Teabagging with Jesus (Part 1)
that the world is multi-cultural—and not liking it one bit.
(BoF reader Travis alerted me to a website run by one of the teabagging groups. It’s an interesting site, and I want to spend some time on it. I came across another site that I want to briefly mention first.)
The whole teabagging movement has had racist overtones from the beginning. Whether they admit it or not, it’s mostly about white Americans feeling like a minority for the first time ever, and they aren’t happy about it. The anti-tax message is merely superficial. They’re actually tapping into some deep-seated frustration that has been brewing for a while. Anti-taxes is just one small part of what they’re pissed off about.
I always like to back up my statements with facts. That previous paragraph contains my impression of the teabaggers that I’ve gotten from the media. I wanted to find out if it’s actually true. I typed “tea party demographics” into Google in an effort to find out. The first site listed is actually called Tea Party Demographics! Heck. Can’t be any easier than that! So I went to the site. It turns out it’s just a tiny teabagging site, no more significant than any other. It has a few interesting things on it, though.
One page shows the demographics of the people who have bothered to fill out their survey. It is very unscientific, and the sample size is too small. Nevertheless, 87% identify themselves as Caucasian.
That same page tells us that 59% are Republican. I would have expected higher. However, it also shows us how these people identify their politics relative to their party as a whole. The majority (84% overall), in every single party, said they “lean right”. Well there’s a freakin’ surprise!
The home page has the results of their survey on who should be their next presidential nominee. The results are:
| Nominee | No. of Votes |
| Sarah Palin | 71 |
| Mitt Romney | 41 |
| Newt Gingrich | 34 |
| Fred Thompson | 17 |
What a wonderful, inspiring set of candidates they’re fielding there! I thought the teabaggers wanted America to be stronger and regain its place in the world. They can’t do it with anybody on that list (especially the one at the top).
Finally, I love this one statement they proudly make on the home page:
An interesting phenomena that I’ve begun to notice in talking with organizers and event coordinators is how LITTLE trash seems to be left behind at these events.
That’s because they all go home to their trailers.
July 27th, 2009 at 2:58 am
‘An interesting phenomena that I’ve begun to notice’ is that it should be ‘phenomenon’. Get a brain, morans!
July 27th, 2009 at 3:37 am
I’d imagine a majority of the remaining 41% would define themselves as Libertarians – who, as someone pointed out recently, are pretty much Republicans who want to smoke pot.
Heh heh! Oh, I love it! You nailed that one, Ron.
This is a large part of the issue I have with the fundies to begin with. You can take the boy/girl out of the trailer park…
July 27th, 2009 at 5:04 am
I believe they are following along the lines of original “Boston Tea Party”
who’s catch cry was “No taxation without representation”
This is interesting because the last time I checked most adults in America were eligible to vote.
My gut feeling is they are disappointed because their candidate lost the election and they only believe in democratic process if they win.
It is amazing how many Americans are saying “Obama is not my President, and he does not represent me”
Strange how they are willing to dump such a long history of democracy as soon as it does not suit them
July 27th, 2009 at 6:31 am
Basically, they don’t understand the difference between “taxation without representation” and “a black guy won the election.”
July 27th, 2009 at 7:06 am
doug – to be fair, a lot of liberals were saying the same thing when W won. Saying “candidate xyz is not my president” is just a normal part of venting after losing. no harm.
My problem with the teabaggers is that they are all willfully ignorant of the massive government spending of the last eight years.
For some reason, money spent on the military is freely available and infinite. However, as soon as we spend money on any other sector of our country, zomg! watch out! TEABAGS! WOLVERINES!
July 27th, 2009 at 7:08 am
Absolutely. When we made similar statements about Bush, we were committing treason. When they do it, it’s patriotism.
July 27th, 2009 at 7:57 am
stoat100:
You don’t know the half of it! You should see the site I’ll be profiling in part 2! (Actually, it might be part 3. There’s a site related to this one that I might look at first.)
If you look at the About page of Tea Party Demographics, you’ll see it’s run by Kay Harrison, a “homeschooling mom.” Wow! Really? In that crowd? What a shocker!
But anyway, here are a few more words she wrote on the About page:
Should be “mainstream”
Not a very good one, apparently.
Should be “pilot’s”
Should be a comma after “young”. “Prohibative” is misspelled.
Run-on sentence.
Should be “now-teenaged”.
That’s just one page on the site. You could proofread the other pages and get similar results.
July 27th, 2009 at 7:58 am
I never regarded George Bush as “my” president since he was never duly elected to begin with. His entire term was a nightmarish farce we all collectively endured to the bitter end. Obama’s victory is unquestioned, which perhaps is why these dildos insist on casting aspersions on his citizenship status. They can’t claim the Supreme Court installed him in office, so they have to go this route.
While I admit there is a superficial similarity between us criticizing Bush and them criticizing Obama, in reality there isn’t a comparison. For starters, Bush couldn’t give a flying fuck about anyone who disagreed with him. He hardly represented “all” Americans. To be sure, a fair number of people oppose Obama, and that’s fine, but I see no evidence his attitude toward them is as indifferent as Bush’s.
These mouth-breathers also conveniently forget how nearly every American rallied behind Bush after 9/11, at least until he began using the event for political gain. I have no doubt these people hope and pray for another terrorist attack so they can blame it on Obama. If such an event occurs, I guarantee Obama will not receive the same level of public support (at least from teabaggers, birthers and fundies) that Bush enjoyed.
Most criticisms of Bush centered on his decisions or his policies. Yes, there were some insults uttered, but they paled in comparison to what the right had to say about Bill Clinton. Conservatives today seem incapable of articulating a cogent criticism of Obama’s proposals, or even offering alternative ideas of their own. Where’s the Republican Health Care plan? Oh, that’s right, they don’t give a shit about anyone but themselves.
July 27th, 2009 at 8:01 am
Jeff:
You’re probably right. The problem with this site is it’s too small to know if the numbers they report are representative. If you look at that page, the second highest political identification is “independent”, at 26%.
July 27th, 2009 at 10:18 am
I just found your site and I psychotically love it! Thanks for doing this!
July 27th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Get a load of CNN’s blatant pandering: “Tea Party Protests – rallies against big government and high taxes”. I suppose it would be too much to ask for an honest tag line like “SOUR GRAPES – ignorant racist rants” or even “RETARDED RACISTS OUTRAGED – Black Man lives in White House!”.
Ron, you should award yourself the Comment of the Day for that spot-on one-liner at the end of your post!
July 27th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Hey now, I’m a liberal atheist living in a doublewide. Just sayin’.
Of course, it’s on a 1.5 acre lot not in a trailer park. Maybe that’s the difference.
July 27th, 2009 at 7:49 pm
Oh, snap!
July 27th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
I’m not really sure I want to do this, but what the heck….
That’s a cute quote, but it’s not very accurate. While I would never claim to speak for most, or even many, Libertarians (uppercase “L” or lowercase) for the most simply simply want the government to get the heck out of their lives.
Sure, some may want to smoke pot — or engage in any number of other currently illegal practice, but that’s not necessarily why they believe what they do.
July 28th, 2009 at 3:05 am
OtherRob, that’s what the guy I stole the quote from meant.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:01 am
Tax Cuts: The Solution to Everything.
Because you know the laffer curve is at its optimum peak when tax rates are about 0.000001% of income or something.
July 28th, 2009 at 7:05 am
I’m not trying to troll here nor derail this thread, I promise. However, I’ve never understood that that argument. Where is government heavily intrusive in their lives? If we are talking Big Picture stuff here, like the drastic reduction in basic civil rights over the last eight years, then hell yea, I’m on board. But I heard this argument back in the 90s and the only evidence I could find was the ATF shutting down that crazy guy in Waco, TX.
July 28th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I’ll add that in countries like the Netherlands, where they have a communal attitude and are able to exercise self-control, taxes are high and the government is running practically everything – but everyone is being taken care of, and no one’s complaining.
This “I’ll take care of myself, thank you very much” attitude for which the Libertarians supposedly stand – you can have it. It’s a peculiarly American attitude, and not one that has served us very well.
July 28th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
You had me until the trailer comment. I’m tired of it being ok to denigrate people because they are from the “bible belt”, because they are of “hillbilly” (usually Scotch-Irish ancestry, poor whites from Appalachia) or because they happen to live in a trailer. I live on Long Island. We have trailer parks here too. Living in a trailer and/or being from the south does not make someone one of these teabagging idiots. Stereotyping sucks no matter what side it’s coming from.
July 28th, 2009 at 9:01 pm
Yes you do Dawn, Mastic is notable, and I’ve known some very nice people from there with some very sad pasts.
July 29th, 2009 at 6:20 am
Jeff – I agree with you, but also would say that there is a difference between “government, please stop listening to all my calls fishing for some terrorism silliness” and “government, can you please pay for my health care and other basic fundamental needs and in return, I’ll give you half of my income?”
On the former, I’m with the libertarians. On the latter, I think they are nuts. Sorry, libers. I like you a lot better than repubs, but I still think it’s nuts and highly agree with Jeff on this one.
July 29th, 2009 at 8:03 am
I thought the entire wishlist for our next president was hilarious. If these people were paying so damn much attention to get interested in a tea party, you’d think they’d have picked up by now the Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp are dead. Ted Nugent and Chuck Norris also are nominated, which can only be a cry for help. Other notables was BoF favorite Rick Santorum, Moses’s stunt double Judge Roy Moore, and noted xenophobe Tom Tancredo. Some of the respondants had to be goofing on the site. Conservatives couldn’t be this stupid….could they?
July 29th, 2009 at 9:13 am
I come from a large family of hillbillies (my parents made a partial escape, and I grew up in various suburbs). Much as it pains me to admit, the vast majority of them are ignorant racists who would be teabaggers if they could find a rally. And quite a few of them do, in fact, live in trailers.
July 31st, 2009 at 9:40 pm
That “great patriot” with the “owebama” sign doesn’t know how to properly display the flag, either. I’m a near socialist and even I know that a hanging flag has the field of stars in the upper left corner.
July 31st, 2009 at 9:49 pm
Spinetingler:
It seems like an awful lot of “patriots” don’t display the flag properly. I guess their patriotism is as shallow as their critical thinking skills.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:32 am
I’m near socialist too and I noticed that and I also know the field of stars is called “The Union.” lol… I wonder how many of them knew that?
August 6th, 2009 at 9:04 am
So I live in a already paid off trailer, don’t want to be taxed heavily (or even just a little), have less than $2K in debt, almost $45K in savings and totally live within my means. You live in a McMansion with a $1/2 million mortgage and you don’t mind giving your hard earned money to the government. I understand that. And that makes me a racist? I’ll accept the “hillbilly” label while questioning your debtor lifestyle.
August 7th, 2009 at 8:15 am
Well if you don’t want to be taxed heavily (or even just a little) that’s fine with me. But then you also opt out of using any government subsidized food, land, roads, parks, telecommunications, or really anything else the government paid or helped pay for. Essentially, you need to go seastead and grow all your own food.
August 7th, 2009 at 9:33 pm
Probably not that many. For the few that do, though, it sounds too much like “labor union” for comfort – too commie, don’cha know?
August 9th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
If these religious zealot,Right wing nuts ever saw the look of the people of the middle east.They would realize that JESUS was not white, but a person of COLOR,or they would have to say that Jesus was a product of evolution for them to believe Jesus to be white.
August 9th, 2009 at 7:52 pm
I’m sorry I haven’t responded to a couple of replies to my comment before now. I wasn’t trying to do a “hit and run” with my remarks.
PL77 said:
Here’s a quick, and far from incomplete, list:
Any efforts to promote prayer in school/teaching Intelligent Design and/or Creationism.
The way the govt tells me who I can’t marry. This has been discussed on this blog many times.
The incredible number of regulatory hoops businesses need to go through — some regulation is necessary (even stringent regulation in some cases), but sheesh….
The sheer amount we’re taxed and where that money goes. I don’t think taxes, per se, are bad, just that we pay too much and that it goes to places I wouldn’t want it to go.
Have you read how intrusive the questions are on the census forms, particularly the long form?
The hoops you have to jump through for homeschooling (they’re held to a much higher accountability than actual schools). My wife has done a lot of research into this as we seriously considered it as an option.
Drug laws.
Social Security (that it’s mandatory and you can’t opt out for other options.)
And pretty much any asinine law that’s passed telling grown men and women what they can and can’t do.
Jeff Eyges said:
I really can’t answer this because I think it comes down to a matter of personal philosophy. The question is whether you think individuals or governments should make decisions for them. Clearly I believe in the former.
And, yes, many in the Libertarian Party are indeed “nuts”, PL. I’d even go farther than that — one of the reason I tend to call myself a “small ‘l’ libertarian”. But just because the messenger is nutty doesn’t mean the message is.
August 10th, 2009 at 7:06 am
Otherrob – Thanks for actually answering that. Quite a bit I agree with, but some things I just don’t see. Let me address them (not a complete list on my case either).
Can you be more specific? I ran a home business for about two years in my past and it was really easy. I did electronics repair. The hardest part was the sales tax forms and even that was easy.
I hear where you are coming from in an idealized universe where people don’t make bad decisions, but that’s kind of the point: people make bad decisions. What do we do with the people who opt out because Bill O’Reilly told them to but then get old (or crippled) and are suddenly like oh shit I have no money and no way to work! What do we do? They haven’t contributed to Social Security, but they need help. This is definitely a “agree to disagree” case because I’m pretty sure your answer is something on the order of “too bad.”
Apparently the standards are not high enough in some areas since fundie home schooling is creating a massively ignorant generation. I can’t comment on your case, so I will say, yea for those who are doing it right, that does suck.
August 19th, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Hi, PL, back again several days later…. A couple of thoughts on your comments (hope this isn’t too long.)
Home-based businesses do seem to be pretty easy to run, especially when you have no employees. I’ve been freelancing for several years and looked into officially starting it as an actual business this year and it seems pretty straightforward here in Georgia, too. Then my two biggest clients went under….
I was thinking more of all the rules, zoning regulations/licensing requirements, etc. you face when opening an establishment. And it only gets more complicated when you start to hire people. Here’s a quotation from one of my running-your-own-business books (attributed to the editor of Inc. magazine): “Legislators have done their level best to create a legal environment that tempts up, when hiring, to focus on everything, but finding the best person for the job.”
Well, in essence you’re right — and I think on a lot of things I’m going to have to agree to disagree with most of the folk here
— but my answer wouldn’t be some sort of cavalier, dismissive “too bad”. Instead it would be a recognition that part of the price of freedom is the possibility of failure. If people are free to make their own choices, some are going to make bad choices. And I don’t think we can truly prevent people from making bad choices, not if they’re free.
And frankly, he said snarkily, anyone who makes major life decisions based on advice from Bill O’Reilly deserves what they get….
Here we are in complete agreement.
August 19th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
Oh, and I thought of one other area where government can massively intrude into the lives of law-abiding citizens: eminent domain. As a worst-case example, there was the case of the elderly woman in New Jersey (I think it was) who had her home taken away from her for no other reason than that the local government thought they could sell the land to a developer who would improve the land enough to bring in more tax revenue.
August 19th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
Personally, I think zoning and licensing requirements are a very good thing. I think zoning is planned poorly in a lot of places, but it is important to establish zones for different businesses so that, say, a tire factory doesn’t open up accross the street from your house.
No argument from me on the eminent domain question. I have read of many abuses with regard to it. I’m wondering if there is a legitimate use for the power. I’m a bit ignorant on the subject, but the “horror stories” do seem bad.
August 19th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
If you wanted to put a new highway in but had to rely on finding willing sellers, you’d never get a clear path. The argument goes that the greater good is served. I agree with it in limited cases. It’s definitely abused.
August 19th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
PL, I do agree that some regulation is necessary and a good thing. As I said before, I even believe that there are some cases where strict regulation is necessary. I just think there’s way too much of it and that government can’t help but stick it’s nose in where it doesn’t belong.
I thought it was Voltaire who said something along these lines, but I couldn’t find the source. I read it a long time ago: Each bad law weakens every good law.
Ron, I do agree that in limited cases eminent domain is useful. In limited cases. I almost abbreviated that as “ED”, but then thought better of it.