Ann Coulter and GLBT Based Insults

Op-Ed By Angela Gardner

Ann Coulter, the White Witch of Narnia, Wicked Bitch of The West, and Republican pin up girl indirectly called presidential candidate John Edwards a faggot. It was done —indirectly—at the end of a speech she made to the American Conservative Union Political Action Conference last Friday (03/02/07). Coulter said she had planned some remarks about Edwards but wouldn’t be able to say them since, “you have to go into rehab if you use the word ‘faggot,’ so I — so kind of an impasse, can’t really talk about Edwards.”

The joke, a tiny joke, is based on comments Coulter had made earlier this year, back on February 6, on Fox News concerning Grey’s Anatomy star, Isaiah Washington, who called his co-star T.R. Knight a “faggot” and then went into rehab to deal with his issues. Knight admitted that he was gay after the incident. On Fox Coulter was making a joke out of it and saying things along the lines of how ridiculous it was that someone would go into rehab for saying the F word. Implying that it was all because of the left wing liberal media that this could happen. Conservative Fox News viewers no doubt laughed heartily.

After her March second speech was reported and the footage was posted on YouTube and other Internet sites reaction from the masses began to pour in. One site, ThinkProgress.com had over 800 posts concerning Coulter’s remarks. Most of them were anti Coulter, which is a good thing. The distressing part though, and what drives me to my keyboard to post to the blog, is that many of the comments—up to half in my estimation—made disparaging remarks about Coulter based on the old Internet rumor that Ann Coulter was born male and had a sex reassignment operation as a teenager. They called her all sorts of names that just weren’t nice.

If Coulter calls John Edwards a “faggot” and it incites a lot of attacks against her isn’t it a bit ironic that most of the attackers resort to her tactic and use “tranny” or “drag queen” as a negative club to beat her about the head and shoulders?

I was so peeved with the anti-transgender sentiments expressed in many of the posts I went ahead and posted myself. I identified myself as a transvestite and made it clear that the TG community would be embarrassed to have Ann Coulter as a member. Sadly I do not see my post when I check ThinkProgress.com so I can only conclude that they didn’t run it because I’m a tranny.

Being gay, trans, bi or any other label that you can think up doesn’t mean anything negative. it doesn’t mean you’re not able to run a country, city or major corporation. I would be happy to have a gay president. As long as the president does a good job I don’t care if he or she is married to a dog and has Mazzolla oil parties with the cabinet every week. If they’re qualified to lead the country then they should win the position based on that, not on their sexual orientation, race, or gender.

What’s wrong with Coulter and those who attack her with TG based insults is their use of labels that are seen as pejorative, labels that further discrimination against people because of their actual or perceived gender, race, orientation and so on. Labels that can make GLBT people feel bad about themselves. By going back to grade school level insults it is easy for people to diminish others and make them into an underclass that doesn’t deserve the rights that everyone has and should continue to have.

But to get back to Coulter being trans—if she is so what? She’s still a manipulating, media whore of a woman who says outrageous things to get people, like me, all worked up so we’ll write about her, get more publicity for her and increase her book sales and public appearances. Okay Ann, I’ve done it. Now do me a favor, go get your hair styled. It looks like straw. Who’s your hairdresser? Some heterosexual?

Category: All TGForum Posts, Transgender Opinion