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Logarock
Many haven't caught it but Phil has made comments to the effect that He feels his life may be in danger here. Well be sure at this rate the day will come soon for public opposes of certain ideas. Like a head on a platter.
So I'm watching the "tolerant" crowd fling insults.
In March of 2003, the drumbeat for war in Iraq had reached a fevered pitch. Despite massive protests throughout the world, over 70 percent of Americans supported the invasion. In that month, presidential approval also shot over 70 percent, the highest it would be for the remainder of George W. Bush’s tenure in office. Despite these currents, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks spoke out during a London show on the eve of the war, saying “Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas.”
When media reports about the concert got back to the United States, all hell broke loose. Their record sales plummeted, they fell down the Billboard charts and a full scale boycott swept through their largely right-wing country music fan base. Country radio stations across the U.S. pulled them from circulation, with radio network giant Cumulus banning the Dixie Chicks from its more than 250 local stations. Former fans gathered to burn previously-purchased CDs and even, in one media spectacle, crush them with a giant farm tractor.
Unsurprisingly, conservatives welcomed this effort to economically discipline political speech. President Bush himself said of the debacle: “The Dixie Chicks are free to speak their mind. They can say what they want to say … they shouldn’t have their feelings hurt just because some people don’t want to buy their records when they speak out. … Freedom is a two-way street. ” For Bush and other conservative cheerleaders of the war, you can speak your mind all you want, but you should be subject to private economic disciplining if you say something unpopular. That’s just the dialectic of freedom working itself out.
This is all well and good except conservatives don’t actually believe this. Their support for economically coercing the speech of popular entertainers is curiously contingent upon the content of the speech in question.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A public relations executive for the prominent New York-based Internet media company IAC lost her job on Saturday after she posted a message joking about AIDS in Africa and race on her Twitter account, sparking an online furor.
"Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!" Justine Sacco, who was IAC's corporate communications director, wrote in a message on Twitter on Friday, shortly before taking a flight.
The company distanced itself from the message.
"The offensive comment does not reflect the views and values of IAC," the company said in a statement on Saturday. "We take this issue very seriously, and we have parted ways with the employee in question."
Spiramirabilis
Also interesting and relevant:
Justine Sacco Fired After 'AIDS' Tweet Controversy
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A public relations executive for the prominent New York-based Internet media company IAC lost her job on Saturday after she posted a message joking about AIDS in Africa and race on her Twitter account, sparking an online furor.
"Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!" Justine Sacco, who was IAC's corporate communications director, wrote in a message on Twitter on Friday, shortly before taking a flight.
The company distanced itself from the message.
"The offensive comment does not reflect the views and values of IAC," the company said in a statement on Saturday. "We take this issue very seriously, and we have parted ways with the employee in question."
Do you think they were wrong to fire her?
ltinycdancerg
reply to post by beezzer
lol oh you
actually its a leotard and tutu, not a dress- and that is a real photo of me- it complies with ATS's rules (the pic I originally wanted to use was denied b/c it was "too revealing") so I've had first hand experience with this particular issue.
Police arrested Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson shortly after the attack, finding the bloody gun and Shepard's shoes and wallet in their truck.[20] Henderson and McKinney later tried to persuade their girlfriends to provide alibis for them.[21]
At trial, McKinney offered various rationales to justify his actions. He originally pleaded the gay panic defense, arguing that he and Henderson were driven to temporary insanity by alleged sexual advances by Shepard. At another point, McKinney's lawyer stated that they had wanted to rob Shepard but never intended to kill him.[20]
The prosecutor in the case alleged that McKinney and Henderson pretended to be gay in order to gain Shepard's trust.[22] During the trial, Kristen Price, girlfriend of McKinney, testified that Henderson and McKinney had "pretended they were gay to get [Shepard] in the truck and rob him".[23][24] McKinney and Henderson went to the Fireside Lounge and selected Shepard after he arrived. McKinney alleged that Shepard asked them for a ride home.[23]
After befriending him, they took him to a remote area outside of Laramie where they robbed him, assaulted him severely, and tied him to a fence with a rope from McKinney's truck while Shepard pleaded for his life. Media reports often contained the graphic account of the pistol whipping and his fractured skull. It was reported that Shepard was beaten so brutally that his face was completely covered in blood, except where it had been partially washed clean by his tears.[25][26] Both girlfriends also testified that neither McKinney nor Henderson were under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time.[27][28]
Henderson pleaded guilty on April 5, 1999 and agreed to testify against McKinney to avoid the death penalty; he received two consecutive life sentences. The jury in McKinney's trial found him guilty of felony murder. As they began to deliberate on the death penalty, Shepard's parents brokered a deal, resulting in McKinney receiving two consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole.[29]
Henderson and McKinney were incarcerated in the Wyoming State Penitentiary in Rawlins, later being transferred to other prisons because of overcrowding.