|
February 26, 2007
The Teh offensive
I don't know how I manage to get dragged into these things, and I don't know who is to blame. (It's not as if anyone makes me click these links.) But anyway, there I was, minding my own business and trying to read this piece about Muqtada al Sadr which Glenn Reynolds had linked. What Glenn says is true; Muqtada al Sadr does not like the surge (good!) and he is holed up in an undisclosed location (good in a way, but it's bad that they can't find him and take him out!) Anyway, as I was mulling all this over, I reached the bottom of the piece and then over on the right I saw some Huffington Post links. I probably should have just left this well enough alone, but when I saw the words "Jerry Falwell on Global Warming: It's a Myth," I couldn't stop myself. Hell, it's just a little click, right? Wrong. It was a click on the road to hell! For, I soon discovered to my horror that not only were gays implicated in the Falwellian assessment of Global Warming, but they were partnered with some strange new force I had not seen before -- the force of Teh! According to David Roberts, Falwell believes that the "nefarious secret agenda of the global warming crowd" is meant to thwart "Teh Gay" hatred: ...to redirect the church's focus, distracting it from its core mission of hating Teh Gay.Global Warming is intended to distract the church from hating "Teh Gay"? Who or what is Teh Gay? How come I'd never been told about this before? Determined to find out, I went directly to Google, and found out that indeed there is a phenomenon called "Teh Gay" -- with a viable presence well known for years. According to the Urban Dictionary, there are two meanings: 1. The non-existant malady that one cathces by being around homosexuals (males especially).Sorry but "cathces"? In a dictionary? This word mutilation stuff must be cathcing. Lots of bloggers have written about Teh Gay, in posts such as "Where Teh Gay Originates," and it's in wide enough circulation that Kevin Drum used it to title a post (although his more clueless commenters kept asking repeatedly what "teh gay" meant). It means a lot of things, and some of them are worse than you can imagine. For example, Satan is teh gay, and the GOP are the Defenders of teh Gay. (Does that mean teh GOP defends Satan? Or just teh concept of teh Gay satan?) If you're really into the nuances, Snopes has a long discussion. Basically it's an imputation of stupidity and bigotry via a gratuitously imputed spelling error. I was so fascinated by all of this that I just had to watch Falwell's anti-global warming rant. (See how out of hand things can get when you dare click on a link?) Anyway, it was disappointing, and there was Not One Mention of Gay. Or Teh. Or Teh Gay. No Teh Homos either. Just a few words about how the church would be distracted from its focus on morality. While doubtless that morality would include his typical pulpit condemnations of homosexuality, I watched the video closely and saw no signs of gay -- "teh" or otherwise. This screenshot accurately sums up what he said: It goes without saying that I'm far from happy with Falwell. By expressing skepticism, he's probably doing more to win over the skeptics to Al Gore's side than Al ever could (especially considering the latter's conspicuous consumption and carnivorous gluttony). Why can't he get with the program like Pat Robertson? That way, we few remaining genocidal libertarian skeptics could at least point to the "religious right" in the hope of swaying maybe a few members of the emotionally hysterical left. (I hope I didn't commit a triple redundancy there.) The worst part of this is that because I clicked on a couple of links I should never have clicked on, I now find myself in the embarrassing position of defending Jerry Falwell. The fact is, he said nothing about gays in the global warming remarks. So the Teh Gay business in this case has turned out to be an imputation of bigotry via a nonexistent spelling error involving a topic that wasn't there. This Teh meme is obviously very powerful stuff. It's not only blowing up the meaning of words, it's blowing up the meaning of language that isn't there. I'm wondering though, why the haste to have Falwell blame Teh Gay? Couldn't the problem just as easily be "teh Global Warming"? I should have stuck with Muqtada al Sadr. Or maybe his allies from Teh ran. MORE: Wikipedia has an entry on the teh phenomenon. It's a leet thing. (u wunt undrtsd.) posted by Eric on 02.26.07 at 11:41 PM
Comments
I wouldn't know. My little brain is already too fried to speculate about what Glenn "realizes." (But I guess what Glenn realizes is none of his business.) Eric Scheie · February 27, 2007 12:11 AM Post a comment
You may use basic HTML for formatting.
|
|
February 2007
WORLD-WIDE CALENDAR
Search the Site
E-mail
Classics To Go
Archives
February 2007
January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003 August 2003 July 2003 June 2003 May 2003 May 2002 See more archives here Old (Blogspot) archives
Recent Entries
Latest Medal of Honor Recipient
Conflating Nazism with Islam? red-and-blue divided by guns-and-race = new collusion? Sandmonkey On Jailed Egyptian Blogger The Teh offensive Obsession at NYU Number one cause? Lets You And Him Fight My merciless attack on untreated hoplophobes Dead blogging the Oscars II
Links
Site Credits
|
|
Eventually Glenn Reynolds is going to realize that it was George W. Bush who put al-Sadr in power. That should fry his little lawyer brain.