I’m not sure if I should thank my friend Ell (of Wilful Damage fame) for pointing me to this inane essay from Peggy Noonan, but she did it, and the damage (wilful or otherwise) is done.
Noonan’s upset because she got felt up going through airport security. Not by a man, but by a woman; a woman doing the thankless job of trying to make a sure an radical chechen woman doesn’t sneak a bomb onto a plane in her bra while impatient bos/wash corridor movers and shakers jet from New York to DC to Boston and back again. (In fact, she hysterically compares the experience to second degree rape, an insult to the woman doing the thankless task of insuring her safety, and rape victims everywhere.)
Noonan thinks this brusk treatment is a symptom of an increasingly indecorous society, one that features prime time ads for viagra and yeast treatments, and one that offends her delicate, lady-like sensibilitites. But worse than offending Noonan, she’s also concludes it “embarrasses the angels”. Writes Noonan:
“You are embarrassing the angels.” This is what I intend to say for the next 40 days whenever I see someone who is hurting the culture, hurting human dignity, denying the stature of a human being. I mean to say it with belief, with an eye to instruction, but also pointedly, uncompromisingly. As a lady would. All invited to join in.”
I’d like to invite Noonan to shut her self-righteous, sanctimonious piehole.
Since when does being a political writer and commentator make anyone an expert on what does or does not embarrass the angels?
I had always presumed that when I get my wings I would flit about, unconcerned with mundane terrestrial matters – like whether or not the transcontinental flight I’ll be taking next week (with my angelic little daughters) will be blown out of the sky, or turned into a guided missle. To never again be worried or embarrassed or otherwise concerened about such things, that’s my idea of heaven. If you know better, Ms. Noonan, I’ll thank you to keep it to yourself.
(The brassiest broad I know tells me it’s the ladylike thing to do.)