An Open Letter To Lori Drew, Mother -- And Patriot -- Of The Year

Dear Lori,

We don't know each other, but after the last few days, I feel like I have a pretty good sense of who you are, what you stand for and the limits of your world view. Maybe it's presumptuous of me to say this since we haven't been formally introduced and I've only come to know you through listening to an interview with you on a conservative talk station, reading your quotes in the newspaper and seeing a photo of you with your daughter, but my sense is that you have a jaundiced view of life, Lori, but that you're nevertheless rather enjoying your 14:59 of fame for spearheading the "banning" of Will Clarke's nonfiction piece in the anthology "When I Was A Loser."

At first, it was simply about protecting your daughter from the word cunt -- a word which is known to turn young women into enemy combatants -- and then it became a crusade against bestiality and now, well, now you're here to help All The People Of The World: "I'm not willing to lower my morals to prove a point," you said recently in the 109th interview you've conducted in the last two weeks. "I feel it is my duty to ensure that not just my child is never handed this kind of vulgar material, but (that) your children never receive it as well."

I don't have any children, Lori, but I thank you for your concern. Of course the problem with your plan to become The Queen of Decency is that the class your daughter was in has likely already finished discussing Clarke's essay and is now well into The Great Gatsby (which is filled with murder! sex! deception! and wanton alcohol consumption!), or Ivanhoe (witchcraft! Jews! sex! violence!), Of Mice & Men (murder! puppy squashing! false hope of the American dream!) or some other classic text and have long forgotten the essay in question, which is good, since it's now been banned. I've been checking the papers each day to see if there's been an up-tick in school shootings, or uses of the word cunt, subsequent to the students in your daughter's class reading the offending work, and really the only tangible thing I can find is you, Lori. You telling everyone else what to think and feel. You being outraged. You on the radio. You in the paper. You being discussed on every conservative blog in the state. And the end result, after all of You, is that an essay an entire class already read, is now not being read, which was the case before you exploded in righteous indignation at a world gone so sour that the word cunt should appear in an essay.

I know, I know, you're also upset about bestiality. Let's examine the grand total of bestiality contained in Clarke's essay, Lori. Are you ready? No need to pack a lunch, because this will be short: "What if a guy fucking a dog only worked on the depraved urges that lead to buying liquor? The book was terribly unclear on this." That's it, Lori, and it's actually referring back to another text the author read in this piece of nonfiction. There's no one actually fucking a dog in this essay, Lori. But the thing is, Lori, this is nonfiction. This is something a teenager thought about. A teenager. You see, teenagers live in this world even if you don't. That Clarke is recounting his own thoughts is simply his personal history. Are you concerned about other historical situations your daughter might read about?

There's World War II, which your daughter will read about in her history class. Are you concerned that the depictions of Nagasaki and Hiroshima will scar her indelibly? What about Auschwitz?  Is the real loss of human life somehow less awful, less spiritually destructive than the silly queries of a 16 year old about a man fucking a dog? I suspect your daughter will learn about the Roman Empire and their wonderful baths. What if she learns that those baths were habitually used by men in the company of other men, which lead to, you know, white hot gay sex? Oh, they might not mention it in her history text, but I'm sure someone in her class saw the documentary on Discovery and will let that rabbit out. What if she happens to get a dash of modern history and learns about ethnic cleansing and the wholesale rape that went along with it? What if she's simply taught about the founding of America, which was largely built on the backs of slaves? Maybe she'll avoid all of these pesky classes after you read this, certain that your daughter will become, you know, human, and thus you'll home school her. What if she happens across the newspaper and reads about any series of grisly murders, rapes and kidnappings? What if she reads about Michael Vick not fucking, but torturing his dogs? An iron lung, Lori, that's where you should put her.

I'm sensitive to your plight, Lori, I really am. I think it's unlikely anyone in the class your daughter was in would benefit from my essay in the same book on my failed forage into oral sex, so I'm glad the teacher didn't assign it. Of course, the irony here is that I wrote that essay about an incident that happened when I was about your daughter's age, which means kids your daughter's age couldn't be too much different than I was, and so perhaps they'd empathize with me. Is my essay appropriate reading for a teen? Oh, probably, if that teen had cable TV and knew who Zsa Zsa Gabor was (it's important for the overall hilarity of the piece, Lori). Some books and essays aren't appropriate for kids -- you'll get no argument from me there. It's not a red state or a blue state issue. It's an issue of knowing your child, I believe, and what they can and cannot comprehend. (I recall being told as a young kid that a book was too adult for me by a librarian in Walnut Creek and my mother getting mad as hell, because she'd decide what was too adult for me...and as it turned out, nothing ever was.) So that you didn't want your child to read the essay is fine, Lori. Though is it beyond the pale to think your child has never seen the word cunt before? Has never heard a gross joke or two about a man fucking a dog? (It's rarely a lifestyle choice in my experience, Lori, not even here in California; it's usually just a joke.) Nothing in Will Clarke's essay is more salacious than what your child might hear in the halls of her school, presuming she ever wants to go back after your star-fucking turn on the dance floor. Nothing in the essay will turn her into a gun toting maniac. Rest easy. Though I suppose it's difficult to rest easy when you're now charged with protecting the morality of children who aren't yours, too. What if other kids, in other cities, are reading this very letter to you, Lori, and seeing the word cunt and anecdotal mentions of dogs being fucked by men? Will the world just blow up? You better get yourself a cape and a sidekick, because saving the world from bad words is a fight made for a superhero.

The thing I'm most appalled about, really, is how you've turned your parenting choice into a conservative talking point. Let me tell you about me, Lori. I know a bit about liberal and conservative politics from the inside. My uncle just had Hillary over for dinner. My oldest and dearest friend is helping to run one of the most high profile conservative campaigns for the White House. And what I can tell you from my experience is that all politicians, no matter the party, are amoral, power driven whack jobs who like kinky sex and use the word cunt as a noun, verb and adjective. The closest I've ever come to seeing Caligula realized was at a California Republican Party Convention held in a swanky hotel in Northern California. By day, Republican law makers talked family values and morals, by night they were literally licking salt off of female Young Republicans. I went to a Democratic function not too long ago and after hours, when the tents were pulled up, it was pretty much the same thing -- except it was organic sea salt. You see, Lori, the people who champion your cause in the conservative blogosphere or radio or, eventually when you're held up as a paragon of values, on the political stump, go home and jerk off to Cinemax porn just like the rest of us. And as kids they probably read about a man fucking a dog or two, at least if they read the Bible, because keeping time with beasts is in there over and over again (really, it is -- check it out and I'll have the lord watch over me and thee when we're apart, one from the other, until you get back), or if they grew up on a farm, and I'm sure they use the word cunt and I'm sure you're not perfect, either, but it's not as if our country is totally fucked up...oh...wait...well, you get my point, Lori. Word rarely makes flesh.

So, really, what has your crusade achieved? You've banned an essay...after the class already read it. You've most likely encouraged, through your vanity and arrogance, more sales than Simon & Schuster could have dreamed possible. Though the thing that really makes me wonder about you, Lori, is your decision to leave a comment on John McNally's blog, where you show yourself to be smug and self-important and not the least bit concerned about the welfare of your child:

lori drew said... Kudos on your first banned book. To bad it's no Pulitzer. Well atleast you achieved something. I just hope I wasn't responsible for any increased sales. That would have been an even bigger trajedy.

The pinheads.
Lori Drew
Dictator as you say.

One might think it would behoove you, when you have the ear of the man who found all the essays in the book in question, to perhaps ask just what the fuck his problem was, why he deigned to create such filth. If you're concerned about vulgarity and you have the source of your most hated text before you, shouldn't you at least try to find the root of his issue? Your study in and of itself might be the grist of your own Pulitzer winning work. I doubt you've read any Pulitzer winners, Lori, but if you'd like to, I suggest the 2001 winner in fiction, Empire Falls, which contains a school shooting, a gay priest, adulterous relationships, drunken behavior, theft, foul language, crooked cops, a really long prologue in italics (a personal issue of mine, but read it...it totally pays off) and there's a cat with a clear and convincing desire to mate with one of the main characters. There's also 2003's Middlesex, which is about a hermaphrodite! But for a really good time, pick up this year's winner, Cormac McCarthy's The Road. It's a very tender love story about a baby on a spit. Really. You'll love it.

Anyway, Lori, you sort of scare the shit out of me. I guess that's what this is all about. You scare me and you honestly sadden me.

But when my next book comes out, I'd like to hire you as my publicist.

All my best,

Tod

Update: This Lori Drew is not the same Lori Drew that allegedly created a fake MySpace identity that led to the death of Megan Meier. But yes, both are complete fucktards of the highest order and, I suspect, will cause an entire generation of women born to the Drew name not to be named Lori. Nancy would be a good alternative.

Comments

[J.D. Rhoades]

"I feel it is my duty to ensure that not just my child is never handed this kind of vulgar material, but (that) your children never receive it as well."

The arrogance in that statement is just breathtaking.

How about I look after my kids and you look after yours, Lori dear?

[Debby G.]

I just ordered the book. I love depravity! I can't wait to read it and maybe even give it to my kids.

[Avery]

Love your response, but I can't help but imagine what her comeback might be...

Would it involve the words "rubber" and "glue"?

[Clair Lamb]

I love that spelling of tragedy, because I always think of these people as citizens of Trajikistan.

[Graham]

I just feel bad that Will Clarke has fallen so far. It seems like yesterday he was playing in the World Series.

[Jane Devin]

Brilliant essay, but lacking a well-placed "fucktard" or two.

[Danny Barer]

Is the puppy-squashing in "Of Mice and Men" truly worse than the psychotic's-wife-to-death-shaking, or the mentally-challenged-gentle-yet-dangerous-in-the-head shooting?

[Danny Barer]

Is the puppy-squashing in "Of Mice and Men" truly worse than the psychotic's-wife-to-death-shaking, or the mentally-challenged-gentle-yet-dangerous-in-the-head shooting?

[Ron Currie]

"Kudos on your first banned book. To bad it's no Pulitzer. Well atleast you achieved something. I just hope I wasn't responsible for any increased sales. That would have been an even bigger trajedy."

Always fun when the sub-literate try to decide for us what we can and can't read. Nice work, Tod.

[A. Decker]

To laugh and gain perspective, and laugh some more-that's why I come here. Today's visit paid off.

[Your dear seester]

Certain that my kids will become, you know, illiterate, I've been home schooling them. They are turning out pretty good, pretty thoughtful, pretty skilled at using the F-word. I guess the way I keep them in the closet just can't overcome their genetics....

[Meredith]

Maybe someone here can help me. I found this link from a comment on Jezebel. Is this the same Lori Drew of Dardenne Prairie, MO who contributed to a young girl's suicide? Even if she is not the same person, this Lori Drew sounds like a real gem of a person.

[jim]

This is NOT the same Lori Drew as the one allegedly involved in the Megan Meier tragedy. The Lori Drew to whom this letter is addressed lives in Rhode Island:

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=18972297&BRD=1713&PAG=461&dept_id=24491&rfi=6

[kay]

maybe all women named lori drew are a complete waste of life. srsly.

[Painful Truth]

How did you miss that Cumberland, RI (location of book banning) is about 1,200 miles from the MO town where this tradgedy took place. Could there possibly be TWO Lori Drews?

Verbose you are; wise you are not.

[painfully stupid]

Painful Truth, you don't think Tod thought this? He posted this essay a month ago! It's these teenage girls who can't find a map that is troubling. I think his update was probably in response to commenters who are coming here.

[tod goldberg]

I assumed PT was commenting on the above comments, but then they aren't very verbose comparatively. But no, I was not under the impression that they were the same fucktards.

[Master Shake]

There’s a passage in Proust where the adolescent Marcel describes his surreptitious activity in the foyer leaving a “snail’s trail” in its wake. It wasn’t until my second reading that I realized he was referring to masturbation. Such subtlety, juxtaposed with similes more “real” than the experience itself (one of my favorites is how the moon in the afternoon sky is like a beautiful actress who sneaks out into the audience to watch a portion of the play). The first two volumes of his masterwork constitute the greatest coming-of-age story ever told.

And less than a century later we have absurd little vulgarians defending references to bestiality in YA books on the grounds that 1) It’s no worse than what happened at Auschwitz (moral relativism: the first refuge of the halfwit); 2) There’s only one such reference (where’s the cutoff, five?). Dazzling logic, that. This simple woman was justifiably outraged by what her daughter, in lieu of literature, was forced to read. Most parents would concur. You responded with a mean-spirited, rambling screed. For shame.

“Some books and essays aren't appropriate for kids…” Where’s the line of demarcation? What are your standards? Some books aren’t even appropriate for Pulitzer prizes because of their obscenity. Why didn’t you mention “Gravity’s Rainbow”? Even the Pulitzer board has standards. (Since you aren’t familiar with it, the book involved scatology.) Try to remember that the occurrence of X is not a sufficient reason for writing about X. Arouse that dormant faculty, your imagination, and peer beyond the tawdry veil of the mundane to uplift your readers.

There's a point where name-dropping exceeds vanity: Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, McCarthy! As though “When I Was A Loser” is elevated into the same rarefied stratosphere as “Blood Meridian” by virtue of its crossing certain lines. If only it were that simple. Are you sure you wish to compare yourself to them?

“Let me tell you about me, Lori. I know a bit about liberal and conservative politics from the inside. My uncle just had Hillary over for dinner. My oldest and dearest friend is…” Argumentum ad verecundiam, anyone? Such puerile braggadocio, followed by such abject nihilism. Please spare your students from these emissions. Stick with “story arcs” and “backstory” and all the other “elements of craft” and sundry nonsense that great writers never thought twice about but simply did.

BTW: Please cite the manifold instances of bestiality contained in the Bible. Seriously. I know of one, and it’s rather ambiguous.

[EG]

So, in other words, your failed sex life and prediliction for sexual perversion is equally holy as the "Holocaust" -

How very jewish of you.