Posted on 09/24/2001 3:10:00 AM PDT by Ada Coddington
Unfree Republic
by Jeff Elkins
Let the stench of Middle East flesh reach Paradise reassuring them that these filth have gone to hell permanently."
The quote above is representative of many posted on the FreeRepublic.com site in the wake of the WTC attack, and unfortunately its like is not uncommon elsewhere. Americans are angry, predictably and rightly so, but just as predictable are the side effects. As always, that righteous anger will be accepted as a beloved gift by the state and molded into tools of oppression.
It’s funny how that works. Every single state-sponsored war the US has become embroiled in has resulted in an inexorable increase in the power of the state.
It’s also funny that it’s always assumed that human behavior in the past has no relation to how we behave today. Why those people were old-fashioned, we’re modern, educated, etc.
The beginning of this repeating pattern has already become public with the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security. It has an ominous sound, that name, almost Germanic. (I can’t wait to see the uniforms.)
On April 13, 1917, days after our entry into World War One, President Wilson created the Committee on Public Information to promote the war domestically while publicizing American war aims abroad. Bush has replicated that step, with this new cabinet-level department.
Under the leadership of journalistic muckraker George Creel, the CPI was a propaganda apparatus unparalleled at that point in world history. The CPI functioned as a de facto public censor, vetting nearly all published material about the war and helping to draft legislation such as the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918. In the months prior to our entry into the war and especially after our entry when they were nearly criminal, antiwar viewpoints were rarely heard.
The same pattern emerges now: Penn. Gov. Tom Ridge will be President Bush’s George Creel, and just as in those dim days of yesteryear, he’ll have plenty of willing civilian accomplices. And after all, there’s so much more to censor -- Ridge will need all the help he can get. In seeking warriors for the front line of Internet censorship, Ridge needs look no farther than FreeRepublic.com. The atmosphere there is now poisonous.
Again, look back to Wilson's CPI. It encouraged businesses to spy on their employees, parents to spy on their children, children to spy on their parents, neighbors to spy on neighbors, and above all to report "disloyal," pro-German sentiments. State authorities banned the teaching of German in schools and changed German street names. As the madness mounted, those regarded as pro-German were hounded from their jobs, pressured to change their German names, beaten, and in a few cases lynched. Almost all cases of violence, while incited by the state, were carried out by "civilians" in the grip of war hysteria.
Along with this anti-German hysteria, Congress passed several measures designed to rigidly suppress criticism of the war. In particular, the Espionage Act, passed in June 1917, specified a fine of $10,000 or twenty years in prison for "whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully obstruct the recruiting or enlistment service of the United States, and whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of government of the United States, or the military or naval forces of the United States, or the flag."
The Espionage Act was very popular in its day. It was cheered on by mindless lemmings under the influence of state propaganda. Their great grandchildren now inhabit FreeRepublic.com, viciously attacking anyone who questions the wisdom of the state.
Our Congress is considering similar measures under the rubric of "anti-terrorism," and as it was at the beginning of the 20th Century, the FreeRepublic lemmings of the 21st are cheering the morally corrupt politicians along.
It’s not just message posters on the site. The management of FreeRepublic has instituted a "loose lips sink ships" campaign, with new moderators patrolling the forum to delete posts that in their opinion are detrimental to the "war effort."
The FreeRepublic mission statement claims "We're working to roll back decades of governmental largesse, to root out political fraud and corruption, and to champion causes which further conservatism in America."
Sanctimonious hogwash. Everything old is new again – the keyboard warriors of FreeRepublic would be right at home in 1917 shilling for Wilson.
September 24, 2001
Jeff Elkins is a freelance consultant and writer living in North Central Florida. His personal website is located at www.elkins.org.
BTW, who starting calling people names? You know what they say...
Old essay exam trick...If you do not know what you are talking about reguarding topic A compare topic A with topic B which you think you might know something about and then write essay answer about topic B. nuff said.
PS Do you know that if cats get in to catnip and eat enough. They will get diarrhea.
On an e-list to which I belong, people were screaming about the islolated cases of gas pricing being doubled on day two. Demanding rationing! The story (unconfirmed) of a local sheriff "getting in his face" ie. physically intimmidating one station owner into setting the price at the level the sheriff thought it should be! And the people cheered!!! So a local elected politican usurped the right to set the price for a private businessman and it was just fine and dandy..... I'm not defending the scumbuckets who tried to take advantage of the situation, but faced with such a power grab by a local pol, I'd have to stand with the scumbucket.
Sorry...
Ah... the beauty of living in a free society, which values the concept of private property is that you don't have to wait to get banned before leaving.
Don't let the door hit you in the butt on the way out.
The tolerance we display for the ignorant, the cowardly and the constant stream of disruptors is testament itself to the dedication to free speech that FR displays.
But under certain circumstances there is a limit.
Oh no, FR is being dissed by an unemployed guy! Oh, the shame.
BUMP!
What you said.
By the way, FR seems to be finally back to normal here since Saturday.
And at the risk of seemingly joining the Rockwell conspiracy delusionists, are you really convinced that the DNS lashup was "accidental"?
It's a good one... If it hasn't been posted it should.
I don't really know. She's your mother.
Now that's a conundrum, isn't it?
I have no doubt in my mind that if the Qaeda existed when the Republic was founded, all those rights you hold so dear would not have been granted to non-citizens. Speculation sure, but reason and induction are still valid tools.
My opinion is that a Constitutional Amendment is overdue to address this reality of modern times. It also would address the other weakness, illegal immigration.
Legal immigration has always been a pillar in the foundation of our stregth as a country, but as of late it has become a joke.
A very expensive joke, paid with the price of the blood of thousands of our innocent citizens. And thousands more will die as the price of doing nothing to address who the rightful recipients are of those rights you hold so dear.
Illegal aliens and terrorist should not have any rights.
We ignore the present danger at our peril.
Well, that doesn't mean we can assume an academic, detached demeanor when we witness the Mass Murder of 6000+ of our citizens.
That is surely a hint that we might be doing something wrong.
I take it you were not personally touched by the World Trade Center Mass Murder?
Und zee must hab zee right uniforms too! Vee must start virst mit zee terrorists, zen vee must git zee seperatists, und zee militias. Zeen vee vill cleanzup zee oder undezirables like zee homozexuals und zee gypsies. Mine Amerika uber alles. Zink right!
And the people on his board would no doubt be perfectly at home shilling for Hitler... anything to stay out of war, after all.
Us freepers? You have been here since two days after the attack, you ain't no freeper. Your screenname gives you away as it tries to give the whole site a bad name. Crawl back under you rock.
Or revert to whatever your screenname was before you were banned, which is a virtual certainty.
Was there something in particular?Nope. They just wanted him gone.
And the unnamed 'they' who 'just wanted him gone' is?
"Well, our nation is under attack by foreign powers. What do you suggest? Letting them bomb our cities at will? Murder our citizens by the thousands? Gonna turn the other cheek? Gonna negotiate with terrorists? Going to appease the cold-blooded murderers? Join the Peaceniks? Protest against your own country during wartime? Ally with Hanoi Jane? Dodge the draft? Run off to Candada? Collaborate with the enemy? Commit treason? We are at war and like the man said, you are either with US or with them. Which will it be?" -They
Ever here of the concept 'the consent of the governed?' It was thrown out in the war of northern aggression. After the Federal imperial government got done with the south they turned west to cleanse the west of the impurity known as Native Americans.
How about if the UN came in here and said, "We feel sorry for the genocide committed against these people therefore we are moving everyone out of the pacific northwest and giving them a homeland of their own."
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