Democrat Speech Codes

As a political blogger, and a partisan one at that, part of my daily reading ritual includes reading the major discussion forums. They represent the pulse of the people. The everyday thoughts, rants, and ramblings of everyday people who are interested in politics, the issues, and current events. They are passionate and raw and not at all for the political faint of heart.

It is a political education in and of itself just to read the two main partisan discusssion forums. One on the right - conservative in nature. One on the left - liberal or "progressive" in nature. Most people gravitate naturally to one or the other. I read both. Granted, one of them is purely for comic relief. But I read both.

On the right I read Free Republic. This site is conservative in nature and features several forums for posting articles, with lively discussion following each article by posters including yours truly. Free Republic gained notoriety lately with a post that started the takedown of Dan Rather over memogate, when an alert poster caught the fact that the memos were fabricated - almost in real time.

On the far, far, wacky left I read Democratic Underground. If you haven't checked it out, you should. If you want to take the pulse of the anti-war, Bush hating, hysterical left - this is the place. Try the discussion forum for the election of 2004, which is still in full hysterical meltdown over the election. (I would post a link for you to check out, but they generally get vulgar quickly, so I'll protect the sensibilities of some of my readers. Go there at your own risk.) This is the forum where they were pushing the conspiracy theory that the owners of Diebold company, as friends of Bush (or shrub or **** or Chimpy or other names that they call him), stole the election by hacking the electronic voting machines. Really.

I have a screen name at Free Republic, which makes me a "Freeper". And a proud one.

I've thought about registering at DU to comment on their posts on ocassion, but I'm pretty sure that I would be quickly banned as a conservative "disruptor". Yeah, that's right. Democrats - champions of free speech - have a draconian speech code known as the "rules for posting" that ban conservative speech as coming from "disruptors". Translation - they're too frail to have their opinions challenged, so don't bother them. If you're a conservative, or generally think that Bush is doing a good job, don't bother posting. Don't believe me? Here's a quote from their "Rules for Posting":

Who is Welcome on Democratic Underground, and Who is Not

Democratic Underground is an online community for Democrats and other progressives. Members are expected to be generally supportive of progressive ideals, and to support Democratic candidates for political office.

We ban conservative disruptors who are opposed to the broad goals of this website. If you think overall that George W. Bush is doing a swell job, or if you wish to see Republicans win, or if you are generally supportive of conservative ideals, please do not register to post, as you will likely be banned.

Notice that you don't have to behave badly to get banned. You don't have to swear, or call people names, or pick fights, or type in all caps, or any other disruptive behavior to be a "dispruptor". You just have to disagree with them.

You can read all of the rules for posting, in the form of a draconian speech code, here at this link.

I checked Free Republics rules. They just say, essentially, please don't behave badly.

Yeah, Democrats are all for free speech. Unless you disagree with them. Then you are a disruptor who must be banned. Wimps.