That'll preach

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union. ...

It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.” This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don’t have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn’t look like you might take your job; it’s that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected.

Comments

[Jeff]

John posted comments to flush out the last few words. Here is the finished undisenvowelling.

I'm not sure why the post was disenvowelled -- it sounds ANGRY (and a bit over-the-top, if John had read or listened to the speech) but no moreso than other posts that have been untouched. At least this way, anyone who wants to read it can find the original post. Perhaps Fred will link to it for future readers.

And it was a fun exercise (plus I got to "neener" at Bugmaster!).

[MercuryBlue]

mike timonin: Don't you mean dancing around the pointe?

[McJulie]

For the record:

The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional gang-rape.

Strikes me as a completely reasonable use of rape as metaphor -- to describe a vicious, aggressive, and sexually-motivated attack with the intent to humiliate and intimidate the victim. It's already qualified as "mental and emotional" so that nobody could possibly get confused as to whether she was physically attacked by anyone.

[Nenya]

Here is a site with a re-emvoweler. It works relatively well, sometimes better than others.

[practicallyevil]

Strikes me as a completely reasonable use of rape as metaphor -- to describe a vicious, aggressive, and sexually-motivated attack with the intent to humiliate and intimidate the victim. It's already qualified as "mental and emotional" so that nobody could possibly get confused as to whether she was physically attacked by anyone.

This is precisely why the word rape shouldn't be used metaphorically in internet debate, it's an emotional trigger and provokes responses that aren't wholly logical. Sorry to make an example out of you McJulie, but can you say that this argument is based on logic? It looks like your making a gut argument without thinking it out, for example even given that internet groups intent was to humiliate, and rape is humiliating, are you saying that all rape is motivated by desire to humiliate? That doesn't sound right.

I think people saw the word rape, formed a mental picture, and started making arguments based of off that with are strong emotions attached to the arguments. It's just going to turn into a firestorm of emotions. So let's drop it, and not make Fred use his moderator powers anymore today, I know he's loath to use it.

[Drak Pope]

I think this kind of rhetoric devalues the very real evils of rape, fascism, slavery, etc., and turns every discussion into meaningless white noise, with opponents shouting keywords at each other... Turns it into modern American politics, in other words. I like to avoid such rhetoric when I can.

The fact that you said that proves that you are a rapist.

it's an emotional trigger and provokes responses that aren't wholly logical

That's exactly why people like to use it. Simply saying that they were very rude and hurtful, while technically more accurate, doesn't carry the same emotional connotations as using the word 'rape'. I gather the initial statement was intended to make you feel sorry for and angry about what had happened to the woman, and if that was indeed the motivation then it makes sense to use the word rape. The minor spat that it provoked was further proof of how powerful words can be.

And, to tie it in to the actual focus of this post -- recognition of the power of certain words is exactly why Barack Obama's speeches are so much more powerful. Surely he is not the only person or even the only politician in the United States to have these same feelings, but the fact that he can express them so eloquently is one of his greatest assets.

[Painini]

It looks like your making a gut argument without thinking it out, for example even given that internet groups intent was to humiliate, and rape is humiliating, are you saying that all rape is motivated by desire to humiliate? That doesn't sound right.

And that doesn't sound like a gut argument at all, practicallyevil.

That entire argument sounds, to me, like a spin-out of 'we'd better not use phrases that will make women emotional. You know how emotional women can be.' Not saying that was intentional, mind, but it's how it reads.

[Glenda]

CowboyDiva: Thanks for the link to FreeRice. A timesuck for a good cause!

I got a high score of 52. I've done a lot of crossword puzzles in my time, and I think it helps to be good at guessing.

[Bugmaster]

Bah ! Everyone already has a re-emvoweler but me ! Bah I say ! Jeff, what kind of program did you use produce the original re-emvowelment (before the manual corrections) ? It is superior to Nenya's version, IMO (sorry, Nenya), so I wanted to know how it worked.

[Bugmaster]

The fact that you said that proves that you are a rapist.

Yeah, we already knew that, since I'm male and white, too. :-)

Anyway, I have no problem with invoking emotionally-charged metaphors and using powerful words -- when appropriate. I just think that they should be used very sparingly; otherwise, the original concepts (such as rape or fascism) end up being greatly devalued; though I do agree that it's a judgement call at times. Extremists, on the other hand, tend to insert "rape", "murder", "fascism", "slavery", etc., into every other sentence, sometimes seemingly at random.

Personally, I think that name-calling on an Internet forum, no matter how hurtful, does not qualify for the "rape" metaphor, unless you're being facetious (similarly to, "omg this dire rat is raping me lol"). Sticks and stones, and all that... But I suppose it depends on how thick-skinned you are.

[swartzer]

Hi, longtime lurker here. Having read the re-envoweled comments, I don't see how they were that much more extreme than other stuff I've seen here (and I don't just mean Sctt.) Angry and tactless, yes, but they didn't seem beyond the pale.

That said, it's Fred's blog and his choice. Disemvowelling is fairer than deletion, as well. And John didn't really help his case by shifting to the "this is an echo chamber" argument so fast. Dude, if you have to make accusations, point them at Fred; he's a grown-up and can deal with the consequences of his actions. Don't accuse the rest of us of being mindless conformists; it makes you look like a drive-by troll rather than someone who's actually read this blog enough to know that all manner of different people post here.

Speaking of which, I suppose I should get on with my main point. I'm impressed with Obama's speech, despite a few little false notes; he definitely didn't sound like your average presidential candidate. I'm not whole-hearted in my support for him, but I have no doubt he's far better than the two realistic alternatives.

Plus the man can speak! I don't just mean that he can string coherent thoughts together, which would be enough in itself to make him better than the current occupant, but he can actually make me feel proud to be an American again. I thought I'd lost that when I grew out of my fundamentalist phase, and it seemed like the last decade put the final nails in the coffin, but when I hear Obama give one of these speeches, I actually feel hopeful for this country again.

Of course after the goosebumps go away, I have to check myself, because I'm really suspicious of emotional appeals and don't like being swayed by them. Still, to be honest, I have to admit being swayed a little. It blows my mind to actually want to vote for someone, instead of against someone else. I just hope that as President, he can live up to even part of what he's promising and not get tied down by all the Lilliputians in DC.

[practicallyevil]

And that doesn't sound like a gut argument at all, practicallyevil.

That entire argument sounds, to me, like a spin-out of 'we'd better not use phrases that will make women emotional. You know how emotional women can be.' Not saying that was intentional, mind, but it's how it reads.

Is it not a logical argument to say that the word rape draws a very emotional response? Also what part is the gut argument? That McJulie was making a gut argument, or that not all rape is motivated out of a wish to humiliate the victim?

Also my argument was that the word rape was drawing emotional responses from everyone, of every gender, creed and race, not just women. I felt that Jeff's, Raka's, Jesu's, and McJulie's, members of both genders, arguments were all contaminated by the emotional connotations of rape.

Also I made a typo, it was supposed to be "This is exactly why we shouldn't use the word rape as a metaphor in this internet discussion, if something absolutely abhorrent were to occur rape may be a suitable metaphor, like for instance the Rape of Nanking. Not to minimize what happened to the victim, but there are far, far worse things that can and do happen to people, (the internet gang up part, not the rape).

[Painini]

Is it not a logical argument to say that the word rape draws a very emotional response?

It's a logical enough point, I suppose. It's not a complete argument - but the only argument I could extrapolate from it is that having an emotional response invalidates an argument.

I seriously misread you here:

are you saying that all rape is motivated by desire to humiliate? That doesn't sound right.

Somehow I parsed this as 'are you saying a desire to humiliate often drives rape?' To which I would say 'yes'. Of course, by putting the 'all' in, you make that response instantly unreasonable.

Not to minimize what happened to the victim, but there are far, far worse things that can and do happen to people, (the internet gang up part, not the rape).

So, just to minimise it in comparison to the things that are really bad. But not to minimise it at all! Except...

[practicallyevil]

It's a logical enough point, I suppose. It's not a complete argument - but the only argument I could extrapolate from it is that having an emotional response invalidates an argument.

So, just to minimise it in comparison to the things that are really bad. But not to minimise it at all!

Alright, we're done. You win. Back to Obama.

[McJulie]

Let's play Madlibs!

Please, fill in the blank with a noun:

The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional______

Cthulhu-summoning?
Tea party?
Dungeons & Dragons game?
Cricket match?
Junior High School dance?

[practicallyevil]

Let's play Madlibs!

Please, fill in the blank with a noun:

The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional______

Abuse.

I'm really good at Madlibs.

[practicallyevil]

Oh wait, noun...

I'm bad at Madlibs.

[hapax]

Please, fill in the blank with a noun:

Musical!
Of DOOM!
On Ice!
Now, With Flamethrowers!

[Drak Pope]

The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional______

What kind of weird madlib is that? Most of the ones I've seen went along the lines of:

(Proper Noun) was heading to the (location) to (verb) some (object/commodity that can be bought) for (name of relative) when all of a sudden (name of animal) showed up and (past tense verb) the (object/commodity that can be bought)!

[hapax]

Rayford
Airport
Telephone
Eternal Salvation
Chloe
Buck
Raptured
Cookie

[Bugmaster]

Wait, since when is "Abuse" not a noun ? I mean, yes, it's also a verb, but that doesn't make it any less of a noun, does it ? Are you a minion of the verb-o-archy, or something ?

[Michele]

practicallyevil: > not all rape is motivated out of a wish to humiliate the victim?

What do you think *is* the motivation of rape?

[Brel]

These words, or at least the matters and sentiments addressed by them, are ones that no American cannot afford not to hear.

This was not a happy speech. Barack Obama had to personally repudiate the statements of a close friend and mentor. Even in a private conversation, doing such a thing is difficult; certainly harder than facing any political opponent. And still more so in such a public and polarized situation as this.

And it was not a happy speech on a national level, either. Obama frankly, and with powerful words, put the problems that we as a people face, misfortunes that we have both inherited and wrought for ourselves, before our faces. He spoke of failures deeper than the tired political talking points—the failures caused by greed, by manipulation, by ignorance. Obama made it clear that addressing political matters with the intent of curing only the symptoms will never truly relieve our problems. This is the hardest of all messages for a society to acknowledge—precisely because it convicts society, and not just a group of the people within it.

Yet it was also not a grim speech. Obama reminded all of us that a great choice—and with it, a great opportunity—lies before us, if we would only take it. It is in this possibility that we can be brave enough to hope, and strive to achieve. Many of those who came before us dared to make real the ideal of improvement available in their time, and we remain indebted to them for the fruits of their efforts.

No, Barack Obama's words went beyond mere inspiration and gloom. And it precisely for this reason that the American people must heed them. Obama is a man who is courageous and magnanimous enough to dare tell society something other than what it wants to hear—and survive it. His words were not sorrowful or joyful: they were honest.

[Michele]

Part of me wonders if we would be so receptive to Obama's message if we hadn't been so divided by the Bush years.

[Brel]

I think you have a good point, Michele. The people hunger.

[J. Random Scribbler]

I may regret stepping into this particular exchange but here goes anyway.

I've not made any special scientific study of rape, but I do have a few decades of experience as a man and so I'm willing to hazard a guess that male rapists are motivated by extreme versions of common male drives. The biggest of these is the need to feel strong and powerful. Naturally, the desire for sex is another big one. Then there's the desire to get back at someone in particular or women in general, for perceived slights.

That last one is really the only one where the main point is to humiliate the victim. The rest is about the attacker wants to feel, and the victim's feelings are pretty much irrelevant. I suppose humiliating the victim might help a rapist feel strong and powerful too, but the victim's feelings are not the main point.

In the particular messageboard incident that was described as a rape, my first reaction was that calling it "rape" trivialized the word. I'm glad I decided not to post at that point, though, because after hearing the details, I changed my mind. An attack that vicious certainly could legitimately be described as mental and emotional rape. Putting on my nitpicker hat, I still twitch at "could only be described..." but that's not nearly as big a deal.

(BTW, the comment from "swartzer" above was actually me. I decided I should use "J. Random Scribbler" instead because that's what I'm known as on another forum that probably shares a few readers with this one; "swartzer" is one I use elsewhere and I typed it without thinking. I figured I'd best explain the change, considering the recent kerfuffle about scottbot, not_scottbot, etc. I'm not trying any sockpuppetry, honest! ;-} )

[Jeff]

Bug: I used the bestest and fastiest super-computer available: the human brain. Well, it was my brain, so not the bestest or fastiest, but you get the idea. Not bad, huh?

His words were not sorrowful or joyful: they were honest.

And that's why people are avoiding the substance -- no-one really wants to be honest about race and racism.

[Ian]

It seems to me that the people on the John and not-John sides of the aisle are worried about the same thing -- security. We've had a nasty little dust up here, and that's made everyone involved feel a bit less welcome in this community.

The pro-John faction is worried because disemvowelling is not the sort of thing that happens very often here. John's disemvowelled posts were unusually nasty, but the pro faction seems to be worried that any sharply worded criticism of a progressive candidate might fall under the axe. People who have found a home here don't want to be treated like trolls.

The anti-John faction has seen what can happen in unmoderated forums -- crude and vicious comments tend to drive out the good. In particular, these folks have seen that women who speak their minds in online forums are often the victims of wave after wave of blistering verbal attacks, which continue until these women give up and go elsewhere. In such cases, the spectrum of intimidation tactics used has included, at the extreme, actual threats of actual rape. The anti-John side does not want the civility that makes this community possible to be undermined.

In short, the pro-Johns (including John himself) are worried about the tyranny of the proprietor and the tyranny of the progressive majority, while the anti-Johns are worried about the tyranny of the loudest and rudest. These fears are all legitimate -- keeping a polite conversation going among strangers with diverse backgrounds is a delicate business.

Maybe the best way to stand down from DEFCON3 is to say a bit about what we think our community standards are and ought to be. This is the subsidiarity principle at work: if Fred needs to act in his capacity as our moderator, that indicates that we have failed to be moderate in the way we treat each other.

[Bugmaster]

@Ian:
I generally agree with you, but I think that community standards, other than the all-time favorite "don't be an asshat", are pretty much worthless. They are either too vague (as the aforementioned, "don't be an asshat"), or too specific (as in, "here's an exhaustive list of words, phrases, and concepts that you can't post"). What's worse, enforcing them is impossible. Polite people are going to be polite to each other anyway, and trolls don't care about any standards at all whatsoever. Additionally, official community standards tend to alienate new users the same way that mandatory registration does: they feel (often, subconsciously) that it's some sort of a trick devised for the sole purpose of wasting their time, and end deciding that posting anything simply isn't worth it.

Do I have a good solution ? No. But I don't think that official standards aren't the way to go, either.

[BillyGee]

There are no standards. Scott's banning offense was accusing Fred of "lusting after power", which is pretty damn mild as far as online abuse goes. Jesu is more obnoxious on just about every post. Thing is, as a woman and thus a member of a protected group, she can be as hostile as she wants.

John, Fred encourages flame wars, then bans non-progressives for bad behavior. Bad behavior on the other side is encouraged. The goal is to drive people who disagree with him away with him being able to say he doesn't ban people. Jesu is just doing his dirty work for him, "who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" style.

[indifferent children]

> ...or do I mean posterior motives?

Ulterior postures.

[Jesurgislac]

*reads BillyGee's comment*

*giggles a bit*

Hey, let's have a women-only Thursday Flame War! As members of a protected group, we can all be as hostile as we like. Our gender is our mithril-coat!

[Rosina]

I'm on - only I want asbestos underwear for a Flame War with Jesurgislac. And not just an unburnable bra and a thong at twilight. I mean the long-johns and nightcap.

[practicallyevil]

Wait, since when is "Abuse" not a noun ? I mean, yes, it's also a verb, but that doesn't make it any less of a noun, does it ? Are you a minion of the verb-o-archy, or something ?

It is still a noun, but it doesn't fit the sentence. That person would have to be a victim of either the concept of abuse in general, or some specific abuse in particular.

practicallyevil: > not all rape is motivated out of a wish to humiliate the victim?

What do you think *is* the motivation of rape?

I don't want to stoke the flames of the flame war any more, and I don't want to risk this being flame-bait, even if unintentionally. If I have truly offended your sensibilities I'd be happy to provide an answer via e-mail so as to not stir the pot anymore.

[Rum Sodomy & the Lash]

if Fred needs to act in his capacity as our moderator, that indicates that we have failed to be moderate in the way we treat each other.

It would help if we could avoid responding like a hive after being poked with a stick EVERY SINGLE TIME Scott made another one of this blitheringly idiotic posts. I mean, the guy would be blatantly making up random crap based on his own delusional misinterpretations of one of Clark's posts and you would have six or seven people trying to prove him wrong before Jesurgislac comes around with a link to the Tale of Woe. There is no reason to waste any time seriously debating with a troll (although I'm not saying that John is a troll). Your arguments could be perfectly rational but the troll will ignore them because the troll isn't here to argue; it's here to piss people off and derail the conversation.

[Lauren]

The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional______

Torture.

[Izzy]

"A victim of online mental and emotional abuse" actually works. You do have to take out the "an," which might be cheating at Mad Libs.

My own reaction to "rape" in not-actual-physical-rape contexts is a little wary, I think because I've seen the metaphor overused in Internet arguments ("Milk is rape!"). Whether it's justified--as in this case it seems to be--or not, my first reaction is skepticism. It feels like the person using the metaphor is trying too hard to play on my emotions, and I distrust that. When this particular situation was explained, "rape" did seem like an appropriate term, but I think it is a handle-with-care sort of thing.

Scott's banning offense was accusing Fred of "lusting after power", which is pretty damn mild as far as online abuse goes.

No, Scott's banning offense was constantly accusing Fred of making statements that Fred did not, in fact, make. Also trying to turn every conversation into "ZOMG EVIL GOVERNMENT" and complaining that the rest of us didn't use Atlas Shrugged as wank material.

Straw, camel's back, etc.

[MikhailBorg]

Y'know, when I first saw the cover of Atlas Shrugged, I assumed from the title that it was a thriller about a world-wide, synchronous increase in violent earthquakes.

Boy, got that wrong.

[Geds]

John, Fred encourages flame wars, then bans non-progressives for bad behavior. Bad behavior on the other side is encouraged.

Boy, it's a good thing that aunursa's been banned, then. Technomad, too.

Oh, wait.

The goal is to drive people who disagree with him away with him being able to say he doesn't ban people. Jesu is just doing his dirty work for him, "who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" style.

He's just trying to be Compassionate(TM)...

When it gets right down to it, Jesu has probably driven away plenty of people who would agree completely with Fred and Jesu herself except in a limited, hot button sort of way.

I'm not entirely sure where I stand on the Jhn stuff. I'm leaning toward Fred erring a bit too much on the side of caution there, but Jhn's invocation of the echo chamber and BillyGee's complete lack of understanding of the Scott ban context aren't going to swing me over to their side at any point in the near future.

Also, I just realized you could disemvowell "BillyGee" and lose absolutely nothing from the word. "BllyG" sounds exactly like "BillyGee," at least in my head. Don't know why I felt the need to point that out...

[Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little]

Haven't caught up with comments, but wanted to get to this before reading everything else made me forget: Raka, I totally see and respect your point about using "rape" as a metaphor for emotional experiences that are not rape. Definitely, "can only be described as" was uncalled for hyperbole on my part. That said, I think that there are times when violations that are not literally, physically rape may still cause an emotional experience that the victim will want to describe as being akin to rape. And that's his/her right. But as I was not the victim in this case, it wasn't my place to choose that word.

OK. Going to catch up now. Thanks for the reality check.

[Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little]

Gah. Still catching up.

OK. The incident I brought up? I really, really wasn't intending to go into the details of it beyond necessary to demonstrate how "I don't believe in censorship so I promise no moderation" will take a forum directly to hell. So I didn't review for myself the details of what exactly happened--heck, until Jesu pointed out the link, I couldn't even remember where it had gone down! What stuck in my mind as relevant was that "I promise no censorship" led directly to the a new forum member's reaction of I can't believe you just sat back and let them attack me like that, I thought you said your forum was a safe place to discuss these issues.

So, yes, the woman's experience was a lot worse than my capsule summary, and a lot worse than I had remembered. I'm sorry to have misrepresented it; I think my lack of attention to detail was in a large part to blame for the argument (about metaphorical uses of the term "rape") that resulted here.

I promise I did not intend to hijack the thread!

Recap: Obama is fckng awesome. Trolls suck. Moderation is good. Peace out.

[Lauren]

I promise I did not intend to hijack the thread! -Nicole

Thursday Flame War: U R doin it wrong.

[Jim]

The disemvowelling of John's posts have drawn much more attention to it than it, no doubt, would have otherwise received. {ZOMG, someone said something ignorant and overheated on the Internet!)

Also, when did Scott get banned? I've obviously not been keeping up. Reading his posts was as compelling as watching an auto accident. Maybe the overreaction to his trolling was too distracting?

[practicallyevil]

No, Scott's banning offense was constantly accusing Fred of making statements that Fred did not, in fact, make. Also trying to turn every conversation into "ZOMG EVIL GOVERNMENT" and complaining that the rest of us didn't use Atlas Shrugged as wank material.

Straw, camel's back, etc.

'Struth, Scotts individual post about a lust for power, not nearly bannable, but years of accusing Fred of supporting a one world government designed specifically to steal from Scott in the form of taxes, definitely cause for a ban. Johns disemvowleing was just Freds way of showing us he will use his powers as moderator to keep things in order in the future, and that a poster like Scott will not be tolerated henceforth.

[Jeff]

let's have a women-only Thursday Flame War!

[sulks]

I'll have to see if I can get my girlfriend's brother to post. He's

a) Mentally Challenged (about age 10 on most things)
b) Schizophrenic (multiople independent diagnoses)
c) Black

If that doesn't make him a member of a "protected group", I don't know what does!

==================================

BTO (Back To Obama -- although Bachman-Turner was awesome): I doubt that the speech will get the recognition it deserves; not at least for a while. There's too many hard truths: we all (black, white, whatever) share some blame in where things have come to; getting past the divide means getting past the anger that has been carefully cultivated by those who profit from it; that there are common enemies that must be acknowledged.

Can yous see the "MSM" or any group wanting to say, "He's right -- **my group** must change."?

[Ursula L]

Does anyone have a link to a transcript of Obama's speech? I've tried watching it, but his particular form of charisma has a negative effect on me, and I haven't been able to make it more than a third of the way through. So I'd like to give it a chance as text alone.

[yagowe]

Ursula: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88478467

[not someone else]

Scott's banning offense was accusing Fred of "lusting after power", which is pretty damn mild as far as online abuse goes.

From Fred's post, I thought the banning offense was that he stopped contributing anything to any portion of the blog, rather than joining in on Fridays and griping about LB with everyone else while arguing endlessly about perceived hypocrisy in other posts.

That being why it took several years of pretty much that statement to get him banned.

I don't like the disemvowelling either, but man, does it occur to you that effective oppression usually takes a hell of a lot more effort than Fred's displayed? If you're worried about "surviving" flamewars, either stop failing to convince people or stop trying.

[Jeff]

In terms of censorship, disenvowelling is pretty weak. Even disenconstanent is worse: "aa oaa a e uee o e eee o ae". Try making sense of THAT!

[MikhailBorg]

That's more of a vowel movement.