Propaganda 101 (Warning: Slightly political, but mainly just anti-BS)
Whenever I go to www.snopes.com, I can be sure that it will make me depressed about the state of America today. I just wanted to mention three things I noticed on that site recently.
Item #1: The sad story of Derek Kieper. Kieper wrote an editorial bashing seatbelt laws, bemoaning the amount of money that the government spends on ensuring everyone wears seatbelts. $138 million to save 6,100 lives per year are the statistics he quotes. If you do the math, that equals $22,622 per person. Um, what??? He doesn't think that saving a human's life is worth 23 grand?
Kieper goes on to say that he is part of a group of people who stubbornly refuse to wear their seatbelts. Great idea, Derek; put your own safety at risk. That'll show 'em. Of course, Americans have never needed a reason to start a commotion; the fact that the opportunity exists is enough.
Tragically, Kieper died the other day in a car crash. He was thrown from the vehicle. Too bad he wasn't wearing a seatbelt.
Item #2: This story about four Christians who are being sent to jail for 47 years for hate crimes just because they were trying to preach anti-homosexuality messages from the Bible nearby a gay pride event. The story is relayed by Donald Wildmon of the American Family Association to Bill O'Reilly. Sounds like a terrible infringement of their 1st amendment right, right?
Of course not. Reading the rest of the web site reveals that the evangelicals are actually being prosecuted for disorderly conduct, ignoring a police officer, and obstructing the highway; that they probably won't face any jail time, much less 47 years; and that the group of Christians were not simply preaching nearby the event, but were in fact dispatched to the event in order to tell those homosexuals that they're sinners. My parents always told me that one of the most important values was to tell the whole truth and nothing but; I wonder how they'd react to the actions of the head of the American Family Associaton.
Item #3: The tragic tale of Jason F. Young, who was - gasp! - refused service at a convenience store! How inconvenient!
Actually, I might have sided with Lance Cpl. Young in other circumstances. The convenience store clerk was a man of Middle Eastern descent, and when the clerk saw that Young was in the military, he refused to serve him. But what pissed me off about this item was what his sister Heather Dowell wrote about the incident.
She writes: "It is not fair that these people come into our country and enjoy the freedoms that my brother and so many others have fought for. They do not respect our service men and women who have died for them to be able to be here. They do not respect our country, and personally I think they need to go back to where they came from."
Oh, do "they"? Pretty strong statement about "them", Heather. But who cares what "they" think? "They" aren't like us.
The story was widely circulated, and people started protesting the store. Of course, once the owner fired the clerk and apologized to the family, the protests still continued. Again, Americans never need a reason to cause a commotion.
