Well, not really.

Treacher’s pissed at me for comments over at Jeff Goldstein’s regarding Opie & Anthony being assholes for hosting an apparently homeless guy who insulted pretty much everybody under the sun during his appearance, along with making jokes about raping Condoleeza Rice.

In short, Treacher (a guy whose stuff I very much like, BTW) says we shouldn’t criticize Opie & Anthony because it plays into Media Matters’ hands.

It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s what it comes down to.

I freely admit I have an axe to grind against Opie and Anthony. Their first sin in my book is they are really, really crass. I’m from New York and really didn’t give a shit about them either way, until they sponsored a contest to call into their show while having sex in just plain wrong places. One episode involved a couple having sex, or trying to have sex – my memory of this fades a bit – in St. Pat’s Cathedral or one of the other big landmark churches in NY. The segment was underwritten by Sam Adams beer, the founder of which backed up Opie and Anthony until he realized that a lot of his customers were Catholics, or plain decent folks, who thought the stunt was exceedingly offensive. I don’t drink Sam Adams any more, as detailed below, as a result of that – more for his initial reaction, than to the fact that he generally underwrote that show. Opie and Anthony’s second sin, in my book, is that they aren’t friggin’ funny.

Treacher’s point contra mine is that schmucks like the Media Matters assholes – David Brooks and Duncan “Atrios/Wanker of the Day” Black – and their little troop of highly politically motivated left wing flying monkeys, are keeping dossiers on everybody and trying to institute a reign of terror in the media, and that pretty much everybody is on the list. He also tries to make the point that Opie and Anthony are somehow friends of conservatives because they skewered some Truthers once and therefore deserve our support. Sorry, ain’t buyin’ it.

Treacher’s bottom line is this:

Every time something like this happens, it just makes it easier for these groups to do it the next time. Cut it out

Yeah, I guess that’s true. So we ought to just bite our tongues? Or do we need to stand on the barricades and tell a couple n***** and rape jokes ourselves, to really stick it to David Brooks?

If the problem is Media Matters, it seems to me that we need to expose them for the ass bandits they are, rather than sticking up for Opie and Anthony, a couple unfunny schmucks whose schtick is about 3 years and a couple million bucks in salary removed from a 3 year old making poopy jokes. Start an email campaign telling network newsclowns and Breitbart that they are being watched, laugh now but the Stalinists at Media Matters are gunning for them too… and then see what happens to Media Matters’ dossier mass mailings.

Let me see if I get Treacher right here. We’re supposed to stand up and defend these clowns against other free speech and corporate business decisions, when most or all of their humor depends on doing things that are patently offensive to us? I can understand defending their first amendment rights, but this is business, bub, and that means it’s not a first amendment issue, it’s a pissing the people off and losing money issue. You think this isn’t going to whack a fair share of toxic, polluted left wing assholes too? It is. Once you raise people’s standards, they expect everybody to follow the same high rules. Look at the backlash the Dems are now experiencing over being in bed with lobbyists and refusing to pass earmark reform – backlash from their own base! It’s the Dems’ fault too, for telling the base they’d be cleaner than that. The same mechanism will operate here.

So at best, I’m equivocal about Treacher’s argument, at worst I reject it because this is to large extent about what the market will put up with and pay for. Treacher makes a big deal about how everybody bitching is costing people their jobs, but you know, if I got fired for something I wrote, I doubt Opie and Anthony, or for that matter Treacher, would give a tinker’s damn about it.

So what’s the deal, Jim? Are we supposed to clam up and not feel just a bit outraged that a couple of serially offensive assholes are giving a microphone to somebody whose idea of funny, is raping the Secretary of State? Is it beyond the pale to be pissed about this, just because Atrios may profit from it, or it might make George Soros happy if I’m pissed?

Around the time I moved into adolescence – roughly four years ago – I stopped doing things just because they pissed off the right people. Sure, it’s nice when you can do something and it pisses off an enemy. But that shouldn’t be your primary motivator.

And while you’re pondering this dear readers… go check out Treacher’s stuff over at Gutfeld’s place. Other than the O&A axe grinding, it’s the same old Treacher. Very funny stuff in other words.