I talk and write about my parents way too much. It’s because I am both in awe of them and fascinated by them; they provided me with a wonderful and very different kind of childhood. One aspect of that childhood was their involvement in the pro-life movement. They became active pro-lifers before Roe V Wade.
One story that my father would tell from time to time has always stuck with me. They were having some kind of pro-life gathering at our house, and some professional political operative was there to sort of guide them along. At the end of the evening, he was speaking privately with my father, and he told my Dad to be leary of professional pro-lifers he didn’t actually know; according to this guy, there were basically spies/bad actors from the other side infiltrating the movement. This conversation transpired in the 1970’s.
I think about that guy and the advice he gave my father often when I see some of the things that some self professed conservatives say on the internet. For instance, on a site which shall remain unnamed, our gracious host Simon relayed an experience he had with a woman in a pepper field in Costa Rica; around that same time, he also made a comment in which he questioned whether women who are involved in prostitution of their own free will should really be considered criminals. By the time the other members who were commenting were done, Simon had been painted as a sex trafficker and a rapist.
Why? Why would conservatives twist Simon’s words in such a way? Why were they so invested in portraying him in the worst possible light? Why did they even care?
Have you ever wondered if maybe some of those who call themselves conservatives on the internet are really conservatives? I have.
ST UnWoked & UnVaxxed! 
This is my theory: just as there are corporate spies, there are political spies. One of their main functions is to identify real conservatives and do everything possible to discourage them and drive them away. I don’t know how else to explain some of the bizarre behavior I have witnessed from some “conservatives” both online and off.
I experienced this personally and in real life over 20 years ago, when I attempted to become a pro-life volunteer. The guy in charge on our side of the state called me and asked if I would consider being their media representative with local news outlets. I accepted the challenge. Everyone on our side of the state (the western side) was wonderful-I had grown up knowing most of them, and none of them were being paid. All of them were doing it as a labor of love. But we were made to understand that the professional pro-lifers who worked out of a skyscraper in Boston knew far better than we did about everything, especially about how all the money that we raised-which was substantial-ought to be spent. They were keenly interested in our fundraising, but other than that, they took a very dismissive attitude towards all of us-I see in hindsight that it was all of us, at the time I thought it was just me. It’s important to know: the local pro-life group that my parents helped to found in Western Mass was-stress that, was-the most successful segment of the pro-life movement in Massachusetts. They raised a lot of money, generated a great deal of interest, held a lot of events, and just attracted more people than the other parts of the state did. But the political “experts” who would come to visit us from time to time from Boston never had a positive or an encouraging attitude.
For a very long time, these political geniuses-our Ivy League educated betters, as they seemed to think of themselves-never showed their worst face to all of of us at the same time. They would single people out, isolate them, and scream at them when no one else was around. This happened to me when I called the office in Boston once trying to get some professional political advice on how to deal with some issue that had come up. I was greeted by one of the highest ranking and highest paid pro-lifers in the state; she started yelling at me. Really, seriously, yelling at me, and she told me that she was busy and that she didn’t have time for me. I swear on everything that is holy, I didn’t say or do anything to warrant that kind of treatment; we had only been on the phone a few seconds, and she didn’t even allow me to finish my question before she started yelling: I am not exaggerating, she was really yelling. I never told any of the pro-lifers in Western Mass about that incident: I didn’t want to be seen as someone who was causing problems or creating drama. I didn’t want to go down some rabbit hole about how somebody in Boston had been mean to me. What I didn’t realize at the time, was that I wasn’t the only one they were doing this to, and at the time, no one else who experienced it wanted to make it an issue either.
They only yelled at people occasionally; the worst part was just their general unfriendliness, and in hindsight, their total lack of interest in attracting new people and welcoming new people and retaining old people. The pro-lifers from Western Mass were wonderful, always very welcoming towards new comers, very loving and supportive. The professionals from Boston were cold, dismissive, and at times downright rude. As a general rule of thumb, when people who say that they want to lead a grassroots movement are not welcoming to new comers, and not kind to old timers, that’s probably a red flag.
I get the same kind of vibe from the people running certain conservative sites that I got from professional pro-lifers in Boston. It isn’t a good vibe.
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I would like to think that I was driven off of a “transparent” blog site by one or more double agents playing the long game to silence charismatic types before our ideas can be exposed to a broader audience; however, I think they were just jealous.
On the other hand I have noticed that some avatars seem to create doubt and confusion on every OP. I refer to them as avatars because their writing appears to me to be done by more than one person. So yes, I agree that the game is afoot on both nominally conservative blogs that have banned me for life.
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Assuming your theory is true, I suspect this is a one-way street because conservatives always prefer to lose with dignity. When we are not losing to the Progs, we join in on the fun of circular firing squads that are never in short supply.
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What is encouraging about our side is how amazingly courageous are our beta-boys under the leadership of a strong and bullying female when they have isolated and are attacking a single alpha.
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*What is encouraging about our side is how amazingly courageous are our beta-boys under the leadership of a strong and bullying female when they have isolated and are attacking a single alpha.”
Re: the above-quoted comment, ST: /sarcasm on/? I agree, but wonder why that litter box and its clones deserve to be noticed. (Hectic work-day; good to ‘chill’ here for a bit.)
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P.S. You raise an interesting and novel idea here.
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Thank you. I think the unfriendly to newcomers/unkind to old timers adage is a good rule to go by. At the very least, a “leader” who is often or always unfriendly to newcomers and unkind to old timers will do far more harm than good; such a person is just not worth whatever intellectual guidance they may say they can offer. It doesn’t really matter whether that person is malicious or just incompetent.
I am not talking here about a normal person who messes up from time to time; I am not referring to people who are occasionally unfriendly to newcomers or occasionally unkind to old timers: with some of our “leaders”, the behavior is ingrained. It’s how they treat everybody, or almost everybody, all the time, or almost all of the time.
Contrast that with Donald Trump; he loves almost everybody, and he is very welcoming towards new people and very kind and respectful to most of the old hands. He didn’t get elected by turning his nose up at Americans and informing us that he is smarter than we are: I think people are getting really sick of that sort of thing, and thank God for that.
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Interesting post, JaC; great description of “sheep in wolves’ clothing”. (No discourtesy to our dear werewombat intended.)
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Thanks, Nanda. If corporations do it, then it stands to reason that those involved in politics, especially at the professional level, do it as well.
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“I talk and write about my parents way too much. It’s because I am both in awe of them and fascinated by them; they provided me with a wonderful and very different kind of childhood.”
Not at all; guilty of the same admiration for two people who raised me with valuable life lessons: work hard, get an education and don’t expect any free lunches. My father adored Lee Iacocca and that just set the tone for my upbringing!
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I think you and I both hit the jackpot when it comes to parents.
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“I think you and I both hit the jackpot when it comes to parents.”
Count yours truly in this blessed category, too, ladies.
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“I agree, but wonder why that litter box and its clones deserve to be noticed.”
“I think the unfriendly to newcomers/unkind to old timers adage is a good rule to go by.”
Ok, seriously girls, these comments are the funniest I’ve read in a good while.
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Thank you, ET 🙂
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Chapter 2 please mai krap & por favor?
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Soon 🙂
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