Posted on 08/16/2007 7:56:17 PM PDT by crusher
Yep, it’s kind of sad when our own people aren’t defending us against things that are obvious smear tactics. Sure, we, like any site, deal with trolls and trouble-makers, but if people actually use the abuse button it’s ALWAYS taken care of — and very quickly as well! There is NO reason NOT to defend this site and the posters here — especially when we consider WHY this is being done, and the results for society on a whole if our ability to speak out is undermined.
RE: the Jose Padilla verdict. I was at my local Wendy’s sitting for a bite with my husband right before they were going to announce the verdict — yep, Wendy’s was running CNN loud enough so that you couldn’t really even ignore it or discuss something other than what they were running! Anyway, I was just HOPING they would announce it while I was still in the place so I could start cheering (or Booing if it came down not-guilty)! LOL I even planned out exactly what I was going to say (loud enough so I could be heard over the incessant whining of the CNN anchors). We unfortunately had to leave before it was read! Darn it! )o:
RE: Up is down & Black is white. I see more and more evidence daily of what Isaiah said in 5:20:
ISAIAH 5:20 (KJV)
20 Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
(Here is the whole chapter of Isaiah 5 from BibleGateway.com for anyone wishing to read the verse in context: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=29&chapter=5&version=9 )
Truly I believe this is what we are seeing within society — over and over again in the last few years alone! And, yes, it will only get worse...
That's a lie. It is the illegal ANYBODY. My head hurts from banging it against the wall on this one.
There are two things going on here: first, I'm expressing my personal opinions about some of the things I've seen here. And second, I'm trying to see FR as an outsider would see it -- because those are the folks the MSM is trying to convince.
We need to honestly address the question: has FR (in the contents of its threads) done anything to bring this upon itself? The answer is yes, and we should not try to minimize that fact.
For the first, that is my personal opinion about some of the posts I see here. I do get the feeling that for some FReepers, race "explains" criminal behavior. If I, who have been here 9 years, can sometimes get that impression, imagine what an outsider, with no sense of how FR works, might conclude.
As for the second two (which are actually part of the same example), it's quite simply true. There are FReepers who advocate the same tactics that the nazis and soviets used, and for the same reasons. It's fair to point that out to them.
And, truth be told, the rest of us could do with exercising a bit of thought before we post some of the things we do, too.
Completely agree r9. But exactly how, on a forum like this, do we do an even better job of policing ourselves? I don't prefer that a lawsuit be filed, or that it would be about punitive damages, it would be about tending notice that FR isn't going to take it anymore. I'm certainly open to suggestions.
Yes, it is a hate site, we hate liberal stupidity and hate those who try to skewer the truth.
LOL! I always love reading “The greatest flame of all time”!
I honestly think the “Loose Lips Sink Ships” phrase is merely to remind everyone (especially as there are a lot on this site who are military, or military family members) NOT to share everything we know — especially about troop movements, etc... I don’t think it has anything to do with keeping silent “true intentions”...
RE: Stormfront — it came to my attention several years ago that an essay of mine (not related to racism whatsoever — the topic was the Constitution) had been posted on their site. It literally HORRIFIED me that my REAL name appeared anywhere on that site! I wanted to scream to everyone in the world that “I am not a racist! I do NOT support that site!!!”. I came to realize though that if people ON that site read what I had written, and read anything ELSE I had written over the course of my short political career that they couldn’t possibly believe that I condoned things ON that site! And, just perhaps, my words could turn someone away from any of their truly hateful thinking...
Anyway, I agree that some people here go over the line. However, the media fails to see where FReepers repeatedly call people on their ignorance, and basically string them up for accusations such as this. AND, the moderators are VERY good at responding to abuse reports, and very quickly. It’s a shame that some people in our world cannot be more mature in their debate tactics, but last I checked we still have the First Amendment. And, as such, we should be fervently defending these people’s RIGHT to say whatever they think — even if we don’t like it. As long, of course, as it stays within the rules that Jim Robinson has set up for this site. Just because the ACLU, or the ADL, or NAACP, or any other organization says that they “see” hatred doesn’t make it so. Indeed, some of these institutions have used this purely political tactic for a LONG time before FR even existed... Indeed, their tactics have been SO successful due to people NOT standing up for the 1st Amendment that we find ourselves in this situation right now...
MY COMMENTS TO FOX5 BASED ON MY EARLIER POST
As a viewer who has watched your newscast for over 20 years, I was outraged by the errors in your report on internet hate.
Please apologize on the air for this misguided hit piece on Free Republic (FR) (where I’ve been a long-time poster).
I’m not a hate monger and am sickened to be falsely labeled that way.
You falsely linked FR to death threats against CASA Leader Torres. You falsely grouped FR in with Nazi, Klan, and Skinhead sites.
Why was FR not contacted to give its side of the story? Why did you not mention that CASA Leader Torres was in a long-time dispute with the Minutemen which led him to threaten picketing of the children of Minutemen at school and that Torres had overcome heated local opposition to push through an additional day labor center?
Any death threats to Torres probably came from someone who followed the more heated disputes (i.e., with the local opponents of the last-built labor center and the Minutemen) that pre-date any dispute between Torres and FR.
Or the alleged death threats may have been invented by Torres as a way to smear political opponents or distract from his aborted attempt to threaten school children of Minutemen. Yet, Fox5 rushed to link threats to FR and link FR to real hate sites.
On Feb 22, 2006, the Gazette [http://www.gazette.net/stories/022206/wheanew213954_31988.shtml] quoted Torres’ threat to picket the schools attended by children of Minutemen, a thinly veiled threat likely to get some children attacked in school.
On Feb 24, 2006 a thread [http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1584976/posts] was started about the Gazette article on the dispute between CASA and the Minutemen. Many FReepers (members of FR) were outraged that Torres would threaten children and homes of Minutemen with picketing. Repeating though, any death threats to Torres may have resulted from someone reading the Montgomery Gazette account of his threat to the Minutemen (before it appeared on FR) or from someone involved in the disputed most-recently opened day labor center. Or the death threats may have been invented by Torres as a way to smear political opponents or distract from his aborted attempt to threaten school children of Minutemen.
Relative to Torres’ contact info being on FR, anyone who knows how to use Google can easily find that based on the Gazette article. (Moreover, there is nothing wrong with calling his place of business to protest his threat to picket children.) Therefore, a reader of the original Gazette article, not someone reading it on FR, was just as likely responsible for any threats.
In terms of FR publishing Torres’ photo, your station did the same thing.
FR did nothing wrong here. FR didn’t threaten to picket the schools of political opponent’s children. Incredibly, your source did make such an outrageous threat.
[At the bottom are links to relevant materials documenting what happened.]
Feb 22, 2006 threatens to take actions against the Minutemen including picketing schools that children of Minutemen attend CASA leader Torres said: ‘‘Then we are going to picket their [the Minutemen] houses, and the schools of their kids, and go to their work.” http://www.gazette.net/stories/022206/wheanew213954_31988.shtml
Feb 22, 2006 article about Minuteman hit with laser as he peacefully photographed CASA operation from a distance
http://www.gazette.net/stories/022206/wheanew213956_31989.shtml
March 2006 columnist applauds Torres for being:
[http://www.takoma.com/archives/copy/2006/03/features_talkOfTakoma.html]
[QUOTE FROM ARTICLE]willing to meet bullying in kind. He is training a counter-force of people with video
cameras who are prepared to follow the Minutemen to their own jobs, even their homes. “We will let their neighbors
know who these extremists are,” Gustavo says. “It will be a shame to their families.” [ENDQUOTE FROM ARTICLE]
March 8, 2006 Torres backtracks on threat to picket Minutemen children at schools
http://www. [DON’T WANT TO LINK TO A SITE OF A GROUP THAT THREATENED CHILDREN - didn’t include this bracketed stuff to ch. 5] casademaryland.org/press/mar8-2006(5).htm
2 removed, one is showing, and that one is not hateful.
I would never frequent a site that was by design hateful, bigoted, or anything else along those lines. There are a few in every crowd, but in general the discussions on this site are thoughtful and fair, although often passionate. I don’t agree with everything that’s said, and sometimes someone will go off the map a bit, but it is generally a great sight for legitimate exchange of ideas. Many of those who criticize FR are critical because they have no interest in exchanging viewpoints. They are convinced their’s is the correct viewpoint and they have no interest in an exchange of ideas.
I think you too, have overemphasized “hate”. Getting the truth out is not hate.
Doesn't matter.
I don't really know how to answer that in a "how" sense -- the real solution is more along the lines of a cultural reformation. What differentiates a civil society from a clamorous horde? It's lots of things -- self-restraint, ideas of duty and honor, good manners, respect for others, and so on.
I'm not suggesting that FR should become a stodgy and dull place. I love those free-wheeling threads that make you laugh out loud, and FReeper irreverence is a real treasure.
But when the topic is serious, wouldn't it be great if we could count on FReepers to address the topics seriously and thoughtfully, rather than letting their emotions get the best of them?
I disagree with your analysis totally. As a moderate on many issues I have been through some of the toughest debates imaginable here but anytime someone hits the abuse button and the post goes against the policy it is deleted. The debates are furious but that's the real world...not the canned MSM version.
The problem with most moderates is they can't take the heat when important issues come up and they stay out of the conversation until the storm is over....so the dominate voice here seems like it is more right leaning when hot button issues come up, then they come back out of the woodwork when the storm is over. Just because the moderates like to "hide out" so to speak still doesn't make it a hate site.
You have to dig deeper then the hot button issues to find the heart and soul of FR.
My point was not that there is something wrong in having a difference of opinion on immigration, but that some of the posts definitely were not really interested in immigration issues per se but were directed entirely at Hispanics. You’d never know from FR that one of the largest groups of illegals in the US are the Irish, for example, or that the ones we have had terrorism trouble with are not Latin Americans and not even illegals, but are Middle Eastern legally admitted student visa holders. Things like “Jorge Boosh,” which some Freepers seem to think incredibly witty, would certainly encourage this impression.
My objection was also to the fact that there was a period where these posts were appearing on every thread, regardless of topic. I know that neither of you two were the offenders, and my post was not directed at you. There were a couple of regulars who I thought went a little overboard, but for the most part, the nastier posters seem to have disappeared. Either the mods got a grip on them, or they served their purpose, that is, to tar FR, and have now gone back to lurk until the next time the Dems call them out.
Yes it would but it ain't gonna happen.
To return to the thread topic, I happen to believe that any press is good press. Get our name out there and let the people come and see for themselves what kind of site we are.
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