The ongoing, albeit amusing, battle to save Bristol

Yesterday, at XX Factor, I blogged about what may be a new low for culture warriors: making it their mission to stick it to the liberals by keeping Bristol Palin on "Dancing With The Stars". My point was that this proves how much it's just culture war for them. Bristol is unpopular with the judges and the fans not because of any personality traits or anything she's done wrong, but because she doesn't work hard and she sucks. If she wasn't considered a member of the wingnut tribe, she would have been gone a long time ago. But due to extensive conservative online organizing and possible cheating, Palin in hanging in.

I expected a lot of snotty comments from fuck-you conservatives in comments, and I got them, which basically proved my point. The election of the President was brought up, making me wonder if someone maybe should step back and think about how there's actual differences between electing politicians with power and winning on "DWTS". It seems, for wingnuts, the two are tied together under one very important life mission.

Pissing off the liberals.

Oh, those wily liberals! Always smiling and so smug, thinking they're so cool. We'll show them. We'll get Bristol Palin to win on "DWTS", even though she doesn't deserve it, and elect any nutbar to Congress with an "R" behind their name. It's all culture war and everything is about scoring points, damn the consequences. The possibility that it doesn't actually piss off many liberals---for instance, I've never seen "DWTS", couldn't tell you who's on it, or who has ever won it---didn't seem to have been a factor. But what was most interesting to me was this reply:

This seems like a case of the rich, popular cheerleaders looking like they've sucked on a lemon when they learn that the poor girl in school, the one in the home-made clothes and religious family, gets elected Prom Queen.

I've rarely seen such a clean-cut example of the conservative tendency to say up is down and black is white. Or, more precisely, to bemoan how oppressed white, rich, and highly privileged people are. First of all, has the poor girl in school ever won Prom Queen? Was that in some 80s movie somewhere? As someone actually in the dork caste in my high school, I can assure you that the boundaries of who got those kind of awards were closely monitored, usually by people like Bristol Palin, who had powerful parents, lots of money, and super jock boyfriends. But it was telling of what a cipher the Palin family has become. They're obscenely rich millionaires who run small town feuds on a level beyond what I ever saw with people trying to establish fiefdoms in the small town of my youth, but in the imagination of their fans, Sarah Palin is basically Dolly Parton---a scrappy poor girl who grew up with no shoes but became a big star on talent alone. And Bristol Palin, too, though more as an afterthought.

I'll give that Sarah Palin has a unique talent at assholery that has allowed her to rise above where a woman with fewer talents in the art of puppy-kicking might have gone. But Bristol Palin hasn't really done squat. She is literally famous for having a baby at an inopportune time. And now she continues to get promoted over more talented people than her because she was born into the right family. Comparing that to the poor kid with handmade clothes making good is like comparing "The Godfather" to a Pauly Shore movie. Bristol Palin is a hero to wingnut America because she's a great example of rewarding someone for being born into privilege instead of on their merits.

I say this without a whiff of knowledge about her character. I don't particularly give a shit. I just find it extremely funny that the wingnutteria is backing someone with no talent on a show with no real importance to stick it to liberals who by and large don't really care, and they're doing so because they're intoxicated by privilege and kind of wish they had a monarchy, but they're pretending that they're doing it because they want to see the oppressed rise above. I suppose after "Dancing With The Stars" is done, they should start sticking it to the liberals by defending poor, oppressed Paris Hilton, who is definitely the weird girl with handmade clothes that is picked on by cheerleaders.