I've Had It
Fresh when it gets here from
Julie Barrett
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
This is a rant. If you don't want to see me ranting and probably use some very strong language, then you might just want to click away. If you don't mind the strong language and are tired of shouting replacing civil discourse in this country, then stick around.
The shouters have won. Mea culpa. I'm wrong. I'm an idiot. I'm an imbecilic - nay, pathetic - pustule on the nether-regions of the slug that just crawled out of the dung heap and is ready dive back in for another helping.
It must be true because I disagree with you. You know who you are. No, you're not one of my regular readers. You're someone who trolls comment threads elsewhere, hiding your identity behind a pseudonym designed to be pretentious, or confrontational, or both. You may have an idea of how far your grammar and spelling-challenged posts denigrating others drag down the discourse. If you are aware, you don't give a flying fark because in your heart, you believe you are right. And I pity you.
You are more than one person - or so I suspect. You disagree with people by conjuring up the incredibly trite, "your an idiot," then hiding behind your own idea of freedom of speech when someone calls you out. Yet, you're unafraid to call someone else out with your odd mixture of all-caps sentences, misplaced apostrophes, and misuse of quotation marks that probably drove your school teachers to drink.
You disagree with people by calling them a liberal. Or a conservative. (As I said, you are more than one person.) You probably don't worship at the altar of Rush or Olberman, But I suppose that it's okay to lob potentially libelous attacks at people as long as you disagree with them.
Well, I've had it.
I respect your right to disagree with me. There's this little thing called the First Amendment that I cherish. However, your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins.* Your personal attacks harm others. Worse, they harm the free discourse which you profess to cherish. Does my right to disagree with you end where your opinion begins? I suspect more than a few jurists in this country would disagree.
I've always said that I don't want the shouters to win. Well, you have. For now. I'm going to try very hard to take a break. I'll let someone else try to stop you from running roughshod over the principles of free speech that make this country great.
I've hit the proverbial brick wall. You win. For now.
Tags: Life
*I've heard that attributed to many people from Oliver Wendell Holmes to Ambrose Bierce.
Filed under: Life
Comments are closed
lisa said:
I raise my can of Pepsi Max to you!
(If I wasn't such a dork I would be drinking wine)
Date: 1/26/2010 5:21:27 PM
Date: 1/26/2010 5:21:27 PM
lisa said:
I raise my can of Pepsi Max to you!
(If I wasn't such a dork I would be drinking wine)
Date: 1/26/2010 5:21:27 PM
Date: 1/26/2010 5:21:27 PM
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