Dreams Of Noise

The sane members of the Republican party aren't afraid of us.

The rank and file, who've been constantly lied to, so much so that we can count them as brainwashed... they're afraid of us.

I concur!

Just tell me this and we'll be done.

My mother-in-law recently voted for the ban-gay-marriage amendment in her state because she's under the mistaken impression that her church would be forced to perform gay marriages if they became legal.

She's not brainwashed. She's not evil. She's just afraid. She thinks that's what people like Michael Moore want.

Tell me how I convince *her* that that she has nothing to fear from people like you?

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That, I wish I could do. In a lot of ways, I and people like me are trying to up-end everything they've ever known. And a lot of people thing, for instance, all that gay stuff is unnatural.

The best takedown of that specific issue I can think of is by Mark Fiore (http://www.markfiore.com/animation/agenda.html).

You might also want to tell her that no one is going to make her church do anything. Marriage within the church is and shall continue to be the church's business. (Yeah, there are always going to be die-hards who want to get that in there as well. I consider that going too far, not because I disagree with it but because that would be breaching church-state separation the other way. Getting civil unions, with recognition of the same rights and advantages afforded married couples, is the goal.)

Un-demonizing the ACLU would be good. Has she ever seen The American President? The speech Michael Douglas gives at the end is as good a quick citizenship guide as you'll find in the mainstream. Dave is less demanding, and therefore might be an even better tool.

Generally... it comes down to liberal progressives wanting to make sure that people have legal control over their own lives. We want to read what we want, think what we want, love who we want, worship (or not worship) as we want, have the right to make our own decisions regarding health care, without hurting anyone else or interfering with anyone else and without the government or anyone else telling us we can't because of someone else's religion.

Anything anyone can add to that would be appreciated. :)

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See, this is my point.

The rank-and-file conservative American hears "Gay Marriage" and they see change in a big kindof way to something they took as a constant. Like many conservatives their attitude is, "We've survived this long...don't change it". It's vulnerable to fear-mongering tactics. Right, Wrong, or Indifferent, big change is easy to spin as a threat to one's way of life. Look at what GWB does and how we yell about it.

Anyway, my MIL and MANY friends of hers are afraid of people trying to change their way of life, just like people like us are afraid that Robertson and Falwell are going to try to change ours.

And I don't want to have to show her Dave, or An American President. That's something I have to do one-on-one. I might convince her, but how do I convince her friends? How do WE convince her friends when you just know those movies get spun as Hollywood's Liberal Movie Industry.

We need a way to do this en masse. Michael Moore movies won't do it.

But I did come close to convincing her at one point..

I used the "Why does you care?" argument. About the only things marriage gives you that you cant get from a contract are tax penalities, survivor benefits, and spousal privilege. None of the conservatives care who gets that. Her reaction was, "Fine, but call it something else please".

But then Michael Moore or Dean opens his trap. And she doesn't trust these guys anymore than you trust GWB or Ann Coulter. She cannot give them an inch for fear they will take a mile.

What this taught me was that whoever bares their fangs looks like the dangerous one in this fight. Slow, steady, and reasonable will win this race. Don't yell, Don't Scream, but do NOT EVER TAKE ONE STEP BACKWARDS EITHER. That's how you win the real conservatives. You let the other guy have all of the whackos.

The ACLU is tough to undemonize. They aren't trying to win popularity contents. Nor should they be trying to.

And I think if Dean and Moore (or anyone else) knew how much damage they were doing in towns like my MIL's, and how much of a lightning rod they have become for the opposition to rally support, they'd be very quiet. The GOP even knew this much in 1996 and put a muzzle at their convention in 1996 on Newt Gingrinch. He rallied the troops, but never appeared on TV during the event.

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Well, welcome to The Big Dilemma. I just don't know how to do it en masse. If I did, I would've done it.

It has to be done one person at a time. But we also have to actually get the agenda out there, saying This is what we mean. There is no magical bumper sticker, no Instant Liberalism Just Add Water. And, yeah, it's awkward, because left to our own devices, we leave people to their own devices, so when stuff is attacked, when we're attacked, we tend to snarl and bare our fangs, as you say, and the ones who started it call us shrill and unserious and angry for defending ourselves when kicked.

And, again, the Moore-Dean/GWB-Coulter analogy grates on me. Last I checked, Dean hadn't lied us into a war or screwed up the environment or the federal budget or lost New Orleans. Moore wasn't calling for the deaths of conservatives, calling them traitors and friends of terrorists and godless.

Unfortunately, it sounds as if any discussion above a polite Tony Randall level is not going to work for you, her, or her friends. In which case, there ain't a thing I can do to help. All I can do is go on telling the truth as I see it, correcting course when necessary, and trying to not hurt anyone along the way.

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The analogy SHOULD grate on you.

This is how people who are all Mercutio on the subject see it. That's grating. But it's reality for much of America.

Don't think that the 700 Club Membership role doesn't see it any other way but the opposite as ours.

They think if we have our way, the terrorists will destroy our cities right after we rename them Soddom and Gommorah.

I dont think the debate should be Tony Randall Level. I think it should be done quietly yes, but with the emphasis on big sticks.

It needs to be won by reasonable people demanding what is reasonable, and making the other guy go to unreasonable lengths to deny it.

I'm thinking on the level of Lunch Counter Sit-ins and Freedom Rides. Make em arrest people who won't leave the line looking for marriage licenses.

We don't need to scream about Ann Coulter. We need to laugh at her REALLY HARD. We need plastic surgeons to publicly offer to remove her Adam's Apple, much like they offered to fix Linda Tripp's face.

Every time we scream, we legitimize her. Our goal shouldn't be to prove her wrong. It should be to relegate her to the B level celebrity circuit.

Here's a suggestion: Write an Ann Coulter song. Make it your funniest work ever. I'm thinking Chad Mitchell level "Your friendly neighborhood liberal Klu Klux Klan" or "A Very Unfortunate Man" level.

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I think you're very wrong about this. But we're going around and around and around and I don't think it's helping, so we should probably break it off.

You keep saying we have to be reasonable, and I keep saying we tried reasonable and we got stomped and blamed for the stomping.

All we can do is say the truth. If we say it quietly, they don't listen. If we say it loudly, you say they fear us.

Fuck it. I'm a loud son of a bitch. And I do my best to be loud with the truth.

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And, again, where do you suppose these public perceptions came from?

I can guaran-damn-tee you that NONE of the people who equate Ann Coulter with Michael Moore have actually LISTENED to what Moore has to say. They've been listening to what Coulter and her ilk say ABOUT Moore. They've bought into the Big Lie.

These same people, I'm sure, would believe that Jonathan Swift really DID advocate eating Irish infants.

Does Moore have an agenda? Of course he does. He's a political activist.

The Right, you see, wants it both ways:
RIGHT: Liberals are ivory-tower elitists, out of touch with the common man.
(Enter Michael Moore)
RIGHT: Liberals are shrill buffoons.

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Now THIS I agree with you on

The Right, you see, wants it both ways:
RIGHT: Liberals are ivory-tower elitists, out of touch with the common man.
(Enter Michael Moore)
RIGHT: Liberals are shrill buffoons

But they combine the tactics. Michael Moore is an Intellectual Elitist AND Shrill Buffoon.

My rebuttal is "What's wrong with being an intellectal? Being Smart is bad??? Dan Quayle started that revolt. You want to be on his side in the smarts argument?!?!?".

Thats the laughable part. We need to destroy that problem. Shrill I can see being bad. But Smart????

So we should quit being shrill buffoons. We should distance ourselves from the shrill. Not being shrill, and laughing at how ridiculous they are. Acting as if Ann Coulter is soooo below our notice....

Ann's job is to get our goat. We need to quit playing into her hands.

And I say pick a tactic and go with it. We can't win a shouting match, therefore we should be smart and give people credit for being smart too as we shake our heads at Ann Coulter while we turn to people like my MIL and say, "Tell me youre not like her, right?".

It's like negative campaigning. Too much of it and the voters get turned off. Right now, we're doing much more of it than the right is. Who can blame us? we're pissed and rightly so. But that doesn't work the way we want it to. It may make us feel better, but it won't win.

MLK had the foresight to see this. Fear and Anger are the MindKillers.

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Finally, a bit of common ground.

Yes, we need to make intelligence a desired trait again. For far too long now, people who are even slightly above average, upstairs, have been demonized for not (in the words of The Screwtape Letters) "being like folks".

Well, frankly, there are times when I'm GLAD to be "out of touch" with much of the country.

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One little grace note: Read this (http://atrios.blogspot.com/2006_08_27_atrios_archive.html#115694773017619745). Now, why do I feel this isn't an isolated incident...?

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...her church would be forced to perform gay marriages if they became legal

Oh, really? Churches all over the place have been forced to perform marriages they disagree with? I'm sorry, I must have missed that memo. Must really suck for all the Deep South parishes that suddenly have to bless the union of a black man and a white woman, huh?

She thinks that's what people like Michael Moore want.

Curious. I'll bet dollars against donuts that someone other than Moore planted that idea. Call me a cynic.

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Will you please stop misquoting me??!?!

I said SHE was worried that would happen. I'm trying to convince her it's not true. We're on the same side on this issue. Comprende?

Every subsequent supposition of yours flows from purposeful errors and I shall ignore them.

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