Why I'm not a 'South Park Conservative', by Michelle Malkin

Townhall.com ^ | May 4, 2005 | Michelle Malkin

[OESY]

I'll get to First Lady Laura Bush's bawdy stand-up routine in a minute. But I want to highlight a related new book out about how young conservatives are shaking up the dominant liberal media culture. It's called "South Park Conservatives." My name is listed on the cover along with many other (mostly) right-leaning pundits, websites, and bloggers, but I must confess to having mixed feelings about the honor.

The best-selling book's author, Brian C. Anderson of the Manhattan Institute, writes a fun, breezy survey documenting the rise of talk radio, FOX News, the Internet, conservative publishing, and college Republican activism. Anderson's chapter on the success of conservative talk radio and the abysmal failure of liberal Air America to replicate it is incisive. Another chapter on the blogosphere (alone worth the price of the book) gives readers a useful history of the explosion of news, opinion, and political websites that have smashed the left-wing media monopoly.

But how did such a wide-ranging list of individuals and organizations -- Anderson's book cover includes the names of conservative-leaning Internet pioneer Matt Drudge and center-left journalist Mickey Kaus, the libertarian Tech Central Station, the culturally conservative WorldNetDaily, political upstart Arnold Schwarzenegger and political chameleon Andrew Sullivan, plus Ann Coulter, Laura Ingraham, and myself, along with a feature blurb from Jonah Goldberg -- all get lumped under the umbrella term "South Park Conservatives"?

Anderson argues that Comedy Central's cartoon series "South Park" embodies the "fiercely anti-liberal comedic spirit" of the "new media" from Kaus to Coulter. The cartoon, he writes, reflects a "post-liberal counterculture" that is "particularly appealing to the young, however much it might offend older conservatives."

Well, I'm 34 and no fan of "South Park." I have many good friends who are indeed huge boosters of the show, but I find that the characters' foul language overwhelms any entertainment I might otherwise derive from the show's occasional, right-leaning iconoclastic themes.

"South Park" may be "politically incorrect." But "politically incorrect" is not always a synonym for "conservative."

My discomfort with "South Park's" increasingly mainstream vulgarity is not a matter of nitpicking. We're not just talking about a stray curse word here or there. As liberal New York Times columnist Frank Rich points out, "South Park" "holds the record for the largest number of bleeped-out repetitions (162) of a single four-letter expletive in a single television half-hour." That's probably about the same number of profanities uttered at John Kerry's infamous New York City celebrity fundraiser last summer, which Republicans rightly condemned for its excessive obscenities.

Rich is wrong about most things, but he's painfully on target in noting the incongruous pandering now taking place by some in the cool-kids clique on the Right. Conservatives criticize Hollywood relentlessly, but as Rich notes, "the embarrassing reality is that they want to be hip, too."

Which brings me to Mrs. Bush. She demonstrated at the celebrity-studded White House Correspondents' Dinner this weekend that you can entertain without being profane. Most of her humor was just right: Edgy but not over the edge. But her off-color stripper and horse jokes crossed the line. Can you blame Howard Stern for feeling peeved and perplexed? And let's face it: If Teresa ("I'm cheeky!") Heinz Kerry had delivered Mrs. Bush's First Lady Gone Mildly Wild routine, social conservative pundits would be up in arms over her bad taste and lack of dignity.

The First Lady resorting to horse masturbation jokes is not much better than Whoopi Goldberg trafficking in dumb puns on the Bush family name. It was wholly unnecessary.

Self-censorship is a conservative value. In a brilliant commencement speech at Hillsdale College last year, Heritage Foundation president Ed Feulner called on his audience to resist the coarsened rhetoric of our time: "If we are to prevail as a free, self-governing people, we must first govern our tongues and our pens. Restoring civility to public discourse is not an option. It is a necessity."

Lighten up, you say? No thanks. I'd rather be a G-rated conservative who can only make my kids giggle than a "South Park"/"Desperate Housewives" conservative whose goal is getting Richard Gere and Jane Fonda to snicker. Giving the Hollyweird Left the last laugh is not my idea of success.

[Vision]

bttt

[Lazamataz]

And just how would that be funny? This was a simple order from Gen. Washington on a concern of the time. I don't see the humor in ridiculing the leader of the Continental Army just for a simple remark that was not out of place for the time period.

AAAAAHAHHAHHAHHHAHHAHHAHAHHHAHAHHAHHA OMG OMG (gasp) Cartman dropping the f-bomb at the First Continental Congress AAAAHAHAHAHHHAHHAHAHHA AHHAHHAHAHAHHAHAH HAHAHAHHAHAHAH HOOHOOHOHOHOOOHOHOHO

[billbears]

No I don't think it would. I've watched SP for years. The cursing, except for a very few episodes (the sh#t episode), is not the center of the humor. It's just there as a regular blue collar guy might speak. I can't see how ridiculing time honored words on morality from the Framers and their peers is even slightly humorous

[cubreporter]

I agree...and that is all it ever will be. Those who don't like it didn't get it and even if they did they didn't like it.

I would like to see video and hear recordings of these very people throughout their lives. Wonder if any of them ever told an off color joke , hmmmmmmmm? Or acted inappropiately but...had they it would have been done in private. The First Lady was out there on national TV doing nothing wrong. People bashing the First Lady on this are really humorless not to mention ridiculously righteous. People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

My only reply is Laura was a hoot and the jokes were funny and wish she could have even had more time to do more. As someone else had said they liked her before but now they now they like her even more.

If this sticks in the craw of people...SO BE IT.

[tiamat]

ROFL!

No...

I was kidding.

I MIGHT make her watch it, but only if it was a school-related thing or if there was something important happening that I wanted to show her.

Or if I REALLY REAALY wanted to punish her!

:-)

[Diddle E. Squat]

And her next column will be titled, "Why I am a member of the National Auxiliary for Godly Seriousness".

[billbears]

I see my statement went completely over your head. I saw that episode and neither that episode nor your incoherent statement addresses my point.

[Luddite Patent Counsel]

You have got to be kidding. The joke goes that "he tried to milk a horse...and it was a male horse." Besides being decidedly unfunny, the "joke" clearly implies, and has always implied, precisely which part of the horse is being "milked". It is, and always has been, a horse (or bull) masturbation joke. Farmers have told this among themselves from time immemorial. They have also told bawdy versions of the "Girl from Nantucket" limerick. Do you suppose that any self-respecting farmer would tell such a joke from the podium at a Rotary meeting? Antiquity does not make such vulgar humor appropriate for the First Lady to repeat in a public forum. If you can't imagine Jackie Kennedy, Pat Nixon, or Nancy Reagan saying it from the podium, a First Lady should not be saying it. Period.

[tiamat]

And there you go.

Standards change.

Shakespeare was pretty blue as well.

As Americans, we really didn't get the current stick up our collective butts until the Victorian era.

[Skooz]

When my daughter was born, lo these 14 years ago, I had a dream that she would be a voracious reader and news junky, like here dad. I had visions of us watching CSPAN and the news and discussing current events and putting them into the perspective of history, comparing our times with, say, the Roman Republic or Plato's ideals.

Instead, she is a blond. All the way. Totally. She's even a cheerleader now. I THINK she knows who the President is.

We just found out that my wife is pregnant again, though. So, maybe this time..............

[Celtjew Libertarian]

As Americans, we really didn't get the current stick up our collective butts until the Victorian era.

Comstock aside, I'm not sure that is case, considering what Mae West, The Marx Bros., etc, got away with pre-Hays commission. That's when the current stick stuck, I think.

[mhking]

if someone doesn't agree with the "oh, Mrs. Bush was SOOO classy" crowd, they are smacked down.... so i say to them - get over yourselves. we don't HAVE to agree on this..... do we??

I'm not saying that we can't disagree, but we can do so without being disagreeable. That's what so many have forgotten on FR here lately.

If you differ with the shrillest of the self-appointed Spanish Inquisition, you are summarily set upon and dragged through the mud until you either surrender to their will or depart for places unknown. It happened with the entire Schiavo mess (and no, I don't want to discuss it - she's dead, the matter is now history instead of news as far as I'm concerned, and too many people get too emotional to have any sort of rational conversation about it - don't even think about dragging me out to be burned at the stake), it happened to a lesser degree with the Pope, and it's happening now over Laura Bush.

Too many good people have been chased away by this kind of Spanish Inquisition-driven crusade. It truly needs to stop.

[Double Tap]

Hey Michelle, I really like your opinions and ideas, most of the time. But you need to get over yourself.

You and every other needlebutt whiner are starting to be really irritating about this comedy skit Mrs. Bush did.

[Lazamataz]

I see my statement went completely over your head.

Good L-rd man. Get that ramrod out of your butt.

It could also be that I'm just goofing on you a little.

Sheesh!

[MiniCooperChick]

Because not only did he mistake the animal, he mistook the gender. It's the "two punch" in a two-punchline joke!

You can't milk a male horse, bull, camel, billy goat, anything male!

p.s. I really don't think this incident happened, do you?

[dirtboy]

Lighten up, you say? No thanks. I'd rather be a G-rated conservative who can only make my kids giggle than a "South Park"/"Desperate Housewives" conservative whose goal is getting Richard Gere and Jane Fonda to snicker. Giving the Hollyweird Left the last laugh is not my idea of success.

Great close.

[finnman69]

Hey Michelle........lighten up.

I think I know what she desparately needs, but I wont say it here so as not to offend the G-rated conservatives.

[Diddle E. Squat]

Oh and btw, as I showed, it's possible to disagree with MM on that point without having to attack her for having a different view, and trashing all the excellent writing she does every single week.

Nice try, but no, since many of Michelle's columns (especially her most recent ones) have been attacks and harping on other conservatives for not being as 'pure' as her.

[KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle]

Incorrect Staement #1: I asked you two simple questions.

Nope. What you actually did, of course, was (take notes, now; this is all going to be on your final) change what was plainly posted into whatever non-existent "points" you wished to debate, instead. This is commonly referred to, online, as "setting up straw men," and is seldom considered the hallmark of intellectually honest posters. Hint, hint.

You failed to answer them and, instead, threw a temper tantrum.

Incorrect Statement #2: I then dissected the "logic" of your post, and you, again, threw a temper tantrum.

Nope. Just pointed out the inherent dishonesty in your approach, was all.

Online debate can be a rough game. Buy a jock.

BTW, there ought to be some sort of "Godwin's Law" concerning the word "liberal" around here.

Ideally, we can institute one the very same day all liberal schools of "argument" are, likewise, stigmatized. I know I have a nominee or two in mind.

[Lazamataz]

I think I know what she desparately needs, but I wont say it here so as not to offend the G-rated conservatives.

I'm willing to take one for the team.