Dear Ann Coulter:

You really caused a stir at the Conservative Political Action conference in Washington, D.C. last week. You said what your right-wing audience was probably thinking: That Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards is a faggot. Their wild applause certainly suggested that they weren’t offended by your comment.

Faggot is still the putdown of choice these days. Listen to teens in the school yard. Faggot isn’t just about being gay. The word is also used to say that someone is weak and ineffectual. I’m not sure whether you meant to say that Edwards sleeps with other men or is simply a man without cojones.

You probably don’t know the origin of the word faggot. Middle Ages. Witch burnings. A faggot was a bundle of sticks. No one seems to know exactly how it came to be associated with gay men. According to the writings of early gay liberationists (which I can safely assume you’ve never read), known homos from the village were tied together at the base of the stake as kindling for the fire. The reason? A good conservative should love this one: The stench from the burning of all that fag flesh would be so repulsive to god that there would be no chance of redemption for the witch’s soul.

I’m a faggot. When I was growing up, that word was used against me many times. I wasn’t the most masculine of guys. I never understood this obsession with gender. Just because I had a few extra inches of flesh between my legs, I was supposed to like playing sports and beating up other boys. And I couldn’t wear something pretty like my sister’s blouse.

It hurt a lot. Imagine being a ten-year-old grappling with all of the problems of that age group and on top of it being ostracized because you didn’t follow the crowd.

I’ve gotten over it. I like the word faggot now. It makes me sound threatening. A sexual outlaw.

Why am I telling you this? Because you seem obsessed with queers. Last year, you commented that Bill Clinton exhibited “latent homosexual tendencies” because of his sexual exploits with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. Your rationale? He was behaving as if he were in a gay bathhouse. As if there’s something wrong with bathhouses. At least he’s not preaching against gay marriage and sneaking off to see a call boy, like that good old conservative preacher Ted Haggard. But you don’t think queer activists should out closeted gay folks who work against queer rights. Oh, wait, they’re all right-wingers.

Then there was your support of the decision by the national Boy Scouts organization to exclude queers. After all, the agency was just protecting itself from child molesting homos, you wrote. Have you ever heard the word “stereotype?” You joined the Vatican in blaming gay priests for the problem the church is having with all those lawsuits by people claiming to have been molested in their youth by their neighborhood clergyman. You even called former Vice President Al Gore a “total fag.”

When it comes right down to it, the right you represent is the right to hate.

Tommi Avicolli Mecca is a radical, southern Italian, working-class queer performer, writer and activist whose work can be seen at www.avicollimecca.com.