I have been banned from the Christian Left's Facebook page. I can go there and see the posts but I cannot "like" anything. I cannot comment on anything. And I cannot post anything. This happened at around 5pm the Saturday after Thanksgiving, just a few days after I wrote my post on how my belief in Jesus Christ places me on the Left. It just does. I have no choice based on His teachings. Read that post if you are interested in that question. It's the one before this one.
Now, how did mild-mannered me get banned from a Facebook page? It was easy, let me tell you. I have a friend. Let me call her Kathleen. I found out today that Kathleen had voiced polite and mild disagreement with The Christian Left's choice of a photograph they used to illustrate the poverty that would come to America's children if Romney were elected. The photo was of an emaciated child in Africa, and Kathleen thought the comparison was a bit much. She thought it was over the top. And so do I.
For criticizing this photo, this mild but polite disagreement on an editorial choice, Kathleen was banned, apparently for life, from posting, "liking," or commenting on the Christian Left's page.
One thing I'm not is a hypocrite. These facts had an effect on me. Had I continued my relationship with the Christian Left exactly as it was, knowing how Kathleen was treated, I could not have lived with myself. It would have been hypocritical.
So what did I do?
I went to the Christian Left's page and asked a question. I told them that I had a friend who had been banned for a mild disagreement and mistaken for a troll. I assured them she was a person of good will and was in no way a troll. I asked them how long her banishment would last and when would we welcome her back into the fold, as surely Jesus would do.
For this I, too, was banned.
I was meek, mild, polite. I did not question their authority to ban her. I only asked when she could come back, and I give you my word I asked nicely.
Now the Christian Left has a very strict anti-troll policy, which I did not know until today. In fact, I didn't even know what a troll was until today. I looked it up online in the urban dictionary and found that the word refers to one who posts deliberately provocative material in an attempt to disrupt. That is not what Kathleen did. Nor did I. My post did in fact disrupt, but that was not my intention.
This banning behavior is not very becoming for an institution of the Left. We are supposed to be on the side of freedom - freedom of speech, freedom in general, absence of censorship, fair trials, appropriate punishment, open-mindedness, free thinking - FREEDOM. And yes freedom can be messy, but it's FREE.
The Christian Left deleted the entire thread of conversation containing my question about Kathleen and the comments of several people, all of whom I hope did not get in trouble with the school marm. They returned their site to its pristine condition as though the incident had never happened. I thought immediately of the Soviet Union's penchant for air brushing people out of photographs after they had fallen out of favor with The Party, even removing them from the history books. This is the Left gone wrong. This is not the way the Left is supposed to be.
But that is only half of the story. They call themselves The Christian Left. The other half of the story revolves around the word "Christian." I know in my heart that I did nothing that displeased Jesus Christ this afternoon. I am at peace. I can just see Jesus as a child of twelve years, questioning the administrators of this page and tying them in logical knots, just as he did the church elders when he wandered away from his parents. What they did to me was not at all "Christian."
I had no choice but to "unlike" the Christian Left page on Facebook. I will check back from time to time because they do post some good material. But now that I know what is behind that material, it has lost its luster for me. I am so let down, so disillusioned, so disappointed. And they have posted there now first thing something about loving your neighbor and please donate. LOL. Right.
I'll give my money to help the least of these my brothers and my sisters, for they ARE Jesus Christ.
Grettalulu,
ReplyDeleteI'm very sorry that you had such an unpleasant, and certainly unnecessary, experience with the TLC people at Facebook. They have lost a strong and highly articulate supporter, for the extremely petty reason of not being able to tolerate even an innocent question.
What would Jesus do? Somehow I don't think he would agree with banning you. They have thoroughly disgraced themselves.
Thank you for the moral support. I am so disillusioned with whoever is running that site, but the idea of the Christian Left remains my goal and my deepest set of beliefs.
DeleteThe exact same thing happened earlier today, also the Saturday after Thanksgiving, over an entirely different issue. TCL had posted a status asking for donations, and someone unwittingly asked what they use the donations for. Pretty simple question and certainly, if an organization is asking for our cash, we surely have a right to ask such a thing, right? He was given no response and banned. Period. A few other people, myself amongst them, asked about this and we too were banned.
ReplyDeleteWithin the half hour, this post was also scrubbed, just like described in this article. It was then reposted as a new status, and a new blank comment section, again asking for donations. What followed on the new post were some distinctly un-Christian like comments about those who had been banned.
I went to their website and looked at their "what do we do with donations" section, and honestly, I couldn't find anything specific at all. Just a lot of vague statements about "advocating" and "supporting" this or that. I would expect a non-profit (apparently they are a 501c) to have some information about....oh, I dunno, food banks, feeding homeless, specific efforts somewhere, something! But I couldn't find anything other than what sounds like people donate so they can "blog" their ideas. With 120,000 followers, someone could make out like a bandit just for sitting and blogging!
I'm not knocking their donation drive. I am vehemently knocking their lack of transparency, their refusal to answer very simple questions about what the donations are used for, and their very heavy handed tactics on anyone who dares to question anything about them.
This whole incident today sent up some big glaring red flags for me and a few others. A couple of people even posted that TCL should be very transparent and very careful so as not to present themselves as your typical right wing Christian religious organization asking for money and buying fancy cars and houses. Those comments were mostly unaddressed; one reply was "we are transparent". End of answer.
I went to TCL many months ago because I had been completely turned off by the extremes of the religious right, and I was heartened to see some people who actually wanted to do the morally right things and still represent religion while doing so. The taste this has left in my mouth today is bitter and has pretty much put me right back where I was when I first joined. Cynical and disappointed. The sheer intolerance and authoritarian attitudes presented by TCL today....eh, whatever. I'll just live my life according to my morals and do it with no religion.
JC7589, thank you so much for posting about your experience with the so-called Christian Left page. Any group that combines such extreme self-righteousness with the complete refusal to answer the most basic monetary questions will probably soon be involved in fraudulent activity of some kind. If that has not happened already. Chris Hedges has written that "It isn't particularly dangerous not to believe in God. But it's very dangerous not to believe in sin." I'd put that right up there with "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely." I predict that the group behind the "Christian Left" will soon become very corrupt indeed. Thanks again very much for your post. It has helped Grettalulu and myself to accept more peacefully the rather shocking events at TCL today.
DeleteNo organized religion. Don't give up on Jesus Christ himself. Christianity has throughout history done horrible things in his name, but these things are all, all, all, counter to everything he taught and everything he stood for. I will not let them take him away from me. Thank you so much for your post and for this information. As I said in my blog post, I will not be giving them any money. I will be giving to the least of these.
ReplyDeleteI find that anyone using religion in the realm of politics is a oxymoron and just plan ass-backwards! Listen, what makes the right better then the left? Ahhh, absolutely nothing, because they both will chose a dogma over any man. This is where the problem lies. Yes, Obama is supported by the the left, and democrats and even more liberal leaning people jump on the CL band wagon, but it's still backed by a total farce. All known religion are created by a man for men... Read them, and you will agree. So, fuck the CL and the CR, and I hope you all pull your heads out of your asses and step out of your boxes and start believing in each other instead of comic book hero's. morons!
ReplyDelete