Posted on 08/10/2002 1:29:46 PM PDT by Jim Robinson
The anti-FReepers are on the prowl. As most of you know, there is a group of ex-FReepers who have been dogging us for the last several years. The anti-FReeper community was started several years ago by a group of disgruntled individuals who were banned from FR and then wanted to get back at us by damaging our reputation. This started out as petty name calling and rumor mongering, but they now appear determined to cause us as much harm as possible. Even to the point of attempting to get FR and FRN shut down and the owners and managers of the organizations bankrupted or jailed.
Some of the early members of the group include ex-FReepers Mojo, Aligyrl, Landshark, Z2, Headhunter, LindaM, and others who have come and gone over the years. The most recent additions to active anti-FReeping appear to be ex-FReepers Clarity, Clinton's a Liar and JoeEveryman.
There appears to be a certain love/hate relationship involved here. Some of these people hate FR and its PTB (that's "Powers That Be" in their lingo) with such passion that they cannot stay away. Some of the original members of the AF community have given up and drifted off, some have come back to FR, and some are as determined as ever to kill FR and have me and whomever else they can thrown into prison for whatever crimes they imagine us guilty. Their motivation is pure revenge. Their driving force is hatred.
Their current attack is centered around an attempt to break up the Free Republic Network and, through that angle, to cause as much damage to FR as possible. Unfortunately for all of us, there is a genuine problem with the ex-leader of the South Carolina Chapter. Apparently, there was some money collected for events that was never paid over to the vendors and the chapter leader is accused of taking off with the money. I am not going into all of the gory details here, but I understand that there is an official police investigation ongoing and the SC Chapter and the FRN are cooperating fully with the authorities. The anti-FReepers, led by JoeEveryman, are trying to gain maximum leverage from any fallout from this case and are attempting to use it to bring down FRN.
JoeEveryman ran an FR thread (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/728856/posts) last week on this subject. I eventually deleted it because it was turning into an anti-FReeper haven and I do not want that on FR. The anti-FReepers have plenty of their own websites to conduct their hate campaign. Those who are interested may find JoeEveryman (posting as "Panjandrum") on the LibertyPost.org forum, now appearing to be the latest home of the anti-FReeper community. I have undeleted the JoeEveryman thread for those who are interested in reading it, but have left it locked. I do not want any more anti-FReeping activity on FR.
JoeEveryman is now banned from Free Republic. It is clear on the thead that he ran here on FR and on this (http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readarticle.cgi?114+1485+0+1) thread on LibertyPost.org that his intent is to bring FR down and to cause us as many legal problems as he can. I cannot see allowing him to do this on my own website.
It appears to me that they are either preparing some sort of lawsuit and or are trying to entangle me, Bob J, FR and FRN into the SC case. None of us had anything to do with whatever wrongdoing may have taken place in SC. The South Carolina Chapter is an independent entity, as are all of the FR chapters, and neither FR nor FRN have any ownership or control over their activities. It appears that the anti-FReepers are trying to break that down. We'll see. FRN is cooperating fully with the authorities and I will too if they ask.
In the meantime, I do not want them scheming on FR so they are banned and will remain banned. I will also ban any other FR members who get actively engaged in this attempt to bring down FR.
A request to all. Please do not drag any of the anti-FReeper stuff to FR. I do not want it here.
Free Republic has withstood many attacks over the years, from both the left and the right and I am confident that we will survive this attack from this Free Republic Haters Association as well.
Thanks for your continued support.
Jim
It's a good move to address this out in the open. No organization is completely immune to this kind of problem. However, maybe it's not a bad idea to think about what controls should be implemented to prevent a repeat of this unfortunate event.
I read a good deal of the thread in question. I'm not an attorney, but should you have legitimate concerns about vicarious liability?
You and Mercuria, for example, would be two Buchanan brigagers who I strenously disagree with on FR during the 2000 election, but you made some great points and always had some insightful commentary.
The problem was liberal Democrats who PRETEND to be(and certainly are NOT) 3rd party people for the sole purpose of destorying icons of the conservative movement. There are a number of individuals on FR (who shall go unnamed) who are caught gloating when a liberal Democrat defeats a conservative Republican. The best way to identify these disruptors is that while they claim to be 3rd party, they never say WHAT party they are a member or WHICH candidate they are supporting.
A good example is the VA Governors's race last year. A number of disruptors were rooting for liberal Dem Mark Warner to win (and he did), by spreading blantantly false, vicious lies about the GOP candidate here. They claimed to be 3rd party people, but hardly ever did you see them tote the alledged "3rd party" candidate that they perfered over Warner. They didn't have any. All they did is exclusively tear down the Republican-- NOT tear down BOTH main parties like most "third" people do here. Their posts purely helped Warner get momentum by fracturing ALL opposition to him. When Warner did win, they could barely contain their glee.
A geninue 3rd party person will be more than happy to tell you who they are supporting and why (whether it be Carla Howell or Pat Buchanan or whatever). A liberal disruptor will not, because they need conservatives to buy into the vicious propanganda they are selling.
I would say that people who profess to be Republicans who do not support traditional conservative ideals could also be suspect. That's not to say that all supporters of Bush are guilty of this, or that all supporters of Buchanan or other third party individuals are all pure as the driven snow either.
People need to keep their eyes and minds open for people who aren't what they represent themselves to be. And that includes some of our former forum participants who have sadly gone rogue.
I dearly liked some of those people. I gain no pleasure from having to face what they have chosen to do. I would ask people who do not have all the facts to keep an open mind, realizing that leadership has nothing to gain from spreading lies about it's true supporters.
You bring up a good point. This issue was one of the reasons that the Network was created. However, since this occured before the Network existed and before there was the ability to discuss and implement controls, we have all had an unfortunate learning experience, one that is informing the structure of the Network and its potential relationships with the chapters.
I use FR primarily as a news source, so I'm not really sure I understand the distinction between FR, FRN and the chapters. My comment wasn't intended to be critical; but I don't find sticking one's head in the sand to be a generally useful tactic.
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