My Own Open Letter – but this one’s to Piers Morgan

Dear Mr. Morgan,

I wanted to thank you for hosting Ann Coulter on your program this past Friday evening, as well as John Franklin Stephens and Tim Shriver, concerning Ms. Coulter’s recent use of the “r-word” in a tweet about President Obama. I had been thinking and worrying and writing about this issue all last week, and it was helpful to hear four new perspectives.

Ms. Coulter appeared to become irritated, even agitated, when she thought you presumed to know what she was thinking when she used the r-word in the tweet. So I will not attempt to do the same thing, to read her mind, but based on what I know of Ms. Coulter’s work and the way she describes herself, I think your assumption that she knew exactly how provocative she was being by choosing that word, is likely reasonable.

I have considered writing Ms. Coulter, and I may still do so, but my concern is that I would put forth considerable effort to be balanced, fair, and gracious (i.e., not expressing exactly how angry I am about this) only to have my efforts ignored, or even ridiculed on Fox News. I thought about telling her about my son David, who is 2 ½ years old and has Down syndrome, or even attach a photo, but given her reactions to your questions I am hesitant to give her any information about my family, or to send her a photo of my beautiful son only to have it appear on TV along with an angry rant about how unreasonable I, and others like me, are to find her use of the word “retard” offensive. My son is too young to understand anything about this right now, but seeing his face on television along with anything but an apology would be more than his father and I could bear.

I assume Ms. Coulter received a great deal of negative feedback about her tweet last week, and she likely came to the interview already on the defensive. Again, I don’t wish to try to read her mind, but perhaps she also felt you had already made up your mind about what she said, and had decided it was “wrong,” and therefore she had to go on the offensive. I have been considering her point, that she would not use the word retard to describe someone with Down syndrome or other disability, that she would only use it to describe someone she thought was a “loser” like President Obama. She also asserted that “no one” uses the r-word to talk about people with disabilities anymore, that the current use of the word is only to express derision of (regular? Non-disabiled?) people; thus, no one should be offended.

I am not a regular viewer of Ms. Coulter’s, nor anyone on Fox News, because I disagree with nearly everything I’ve heard from her and her colleagues. Based on what I have seen and heard, and what she’s said about herself, it does not seem to be her way to admit that she has done or said anything wrong. I wish in this instance she would at least consider (not accept, simply consider) that she could be … wrong … on this particular issue. I wish she were right, I really do – I wish the r-word were not offensive, I wish it had lost its sting and was no longer hurtful. She compared the r-word to other terms, moron and imbecile and whatnot, that used to be used as technical terms to describe people who are mentally retarded/developmentally disabled, and are now in common use. I wish we were at that point as a society, but we are not. We are not. The r-word is different. I wish I did not have to worry about the first time someone calls my son a retard, I wish everyone were as nice as Ms. Coulter and would never say anything like that about him. But they will. Language evolves, but this particular word is not at that point yet. When someone like Ms Coulter uses the r-word thoughtlessly and casually, they are still saying that what someone else has said or done is so stupid, so dumb, it is similar to or worse what someone with an IQ below 70 would say. That is what it means; maybe one day it will be a synonym for “loser” but it’s not now. It’s not. When I (and other parents) hear the r-word, we wince. We feel uncomfortable, we change the television channel, we wrap our arms around our son and give him an extra hug, hoping to ensure a little extra protection from the Mean People out there in the world. We are offended, and Ms. Coulter’s saying we have no right to feel that way doesn’t change that.

When you compared the r-word to the n-word, Ms. Coulter appeared to check out of the interview completely, to push back from the table, toss her head and roll her eyes (I’m not certain about that last, when I watched online it was difficult to tell). She seemed to be saying that unless you are the descendant of slaves or those directly affected by segregation, you have no right to complain about whatever negative term is aimed at your group. That we are denigrating the experience of African Americans when we compare it to being called a “retard” or a “faggot” or whatever. To a tiny extent, I agree that the n-word is a uniquely powerful slur with a unique history in the U.S. But to a much larger extent, I think Ms. Coulter is simply looking for a reason to be able to say whatever she wants to say, without consequence.

I’ve read many of the comments posted on the CNN website, following this interview. A good many people (kindly) asked why anyone worries about anything Ms. Coulter says, that she is being deliberately inflammatory to get attention and sell books, and perhaps if we ignore her she will go away. That to get too upset and give her attention is to encourage her to continue. This is basically what I remember from last year when Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a “slut” on his program – what do you really expect from this particular person, other than rudeness? It’s just him/her – don’t pay them any heed. … I agree with that, that Ms. Coulter and Mr. Limbaugh are both primarily looking to rile up folks who disagree with them. But that doesn’t make it okay. It’s still wrong, it’s still hurtful.

You’ll note I said above, when we hear the r-word on television, we change the channel. I am not the “word police” and I’m not suggesting Ms. Coulter be censored or fired. She has the absolute right to say whatever she wants to say. I just wish that more journalists (heck, more people) understood that just because you can say something, it doesn’t mean you should. That one does not need to exercise his/her right to free speech at every single moment. Not more importantly, but perhaps nearly as importantly, an educated adult woman does not need to use a word most often used by eighth- or ninth-graders, to describe the President of the United States or anyone else she doesn’t like, just because she can. You don’t get to say whatever you want – we humans have a social contract of sorts, in which what we think, what we say to close friends and family, what we say out loud in church or at work, and what we say on national television – those things are usually (and perhaps should be) different. Ms. Coulter might call it over-sensitivity or censorship; as a mental health professional I would call it, “having a filter and occasionally thinking about what you say.” The words you use matter, and I would further offer that the target of the words, rather than the speaker, gets to decide what is hurtful.

I’m also glad for your interview with Mr. Shriver and Mr. Stephens, and that the interviews were separate. Ms. Coulter may assert she would never call a person with a disability a retard, but … I don’t believe her. She appears to be a generally unhappy and dissatisfied person, and on this occasion she was so angry I’m don’t think I could trust her to sit in the same room as Mr. Stephens or my son. This is a scary prospect for me – that Ms. Coulter appears to be such a Mean Person that I don’t believe she would interact appropriately with my son, or pay attention to a letter I might write her, or misuse a photograph of my son to promote her own purposes. My mother told me when I was very young that you shouldn’t call someone “retarded” because it is mean; Ms. Coulter’s unwillingness to grasp this basic concept is really troubling.

Or perhaps as folks have said, she likely does grasp it perfectly well, and is just trying to piss people off, and in that she has succeeded. At this moment, I am not capable of being as gracious in spirit as Mr. Shriver and Mr. Stephens, I am not capable of extending the hand of friendship to someone so negative. It’d be nice to engage in a thoughtful dialogue with Ms. Coulter or others who agree with her, to educate and inform about what we hear when they use that word. But right now I will allow the two gentlemen to be my spokespersons, to be nice and polite and not interrupt or yell. Because I’m not there yet.

Thanks for your efforts to try to get Ms. Coulter to understand what is wrong with what she said.

Joanna Hudson