Maybe I’m strange, but I love getting hate mail. There’s something satisfying about getting under the skin of someone who abhors my views. Don’t get me wrong; I like praise, too, but the bitter mail tends to be more creative. And for some reason, these last few days have brought me quite a bilious bounty. One of the more tame e-mails is from a guy named Rick:

From: Rick <ismore@spiritone.com>
Subject: the complete video set
Date: April 16, 2006 3:51:53 AM EDT
To: Evan Coyne Maloney

just picked up a copy of your video from the local library.
found it to be very amateurish.
you have a long way to go to become the “conservative Micheal Moore”.
where’s the humor?
what’s the point?
conservatives control the white house,
congress,
the senate,
the supreme court,
and virtually all major media outlets,
yet, your all white male crew seems to be whining about being disadvantaged.
anyone with money can make a movie,
and I think it’s safe to say that conservatives control most of that too.
it takes brains (and humor) to make a good movie.
so maybe you should sell the camera,
join the army,
move to Iraq,
and fight the good fight.
you’d look good in camo.

I rarely post e-mails that don’t address a specific argument I’ve made, but in this case, what I find interesting is Rick’s assumption that I use an “all white male crew.” (You forgot to critique the sexual orientation of the crew, Rick!)

The people who’ve helped me on my various videos are neither all white nor all male, but Rick wouldn’t know that because the crew has never been shown on camera.

Rick just assumes that, because I am white and male, everyone who works with me must be as well. There must be something about Rick’s world that would cause him to assume that white males don’t associate with anyone else. Perhaps Rick is a white male, and if so, I’d argue that his thinking is a form of psychological projection, where he takes his own internal mindset and assumes that everyone else in the world has the same prejudices. But I don’t know Rick, so who am I to assume that he is white or even male?

What’s also interesting is that Rick seems to think that the racial and gender makeup of the people who work with me on shoots has some relation to our political outlook. To Rick, only white males are allowed to be conservatives. People from other groups may only hold Rick-approved views. He must be ignorant of a number of powerful thinkers who are neither white nor male nor straight.

Rick must hate that, all those uppity non-white-males daring to think differently from how he believes they should. The funny thing is, this guy probably thinks I’m a racist.