My eyes! My eyes!
I read publications like yours to escape the Jesus nuts, so imagine my disappointment when I saw your recent cover! Ugh!
Don’t these individuals have enough forums to spread their ridiculous message? What’s next? An article claiming that Barack Obama is not a U.S. citizen? Come on, Mountain Xpress!
— Jennifer Williams-Wager
Asheville
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The better question would be why the Mountain Express gave voice to your open bigotry towards people of faith.
As opposed to the travelah’s exceptional tolerance for ideas he doesn’t like?
I am very tolerant of opposing ideas. In fact, in todays political climate, it seems only the conservative voices accept tolerance and divergent views. The left is too busy trying to silence opposing thought and demean anybody who challenges their group think.
It is quite a social experiment to observe the left engage the idea of diversity of opinion. There is no greater group of bigoted and oppressive minded souls in all of politics than the leftist-liberals.
“In fact, in todays political climate, it seems only the conservative voices accept tolerance and divergent views.”
Classic.
Are you one of these so-called “Conservatives”?
It’s great how you classify everyone who disagrees with you as a Democrat.
“In fact, in todays political climate, it seems only the conservative voices accept tolerance and divergent views.”
Tell that to Natalie Maines and the Dixie Chicks.
Or maybe conservatives like Ann Coulter, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, etc. haven’t gotten the memo about the tolerance they are supposed to be showing.
I actually agree with the sentiment expressed in travelah’s original post. Change to target of the letter writer’s complaint to gays, African Americans, Latinos, etc. and what kind of response do you think she’d get? — But to claim that conservatives are the practitioners of toleranceis absurd.
Yeah travelah, the right sure loves diversity. So much diversity in the Republican party. That’s why the Republican convention was just overflowing with people of different colors, religions, and sexual preferences. I was particularly glad to see them embracing so many pagans. And all the nice things they had to say about Muslims and homosexuals, it was just so touching.
I just love the way the far right wing is always fighting for the voices of non-Christians. When they spout that stuff about how they think America was founded to destroy Islam, “destroy” is obviously just code for “appreciate.” And all that nonsense about America being a Christian nation…. same thing.
When they say that homosexuality is wrong, “wrong” is clearly just a secret code for A-OK!
Clearly all those people at the Sarah Palin rallies chanting racist and anti-Islamic hate language were just speaking a secret code for peace, love, and understanding.
And then there are those lovely songs that the Republicans have been passing around, such as “Barack the Magic Negro” and the “Star Spanglish Banner.” No doubt they are the most culturally sensitive humans ever to walk the face of the Earth.
And what on Earth could be more tolerant than their term “femenazi”? It gives me the warm fuzzies just thinking about it.
Or here’s a novel thought… maybe the Republican convention was so outlandishly white because they don’t really represent most people of color. Maybe the vast majority of people of color voted against them for an actual reason. Maybe the vast majority of the gay and lesbian community voted against them for a reason. Maybe most women voted against them for a reason. Maybe atheists and pagans voted against them for a reason.
Nah, what do women, brown skinned people, gays, atheists and pagans know, right? The Republicans are definitely the party that embraces diversity.
(Not)
“In fact, in todays political climate, it seems only the conservative voices accept tolerance and divergent views”
Nonsense. Let’s take some media examples: most consider MSNBC to have a ‘liberal bias’ (and I accept that). Invariably, there political programs have both liberal and conservative spokespeople on there (i.e. Brad Blakeman, Todd Harris and many more). Compare that (for example) Bill O’Reilly who routinely shuts off the microphone when opposing voices are heard. Other examples abound.
Welcome to travelah’s Wild World of Fantasy.
Not one of you who responded to my tolerance comments grasped the point I was making. I was not referring to MSNBC, the Republican Party or even the Democrat Party. I am referring to you and your fellow like-minded souls that can found all over this town. Nor one of you is tolerant of anything but your own views. You favor the censorship of opinion. You denigrate those who think and believe differently than yourself and your personal animosity towards those of differing opinions is expressed openly wit your constant ad hominem attacks against anybody who challenges your particular paradigm.
Face the facts. The leftist-liberal is the poster child for intolerant bigotry. Just go to the opening letter to see it at work.
“I am referring to you and your fellow like-minded souls that can found all over this town.”
Okay t, that does clarify what you meant; local vs. national.
“Nor one of you is tolerant of anything but your own views.”
It appears that to you, ‘tolerance’ of other views means sitting idly by and not responding to these ‘other views’. Taking issue with them is, evidently, intolerant.
“You favor the censorship of opinion.”
My, now that’s a broad statement. For my own part, I have always advocated Franklin’s ‘marketplace of ideas’, and have never advocated or supported censorship, no matter how goofball the opinion may be (even racist remarks). If you can find a post of mine that invalidates this, please point it out. However, I do think you have a point about the original letter. For me (and I only speak for myself), the more rightwing bilge that is published or heard, the better. Suppressing these views is not only inherently wrong, but deprives rational minds of seeing the bankruptcy of those opinions. Plus, it would be deadly dull to have nothing but an amen corner; there would be nothing to challenge.
“your constant ad hominem attacks”
You keep making that charge. Are you aware that ad hominem means personal attacks on one’s character? Sometimes such things are done, on both sides, but simply taking a view to task is not, per se, an ‘ad hominem attack’. You have engaged in similar vitriol against those whose opinions you don’t like, so how about dispensing with the selective outrage?
“Face the facts. The leftist-liberal is the poster child for intolerant bigotry.”
No, that’s not “facing the facts.” It’s facing your opinion. You seem to have a difficult time separating your opinion from objective fact.
Oh, and one more question, t…since it is generally accepted that the Mt.Xpress reflects a ‘liberal’ bent, have you ever had any of your posts censored or suppressed? It seems your ‘conservative opinions’ (as well as those of others of like mind) are published.
Remember the old Wendy’s commercial? ‘Where’s the beef’?
Here’s how a typical travealh debate goes:
t: outrageous claim backed up by dubious, cherry-picked information.
Person arguing with T: Responds with actual facts that show the bigger picture.
t: more dubious information now mixed with persoanl insults, snide insinuation, as well as the phrase “your constant ad hominem attacks” without any hint of irony.
repeat.
The Mountain Express should be commended for it’s willingness to allow the expression of diverse opinion. It is not the norm nor is it representative of the bigotry expressed in the opening post. Until the detractors can deal with that post for what it is, there is no real substance in their posturing.
dave, you offer nothing of substance worth engaging beyond this reply.
thanks for proving my point so effortlessly, lil t!
It’s telling how this ignorant, intolerant letter to the Express generated so many comments, featuring the usual mud-slinging and name-calling, whereas Nate Spencer’s thoughtful letter regarding the same article generated nothing at all.
Exchange the subject of Christianity with any other, less prominent (in America) religion and there would be an uproar all around.
travelah is absolutely right in this case.
Since the South is home to many folks who grew up in less-than ideal “christian” households, the backlash towards the cult is more than a bit understandable.
Hilariously, travelah actually said:
“The leftist-liberal is the poster child for intolerant bigotry.”
Yeah travelah, when those leftist liberals were being blasted with fire hoses, beaten with baseball bats, and set on fire by you good old fashioned values people from the right during the civil rights movement, you really proved how liberals are the poster children for bigotry and right wingers are the poster children for tolerance.
The right wingers that degrade feminists as feminazis are tolerant?!? Now that’s rich. The same party that blocks homosexuals from basic human rights. The same party that never ceases their frightfully xenophobic rants about immigration.
All those racist chants at the Sarah Palin rallies really did a lot to make your point as well (not). And how could we ever forget your phenomenally bigoted Muslim mole conspiracy theories about Obama? Those conspiracies, including the disgraceful birth certificate theory, originated from none other than the admitted white supremacist hate-monger Jerome Corsi!
Yeah, just keep whistling Barack the Magic Negro and the Star Spanglish Banner to yourself as you pat yourself on the back with how tolerant you are.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with a liberal citizen of this community wanting an alt-weekly geared towards liberal issues and opinions. Not every publication has an obligation to give equal voice to all sides. I don’t expect the right wing extremist rag, the Asheville Tribune to start publishing articles about the benefits of paganism and homosexuality any time soon.
What is unconscionably hypocritical is when Fox News or the Mountain X for that matter, claim to be fair and balanced. If the Mountain Xpress was truly a paper for the whole community, not an alt weekly for progressives, it would have right-wing extremist cartoons making fun of women and homosexuals, not just left-leaning cartoons making fun of right-wingers. They would also have a page of evangelical Christian affirmations, not just Rob Brezny’s Real Astrology. They would also have vastly more articles from a right-wing perspective. They would also focus much, much more on right-wing cultural events.
Again, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the Mountain Xpress being a progressive alt weekly, any more than it is wrong for the Tribune to be a right-wing rag, but if they pretend to be something else, it is not just a lie, it is an insult to our intelligence.
The point of the above letter is that there are plenty of sources for right wing extremist opinions, such as the Tribune, but the vast majority of Mountain XPress readers are looking for an alternative to that.
If you seriously think that opinions about the importance of accepting gay marriage, feminism, abortion rights, the separation of church and state, government aid for the poor, and the importance of electing liberals would be tolerated by the Asheville Tribune crowd or at a Carolina Stompers meeting, you are even more delusional than I had imagined, and frankly. that is a promethean feat in and of itself.
entop, your vitriolic opinion matters not.
Since the South is home to many folks who grew up in less-than ideal “christian” households, the backlash towards the cult is more than a bit understandable.
Nice dodge.
That’s right travelah, my opinion is vitriolic. When you right-wingers were turning hoses on liberal civil rights marchers, that was just gentle teasing. When you use terms like feminazi, that’s all in good fun. When you try to block gay people from basic civil liberties, it’s just a harmless game.
Why am I not at all surprised that you backed a candidate with a shockingly abysmal 17% rating on civil liberties, even though you profess to be so darned concerned about free speech?
Thanks, I needed a good laugh.
entop, your comments remain irrelevant and uninformed. I was a child when Democrats were firehosing black people and in my early political years, was a fairly radical leftist. I have never conversed with a “feminazi” but I have sat down and talked with a couple very confused man haters. I don’t know of anybody in my circles who advocates denying anybody their basic civil rights, homosexual or otherwise (I pretty much take Dick Cheney’s position on the matter). As for McCain, I voted for him along with many millions of other Americans not willing to support a radical whose stripes are now being revealed in office.
I strongly advocate your right to spill your soup in this forum or any other. By all means, continue . You need the good laugh although I’ll leave you to your devices.
travelah, you and your right wing friends don’t want to deny civil liberties to homosexuals? I am thrilled to see that you all have finally come out in favor of gay marriage.
And the silliest sentence possible in the English language: “(I pretty much take Dick Cheney’s position on the matter)”
As usual, you seem to miss the point travelah. It was conservative Christian right wingers who were blasting those liberals with fire hoses, beating them with baseball bats and crobars, and setting them on fire. All because they wanted black people to be treated like humans. The fact that you were young at the time doesn’t make the liberals right wingers or vice-versa.
If you seriously think the Dixiecrats were liberals, you have managed to outdo yourself once again. Both Dixiecrats and Republicans were involved in those atrocities, but all the attackers were right wingers. The Dixiecrats were right wing extremists who bore little resemblance to the Democratic party of today. That’s why they all became Republicans. So much for your theory that liberals represent intolerance and right-wingers represent tolerance.
Apparently the irony of the fact that you are complaining about freedom of speech, yet you supported a candidate with an astonishingly abysmal 17% rating on civil liberties is completely lost on you as well. It must be nice not to bear the burden of small inconveniences like continuity.
What exactly did i “dodge”, bobaloo?
Or are you just trying to imitate Ken?
Asheville has a liberal alt weekly, the Mountain Xpress, and a right-wing weekly, the Asheville Tribune. According to travelah, the right-wing weekly offers more diverssity in opinions because right wingers are open and liberals are intolerant and bigoted.
The problem is travelah, I was just poking around their website, and there is absolutely no diversity whatsoever. No matter how you slice it, that makes your entire argument a laughable joke.
Unfortunately for you, it’s easy to prove. I defy you to show me the liberal voices on the Asheville Tribune’s site. The fact is, you can’t, because it is just a heaping pile of right-wing extremist blather, and nothing else. There is no dissent there whatsoever. Read it and weep:
http://www.ashevilletribune.com/
There is absolutely no rational way that you can keep arguing that the local right-wingers are more open to diverse opinions than the left. I have to admit, it is fun proving you wrong, but I wish you wouldn’t always make it quite so darned easy.
Entop, I do not read the Asheville Tribune and have no idea who or what they have to say. I do read the MX and have for several years now and I appreciate their open and fair communications. They are hardly representative of your vitriolic mindset. For that dose of reality, all one has to do is turn to the Daily Koss, that liberal leftist bastion of open and diverse discussion.
http://www.dailykos.com/
LOL!!!! travelah, it is hysterically funny how continuity and reason appear to mean absolutely nothing to you.
You claimed “Face the facts. The leftist-liberal is the poster child for intolerant bigotry.”
Yet here you are at the leftist liberal alt weekly’s site posting! What’s even more hilarious is that you just said that you don’t even read the local right wing weekly!
It really is amazing that you can’t see the gaping hole (understatement of the year) in your own argument. You just don’t get to hang around the local liberal alt weekly’s website all day, posting with abandon, and then claim that the local liberals don’t tolerate diversity of opinion, without the ludicrous hypocrisy of that being pointed out.
You also don’t get to blather on about how much more tolerant the right wing is, when I just irrefutably busted you on the fact that there is absolutely no diversity of opinion WHATSOEVER in the right wing counterpart to the Mountain Xpress, the Asheville Tribune. Such a ridiculous claim is beyond reason, even for you.
It is also hysterically funny how you change your arguments as if we couldn’t simply scroll up the page to bust you!
travelah said: ” I was not referring to MSNBC, the Republican Party or even the Democrat Party. I am referring to you and your fellow like-minded souls that can found all over this town.”
The MountainX IS the local liberal alt weekly! If the local liberals were not tolerant of diverse opinions, we sure as heck wouldn’t see the likes of you and Chad Nesbitt here!
The Asheville Tribune IS the local right wing weekly! If the local right wing community was so much more open to diverstity of opinion, as you claim, there would be some diversity of opinion in their paper, and there is NOT! There is no arguing your way out of this. Plain and simple, your claims have been proven to be completely ridiculous.
Sorry, but I have irrefutably proved my argument beyond question. If you don’t recognize that, you are not being intellectually honest or even trying.
I haven’t been feeling too well lately, but laughter is the best medicine, so you really do have my sincere thanks.