The first time I saw Kayleigh McEnany on TV, she impressed me as a twit, and my opinion of her hasn’t changed much. She currently works as a Fox News propagandist, which is an appropriate placement for her. She doesn’t belong in respectable journalism.
Even though I pronounce her name “Mack-A-Ninny,” I don’t believe she’s stupid. That word isn’t descriptive of someone educated at Georgetown, Oxford, and Harvard Law.
And when her Fox coterie jumped on the Bible’s expulsion from a Texas school library (details here), she said something inarguably intelligent: “I’m in general not for canceling books,” she insisted. “Students need to see and understand the holocaust, slavery, human atrocities and the world’s history.” (Story here.)
Wow. Give her credit for that one. It’s more than many Republicans are willing to let students see and understand, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a leading contender for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, who’s threatening to jail teachers who talk about racism.
McEnancy also said it’s “horrifying” that only “one or three” people can kick a book out of a public school library, although she didn’t venture so far as to argue that should be a community affair. I’m not sure that’s the word I’d use, but the concept is on point.
But then she “argued that the review should be limited to books with gay and transgender themes,” which goes and spoils the whole thing.
That makes her a homophobe, a bigot, and an ignoramus on the subject of LGBQT people in general. Why shouldn’t they have their books? And, more importantly, why should public school students be shielded from knowing there are LGBQT people in the world, their community, and some may be their classmates?
Republicans think that way because they still believe LGBQT is a behavior, and a pernicious one at that, when in fact it’s a biological condition people are born with. (Who in their right mind would choose to be gay, with people like her around?)
Discriminating against LGBQT people is indistinguishable from discriminating against people because they’re black, Hispanic, Asian, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, or anything but what they are. (Republicans do a lot of that, too.) Republicans complain about “cancel culture,” but they’re working overtime to “cancel” LGBQT people. (Typical Republican hypocrisy.)
McEnany is on the right track in feeling uncomfortable about censoring books and student learning. But she still has a huge blind spot about LGBQT people.
The next question is: Was her birth name “Kyle”? (That’s an The-Ave.US inside joke; to figure it out, see here and here.)
