Great Moments in Conservative Humor

We're back for Issue #2 of our ongoing series, Great Moments in Conservative Humor.

This time, we've got a deliciously humiliating "editorial" by conservative "comedian" Julia Gorin. If Gorin's name is familiar, you're either a careful reader of this blog or an idiot with a terrible sense of humor. I'm hoping for the former. She was mentioned by Doug Giles in the previous Great Moments in Conservative Humor column as one of the rare, shining lights on the Right-Wing Comedy scene.

Yikes.

Gorin's Wall Street Journal editorial is entiteld "Fetal Attraction." Quadruple yikes.

I've been married seven years, and people often ask me, "Why don't you have kids? Don't you like kids?"

I'll be honest. I don't particularly like kids.

Hey, I feel the same way! Maybe this article won't be so bad after all...

But I do have a thing for fetuses--and embryos.

Oh, no, wait, never mind. Worst article ever. Got it.

Friends are puzzled as to why, considering my indifference to children, I get all stirred up about abortion.

Are these friends the same people who always ask her why she doesn't have any children? She's got some fucking obnoxious, nosy friends.

After all, they say, fetuses and embryos aren't "children" or even "babies."

Bingo. The thing is, whatever these creatures are, they've got kids beat by a mile.

See, Gorin runs into trouble early because the entire comic premise of her article makes no fucking sense. I read through it twice and I still don't really get what she's saying.

She starts off doing this sassy, nonplussed "I'm a woman but I hate kids" thing, but then starts talking about the magic of being pregnant and how only a lazy worthless bitch would rather get an abortion than carry an unwanted fetus for nine months. It's really confusing and not at all funny. Grim, really. And strange. And creepy. Oh, and not funny.

A fetus or embryo has to go to the parties I want to go to and see the movies I want to see. If I were to take my fetus to a midnight showing of a horror movie, no one would look at me as if I'm a lunatic the way people do at parents who bring their infants and toddlers. (Is it their fault they couldn't find a sitter?)

That's another amazing thing about embryos: no babysitting required. You can party and travel for weeks on end. In fact, these days if you don't have time for an embryo, you can just freeze it. Try that with a kid--you'll go to prison.

W the fucking F? Seriously...Are these jokes? The amazing thing about embryos is that you can party and travel for weeks on end? What does that mean? Was this editorial ghostwritten by the late Wesley Willis? Check out this paragraph:

Not to mention that with these embryo and fetus critters, you don't have to worry about what they're watching on TV, or whom they're meeting on the Internet and how protective a parent you should be. Not only are fetuses and embryos a lot cheaper than kids, but you don't have to deal with strapping on any of those baby sacks to carry them around, since they're already attached--and you don't have to fuss with a child safety seat before driving anywhere.

I may be wrong, but didn't she steal this routine from Milton Berle? It has the lived-in feel of an old classic.

I don't know much about professional comedy, but I do know this - if you find yourself using the phrase "embryo and fetus critters," you should consider leaving show business for a career that better suits your talents, such as pest control or some kind of position in professional awards-show seat-filling. Start at the bottom - the Cable ACE Awards, I'd presume - and work your way up.

A fetus has to eat what you want to eat, and can't whine about being at Le Cirque instead of Chuck E. Cheese's. You can eat as much as you want, and the embryo isn't going to say, "Mommy, you're fat," the way a kid will as soon as it can talk (despite being the culprit behind your changing body). That alone makes an embryo or fetus at least as worthy of protection as a child.

"Any signs of an actual joke and/or coherent sentence?"

"Nothing yet, sir."

"As you were."

There's another reason I have a soft spot for the preborn: Children who have been born have plenty of defenders, advocates, protective laws and folks who love kids; they're universally recognized as human beings and get all the attendant protections, including a mother's self-restraint even at the most trying times. Their right to life isn't in dispute.

Wow...She really does hate children. I mean, I make a lot of jokes around here about my hatred of children, and it's 100% true that I have trouble relating to them and don't enjoy being around them a great deal. But...and this is a HUGE BUT - I don't actively hope for harm to come to any children. In fact, in the abstract, I tend to have a tolerant, even affectionate attitude towards children, so long as they're not around me. I think giving children access to the best medical care and education, for example, is a good idea.

Julia actually seems to loathe children. The very idea of professional child advocates makes her upset. It's such bullshit that there are all these protective laws for children. Back into the mines with the lot of 'em, I say.

The converse of this would be that Julia is just joking, that she doesn't really dislike children but thought (hoped, really) it will make for a funny column. I'm not sure which possibility is more pathetic...

But these other, utterly defenseless critters...

There's that fucking word again. Jules, this ain't fucking "Petticoat Junction." What's with the critters thing? To me, it speaks volumes about your lack of comfort in your own position. You know it's stupid to call an embryo a "baby" or a "child" so you fall back on this "critter" invention as some kind of middle ground. A human, but not really, but a person.

But these other, utterly defenseless critters are under daily threat of slaughter. The way I see it, the "mass of cells" has a human soul in there. (Of course, once it's out, then I don't know what it is aside from a pain in the butt that you'd better keep out of my way.)

Again, Julia's probably trying to make with the funny here, but she winds up summarizing the position of most pro-lifers succinctly. When it's a hypothetical pre-born baby, it's a beautiful magical gift from God that must be protected even if it means pumping a live, human doctor full of lead or tormenting young girls who aren't ready to be mothers.

But once it's born, get that stupid fuck out of the way. Ship it off to war or to prison. Deport it. Deprive it health care and adequate social services. Who cares? It's just a stupid human now, not a beautiful magical Fetal pre-born miracle baby. It's a drain on the taxpayers and a burden.

That's not funny because it's too fucking sick. It just hurts my brain to consider things from that perspective. Be like chuckling at Richard McBeef.

Feminists heralded the proliferation of abortion as a tool by which to "empower" women and give them control over their lives and destinies. But power is being pregnant. Because it gives you control over other people's lives. Embryos and fetuses get you treated like royalty. Not only do people cede the right of way to you; not only do people in line at the ladies' room let you get in front of them; but if the man who impregnated you sticks around for just a few more months, you get to lie on the couch all day and just point to things, and they magically come to you. You just have to say, "Honey, I think I'm craving a ---," and the chocolate-banana-peanut-butter milkshake appears in your hand. What can be more powerful?