Cockroaches for Mikey (Updated) Friday, Jan 18 2008
2008 presidential election and astro-gossip and astrologers and general knavery and general stupidity and hillary clinton and michael lutin and scorpio 2008 presidential election, astrology, barack obama, bill o'reilly, cockroaches, gender, hillary clinton, huffington post, huffpo, michael lutin, mikey, misogyny, scorpio, vanity fair 7:18 pm
One of most common justifications offered by sun-sign columnists is that they perform a valuable public service by introducing astrology to the public and representing it in a positive way.
So, how does one jibe this rationalization with the misogynistic and hateful pseudo-astrodiatribe typed by former Vanity Fair sun-sign columnist Michael Lutin in the popular political blog, The Huffington Post. He writes:
It should come as no surprise that Hillary Clinton came out swinging after her defeat in Iowa. After all, it was in the stars: she is a Scorpio and Scorpio rules the instinct for survival. Scorpio also rules cockroaches. Did you ever try to spray or drown them? They can hold their breath and play dead until you walk out of the kitchen and turn out the light. Then they scurry away, laughing. Scorpios are loved and hated at the same time. Those who hate Hillary still respect her sheer chutzpah, and those who love her have to put up with the fact that she can be a nightmare to live with, especially if she gets a whiff of betrayal.
He goes on to observe that sneaky little Scorpionic cockroaches have no subtlety when they have a goal in mind.
Back in the 90s when she was laughed out of Congress, her critics believed she was done for. You have to understand how Scorpios operate, however. And Hillary does operate. She operates like a nuclear-powered paper shredder. The whole Congress-health care fiasco was a disaster, partly because Scorpios do lack subtlety when they have a goal. They get fixated. They zero in. Hillary can’t help it. She’s an assertive female. (That’s why Bill married her. He likes to get slapped around once in a while.) She is not the frilly-I-enjoy-being- a-girl type of woman. She’s more like a girl’s gym teacher; just fit her out with a whistle and a pair of sneakers and she’d be ready to dribble a basketball. That image makes it easy for her detractors to cast aspersions on her sexuality.
Cute way to insinuate that not only is she a dominatrix, but she is a dykey one at that, and worthy of something one would expect at Little Green Footballs or Redstate, and not the Huffington Post.
But nevermind that, because Lutin seems to get back on the stereotypical Scorpio track later in the post:
So when she busted into the Senate with six-guns blazing, the Old Boys snickered and thought they could just send her back to the kitchen. Scorpio women are not just women, though.
Hillary backed away. In typical Scorpio fashion, she went into Plan B. Scorpios always have not only Plan B, but they usually have it figured out all the way up to Plan Z. She probably figured, well, if she couldn’t convince those old buzzards to do what she thought was right, she would just have to take over the whole shebang.
The column sputters to an end with this baffling notion:
Some will vote for her just because she’s a woman. Many will NOT for the same reason. In the end, foreign or domestic policies notwithstanding, Scorpio always turns out to be an issue of gender.
Umm, setting aside that there really are a good number of people (including a bunch of men) who have and will vote for Clinton because they actually believe that she is the most qualified candidate, I wonder what Presidents Adams, Garfield, Harding, Polk, and [Theodore] Roosevelt think about that (if they were alive to read it)!
Mikey does seem fixated on the gender thing. On the 14th, he turned up again at the HuffPo, this time somewhat toned down and makes a lame attempt (and illustrating in the process why sun sign astrology is so lame) to analyze the possibilities of all the presidential candidates. In fact, he just touches on the sun-sign transits of what he considers to be the 4 front running Republican candidates (Guiliani was included, even though he has been getting trounced even by Ron Paul), ignores the existence of Edwards (in spite of the fact that Edwards has been routinely garnering more votes than most of the Republican candidates due to the fact that most people don’t seem to be bothering with the Republican clusterfuck of a race) and deals with Obama and Clinton with the following throwaways:
“A woman in the White House, I wouldn’t trust one even AFTER menopause.”
Or “A black man President? Shoot me now.”
There is too much in both of these statement to unpack (I’m betting that most sane people of good conscience can see the problem without it being spelled out), except that I can’t but wonder if there isn’t a whole lot of projection going on here.
Two tidbits that might support this notion:
About a year ago, I posted this excerpt of a Mikey interview:
What’s your sign?
I never tell. It’s not good for my practice. I try to be neutral in my practice, and people have prejudices against certain signs, so that’s why. People have all kinds of crazy notions, based upon their childhood, mostly. They’ll say, “Oh, I hate Geminis,” and I’ll say, “Is your mother a Gemini?” “Yeah, how’d you know?”
You don’t say! Can we infer from this that the real reason Mikey hates Hillary is because she reminds him of his own cockroach of a mother?
The other tidbit comes from an ISAR conference I attended in Chicago a few years back. Mikey provided the evening entertainment at the grand $40. dinner. It was meant to be funny and to provide a laugh. But there was seriously un-funny moment toward the end as he began to rant about the dangerous times in which we live–and, with a straight face–said that since 9/11, life in NYC has become so terrifying and scary (what with all the terrorist hordes hiding out in Jackson Heights and Bay Ridge), he never ever gets into a cab if the driver is wearing a turban. It was a tense moment, and although there was a bit of buzz about it later–most people chalked it up to Mikey being Mikey. Sorta like Imus being Imus, I guess.
Not only is Mikey racist and sexist, but he is dumb. Because Muslims don’t wear turbans, Sikhs do.
On a funner note, some Scorpio women are pushing back.
Update: Lutin is fear-mongering has posted again on the Huffington Post.
This time, because Obama has a Leo North Lunar Node, he has a Messianic Complex, and because he had to grow up fast, he is grandiose (that is, he has forgotten his “place).
And Hillary Clinton is still a bitch on wheels.
If he didn’t have the astrology to hide behind (because the reality is that there are some places even a stand-up comic will not/should not go) this is how this one this reads:
Ambitious African-American man: Grandiose, i.e., uppity.
Ambitious woman: Castrating bitch, i.e, uppity.
Michael Lutin: The Bill O’Reilly of the astrology world.
19 January 2008 at 2:12 am
thank god you wrote this - lutin’s post disgusts me. utterly. it gives astrology an even worse name than it already has, simply by implying what it does about scorpios, scorpio women in particular. I have nothing in scorpio but an unaspected jupiter, and while I don’t particularly love a scorpio (although I did have trouble with my father! and he’s a scorpio! zing!), this is obviously a bunch of bullshit. ugh.
19 January 2008 at 3:29 pm
There is nothing nice that can be said about Lutin’s post. It is a cheap shot and far off the mark.
Professional astrologers usually have the good sense to treat any analysis of an individual with care and respect. If you are entrusted with the skills to pull an individual’s personality apart, then you have the responsibility to do so constructively.
Unfortunately in our society public figures are fair game for any type of commentary we care to make, including cheap shots. It is unfortunate that someone of Lutin’s professional standing has apparently confused one of the perks of living in America with the privileges of using his art.
19 January 2008 at 5:40 pm
Thanks Isadora and Beth for your comments.
Sadly, with Lutin, and a few others like him, this kind of destructive rhetoric (to politics & culture, as well as astrology) is not uncommon.
Unfortunately, most of the people who follow him don’t realize that much (most?) of what he says has very little to do with astrology and has more to do with his own dark view of life. Because there is very little “real” astrology in most of what he writes…including his book, Sunshines.
What is indeed shocking is how many “real” astrologers out there who either giggle along or turn a blind eye to to his nastiness.
I find myself wondering what his real agenda is in writing this sort of thing–particularly in the 2nd column about Clinton and Obama. In all the national polls, they are both well ahead of all of the potential republican candidates. The people who might not vote for Hillary because she is a post-menopausal woman or Obama because he is African-American wouldn’t vote for ANY Democrat, ever, period, end of story. So, what is he trying to accomplish?
Because it certainly isn’t entertaining.
30 January 2008 at 10:08 pm
Well said!
Personally, I have never figured out why so many people hang onto Lutin’s nonsense. The guy is a sad joke.
6 March 2008 at 5:09 pm
Why do we listen?
Because the guy is hysterically funny, dead-accurate in his assessments,compassionate and encouraging in how to work the energy you were born with.
What more could you possibly want in an astrologer?
9 March 2008 at 4:44 pm
Have to agree with Dawn. Lutin is a very good astrologer, and highly entertaining, but he has a polarizing effect on people and the above commentators don’t appear to “get” him. I think it’s a cultural thing — a NY state of mind.
Keep it up, Mikey.
9 March 2008 at 5:30 pm
OK. Lemme see if I have this right. It is an “hysterically funny, dead-accurate” “compassionate” and “a NY state of mind” to use astrological symbolism to advocate a misogynistic racist “political” attitude?
I think an awful lot of NY’ers would have trouble wrapping their heads around that one. Furthermore, there are plenty of astrologers who seem to have the same problem, though for some “odd” reason, most would never dare to say so publicly.
10 March 2008 at 2:22 am
sun,
it is amazing to me how you are completely mising the point — he’s not against hillary, nor misogynist, nor anti-scorpio. re-read him, or maybe not . . . you seem to have an inability to understand him and are taking his funny, wise articles in a way he’s not intending
12 June 2008 at 2:24 pm
This article about astrologer Lutin (who isn’t only a sun sign astrologer, by the way) is nothing more than a rant that lacks insight into Lutin’s objective and humorous approach to the insanity of current American politics. To take out of context the statements in which he paraphrases the craziness of extremitsts is unfair and misses the point, to say the least, and slanderous at worst. Furthermore, there is no credibility in an article written by a person who will not identify himself or herself. This is America, and a person has a right to say what they want, but please, have the courtesy and courage to IDENTIFY YOURSELF.
22 June 2008 at 9:40 pm
LOL!
Michael Lutin is a public figure, and for that reason his writings are fair game for anyone who wishes to comment. I choose to publish this blog anonymously for reasons which I do not have to divulge to you or anyone else. You or anyone else may choose to agree or disagree with what I write. I don’t delete comments.
As for taking out of context Lutin’s “paraphrasing of extremists,” as you call it, well, in his articles he rationalized/supported those “paraphrases” with the candidates own sunsigns (because Clinton is a bitch of a Scorpio, because Obama is a grandiose Leo). No, what he was doing was exemplifying the astrology of the lowest common denominator.
Criticism is NOT slander, btw. Look it up.
2 July 2008 at 2:44 pm
“Michael Lutin: The Bill O’Reilly of the astrology world.”
??? Not sure, but I used to come from that place, too. A lifelong liberal Democrat, I stupidly followed the herd regarding O’Reilly without ever watching him. Shame on me. After listening to one of Keith Olbermann’s “special commentaries” on Hillary Clinton, and sitting there in fear lest he have an on-air stroke because he seemed to be turning purple, I decided I could not take the screaming anymore. In truth, O’Reilly’s interview with Hillary Clinton was worth watching and turned out to be a surprisingly respectful and thoughtful exchange. This past primary season has forever weaned me from the Huffington Post, CNN and MSNBC. And Michelle Obama’s comment regarding Clinton that she (Hillary) could not run her own house let alone the White House showed me a level of sexism that I hadn’t seen since Lynn Cheney’s mouth flapped open. As for Vanity Fair, they’ve been making money out of poison for too many years. I stopped buying it a long, long time ago. Feels good to be liberated from the herd.
21 July 2008 at 9:56 pm
These Huffpo articles don’t surprise me.
Mikey Lutin is a hypocrite.
He doesn’t hesitate to dissect the charts (negatively) of anyone he can get birth data on, yet hides his own b-day info. He is into men, yet he tries to hide that he is gay. He pretends to be a voice of “enlightenment” but he is really a reactionary paranoid right wing Bush loving rethug (who has heard him go after Bush–ever?). He hides his fear and loathing of just about everyone. Particularly women and those with brown skin.
That is why he is the Bill O’Reilly of the astrology world, imo.