Do we have anything at all in common with freeps?

[Southsideirish]

As a longtime lurker on "freep central" the only things that I have noticed is that we have similar feelings about animals and those that mis-treat them and we both pray and sympathize with people who are suffering. In fact, if the truth be known, I have even prayed for freeps who have problems. Hard to believe, I know.
Sometimes in moments of complete insanity I try to imagine some things that could ever bring the two groups closer together as I get sooo tired of all the fighting plus it would put the bullies like Rush Gasbag and Rove out of business as they wouldn't be able to spread the hatred to widen the divide between us. I know most of 'em are beyond hope but every now and then I do see a sign that a few of them are actual human beings.

[Brucey]

1. Some of them

dislike terrorists, as most of us do, and some believe in education and helping others. Oh, and nature. We also both hate the other side.

[TrogL]

2. Actual living, breathing threats to America...

North America or Western culture.

I mean real, actual, verifiable, perceivable real threats, not the straw man of "terrorism" or the "war on drugs".

If the Freepers ever find out they've been lied to all these years, civil war with break out.

[stopthegop]

3. you don't think 'terrorism' is a real threat? n/t

.

[TrogL]

7. A clear terrorist threat

not this idiocy the Dubya administration has been trotting out.

Actually the Dubya administration is the terrorist threat.

[Xithras]

4. Sure

When it comes right down to it, many right wingers are nice friendly people with families, mortage payments, jobs, and dreams. We live in the same country and deal with the same problems, so it's only natural that we have a lot in common.

I lurk FreeRepubland almost every day, and have had over 40 ID's permanently banned by RimJob. Still, I've discovered that MOST Freepers are only right-wing on a few issues, and are fairly centrist on everything else. There are a few right wing extremists there that I disagree with vehemently, but I've seen quite a few left wing extremists here in the past couple year and a half that I disagree with just as much. Ultimately, this country is only divided on a handful of issues.

[noonwitch]

5. I think we all share the same feelings about NAMBLA/child molesters

Sick pigs that they(child molestors, that is) are. Also, there are a lot of people on both boards who are opposed to the war on some drugs.

I also agree with them about the Terry Schindler-Schiavo case in Florida, where the court is allowing her husband to remove her feeding tube and starve a conscious, independently breathing woman who is capable of smiling and turning her head, so her husband, who may have been responsible for her condition, can inherit her insurance money before it's all spent on her care. I differentiate between removing life support and starving a woman to death. I rather respect the freepers for taking up this cause and I hope they can get the court to reverse it's ruling.

[Interrobang]

8. What does she have to say about it?

A guy I felt very sorry for went away for 10 years for suffocating his daughter when he'd been refused respite care repeatedly. They were trying to force him to institutionalize her, and he and his wife didn't want to do that. All they wanted was a break. He snapped, and his daughter's dead.

So in this case, I would have to know more about it before I said yea or nay on whether I was for or against it. Is she capable of expressing any opinion either way? Personally, I am a quality of life person, rather than a quantity of life person, and I hope that if I were ever in that situation, they would just shoot me full of a "therapeutic" dose of morphine or something and let me drift away. Ugh. Brain damage!

[leftyandproud]

11. you reminded me why I now HATE the ACLU..

They may have done good in the past, but they are defending NAMBLA pro-bono..

Now who the hell would take contributions from members to defend an organization that defends CHILD MOLESTERS for FREE??!

They lost me when they did this.

[Dookus]

12. Can you tell

us exactly what the case was? I doubt very much the ACLU has decided they LIKE child molesters and want to just give a helping hand. I suspect, like with all ACLU cases, there is an important legal issue at hand.

They defended the KKK's right of peaceful assembly, too. I hate the KKK. I love that the ACLU defended them on this issue. The issue is bigger than the participants.

[Dookus]

13. I did a quick search....

the ACLU's website has exactly one press release regarding a defense of NAMBLA. It reads:


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


NEW YORK--In the United States Supreme Court over the past few years, the American Civil Liberties Union has taken the side of a fundamentalist Christian church, a Santerian church, and the International Society for Krishna Consciousness. In celebrated cases, the ACLU has stood up for everyone from Oliver North to the National Socialist Party. In spite of all that, the ACLU has never advocated Christianity, ritual animal sacrifice, trading arms for hostages or genocide. In representing NAMBLA today, our Massachusetts affiliate does not advocate sexual relationships between adults and children.

What the ACLU does advocate is robust freedom of speech for everyone. The lawsuit involved here, were it to succeed, would strike at the heart of freedom of speech. The case is based on a shocking murder. But the lawsuit says the crime is the responsibility not of those who committed the murder, but of someone who posted vile material on the Internet. The principle is as simple as it is central to true freedom of speech: those who do wrong are responsible for what they do; those who speak about it are not.

It is easy to defend freedom of speech when the message is something many people find at least reasonable. But the defense of freedom of speech is most critical when the message is one most people find repulsive. That was true when the Nazis marched in Skokie. It remains true today.

************************

So... they were defending the right of people to say unpopular things on the internet. I think all of us here should take that right very very seriously.

[newyawker99]

15. Congrats leftyandproud!! 600 posts

:toast:

[bowens43]

6. I assume , for the most part,

they are sentient beings.

[leftyandproud]

9. for about 5 minutes on 9-11..

I think we all came together.

It's true...when you get down to it..people are mostly alike, though they can have very different personal philosophies.

People at FR make "prayer requests" while folks here ask for "good karma"...same deal, same situations arise in life to all people...They are just dealth with slightly different, and seen from different perspectives.

[jburton]

10. we both have internet connections

[CO Liberal]

14. We Both Breathe Oxygen

But Freepers suck.

[cally]

16. We both believe in informed citizenry

Ilike the freepers more than those who are so uninformed and say politics does not matter. I prefer folks that at least try to enter the debate.

[scarlet_owl]

17. I'm sure lots of freepers like MoonPies as much as I do.

[Padraig18]

18. I work with a freeper

He and I disagree about TONS of things, as you can well imagine, but... He's a wonderful father, a good husband and provider for his family, he mows the lawn and does all the handyman/honey-do chores for his widowed next-door neighbor, etc., and I have no doubt if I needed help of some kind, he would do his best to help me.

We're all human, and freepers are just as multi-faceted as any of us. :)

[chadm]

19. We all want the same things in life

Success, security, happiness, love. We just disagree on the status quo and how to achieve things. We speak different languages, use different mental models, and yet in the end I find we all want the same things. We are all human beings with the same needs.

[Ladyhawk]

20. The freeps I know abuse and mistreat animals.

My brother and father did when we were growing up and I imitated them. My brother's attitudes toward animals now are suspicious. He keeps saying things that make me think he's still as awful as he was when we were children.

Sick, sick stuff, man. And one of our freeper CA state senators was one of the main instigators during my childhood. Just sick.

Wanna read a true story about animal abuse freeper-style?

http://www.goldrush.com/~ladyhawklh/crossroads.doc

Excuse me while I stew...sorry, thinking about all those things makes me feel ill.