo, dumbass conservative knuckkle-dragger extraordinaire?

And now we have Denny Crane, a wacko who’s also the only conservative on Boston Legal. Where are the laughable liberals? I can’t think of one in forty years of television programming?

[Rubystreak]

Isn’t this supposed to be a thread about polar bears? How did it become another soap box for Starving Artist’s in(s)ane and unsubstantiated ravings?

[Starving_Artist]

@Cosmic Relief

My complaint is what (to me) seems like an exasperatingly common right-wing tactic. You engage a liberal, having some pre-existing assumption about them, and identify some belief or action that is inconsistent with the assumption. At that point, rather than discarding the assumption as incorrect or inapplicable in this specific case, you label that individual as a hypocrite for failing to comply with your assumptions, and then generalize that individual’s actions to all liberals as hypocrites. It’s wrong and it’s stupid.

What is wrong and stupid is a person not knowing what they’re talking about…in this case, you! I didn’t engage the OP, I asked why the board’s liberal membership wasn’t up in arms over the OP’s use of a word the liberals have been telling us (via politically correct speech) that demeans and dehumanizes women and is second only to the n-word in offensiveness. This is a predominantly liberal board and so I wondered where all the outrage was…outrage that would most certainly been visited on me or most of the other conservative posters around here had we dared to call Hillary or Nancy a cunt.

My intent was to highlight the fact that, like with tolerance, the left demands it of the right but exempts itself.

And now, Finn, I apologize for not answering your post in greater detail, but time has been short the last few days and I haven’t had (and still do not have) the time to address it fully.

And on preview, Rubystreak, if you persist in following me about and thowing around insults with regard to my character and/or mental capabilites - and in light of your less than gracious response when I courteously agreed with your request that I not alter your user name - I may have to reconsider whether I want to continue to honor that request. You have done nothing but snipe at me and insult me since then and I’m at pains to understand why I should be showing you even the slightest consideration.

[Rubystreak]

@Starving_Artist

And on preview, Rubystreak, if you persist in following me about and thowing around insults with regard to my character and/or mental capabilites - and in light of your less than gracious response when I courteously agreed with your request that I not alter your user name - I may have to reconsider whether I want to continue to honor that request. You have done nothing but snipe at me and insult me since then and I’m at pains to understand why I should be showing you even the slightest consideration.

I’m following you around? This thread is at the top of the page. I shouldn’t comment on it and your participation in it? You are hijacking the shit out of it, if you hadn’t noticed. So go ahead, please, fuck with my username like any 12 year old would do. It will only make you look petty and small. Your username would certainly lend itself to easy mockery, something I haven’t descended to no matter how idiotic I find you. But please, by all means, abandon the civility you claim you so treasure as a conservative value. Call me a cunt, even. Go on, it’ll make you feel so… liberal.

[Starving_Artist]

@Rubystreak

Call me a cunt, even. Go on, it’ll make you feel so… liberal.

Nah, even that wouldn’t do it. It’d just make me feel like a scuzzbug.

Oh, wait…

[Rubystreak]

@Starving_Artist

Nah, even that wouldn’t do it. It’d just make me feel like a scuzzbug.

Oh, wait…

You are a class act.

[Starving_Artist]

Thank you, darling.

[FinnAgain]

@Starving_Artist

And Finn, I don’t agree about Johnny Carson.

That’s fine, I don’t think I’ve ever posted anything about him on the Dope.

@Starving Artist

I asked why the board’s liberal membership wasn’t up in arms over the OP’s use of a word the liberals have been telling us (via politically correct speech) that demeans and dehumanizes women and is second only to the n-word in offensiveness.

But that’s the point. Why should the board’s membership be up in arms because someone other bunch of people, who also happen to be liberals, would be up in arms? You’d have a point if Poster X said that the word “cunt” should never be used, and then read this thread and didn’t object because it was Plain who was being insulted. You wouldn’t even have a point if Poster X said that the word “cunt” should never be used, but had never seen this thread in the first place.

As it is, you’re essentially taking Poster X to task, whether or not he actually believes that the word “cunt” should never be used, become some other people who happen to be liberals (or the entire media, or whatever), present the idea that the word "cunt’ should never be used.

Yes, some liberal posters here might have flamed you for calling Hillary a cunt. Then again, some liberal posters here called Hillary a cunt, themselves.. Some couldn’t care less if you called Hillary or Palin a cunt. If you have a problem with certain individual posters, then it’s proper to take up the problem with them, and not anybody who happens to share their politics to a certain degree.

There’s a reason why I’ve pointed out that that’s fallacious fungibility.

Let’s put it another way. Let’s say that, tomorrow, I decide that I’m a liberal. However, I still don’t see anything wrong with the word “cunt” and wouldn’t have a problem if anybody used it in general unless they were insulting someone who was my friend, and then I wouldn’t care if they used the word “cunt” or “asshole” or “nudlick”, it’d only be the insult directed at a friend that I cared about.

Okay, that’s the situation for the sake of argument.
Now in this alternate universe, am I a nasty hypocrite become someone else who is also a liberal treated you poorly, perhaps even without my knowledge?