Did Ann Coulter really say “Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It’s yours”?

On By geochristianIn Creation in the Bible, Environment

4/22/2013 — For a much more Biblical view of nature than what you will hear from Ann Coulter, see my Earth Day 2013 entry: The goodness and fruitfulness of creation. See also the environmental quotes from Christian authors Francis Schaeffer and Steven Bouma-Prediger.

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I’ve seen this quote from conservative commentator Ann Coulter in several places, and I’m curious about its authenticity:

“God gave us the earth. We have dominion over the plants, the animals, the trees. God said, ‘Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It’s yours.'”—Hannity & Colmes, 6/20/01

I’ve always wondered why anyone would listen to Coulter—she comes across as fuming with rage and anger. I know she claims to be a Christian, so this quote (if genuine) bothers me for a number of reasons.

  • It is just plain wrong. The concept of dominion in Genesis 1 is to keep and care for the creation as God’s representatives, not to rape and exploit it for our own selfish desires.
  • The creation is not “ours,” it is God’s.
  • The tone makes absolutely no contribution to anything, other than to help most people to see conservative Christians as a bunch of yahoos.

Does anyone know if she really said this? Or is this a distortion that has become entrenched in environmentalist urban legends, sort of like James Watt’s statement (that he never made) that it didn’t matter whether we took care of the Earth because Jesus was coming back soon?

Grace and Peace

 

14 thoughts on “Did Ann Coulter really say “Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It’s yours”?”

  1. Anna

    Yep. At least she claimed to have said it in her book. http://tinyurl.com/2cqw69s It’s on page 104
    If the link doesn’t work, search for “If Democrats Had Any Brains, They’d Be Republicans” in Google Books.

    Thanks for posting. I don’t know much about Coulter (though I consider myself a Republican), but what little I had heard turned me off. Now I have a good reason to be angry with her.

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  3. geochristian

    Anna,

    Thanks for the link. It would have been nice if it turned out that this was only an urban legend.

    Carl,

    Ann Coulter is witty and often right, but overall I find her style to be needlessly offensive. If what she said about “rape the earth” (and attributing that statement to God) is hyperbolic, it is only slightly so. Her views on the environment seem to come from the “disposable planet” end of the conservative spectrum.

    Thanks to both of you for your comments.

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  6. Doublejay

    Ann Coulter is the worst kind of bottom feeding scum there is. She is a typical republitard, totally ignorant, full of hate and anger for anyone who doesn’t agree with her. Here are a few more quotes:The ethic of conservation is the explicit abnegation of man’s dominion over the Earth. The lower species are here for our use. God said so: Go forth, be fruitful, multiply, and rape the planet — it’s yours. That’s our job: drilling, mining and stripping. Sweaters are the anti-Biblical view. Big gas-guzzling cars with phones and CD players and wet bars — that’s the Biblical view. “Oil Good; Democrats bad”, Townhall, 12 October 2000
    A cruise missile is more important than Head Start. Remarks during an address (November 2001), rebroadcast by C-SPAN in January 2002, quoted in “Amy Goodman vs. Ann Coulter” in High Timber Times (29 September 2009)
    It would be a much better country if women did not vote. That is simply a fact. In fact, in every presidential election since 1950 — except Goldwater in ’64 — the Republican would have won, if only the men had voted. As quoted in “An appalling magic” in The Guardian (17 May 2003)

    If Chicago had been hit, I assure you New Yorkers would not have cared. What was stunning when New York was hit was how the rest of America rushed to New York’s defense. New Yorkers would have been like, “It’s tough for them; now let’s go back to our Calvin Klein fashion shows.” On the September 11 attacks, as quoted in “An appalling magic” in The Guardian (17 May 2003)

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  10. There were also these bits that people tend to ignore. Unless God was just telling us what he was doing but didn’t intend for us to give a shit about it. Both are in Genesis, obviously.

    21 So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 22 And God blessed them, saying, n“Be fruitful and multiply and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.”

    AND

    30 And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so.

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  11. susie8765

    I think she’s making the same point as the author at the start. It’s sarchasm. She’s making the point that mankind is destroying the earth and that’s NOT what God intended. I’ve heard that Americans don’t always understand sarchasm… but that’s what this is. She’s highlighting how ludicrous our lack of respect for the planet is.

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  12. geochristian

    susie8765 — Yes, a little sarcasm. But there is little in Ann Coulter’s brand of conservatism that actually seems to want to conserve things in the natural world. Pollution regulations? They restrict economic growth. Wilderness areas? They are for tree-hugging hippies. Climate change? A left-wing conspiracy. Unfortunately, Ann Coulter’s beliefs on environmental issues are a little to close to “rape the Earth” for her attempt at sarcasm to work well.

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