Teabagging townhalls: Whose nuts? Whose mouths?

August 15, 2009

Teabagging, as shown by this video, has the potential to ruin the lives of kid, and it also has the potential to ruin our chances of having an educated debate on health care. The term “teabagging” is slang for the act of a man (teabagg-er) placing his scrotum in the mouth or on, or around the face of another person (teabagg-ee), often in a repeated in-and-out motion. The practice resembles dipping a tea bag into a cup of tea. By now you may be asking yourself what this weird sexual act has in common with health care. The answer is everything.

The media has been struggling to characterize the teabagger movement. Some media outlets are quick to call them all crazy (notably MSNBC), some try to keep an objective stance on them, while other outlets (notably FOX) are happy to promote them as innocent patriotic protesters.

Americans do not understand the importance of the issue. Are we too stupid?(maybe…this Gallup poll shows 1 in 5 Americans think the sun revolves around Earth) Perhaps it is not a lack of intelligence, but a lack of information that is preventing us from moving forward. Take one look at the reporting being done by the media and you’ll see it’s likely a combination of the two. The need for debate on the best method to reform the health care system has been eclipsed by our insatiable thirst to gawk at the absurd. The health care debate has been hi-jacked by crazy stupid people, and the ratings obsessed media has obediently followed. Forget about having the focus be on actual educated debate by those on both sides of the issue. The focus has now been shifted to the insane few on the fringe from both sides and their abilities to disrupt town hall meetings. The winners of this health care debate so far are insurance and pharmaceutical companies, because they have successfully diverted our attention from the real issues.

I know these lunatics are not representative of all those that oppose health care reform, the media is just guilty of making it look that way. There are plenty of people, both liberal and conservative, who are opposed to the current proposals. I am not advocating that these people not be able to exercise free speech, some of these people just need to be adequately educated on the issues and informed of the real interests of those who are organizing them. These crazies need to know that they’re being played.

The media should do a better job of reporting the news, as opposed to reporting only the tidbits of the news that conform to their brand of rhetoric. Example- FoxNews was the only cable news outlet not to air Obama’s town hall meeting in its entirety, instead it cut out early into the meeting and promised to come back only if there was some angry protesters interruptions. Some outlets need to stop with the false “they’re regular folks fighting for what they believe in” and identify most of them for what they really are…”grassroots” looking protesters funded by the highest bidding corporation. Instead of legitimizing the views of a small pocket of society’s crazies, the media should be objectively reporting the facts of the proposals and let us decide whether we want to support it or not. The public is being misled by media outlets that report opinions and myths as facts. You know things are out of control when you have the White House unveiling a website to debunk the rumors spread by the opposition of health care reform.

It is clear when overwhelming percentage of Americans know more about the myths than they do on the fundamental basics of what is being proposed, that the insurance and pharmaceutical companies have figuratively placed their nuts on/in the mouths of those in the media, and in the faces of the public. Its impossible to see with nuts in your face, and as expert teabagg-ee Anderson Cooper noted, just as difficult to talk with nuts in your mouth. Nuts have clearly made it difficult for the media to speak and get the truth out. And when nuts are all we see, it makes it impossible for us see a clear picture and truly understand what is really happening.