The Internet Should Work Like Our Democracy [Democrat Broadcsster Blasts Freepers]

DemocraticTalk Radio.com ^ | November 24, 2006 | Stephen Crocket & Al Lawrence

[papertyger]

FR just needs to send this reporter a reminder that they are not “freepers” and please do not refer to them as such!

Nonsense. "FReeper" is the term that embodies all that liberals find opposed to their utopian vision. Distinctions are irrelevant to them unless they are used BY them in defense of the liberal's own dissimulation.

[donnab]

Yeah thats us ...horrible
We are the ones that leave a show because we can dish it out but cant take the vitriol ala Rosie...
Or we are the ones cussing on tv ala Sally Field ...
Or we are the ones that refuse to appear on a show because our views dont agree ala Barry Manilow...
Or the dems that wont appear on FOX because they cant handle it ala all of the wannabe presidents...
yep its us ..
We are the ones calling an esteemed general a liar and a betrayer ala moveon.org or Hilliary Clinton...
We are the ones that put ads in overseas enemy papers to aid and abet the enemy ala the pink people...
We are the ones portraying our brave soldiers who sacrifice literally all as baby killers and rapists in movies ala Oliver Stone etal.
...yep its us ....
mea culpa mea culpa

[beachn4fun]

"FReeper" is the term that embodies

I disagree simply because I never heard the term "FReeper" outside of FR before people at Free Republic started using the term. I do believe that someone at Free Republic coined that phrase. We use it to mean people at Free Republic. Reporters picked up on it and now it's become a catch-phrase to mean "the term that embodies all that liberals find opposed to their utopian vision."

[TheRightGuy]

Everyone active at Free Republic.com are not involved in the “freeper” attacks. The terms are now applied to Right Wing extremist who use the harassment tactics but are not necessarily associated with Free Republic.com. The terms have become generic.

N U T S

Generic, hell! A FReeper without FreeRepublic is like an olive wandering around without the martini.

[papertyger]

I disagree simply because I never heard the term "FReeper" outside of FR before people at Free Republic started using the term.

WTH? Can you believe a candidate won an election if no one you know voted for them?

The term "FReeper" was coined by Lucianne Goldberg to describe folks on this site.

As we are the most successful of the conservative forums, the term has evolved into a generic...whether you are aware of it or not.

The left has a love/hate relationship with the term because whenever they use it, it acknowledges our influence. They tend to use it more online because we are no secret. In MSM formats, they are much more tight-lipped, probably because they don't want any more of the pre-internet generations getting any unapproved ideas.

[papertyger]

I do believe that someone at Free Republic coined that phrase. We use it to mean people at Free Republic. Reporters picked up on it and now it's become a catch-phrase to mean "the term that embodies all that liberals find opposed to their utopian vision."

How is that not a distinction without difference?

[beachn4fun]

I think you’ve got your wires cross or simply have failed to understand what I said. So, never mind. Bye.

[beachn4fun]

I think you’ve got your wires crossed or simply have failed to understand what I said. So, never mind. Bye.

[Fiji Hill]

“Freepers” attack open message boards and blogs with smear campaigns in which they use profanity and obscenities, racist language, character attacks and false accusations. Every idea that is moderate, liberal or progressive is labeled communist or socialist. Anyone who does not completely follow the line of the Republican Far Right is called a traitor or supporter of terrorism.

This is the Big Lie technique--making and repeating a sensational accusation while providing no evidence to back it up.

FR's managers actually do a good job in keeping their site clean. Although I haven't read many Ron Paul threads, it seems to me that anyone who uses racial slurs or profanity or who engages in too much flaming is quickly zoned out, or "zotted," which makes FR far more pleasant to read than some of those obscentiy-filled leftie blogs.

[Oberon]

Racial slurs and profanity are generally off-limits, I’ll agree, and those limits are generally respected as well. However, most of the other stuff happens, and is directed at Ron Paul and his advocates here at FR.

[George W. Bush]

Some individuals who have been active in the past at sites like Free Republic.com have been connected to acts like the mailing of anthrax hoax letters.

I notice how they accuse so slyly that they can't be sued for libel. They suggest and seem to accuse yet it's not actionable because they said sites like FreeRepublic.com. So a careless reader is left with the intended impression that it is actually FreeRepublic members sending anthrax hoax letters.

Personally, I'd be happy if we just had more freeping of online polls and such. I am aware of a few folks who are trolling on the lib sites like D.U. because they mention it here but I have no proof they actually do it. Since the DUmmies do read FR, I always wondered if FReepers say that stuff just to make them so paranoid that they attack each other on their own forum.

As for the accusations that FReepers have sent email virii and such, very few here at FR have those kinds of skills so I don't believe that. It could be they're making it up or that they assume every lame email virus they get is an attack by the "freepers" (they're a hysterical and paranoid bunch) or there could be agentes provateurs on the Left who seek to fan the flames of their own wackos by using such tricks and then blaming it all on attacks by "freepers".

In short, the whole thing is just hogwash. Why don't they produce some actual proof of what they're asserting? Most likely, they don't have any and wouldn't know how to get it anyway.

I wish they'd said enough to catch them in a libel suit.