In March I was elected to be a delegate to the National Committee from Illinois. I joined because I felt that the NC needed feminist's voices to speak up for the rights of women and children, which are under attack from the Lavender Caucus and its acolytes.
telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act
On the first day Mike Gamms sent a ''welcome'' letter in which he subtly reminded me of his previous abuse and threats he had issued on the GP Facebook page, including one where he posted a screenshot of a search for plane tickets to my town, and numerous memes of an anime character pointing guns and other weapons with my name on them.
I responded by sarcastically telling him that ''your mother must be proud'', and ran into my first strike, when the forum managers informed me that I had been reported and my comment was not allowed. Say what? He threatens me and I am dinged for responding? What kind of rules are these?
As the week went by, I was repeatedly reported and racked up the strikes. No matter what I said, I was turned into the authorities and they found some sort of internal value that I had defiled. Meanwhile, I was attacked and insulted by others, but apparently they were following Green values that I was unaware existed.
Much like the community standards that heretics and dissenters run afoul of on Atlantic Council-monitored social media, the managers invented Kafkaesque interpretations of existing rules to make my statements seem unacceptable.
Then came the new forum manager election. Rose Roby pointedly ran on a platform of No Free Speech Allowed. I was sure that would cause Green Party members to reject her candidacy, since Democracy is one of our Four PIllars and you can't possibly have democracy without free speech, open debate and a diversity of opinions.
Nope, not so, she was elected handily, along with a cadre of anti-feminist and anti-free speech followers.
I decided to quit posting so as not to trip any more wires, not wanting to end up completely silenced, (that is, silencing myself preemptively1) but the new managers went back in time to posts I had made before they were elected, found some imaginary offenses, and retroactively applied them so that any post I made would have to go through the Censor Bureau.
It is amazing to watch as the US ruling class stomps out dissent in the wider public, while the petty bureaucrats of the Green Party do their part in solidarity, like little Mini Mes of totalitarianism.
Paula Bradshaw
1 [Editor's note]: The chilling effect is a legal term of art, developed primarily in First Amendment jurisprudence, and first articulated by the Courts in a 1952 case called Wieman vs Updegraff. It describe the adverse impact on protected First Amendment activities, primarily, produced by the adoption or implementation of policies exhibiting, as Justice Brennan once framed the concept, "vagueness, overbreadth or unbridled discretion".