How they do foam at the mouth!
A rightwing Web site discovered one of my essays, "We Are the Nazi Hordes", and they're ranting about it here.
They have a lot of time on their hands. I guess preschool isn't in session.
Update: One of them linked directly to this blog, which explains the troll comment. (And thanks, Daniel, for the excellent reply.)
If that essay made their little potty mouths foam so much, I wish they'd all buy and read my novel Business Secrets from the Stars. That would make their little fascist heads just exploooode! And make me some money, in the process.
I've also received a couple of e-mails from that direction today. One of them wished that my family and I would be attacked by Islamic extemists, so that maybe I'd realize blah blah blah. Oh, those wacky kids!
17 comments:
Haven't we been through this once before? Ah, but this is an entirely different set of nutjobs. Over six million of them, if you're to believe their hit-counter (and they don't seem the type to lie...)
Gee .... so when do we "nazis" start putting folks like you in prison camps?
Isn't that what Nazis are supposed to do to dissenters?
Gee .... so when do we "nazis" start putting folks like you in prison camps?
Isn't that what Nazis are supposed to do to dissenters?
Yes, kristopher, that is exactly what people like you want to do. And will do, if we're ever foolish enough to give you the power. Fortunately, America isn't Germany; we have enough of a tradition of self-government and the rule of law that it's taking longer for you and your kind to dismantle our traditional freedoms than it did Hitler and his gang in the fragile democracy of the Weimar republic. But evil is patient, and a good learner.
No dictatorship has ever sprung into being fully formed. France did not go immediately fall from liberte, egalite, fraternite into the Reign of Terror. Russia took years to traverse the road from the idealism of the Provisional Government to the grinding horror of the gulag. Germany did not start building death camps in 1933.
And all the while, millions of patriotic, well-meaning, normally sensible Frenchmen and Russians and Germans were saying, "Calm down ... things are different here ... it won't get that bad ..."
Until, you know, it did.
Well, I suppose that, on a positive note, as long as your essays are still up and running on the internet, we can say that Democracy and Freedom of Speech are still firmly in place.
"And will do, if we're ever foolish enough to give you the power. "
I thought that was the point of your essay that the evil Bushnazicorporatewarmachine.com was in charge of everything. Stealing the election, killing Elvis, etc.
Come on, a little consistency here.
Either the evil bushhitlerrepublicandemocracykillers are real and in charge or they aren't.
Note: I'm Daniel, my father is David. We share most of the same political opinions (I'm more libertarian than he is, but it's a difference of degree, not kind) but we're not the same person.
Anyway, saintknowitall (what a startlingly appropriate screen name!) maybe you didn't read the rest of my post? (Which wouldn't be surprising, seeing as right-wingers generally can't stand to read anything they disagree with. Or much at all, for that matter.) The Bush junta has seized power, yes. But they're not fully "in charge," any more than, say, Robespierre was in 1792, or Lenin in 1920, or Hitler in 1934. And it's taking longer, because this is America, for which we all -- even you! -- should be profoundly grateful. As I wrote on Slashdot a little while ago, in a similar discussion:
America has come close to the brink before -- we very nearly made the monarchist mistake after the Revolution, the savage-suppression mistake after the Civil War, and either the fascist mistake or the communist mistake (or both at once; imagine the Spanish Civil War writ large ...) during the Depression -- and every time we've pulled back. I'd like to think we can do the same this time around.
But there are no guarantees. None. We are not the City on the Hill, specially chosen by God to be a beacon of liberty unto the world. We're just a country, worse than some, better than most, which has been profoundly lucky for 200+ years. It is this very luck which allows naivete such as yours to flourish. Pray you never have to live through events which would teach you how very naive you are.
Chris, yes, we have been through this before. It happens occasionally, when a group of those jerks discovers something I've written and goes into mouth-frothing mode.
Fortunately, their attention spans are short.
Daniel, thanks for upholding the family honor so capably once again.
anonymous,
The problem is that, while those freedoms are still in place, they're no longer in place all that firmly, and the forces of darkness are working hard to eliminate them. In short, what Daniel said in his two posts.
That's why it's so important not to shrug one's shoulders and ignore it all. Whether putting essays up on one's Web site really constitutes fighting against evil is another matter. It feels better than doing nothing, but I have no idea if it really amounts to doing something.
David,
You are, of course correct. But I have to also agree with Daniel's well-written comments about how our country has faced such moments of crisis in the past, and survived.
I have been around long enough to know that, in almost every presidency, there are some people willing to say things about the sitting administration that are, well, asinine, to say the least. It was certainly unecessary to label Bill Clinton a traitor because he got a blow job in the White House, nor does it help to note his much ballyhooed "corruptions." It certainly did not help the dialogue. Just as suggesting that we are a nation of "Nazis" does not help the dialogue about our country's current problems.
In other words, the pendulum is still in motion.
You have every right to say what you wish, of course, and you have every right to use whatever level of rhetoric (as ludicrous as I may consider it) you wish. But if you do not or cannot have confidence in the President, then at least have confidence in the system. In a few years, there will be an entirely new administration for us to weep about and gnash our teeth about and praise to the heavens and damn to the lowest hells and write nasty and wonderful things about. And then we will do it again in a few more years.
Democracy: The worst form of government, except for all the others.
anonymous,
In fact, Daniel and I have had that discussion occasionally over the years. He tends to be much more optimistic than I am about the underlying strength of the American system and its ability to outlast and overcome dangerous administrations.
Partly, the difference between us on that question is due to his having a much deeper and broader knowledge of American history than I do. But partly, I think, it's due to his having been born and grown up here, whereas I spent an important part of my youth in Apartheid-era South Africa, where I watched people displaying justifiable fear of their own government. That was a police state with much that was fascist in its makeup. I feel that I see too much of the same in the current American government -- not the same in degree, but the same in kind -- and I also see citizens giving way in fear in the same way.
Whenever we have that argument, I hope that I'm wrong. But I stand by what I said in that essay, and I certainly don't think it goes too far or throws around the Nazi accusation carelessly.
From inside his lonely prison cell, having been silenced once again for his well-informed and meaningful political dissent, Henry David Thoreau might well have said to the voices of unrelenting conformity that admonished him from beyond the framework of his imprisonment:
"I'm not so concerned about you not being imprisoned inside this tiny cell with me as I am concerned with you being imprisoned inside a cell of self-imposed prudishness. A prurient keep that would bind your eyes and still your soul unto the pain and suffering of those on this Earth born to live and love and enjoy the fruits of community as deservedly as yourselves.'
'To any of you who consider yourselves superordinate, I challenge that your lack of self-love is what fuels your rage and compels you to a higher station.'
'And it disheartens me profoundly that many of you will never experience the simple joy of respecting and loving your fellowman, regardless of his or her circumstance -- to never disdain the iniquities forged upon them by the relentless insufficiencies of self-righteousness.'
'Give me my prison cell of steel and sorrow. But spare me the audacities of impudence -- for tomorrow I love the downtrodden even more than today. And I am forever steeled in the knowledge that they love me evermore in return.'"
Thoreau? Thoreau?
I dunno. That sounds French, to me. What was he, some kind of cheese-eating surrender monkey commie liberal, or somethin'?
Hey, didn't he oppose the Glorious War against Mexico? Well, there ya go! Just another one of those anti-war types. Just another wimp.
Bet he didn't even know how to swagger, like a real man. Not like the real man in the White House! There's a guy who spends his free time clearing brush! Betcha that Thoreau guy couldn't even cut down a tree to save his -- Um, well never mind that part.
To free the weak by overpowering the strong is to manipulate the same marionette on precisely the same stage of conquest.
To empower the weak by enlightening the strong is to give bone, breath and sinew to the puppets of despair by awakening the puppeteers of dominion to antecedent responsibilities toward sufficient dignity for all.
Wow...I'm an English teacher accustomed to wading through freshaman essay, and even I didn't understand that.
To anonymous:
Perhaps this is more understandable.
"Same poop, different scoop!"
The Dogs of War
But partly, I think, it's due to his having been born and grown up here, whereas I spent an important part of my youth in Apartheid-era South Africa, where I watched people displaying justifiable fear of their own government.
True enough; I suppose I shouldn't criticize others' ignorance without acknowledging my own. I've seen the effects of tyranny in a few cases, and studied plenty more -- but I haven't lived with it, and that's a unique perspective. Not that this is experience I regret not having!
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