Oh. That.
I was probably on the opposite side from you in that debate, but you're right. It got absolutely crazy. I had to take a step back and quit posting for a while. After time passed, I realized that what happened on FR (and around the country) was perfectly understandable. BOTH SIDES couldn't help but bring their own baggage to the debate. Many of us on the "Save Terri" side either were disabled ourselves, or had a close loved one who was. It was impossible not to see our own situations juxtoposed in the Schaivo slippery slope. On the other side were a lot of people who previously had to make the heart-wrenching decision to "pull the plug" in a hopeless situation. What they saw were a bunch of yelling, judgmental people sticking their noses in an intensely private situaion and wagging their fingers at THEM. And there we were thrown together with our wounds wide open. It was just entirely too personal for anybody to discuss it rationally.
Except for a few, I don't think this debate even comes close. It's not REALLY personal, just the same old true-believers vs pragmatists debate.
After Schaivo, I was literally exhausted, and felt dirty. It cut that deep. I know many felt the same. Thank God we've got a new "hot-button" issue. I don't ever want to go through that again.
I did, too. We all seem to get that way when we let emotion rule over reason. It happens from time to time. The "he raised our taxes" thread before he was ever inaugurated, the Lott threads...remember when everything was turned into a Lott thread?...the WOT (illegal police action)...drug enforcement (legalize, tax and the problem will solve itself!)...the recall threads, Miers, whether the Iraq Museum "looting" was truth or fiction (but those were ANTIQUE plaster replicas!!)...
There are plenty more I forgot.
Differences of opinion about Terri's condition did not bother me but when I was accused of having no compassion and no heart by those without a clue as to my personal history by people threatening Michael Schiavo, the judge and the doctors it became too much. T
hey did not know that I had only a couple of years before lost my beloved and beautiful wife at the age of 43 being sustained since only by faith in God and our wonderful sons.
They did not know of the fountains of tears shed and the fruitless search to cure her even to the point of pouring money into cures even quacks would not promote grasping at every straw. Yet, I was part of the Culture of Death who cared not for the afflicted and the impaired.
It was then that I realized just what a threat to FR such people are and how I must do everything I could to make sure they were confronted at every point. This site is simply too important to allow it to be taken over by fanatics and frauds.