Statement I
Oct. 11th, 2007 12:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
caraigI wish to voice my revulsion at the harassment and stalking and smear being waged upon Graeme Frost and his family. More behind the cut.
For those of you who do not know, last week the US Congress voted to expand the SCHIP program, which is a health insurance program for lower-income families. The office of the President vetoed the bill. On Friday, 12-year-old Graeme Frost was brought forth as a SCHIP recipient, whose family has benefitted from SCHIP; there was an accident, his sister is brain-damaged and Graeme was also injured for some time. I do understand the pros and cons of the SCHIP bill. That is not what I am talking about here. I also understand that Graeme Frost was asked to speak on the SCHIP bill because of political reasons; the supporters of the bill wanted to put a human face on it. That also is not what I am talking about here.
I am talking about the treatment that the Frost family has received from some people, apparently the most vociferous opponents of both SCHIP and anything remotely resembling liberalism or social programs. I believe that this country is big enough, and we are all adults enough, that happy mediums can be found, for the greater good of all citizens and guests of this nation. However, the people hounding the Frost family are not acting in any rational, polite manner. There are people sending private investigators out for information about the Frosts, to purposely dig up dirt on them; there are people who are not any sort of law enforcement personnel asking probing questions of their friends, relatives, neighbors, and co-workers. There are people who are leaving harrassing messages, invectives, and even death threats on their answering machine. And, worst of all, there are people out there who are promoting this kind of behavior towards not only the Frosts, but anyone else who disagrees with them. One pundit has said, essentially, that they want to hire private investigators to dig up everything they can on the Frosts, every nickel and dime; and then use that information to 'destroy them.'
This kind of behavior is reprehensible and immature; it is utterly lacking in empathy, and as much as some people might think, lacking empathy is not any sort of virtue, but rather dangerous self-absorbtion. At worst, it is utterly criminal behavior. We as a society should not be accepting this behavior as 'normal.' It is not 'normal.' It is sick and it is flat-out wrong.
So, why am I bothering to put this in my journal? I was once berated for saying something similarly supportive; I was told basically to not bother posting that sort of thing because it 'does nothing.' I was told to shove it because I was 'following a meme' or something like that Well, let me say this in reply to anyone who will say such this time: I can do nothing but speak, and this journal is my voice. And I will not be silent. We are a society, and as a society we have certain duties to each other. Part of those duties is polite disagreement and debate. Another of those duties is to speak out when we see injustice being done. Our country is great because it can accommodate a wide variety of beliefs and politics. There literally is room for everyone. But when that acceptance is hijacked and used as an excuse for hate-speech, vitriol, and attacks, then that acceptance should turn to unilateral rejection of such behavior. I'm not asking people to copy this into their journal and pass it on. I'm posting it here because I believe that if we are silent on an injustice, we are giving approve of that injustice. Silence, then, is the greatest crime of all when we are trying to heal society.
If someone thinks there's nothing wrong with this... if they think that having web sites post the home addresses of people like the Frosts expressly for the purpose of harrassing them is 'all right'... if they see nothing wrong with some sick individuals calling for the harrassment and denigration and murder of people who disagree with them... then we need to make them aware of how unhealthy and frankly sociopathic this behavior is. This is our society, we are all a part of it, and if someone in our society thinks it's all right to do this sort of thing, we need to bring the point home that we cannot and will not tolerate it.
Pax.
EDIT: To clean up some thoughts.
For those of you who do not know, last week the US Congress voted to expand the SCHIP program, which is a health insurance program for lower-income families. The office of the President vetoed the bill. On Friday, 12-year-old Graeme Frost was brought forth as a SCHIP recipient, whose family has benefitted from SCHIP; there was an accident, his sister is brain-damaged and Graeme was also injured for some time. I do understand the pros and cons of the SCHIP bill. That is not what I am talking about here. I also understand that Graeme Frost was asked to speak on the SCHIP bill because of political reasons; the supporters of the bill wanted to put a human face on it. That also is not what I am talking about here.
I am talking about the treatment that the Frost family has received from some people, apparently the most vociferous opponents of both SCHIP and anything remotely resembling liberalism or social programs. I believe that this country is big enough, and we are all adults enough, that happy mediums can be found, for the greater good of all citizens and guests of this nation. However, the people hounding the Frost family are not acting in any rational, polite manner. There are people sending private investigators out for information about the Frosts, to purposely dig up dirt on them; there are people who are not any sort of law enforcement personnel asking probing questions of their friends, relatives, neighbors, and co-workers. There are people who are leaving harrassing messages, invectives, and even death threats on their answering machine. And, worst of all, there are people out there who are promoting this kind of behavior towards not only the Frosts, but anyone else who disagrees with them. One pundit has said, essentially, that they want to hire private investigators to dig up everything they can on the Frosts, every nickel and dime; and then use that information to 'destroy them.'
This kind of behavior is reprehensible and immature; it is utterly lacking in empathy, and as much as some people might think, lacking empathy is not any sort of virtue, but rather dangerous self-absorbtion. At worst, it is utterly criminal behavior. We as a society should not be accepting this behavior as 'normal.' It is not 'normal.' It is sick and it is flat-out wrong.
So, why am I bothering to put this in my journal? I was once berated for saying something similarly supportive; I was told basically to not bother posting that sort of thing because it 'does nothing.' I was told to shove it because I was 'following a meme' or something like that Well, let me say this in reply to anyone who will say such this time: I can do nothing but speak, and this journal is my voice. And I will not be silent. We are a society, and as a society we have certain duties to each other. Part of those duties is polite disagreement and debate. Another of those duties is to speak out when we see injustice being done. Our country is great because it can accommodate a wide variety of beliefs and politics. There literally is room for everyone. But when that acceptance is hijacked and used as an excuse for hate-speech, vitriol, and attacks, then that acceptance should turn to unilateral rejection of such behavior. I'm not asking people to copy this into their journal and pass it on. I'm posting it here because I believe that if we are silent on an injustice, we are giving approve of that injustice. Silence, then, is the greatest crime of all when we are trying to heal society.
If someone thinks there's nothing wrong with this... if they think that having web sites post the home addresses of people like the Frosts expressly for the purpose of harrassing them is 'all right'... if they see nothing wrong with some sick individuals calling for the harrassment and denigration and murder of people who disagree with them... then we need to make them aware of how unhealthy and frankly sociopathic this behavior is. This is our society, we are all a part of it, and if someone in our society thinks it's all right to do this sort of thing, we need to bring the point home that we cannot and will not tolerate it.
Pax.
EDIT: To clean up some thoughts.
