Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Who ARE These People?

All right. Yesterday's post was a little bit of fun. Sure. Strange people are scary. But it doesn't keep me up at night...

Did you see the ABCNews blog about the government tracking a reporter's phone calls? I thought about that one for a little while around 4:56am today.

...and who ARE these people that are posting their comments on the ABCNews blog? Go ahead. Scroll down and look at some of the comments. Waste a few minutes. Here's a sample:

Good! I hope they do find out who is leaking national security info to the press. I'm tired of the press helping our enemies. Maybe you guys should start trying to "FOR the USA" instead of "AGAINST the USA" ALL THE TIME. I hope the FBI nails lots of idiots who are out to destroy the intelligence agencies and cost us more soldiers and spys!


The comments section is packed with similar rants. Almost every comment is against the media.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Its amazing to me how many people just blinding follow the republican rhetoric like sheep to the slaughter. Spewing back sound bites without any substance. Have none of these people read the book 1984? Do they not understand that the eroding civil liberties will eventually extend to their rights. Its a slippery slope. We invade other countries to bring democracy-free speach, the right to keep the government from monitoring our lives - yet they don't seem to see that the liberties that are being lost are here, on our home soil.

So, as I get ready to send this I say to myself "do I send it? What if the government is monitoring this? What if they take offense? " Its not such a far cry from monitoring who I call...don't you think

Anonymous said...

Good morning, Ray. Yeah, there are screamers everywhere.

I met one the other day. I was browsing in one of my favorite book stores. A mother walked in with her daughter who looked to be about three. The daughter took one look around and went running through the store, arms held over her head, yelling in full voice. Of course, her mother was mortified. The other customers and I smiled. Later, in a quieter moment, I told the mother that I felt just like her daughter did when I walk into a good book store.

Society has taught me restraint. Maybe my mother told me in a firm voice that I should control my enthusiasm in a book store or library. Maybe I got thrown out of other less noble places as I my learned restraints slipped away.

The little girl in the book store was harmless and deserves only a smile. Your screamer on a train was probably old enough to know better so it is better to keep distance from him. It is harder to tell about the screamer in the ABCnews blog. I like to be able to see screamers so that I can make a judgment from what I see in their eyes. Not being able to see the blogger’s eyes, one can only tell from their words whether they have learned civilized restraint.

But this is one of the reasons for the existence for blogs. Isn’t it? Instead of a place on the quadrangle on the Georgia Tech campus there in Atlanta, we say or scream our message to the world. Maybe we speak quietly with learned restraint. Maybe not. Yet, the existence of blogs is a bright innovation in this flat world. From it, we will hear screamers and talkers. Each of us then make judgments about the quality of reason in what we hear.

Hipocketraveler