| Subject: Mercedes, I understand that that is your OPINION. But to quote: |
Author:
obitchecker
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Date Posted: Sun, March 15, 2009 5:51:21
In reply to:
Mercedes
's message, "Okay, now I get it, Obitchecker. But do you understand me?" on Sun, March 15, 2009 10:23:08
"I don't like people pushing and shoving their views in my face--basically telling me I MUST agree with them--or I am against them."
Tell me about it. I have received this attitude from my very far left brother and sister now for going on 30 YEARS. And just like your father, our father was a Republican (though he frequently supported Democrats too). Believe me, I get this attitude from the far left just as much as from the far right. It is their opinion. Just like yours is your opinion. Forgive me, Mercedes, but you seem a bit upset that I am just pointing out to you that your opinion is just that....opinion, and not the one and only TRUTH. You did read my last post in the thread below, correct?
My sister and brother both stated their wish on several occasions that Reagan be assassinated. Going further back, they also said that about Nixon. (At that time, I even joined in). My brother, at least, said the same about both Bushes and others. Though I think they particularly disdain Joe Lieberman now.
Perhaps the most glaring example of the twisted reasoning I've dealt with over the years:
I don't know if you remember when all the boat people came over here from Cuba in 1980. Well, several years later, some of the boat people (a small minority, I stress) had committed crimes and were in American prisons. There was a proposal to send these prisoners back to Cuba. When they heard about this, the prisoners rioted in protest!
Now, what did my brother say about this? That, obviously, these people preferred life in American prison to life in Cuba? No. He said that these prisoners were rioting because they had been brainwashed so by Ronald Reagan in the few years since they had come over on the boats! That's right, all their life in Cuba, and voila, all it took was a few years in Reagan's America to totally brainwash them, but my brother, of course, is too smart to be brainwashed, unlike those stupid people who actually lived in Cuba.
Anyway, this is just an example of what I've been hearing over the past 25, 30+ years.
Don't get me wrong. I love my brother and sister dearly. I love talking to them about many things. But I cannot openly take a strong disagreement with them on any topic related to politics, because the self-righteousness pours out and they seem to regard any disagreement as somehow a betrayal. So I just don't say too much. My brother just refuses to believe that there is a legitimate opinion on political issues other than his own, and my sister is almost as bad. (When Indira Gandhi was assassinated, she whispered to me, so that my parents couldn't hear, "I see there was an assassination! Too bad it was the wrong one, huh?", meaning Reagan).
Again, I love my brother and sister, but I tell you in sincerity: I am absolutely convinced that if someone who thinks like them politically came to power, we would lose freedom of speech and become a dictatorship, and many people would be killed, and I don't mean just from war, I mean on direct orders from the government. I have seen how this kind of polarized thinking, in which the zeal of religion at its worst is transferred to politics, corrupts the minds of people. I see it happening on this board too, and though I know you all say you respect freedom of speech, just see what happens in a generation if such attitudes continue. Why will they feel any need to grant freedom of speech if they just "know" that everything the other side says is "all lies"? Then, they are sooner or later to conclude, it becomes like granting free speech to the guy who screams "Fire" in a crowded theater when there is no fire.
We are all fallible. We do not know everything. We could all be wrong about some things. Respecting that is the beginning of respecting free speech.
I will be glad to elaborate more, and relate more about my reasons for getting into all this, sometime later.
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