You are allowed to state your peace. I can see where you are coming from. As long as you do not say my/our caring about this is wrong, and stay in your own beliefs, I’m cool with that.
There’s a lot of things I don’t give a flying fuck about. This is not one of them. – Just as there are a lot of things I care passionately about that you would make you go “huh?”
How could you miss them? wring’s was the first substantative reply you received, and it was referred to at least thrice by later posters. If you’re going to start a thread, the least you can do is read the replies.
In a recent thread about my very early delivery of a baby, there’s been almost 6,000 hits and 180-something posts from complete and total strangers who know nothing of me, my husband, my son or my brand new baby daughter in intensive care. I have no reason to believe that a single one of them knows me personally. Yet I’ve received generous offers of prayer, information, premie clothing, a handmade quilt, and countless shoulders to cry on should I need it.
Off this board, there are at least four churches I know of who have listed my daughter on their prayer lists, and she is prayed for weekly or daily by at least 500 people. The FOAF who runs the campground I camp at called me in the hospital to wish us well and sent flowers. I have received offers of money, more clothing, bassinets, a stroller and endless rides to and from the hospital - all from strangers.
Do I expect you to give a fuck about a total stranger?
No.
But I’m very, very grateful that there are hundreds of people who do.
The fact that Terry Schiavo is all over the news is (almost paradoxically) the very reason I DO care that Terry Schiavo is all over the news.
Lemme 'splain. I SHOULDN’T know who she is. None of us should. There’s no sane reason she shouldn’t have died years ago, quietly, privately, in accordance with her husband’s decision to remove her feeding tube, as was his right and responsibility as next of kin. Instead, in the intervening 15 years since her brain died, at the insistence of her family who refuse to let themselves grieve, the Florida state government and now the federal government have butted in and said “we’ll make that choice for you.” That scares the crap out of me. That should scare anyone who could find themselves in either Michael or Terry Schiavo’s position. Which is, of course, everyone.
As for the OP I can see not caring about Terry Schiavo individually. But the case has gone beyond that point. How can you not be concerned with how our elected officials behave?
And yes in addition to posting this I also contacted my congressperson and made my feelings about the case known. I’ve also sent an e-mail to my husband telling him exactly what to do were I in Ms. Schiavo’s unfortunate state.
Of course posting to a bulletin board is accomplishing something! That’s what *open-minded * people do - listen, discuss, and then make up their own minds after hashing it all out. Then what do they do? They write their congressman.
After reading (or being subjected to) your recent threads here, I am compelled to step in and suggest that maybe you could benefit from a little professional analysis, if you get my drift.
I am being sincere in this. I am not being flippant at all. From one Doper to another, if this isn’t sociopathic behavior, then I’ve never seen it.