So, Iptuous, there's this old flag outside of my office.

[Jasper]

I'm starting to warm up to the idea of Free Speech zones.  

Look at the silly man ranting inside the fenced off area!

Not good enough.

The only free speech zone I will tolerate goes from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from 58.40 to the Rio Grande.  Alaska, also.  

And it's tyranny when you allow it.  When you're afraid of it.  When you warm up to it.

I am of course talking with tongue firmly in cheek when I say that though.  To me it is high comedy to invent a "Free Speech Zone", because of the way free speech has been treated over the history of the country.  Free speech is just one of those nice things^tm that we like to stand up for in principle, but fuck anyone who talks dangerous noise in the wrong places.  Like the guy who posted anti-religious pictures in public.  They don't think that's protected by free speech.  Why?  Because they're monkeys, and so is he.  And so are we.  There is no escaping the monkeys.  Their lanky fucking legs and their hand shaped feet are firmly wrapped around the throat of every thinking being on the planet, ready to squeeze should the bad noises come burbling out at the wrong moment.

[Jenne]

He's proud of his defiance, and I can't say that in and of itself makes me a proud mother.  It's not like he takes it into the Danger Zone, either.  Just quietly stands there so he doesn't stand out, but if you ask him why, he will tell you to your face that the flag is a religious symbol, and he's not religious about his country.

That's a really good way to look at it, actually.

But he should be wary.  There's no shortage of uber patriots that will cheerfully show him the error of his ways, on the way home from school.

Luckily, Suburbian Heaven^TM means that if you will the Free Speech Zone, it might just come.  I am thinking it's his school environment that allows the perpetuation of his crazy, mixed up ideas about patriotism moreso than his home environment...but I could be wrong.  We have so many military, serving and retired, that I often put my own foot in it in front of them and their wives/children type units.

Whole thing can be rather meh at times.  But we have a large level of the paranoid here too.  My husband's taken to quoting the "Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't after me" to me, so  I think he gets it, though he himself has his OWN paranoid phrase, "The walls have mice." (extrapolation: the walls have mice, the mice have ears, and this is what they said in Soviet Afghanistan when they didn't want to talk about something for fear of being turned in/informed on)

[Doktor Howl]

He's proud of his defiance, and I can't say that in and of itself makes me a proud mother.  It's not like he takes it into the Danger Zone, either.  Just quietly stands there so he doesn't stand out, but if you ask him why, he will tell you to your face that the flag is a religious symbol, and he's not religious about his country.

That's a really good way to look at it, actually.

But he should be wary.  There's no shortage of uber patriots that will cheerfully show him the error of his ways, on the way home from school.

Luckily, Suburbian Heaven^TM means that if you will the Free Speech Zone, it might just come.  I am thinking it's his school environment that allows the perpetuation of his crazy, mixed up ideas about patriotism moreso than his home environment...but I could be wrong.  We have so many military, serving and retired, that I often put my own foot in it in front of them and their wives/children type units.

Whole thing can be rather meh at times.  But we have a large level of the paranoid here too.  My husband's taken to quoting the "Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't after me" to me, so  I think he gets it, though he himself has his OWN paranoid phrase, "The walls have mice." (extrapolation: the walls have mice, the mice have ears, and this is what they said in Soviet Afghanistan when they didn't want to talk about something for fear of being turned in/informed on)

Paranoia is impossible, at least on that level...As paranoia is the delusion that they're against you.

[Doktor Howl]

I am of course talking with tongue firmly in cheek when I say that though.  

That's a relief.  I thought they got to you, man.

[Jenne]

Paranoia is impossible, at least on that level...As paranoia is the delusion that they're against you.

Perhaps...but on the other hand, given enough provocation, the "against you" part is rather a certainty, and so I totally get what you mean by caution.

[Doktor Howl]

Paranoia is impossible, at least on that level...As paranoia is the delusion that they're against you.

Perhaps...but on the other hand, given enough provocation, the "against you" part is rather a certainty, and so I totally get what you mean by caution.

Sure.  Given his father's nationality, and his rejection of the group singalong to the almighty flag, it's not a question of IF but WHEN some fine young all-American lads decide to beat some patriotism into him.

Three solutions (worst to best):

1.  Gandhi it.

2.  Learn to run.

3.  Learn to fight.

4.  Find a couple of big friends.  My son enjoyed real success with this one, before he grew 8 inches in 2 years.

[Freeky]

Sometimes, there is no hope for people, Dok. Sometimes a few words can change everything for others. And sometimes, a few words can put a few ideas into some bright and shiny mind, and reality sinks in, and those people can still be hopeless, but they can pass on what the reality is, and maybe THOSE people will be real Americans. It could be that we're either one generation away from total destruction of Freedom^TM, or one generation away from a resurgence of what America is really all about. All it takes is words at the right time, and the right kind of people to hear those words, and everything could change.

Is that hoping for too much? I hope not, because then what reason is there to keep going?

[Doktor Howl]

Sometimes, there is no hope for people, Dok. Sometimes a few words can change everything for others. And sometimes, a few words can put a few ideas into some bright and shiny mind, and reality sinks in, and those people can still be hopeless, but they can pass on what the reality is, and maybe THOSE people will be real Americans. It could be that we're either one generation away from total destruction of Freedom^TM, or one generation away from a resurgence of what America is really all about. All it takes is words at the right time, and the right kind of people to hear those words, and everything could change.

Is that hoping for too much? I hope not, because then what reason is there to keep going?

The lulz, Freeky, the lulz.

Get YOUR America on.  Let the braying masses worry about themselves.

[Freeky]

I really do like living in this country, even though sometimes it scares the shit out of me that I do, and i've been disillusioned.

Thanks, by the way. I much prefer being disillusioned and scared shitless than Lala-landed. Who knows, maybe a few more months and I will understand what you mean by that.

The lulz, Freeky, the lulz.

Get YOUR America on.  Let the braying masses worry about themselves.

[Doktor Howl]

I really do like living in this country, even though sometimes it scares the shit out of me that I do, and i've been disillusioned.

Thanks, by the way. I much prefer being disillusioned and scared shitless than Lala-landed. Who knows, maybe a few more months and I will understand what you mean by that

If America isn't scary, you're doing it wrong.

[Freeky]

 

[LMNO]

Idealistic pretentious jake:

Build small enclosure made of chain link fence.

Print placards that read "FREE SPEECH ZONE".

Place the placards facing in rather than out.

Get pedantic.

[Iason Ouabache]

Idealistic pretentious jake:

Build small enclosure made of chain link fence.

Print placards that read "FREE SPEECH ZONE".

Place the placards facing in rather than out.

Get pedantic.

I like it. Reminds me a lot of Wonko the Sane.

[Elder Iptuous]

I don't know Dok,

I really don't anymore...  I used to when I was a kid and Dad was Right.  I did when I started thinking about it myself and figured he just wasn't Right enough.  I did when I decided that I'd be better off if I Left my Right at the door.  It seemed clear at one point that the Top was the Problem, until I looked at the all the knuckle dragging  Bottom and realized that I might not do anything any differently if I were in a position to choose.  I don't know any more.  I can't tell what this country is and who we are, let alone what it and we should be. 

And maybe that's what America is, in the end.  Maybe that's what it always has been.  A brightly colored shell with contents undefined; allowed to go through the natural progression of governance while maintaining a semblance of continuity.  Every time I'm 'informed' of what this place and these people are, the notion just gets swept away by some other example or story.  I don't know that there is a cohesive America, beyond that flag and some shape on a map.  Maybe if that flag is allowed to fall apart and the mythos around it, the borders would too.  What happens when the line towing masses of red white and blue folks can't even get together for a common parade in celebration of this absurdly disparate idea set that each thinks they have a real bead on? 

So now I have tentatively extended the attitude of my religious/philosophical beliefs to the political sphere, and simply observe this perpetually unfolding and titanic flower, and admire the beauty and horror.  Accepting what it is, and indulging myself in a sort of aloof unknowing...  an unstable separateness based on acknowledgment of my own ignorance.

Maybe someday I'll get some convictions back.  Maybe I'll know the answer once again.  Until then, I'd certainly be content to have some fun with folks like you that just want some fucking slack under that ratty banner.

I don't know,
Iptuous

[Doktor Howl]

Well, that's understandable.  Nobody wants to walk away from something as powerfully evocative as Old Glory.  But that's just the point...you don't have to.  It's still there, and it remembers far better than you or I what America was supposed to be: an imperfect nation, yet composed of people who wanted to make it better, so that they themselves would be a better people.

That may no longer be the case...The whoring and imperialism and aristocratic bullshit is apparent to anyone who cares to look.  But why should we let the pimps and fixers and faux-patriots steal the flag?  That's Our flag, and I'm not ready to hand it over.

Needless to say, this concept applies to other nations as well.

Like the man said, Ippie, rock n roll never forgets.  We'll take that tattered rag and make it our own again, and stand on this ground, and tell the religious freaks and the dems and the GOP and the libertarians and everyone else to FUCK OFF, this is OUR PARTY, and the only requirements for admission are BIPEDALISM, BEING SERIOUS ABOUT HAVING A GOOD FUCKING TIME, and knowing about GODDAMN SATURDAY NIGHT!

Asshat 2010.  We won't be on the ballot, we'll be screaming and spraying spittle and laughing in their shocked and confused faces.

Or kill me.