The bigger problem in America surrounding the Duck Dynasty hysteria

[alp227]

Back in the 2008 campaign, Obama got a lot of flak for his comment about working-class Americans: "They get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." You could tell how correct he was by how annoyed the right wingers got.

Reading the meltdown in the comments section at the Variety.com report about the Duck Dynasty cast member being suspended makes me wonder. These armchair patriots whose idea of American values is masturbating to Duck Dynasty and "I can typing" FREESPEECHFREESPEECHFREESPEECH in any comments section regarding a controversy over racism, homophobia, etc. are really annoying and clueless and full of cognitive dissonance.

These pseudo-patriotic zombies say "let the free market decide" in decrying things like Obamacare or business regulations.

And then when the A&E channel (which abandoned its original mission as a cable version of PBS what, 10 years ago?) decides to follow what the free market would go and discipline Phil Robertson, these same zombies go argleblargleblegh IT'S A LIBERAL CONSPIRACY TO SILENCE THE CHRISTIANS AND TAKE AWAY THEIR FREE SPEECH!!!!!111!!!!!!

Oh yeah, don't forget the JAQing off of "WHERE'S THE LIBS' TOLERANCE FOR US?"...they expect their bigotry to be tolerated too without understanding what tolerance means. They can't admit they believe that gay people are inferior to straight people, so they have no choice but cloak it in concern trolling.

The brutal truth is? Ignorance and being narrow-minded are "patriotic" American values.

Sigh. Why couldn't the South have just seceded back in the 1860s so the Yankees could build a nation based on Enlightenment values while the Confederates could have a big theocracy all to themselves?

But really. What we're seeing here is a freakin' BRAIN DRAIN. You've heard of the nickname "idiot box" for television, right? Well, add the Duck Dynasty fans' hysteria as a contextual example in the idiom dictionary.

Remember. The Texas Republican Party actually OPPOSES higher-order thinking being taught in public schools. I'm not talking about Chuck Baldwin's loony fringe party, I'm talking about the party of mainstream politicians like Ted Cruz, Steve Stockman, and Rick Perry. And Bobby Jindal, the governor of the Duck Dynasty boys' home state of Louisiana, is alright with intelligent design being taught in his state's public schools.

The thing is that modern Americans are actively afraid of even thinking about other points of view and weighing the evidence other than what they've been indoctrinated in. That is why homophobia, creationism, and other forms of bigotry and crankery thrive. Do you know why websites like Campus Reform exist to whine about "liberal professors"? Do you know why Duck Dynasty fans are cool with Phil Robertson's "othering" of gays? Do you know why right wingers are so afraid of education? I think you do now.

[villager]

1. The first couple comments in the LA Times post on the subject...

...gets right to the Jewish media conspiracy.

Of course.

What is with these hysterical, deranged, always-posting rightwingers?

[alp227]

24. Looks like that comment has been deleted.

Of course no surprise that anti-Semitic types would watch such garbage as Duck Dynasty.

Now, the top comment on the LAT article is:

Conservative logic: 1. TV star says things offensive to people of category x. 2. Some people of category x complain about it. 3. Controversy-shy TV company--not the government--sends star to his room for some quiet time. 4. Conservatives denouce not the TV company but people of category x and very disingenously claim his free speech rights have been violated when they haven't been.

[Kurovski]

2. Yes, but what does GOD say about all this?

Aha, see? Yep. Tha's it now. mmm-hmmm'. Where's God's OP, alp?

K&R

[yeoman6987]

10. Duck Dynasty

I have watched the show once. It was ok but nothing Earth shattering. I thought it was a silly show. As far as Phil's comments, as a gay man, I could care less what he thinks. I don't know why people are saying the show is done. If Phil leaves the show, they still have four sons to carry it on. When shows get so popular, eventually they fall. After four years of nothing but Duck Dynasty on the media, it was time for them to begin the fade. Look at Mad Men, Kate plus 8, True Blood and so many others where people could not stop talking about the shows, they normally fade out eventually. It was way past time for Duck Dynasty to stop being a front page story. I am not talking about their current story, but every time you turned on an entertainment type news show, there they were. It was getting overwhelming anyway. Glad to see them go down as a blip in our entertainment history.

[sendero]

11. Yes..

.... I find they whole DD thing amusing. I've never seen the show, never will. I had never even heard of it until a few months ago and then suddenly it was EVERYWHERE and I mean EVERYWHERE.

There are all kinds of "bubbles". There are financial bubbles, real estate bubbles and entertainment bubbles. this bubble just popped. In 2 years nobody will give two shits about DD but I wonder if the principals get that. Probably not, they felt they had earned the right to spew bilious bigotry with impunity.

Time to go back into your holes of obscurity folks.

[jtuck004]

3. And as long as we keep fighting each other, the corporations rule. n/t

[JI7]

7. what does that even mean ?

[bettyellen]

8. that this kind of cultural infighting among us rabble is fostered by the powers that be in order to

keep the focus off them, and how they are screwing ALL of us over. I was first introduced to this concept by peace activists I met in Northern Ireland. They pointed out that it was largely the poor fighting the poor over there, dying in the streets- and it kept the poor communities too occupied to advocate for themselves while they wealthy were busy exploiting all of em.

[jtuck004]

9. Thank you. I couldn't have put it better. n/t

[sendero]

12. I do believe...

..... that is the game plan and god knows it is working quite well.

[Kurovski]

13. Because...we never go after the 1% online or in life?

I'm not sorry to say that I'm going after proud homophobes and racists. People who are on the right who are blinded homophobes already think my ideas about the financial mess we all live in are ideas based in "Commie-Socialism". They are lost to history and confusion already.

Plenty of conservatives get what's going on. Some have even joined DU.

I do however hate it when we argue endlessly right here about say...our Gods, or how differing levels of awareness of this issue or that one are not quite up to the outrage they SHOULD be, etc, "purity levels", perhaps.

Wha...

Edited to say: I also actually agree that there is a plan to "divide and conquer" and it has been around as long as media, and has gone full-bore since at least FDR. It has been discussed on DU over the years. The meduia's red-state, Blue state "concept" just screams of division. So there you have it.

edited again: Who is that "macho-valley-ann" guy anyways?

[bettyellen]

14. it was a revelation at the time- the skewed press coverage, the increased surveillance and abuses

by local police were all really bad over there, and yet to be seen in the USA. They called it "keeping croppy down" , croppy being the poor farmers.

[Coyotl]

18. Only people rule. All agency is human actors.

Corporation influence humans. Government also does absolutely noting, on humans are the actors with actual agency. Government and corporations are collectives of human actors.

[Sky Masterson]

4. It's only a matter of time before someone on that show drops the N word.

.

[warrant46]

5. I'm sure that word gets dropped a lot

When these subhumanoids are out of camera range

[Coyotl]

19. They edit that shit out, no doubt.

[chervilant]

6. Almost half of our adult population

is functionally illiterate. Our math (and science) skills are in the toilet. Why are we surprised when our M$M propaganda -- served with a healthy dollop of Bernays sauce -- works so effectively?

[Blue_Tires]

15. and call me a cynic, but I must wonder

if this whole publicity stunt was engineered, and what's his name intentionally spewed out inflammatory bullshit in that interview just for a publicity and ratings bump...It has happened before, you know....

[Sissyk]

21. +1

Especially when A&E's website still has the show going forward Jan 15th. Nothing about the show has been taken down. Only about Phil who I think is tired of doing the show. The boys are not and want it to continue.

It was a "planned, sit-down interview". It was pretty much scripted.

To bad he's not the Pope. He could keep his job.

[AlinPA]

16. "Ignorance and being narrow-minded are "patriotic" American values." This is a GOP

principle.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

17. The bigger problem is the deliberate dumbing down of America

Twenty years ago, Republicans were pointing to A&E as the reason that PBS was unnecessary. It imported a lot of British and Australian dramas and comedies and had regular arts programming.

Then, just around the time GW Bush came into office (I just checked the Wikipedia entry--it was 2002), new management came in, and one by one, the intelligent programs disappeared, to be replaced by the dumbest, crudest, reality shows the owners could find.

See the Wikipedia article for a list of what A&E used to produce:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A&E_%28TV_channel%29#1984.E2.80.932002

It is only one of the cable channels that has gone to the dogs as the six major media companies continue on their quest to make Americans dumber.

The last straw for me was when BBC America began filling its prime time with Star Trek: The Next Generation reruns and Dancing with the Stars reruns.

I am now a happily cable-free viewer who watches the best of worldwide and classic television and movies on Netflix, Hulu Plus, and a few other services available on the Roku; DVDs, and PBS broadcasts.

[Coyotl]

20. Watch the film "Stupidity" if you can get a copy.

[redqueen]

22. "Sigh. Why couldn't the South have just seceded back in the 1860s so the Yankees

Why couldn't the South have just seceded back in the 1860s so the Yankees could build a nation based on Enlightenment values?"

[IdaBriggs]

23. Louisiana is a "Right to Work State" which means the actor

doesn't have "union protections" so his actions off the job can be used to determine whether his employer wants to fire him or not (especially because they are "pretending" he is just being himself/that is the character he is selling).

I believe part of the problem is that people forget this "reality show" is basically scripted. If the actor/participants don't present the "right image", they get replaced/fired.

Welcome to America's "Right to Work" ethos; what you do "off the job" does matter, and you can get fired for it.

I don't know why someone thinks that insulting the boss or members of the boss's family (since most people are related to gay people) is a way to stay employed. DUMB. And thankfully, in this case, a firing offense.

Go, A&E! At last some of these laws finally pay off - did these morons not realize they would be used against them, too?



Suck it up.