MSNBC’s Tucker Carlson took to Dan Abrams‘ airwaves last night to discuss the Larry Craig case.
Besides swearing “I’m not anti-gay” about a billion times, Carlson informs us all that he’s been “bothered” in a public bathroom. His reaction? He grabbed him – and then beat him up.
Oh, Carlson, you’re so virile!
Dawster
oh my god, he totally admitted a hate crime while the other two giggle.
he could of said… “leave me alone” like normal people. although if the creepy guy CONTINUED to bother me, i probably would have done something similar…
but bring someone back and beat the guy up… and the cops arrested THE GUY?? WTF?
and are the creepy guys after his children now? why don’t we ever think of the children?
GranDiva
Oh, jeez. If I had to pay attention every time Tucker Carlson said something stupid…
Mr. B
God. Tucker Carlson is such a testosterone overdose. His whole schtick–aside from the conservative pundit part–is that he’s a big dumb tough guy.
And, yeah. Beating up a guy because he propositioned you is a hate crime, prick.
Paul Raposo
Bow tie boy really expects us to believe he could beat up another man? Like a typical conservative punk, the boy went and found someone to help him do his fighting.
Matt
Did this happen while he was still sporting the perky little bow tie?
kamasutrajones
While I certainly don’t condone beating up the guy who hit on him (a simple call to the police or park security would have sufficed), I understand some of what he’s saying. Why so many gay man or closeted straights or whatever feel that having sex in a public restroom is their right, I have no idea. And when they get arrested for lewd behavior and then claim it’s homophobia is completely beyond me. It’s a public restroom. And, having sex in a public restroom is illegal. I also don’t think that mentioning not bringing his kid into the restroom equates homosexuality to pedophilia. He just doesn’t want to walk in with his kid and have two guys going at it.
Jack Jett
I watched this last night and thought it was like a gathering of drunk frat boys who were trying to over compensate their heterosexuality.
Dan Abrams is the director of news and the fact that they can not cover this issue in the year 2007 without the giggles is really annoying.
If I saw Tucker Carlson in a mens toilet I would choose to piss on him than to blow him…
This little bitch gets under my skin.
BTW..thank you kamasutrajones for letting us know that “public restroom sex is illegal” as I never knew that. How about a guy fucking a chick in the back seat of his car…is that illegal? How about priest butt fucking alter boys….is that illegal?
jack jett
Bill Perdue
Tucker Carlson is a pig and a prude. His chickenshit cowardice in getting a friend to help him assault the guy who ‘bothered’ him is rightly condemned by all of us.
However I was amazed to find that his prudishness and uberchristian revulsion for promiscuity and gay sexuality are shared by a few gay men. In the discussion of the Craig arrest some poor souls went so far as to say that no gay man, ‘in’ or ‘out’ should ever look for sex anywhere but in a bar or on the net.
What a bizarre idea. There are, as of 1530 GMT on August 29th, 2007 about 302,703,021 Americans, so that means there are about 15 to 30 million gay men, give or take a million. There just isn’t room for us in the bars. Not all of us live in cities, we’re not all 18, some of us works our asses off and take it (safely) where and when we can find it, some of us just don’t like bars, and some of us do like roaming around looking for (safe) sex. What millions of us have in common is that we don’t want to listen to this barely disguised christian bullshit about sex and nudity and all that ‘dirty’ stuff being verboten.
That’s why very few gay men go to church, or temple, or face Mecca, or dance with rattlers, etc. Hopefully these judgmental prigs will climb down off their hobby horses and show a little respect. If not they’ll just have to trot on down St. Patrick’s and say a novena for our lost souls. Just remember not to tap you toes when you get into the confessional. You could be arrested.And don’t even think about ‘bothering’ an altar boy, they’re spoken for.
Mr. B
I don’t think anyone was claiming homophobia on the basis of public sex being illegal (I think we all know that), so much as being appalled that Tucker was justifying violence as an appropriate response to gay cruising. Because, really, that seemed to be the punchline of the whole thing. (Pun NOT intended.)
What’s really disturbing about a lot of media coverage of the Craig case is that so many of the (especially male) anchors are, as has been mentioned, treating it with theatrical revulsion and “Oh, how bizarre!” amusement.
As for Craig, he did something he knew was illegal and wasn’t even particularly careful about it.
Paul Raposo
A friend of mine is a bartender/bouncer at a pub and in five years he says he’s ever had to toss out guys for having sex in the men’s room, or for making sexual advances. However, he’s lost count of the number of straight couples he’s had to bounce because of sex in the bathrooms. Yet gay men are labeled degenerates.
ProfessorVP
Apparently he wasn’t raised to have good manners. Your fault, Mother Tucker!
NeoAurelianus
You know what? I agree with Carlson Tucker that being approached for sex in a public bathroom is disgusting, especially if, as he said, he was in high school. I’ve always believed “tea rooms” are mostly for closeted men and the anonymity and randomness of such encounters are unattractive to me.
I’m also going to come out as an “olderNOT4youngerbutclosertomygeneration” kind of guy and say adults have no business soliciting sex from minors, which most high school students are until or after senior year. These are my beliefs but I don’t expect others to agree with 1% or 100% of them.
But (!) Tucker had no right to return with help to attack the other guy or even to attack immediately after the advance unless he was defending himself from true assault. Unsolicited groping is unpleasant and might lead to assault but one grope is a matter to be handled with a firm hand removing the offending arm (except, as noted, in the case of attempted or intended pedophilia).
Luckily I don’t watch TV so this was the first time I’ve seen Tucker but the great amusement of the other 2 men is as inexcusable as his admission. That’s the real battle to be fought — approval of and even unbridled amusement about violence against gay men. When I was a kid in the 60s I’d hear men make jokes like “If a woman is being raped why doesn’t she just lie back and enjoy it?” and my stomach churned. If Tucker had made that statement and received laughter in response all three of them would be fired, and they should be.
Our society (i.e., the USofA) has been strangely slow in recognizing rights of so-called minorities of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, economics, etc. but slowly attitudes and beliefs change. 175 years ago people owned other people. 100 years ago women could not vote. Until 1954 unconscionable racial discrimination was sanctioned as “Separate but Equal” and 50+ years later we still deal with hatred and bigotry based on the amount of melanin in one’s skin.
I’m 51 and didn’t think I’d live to see Bowers v. Hardwick overturned but it happened. The USA is shamefully and ridiculously behind most “civilized” nations in recognizing gay families rights but those changes will come.
Tucker’s homophobic rant and the ignorant responses of his co-hosts may help accomplish positive changes in some people’s attitudes and beliefs. More and more people see homophobia for what it is — an irrational prejudice or belief popularly held by a society, often codified by law (until the last 25 or so years), which must be eliminated in the cause of human progress.