Holy shit, I had no idea Yahoo boards were so full of freeper assholes

[mike1963]

just happened to notice the link below the Charley story...there are some sick bastards there...
http://news.messages.yahoo.com/bbs?.mm=&action=m&board=37138445&tid=nmweathercharleyscenedc&sid=37138445&mid=513&thr=513&cur=513&dir=d

[MikeG]

1. freeper - asshole - redundant

[gmoney]

2. Yeah, that's about the size of it...

Yahoo posters run about 5-to-1 asshole to rational individual.

[mchill]

3. I find

America Online to be very conservative. Not smart conservative, red necked conservative. It is so totally depressing to take a poll on their website. Kerry's convention speech was received well though, but then I realized the lead in was "Did you see the speech?." I'm sure most those AOL fools never even got to the poll.

[Moonbeam_Starlight]

4. Hmmm

that explains a lot about my in-laws, big-time conservatives who have had AOL for going on ten years.

My husband keeps trying to explain the benefits of DSL/broadband but they are afraid to leave AOL because they understand how it works.

Ok. But I think AOL are training wheels.

[GoneOffShore]

9. I dropped AOL

about 6 months ago after having it for years. I realized, one, that we were hardly using it and two, that it was impossible to have a discussion in any of the chat rooms without encountering a high degree of wingnut or fruitcake opinion. I though I'd miss it, because it was always possible to troll and screw with peoples heads. But I don't miss it at all.

[alphafemale]

11. A Oh-hell is what I came to call it.

I did enjoy some of the writing contests they had, as well as some of the other games.

But it ultimately wasn't worth it.

[QC]

17. Rumor has it that AOL really stands for

Assholes Online.

[CNH_1313]

34. hahahahaahahahahahahaa!!!! ....

tell me about it- im trying to dump them now.

[alphafemale]

54. Good luck.

They kept pinging us for payment for months after we told them to pound salt up a rat's rectum.

Watch your statements.

[Spirochete]

43. Army Of Losers

is what I usually tell people it stands for. I try to persuade everyone I meet that's on AOL to let me help set them up on a different ISP. I've weaned a number of people off AOL, I'm proud to say.

[JohnLocke]

20. "Smart conservative" is an oxymoron.

[Jackpine Radical]

55. That's not fair.

There are many smart conservatives--all of them psychopaths who see "conservatism" as a legal means to take advantage of others.

[Sparkly]

25. AOL is abysmal

Last time I saw the message boards there, it was nothing but cut/pastes from reeeeeally badly deluded Freepers. Or worse than Freepers, if possible. Poor slobs deluded by Freepers, maybe.

[NightTrain]

36. I spent all of a month on AOL. That was in 1998.

I see it hasn't changed much in the last six years.

And by the way: welcome to DU! :hi:

[alphafemale]

5. ewww

Some of that reeks of 20 somethings in extended adolescence still livng with mommy.

[CatWoman]

6. I post on Yahoo when I want to be a bitch

or when negative stories about Chimpy hit the news.

There are several liberal posters over there, and we all team up on the kool-aid kids.

It's funny as hell -- you can actually see their heads exploding.

You can get nasty as you want to over there with no reprecussions -- unlike on DU.

Thing is, its the cons who always start the fights, and/or pull these ridiculous straw men out of their asses.

Facts doesn't go over well with those assholes.

I know a few DUers post over there as well.

[LibertyorDeath]

14. Hey do you know alisongiggles? at Yahoo

Cause she Rocks...

She is my better half going on 20 years..

[CatWoman]

19. all right!!!

:thumbsup:

I've seen her.

Admire her work :D

[LibertyorDeath]

32. Thanks CatWoman

Yahoo can be fun but most of the time I don't have the patience to do battle with the kool-Aid kids..It's so draining.

Ali on the other hand loves to hang out there & get down in the mud with
the freeps.

I admire anyone that does battle with the freeps at Yahoo

Cheers to you!

[CatWoman]

44. I have two names over there

here's a hint: whenever you see a post saying, "Why does ______ hate America, or Why does _______ hate Freedom", you know its me. :D

[0007]

56. You got more guts than Wonder Women LOL

:hi:

[WoodrowFan]

7. It's not just there

I gave up on the Amazon and Ebay chat boards for the same reason. WOW. RWers out the wazoo and lots and lots of assholes. Not all assholes were RW, but the vast majority were....

At my old job there were a few public discussion boards for the employees to ask questions, post viewpoints about policies,and even discuss non-work related events. They were shut down because they became too much hassle. A handful of loud rwers killed the boards by turning EVERY discussion into a freeper flame fest. One young mother asked for recommendation on books about child rearing. Someone recommended a popular book that's pretty mainstream. The RW xtians started a flame war saying the book was sinful and how dare we recommend a book like that! No calm discussion, just instant flames! Finally, when someone began ranting about the Clinton "Death List" and called Justice Ginsburg a "communist" (seriously!) the boards were killed. They tried a moderated board but the volunteers were inundated by hateful emails every time a RW note was deleted.

The lesson I learned was that RWers will try to dominate and thereby ruin any public discussion board. It really is a crusade to many of them with no prisoners and no discussion.

[LTR]

8. You think that's fun?

Visit the Yahoo chat rooms.

Lots of freeper fun there.

[SOS]

26. Yahoo CEO hardcore Bush supporter

Mr. Terry Semel
C.E.O.
Yahoo, Inc.
RNC
$25,000

Mr. Terry Semel
C.E.O.
Yahoo, Inc.
RNC
$25,000

Mr. Terry S Semel
Chairman & C.E.O.
Yahoo
George W. Bush
$2,000

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

10. I learned that years ago

when I first went to yahoo news and saw there were discussion lists connected. One look at my username and I was condemned. So nice to know there are creeps who are ready to kill you just because of your name.

[ronnykmarshall]

24. They suck!

The yahoo boards are full of freeper creepers.

[Fatima]

12. Oh, yeah- just like the AOL boards

you'll see some of the sickest stuff get posted there and if you hang around long enough you'll want a shower just to wash the slime off.

[slojim240]

13. I frequently post over there just to get their panites in a bundle.

Every little bit of new information that smacks down Bush I post over there. Who know, a few may even become edumacated.

[Must_B_Free]

15. They're just trying to wipe the writing off the wall.

They are hired to post in volume there so that the threads exposing Bush don't sit on the top of the list for too long.

[dumpster_baby]

21. posters hired?

Do you have any evidence of that? I mean, I have also thought the same thing many times. I mean, we know that corporations and rich people spend many millions funding rightwing think tanks and pundits, so why would they not spend some money on posters for online forums? I mean, opinions are being shaped and formed there as well.

So how would we find out? I mean, it would seem almost untraceable: a well-funded right wing foundation (of which there are many) could spend just one million dollars a year and buy 20 writers, who write anonymously 8 hours a day. $1M is not much for them. And these people are anonymous, and they can be made to sign nondisclosure agreements, this knowledge of their work online might not be made public for decades.

How can we counter them? By exposing them, perhaps. But we really do not know for sure: we have no evidence. But all the forces are there for them to be there, so they almost certainly are there.

[Must_B_Free]

37. I don't have any evidence other than

1. the other obvious example of astroturfing we have seen in letters to the editor in newspapers around the country

2. they seem to be organized in "shifts". You can catch times when they aren't "on duty." One night I was watching and they all stopped all at once at 11:00 PM.

[dumpster_baby]

38. use a bot--an HMTL scraper/screen scraper

I have written a couple of them in the Perl computer language: they basically just download a webpage automatically whenever you set to do so, and then you can write code to parse out certain words. You could write a bot to obtain all the posts for certain boards, and then have the bot keep track of all the posters, what time and dates they posted, and what the most common or interesting words they used in their posts.

Then maybe you could use that data to decide if the right wing has paid posters to go on the net.

[dumpster_baby]

51. kick

[glitch]

53. Also - when a username's personality changes

Sometimes I've seen a user who normally posts in one style suddenly shift to another, and say things that differ logically from the first. So I've thought - hmmm, bi-polar?
Or just another shift change at Scaifes?

[peekaloo]

31. Yep. For a while the freeps were getting their asses handed

to them by the anti-Boo$h crowd. Now you can't even get a good three line hate going! :evilfrown:

[tuvor]

45. You have any proof ot that?

It seems apparent, but would be nice to have something to back it up with.

[VolcanoJen]

16. Yep. Sadly, the Freeper Boards mirror real life.

Got into a heated argument with one of my bar customers late last night... telling me about how the reason he won't vote Kerry is because of the medals he threw over the wall.

Sad, isn't it? And it didn't matter how many times I asked him how many medals Chimpy threw over the wall.

Remember back in the day... when we thought for ourselves??

[dumpster_baby]

22. But that type of person does not go online and write voluminously and well

They are not educated enough to present the type of arguments and background info we are seeing in the type of posts you see online, in general. So perhaps we are seeing hired posters. It would not cost that much, and there are rightwing foundations that have more than enough money to fund them.

[jdj]

40. Why can't we infiltrate?

PETA infiltrates all the time.

Why can't dems do it. People would probably do it for free. If it were online, I would definitely do it.

[latebloomer]

18. Hey, "karlrschneider" posted on that thread

calling the anti-semite a "disgusting piece of shit."

Wonder if that's the DUer-- haven't heard from him in ages.

[mike1963]

27. Dat be me...

:evilgrin:

[latebloomer]

30. Hey there!

You have reincarnated!

:hi:

[mike1963]

50. Hee...

:toast:

[Tight_rope]

23. Old news!

[Glacier]

28. Their chat rooms are full of Freepers too.

They make me furious. :grr:

[procopia]

29. any DUers post on Yahoo op-ed board?

It's my favorite.

[CNH_1313]

33. yahoo chat & freepers

Dont feel lonesome! I get b****ed at all the time for mentioning kerry or edwards in Yahoo chat... my own Mom even calls Kerry a "Piss-ant" :( its a hostile world out there

BTW Im new here

[procopia]

47. Yes, it is

a hostile world, and if you live in a red state, you begin to wonder if everyone else is nuts or maybe you are. Thank god for DU! You will like it here.

[NightTrain]

35. "Lots of filthy Jews in Florida"?!

That was all I needed to see before I got the hell off that board! :puke:

[Shopaholic]

39. MSN boards are too

I regularly post in a group about MSNBC and two right-wing assholes are complaining to the board's monitors that there are too many political posts. Funny, they didn't have a problem before Democrats showed up and began to express views contrary to their own! I honestly think that the Republican party pays these asswipes to invade the boards on the 'net or heavily encourages them to do it. I don't put anything past them and what better what to influence people's opinions than through the internet--right? I've seen boards that I've been posting at for years--boards that have nothing to do with politics--like music or tv series special interest groups suddenly become filled with freepers over the past year--since primary season began more or less. And it's filled with anti-Democratic statements and lies and every dirty trick you could think of. If you complain and post facts, they try to silence you by complaining to the moderators or accusing you of being a communist, a terrorist supporter-you know--the usual freeper BS. They invade, they post their lies and hate and then they boot out the regulars. It has to be a set-up and a well-paid and financially backed operation. Some computer genius needs to check out a few of these groups and trace this shit to its source. Not that we could stop it or get a news organization to cover it if we found out our suspicions were right--do ya think CNN is going to admit that they've got paid political commentators on the AOL boards?????

[jdj]

41. They are miserable @ssholes who don't have any friends.

(The real reason they are so big on family values, by the way, family are the only people who will have them).

[mvd]

42. Oh, I know what you mean

I have seen some vicious, sexist, explicit, racist, and inane stuff on the yahoo boards that I haven't even seen on Free Republic. I don't take the time to argue with people like that. But I'm glad there are some that attack back.

[underseasurveyor]

46. I couldn't stand it

I had to leave the "filthy" guy a message. And I didn't even use bad words ;-)

[Razoor]

48. the aol chatrooms are the worst

I used to frequent the room in people connection called from the left.
mostly freepers in there even when they had there own room called from the right they would still come in and talk crap. I dont bother no more its like arguing with a fence post no matter how loud you yell or tell the facts it goes through through one ear and out the other. its nerve racking thats why I love DU! I dont even bother with yahoo i know the boards are terrible there.

[Shopaholic]

49. I've posted on the AOL boards and then

had hate mail sent to my AOL mailbox. I've complained to AOL but they never respond to my complaints. Shocking, huh?

[progressivebydesign]

52. They're just frightening..

..sometimes I like to sign in there and just screw with them. It's a nice way to blow off steam (because I don't have the opportunity to curse out Senators on the Senate floor).