Today, as with any other day, I was bombarded by those fanatics in the Tea Party who are forever trolling on Twitter and ready to pounce with a ridiculous meme to put the rest of us in our place and define their preeminence over whatever issue they are on fire about at any given moment.
First today I was offered an opinion that, because I am a Liberal, I hate Chris Kyle, the soldier profiled in the recent movie American Sniper. As much as I genuinely love for people to consider my opinions, I would always much rather those opinions actually be defined by my points of view. I replied by sending a link to the blog entry I wrote in January here where I went into detail about my support for not only the troops, but Chris Kyle, himself. I then went on to tell those fanatics that one of the many beautiful aspects of being a Liberal is the fact that I get to think for myself. One of the necessary messages from the right about those of us on the left is that we hate soldiers. You will find there are many Liberals who support our troops. We hate war. We hate administrations who have no capacity or desire for diplomacy. But we do not all hate the troops. The distinction, however, is lost on them and their moral superiority would be quickly dashed if you reminded them that the food stamps they are rallying to cut are used by many military families and vets. Of course, you could always remind them that their elected leaders were the ones who block bills supporting the veterans. Repeatedly.
There is little that surprises me more when debating with someone in the Tea Party than when they post this meme to prove that they are not a racist. I always ask them to question the history of their party and explain to me why they think Dr. King was a Republican. And I ask them how they could possibly think that the man who wrote the Emancipation Proclamation could have been a Republican. It doesn't ever seem strange to them. It is as if they had never had a moments curiosity about it. Countless times I have had a discussion ended with the word "liar" and been blocked when I tell them that the party's switched over time and that it was Civil Rights, specifically, that completed it.
The gentleman I was discussing this image of Dr. King with also demanded that the left were racists. He had many other memes in his profile, as well, which were absolutely offensive. I was going to put one in this piece, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. Just know that during Ferguson he really enjoyed a depiction of the only place not being looted as a KFC and there was a rather upsetting depiction of a black child being compared to an ape in a tree.
Later this evening another fanatic who was ranting about the pizzeria in Indiana who stated they would not cater a gay wedding offered me some very clever information. He sent me a link to an online magazine whose name I will not offer because they are absolute garbage and I won't promote their nonsense. They are known for perpetuating hoaxes and hate and I refuse to have any part in that. The story, however, was about a young woman who donated to the fundraiser for the pizzeria who say they were forced to close their doors due to threats of violence from the gay community. Its always funny to me when, in their eyes, an entire community is accountable for the actions of a handful.
The story about the young woman explained that she donated and put a comment identifying herself as a gay small business owner and said that she and many other people in the LGBT community were horrified to see that the business was getting death threats. She wanted to support their rights to operate their business and believe whatever they wanted to. It said that she also called in to a radio show to explain her reasoning. I Googled the piece to see if it was a hoax or if I could not find the story from a remotely credible source, and I could not. I do, however, concede that it may be true.
The thing that these fanatics on the far right fail to understand is that they are defining their own ignorance and hypocrisy when they use the above referenced stories to perpetuate their beliefs. They're so proud of themselves when they have something to offer validity to their stance on an issue by a person who would otherwise meet their disdain that they do not stop to realize why they think it would offend us. They have such a narrow view that they expect the rest of us to, as well. Those on the left, who are allowed to think for themselves and believe others are, too, don't need to have every person in our party believe the same thing. Because we are confident and open-minded, we acknowledge that all people in a single ethnic group, religion, gender, etc do not have to subscribe to the same ideals, even if we support and embrace the group that may find them outsiders in another party.
They congratulate themselves for having found support for their ideologies by those they had determined to hate. I think we should all congratulate them, too. They are finally starting to embrace people who would have previously been maligned. So, because I am a liberal who wants to believe the best in everyone, I will take this as a positive sign that they are finally coming around to a more tolerant way of thinking.
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