Don't knock it, Becks - I don't know that the editors actually get it, but the images of the sobbing LIFE women outside the Schiavo hospice (?) were some of the most powerful anti-them images ever. It was the first time that the cultural right really looked as ridiculous/offensive/stupid as the dirty fucking hippies to ordinary, non-political Americans.
Digby's written about this a couple times, and I think s'he's exactly right.
JRoth beat me to the punch here. This, to me, is the right-wing equivalent of a dreadlocked white kid in a 'Free Mumia' shirt, carrying a giant puppet. It only helps the pro-choice side.
That said, from a journalism point of view, you're exactly right - it's very irresponsible. Just as irresponsible as using the turtle people to illustrate the Seattle protests, or people with Bush=Hitler signs to illustrate 100,000 anti-war demonstrators in March 2003.
the even bigger problem with that particular photo is that that sanctimonious twit is BEGGING FOR A BEATDOWN. seriously, I almost posted about that guy when I saw the picture on andrew sullivan's blog. something about the way he's wrinkling his brows in a deeply felt paroxysm of caring about wombabies makes me want to fuck him up real bad.
Right, particularly because the 'being gagged' imagery is incoherent. (I don't actually understand it at all -- is it about restrictions on abortion clinic protesters?)
ok, pwned, maybe it's secretly advantageous that he makes ordinary people want to brain him with a tire iron.
I see it as more of a Platonic thing -- that boy's ideal essence is shackled by the bonds of Life.
LB: the gag imagery is about the voiceless unborn.
Cripes - right now on the Times home page, the photo for an article on Wicca is a woman holding a black cat.
Maybe the next story on Catholicism will include an image of someone self-flagellating.
the gag imagery is about the voiceless unborn.
But surely duct tape in the womb is terribly unsanitary?
I'm sure some of the DC readers of unfogged remember our friend, the blogger formerly known as DCSOB.
8, 5: yes, he's like the Lorax that way.
There's a bigger version of the pic here . Exactly right about the eyebrows.
8: But that's stupid. The voicelessness of the unborn isn't anything people are wrongfully doing to them -- they don't have functioning brains yet, and you couldn't hear them if they did. Gagging yourself in sympathy makes no sense at all.
alameida beat me to it. Voice for the voiceless, millions of voices silenced, I speak for the trees for the trees have no tongues, that sort of thing.
But that's stupid.
So are most of the people standing out there with tape over their mouths. It's a perfect fit, really.
Didn't one of those talking baby movies cover the ill effects of fetuses (feti?) who speak? Will no one learn the lessons of John Travolta vehicles?
What a little shit. Spiritual brother of the puppetistas.
Btw, has everyone seen Hitchens going off on Falwell? "People like that should be in the street, carrying a cardboard sign, shouting and selling ... pencils from--from a cup."
A pity the old sot is so wrong on Iraq.
Generally these images feature attractive young female protesters with tape over their mouths, so I always figured it was about the pro-life movement coming clean and admitting that they just want to silence women.
I'm totally going to slow-roll my van over the next group of LIFE-tapers I see.
20: It's actually a dating service: "Young Christian men, would you like an attractive, silent wife who will never question your lordship over her and her ladyparts?"
I'm totally going to slow-roll my van over the next group of LIFE-tapers I see.
And in the resulting YouTube video you'll be in your van, and they'll be outside saying "Mmmph mmmph mph mph! Mmmmph!" And you'll be like "What? What? I can't HEEEEEAR you."
I'll have to come back later to vent about various outrages by the anti-choicers.
I respect many people who are against abortion. However,I've also come across so many lunk-headed, mean, vicious, dangerous assholes.
Eh, if they want to protest dopily (You know, the Lorax was speaking for the trees, not failing to speak in solidarity with the trees) I don't much care. I do think the illustration is good rather than bad politically for the pro-choice side -- it makes it clear that there are fired-up protesters trying to ban abortion. What scares me is all the "We're not trying to ban anything, we just want to institute these perfectly reasonable regulations. Oh, is it impossible to get an abortion anywhere outside of Manhattan now? Funny how that happens." with the nitwitted moderates going along with it.
If this guy is the face of pro-life, it'll keep people vaguely on our side awake. (I'm agnostic as to whether it's fair journalism, but if it's unfair, I think it advantages the pro-choice side.)
It's "fair" journalism in the sense that a bad parent who randomly punishes both his children is "fair." The media has done this kind of BS for decades, and the left has generally suffered (puppeteers aside, the left has generally been the home of outspoken women, passionate people, and sometimes-angry nonwhites, all of whom scare the bejeezus out of Middle America. Christ, every national picture of Bella Abzug probably cost Dems half an electoral vote). Sauce for the goose, etc.
Somerby at the Daily Howler always argues that we shouldn't demand tit-for-tat fairness, but actual good journalism. Partly on principle, but mostly on the belief that Dems/progressives/lefties suffer disproportionately - and always will - from this kind of bad journalism.
These aren't the "reasonable regulation" people, they're the "imprison doctors, and heck, women too" people. The politicians they support are the reasonable regulation people because the complete ban people can't get elected saying what they really think.
28: Well, right. There's a real value to keeping people aware that the constituency of the "reasonable regulation" politicians is the "put doctors in jail" weirdos.
Eh, if they want to protest dopily (You know, the Lorax was speaking for the trees, not failing to speak in solidarity with the trees) I don't much care.
This isn't the only movement that does the taped mouth symbol, is it? I know I saw it in high school (for gay rights), for violence against women groups (end the silence), and at a protest about Darfur.
27: Well, the question is whether the mouth-tapers are a reasonable synecdoche for pro-lifers generally. I'm clear that people with giant puppets weren't a fair way of presenting opponents of the war -- I have less of a sense of the demographics of engaged pro-lifers to be certain if mouth-tapers are an equally unfair presentation. The question is whether Joe Average pro-lifer looks at a picture of a mouth-taper and winces in embarrassment, or says "Good for him!" If the latter, it's not bad journalism, I don't think.
Well shit, spread the word - let these assholes own this particular image. Let's not dilute the crazy value (the eyebrows-of-sorrow is actually what makes the image, and was also prominent in the Schiavo-era pics).
30: The thing is, it makes sense if you're protesting actively being silenced -- if your grievance is that people are depriving your side of a voice. You make your wrongful voicelessness visible, in the hope that people will sympathize and work to remove the symbolic gag.
For fetuses, regardless of the regulatory environment, they're going to stay voiceless -- that's not an injury being done them, it's in the nature of what they are. So speaking for them might make sense; protesting the fact of their voicelessness doesn't.
I'm wearing tape over my mouth right now!
As a blogger, I should really wear mittens if I want to make a statement, I guess.
Come on, LB, this isn't really a hard reach. Their voices are silenced because the babies are brutally murdered before they're born, learn to speak, learn to speak coherently, and can talk.
Duh.
Honestly, though, I'd be willing to bet that the pro-life movement picked it up from another group where the symbolism makes a little bit more sense. It's church kids going to a protest, after all, so they probably had to research how to be radical first.
31: Yeah, actually, as I wrote 32, I started to think about those issues. I mean, I certainly think that the mouth-tapers were a pretty good representation of the Schiavo folks - that was a tiny, utterly insane minority. Hell, probably 50% of all Americans who actually wanted Tom DeLay to decide Terry's fate were there in person, mouths taped.
The broader pro-life movement is, obviously, much, much bigger, but there's a hell of a lot of this kind of extremism in it (as we've all seen at clinic protests, and the "censored" billboards, etc. Hell, NOW or someone was in town for a convention a few months ago, and the aborted-fetus-photo people showed up - another crowd I wanted to drive into).
I think that LB's suggested rule - would the median pro-lifer disown this cobag? - is a good one, but I think it's also critical to look at lines of power: do actually-elected politicians listen to leaders who would not disown this cobag? IOW, people like Dobson would, I'm sure, support tape-mouth, and they have the ears of Bush, among others. I don't see anyone whose people are in Free-Mumia shirts getting meetings with Clinton.
By contrast, that über-prick Phelps doesn't get meetings with powerful Republicans, and it would be unfair to paint the GOP with his particular brand of assholery (altho not unfair to paint the religious right with it - Falwell, too, thought god hates fags).
I don't have any problem with dialogue, but there needs to be a much greater clamp down on the death threats, harassment, and attempted intimidation.
I am concerned about what is going to happen once this generation of abortion providers retires.
As fewer medical schools provide any training, and no doctors are available to step into the current providers's shoes, abortion is going to be significantly more difficult.
I thought it meant,"pity me, for I am silenced by secular humanists, and may never get the chance to tell other people what to do with their bodies". I'm not good with symbols.
For fetuses, regardless of the regulatory environment, they're going to stay voiceless
No but don'tcha see, the Anti-Choicers are giving voice to these little lumps of flesh.
I don't see the issue with the image at all. I think it works for pro-life side--it makes them look passive and doe-eyed--it works for the media, and it's not fake. All criteria met by the relevant parties. I don't think that the picture is supposed to tell the story, and I'm not sure how the image is supposed to be too inflammatory.
It's not you, mcmc, it's them. That really is the most-apparent reading of the symbolism. Especially in the context of decades of bitching that the right wing is powerless and voiceless.
would the median pro-lifer disown this cobag?
Those cobags are the median pro lifers.
People, where are the mad Google skillz? Of course the tape people have a website:
http://bound4life.com
In case you have no desire to wade through such muck:
"When LIFE is written on a piece of red tape and placed on our mouths, we are identifying with the silent screams of the unborn and of those who have no voice."
By contrast, that über-prick Phelps doesn't get meetings with powerful Republicans
He does OK for himself, though:
Phelps' son, Fred Phelps Jr., hosted a Gore fundraiser, which Al and Tipper Gore attended, at his home in Topeka. Fred Phelps, Jr. served as a Gore delegate to the 1988 Democratic National Convention.
Yeah Neil, they're so tight with Gore that they picketed his father's funeral.
Yeah, the catch with Phelps is that he's neither conservative nor religious. He's running a shakedown scheme where he and his family are as calculatedly offensive as possible in order to goad somebody into attacking them. Then they sue for damages.
Note that Phelps had cooled on Gore by the time he was in office.
A cobag is everything outside of a bag, right?
If you define "interior" that way, then sure. All we can really say is that the bag divides the world into two components.
Huh, I read that exactly backwards: I thought it was a pro-legal-abortion dude saying that anti-legal-abortion dudes were gagging him with their "life" rhetoric.
Which was as incoherent as any other reading here, I guess.
the guy looks like Sylar.
are there any people with cut-open heads lying nearby ?
I admit that I don't find the picture as appealing as others as a way to display the stupidity of the anti-choice crowd. I suspect this type of image occasionally stirs some suburban heart and prompts a reaction of, "Look at that nice white boy, in so much anguish!" I don't want that. I want pictures of them harassing and intimidating, beating up, shooting, burning, bombing. I want their portrait to be more accurate than this clean-cut honky who was so busy squinting in the fight against eye babies that he tripped and fell mouth-first into the bloodied duct tape.
51: Myself, I've always assumed that the relatively well-established habit of pro-lifers wearing duct tape gags comes from pro-life women who felt oppressed, or at least ignored, by the pro-choice hegemony among feminists. Or something. Which, under my interpretation, makes this guy look dumb for a different reason than the reason everyone else seems to have.
52: Sylar: pro-life or pro-choice? Not as obvious a question as it seems.
Look at that nice white boy, in so much anguish!
Not half the anguish he has coming, forced-birth advocating little shit.
IOW, what Alameida said.
54: I guess what threw me off was the "Life" label on the gag. That makes me think that "Life" is gagging this guy.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing that my interpretation is the correct one. Just thought it was funny that I ended up at the opposite idea from everyone else.
I talked a bit about back in the dark days when I had a blog and Schiavo-protesters were in the news, I wrote about this protest tactic. Looking now, one of the links is defunct (it was just to a news story which included images of said protesters wearing the "Life" tape).
3: What's wrong with using the turtle people to represent the Seattle protests? "Turtles and Teamsters" was one of the prouder moments of the whole things. I'd much prefer turtles as my stand-in than black bloc-ers.
When the "pro-life" demonstrators do this, they are not claiming that they do not have freedom of speech, but that the fetus is denied a voice and choice to life.
