Yeah, I understand why everyone's chuckling at this:
Judson Phillips, president of Tea Party Nation, is a little upset about Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer's decision last night to veto a bill that would have expanded the ability of business owners to discriminate against LGBT people and others.But I'm struck by something else Phillips wrote in the same post -- something that tells us a lot about right-wingers' non-sexual delusions:
"Tyranny is on the march," Phillips declares in a piece on the TPN website that he also emailed to members of the group....
Phillips then wonders if business owners will be forced to "create a cake for a homosexual wedding that has a giant phallic symbol on it," "create pastries for a homosexual wedding in the shape of genitallia [sic]," or "photograph a homosexual wedding where the participants decide they want to be nude or engage in sexual behavior." ...
....Why is this bill so important and what did it mean for not only Arizona but America?Teabaggers and other Rand-addled idiots seriously believe that, in the absence of liberal government intervention, all American workers would have absolute "control over their labor." I suspect they believe that in the reddest of states, workers actually do have full "control over their labor."
The issue can be boiled down to one word: Freedom.
A free man or woman controls their labor. A slave has no control over their labor. A free man or woman decides who they will work for and under what conditions. The slave cannot.
Do these folks know anyone who actually works for a living?
America is full of low-wage workers who never know from one week to the next how many hours they're going to work or to which shifts they're going to be assigned; employers don't care if employees can't arrange child care because of a sudden change of shift or can't get by on suddenly reduced hours -- those are the conditions of the job, take 'em or leave 'em.
If you work at Amazon, don't get used to the pace of labor, because you'll just be expected to speed up in the future. And Amazon will electronically monitor everything you do during your shift.
And if you work in the white-collar world, you're expected to be on call 24/7 via electronic devices, otherwise you're perceived as a slacker who never deserves a promotion.
Controlling one's own labor? That's a fairy tale for most workers. But for the deluded Randians, it's reality -- they don't even acknowledge that the huge power inequity between employers and employees, so they advance the ludicrous notion that we're equal partners in contracts freely entered into.
To them, all workers are perfectly free -- except when liberalism intervenes.
They're nuts.
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Phillips then wonders if business owners will be forced to "create a cake for a homosexual wedding that has a giant phallic symbol on it," "create pastries for a homosexual wedding in the shape of genitallia [sic]," or "photograph a homosexual wedding where the participants decide they want to be nude or engage in sexual behavior." ...
Somebody's been doing an awful lot of thinking about gay sex.
Why is it that the really stupid get the most press?
Good article, but this...
"Teabaggers and other Rand-addled idiots seriously believe that, in the absence of liberal government intervention, all American workers would have absolute 'control over their labor.'"
...isn't true. They don't care about any of that. All they want is to bring back the ability to discriminate against whomever they wish.
But that is classic libertarian thinking -- that the wage slave, even at minimum wage, and the employer, even a multinational, multi-billion-dollar corporation with hundreds of high-powered D.C. lobbyists, enter into every employment contract as absolute equals. They all think that.
These people are feckin' eedjits!!!!!!!!!!!
Now, having said that, I don't know about them penis-cakes - but I'd gladly dive into a nice, fresh, vagina-muffin!
;-)
But, then, since I'm male, that's "sodomy" - according to "them..."
Why did we have to get the Puritans from England, and not some French Protestants?
OY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You're forgetting that Randroids believe that if an employer really is horrible, people will decide not to work for it and it will go out of business. (See rebRand Paul on mining disasters.)
The myth of Completely Free Laborer is essential because they think it provides a good argument for blaming the unemployed, the working poor and the government all at the same time.
If you're not working it is your fault because their are jobs out there. Somewhere. If you're working and still poor, it is your fault because you should just up and find a better job. Or a second or third job.
But also, if there aren't any jobs it is because the government won't allow a Job Giver to pay people 20 cents an hour to pick up toxic waste with their bare hands.
Think of it less as anything approaching a rational theory of how human beings can live and more a constant game of Heads I Win, Tails You Lose, har har har.
Oh, and Judson is the Teahadist who thinks only property owners should be able to vote.
(DO not ask me why I have developed the tick of screwing up there and their. I didn't used to do that.)
I sometimes type "your" when I mean "you're," even though I've been a grammar nerd since childhood.
I'd like to Phillips that genitalia shaped cakes, cupcakes, pudding desserts, etc. have been made for decades. At one party the hostess made a pinkish gelatin half-ball shape onto which was put whipped cream and nut/fruit to look like a female breast.
Where do these characters hibernate that they don't know about racy desserts?
The breast dessert is quite old. In italy its called "mini di virgine" http://www.goodfoodstories.com/2011/02/04/minni-di-virgini/ and I've also heard of versions which are floating island style meriengues sitting on red rasberry sauce to mimic the severed breasts and blood of St. Agatha.
But aside from that--Rand Paul has always made the argument that someone who is a property or business owner can be reduced to the status of "indentured servant" through laws forcing him to accept customers he doesn't want while also arguing that freedom of contract means that workers can freely renounce all rights once they accept a paycheck. People become "defacto slaves" when they lose the ability to refuse a service to other people. But workers are not considered de facto slaves when they sign away rights to sue, are forced to work in substandard conditions, or forced by the market or by corporate malfeasance to accept low wages.
But workers are not considered de facto slaves when they sign away rights to sue, are forced to work in substandard conditions, or forced by the market or by corporate malfeasance to accept low wages.
They want to give employers the sort of power I associate with fictional God-Kings. Why, I don't know.
Maybe they believe they could become the ruler of their own little business kingdom if it weren't for government interference.
Maybe they're just miserable human beings. Or morons.
Ever since the Voting and Civil Right's Acts were signed, Conservatives seem to have come to the conclusion that Simon Legree was the hero of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" - not that a lot of them didn't before, but they seem to be getting more open about their racism, but hiding it better with flowery cover language and dog-whistles.
And they love Simon so much, that they've extended his racism franchise to include misogyny, xenophobia, homophobia, and religious intolerance.
Julia,
I like to think that I'm pretty literate and knowledgeable, and usually what I write is grammatically correct - but I still don't get apostrophes (apostrophe's?).
AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!!!!!!!!
The apostrophe is the bane of my existence.
Maybe because the first three languages I learned to speak before English, didn't have the damn things in their written form!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And yes, I've read about them, and tried to correct this bane of my life, but I still can't remember sometimes - and either add them when I didn't need them, or not put them on when they're necessary.
OY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Controlling one's own labor? That's a fairy tale for most workers. But for the deluded Randians, it's reality -- they don't even acknowledge that the huge power inequity between employers and employees, so they advance the ludicrous notion that we're equal partners in contracts freely entered into.
No, it's just an incredibly ballsy, barefaced lie.
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