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Welcome, ACLU

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Re: Welcome, ACLU

#811

Post by freehunter »

lol214365 wrote: post #724
justinlaster wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I get the feeling conservatives may not feel welcome at YC. Sounds like a personal problem. "Oh no, an organization that defends people's liberties is making me feel uncomfortable!"

More like: "Oh no, an organization that casts advocacy for their leftist politics as defense of people's liberties is making me feel uncomfortable!" Opposing a border wall defends no one's civil liberties.

So they're not going to have to use eminent domain to purchase the land to build the wall?

A lot of conservative landowners on the border are very much against the idea, and private property ownership is part of the reason the current fence has gaps in it.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/09/17/texas-border-w...

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#812

Post by andy_ppp »

andy_ppp wrote: post #146

There are quite a few comments by presumably more right wing people marked as dead here. Excluding these people from debate this way makes hacker news less useful IMO. Why not make constructive criticism instead of downvoting, I realise it's easier...

It's really great to see some interesting discussions of the points here rather than needless downvoting! I learned some things too and nobody got hurt.

I hasten to add that I think this order is designed as perfectly as possible to piss of liberals and entrench Trump supporters.

I mean the left is very good at pretending Obama wasn't an evil disaster for say Pakistanis or you know the rule of law. Just my opinion we need to get rid of executive orders and allow people to vote more directly. Politians should be lowered to civil servants rather than gravey train shoe ins. Wait and see if Trump does force through a two term limit for congress!!!

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#813

Post by danaliv »

coldpie wrote: post #569
CydeWeys wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To really spell it out, as these "pro-life/pro-choice" terms are somewhat esoteric and not always understood by foreign speakers, the ACLU is in favor of abortion rights and many conservatives are against abortion rights.

The terms I usually see are "pro-choice" and "anti-choice." Everyone on the planet is "pro-life" and thinks abortion is a bad thing, the question is whether outlawing abortion results in better outcomes than allowing it. I think there is room for reasonable disagreement, though legally speaking it's largely a settled issue.

> Everyone on the planet … thinks abortion is a bad thing

I think it's a pretty damn good thing when it's needed, so let's cool it with the "everyone on the planet thinks" business.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#814

Post by freehunter »

asveikau wrote: post #573
tim333 wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guidelines: "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon." I think this counts as an interesting new phenomenon.

Is it new if they've been promising to do this for ~1 year? This is exactly my point, that people on here flame you into the ground if you talk about "politics", but it could be that some of us 1 year ago would have been legitimately trying to talk about what was to come.

Some day we're going to have flying cars. There, now when we actually get flying cars, no one is allowed to talk about it.

You see the point there? Lots of crazy people run for president and say crazy things, that doesn't mean you panic about it right then, because the odds of them getting elected is so slim. And lots of people say crazy things to get elected, then never do those things because those things would be crazy. What we have here is a crazy person who got elected by promising crazy things, and is now following through on those crazy things.

That's why this is novel even though he's been saying these things for over a year.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#815

Post by cptskippy »

nowarninglabel wrote: post #614
cptskippy wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would caution people about how they donate to the ACLU. I made a donation last year and since then have been awash in solicitations for donations from SCLC, Planned Parenthood, Grean Peace, PETA, and other leftist organizations. While I don't object to many of these organizations, I take my privacy very seriously and I wasn't aware when I donated that my personal information would be given/sold out the way it has b…

Yes, I experienced this as well, though it was about 8 years ago. I was really disappointed in the ACLU, I would have thought of all people they would be the last ones to sell off private information. It bothers me that all these groups have spent more money on sending me mail in the ensuing years than the original donation amount to the ACLU. At least now it seems like they let you opt out. This is a problem in the…

As an employee of an old world charity trying desperately to connect with younger generations, I completely agree with you.

Our organization struggles to unsubscribe people from mailing lists. It's kind of ridiculous.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#816

Post by mynameisvlad »

cptskippy wrote: post #598
buechs wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's an option on the donation page where you can opt-in to the ACLU sharing your details with other charitable organizations. (the default is opt-out).

I verified via the wayback machine and the page is the same today as it was when I made my donation. I'm fairly certain I would not have checked that box. I make it a point to read checkboxes very carefully as companies are so prone to anti-patterns to get you to agree to share your info or join mailing lists.

Except, you know, they're a bunch of lawyers so any abuse of their own privacy policy is not really going to fly with them, especially from an optics perspective. It's far more likely that you did, in fact, click the checkbox, and just forgot about it than the ACLU deciding to ignore your request and forward your information anyway.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#817

Post by judahmeek »

gregw134 wrote: post #781
bradleyjg wrote: post #758

Earlier quoted context omitted.

hearing this kind of rhetoric from Democrats and left-leaning media("they give up rights when the went into business") is exactly what caused the center of the country to swing further right in the last election. Do you have any evidence for that?

I grew up in the Midwest and still visit sometimes. Many people I know think Democrats have lost their minds with this issue (and the bathroom debate).

That's not evidence of a political swing though.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#818

Post by DashRattlesnake »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #541
jessriedel wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nominally, but so are other organizations that are clearly partisan in practice. I don't think anyone disputes that members of the ACLU are overwhelmingly democrats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_Liberties_Union... It's hard to imagine this doesn't have real-world consequences, e.g., strategically choosing to not defend right-leaning speech as vigorously as left-leaning speech.

They defend actual Nazis. That's about as right-leaning as you can possibly get.

Actually, I think a more telling test is "would they defend a Republican's civil rights (against liberals)?"

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#819

Post by haldean »

DashRattlesnake wrote: post #644
alanh wrote: post #590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You used the passive voice, “the ACLU are being politicized right now as being anti-Trump.” The ACLU, in their official communications and advertisements, have been actively and explicitly anti-Trump. Witness their current 'pinned tweet' for example: https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/825805289572151298 I don’t really mind that, but let’s not ignore that the ACLU intentionally earned their reputation as an opponent of t…

A long time ago, during the GWB administration, I donated to the ACLU and got placed on the postal mailing lists of innumerable unrelated Democratic-leaning activist organizations. I was disappointed by that, since the partisan association cheapens their work and opens them up to attack.

Usually, organizations sell these lists to anyone who pays for them. It's not the ACLU's fault that left-leaning organizations perceived that list as valuable while right-leaning organizations didn't; my guess would be that right-leaning organizations bought the lists of new donors more frequently during 2008-2016.

Re: Welcome, ACLU

#820

Post by jrockway »

cptskippy wrote: post #598
buechs wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there's an option on the donation page where you can opt-in to the ACLU sharing your details with other charitable organizations. (the default is opt-out).

I verified via the wayback machine and the page is the same today as it was when I made my donation. I'm fairly certain I would not have checked that box. I make it a point to read checkboxes very carefully as companies are so prone to anti-patterns to get you to agree to share your info or join mailing lists.

I also didn't check the checkbox and haven't heard from the other organizations you cite.
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