So the lovely and talented Bill O’Reilly of Fox news has had a bug in his butt about single women voters for a while now — at least since he ran across a Gallup poll a couple months back showing that single women as a group overwhemlingly support Obama.
So last night he sent a “reporter” out to investigate these strange creatures. Or at least those representatives of the single female demographic that happened to be wearing skimpy and/or silly Halloween costumes.
Amanda Marcotte offers a few thoughts about the segment in a post on Slate.
Here’s an equally “fair and balanced” look at the world of single male voters.
At least when the Daily Show does their mock ups of the man on the street, they do so by mocking everyone-not just attractive young women who happen to be out on a night of socialization.
@princessbonbon: That’s what the conservatives ALWAYS get wrong about comedy. They seem to think that since liberals (as represented by centrists like Jon Stewart) poke fun at conservatives, they ought to be able to poke fun at liberals.
They just don’t get that it’s comedians’ jobs to poke fun at PEOPLE IN POWER and people who do things that are stupid and senseless. Poking fun at people with no power, or making fun of the person and not their mockable behaviour, is not satire, it’s just mean.
And it’s hardly the comedians’ fault that conservatives do SO MANY things that are stupid and senseless.
It’s the mindset. In the RightWing Authoritarian mindset, the worst thing you can do is laugh at authority. The authority laughs at people wiht no power? That’s the way it’s supposed to be.
Their entire mindset is geared around worship of those at the top. They literally cannot comprehend why you would punch up, not down. If they could understand that, well… all the conservatives I’ve known who had a good sense of humor eventually had that bit of humanity leak out over everything else, and it made it exceedingly difficult for them to remain conservatives.
Those that managed it had to lose the humor.
(the humorless make the best conservatives…)
I actually think that statement pretty much sums up why conservatives have been saying that President Obama is the worst ever and ohmygod he is awful because liberals were pointing out that President Bush was pretty fucking horrible with proof to back it up. What proof do conservatives have? Their own policies that he keeps enacting?
And conservative humor always seems mean to me-because it is the powerful beating up the powerless which is pretty mean. I have never been a fan of humiliation comedy and almost all of theirs is that way.
I think I’ve linked this blog before, but if you ever need kitten pics, here’s a place to go:
http://www.theittybittykittycommittee.com/
It’s a blog about foster kittens. Right now the second post has “alumni” pictures of a couple of fluffy tabby points and OMG they’re the prettiest cats I ever saw!
I was actually expecting to see a bit more actual conservative humor when Obama took office, since they could then poke fun at the people in power. And yet, no. I honestly can’t think of a single bit of funny conservative comedy from the entire term.
The other weird thing is that, when conservatives try to do comedy, their timing and delivery are also really bad (remember the 1/2 Hour News Hour?). What does that have to do with political views?
There’s a small error in the first sentence of this post:
“So the lovely and talented Bill O’Reilly of Fox news has had a bug in his butt about
singlewomenvotersfor a while now…”Fixed it.
Great. There went years and years of trying very hard NOT to remember the 1/2 Hour News Hour.
Thanks. /snark
But yeah, their timing is awful most of the time. What’s up with that?
I haz a depressed:
http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_long_con/print
I completely forgot the Half-Hour News Hour. Wasn’t it all BO jokes and photoshops of Nancy Pelosi in witch hats? Blargh.
I dunno, maybe it’s for the same reason that conservatives are completely incapable of grasping the concept of “scansion”?
princessbonbon, that is not “I haz a depressed” material in my book – that is high-octane nightmare fuel.
No wonder those “This coffee bean burns fat!” or “Cut 75% off your electricity bill! Learn how to do it – before the government shuts it down!” have a conspiratorial air to them – they’re targeting the people who’ve been scared into parting with their money.
I’ve always wondered who actually buys that crap.
So, I’m wondering. Since liberals have more power in the EU than they do in the US, do they have funnier conservatives?
I have to talk these people who buy this crap into voting and the problem is that when you tell the truth, they just take that as evidence that the lie is the actual truth.
I read the Long Con, and I remember all the adds and sponsored products I saw when I ventured into the deep abyss of the right-wing online newsmedia (for lols, of course). They do seem to make a living preying on the true believers, and I guess it makes sense for the politicians to be similar.
It reminds me of when I read Altemeyer’s book on right-wing authoritarians, where he mentions that they tend not to be very good at telling when someone is just saying what they want to hear.
Since it affirms what they already “know” it seems to be perfectly reasonable. Which is why I still have a hard time convincing my conservative colleagues that Stephen Colbert is simply a parody act.
Yep. O’Reilly’s take on the “…women in binders” was equally shitty:
http://www.newshounds.us/bill_o_reilly_s_condescending_paternalistic_and_dismissive_response_to_binders_full_of_women_backlash_10192012
This time, the comments section doesn’t make me want to vomit.
In short, he’s an asshole.
@princessbonbon- I have such a hard time believing that, even though I know logically it’s true. I just feel like every week the mask slips further and further down his face…
I used to have a hard time believing it myself but considering all the other silliness they believe, it has become simply too easy.
Wow, I am astonished that there are people who think Colbert is serious! And then I remember the existence of Fox News.
The Best O’Reilly clip I ever saw was Scott (crap, I forgot his name, the weapons inspector) take him apart in the run-up to the War in Iraq.
The best thing I ever saw about Colbert was someone trying to figure him out and coming to the idea that Colbert was a Real Conservative, pretending to be a Lieberal, playing a Fake Conservative, so the other Lieberals would be exposed to THE TRUTH, in a form they could understand.
He was a fifth columnist.
It came to me. Scott Ritter.
After watching that, millions of old, sexually frustrated assholes in middle America are mad that young women get to vote.
@Mikey – good! They’ll die off soon, anyway.