# Why I can't just laugh Ann Coulter off **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 8, 2005, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320 "2005-04-08T01:04:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![pokey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ebca7d/32.png) [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/41 "2005-04-08T15:17:38Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#): > > That’s why (semantic quibbling aside) I was thrilled to see her sputtering around on our very own CBC. If anyone can reduce her to openmouthed speechlessness and bemusement, I’m all for it; having it be the Mother Corp. is just a special treat. One thing that’s nagged at me since that show aired: If it’s so obvious to people outside the states that the likes of Ann Coulter and her whole ilk are borderline-obscene cartoon figures with absolutely no knowledge of what they’re talking about, and if we see them more as a bizarre and freakish byproduct of a dangerous, degrading circus of a US media, why do people on this board talk about her like she’s real? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/42 "2005-04-08T15:25:54Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > How do you determine, precisely, that Anne Coulter is just wacky fun, but Susan Sontag was deadly earnest? I’m genuinely curious, because I’ve never seen any indication that she’s being the least bit tongue in cheek. > > And comparing her to P.J. O’Rourke is downright insulting to P.J. Actually, forget Sontag. Michael Moore specifically defines himself as a satirist. So far as I know, Anne Coulter has never claimed to be anything other than a serious journalist and political pundit. And yet you, **Rune** , claim that he “actually means it” when he calls Americans stupid, but when Coulter calls all liberals traitors, it’s “great fun.” How are Coulter’s statements more defensible than Moore’s? How are they more “fun”? ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/43 "2005-04-08T15:28:00Z")
Ann Coulter is not simple good natured fun. Fun never made me feel the same way. Ann Coulter gives me the same feeling I get when I step in dogshit. Itchy and Scratchy are fun. Ann Coulter is dog shit. Sorry I can’t come up with any great insights or astounding wit, I gotta go scrape my shoes off again. ---
**Author:** ![davenportavenger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f8ce5/32.png) [@davenportavenger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davenportavenger)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/44 "2005-04-08T15:51:28Z")
If Ann Coulter registered on this board and started posting her columns in Great Debates, she’d get banned in a week. And this board puts up with a lot. ---
**Author:** ![askeptic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb9ed0/32.png) [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/45 "2005-04-08T16:11:50Z")
> [@Atticus Finch](#): > > No argument that he’s a murderer, of course, but Walker Lindh isn’t. He was in the Taliban, which is morally reprehensible, but not illegal. Not true. The U.S. Constitution states: “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.” [Walker Lindh was sentenced to 20 years in prison as part of an agreement reached in July under which he pled guilty to one count of supplying services to the Taliban and a criminal information charge that he carried a rifle and two hand grenades while fighting against the U.S.-backed Northern Alliance.](http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/people/shows/walker/profile.html) ---
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/46 "2005-04-08T16:26:03Z")
Zeus’s balls! Listen, folks: There’s no one in the world like Ann. Including Ann. She’s a professional absurdist. An actress you don’t notice is acting because you don’t see the stage. I don’t doubt she’s conservative by nature, but her shtick, her hook, is to distort conservative views into absurdly exaggerated abstractions. In a perfect word, it would be high satire. Instead, we have people agreeing with her, others appalled by her, and all them fool enough to take her seriously. She must sit by herself each night and just giggle hysterically at whole thing. Any yeah, she’s a babe. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/47 "2005-04-08T16:35:09Z")
> [@Rune](#): > > She’s fun. It’s deliberately exaggerated, hyperbole. She’s the slightly hysterical O’Rourke on speed. It isn’t meant to be taken as gods own gospel. Don’t be such bores. It’s all great fun. No way. O’Rourke is funny w/o being mean, and he never takes himself too seriously. Coulter is just plain mean spirited. She WANTS to upset people and knows she sells more books that way. I have a special dislike for her because she is, in fact, very intelligent but uses that intelligence to deceive and deliberately try to divide the country along partisan lines. I can’t think of anyone on the left who is as bad as she is. She is, quite simply, a despicable human being. As for Bill Maher, I have heard him say that Coulter is a good friend of his. I’ve never heard him say “best friend”, but definitely good friend. Go figure… ---
**Author:** ![THespos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8c91f0/32.png) [@THespos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/THespos)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/48 "2005-04-08T17:15:49Z")
> [@Little Nemo](#): > > I don’t mind what Ann Coulter says. There are crazy people all over the place. What disturbs me is that she has an audience. Yeah, that’s kind of disturbing to me as well. It’s not just the run-of-the-mill wingnuts in her audience, it’s the folks in the mainstream media who fish her blog for story ideas who bug me. (IIRC, she was one of the first high-level bloggers to start casting doubt on the authenticity of the Schiavo memo…and then the avalanche started.) ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/49 "2005-04-08T18:07:29Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > **spectrum** , Ann Coulter, **Evil Captor** - different audience, otherwise much the same. > > The occasional good point buried in meters of spiteful bullshit. Do you really think that’s a reasonable comparison? Even supposing you find a particular Coulter-esque quote from **spectrum** , say, “All Bush voters are racist homophobes”, do you think that’s his honest opinion, one he’s going to endorse in the cold light of day, or is that just something he said in a moment of heated frustration while arguing on internet message board? Whereas, AC not only seems to truly believe that all liberals are traitors, she believes so so much that she wrote a book about it! And was that book ignored and basically laughed off the shelves? NO! It’s a best seller! And she has huge numbers of fans! THAT is the difference. I’m not saying that no person exists in the world who’s the leftist equivalent of AC. I’m saying no one exists in public life who’s the leftist equivalent of AC, at least, no one nearly as famous. Note that while there’s quite a bit of ranting against AC on the SDMB, there’s far less against, say, Michael Savage, who is (unbelievably enough) even WORSE than her. Why? Because he’s a lot less popular and less prominent. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/50 "2005-04-08T18:24:40Z")
> [@Rune](#): > > Don’t be such bores. It’s all great fun. Yeah, why would we possibly be so touchy about cute little teasing that we’re insulted when someone calls us TRAITORS. Where I come from that’s an incredibly ugly insult, trailing only “child molestor”. Gee, can’t we take a joke? I mean, not that it IS a joke, as there’s never a punch line, and neither she nor her fans ever says a single word to indicate that she’s anything less than totally serious, but c’mon, people are always making fun of Republicans for having no rhythm… how is this any different? > [@](#): > > The difference between her and the lefts bullshit is the left actually mean it. If she DOESN’T actually mean it, then what precisely is motivating her? Is she just making it all up, just for the money? That’s reprehensible and, frankly, evil. Is she a relatively sane conservative who somehow thinks that the best way to promote her agenda is by basically trolling? Is she a liberal who is engaged in some kind of extremist long term political street theatre? I mean, say what you want about Michael Moore, but few doubt his basic sincerity… > [@](#): > > You think Ward Churchill was snickering when he did the Eichmann thing? What I think is that if there was a thread about him, you wouldn’t see liberals coming in and saying “aww, c’mon, laugh it off… sure, he insulted your dead relatives by comparing them to nazis but he didn’t MEAN it, can’t you take a joke?” (And for the record, I think he’s a detestable little shit.) > [@](#): > > You think M. Moore was giggling when he said Americans were dumb as batshit? I don’t know the context of that quote, but I somehow don’t remember him publishing a book entitled “Americans are dumb as batshit”. (Note, also, that that’s a NONpartisan statement.) > [@](#): > > Susan _“The white race is the cancer of human history; it is the white race and it alone”_ Sontag didn’t mean every single word exactly as she said them? Noam Pol-Pot Chomsky. etc. etc. Again, when did either of them write a book entitled “Republicans are Rapists”? And when did it become a best seller? And how are either of them, and their position in the current political discourse, even remotely comparable to AC? > [@](#): > > The truth is, when it comes to crazy hateful bile, nothing can touch you peace loving liberals. Wide brush, much? Please point me towards a single example of crazy hateful bile I’ve EVER spewed. Seriously. I don’t think of myself as a crazy hateful bilespewer, and if I am, I’d like to be made aware of it. > [@](#): > > And the Bush=Hitler, Republican=Fascist, Israel=Nazis you see everywhere - many threads here on SDMB with just such comments. Uh? That isn’t hateful? In what way is Ann’s drivel worse than that? Two things: (1) No matter how bad the things are that people say about Bush, that’s a far cry from saying things about republicans in general. Bush is insulted a HUGE amount on the SDMB. Maybe even more than he deserves. Some of it is over the top. But “Bush is a lot like Hitler” is nowhere near as bad a statement as “republicans are rapists”. One is an insult aimed at a specific person, a public figure; one is slurring 50% of the population with one of the nastiest slurs that exists (2) Again, whatever things people say when they’re arguing on the SDMB and angry, they aren’t going out, writing entire books with that slur as their premise, having those books become bestsellers, and then being viewed as just as respectable as Al Franken ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/51 "2005-04-08T18:27:24Z")
I was listening to Al Franken about an hour ago as I drove around doing errands. He’s no Ann Coulter. Sure, he called Rush Limbaugh “despicable,” but c’mon, he kinda has a point. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/52 "2005-04-08T18:38:54Z")
Franken is a pussycat. The other thing that bothers me about Coulter is that I probably agree with her politics at least 80% of the time. But I just \*\*\*cringe \*\*\*at the arguments she uses to defend her positions. She’s also a really bad liar-- ie. it’s so obvious when she’s lying, and it’s so obvious that she KNOWS she’s lying. Blehhhh!! ---
**Author:** ![litost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@litost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/litost)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/53 "2005-04-08T18:40:06Z")
Ann Coulter and her audience dispel the notion that somehow the Democratic contingent in the US is more suffused with partisan hate/dislike than the Republican contingent. (Sidenote: I feel the Dem contingent is frankly not angry or articulate enough.) ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/54 "2005-04-08T18:44:31Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > THAT is the difference. I’m not saying that no person exists in the world who’s the leftist equivalent of AC. I’m saying no one exists in public life who’s the leftist equivalent of AC, at least, no one nearly as famous. Be careful making statements like this. I sure don’t want to make this any kind of “your side is worse” pissing contest, but the fact is that there are prominent enough nutcases on both sides. Cynthia McKinney is nuttier than a Stuckey’s log, and a bigot on top of that. And she’s arguably worse than Ann Coulter, in that she’s an elected official and can do genuine damage in addition to stirring the shitpot. I wouldn’t dream of saying the whole Democratic Party or all liberals are tainted by her example, yet there she is in the Democratic caucus in the House. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/55 "2005-04-08T18:50:56Z")
> [@litost](#): > > (Sidenote: I feel the Dem contingent is frankly not angry or articulate enough.) Well, out of curiosity I’ve listened to some Air America over the last week–and apart from Franken, I find most of them to be very distasteful. They’re illogical, and they talk over callers, and they start hyperventilating in the middle of making points, and their humor is mostly meanspirited and inaccurate mockery of conservatives, and it’s all just pathetic. Franken’s pretty great, though. The segment I listened to was him talking to a Limbaugh fan, having the Limbaugh fan listen to a segment of Rush saying that Jimmy Carter was ineffective in the third world and just acted like he cared, like a typical liberal. Franken asked the fan for his feedback, and the fan said that the sentiment was overall correct. Franken then gave like a five-minute diatribe listing some of Carter’s greatest hits in Africa (helping to reduce river-blindness disease by over 99%, negotiating ceasefires in country that allowed for children to be vaccinated against polio, building hundreds of houses in impoverished communities, etc.), and finished by asking the fan how he could possibly defened Limbaugh. “Well,” the guy said, “You know, Jimmy Carter’s not a saint, and…” “Sure!” interrupted Franken. “And I’m the first to call Carter on it when he declares himself a saint. ‘I’m a saint,’ Carter’s always saying at public speeches, and I call him on it, because he’s NOT. Excellent point!” See, that’s my kind of political humor: deadpan sarcasm that underscores when someone’s trying to obfuscate the issue. He wasn’t yelling, he wasn’t adopting a Southern accent to mock someone’s stupidity, he wasn’t making broad generalizations aobut conservatives; he was just addressing the issue at hand in a clever fashion. Would that there were more conservative humor along those lines. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/56 "2005-04-08T18:53:07Z")
> [@Mr. Moto](#): > > Cynthia McKinney is nuttier than a Stuckey’s log, and a bigot on top of that. And she’s arguably worse than Ann Coulter, in that she’s an elected official and can do genuine damage in addition to stirring the shitpot. Do you _really_ think Cynthia McKinney is nearly as famous as Ann Coulter? I’d be astonished to find out that that’s true. If we’re going to go as far down the fame spectrum as McKinney, I imagine I can dig up one or two conservatives that make McKinney look like a Three Musketeers. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/57 "2005-04-08T18:55:59Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Do you really think that’s a reasonable comparison? Yes, I do. > [@MaxTheVool](#): > > Even supposing you find a particular Coulter-esque quote from **spectrum** , say, “All Bush voters are racist homophobes”, do you think that’s his honest opinion…? Yes, I do. At least as much as Ann Coulter. Of course, I think Ann Coulter is sometimes trolling. Making the same accusation against another Doper is a violation of board policy, so I assume the afore-mentioned twits are serious when they post as they do. I assume you missed **Evil Captor** ’s (or maybe it was **Stoid** or another of the Usual Suspects) thread that Republicans are racists by virtue of their membership in the party. One letter off from “rapist”, but close enough. I realize you are trying your usual "conservatives use over-generalizations and liberals don’t"shtick, but still. Some morons, fools, and sociopaths are on the Left, some are on the Right. You’re kidding yourself if you think one side is worse than the other. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Debaser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3da27b/32.png) [@Debaser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Debaser)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/58 "2005-04-08T18:59:48Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > I don’t know the context of that quote, but I somehow don’t remember him publishing a book entitled “Americans are dumb as batshit”. (Note, also, that that’s a NONpartisan statement.) Well, he did publish a book called “[Stupid White Men](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060392452/qid=1112986701/sr=2-6/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_6/103-3607833-9955861)”. I also think it’s fair to call it partisan since it’s pretty obvious which political persuasion he is talking about. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/59 "2005-04-08T18:59:41Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Of course, I think Ann Coulter is sometimes trolling. Making the same accusation against another Doper is a violation of board policy, so I assume the afore-mentioned twits are serious when they post as they do. > > I assume you missed **Evil Captor** ’s (or maybe it was **Stoid** or another of the Usual Suspects) thread that Republicans are racists by virtue of their membership in the party. Interestingly, conservatives who make egregiously insulting statements about their political opponents get a lot more accolades from other conservatives than liberals who make egregiously insulting statements about their political opponents. Why is that? Why does Ann Coulter have a reach that **spectrum** can never hope to get? Is it because evil is sexy? Daniel ---
**Author:** ![litost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c4cdca/32.png) [@litost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/litost)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2005, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320/60 "2005-04-08T19:03:38Z")
> [@Left Hand of Dorkness](#): > > Well, out of curiosity I’ve listened to some Air America over the last week–and apart from Franken, I find most of them to be very distasteful. They’re illogical, and they talk over callers, and they start hyperventilating in the middle of making points, and their humor is mostly meanspirited and inaccurate mockery of conservatives, and it’s all just pathetic. > > Daniel Spot on. Not that conservative humor/satire is any better but they are the ones in power and all they have to continue to do is be organized, have all the “cadres” spout the same spiel, get the Dem contingent riled up but since the Dems have failed at being articulate, they look incoherent and in comparison worse. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-i-cant-just-laugh-ann-coulter-off/298320.md?page=4)