So I came home Friday night and decided to cruise the Rants & Raves section of the detroit.craigslist.org website. With all the stuff happening with Kwame Kilpatrick and his sordid shenanigans, it has become quite the hotbed for my fellow local disgruntled citizens to voice their (unfortunately and oftentimes racist) opinion of the city of Detroit and the people that run it. As an aside, I recommend everyone take a look at their local Craigslist Rants & Raves. It really has come to serve as a very accurate barometer of the current social climate.
On a lark, I submitted a half page post titled “No taxation without representation.” After finishing, as an afterthought, I submitted a link to the post on reddit.com and went to bed.
When I woke up, I had received over a dozen emails, including one that informed me that my post had landed on the front page of reddit. It has now been cross-posted by who the hell knows to the San Diego, Chicago and Tampa Bay Craigslist, as well as another dozen assorted blogs, including one in German.
I found it truly amazing that someone with such a small voice, in a secluded corner of the internet could say something in such a way that The People would take it up and REALLY make it THEIR voice.
That got me to thinking…
Although the network media has a strong sway on public opinion, it would seem that the internet has really become the voice of The People. As we have seen in this current election, the Net is a powerful fundraising tool. And as the early adopters of the Net already knew, and the corporations and powers-that-be have come to know, it is an even more powerful opinion raising tool. Even in the early days of Usenet, before the politicians and corporations got ahold of it, The People pushed their ideas and knowledge and opinions out there and changed people’s minds.
While reviewing some of the comments that people had left following my post, I was at first alarmed by some of them. There were suggestions of government intrusion into my life for what I had written and irrational conclusions reached by people that had misunderstood my ravings. There were even some questions, almost pleadings from people asking ME for direction. Questions like, “What’s Next?” and “What can people do?” I even had a mysterious invitation to join a secret and exciting “plan” of some sort (he wasn’t very specific).
And that’s when I got mad. Why should I be worried about my government coming to get me like some boogieman in the night? Any why are our fellow citizens, The People, coming to ME for advice when we pay SO much money in taxes to a government that is supposed to be WORKING FOR US AND SORTING THIS SHIT OUT!
It made me realize how important a single voice can be, and how The People can turn one voice into the voice of a hundred or a thousand or a million. So to answer the most rational of the questions I received, educate yourself, your family, your friends and your neighbors. Don’t depend on any one source for your information and listen to the people around you, even if you don't agree with them.
AND NEVER STOP TALKING ABOUT IT. I mean, the first line of the Constitution is We the People, and the very first amendment guarantees it as our right.
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2 comments:
Most of the "black helicopter" replies on reddit were tongue-in-cheek. Though I imagine not all.
Still the mere fact that that kind of comment comes up as often as it does, serious or otherwise, is a symptom. :(
Our freedoms have been eroded over the last eight years by the worst and least "American" adminstration I hope any of us will ever see.
It makes sense that people feel a little paranoid about what they can, or more to the point, should say when these folks are ruthless and unconcerned with the constitution.
On the other hand, we can take a little comfort knowing that if Bush administration was so unbelievable incompetent in Iraq, those "black helicopters" are likely to be just as inefficient here.
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