StrangeSox

Making it a headache to get to work and being ineffective does not warrant being pepper-sprayed for exercising their first-amendment rights. A majority of them do not have "one goal" to f*** with people/destroy things. At some protests sometimes, a very small minority get violent or destructive, and sometimes it's agent provocateurs (the police themselves). Since at least Seattle, all leftist protests are met with heavy police presence and crowd dispersal weapons (pepper spray and rubber bullets, typically) are usually deployed regardless of provocation. I am not painting them as hippies holding hands but as American citizens exercising their right to protest. If you wish to remain willfully ignorant of unwarranted use of pepper spray by police against protesters, that is your prerogative. I gave you two very recent, very clear-cut examples.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 04:58 PM) Part of it is to hide their identity too, so they can't come after them later (See, Vancouver riots). There are many reasons for anonymity. Avoiding retaliation is one of them; retaliation is not necessarily justified. I suggest you revisit King's letter that I recently posted, the UC Davis pepper-spray incident I recently posted the findings on in the OWS thread, the acts of the NYPD lieutenant early on in OWS and the history of police response to leftist protests in general. That they anticipate it possibly being used does not mean they know they're about to do something that actually warrants its use. Merely being a large crowd is often enough to "warrant" the use of pepper spray at protests.

That's exactly right.

I don't think you understand why they wear those scarfs. But why does anonymity piss you off?

QUOTE (Cknolls @ May 14, 2012 -> 08:27 PM) Yeah shocking coming from the resident liberal at AEI. Are these guys a bunch of lyin' libs, too?

Oh and I know people will be shocked to find this out, but O'Keefe's latest undercover bust is hilarious dumb. The nefarious "non-citizen" voters he captured voting are, in actuality, naturalized citizens. Sadly, O'Keefe's expose will likely remain in the conservative blogosphere psyche as evidence of voter fraud and the necessity of strict Voter ID laws.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ May 14, 2012 -> 03:18 PM) Walker is blaming poor jobs numbers on the Democrats and their dastardly recall scaring off the confidence fairy: Walker's decided that he doesn't like the poor jobs numbers, so he's publishing his own.

I'm not sure how big of a buyer they were, but GM announced they wouldn't be advertising with FB any longer.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ May 16, 2012 -> 01:30 PM) Isnt contact with an umpire an automatic 5 game suspension or something? Yeah, I'm sure he'll be sitting for a while, and should be. But enough of this "old school" umps with huge ego crap who don't want players to 'show them up' by assuming a pitch a foot off the plate is a ball and then making a vindictive call against them on the next pitch.

That's terrible. It's much more important to be extremely strict on procedural rules than to understand the spirit of the rules, I suppose. Hopefully she's handling it like Galarraga did when he got screwed, with grace and confidence knowing what she accomplished, regardless of what the record books say.

The nuclear engineers didn't screw up at Fukishima, it was the mechanical, civil and electrical engineers.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 11:16 AM) If we stop pretending their isn't a strong overlap between the left that pushes this, and intolerance of religion. There's not a huge amount of anti-religious people in this country, but yeah there's going to be an overlap with people who are fighting religious-based bigotry and people who end up with a pretty unfavorable view of religion. But that's still not equivalent to wanting to deny religious people their rights, which is what opposing LGBT rights does for another group.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 11:18 AM) Wait a minute. 40-50% of the country thinks homosexuality is wrong. Are you suggesting that the vast majority of those people would be accepting of a father beating his child over it? No, but by supporting all of the behavior to the left of that sign, they are helping to legitimize it. You're perpetuating second-class citizen status.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 11:18 AM) Ha, ok fine. But even the inclusion of "rights" doesn't change my point. If I don't act on that and I just think it i'm not perpetuating malice behavior. If you oppose LGBT rights you are perpetuating discriminatory behavior against that group. Discrimination is malice, and by opposing LGBT rights, you are helping to legitimize actions you might not personally take. But you two both seem pretty hung up strictly on the physical violence aspect. You're missing a whole lot by focusing in on that, including what most of the signs say.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 11:13 AM) But the message in the image is that if I think that homosexuality is wrong I must be accepting of violent or disrespectful behavior, How is that not directed at me? I suggest you re-read that image.

And let's stop pretending that there isn't a strong overlap between "oppose LGBT rights" and "would act with malice towards LGBT people, especially if it was their child"

See that's not a workable equivalent because I 100% support religious freedom and religious rights and would be against efforts to legally restrict them. Whereas if you oppose LGBT rights, you are preventing equal treatment under the law. You are promoting discrimination. You are legitimizing these sorts of actions.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 11:01 AM) Categorizing all people as supporting all of those items if they don't agree with you. Opposing LGBT rights leads to those things because LGBT people remain second-class citizens who it is ok to discriminate against. It is de facto support.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:56 AM) I don't think by telling those people that believing they way they do means they accept violence or whatever is the best way to go about that. Because, frankly, that's just not true, hence the masturbation joke. You're trying to shame those people for what they think by placing the blame on them for what other more extreme people think (or do). It's perfectly logical and acceptable for me to think homosexuality is wrong, that it's a sin, but that in this world we live in, in this society we live in, it's not my place to deny that person the right to be married or visit their partner in the hospital or whatever. Having that belief doesn't fuel hatred or violence anymore than me not liking Cubs fans fuels hatred or violence by moronic Sox fans over two weekends of the year. So, since you don't oppose LGBT rights, the image isn't directed at you. Why take offense? I do object to your phrasing that implies you don't think it's right to deny them their rights because of the society we live in. It's not right to deny people their rights regardless of the society you live in.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:54 AM) It is if you use hate and intolerance to do it. What is hateful or intolerant about the image I posted?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:53 AM) Hate begets hate, in all forms. This is just some silly solipsism to provide cover for the continued existence of bigotry. Showing society what opposing LGBT rights really means is an effective way to marginalize these beliefs

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:47 AM) This just offers more hateful ideology. It isn't hateful or intolerant to oppose and work to eliminate hatred and intolerance.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:22 AM) Fighting stereotypes with more stereotypes isn't going to change anything. There are consequences for this both ways. Actions like this don't bridge any gaps, instead only reinforcing them. Actions like what? Posting an image on a message board in a forum a handful of people frequent? I'm not sure how many gaps were bridged during the 60's civil rights fight vs. shaming bigots into the margins. This picture is humorous: but it sort of masks an important issue, which is that those people who look really stupid 40 years on generally didn't repudiate their beliefs, they just stopped being vocal about their racism as society changed around them and younger generations grew up without having it embedded so much in the culture.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:45 AM) But you're equating "everyone who thinks LGBT people are living in sin/wrong" with "everyone who thinks LGBT people shouldn't be given equal rights." One does not necessarily lead to the other. How so? The pic you responded to with kitten masturbation jokes specifically says "against LGBT rights."

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ May 16, 2012 -> 10:39 AM) Yes. I'm all about equal rights here, but that includes a persons right to think homosexuality is wrong and a sin and whatever follows from that. I don't think having that viewpoint means that you accept fear/violence/suicide as acceptable reactions to that belief. Equal rights and free speech aren't the same thing, but I agree 100% that people have the right to be homophobic, just as they have the right to be antisemitic or racist or any other sort of bigot. That doesn't mean you can't work to change those mindsets and eliminate hateful ideology, though. These are still the real consequences of opposing LGBT rights regardless of one's personal approval of these consequences.