Here in Kentucky where I live, there are a lot of long-standing stereotypes having to do with guns and being barefoot and pregnant, which does not excuse the above ad which is currently running in the Louisville Eccentric Observer (LEO) .
If you follow the link in the ad, you will find out that,
“Nothing says “I DO” like a machinegun on full auto. Rent our 11,000 sqft Party on the Green with a kicking sound system. Set your band upstairs your Dance floor downstairs for an edgy wedding you’ll never forget.
Sara Palin are you listening?*
*and no you don’t have to be pregnant – BUT if you are, write us why you should win an Openrange Shotgun Wedding. If we are amused you might win the use of our Party on the Green, Full Auto Vows on the gun range! plus a Ceremony by Certified Range Safety Officer and Minister (that would be me).
Win Stuff – Every bride or groom you bring that is new to Openrange could win you points for really cool gifts and things. Free range time, free guns! The limit on your number of brides and grooms is up to you.
This project is supported by the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s 2008 Range Partnership Grant Program”
According to Jonathan Meador writing on LEO’s blog, the ad takes the stereotypes to a form of “high/low art”,
Sure, it’s done in extremely poor taste, it “crosses the streams” of several psycho-sexual themes you don’t normally find even in a Mapplethorpe photo (much less a weekly newspaper), is beyond degrading to women and motherhood, and is generally unsettling to most of our middle-class sensibilities… but so what? This is Kentucky. There are people like this here. Why all the shame, folks?
In an increasingly homogenized and global world like ours, the properties that make Kentucky Kentucky become all the more precious when faced with McDondaldization and its white-washed discontents. Granted this ad alone isn’t a Bluegrass zeitgeist or anything, and shouldn’t be read into that much, but it manages to be successful by playing with our nativist tropes and pushing the boundary of good taste.
Meador goes on to say,
A sense of humor, after all, is required — and with it comes a form of empowerment. Besides, preggo-gun nuts are just one more thing we’ve got over, say, Austin. Or Portland. Or Brooklyn. Or Cool Place #725.
And since the ad has gotten attention on the web, hey that makes LEO a great place to advertise.
Unfortunately this goes well beyond degrading women and motherhood let alone the boundary of good taste. What Meador doesn’t mention and perhaps doesn’t know is that pregancy is a time when women are most vulnerable to intimate violence. And there is nothing funny or empowering about that.
Domestic violence is prevalent in pregnancy, with homicide as the leading cause of death for pregnant women. Prenatal screening and well newborn visits provide screening opportunities for family violence as well as routine physical care.
According to the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office in Clark County, Indiana (which is right across the river from Louisville), “25% – 45% of all women who are battered are battered during pregnancy“.
LEO has a reputation, well deserved for the most part of being the liberal, alternative voice of Louisville, unfortunately this ill-considered ad sadly tarnishes that image.
*Fair disclosure, I wrote a column for LEO for awhile. Also, the language in the ad was cut and pasted from the Open Range website, including the spelling which I elected to leave despite assorted warnings from my spell-check.
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