I never thought I’d say that I’d love reading a response brief to a takedown request for a web domain, but this one (pdf) is just … awesome. This is regarding the site glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com, for which Mr. Beck has skipped the U.S. courts where his request would be denied due to First Amendment parody rights, and has instead brought it up with the World Intellectual Property Association.
I love how the first few pages basically say “Why are we here, anyway?”. I love that it includes the sentence “Nobody believes that the director of the critically acclaimed
“Downfall” would have directed a script in which Hitler screams “YOU HOMOSEXUAL BLOOD ELF!” “.
I particularly love the text at the bottom of the actual web site in question:
Notice: This site is parody/satire. We assume Glenn Beck did not rape and murder a young girl in 1990, although we haven’t yet seen proof that he didn’t. But we think Glenn Beck definitely uses tactics like this to spread lies and misinformation.
Read the last sentence again. That’s the point. Read it a third time and ignore the name of the site itself, because anyone who believes that we’re trying to actually get people to believe Glenn Beck raped and/or murdered is *whoosh* missing the entire point. So don’t be dumb like a lot of people are. I greatly expanded this text because so many people *read* it, and *still* didn’t understand.
Now this is regardless of politics – I happen to think that the pundit in question should be considered a black smear for actual conservatives. I’m not a democrat. I’m clearly liberal-minded in general, and highly liberal-minded when it comes to social issues, but they’ve stepped in it enough to push me away.
Beck’s tactics of deception and misdirection are sad indications of the state of political discourse in our country – namely this:
We show no respect for each other unless we’re “on the same side” of an issue – requiring the opposing party “prove its patriotism”. We, as a country, care more for the victory of our given issue than for honesty, the rule of law, or actual discource. We, on the whole, leap to conclusions based on the hearsay and logic of talk show hosts and distrust experts who have spent a decade in school specializing in the given topics of debate.
We are bitter. We are hateful. And Glenn Beck’s show isn’t an insightful look into the conservative political viewpoint, it’s an attack show that ignores legitimate concerns in favor of misdirection and baiting. It reduces the republican/conservative viewpoint to racist, sexist, and farcical questions about the President of the United States’ heritage instead of diving into the meat of very real violations of privacy and first amendment issues his administration has perpetuated. It attacks him even for pursuing policies they approve of (such as the war) because the show, and that channel, seek the destruction of the democratic party more than anything else.
I’m not sure how one can step away from that, but parody seems to be the best fight we’ve got against ourselves. It’s the only way to make people see the ridiculousness, and perhaps find reason again.
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