It’s probably fair to assume that back in 1773, the word “teabagging” didn’t make everyone–from immature bloggers to perfectly mature mainstream media types–giggle like school children. But even still the would-be founding fathers took the appropriate precautionary measures, and dumped tons of loose tea (not tons of tea bags) into the Boston Harbor.
Unfortunately, it took today’s tea party protesters almost two months to get the memo. I mean, an actual memo:
The term “teabagging” has strong sexual connotations. Be wary of anyone with a camera asking you if you are a “teabagger” or if you enjoy “teabagging” or similar leading questions – they are trying to make a fool of you.
The one-page flyer was written by one Ross Kaminsky–a FreedomWorks blogger and contributor to the conservative magazine Human Events–who describes himself as a professional derivative trader and a Heartland Institute fellow.
That’s a lot of responsibilities–so it’s no surprise that he got around to sounding this alarm a bit too late. Teabagging jokes have been making their way around the Internet ever since the first protests in late February, and not just by immature irony-minded liberals. In fact, conservatives got there first. By now, though, even respected media figures like Rachel Maddow and David Shuster have decided to leave propriety behind and dive headlong into teabagging madness.
But that doesn’t mean Kaminsky’s too late to do any good. His flyer also contains tips to keep protesters from embarrassing themselves in other ways. For instance, he warns potential attendees that “[n]etroots interviewers might ask leading questions about immigration, President Obama, etc., to bait you into making comments they can paint as racist [and] might also ask questions designed to show you are uneducated and ignorant.”
Emphasis in the original, and duly noted. Kaminsky may be a day late and a dollar short, but he seems to understand that when conservatives aren’t out teabagging like crazy, they sometimes say the darndest things.
