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Who's Homophobic Now?

July 21, 2005 | By Charmaine Yoest

john_roberts_plaid_pants.jpg

John Roberts
Circa 1972ish
La Lumiere High School

Just a caution for my male readers: if there are any extant photos of you from the '70's in plaid pants, better get rid of them now. And it's not just the evidence of questionable fashion sense. Apparently now that's the goods on being gay.

Call it the Mary Cheney Strategy. Call it desperation. Some on the Left have started a "maybe he's gay" whisper campaign against John Roberts.

It started with Manhattan Offender in a post yesterday asking "How Gay is This Guy?" and then he quoted Wikipedia's entry for Judge Roberts. He zeroed in on some really damning evidence from Roberts' youthful past: the all-male boarding school, studying French and Latin (gasp!), being a wrestler and, oh the horror, participating in choir and drama.

So, it was only one silly post. Today, however, Wonkette picked up the ball and ran with it:

We're not making any conclusions here -- we wouldn't want to comment on an ongoing investigation -- we're just laying out the facts: He is a graduate of an all-boys Catholic school where, as a member of the wrestling team, he regularly grappled with other sweaty, repressed boys. That is when he wasn't the drama club playing Peppermint Patty, for God's sake.

What's that about Peppermint Patty?!? Yes, well, that's where the story starts to get interesting. That's a reference to a point raised in today's New York Times profile of Roberts, "Court Nominee's Life Is Rooted in Faith and Respect for Law," written by Todd Purdum, Jodi Wilgoren and Pam Belluck. In the midst of a very lengthy profile, Purdum, et.al. just throw in the little factoid that Roberts' yearbook records that "he played Peppermint Patty in the production of 'You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown.'"

Did I mention that this was when he was in high school?

So maybe that snarky little bit is just there for a little color? Ann Althouse has picked up the story and she thinks otherwise:

I do think the NYT piece was subtly constructed to plant this idea. Just look at the series of photographs they chose: young John in plaid pants, young John with his boys' school pals, young John in a wrestling suit with his fellow wrestlers, John with footballers, and -- the final pic -- John smiling in an all-male wedding photograph.

I think she might have a point.

Of course it is the height of hypocrisy for the (allegedly) pro-tolerance crowd to start questioning someone's sexual preference. It's a strange and twisted tactic for those who are allied with the gay rights movement to try to make an issue out of someone supposedly being gay.

Who cares?

Well, that's just the point: they think we do. They think that they can undermine support for someone among conservatives if they can dredge up some sort of homosexual connection -- or, in this case, just the manufactured whiff of a question.

If it weren't so cruel and small, it would be funny. (It's not just the plaid pants. Some of the commenters on these other sites have been questioning the Roberts' marriage, and even referencing their adopted children. That's just beyond the pale.)

The Left didn't learn their lesson when they tried this with Mary Cheney and it backfired. John Roberts may have played Peppermint Patty back in the day, but here and NOW, the Left is playing Lucy with the football . . .

***

UPDATE: Follow-up posts on this topic are at
Hardball Politics . . . and Humour, and at
Plaidgate

* * *

Althouse via Instapundit.

Puppy Nomination at American Daily. Thanks to vector Tom McMahon.

WILLism says wise pick. Salute to Mudville Gazette's Open Post.

Don't mess with Karl Rove says Evangelical Outpost.

Wonkette gets it good critiqued over on Ace of Spades HQ.

The Indepundit says lack of paper trail not a confirmation problem.

John Cole at Balloon Juice has the other hot button: abortion.

Thank you to Blogs for Bush for alerting us to JudgeRoberts.com.

Jeff Jarvis at BuzzMachine calls this the Unstory.

Captain's Quarters has more on the fashion show at Let Me Revise -- Attack The Wife And The Kids.

FaithMouse has Gaybear and the true tolerant take.

Charlotte's Allen and Hays from IWF write on the (proper) attire .


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Comments

Boy, you right wingnuts will believe anything. It's not "cruel and small," it actually is funny. I guess when you're a fanatic, anything of sarcasm or satire is lost on you. But, of course, that's why it's funny.

I know you'll find this hard to believe, but Wonkette isn't always being serious in what she says.

Bob, what a bunch of bull.

You think that you and your buddies on the left can smear someone, and then claim, "It's all a joke, It's funny, ha ha."

Charmaine is correct when she says this "Well, that's just the point: they think we do. They think that they can undermine support for someone among conservatives if they can dredge up some sort of homosexual connection -- or, in this case, just the manufactured whiff of a question"

I read DU and Daily Kos, too. There have been many posts related to this-trying to peel off Conservative Christians by claiming a Republican is Gay. Because the lefts mantra is that conservatives are "homophobic" because many of us do not support gay marriage, they are actually puzzled (I've seen it posted) when conservatives don't respond with horror and distance themselves from the person who is supposedly "gay".

The left still hasn't figured out that they do not achieve their goal when they start whisper campaigns saying that a conservative is gay, but only reinforce that liberals, for all their talk, are actually the ones that not only have poor taste but are "homophobic" and "bigots".

"What goes around comes around," is the phrase I think you are looking for. Leave it to the right to view satire of right-wing hypocrisy as really an example of left-wing hypocrisy. This is funny on many levels, not the least of which is the blank stare from the right when confronted with their own worldview. What is that I see in the mirror? Persecution!

Geez, Bob

So talking about how great it would be to "out" Jack as gay by the kosskiddies is just all fun and games? (and that was before the idiots making that remark even knew Jack was FOUR YEARS OLD)

But we know how much the moonbats love sarcasm...after having gone ballistic over Iowahawk's fun at their (and later Armando's) expense.

I know you'll find this hard to believe, but Wonkette isn't always being serious in what she says.

Nifty that only the alternate-reality-based community can make a funny about homosexuality and get a pass from gay activists flinging "homophobe! around recklessly. But no one is supposed to notice that, I suppose?

Pardon us if after decades of experience folks are a bit short-fused on veiled epithets hidden behind false masks of humor.

Wow. I guess people don't discuss a judge's actual qualifications anymore...

Actually, I'm surprised that Right didn't think of this. If he's outed as gay, the Left will be forced to give him first class treatment and confirm him immediately, lest they come across as homophobic.

Reply to Bob Munck. Hey, it's the typical response by left-wingers (the real fanatics): pose a lie, certain to raise an inference by innuendo, hide behind NYT v. Sullivan for 1st Am. protection from a libel suit by a public figure (which Judge Roberts is now), and then when conservatives are outraged by the latest low which you amoral thugs pull, you back off and claim that its a joke or parody, and claim that we're mentally unbalanced. When we wind up being the ones who backpedaled, the new low in political mudslinging is now set, until the next opportunity to deal dirt. As Solomon said in the Word of God that WILL judge your godless soul (whether you believe it or not, jerk!): "Like a madman shooting firebrands or deadly arrows is a man who deceives his neighbor and says 'I was only joking!'

We are going to win this fight, and the other ones, too. And then you can start doing the howling, as America starts to regain its sanity again, and stick clowns like you back on the societal shelf where you belong!

Wonkette is NEVER serious. Like most on the Left she is usually solemn, occasionally pompous… but never, ever serious.

Wonkette sounds like she's clowning around, but the NY Times? I've seen these subtle NY Times photo arrangements before -- it's a game they like to play. They once had five photos whose orchestrated point were that Orlando is a Mickey Mouse town. It was really quite funny.

What the NY Times is doing now, in a supposed news report, is **simply throwing stuff** at Roberts. The point is -- whatever negativity comes of it. In some circles one is not supposed to act insulted at the suggestion that one is a homosexual -- there was a funny Seinfeld episode about that. The NYT's point is to make things unpleasant and uncomfortable for all to see, for Roberts or whoever Bush nominates to a position on the Supreme Court. The NY Times has become such a silly newspaper since the ascendancy of Pinch Sulzberger*.

* Refuses to strike Pulitzer awarded for NYT's Walter Duranty's reporting which covered up Stalin's mass murder.

Sure, it's just a joke. Like the liberal websites that exist to "out" gay Republicans, whether they are gay or not. Like the GAY C**K! orgy that liberals unleashed on conservative reporter Jeff Gannon.
Liberals are unapologetic hatemongers and Americans are showing over and over that they are sick of their throwback antics.

The Fatal Democrat error.
You hit it. The liberals give conservatives credit for nothing. We have no insight, compassion, capacity to synthesize new ideas and an absoloute hatred for all things not biblical.....a gross strategic blunder. This assumption has caused their near complete undoing. Time and again these attempts at villification fail, and yet they learn nothing. What a shame. A weak adversary will make us lazy and unprepared for the next fight.

Ah, the old "we can say anything we want as long as we claim it's a joke" line.

Joking, eh? I thought it was politically incorrect to joke about sexual orientation?

Or, maybe if you're on "the good side," and not an evil right wing nazi, you can pretty much joke about anything and it just demonstrates your sterling sense of humor.

If it's serious it's sad. If it's a joke it's hypocritical. You pick.

Oh my god, I'm gay. I used to wrestle, sang (and sing) in a choir. Was Will in Oklahoma and once had plaid pants. Shoot me now. My daughters are gay too, one is the manager of her high school wrestling team and the other wrestles. They both sing in the high school select choir AND they both act. Where do I get plaid pants for them?

This is insane. You kooks need to see that you cannot throw this stuff around. If this was being done to a liberal, you would all be wailing in the street. Oh yeah, one more thing, YOU GUYS LOST THE LAST TWO ELECTIONS TO GEORGE W. BUSH so sit down and stay quiet.

The ad nauseum attacks begin! Can't say they oppose him because he's Catholic and has a religious background can they?

Plaid pants???

May I see the part of the Constituiton that mentions anything about clothing styles. If this is the big complaint of the left, they are seriously off their medication.

Just a joke, and we right-wingnuts don't get it? Well, it's not always easy to know when our Lefty friends are trying to be funny. As a group, they lack humor, are literal-minded and self-serving. Anyway, Wonkette isn't joking.

What passes for humor on the left is to engage in the politics of personal destruction and when that doesn't fly then claim it "was all a joke." Take Al Franken of the failing Airhead America show, he titles a book "Rush is a big fat idiot", know all the while that Rush HAD a weight problem and noting this outdated piece of information would make brownie points with his pinheaded readers.

And you have to love the hypocrisy of the left with respect to name calling. To here them tell it conservatives are by nature insensitive and mean-spirited so they always resort to stereotypes and name calling (this is a stereotype in itself!) in an attempt to denigrate the competition. So what's the "open-minded", "tolerant" and "sensitive" liberal's excuse for their hateful name calling and fingerpointing? They have none other than "Well, Billy does it, too." Pathetic. One would expect left-wingers to conduct themselves with far more decorum and sensitivity given the load of crap they whine about in the public square about how "tolerant" they are.

The same goes for the issue of "world peace". Here are these people more closely identifying themselves with the cause of terrorists than they do with the concerns of their own conservative neighbors right here in America. Here's their version of "world peace" as indicated by their actual practice: In order to have world peace we must villify our president and hate conservatives!

Get it? To have peace you must hate. Boy, if this isn't cult-think I don't know what is. For most Democrats, their politics is their religion, so in that light I say let's begin applying some separation of church and state, which apparently the general electorate has been doing the last few election cycles by voting out Democrats - at least those voting-aged Democrats who survived the abortion gauntlet.

Wow, you guys just keep making it funnier and funnier. It's not a joke about Roberts, it's a joke about you. And it's right on target.

I'm going back to just 'blogging' about things in Manhattan, our beautiful island off of the coast of the United States. This exposure to the 'reds' has been disheartening.

I'm starting to think that a whole lot of supposedly-tolerant leftists really are homophobes, given their obsession over everyone's sexual orientation, and their giddiness at forcibly outing gays (whether they are actually gay or not). The only reason they profess to be in brotherhood is because they see gays as a captive voting bloc. Hence, their unhinged reaction anytime a gay person goes off the reservation on any issue.

I thought the left loved gays and everything they stand for? What stuff like this points out is that the Left is elitist, prejudiced and racist. Just imagine in six months when Janice Rogers Brown wins her nomination to the Court. The black jokes will be flying around on dumb sites like these. Maybe you can use the gay and black on her too.

Patch, I think it is in the Declaration of Independence, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of plaid pants". And who can forget the Boston Plaid Pants Party. And Patrick Henry's stirring "No Plaid Pants without representation" speech before the Virginia House of Burgess.

This is wrong. I'm glad you spoke out on this terrible injustice.

BTW...Hillary is a lesbian. Pass it on.

It really is a joke. I promise. Cross my heart. (And it's pc because it's a send-up of homophobia.)

You've got your nominee, and you'll probably confirm your nominee. Take three deep breaths and enjoy running the country.

Are you serious?!?

Ah yes, that's quite a hit-piece the Washington Post ran - he must have hated a title like "Court Nominee's Life Is Rooted in Faith and Respect for Law." Boy I bet the White House was steamed!!

And they were next on the phone to chew out Cass Sunstein and Larry Tribe for declaring Roberts an excellent choice. Those liberals have no decency at all!!

First, let's not confuse things. Mary Cheney is gay, not that there's anything wrong with that.

Second, they're joking. It's sick and juvenile, but that sort of "humor" is only encouraged by whipping ourselves into a frenzy over it.

Forget it.

Floyd:

What you describe, it's called being a slime ball. Some on the left are great at this... claim the moral highground as you plumb the depths of good taste.

I haven't read much Wonkette much recently, but I was a regular reader for a couple of months. She regularly made jokes about almost every political figure being gay, especially Kerry and Edwards. The key words here are, "made jokes."

Wonkette isn't joking? When isn't Wonkette joking? If you're not joking, you're an idiot. And your "Lefty friends...lack humor, are literal-minded and self-serving." I think you're projecting.

Comments above all make good points. I would say, however, that whether one is homosexual oneself may be a good predictor of where one would stand on the issue of homosexual marriage. Maybe not, but if I had to make a bet about person X and he himself were homosexual, it would influence the odds I would take. I think it Roberts case this is almost certainly hooey. And the points about a double standard are completely correct.

Re: The "Peppermint Patty" thing...I wish someone would verify this. Peppermint Patty isn't *in* "You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown". The earlier character named Patty is. Did they change it for his high school, or is the person who wrote this article for the NYT just too young to remember Patty?

Wouldn't make much ado about Roberts being 'gay' make the left....hypocrites?

Just a thought...

The left is full of a bunch of [d*mn] bigots. Quite frankly the left believes it gets a pass as long as they are the ones calling people queer.

Well, I finally feel old. This is generational confusion! As someone who grew up in the '60's and '70's, I know what people were wearing then--and for men, plaid pants were hot! (Remember "Animal House"!) If this indicates anything other than Roberts was "fashionable" -- then most of the boys I knew in high school were gay as well.
Yes, it's probably all a joke--but what you joke about says a lot about your heart and mind.

Wow, I didn't even hear about these rumors until some righty wing-nut dredged it up from the bottom of the blog ocean...

I love the right's obsession with Daily Kos. They find one offhand comment from a commenter on the site (which the other commenters all denounced and then say it represents "the left" (insert horror music here). If the left played the same game with the Free Republic and LGF, it would be neverending fun. I like whne the Freepers called Sandra Day O'Connor on the day of her retirement a fat cow. And the LGF'rs, jeez, they constantly endorse genocide of all muslims. Guess what, guys --- Kos said that he was not opposing Roberts, and now you can't attack anyone so you are just digging for stuff . . . . YOu are all crazy.

All this is absolutely the most hilarious episode in recent blog-history!!!!

I think you people are so intoxicated with that bile flowing in your veins that you cant even begin to imagine what fools you are making of yourselves.

I only wish that the "left" were clever enough to be able to take credit for setting youse guys up as suckers like this - but no, I think y'all get all the credit for this yourselves.

You're taking Wonkette way too seriously. I'm a big John Edwards fan, and I didn't have any problem with her playing up an Edwards-is-gay line.

Look, this is pretty much her M.O. She looks at a news story, finds the silliest link between it and anal sex, and writes about it. Maybe some of you good people are too mature for that, so it doesn't amuse you. That's fine. But don't think she's being serious.

Observer: All this is absolutely the most hilarious episode in recent blog-history!!!!

No. That would be the Valerie Plame non-scandalgate

Plame not a scandal, huh? Bets, anyone? It will bring the illicit Bush house down. Oh how nice it will be! Do enjoy your 'last throes'!

and my thesis, that conservatives do not have a sense of humour, is now proved.

i mean, jesus, this is wonkette, we're talking about.

Face it, you guys have no sense of humor. When Ann Coulter says it's too bad that Tim McV didn't blow up the NYT building, oh boy THAT was funny. But make fun of a pair of plaid pants? HOW DARE YOU!

Get a [deleted] grip.

Seriously. If ever there was doubr that conservatives don't understand irony, now is the time.

You guys just have no clue that it's YOU, not Roberts, being mocked, and you're making it funnier and funnier with every oblivious comment that makes clear just how clueless you are.

Besides, you really have no worries about us liberals starting "whisper campaigns" or engaging in character association. We might try to learn how, but we would never come anywhere close to the skill, shamlessness and utter lack of moral compunction that's necessary to do it well. We'll leave that to your side, because you all do it so very well.

Good lord y'all are tripping! just listen. Everything is going to be fine. You're very high right now. You will probably be that way for about five more hours. Try taking some vitamin B complex, vitamin C complex.. if you have a beer, go ahead and drink it..Just remember you're a living organism on this planet, and you're very safe. You've just taken a heavy drug. Relax, stay inside and listen to some music, Okay? Do you have any Allman Brothers?

Its not so much that its a "joke." Its that we find this behavior by the nominee endearing.

you're kidding right? please tell me you're kidding.

Wonkette apparently missed Freud and the vast psychological literature on humor. That brand of "humor" is aggressive and vicious, and not funny at all. Wonkette is seriously humorous.

So a gay blogger points to stereotypically gay aspects of the nominee's biography to insinuate he's gay and you don't pick up on the fact that he's attacking the stereotypes? Have you ever met a gay person? And, if you asked them, did they think that all people who have a stereotypically gay characteristic are, in fact, gay? Far out.

Duh - it's a JOKE. Maybe not as hilariously funny as, say, when President Bush hunted for the missing WMDs at the corresponent's dinner, but a joke none the less.

Haven't you ever heard of "camp"? No one is attacking Roberts for being gay. Hell, the left would love that. They're just making fun of some funny details in his background. Wonkette also makes a point of posting pictures of G.W. Bush limp-wristed or holding a guy's hand, but she is not really suggesting that Bush is gay. Its humor, irony. It is funny to see Bush who made anti-gay rhetoric practically a pillar of his campaign in gay poses. Likewise, its funny to suggest a posterboy conservative family guy Roberts would have these silly stereotypically gay characteristics in his history.

The wingnuts do protest too much, methinks.

Hey, right-wingers, here's the liberal point of view in a nutshell: Being called gay, even if you're not at all gay, even if it's not meant as a joke but rather is meant as a serious, sober accusation, IS NOT AN INSULT.

What you wingnuts don't get is that straight people on the left dont think there is anything whatsoever wrong with being gay. Nothing nothing nothing wrong with it. It's like being tall or being a preppie - it has no moral right/wrong status whatsoever. We can hang out with openly gay people and talk about their gayness openly, we can innocently joke about the gayness of anyone we wish, and we can call people gay who obviously are not -- all without even a drop of judgementalism or condemnation.

We also think it's fine if our children grow up and become gay. If gay people influence my children to become gay and I end up without any heirs and my family bloodline dries up, so what? I just want my kids to be happy. And yes, gay people are happy.

The fact that we have 100% non-judgemental attitude towards gay people is something you wingnuts cannot understand. You hear a lefty use the word "gay" and you cannot comprehend that it might not be an insult. Listen: it's not!

In fact, we like gay people so much that we think most gay people are pretty cool. It's far more likely that the effete aura that some are painting Judge Roberts with will endear him to the gay-friendly left far more than it will alienate him from the left, or even from the right. His plaid pants tell us that maybe, just maybe, he too doesn't waste his time with insane worries over how gay people are going to lead America's children astray.

I don't think anyone has yet pointed out how all these wingnuts lept to the conclusion that the suggestion Roberts may be gay was an attack on Roberts. A totally unwarranted conclusion. Wonkette, for instance, ends her post by saying "I like the guy more and more."

A clearer display of mass homophobia would be difficult to find. All the more clear for its being uncounscious.

That and the fact that they obviously have very thin and humorless skins on the subject. Sublimate much?

This is hilarious. You've set a new gold standard for me for Wingnuts Who Completely Miss The Point.

Congrats on your achievement.

I'm working on a response to these comments which I'll be posting on the main page later this afternoon. Thanks for stopping by and commenting.

The irony is too rich. The irony I'm referring to of course is the fact that lefties have no problem with gays, and that only right-wingers, vividly displaying their own homophobia, would think that a leftie calling someone a gay is a smear or an attack. That you guys don't even get this only makes it sadder.

Um, wait a sec...

Do you have any evidence of anyone on the left actually calling him gay?

You have one flippant remark by a gay, Wonkette (Wonkette, few gawds sake) and a conservative blogger.

Based on this, to judge from the comments and the trackbacks above, the entire right wing blogosphere is in turmoil.

There is no smear campaign. Not even close. This is just a hyper-sensitive "we're being picked on" reaction. And it's silly, and it's sad.

But Mary Cheney IS, by self description, gay. I'm confused. Are you saying Roberts is gay too?

Alexander: no, you misunderstand my point. I am referring back to the "Mary Cheney strategy" which was: the Left attempting to undercu