I engaged in lively debate with someone. But I committed the cardinal Sunday morning sin: I persisted in my dissent from the orthodoxy according to one of this thread’s stalwarts.
My opponent clearly elicited reinforcements to gang up on me by labeling his replies “Cedric; All”. I called him on it. I hit a nerve.
Now, to the larger issue. With all due respect, this thread is run like a high school clique. It’s like an echo chamber each week. And you are cold, intolerant and dismissive to “outsiders”.
I lurked for several years and was astonished at the level of intellectual in breeding and self congratulations {with “awards” given weekly to the same small handful of participants} while dissenters were slighted or, worse yet, attacked. The holier and more pure than Thou definitions of who is acceptably “conservative” I found truly stifling.
You seem to be proud of this thread. I am embarrassed by it. On the one hand you demand civility and decorum from others, yet I, for one, have been rhetorically assaulted on this thread to a degree I’ve encountered on no other.
And you take yourselves way too seriously.
So, I decided to have a little fun with you. And you took the bait.
Don’t bother telling me that I’m the only reprobate on this thread. I would retort by citing a thread, just last night, on which one of your “regulars’ viciously accosted a fellow FReeper {complete with name calling and slurs} over what was a simple difference in point of view. Then we’d be engaged in a meaningless spitting contest.
Perhaps you'd like to banish me into outer darkness, but as a Bible believing, Pro-life, Born Again Christian, Constitutionalist, I belong here. {Although I wonder if I'd get any more grief over at the DU or Huffington Post.}
Finally, if you don’t render unto me the respect and admiration I so richly deserve, in time I will feel compelled to leave this weekly gathering of august FReepers and never return. Then you’ll all be sorry! You've been warned!