As I said in the title: "censorship, of a sort". I agree that it's not censorship per se. It is, however, a case of being punished for exercise of free speech.
"Perfectly understandable", you say. Let's say you founded a company that makes ultrasound machines. Let's further suppose that you are strongly pro-life, donate money to the McCain campaign, and are subsequently interviewed about this support. Finally, let's suppose that your company starts getting threats from pro-choice doctors to stop buying your ultrasound machines unless they fire you, so they fire you.
Would such an action also be 'perfectly understandable', in your view? I promise you, even though I am pro-choice and definitely not a McCain supporter, I'd be pissed as hell on your behalf if that had happened to you, and if I'd found that story instead of Cooper's, I'd have posted it here.
Your analogy is cute, but not really relevant. The KKK is, not to put too fine a point on it, a domestic terrorist organization. And supporting the KKK does not seem to be consistent with the goals of the NAACP _as an organization_. Contrariwise, there _are_ a number of people that are gun owners and users that support Obama and his policies.
"What if Dan himself had professed to supporting the KKK?" Heck, why not add a few more things on there? Make him a serial killer. Make him a professed hater of kittens, Mom, and apple pie, and an inveterate burner of flags.
That's a different situation, and I think that it should have been handled differently.
"You cannot kneel down...": so, as one of the people that contacted the company and promised (emptily, as you weren't in the market for one of their guns) to boycott them, you've just put yourself in that analogy as the driver of a car on that highway, and specifically as someone who apparently believes that kneeling in the middle of a highway is a death sentence...you're going to run him down. Aren't analogies fun?
Dan may well have thought through his decision and its likely consequences. Maybe he was willing to take the risk that there were enough reflexive jerks out there to get him canned. You don't know any more on that subject than I do.
"Rabidly anti-rights"? This here is Obama's actual position as a candidate: http://obama.3cdn.net/7d467fe75a3029d7df_hum6injwr.pdf I followed some of your links off the post you referenced above. I'd say that he's not 'anti-rights', he simply disagrees with you as to the degree of freedom with which some rights ought to be able to be exercised. Nor is he 'rabid' about anything, as far as I know.
I don't claim that there's a simple decision for cases like these. I've been chewing on a similar situation for years: someone whose work I admire has some political views that I strongly disagree with, and I've considered boycotting them as a result. But I'm not calling a witch hunt on that person regardless of my eventual decision.
You are welcome to take whatever position you like regarding Obama's candidacy, or Cooper's advocacy of it. But I do not believe that Cooper Firearms' board of directors' decision was the honorable one.
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branchandroot
(no subject)
Date: 31 October 2008 00:14 (UTC)As I said in the title: "censorship, of a sort". I agree that it's not censorship per se. It is, however, a case of being punished for exercise of free speech.
"Perfectly understandable", you say. Let's say you founded a company that makes ultrasound machines. Let's further suppose that you are strongly pro-life, donate money to the McCain campaign, and are subsequently interviewed about this support. Finally, let's suppose that your company starts getting threats from pro-choice doctors to stop buying your ultrasound machines unless they fire you, so they fire you.
Would such an action also be 'perfectly understandable', in your view? I promise you, even though I am pro-choice and definitely not a McCain supporter, I'd be pissed as hell on your behalf if that had happened to you, and if I'd found that story instead of Cooper's, I'd have posted it here.
Your analogy is cute, but not really relevant. The KKK is, not to put too fine a point on it, a domestic terrorist organization. And supporting the KKK does not seem to be consistent with the goals of the NAACP _as an organization_. Contrariwise, there _are_ a number of people that are gun owners and users that support Obama and his policies.
"What if Dan himself had professed to supporting the KKK?" Heck, why not add a few more things on there? Make him a serial killer. Make him a professed hater of kittens, Mom, and apple pie, and an inveterate burner of flags.
That's a different situation, and I think that it should have been handled differently.
"You cannot kneel down...": so, as one of the people that contacted the company and promised (emptily, as you weren't in the market for one of their guns) to boycott them, you've just put yourself in that analogy as the driver of a car on that highway, and specifically as someone who apparently believes that kneeling in the middle of a highway is a death sentence...you're going to run him down.
Aren't analogies fun?
Dan may well have thought through his decision and its likely consequences. Maybe he was willing to take the risk that there were enough reflexive jerks out there to get him canned. You don't know any more on that subject than I do.
"Rabidly anti-rights"? This here is Obama's actual position as a candidate: http://obama.3cdn.net/7d467fe75a3029d7df_hum6injwr.pdf
I followed some of your links off the post you referenced above. I'd say that he's not 'anti-rights', he simply disagrees with you as to the degree of freedom with which some rights ought to be able to be exercised. Nor is he 'rabid' about anything, as far as I know.
I don't claim that there's a simple decision for cases like these. I've been chewing on a similar situation for years: someone whose work I admire has some political views that I strongly disagree with, and I've considered boycotting them as a result. But I'm not calling a witch hunt on that person regardless of my eventual decision.
You are welcome to take whatever position you like regarding Obama's candidacy, or Cooper's advocacy of it. But I do not believe that Cooper Firearms' board of directors' decision was the honorable one.