Censorship at the Local Level - RF Cafe Forums

Greetings:

Those of you who follow the illegal immigration issue (both in the U.S. and in other countries) might be interested in my encounter with the editor of my local newspaper, the Mt. Airy News.

Here is the hyperlink to the dialog:
https://www.mtairynews.com/articles/2008 ... blog03.txt

I consider this to be a significant issue for two reasons. First, Mr. Andy Matthews has extensively used his bully pulpit as editor to advocate for toleration and acceptance of illegal immigration ever since he was installed into the position last spring. Second, he has redacted a paragraph of my post (12th in the list) for no good reason. His excuse is that it constitutes a personal attack, which I contested (see below for exactly what I wrote). When confronted with the issue, he would not address my objection. This smacks of censorship and downright unfair treatment.

Here is the final paragraph that he omitted (addressed to an anonymous participant):

“Since you are hiding behind an anonymous screen name, we cannot determine who you are or what your motives might be. You, yourself could be an illegal alien, or a local farmer, construction or landscaping company, hotel owner, or any other person who is personally profiting from the use of illegal labor – possibly paying off-the-record. You can refute the supposition, but without identifying yourself, it will be meaningless.”

Here is the note I wrote to object to his censorship:

"Greetings Andy:

I see that the last paragraph of my latest post was omitted. If it was unintentional, then please add it back to the post and ignore the following. I thank you for doing so.

If the omission was intentional, then the act amounts to censorship in a manner that is incongruent with the concept of the free press which you as a newspaper editor represent. A personal attack must, by definition, be directed toward a person. The anonymous monikers used here – other than by you and me - are not identifiable persons.

In fact, the last paragraph was intentionally designed to be provocative to the extent that it might foster a more honest exchange of ideas, where the participants meet on an even playing field that includes identity disclosure. Hiding behind any form of anonymity, particularly when making bold claims, is pure folly – the Internet is full of it."

Mr. Matthews has complete control over what is posted and decides what the public will see. That makes all the material he personally edits suspect, in my opinion. I duly cancelled my subscription to his newspaper, because his actions have proven The Mt. Airy News to be untrustworthy under his reign.

_________________
- Kirt Blattenberger
RF Cafe Progenitor & Webmaster

Hi Kirt

I am in total agreement with you. Regardless of your position on the matter, the editor of a newspaper should not be censoring your input for such a trivial reason. The impression he leaves is that you let loose with a severe personal attack on somebody and he did the heroic job of not exposing the unsuspecting public to it.

I actually took a little time to read through some of Andy's writings and you are correct in saying that his enthusiastic support to illegal immigrants is suspect. Do you know if he or someone in his family owns a farm, or other business that is using illegal laborers? I'd check into it if I were you.

Keep us posted. This guy really needs to be put in place.


James King

Here is a recent article from the UK that talks about the problem of illegal immigration there.

500,000 fewer Britons in work following influx of Eastern Europeans
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/a ... ge_id=1770

It's happening everywhere and the damn politicians are sell us all short for illegal votes. What can we do to stop them? Anybody got any ideas?

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... Jose' Arrina

You are quite correct Jose, we are dealing with out own version of your uncontrolled illegal immigration disaster here (I assume you are from America). We here in Britain - and the EU in general - are reaping the rewards of our open arms policy. We have gotten exactly what we invited. London was recently designated as the world's most admirable city due to our divertisy. The downside is that I never visit there anymore because it is unrecognisable from my boyhood familarity with the city. It has changed profoundly. I am no opponent of change, but this level is shocking to me, and to most engineers I know.

At least some in America are rising up against the inanity of your politicians. Ours learned long ago that the commoners will accept their divine wisdom and get along with life as best they can. Do not believe the media when it says all of Europe hates America. The truth is that while we love the montherland and would defend her to the death, we sorely deisre the form of liberty and citizen action available in the U.S.

Keep up the good fight. - Cheers

Yeah a picture is worth a thousand words...

_________________
... Jose' Arrina

LOL. Thanks to kirt for sending me this one.

_________________
... Jose' Arrina

Greetings:

Well, the editor got me upset enough to purchase the MtAiryNews.net domain name and put up a website to fight the lunacy of aiding and abetting the illegal activity.

https://www.mtairynews.net

It's just a start, but if nobody takes a stand, then it goes unchecked. I will eventually be adding a forum there. It'll be interesting to see what comes of it.

My dental hygenist told an interesting story yesterday. Her son was in first grade last year in Kernersville Elementary (NC). A little more than half the class was Hispanic, and about half of those could not speak, read, or write a word of English. The rest of the class was severely restricted in its learning progress because of the dang No Child Left Behind intitiative. She enrolled him in a private school this year.

Now, before you accuse me of having a bias against Hispanics, I DO NOT. I have a bias against people in this country illegally. My ample writings on my open arms invitations to legal immigrants from worldwide origins can be found both here and in other locations across the Web. Your comments on the issue are welcome.

_________________
- Kirt Blattenberger
RF Cafe Progenitor & Webmaster

I am sick of this illegal crap. I'm from NC like you, from around Raleigh. We had a story in the paper recently that reported the main Chapel Hill hospital had more than 50% of its births to illegals in 2007. It talked about the Medicad, federal and state subsidies that paid for the care, as well as for a car seat, diapers, baby formuls, etc. Then there's the prenatal and newborn care that's all provided on my substantial tax dollars (I paid more than $15k to the state last year, $25 to the Fed). It said that most of the women are there having their second, third or fourth Jackpot Babies.

I read the info on the MtAiryNews.net website and you're right Kirt about this has to stop. It's good to see someone in the public eye like you are taking a stand, because us little guys don't have a voice. You'd better watch your back though, because with the MS-13 and other Hispanic gangs moving into the area, you could be targeted for a driveby shooting.

Seriously, be careful bro!

PC (sorry, but I was born with those initials!)

Here's another one for you to ponder.

From the Tampa Tribune:

"Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas [is] the second busiest maternity ward in the U.S. In 2006, 70 percent of the women giving birth in Parkland were illegal immigrants. That added up to 11,200 babies for which Medicaid kicked in $34.5 million to deliver these babies, the feds another $9.5 million and Dallas taxpayers tossed in $31.3 million...

By law, illegal immigrants cannot be denied medical care based on their inability to pay or their immigration status. These women also receive free prenatal care, medication, car seats, bottles, diapers and formula."

Our country is under seige and the pathetic business owners buy this slave labor and pass the helath care and living costs on to everybody else. That's why both Rs and Ds are guilty of the problem. It will take an uprising of the legal citizens to stop it. It will take people boycotting those businesses.

But hey, they're comfortable with all our production going to China and our Air Force tankers being designed and built in France (oh, and partially assembled in America), so why would they be willing to inconvenience themselves for anything?

All I can say is when the s**t hits the fan, my neighbors can fend for themselves, because I know they aren't doing anything to help now.