Anti-war movement a caricature of itself

[kickabuck]

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Any evidence supporting either of your claims?

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Many years of direct personal experience. I'd name specific names and post photos, but that would not be appropriate to this forum, so I guess you'll either believe me or you won't. I'll live either way.

However, just to illustrate the point, let me give you one generic example. Since you cited a Democratic Underground thread previously, I'm sure you're familiar with the situation of right-wing trolls from sites like FreeRepublic.com who register for that site and then pose as "leftists" in order to post outlandish conspiracy theories to the site. They then use those same posts to try to attack the site as a haven for wackos. (One recent example was the user who posted under the name "seventhson", who spent every day for two years monkeywrenching that site on behalf of FreeRepublic.com. There are plenty of others, but I think the point is made. This tactic is well-established and well-known, and its practitioners border on the obsessive. Users at various right-wing websites actually brag about doing this stuff on a daily basis, so if you want an exhaustive list of examples I suppose the easiest way to get them is straight from the horse's mouth. Of course, since you clearly follow these right-wing websites, I find it impossible to believe that you're not already aware of this practice in pretty good detail, so, again, that brings us right back to the problem of your fundamental dishonesty.)

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Your assertion that Riddick lacks integrity smacks of zealotry or willful ignorance or one who 'protests too much'. Starting to make me wonder how much influence at these protests the fringe groups have. More than you're letting on? He has not made any grandiose claims of complete infiltration of the pacifist movement by fringe elements, yet you persist in castigating his integrity. Your responses to assertions of leftist influence at various sites and functions are 'it's all a right wing conspiracy'. Doesn't fly.

[QuadsOverQuads]

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Any evidence supporting either of your claims?


[/ QUOTE ]Many years of direct personal experience. I'd name specific names and post photos, but that would not be appropriate to this forum, so I guess you'll either believe me or you won't. I'll live either way.

However, just to illustrate the point, let me give you one generic example. Since you cited a Democratic Underground thread previously, I'm sure you're familiar with the situation of right-wing trolls from sites like FreeRepublic.com who register for that site and then pose as "leftists" in order to post outlandish conspiracy theories to the site. They then use those same posts to try to attack the site as a haven for wackos. (One recent example was the user who posted under the name "seventhson", who spent every day for two years monkeywrenching that site on behalf of FreeRepublic.com. There are plenty of others, but I think the point is made. This tactic is well-established and well-known, and its practitioners border on the obsessive. Users at various right-wing websites actually brag about doing this stuff on a daily basis, so if you want an exhaustive list of examples I suppose the easiest way to get them is straight from the horse's mouth. Of course, since you clearly follow these right-wing websites, I find it impossible to believe that you're not already aware of this practice in pretty good detail, so, again, that brings us right back to the problem of your fundamental dishonesty.)



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So its far too much for you to post simple evidence to back up your wild conspiracy theory claims,

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(edited to re-insert the part that you edited out)

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but after posting exhaustive, irrefutable evidence to back up my simple claim, I'm clearly the one who is fundamentally dishonest.

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You posted cut-and-paste right-wing talking points, backed by cut-and-paste photos from right-wing websites. Moreover, anyone with an ounce of experience in any antiwar event recognizes your mischaracterizations as not just "non-representative" but wildly so.

I note also that you didn't even bother to deny ANYTHING I said about right-wingers posing as "left wing radicals" in order to harass and disrupt progressive websites and events.

And if you're familiar with Free Republic vs. Democratic Underground, then you're VERY familiar with this practice, because it happens all the time there.

So basically what we're left with is the usual blather from you : everyone who disagrees with you has been a victim of "communist influences", and then you won't deign to address the DOCUMENTED FACT of right-wing harassment, vandalism and infiltration by sites like Free Republic.

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You make me sick. You're going on ignore.

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That will also be a lie. But hope springs eternal.


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[kickabuck]

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Wait a minute. ANSWER organizes many anti-war rallies yet you characterize them as a very small fraction of the anti-war movement. Perhaps it is you who are being disingenuous for although true they represent a small fraction of those who oppose the war, they seem to be quite representative of those who fervently oppose the war, after all they are ORGANIZING the rallies Quads.

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This thread seems a little odd but... the people organizing a rally does not have to be representative of the people attending.

A group of 50 people people can organize a rally attended by 1000's. The organizing group can have many different agendas and goals then the people who show up specificially for that rally.

For instance: Let's say there is a socialist group of 100 people that oppose the war. And there are another 500,000 people unrelated to the socialist group who also oppose the war. They all come together at a war rally organized by the socialist group. Only an idiot would say that the 500,100 people are all socialists.

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Well let's suppose the Patriotic People's Party(it is a front for the Ku Klux Klan, no one would come if they said it was the Klan) has excellent organizational skills and decides they are going to organize a pro-war rally. They feel the more dead Muslims the merrier. Now they organize the event and some of their sympathizers come as well. Lots of freedom loving Americans come to support the troops and the stated goals of the war in Iraq. Do you not feel it appropriate to scrutinize the organizers and the goal of the organizers and what is being said by the speakers and the literature being handed out?

You cannot completely separate the rally from the organizers. They have an agenda and will of course attempt to advocate that agenda(why would they not?), and what better way than under the cloak of anti Iraq war sympathy in the case of ANSWER.

[QuadsOverQuads]

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Your responses to assertions of leftist influence at various sites and functions are 'it's all a right wing conspiracy'.

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You are deliberately using the word "leftist" as a synonym for "communist"/"Stalinist"/"violent anarchist". These words do not mean the same thing, and engaging in this sort of semantic sleight-of-hand won't change that, no matter how badly you want it to.

Accusing me of harboring sinister motives won't change that reality for you either.

I encourage you to get out from in front of the TV, turn off your AM radio, and actually take the time to meet and talk to some of the people who disagree with you. Next time you see people gathering to oppose the war, take a few minutes and go down and just talk to them. Don't attack. Don't scream. Don't try and bully them into submission. Just listen and consider.

You'll probably project sinister motives onto them, too, I'm sure. But if you actually are capable of seeing past your own biases, you might actually learn that your fellow Americans aren't all Communist agents. Some of us actually care about this country, and we are sickened watching what the nutcases in power are doing to our nation, and the young men and women who are paying for this idiocy with their bodies and lives.

This isn't a rah-rah section for a football game, where it's all about whose "team" wins. Real people are being killed. Right now. Someone's kid is going to come home in a body bag tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that.

And that's the reality that the right-wing absolutely doesn't want to talk about.

So, let's talk about whether Jane down the street is secretly a communist agent. Sure, why not, let's do that. I mean, it's either that, or you'll have to talk about 2500 dead bodies, and all that blood on your hands. And we know you don't want to talk about that.


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[kickabuck]

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Your responses to assertions of leftist influence at various sites and functions are 'it's all a right wing conspiracy'.

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You are deliberately using the word "leftist" as a synonym for "communist"/"Stalinist"/"violent anarchist". These words do not mean the same thing, and engaging in this sort of semantic sleight-of-hand won't change that, no matter how badly you want it to.

Accusing me of harboring sinister motives won't change that reality for you either.

I encourage you to get out from in front of the TV, turn off your AM radio, and actually take the time to meet and talk to some of the people who disagree with you. Next time you see people gathering to oppose the war, take a few minutes and go down and just talk to them. Don't attack. Don't scream. Don't try and bully them into submission. Just listen and consider.

You'll probably project sinister motives onto them, too, I'm sure. But if you actually are capable of seeing past your own biases, you might actually learn that your fellow Americans aren't all Communist agents. Some of us actually care about this country, and we are sickened watching what the nutcases in power are doing to our nation, and the young men and women who are paying for this idiocy with their bodies and lives.

This isn't a rah-rah section for a football game, where it's all about whose "team" wins. Real people are being killed. Right now. Someone's kid is going to come home in a body bag tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that.

And that's the reality that the right-wing absolutely doesn't want to talk about.

So, let's talk about whether Jane down the street is secretly a communist agent. Sure, why not, let's do that. I mean, it's either that, or you'll have to talk about 2500 dead bodies, and all that blood on your hands. And we know you don't want to talk about that.


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Actually having read my post later I regreted using 'leftist' instead of far left. It was not purposeful.

You are obviously passionate in your anti-war stance. There are excellent reasons to oppose this war, and to be passionate in doing so. However to recklessly impugn the character of those who differ(and in Riddick's case he actually stated he is indifferent, I will take him at his word) for principled reasons of their own does your cause a disservice. Of course you have the true faith and judging from your posts can not concieve of how one who questions the motivations of aspects of the pacifist movement could be anything other than a heathen. Nevertheless one who asserts something unpalatable to you is not automatically an unscrupulous person, and saying they lack character so matter of factly actually puts you in a bad light. I have no horse in this game and that is my observation.

I had not thought much about the makeup of demonstrations since the nuclear freeze movement. Riddick's posts made me think again, and your personal attack of his character made me more interested. Why the vitriol? Either there is something to his assertions or Quads lets his passions get the best of him.

You are mistaken when you label the right as being for this war and not wanting to talk about body bags. This is a neo-con war not necessarily one advocated by true conservatives. I myself am happy to discuss the merits of the conflict and the motivations of those who got us into the conflict, Riddicks posts were about the far left movement and their influence at the demonstrations. I am interested and your idea of seeing for myself is a good one. I think I will.

[QuadsOverQuads]

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Actually having read my post later I regreted using 'leftist' instead of far left. It was not purposeful.

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I personally wouldn't call any of these fringe groups "far left" either, but I suspect that's a matter we won't agree on anytime soon. At minimum, I appreciate you recognizing that there is a substantial distinction here between these groups and your average American progressive.

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You are obviously passionate in your anti-war stance.

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I just think it's a horrible, horrible waste, and lots of innocent people are suffering because a bunch of Fox News addicts want to pump their fists in the air and scream at the hippies in their heads. It's just sick, sad, tragic.

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There are excellent reasons to oppose this war, and to be passionate in doing so.

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Agreed. And reasonable people can actually discuss such things reasonably. My major problem with Riddick and his crew, however, is not that they are passionate, it is that they are unreasonable, intellectually lazy and severely dishonest.

I don't throw those terms around lightly.

Nor do I suggest that anyone who sees things differently from me is dishonest. But these specific posters are dishonest, and the cut-and-paste spam that they're posting here is dishonest.

They're clearly aware of that, too. To get to the misrepresentations that they post, they first have to sift through a mountain of pictures and references that aren't unrepresentative, in order to cherry-pick the few images and crazed right-wing authors that tell them what they want to hear. To question the honesty of people who do this is not random or wanton, it is a necessary element of honest debate. To treat the dishonest man on the same footing as the honest man is, conversely, to demean the standing of those who have taken the time to actually get their facts straight and who have shown proper attention to accuracy and context. It is to place the liar on the same plane as the truthteller. It is, to put it more bluntly, unreasonable and irrational.

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However to recklessly impugn the character of those who differ(and in Riddick's case he actually stated he is indifferent, I will take him at his word) for principled reasons of their own does your cause a disservice.

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For reasons stated already, I do not take him at his word because I do not believe his word to be meaningful. His citations never stand up to scrutiny, and his attempts at reasoning are always paper-thin and hollow.

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Of course you have the true faith and judging from your posts can not concieve of how one who questions the motivations of aspects of the pacifist movement could be anything other than a heathen.

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First off: I've never claimed to be a pacifist, and I believe there are plenty of things worth fighting for.

Secondly: I can respect reasoned and honest disagreement. But I do not respect dishonest, bad faith arguments, nor do I respect people to try to misrepresent the facts in order to falsely sway people to their position.

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Nevertheless one who asserts something unpalatable to you is not automatically an unscrupulous person, and saying they lack character so matter of factly actually puts you in a bad light. I have no horse in this game and that is my observation.

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I'm sorry if I came off that way, but ... well, no, I'm really not that sorry. My criticisms at Riddick and the "ACers" have been pretty specific to them, and most readers should be clear on that from what I've posted. vulturesrow and I have had plenty of respectful dialog in the past, and although I disagree with him on many things (most quite strongly), I don't see him bending logic and facts anywhere close to what the real wingnuts here do -- and these few posters do it simply as a matter of course.

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I had not thought much about the makeup of demonstrations since the nuclear freeze movement. Riddick's posts made me think again, and your personal attack of his character made me more interested.

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Read our past exchanges and you'll get a better sense of the context here. But either way, I will simply say that it's not a "personal attack of his character" when what I'm saying is demonstrably true.

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Why the vitriol? Either there is something to his assertions or Quads lets his passions get the best of him.

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You left out the third option: that I actually despise the way the dishonesty of these people is poisoning the public dialog on these matters. I think it is a public service to call them out for what they are, and I think it aids the public discourse to call a spade a spade.

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You are mistaken when you label the right as being for this war and not wanting to talk about body bags.

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Sorry, but that's simply not true.

There are some people who would [/i]call[/i] themselves "right wing" yet who still oppose the Iraq war (these are paleoconservatives with an isolationist streak, mostly), but they are FAR in the minority when it comes to the right wing.

Like it or not, Bush and his policies are owned and operated by the right wing. You forced it on us, you own it, and now you're stuck with it.

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This is a neo-con war not necessarily one advocated by true conservatives. I myself am happy to discuss the merits of the conflict and the motivations of those who got us into the conflict, Riddicks posts were about the far left movement and their influence at the demonstrations. I am interested and your idea of seeing for myself is a good one. I think I will.

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I'm glad to hear that. I hope you take what I said to heart and consider that just because someone waves a red flag that doesn't mean that they're really who they say they are. Look for the cameras they're following, and the truck they drove up in with the big "W" sticker on it. Ask them some basic questions about Marxist economics (hint: if they don't know what's in chapter 1 of "Das Kapital", they're not real Marxists). Look at their haircuts and their clothes (hint: if they're wearing $200 sneakers, they're not actual "anarchist street kids"). Keep your eyes and ears open and you'll learn a lot.

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to respond thoughtfully. It's becoming increasingly rare in this world of cut-and-paste political spam.

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