Email: The Future of Free Republic

Email | 06/25/02 | Jim Robinson

[Jim Robinson]

The following email is being circulated to our members by various disgruntled former FReepers:

Subject: The Future of Our Free Republic

Dear Fellow Free Republic Member,

Many of us at Free Republic are distressed by the extraordinary level of censorship that has been so obviously going on. It is very obvious that individual posts, entire threads, and the entire work of members who have been highly regarded are disappearing into a Memory Hole.

Scores of us have organized an e-mail network that is independent of the communication controls presently, and sadly, being used at our Free Republic. We have carefully documented the unmistakeable evidence that most of the posts, threads, and posters that are vaporized completely are overwhelmingly targeted for their political stance on the Right. These are not Leftwingers. These are not even Middle-of-the-Roaders. These are not disruptors. These are not foul-mouthed delinquents. These are fellow patriots on the Right who disagree with the controllers of FR on specific issues that are now hotly debated by the Right. We have documented that FR will parade before you, as if to hide all of the great posters whose work has been destroyed, a straw-man delinquent that has been banned. This is deceptive.

Treating these fellow patriots on the Right so shabbily is not right. As shabbily as those banned into the Memory Hole are being treated, the most shabbily treated of all are all of the good folks on Free Republic themselves. We came here for honest debate. Free Republic advertised itself as a Forum for honest debate. Without that honest debate...everything at Free Republic becomes shabby.

We can do much better. As a measure of how intense the simmering feelings have gotten among members on this unjustifiable use of deleting, censoring, and banning please link to the following thread. You will notice that one simple and sincere plea from one of our finest members has spontaneously touched off a prairie fire of approximately 500 posts in a mere 18 hours. If it isn't Memory Holed this thread may shoot into the thousands.

If you would like to receive anonymous updates of information concerning the hundreds of Freepers who have networked via e-mail to restore the wonderful honest debate to Free Republic, just drop an e-mail of just one or two words if you like for extreme brevity to:

StopCensoringUs@hotmail.com

And, here's that link back to the snowballing thread at FR:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/704701/posts

Thank you so much for giving your thought to this vital matter for our Internet home.

Sincerely, StopCensoringUs@hotmail.com

[olliemb]

Free Republic is very addictive and I certainly enjoy it very much. Thanks for getting rid of the malcontents and bad mouths--it is your web site and by all means set the rules and enforce them. I will be very happy to continue donating to keep this site.

[billhilly]

Hatred is transparent in many of the posts on FR. So is ignorance. Both are very difficult to hide. Let them begone.

[RaceBannon]

First of all, there is not an extraordinary level of censorship on Free Republic. It's natural that those who get booted and have their posts removed will feel that way, but it is not an extraordinary level overall. The vast majority of FReepers have never been banned, never been suspended, never had a post pulled, and never had a moderator send them a warning message.

I have made my share of controversialposts. I have seen some yanked by others, but only 4 of mine, and 3 of those at my request.

While I wish some of those that I saw yanked of others remained, I do not see the major censoship people speak of. I myself have made some hot comments, off the cuff at times, that could have been considered personal, attacking, or whatever, and JimRob never banned me, nor did he ever give me a warning.

While I am of a different opioion from some conservatives regarding our president and the state of the GOP, I have been allowed to openly state so, cite references, make demanding accusations against GWB, call him as I see him (A LIBERAL in disguise), and not once has the moderator or JimRob ever bannedme or pulled any of those comments that i am aware of.

Jim, you got a lot thicker skin than I sure do! :-)

[DB]

"... pointed out that only at most 100 out of millions of Muslims have tried to attack us here..."

Sorry, but that is a mindless statement.

There were many more than 100 that were involved in training and funding of just the 19 that went down with their flying bombs. If you think Al Qaeda has only 100 members that planned this then your living in another world.

When Muslim countries scream over and over "Death to America" you think they are just crying wolf?

bin Ladin declared war on America back in the mid 90's and nobody listened. Not listening is the mistake.

[Johnny Shear]

Sounds like the "Islam is Peace" Racists are throwing a hissy-fit.

I say good riddance...Personally, they make me feel embarrassed to be a Freeper.

[BlueLancer]

"You say that you're an officer of an elite moose-spanking group?"

Yes, like the Freedom League (or, as some would say, the Powerpuff Girls) we are the ultra-secret combat arm of the Israeli Amen Corner and He-Man Women Haters Club. It is our mission to fight for truth, justice, and the right to spåånk elite Møøses.

Don't knock it if you haven't tried it.

PS ... now that you know of our secret existence, we shall have to kill you. Please let us know the time that would be convenient for you.

Regards,
Der Elite Møøsenspåånkengruppen OberKømmååndø

[Johnny Shear]

I believe Palmer was referring to the "Nuke Mecca" crowd.

Total and complete F***ing IDIOTS!!!!!

[Neets]

BTT.....What gets me is these brave souls who are so disenchanted with FR have no qualms whatsoever in running over to the LF and posting tid bits from FR to make themselves look good, while from time to time, even launching PERSONAL and ABOHORANT attacks on Jim Robinson also...it's kind of like a Clintonesque "DO AS I SAY NOT AS I DO" mentality....in other words they want free reign HERE to slime and slam the President...and when they can't get their way..then run over to LF and slime and slam Jim Robinson.....Will Arator and his friends EVER GROW up???

[summer]

Pokey78,

Thank you for the ping on this important post.

I must say, I for one had no idea any of this was going on as of late. In my view, FR has gotten better and better because I see more and more on-topic, insightful relevant discussion on the threads, as opposed to people merely posting personal comments that have nothing to do with the posted content. I believe this is a huge improvement, as I would much rather read these kind of threads than non-stop venom. (BTW, to read non-stop venom, there are plenty of other sites offering that in thread after thread after thread.)

I would like to say something about the following sentence written by that former FR poster and sent via email:

We came here for honest debate. Free Republic advertised itself as a Forum for honest debate. Without that honest debate...everything at Free Republic becomes shabby.

It seems to me the above writer is actually being dishonest in claiming to desire "honest" debate -- because what the writer really demands, considering the rest of above email and other information above, is to choose the topics and post without regard for any posting guidelines established for this forum by its owner.

When people follow the guidelines of this forum, and stay on topic within the forum, and within threads, there is some fascinating debate going on here at FR.

The solution for the writer of that email is to establish a new forum with different guidelines or a different menu more to his liking, instead of demanding the FR owner rewrite the FR menu being offered.

I think Jim Robinson, to his credit, tries hard to make it very clear what subjects are welcome on this forum, and his message about that has been up front and rather consistent throughout the time I have been here.

Expressly setting up guidelines and specific [topics/subject] expectations, and sticking to that, is obviously a very "honest" way to run a forum. In fact, it's very similiar to the way a successful teacher runs a classroom. Honest.

[dennisw]

Liberty Forum has a low volume of traffic with a few posters (15 or so) making most of the posts. Anti Jewish and anti Israel posters there express themselves pretty much any which way they want.

[Neets]

I forgot to ping you to this too.

[eno_]

The one and only point of complaint I agree with is that there is an identifiable coterie of government and/or public relations shills on FR, as much as there were CFR tin-foiler, racists, etc. Banning them or instituting a Slashdot-like system of "karma" and/or the ability to filter out specific posters would further improve FR content.

And that is a VERY minor quibble with a job magnificently well done.

[dennisw]

I too saw that thread where LF members were bragging about how many times they have been banned here. LF is interesting the first few times, then it gets to be predictable and dumb ..... and low amount of traffic like I said.

[Cachelot]

I find it amusing that these individuals think they have some sort of constitutional 'right' to post on FreeRepublic.

These are the individuals that always get in a lather about their free "speach"?

Anyway, betcha I know who the author of that letter is. The style is somewhat unmistakable.

[gunnedah]

Jim and fellow Freepers:
I agree with you ,but I am nosy and want to see some of this for myself so I will try and look into it.
I am a very opinionated person and probably have written some things that come close to what you ban here.But to date I have had nothing removed or never been warned about anything to my knowledge.
I harbor no ill will against any person,their lifestyle,race,creed or color but I strongly resent certain things being pushed down the publics throats in the name of equality and I know this feeling can be used against me,so be it.
Saying that just keep up the good work and you can count on my quarterly support as long as I can afford it.Keep us abreast of changes and updates and if I disagree I can always go somewhere else,this is a free country.

[mhking]

Well, they've reported and I've reported, you decide.

Jim, first off, thank you - thanks for a wonderful place to have intelligent conversation, free (at least for the most part) from ad hominum attacks. It feels good to tell what's on my chest without being called an Uncle Tom or Sellout.

As for the nattering nabobs, let 'em go do what they want. The simple fact that they feel compelled to contact every banned member of FR actually shows their level of contempt combined with jealousy.

Now you, on the other hand, keep on fighting the good fight. I can safely say that the rest of us are behind you.

[palmer]

There were many more than 100 that were involved in training and funding of just the 19 that went down with their flying bombs. If you think Al Qaeda has only 100 members that planned this then your living in another world.

Probably a handful of others. My proof would be that we didn't detect it and if there were more than a handful we would have.

When Muslim countries scream over and over "Death to America" you think they are just crying wolf?

Those are the rantings of exploited and brainwashed fools.

bin Ladin declared war on America back in the mid 90's and nobody listened. Not listening is the mistake.

You are being naiive. We supported bin Laden in the mid 90's for stupid geo-political reasons.

[tdadams]

I won't cry for anyone who gets booted from FR. I wouldn't mind if there were a few more. It seems to me there are several people here who only come on to some threads to be a muckraker, lob baseless and childish insults, and refuse to actually debate facts and figures.

There are several people who get their kicks by finding every thread they can that bashes their favorite enemy (libertarians, gays, Mexicans, etc.) and devolve the thread into inflammatory insults and grammatical nitpicking.

As far as I can recall, I've only had one post pulled and that was because someone got offended at my good faith attempt at humor. Understandable. On the other hand, there are some here who have posts pulled on nearly every thread they enter. If I were JimRob, I wouldn't give them nearly the leniency he does. They ought to feel lucky that I'm not the AdminModerator.

Let them whine - that's all they usually did here. Some of us like having a forum where we can actually discuss issues like civilized adults.

[McGruff]

I don't have a problem with banning posters you feel are making inappropriate comments. After all this is your website. FR is like a TV, if you don't like it here then change the channel.

One thing for everybody to remember is that the whole internet is watching. Some RATS lurk here just trying to find some reply that can be used to brand Free Republic as a right wing hate site. Remember the anthrax rumors.