Feb. 22, 2009: Free Republic poster suggests, “Every movement needs symbols and icons. I propose the various groups promoting new “Tea Parties” adopt the simple and lowly teabag, clipped to the lapel with a plain paperclip as a badge.” Responses include “GREAT IDEA!!!!”, “Count me in,” and “new slogan ‘Tea Bag Obama.’” Some posters point out the less-well-known meaning of “teabag,” but are overridden: “Well, maybe some folks will have that repulsive image in mind everytime they see a teabag, but the vast majority of regular folks aren’t aware, and wouldn’t take it that way even if they did.” “Never be afraid of what left scumbags will say.”

Photo of Tea bag the liberal dems sign

Another (from Feb. 28, 2009)

April 1, 2009 post, “Tea Bag the fools in D.C.”, promoting the April 15 tea parties.

I think there is a higher degree of lunacy among the fringe of conservative TV and radio hosts, than among liberal ones.

I listen to most of the conservative radio and tv hosts from time to time during the week and (aside from Michael Savage who may not actually be a conservative) don’t hear any shouting. I hear more shouting on Air America or MSNBC (even though they won).

Dr. Levin does speak forcefully but is in no sense “fringe” and doesn’t shout.

I don’t listen to left radio and tv as much but do encounter clips.

Note that the General Social Survey and other studies suggest that lefties are more likely to be treated for mental illness than conservatives (self selection error?) and much more likely to commit suicide (self selection error?). They also report much lower levels of happiness or life satisfaction and they die younger.

Conservative behaviors like marriage and regular church attendance are associated with longer lifespans (as is staying home on Friday and Saturday nights rather than hitting the clubs).

I did note at the DC Taxpayers March that the attendees were better dressed, better tressed, and cleaner than the average of left demos I’ve attended since the ’60s. Reports of the lack of trash were certainly correct. Not quite as much bodily mutilation either.

in the US, it’s very easy to become socially isolated. You can exist in your home without any interaction with the outside world,

Then I wonder why Europe suffered more from cults like Nazis or the Red Army Faction or the Red Brigades that caused a lot more trouble there?

Nick

* On Feb. 19, 2009 Rick Santelli, in a CNBC rant against plans to help failing mortgages, says its time for a “tea party.”

* On Feb 27, 2009, protests are held for the “New American Tea Party.” Protesters display signs saying, for example “Tea Bag the Liberal Dems before they Tea Bag You!” Liberal sites like wonkette.com snicker at the unintentional hilarity of conservatives talking about “teabagging.”

* Posters at freerepublic.com coin “Operation Teabag,” encouraging others to send tea bags to their representatives to protest various bailouts, resulting in several letters being detained under Congress’s procedures to avoid anthrax threats. “Teabag” starts to become commonly used as a verb to describe tea bag protests.

* The “teabag movement” then plans another round of protests for tax day, April 15, 2009.

* By the beginning of April, MSNBC picks up on the other meaning of “teabag,” lampooning the teabaggers’ efforts.

* Individuals like geokstr eventually cry foul when others use the teabaggers’ own self-designation against them.

Sorry, but “teabag” and “teabagger” were terms adopted by the protesters in the first place. When some liberal group starts unironically calling itself “fudge packers,” you may lampoon them to your heart’s delight for doing so.

Does anybody know how to set up subscriptions on this new site so that I get an email every time a new blog is posted, instead of once daily as a digest? I went to the FeedBlitz account site, looked at preferences, but I didn’t see it there.

But I don’t think the situation is symmetric. I think there is a higher degree of lunacy among the fringe of conservative TV and radio hosts, than among liberal ones. I don’t know if this is simply the effect of Fox News (and MSNBC hasn’t “caught up” yet) or if it reflects a higher tolerance of conservative lunacy than liberal lunacy or something else.

But, we shouldn’t be surprised if this asymmetry in media talking heads generates an asymmetry in the population, among those susceptible to the sort of brainwashing these extremes feed on.

The other factor is that, as the “ESPN effect” shows, wider publicity can reinforce the extremes. That’s probably a good thing for baseball, but it’s dangerous for politics. Sure, the crazies can be highlighted more readily, and IF the public turns away in disgust that can be useful in the long run in improving discourse (e.g., Kos and the Truthers). But there’s always the risk that in a crisis people will turn to the extremes (see Nazi Germany). In that case the wider publicity given to the extremes can destabilize the whole system.

James Oaksun: I call this the Daily Kos effect. I’m convinced that site began when 3 radical vegetarians from Berkeley used the Internet to connect with 4 anti-WTO activists in Seattle, and a coven of Wiccans in Madison.

I don’t really like the site, but it doesn’t seem to come from that sort of crowd: it was founded by a strongly pro-capitalist ex-Army guy, who now makes a bunch of money from the site, as essentially a (very successful) media entrepreneur.

The question is whether there is anything that can be done about the level of crazy that we hear about on a daily basis. From my perspective, the left is currently handling their crazy better than the right in that I hear about it less, but this could well be because the democrats are currently in power. But both sides are currently overplaying the right’s crazy people.

Let me suggest that the reason that the right seems crazier right now is that we see this through the prism of the left. The reality is that there was a lot more violence at the G-20 than probably at most of the tea bagging parties combined. But that violence was downplayed, or, even ignored, by much of the “mainstream” press. And, ditto for the pictures that you see of each. At the Wash., D.C. rally, there were thousands of signs present, most of which involved either protesting specific Democratic policies or agenda items (such as health care reform), or were classically anti-government (“don’t tread on me” type signs). Yet, what you saw in the papers and on much of the media were the few extreme ones, that were probably less than 1% of the signs present.

No, I have no doubt what it refers to, and it certainly isn’t a particularly hetero activity.

And what activity IS particularly hetero, other than standard vaginal sex? Every other act is practiced by some orientation other than heterosexuals.

Moda says:
There seems to be a lot of misinformation about what “tea bagging” refers to.

No, I have no doubt what it refers to, and it certainly isn’t a particularly hetero activity. And please don’t BS me with this:

Thus, I’m not even sure how you can object that it’s demeaning. The “teabagger” is the man placing his scrotum upon the head of the victim. I’m sure the tea party protesters would love to tea bag Congress, no? Which they did, by sending Congressmen bags of tea in the mail or by throwing tea bags at them in public.

You know very well that this is NOT meant as a compliment by the left.

I even had one of the commenters on this very thread tell me on another post that he hoped I got “tea bagged” in response to a fairly innocuous comment that wasn’t even directed at him. But you would have me believe that he was only giving me a compliment, right?

Yes, there are such things as “tea bags” that are used for things like making tea. But your contention is that sending tea bags to congressmen must mean that those at the Tea Parties meant this disgusting sexual activity? Maybe it actually had something to do with being a symbol of the original Tea Party.

So much of the left is literally repulsive.

Moda says:
There seems to be a lot of misinformation about what “tea bagging” refers to.

No, I have no doubt what it refers to, and it certainly isn’t a particularly hetero activity. And please don’t BS me with this:

Thus, I’m not even sure how you can object that it’s demeaning. The “teabagger” is the man placing his scrotum upon the head of the victim. I’m sure the tea party protesters would love to tea bag Congress, no? Which they did, by sending Congressmen bags of tea in the mail or by throwing tea bags at them in public.

You know very well that this is NOT meant as a compliment by the left.

I even had one of the commenters on this very thread tell me on another post that he hoped I got “tea bagged” in response to a fairly innocuous comment that wasn’t even directed at him. But you would have me believe that he was only giving me a compliment, right?

Yes, there are such things as “tea bags” that are used for things like making tea. But your contention is that sending tea bags to congressmen must mean that those at the Tea Parties meant this disgusting sexual activity? Maybe it actually had something to do with being a symbol of the original Tea Party.

So much of the left is literally repulsive.

By contrast, the nuts that really make history are the nuts that caused major damage.

So our view of history is distorted into thinking that large numbers of irrational people in politics is (a) new and (b) much more dangerous than it really is (which isn’t to say there is no danger there).

The other point that I would make is that I notice a not infrequent phenomenon of someone with good judgment and lousy logic. If I see someone making an exaggerated point or making a point badly, I do try to look towards what they might be trying to get at. It isn’t always what they say, but sometimes a few pointed questions can help get them on track. Obviously, this only works if the pointed questions are designed to be helpful and not designed to dance over the gravesite of their fallacies. This is why conversations with fewer than six people are so nice. But just because the conversations that require many people are not nice doesn’t mean they aren’t necessary, and it simply isn’t possible from any practical point of view to expect them to be nice.

The polarization is real.

As evidenced by several in this thread.

In the same way I think 24 hour news networks and the internet have increased the hyperbole amongst the various sides in order for them to get on the highlight reel of the news networks. Maybe people are not actually crazier, but the amount of crazy things people are doing has most definitely increased as what you have to do to get attention has increased.

Recovering Law Grad: The thesis is appealing, but, unfortunately, the data just isn’t there. For instance, a recent poll indicated that a majority of Republicans, nationwide, either doubt or outright disbelieve that Obama was born in the U.S. I’m not sure where I can go with that, but to conclude that something has gone very, very wrong with a very large number of people.

Further, more Americans believe in anthropogenic global warming than in evolution. And more believe in the active intervention of angels and demons in our day-to-day lives than either.

If two sides are actively accusing one another of succumbing to insanity, neither of them is necessarily wrong. And possibly both of them are correct.