This certainly isn’t the first time Free Republic has been mentioned in regards to the racism found on that site, but to my knowledge it IS the first time it has made the news in Canada. The article refers to Free Republic as a blog, which it is not. Free Republic is a message board. Of course the comments quoted in the article aren’t representative of everyone at Free Republic but the message board has a history of racist and violent comments. Any message board that cannot provide the moderators needed to keep the board clear of hate posts should be shut down by the owner.
By Chris Parry, Vancouver Sun July 11, 2009
“A typical street whore.” “A bunch of ghetto thugs.” “Ghetto street trash.” “Wonder when she will get her first abortion.”
These are a small selection of some of the racially-charged comments posted to the conservative ‘Free Republic’ blog Thursday, aimed at U.S. President Barack Obama’s 11-year-old daughter Malia after she was photographed wearing a t-shirt with a peace sign on the front.
The thread was accompanied by a photo of Michelle Obama speaking to Malia that featured the caption, “To entertain her daughter, Michelle Obama loves to make monkey sounds.”
Though this may sound like the sort of thing one might read on an Aryan Nation or white power website, they actually appeared on what is commonly considered one of the prime online locations for U.S. Conservative grassroots political discussion and organizing – and for a short time, the comments seemed to have the okay of site administrators.
Moderators of the blog left the comments – and commenters – in place until a complaint was lodged by a writer doing research on the conservative movement, almost a full day later.
“Could you imagine what world leaders must be thinking seeing this kind of street trash and that we paid for this kind of street ghetto trash to go over there?” wrote one commenter.
“They make me sick …. The whole family… mammy, pappy, the free loadin’ mammy-in-law, the misguided chillin’, and especially ‘lil cuz… This is not the America I want representin’ my peeps,” wrote another. SOURCE
I pulled Lame Cherry from DailyPUMA (they never asked to be on it so they probably don’t care) after they too ran an insulting caption about Barack Obama’s daughters. It just happened to Sarah Palin, I am so sick and tired of these idiotic democrat vs republican barbs that get thrown back at each other in which the children are insulted.
Plus, one can’t even leave a comment on the lame cherry blog anyways, what arrogance.
http://www.dailypuma.com
Sage Reply:
July 12th, 2009 at 12:03 am
I feel politicians children should be left alone. The first time I remember being aware of a politician’s daughter being bashed was when Rush Limbaugh kept barking when Chelsea Clinton’s name was brought up. It was truly disgusting.
Wizcon Reply:
July 12th, 2009 at 6:15 am
Good for you Alessandro! I finally went there and looked because I see that site sourced so much on sites like Rosettasister. It seems it’s a source for the cherry picking of the outrageous claims
It’s one thing to use someone elses calims and innuendo’s for a basis of your beliefs and another to argue your point on your own merits.
I seems, at least, Lame Cherry is aptly named.
How long has this ‘free republic’ been online? I wonder when the Bush twins were in trouble for their partying hard nights in Austin, if comments were made then !
AND,,, even if they WERE made about the Bush twins drinking habits, they were adults at the time. Does not make it right, but Obama’s babies are BABIES still. They’re very very young! In my mind, president’s daughter or not, an adult can PROCESS trash talking 1000 times better than a child. So hopefully and probably, the Obama girls don’t know a thing about it.
Chris Parry uses a pseudonym to publish on the KOS hate site. Apparently, he feels this information isn’t worth mentioning in his article.
Sage Reply:
July 12th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
So? Doesn’t change a thing that was said on Free Republic, does it? What was said about that child for nothing more than wearing a peace symbol was vile and repugnant. A whore and ghetto trash for a peace symbol? It shouldn’t be said about a child for any reason but especially for wearing a peace symbol.
I suspect the people who wrote that crap are nothing more than white trash and racist white trash at that.
I guess when something is indefensible it’s a common tactic to attack the messenger.
It’s unfortunate that there are people on both the left and right that use our elected official’s son’s and daughter’s for blood sport. If our press focused on delivering news and unbiased information on the issues, and not 24/7 tabloid sensationalism, we’d be in a better place.
However, Chris Parry does have an agenda which is relevant to the discussion. Namely people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. I doubt he will be coming out with an attack article on the Daily Kos for comments focused on the Palin children (or Bush twins, etc.). Some of those comments have been equally as outrageous.
Who is the mysterious “writer doing research on the conservative movement”… perhaps Chris Parry himself?
Sage Reply:
July 13th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Actually lots of people visit Free Republic daily to see what’s going on there. A number of the looney tune right wingers who have gone on killing sprees lately had accounts at FR which is why people are keeping tabs on it.
Parry’s agenda isn’t relevant to what was said on FR. he didn’t make it up because I have seen cut and paste jobs directly from FR.
Yes, some of the verbal attacks on Palin’s and Bush’s kids were bad but I don’t remember seeing anyone calling them whores. Besides the nastiness at FR about Obama’s daughter there was a huge element of racism which is even more disturbing.
Can you source this please?
“A number of the looney tune right wingers who have gone on killing sprees lately had accounts at FR which is why people are keeping tabs on it.”
Sage Reply:
July 13th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
You can search for it using the search function as I’ve commented on their membership when I posted about them.
Scott Roeder was one of them if I remember correctly.
Unless the family is actively helping their member run (Like Chelsea and mini-McCain in 2008), they should be off limits. The candidate is running, not their family
siorry, forgot to subscribe