Strikethrough '07 [the power of dominionism]

[Pmyi]

I'm sure you've all heard about the recent events on LiveJournal. If you haven't, here's a basic rundown of what happened:

On May 29th, LiveJournal deleted around five hundred accounts and communities, a good majority of these fandom communities and writers/readers of fanfiction. Some of the communities also deleted were incest/rape survivor groups and a discussion group for the book Lolita.

The reason? Due to their interests, LiveJournal deleted them. Their interests may have been "rape", "incest", "shota," et cetera.

People began to look into the event and it was revealed that a vigilante group called Warriors for Innocence was behind it. Warriors for Innocence aims to get rid of "*****" to "protect the children." They called anyone who opposed them a ***** as well.

"In other words, with the "Warriors for Innocence" scandal, we may actually be dealing with part of a fairly extensive network of neo-Confederate, militia-sympathiser (if not flat out militia-member) "Christian Patriot" God-warriors-with-guns "Joel's Army" nutcases on our hand...one that potentially makes Focus on the Family or even the American Family Association look like the friggin' Society of Friends in comparison."

Link to the post.

A lot of people are calling Strikethrough '07 "Internet drama" and after reading rant after rant after rant I'm beginning to get tired of hearing about it. However, this has kind of opened my eyes.

If Strikethrough '07 -- the deletion by LiveJournal of five hundred journals and communities -- was the result of dominionists, imagine what would happen if dominionism influenced the United States or the world. Imagine what would happen to us, the atheists / agnostics.

Am I the only one who is frightened about this?

And sorry if this kind of post doesn't belong here. Just tell me, and I'll delete it. :')  

[Six Billion of Spades]

Though I have never used LiveJournal at all or, frankly, heard a word about this event until now, I have sadly run into a number of these "dominionists" you're talking about.

Dominionism appears to be an intrinsic part of human nature; I imagine something like that would stem from territorial behavior, a primitive impulse present in all of us. Of course, as Tears for Fears tells us, everybody wants to rule the world; it's just a matter of how much and what part.

Among the worst offenders are the ones who immediately dismiss certain ideas and push entirely subjective agendas, refusing to look beyond the possibly deceiving first impressions of their competitors. These are the people who claim the moral high ground by default and carry out these nonconstructive campaigns in the name of "protection" or "justice," when all they're really doing is propagating sensationalism and drawing unnecessary attention to what they want erased.

Now, I don't mind healthy opposition to certain ideas. Actually, nowadays, there are lots of things that should be opposed. But I really wish some people would sit down and actually figure out what they're fighting against before they start blowing the war trumpets.

I imagine most of these bigots eat at Burger King, just so they can always "have it their way."  

[Tenth Speed Writer]

Ugh.


The concept that established laws and national constitutions don't apply to the internet is still proving true.

Unfortunately, the concept of "Freedom of Speech" gets lumped in there with that.  

[Baron von Turkeypants]

You know, when asked what the most important pressing political issue for me is, I stated dominionism, even if there are more important things in the world. I was hoping I would have overestimated its severity.  

[Cirosan]

Democracy was founded on the basis of ensuring that dominionism did not so much as gain a foothold. Unfortunately, people - Americans in particular - seem to have forgotten that lately (i.e. 2000 - present day). Why do you think that is?  

[Baron von Turkeypants]

Cirosan

Democracy was founded on the basis of ensuring that dominionism did not so much as gain a foothold. Unfortunately, people - Americans in particular - seem to have forgotten that lately (i.e. 2000 - present day). Why do you think that is?

So few people understand the founding fathers' goals when they wrote the constitution, so when they read it and other documents from that era, their own interpretations are sometimes considered valid--"freedom of religion does not mean freedom of religion"

Of course, nothing could be farther from the truth.  

[AnonymouZ]

I hardly find the deletion of 500 journals an act of "dominion." I mean... s**t happens, and ***** or kinky people got ******** (pardon the pun.) But trust me, the world will keep on turning and i bet most of them are already starting a new journal somewhere else, if not a new one on livejournal... again.  

[Theophrastus]

AnonymouZ

I hardly find the deletion of 500 journals an act of "dominion." I mean... s**t happens, and ***** or kinky people got ******** (pardon the pun.) But trust me, the world will keep on turning and i bet most of them are already starting a new journal somewhere else, if not a new one on livejournal... again.

I think the reason people are upset is not because of an inconvenience due to relocation; the trouble is the fact that loud minority interest groups can have a widely destructive effect on hundreds of accounts because of a few genuinely bad ones. And that large presences such as LJ can be so easily swayed by radicals.

From what I've heard the efforts were about 5-10% accurate in removing illegal content and ToS violations and the rest went towards messing up the otherwise pleasant day-to-day of fanfic writers, role players and much more incriminatingly to LJ, support groups for victims of abuse.

Wiping out hundreds of accounts to stab at a few isn't really my idea of efficacy. But again the information I've heard is secondhand, so don't consider me to be speaking for authority, just principal.  

[Pmyi]

If I remember correctly, it was only twelve journals / communities that remained banned and were actually promoting *****>  

[Meirelle]

This freakin' creeps the crap out of me. I know plenty of people who have "rape" or "incest" in their LJ interests, but that doesn't mean they partake of it. It only means that, hey, maybe they have an interest in rape help groups, or they like to write fiction about incest. That was the dumbest s**t LJ ever did. But it really scares me. I mean, if those people can get to LJ, then who knows where else? eek  

[Pmyi]

Exactly my point. It is really scary to think about. It's innocent people with INTERESTS.

Religion and what people will do in the name of it scares me sometimes.