Dumbfuckery du Jour

Right, then.  So I'd had this perfect trifecta of burning stoopid all set and ready for ye when I got a bit sidetracked, and I thought this morning, "Oh, dear, something really profoundly inane will happen today and I'll end up with either an unwieldy foursome or I'll have to scuttle the trifecta as old news."  That was before I spent all day at work watching our queue grow and grow and grow (because apparently the scheduling software has a blind spot when it comes to staffing on Wednesdays).  Then there was the flood in ye olde inbox - a great many excellent old friends whom I'd lost touch with tracked me down on Facebook, and I spent some time reading over the list, reliving fond memories, and thinking, "Holy shit, how the fuck am I going to catch up on sleep, reading, blogging, and all these folks???"

Well, new dumbfuckery can wait.  Besides, this stuff is like cheese - it doesn't spoil, it just ages.

Let us begin with the rallying cry of Temecula, California's rabid right, who don't want none of those icky Mooslems building no new mosques in the territory they've already pissed on.  Well, they know just how to scare away that kind of rabble, yes they do:

As the Valley News of Fallbrook reports, the leader of the anti-community center rally -- who the paper does not name -- has "been active with Republican and Tea Party functions" in the past. Recently, the activist distributed an email to area media outlets calling on those opposed to the construction of the Islamic Center in Temecula to come to a "one-hour 'singing - praying - patriotic rally'" July 30 at the site of the town's existing Islamic center, which local Muslims are trying to replace with new construction.

Details on the event, from the Valley News:

"We will not be submissive," the notice proclaimed. "Our voices are going to be heard!" The alert went on to question what its authors described as Islamic beliefs. It suggested that participants sing during the rally because Muslim "women are forbidden to sing." It suggested that rally participants bring dogs because Muslims "hate dogs."

And they know this because an uncle of a cousin of an acquaintance of a friend once told the local pastor that some dude with dark skin and a Middle Eastern name once called in a nuisance complaint on someone's constantly barking dog, I'm sure. 

As for the Muslim ladies being forbidden to sing, well, that's going to come as a surprise to the other folks who could find nothing in the Qu'ran to prevent such activities.  (That, of course, has not stopped frothing fundie clerics from inventing such a prohibition, much like frothing fundie preachers have manipulated Bible verses to expressly forbid some activities not actually forbidden whilst explaining why it's okay to wear blends and eat shellfish despite clear prohibitions against those things.  However, I rather doubt the Temecula mosque and community center gives two shits about those fucktards.)

After that display of amazing ignorance, everything else should've been distant second.  But no.  When one group of rabid righties explodes with teh stoopid, another set needs to outdo 'em.  And when it comes to a right-wing fucktard trying to parse the meaning of the word "lynch," you just know the dumbfuckery's deep and getting rapidly deeper:

Yesterday, the American Spectator's Jeffrey Lord decided to go after Shirley Sherrod, this time accusing her of lying because she said Bobby Hall was "lynched" in 1943. Hall was beaten to death by a white sheriff and his two white deputies, but as far as Lord was concerned, rope wasn't involved. Ergo, Sherrod's credibility is in question.

As Adam Serwer responded yesterday, "A lynching is an extrajudicial mob killing. No one who worked to document the practice of lynching in the South limited the definition of the term to solely include those lynchings that occurred using a rope.... Now does three guys beating someone to death sound like an extrajudicial mob killing to you?"

Today, Lord answered that question and defended his offensive argument.

Random House Webster's College Dictionary defines lynching as: "to put to death, esp. hanging by mob action and without legal authority."

I have read the Court's decision. Three people are not a "mob." A mob is defined as a "large crowd." So there was no "mob action" because there was no mob.

Look, this is ridiculous. Lord wisely gave up on the whole rope line of argument, but now wants to parse the meaning of the word "mob." Three white cops beat a black man to death. They arrested him on weak evidence, beat him mercilessly for a half-hour, and dragged the man's unconscious body, feet first, through the courthouse square before his death.

If there were four white cops would Lord be comfortable with the word "lynching"? How about five? 

I have a feeling he won't accept anything less than a round hundred complete with torches and pitchforks, but who knows?  He could be satisfied with fifty.  However, debating the exact number of people required to make a mob (anyone encountering a toddler knows the correct answer is 1) rather distracts from the fact that some kindly soul needs to take little Lord aside and 'splain to him the meaning of "esp."  As I am not a kindly soul, I shall put it this way, Mr. Lord: if you looked up the word "dumbfuck" and found this definition:

"an extraordinarily stupid person, esp. Jeffrey Lord"

that would not mean that you are the only possible type of dumbfuck in existence, just an especially fine example of one.  Hope that helps!

Anyway, while we're on the subject of lynching:

The National Organization For Marriage (NOM) has embarked on a disastrous 23-city “Summer for Marriage Tour 2010,” spreading the gospel of one-man-one-woman marriage to tens of supporters and encountering well organized counter protests in almost every city. Yesterday, the The Bilerico Project’s Bil Browning attended a NOM rally in Indianapolis, Indiana and found that while “over 250 LGBT and allied folks protested the rally,” “only 40 fundies showed up.” Among the small crowd of so-called traditional marriage supporters was a man holding a sign reminiscent of the Jim Crowe era. It showed two yellow nooses and a bible passage suggesting that gay couples should be put to death...

(I do not want to confuse Mr. Lord here, so let me explain: just because "noose" is the first image to spring to mind when someone brings up "lynch" does not mean that a noose is the only possible means of lynching someone.  Please refer to the definition of "dumbfuck" above once again, Mr. Lord.)

I'm sure it will surprise you not at all to learn that the wielder of said sign "was all confused himself" before he became a fundie and learned he should hate himself for his icky attraction to other blokes.  Amazing how such buffoons feel the need to turn their self-loathing into exhortations to execute those who refuse to despise their sexual orientation.

These are the supporters that NOM's Maggie Gallagher was "very proud of" before the rally.  I wonder how proud she is now?

That's it, my darlings.  We've had to don scuba equipment for this foray into the deep dumbfuckery, and I believe I'm running out of air.  Time to surface.