Ohhh Tucker Max. I don’t even want to respond to this blog post because the writing is bad enough to be nearly incomprehensible (editors!) and Tucker himself appears to have an IQ slightly above that of a medium-sized houseplant, but against my better judgment, here we go.
So Tucker haz a sad because he tried to donate to Planned Parenthood so that PP would name a clinic after him and he could be like, “LOL the Tucker Max Center for Pushing Bitches Down the Stairs” and instead PP was like, “Hey we appreciate the offer, but we think taking your money and naming a clinic after you is a bad idea given that our funding is on the chopping block around the country and accepting this donation will definitely be used against us and could result in our losing millions of dollars, so thank you but I think we have to pass on this one.” Instead of dealing with it like a big boy and recognizing that maybe PP has more important things to consider than how they can assist Tucker Max in being perceived as slightly less awful, Tucker has decided to be exactly as awful as he is and pitch a virtual fit about how PP is just so judgey and they don’t even know him, GOD.
I was very serious about this donation: Lots of people have tried to call this a “stunt.” That’s funny, I didn’t know that a 500k check is a joke to them. So maybe if I gave a million dollars, then it’d be real? I’ve been pro-choice my whole like, I used the services of PP when I was poor and got help from them, I believe in their mission and I believe in universal access to family planning services. I’ve ALWAYS believed in those principles, and this was a sincere attempt to cut Planned Parenthood real check. A “stunt” would be doing something, I don’t know, that DIDN’T INVOLVE GIVING HALF A MILLION DOLLARS TO THEM. Its ridiculous how people think what you do doesn’t matter, it’s only their perception of your action that defines you.
We understand that you actually intended to give PP $500,000. We also understand that the attempt to give PP $500,000 was something “spectacular or unusual done to gain publicity,” which is the dictionary definition of “stunt.” Stunts may be very expensive; stunts may also involve a cause you actually believe in. “Stunt” is not a synonym for “joke.” Attempting to give an embattled organization half a million dollars so that they’ll name a clinic after you and wouldn’t THAT be funny and great publicity for your new book is, in fact, a stunt.
This was not about my image: Some people have tried to say this about me “rehabbing my image” by using PP. That’s comical bullshit. Right now, I have THREE books on the NY Times Non-fiction Best Seller List and millions of fans, I’m VERY happy with my current image. I have no need or desire to apologize for anything or try to change into some bullshit that other people should think I am. So why did I want to donate this money (other than the fact that I believe in PP’s mission)?
Yeah, so weird that anyone would think you were trying to “rehab your image” after your PR strategist published a column in Forbes stating, “This would have been a win-win-win-win situation. Cut a check, keep a clinic open. Rehabilitate some of Tucker’s PR.” But you know that feminist media, so full of lies and comical bullshit. (Also, if you’re going to quote someone, maybe use their name or add in a link?)
Yes, I did want something: What I really wanted from this–aside from that good feeling of doing something actually positive for men and women who need help–was a way to get a different type of press for my then-upcoming book (which was now been out for two months). There is a bullshit idea that comes from a certain type of media person that my writing is anti-woman. Mind you, none of these people have read my writing, and none of them have EVER addressed the idea that my writing can’t be anti-woman when half my fans are women, but whatever, who needs facts in media, right?
So you weren’t trying to use a PP donation as a publicity stunt, you just wanted publicity for your upcoming book by donating to PP and making a big public deal about it. I see. Thank you for clearing that up.
Also, just because some women are a fan of something doesn’t mean that it cannot possibly be “anti-woman.” Look: There are women out there who oppose the right of women to vote. There were actually very large proportions of women who, at the time the 19th Amendment was being debated, opposed voting rights for women. It does not follow from that, though, that laws barring women from voting were not anti-woman just because some women — or even a lot of women, or more than 50% of women — supported them.
Anyway, I thought this would be the perfect hook for a ton of stories that would spin this idea on its head, and I was laughing just thinking about these idiots trying to explain this away. After all, if you think Tucker Max hates women, how to do you explain him giving 500k to PP? Well, they said this made me…MORE anti-woman? HAHAHA! I swear to god. So to these people, cutting a 500K check to help women out is ANTI-WOMAN!! Politicians cutting money to PP is anti-woman, and now, so is me giving money to PP. I guess regardless of what I do, I’m against women. That is kind of awesome when you can make someone so angry, they can’t even be ideologically consistent in their criticism of you.
The above paragraph doesn’t actually make much sense, but I’ll do my best with it. We understand that you were trying to use PP as a gotcha point — so when you were accused to misogyny for writing ridiculously misogynist things, you could be like, “BUT SEE I GAVE MONEY TO PLANNED PARENTHOOD!” And that’s the point: You don’t actually view PP’s mission and women’s health to be important unto itself. You view women, and Planned Parenthood, as things that might be beneficial to you, and that you may use to further your career or get something else you want.
As Irin Carmon pointed out at Salon, Max has commented on Planned Parenthood before — in tweets like ““Planned Parenthood would be cooler if it was a giant flight of stairs, w/someone pushing girls down, like a water park slide #FF @PPact” and “In South Florida. This place is awful. Shitty design, slutty whores & no culture, like a giant Planned Parenthood waiting room.” SO WEIRD that a lot of us maybe don’t believe that Max is really a dedicated supporter of women’s health and PP’s mission.
[Another thing to consider: Think about how completely fucked up someone’s worldview is when they don’t judge you based on your ACTIONS, they judge you based on their PERCEPTION of your actions. That’s what all the articles critical of my donation are attempting to do: They create some sort of mental gymnastics to try and make my act out to be evil, even though it is unarguably good. That’s when you know someone doesn’t care about truth, just about defending their own ideology.]
Actually, we are judging you based on your words. You know, the words you write (hint: writing is an action that you choose to take). And your donation was not “unarguably good.” You donated specifically because you wanted publicity. It would have been good publicity for you, but bad publicity for Planned Parenthood, and so they declined. And now, because you’re an entitled whiny-ass titty-baby, you’re taking to the internet to try to vilify an organization because they protected themselves.
I really thought PP would be excited about this: Look, I recognize that, on one level, it may seem absurd to name an abortion clinic after Tucker Max (of course its also funny as well). But once you really think about it, it makes a ton of sense, and perhaps it was dumb of me but I honestly thought PP would be excited about it. And they were at first. Of course my assistant told them who I was and what I wanted from the donation, and they were falling all over themselves pitching me. They set up a lunch to talk and finalize the deal. I expected the lunch they scheduled would be about negotiating how much the donation would be, and what would get named. I was cool with whatever spin they wanted to put on this, I really just wanted my name on a building or a room or something big. That was it. And then, as I was DRIVING TO THE MEETING, they called and cancelled everything. The meeting, the donation, everything.
You thought PP would be excited about naming a clinic after you? That is because you, sir, are a narcissistic idiot. I don’t know whose fault that is, but it’s not Planned Parenthood’s. Maybe take it up with your parents.
And “I really just wanted my name on a building or a room or something big.” That’s the point, right? This wasn’t about Planned Parenthood. It was about you and your own image. And now, instead of doing something positive or realizing that maybe you have an image problem, you’re going online to malign a really fantastic, necessary and embattled organization because they didn’t put their own existence and reputation on the line by naming a building after you.
I don’t know why PP turned the money down, but I can guess: People keep asking me why they turned the money down. Other than what they said to me on the phone (“We don’t believe taking your money would be in the mission of Planned Parenthood”), I have no other information. I do have speculation.
I think this is about status and signaling and institutional power, and has nothing to do with women. Planned Parenthood proved something I have always believed: Most charities are not run to help people, they are run because they are ways for people to signal status about themselves to other people. I think there are many great people that work at PP, but I think the people who run PP are power-hungry bureaucrats who care only about how a select group of their friends and peers view them, and that’s what this is about. I wasn’t the “right type” of person to take money from so they’d rather close clinics. It’s the worst kind of elitism, the kind that cloaks itself in altruism. They care more about the perception of themselves and their organization than they care about its effectiveness at actually serving the reproductive needs of women.
I don’t expect that Tucker Max ever reads a newspaper, but if he did, he might realize that PP HAS to care about how people view them. There are organizations dedicated to destroying Planned Parenthood. There are politicians who run on anti-PP platforms. Congresspeople regularly brawl it out over Planned Parenthood’s funding. It’s not “elitism.” It’s not that a group of people at PP sat around and said, “You know, Tucker Max’s books are really stupid, and we are all dumber for having read them, we award him no points and may God have mercy on his soul, so let’s not take his money.” What probably did happen is that a group of people at Planned Parenthood found out who Tucker Max was, realized that his donation was going to be big news, and decided, “You know, if this is made into a big public thing, Republicans are going to use it as further evidence that PP is a terrible organization that should not receive any more federal or state funds, and it could result in us losing millions of dollars in funding and having to close down even more clinics, so let’s not take his money.”
That’s smart. PP has to think ahead. And I’m amused that Tucker thinks this is about “status” and “elitism,” like Planned Parenthood is sitting on a big leather couch adjusting their monocle and deciding that Max is just uncouth. No, PP needs funding to survive. In order to get funding — in order to not have even more states attempt to cut off their funding — PP does need to maintain an image of a serious reproductive health provider. Naming a clinic after a dude who suggests that “Planned Parenthood would be cooler if it was a giant flight of stairs, w/someone pushing girls down, like a water park slide” would turn Planned Parenthood into a joke.
How else can you explain Planned Parenthood’s preposterous logic: that a CLOSED clinic is better than one with my name on it. Seriously—after they turned my money down, they CLOSED CLINICS IN TEXAS. That is not better for poor women. It is only better for people who run Planned Parenthood. Because it doesn’t threaten their delusion self-image and offend the people whose opinions they care about. But it does hurt the poor women they’re supposed to he helping.
Here’s how: One closed clinic > ten closed clinics.
You want to know how I know this wasn’t about money, that this was just about them judging me? They never even suggested an anonymous donation. Never suggested I name it after someone else. Never brought it any of it up. They just flat out said no.
Now, I’ll be honest, I don’t think I would have done an anonymous donation for that much, but the fact is, THEY NEVER EVEN BROUGHT IT UP! To them, just taking my money signaled the wrong things to the people they want to impress, so they wouldn’t do it, regardless of the circumstances. We don’t want your dirty joke money!
See, he was donating the money because he really cares about PP and not because this was a publicity stunt, but he would never have donated all that money anonymously because where’s the publicity in that? But it’s PP’s fault for not even suggesting an option he never would have availed himself of! Because the entire world needs to hold Tucker Max’s hand.
I told PP when this whole thing went down that I was going to tell the truth about what happened, and so I have. That it enrages people is not my fault. They need to look at Planned Parenthood and how it conducted itself, not blame me for trying to help the organization out.
Haha. Except people aren’t “enraged” at Planned Parenthood. As far as I can tell people are “enraged” at Tucker Max, and then he’s like “It’s not my fault people are mad at me after I publicly attacked a great organization just because I’m an attention monster of staggering proportions! Don’t blame me for sounding like the petulant child I am! It’s not my fault!”
It’s probably not his fault, since he does appear to have the socio-emotional development of a four-year-old. He didn’t get the exact publicity he wanted, he decided to throw a public temper tantrum, and now the entire internet is pointing with raised eyebrows and being like, “Where are that kid’s parents?”
Someone get him an ice cream cone or something.
(Thanks, Cynthia, for the links).