It's a bit extreme. From the point of view of a foreigner, Obama actually seems to have the understated auctoritas that many of your recent presidents appear to have lacked. I suppose, as well, we all need to be careful what we write or say on any site as we do not know who will see it and, possibly, use it against us.
Too right, as Londoners would say! It might be worth deleting some of the comments as it's not like sitting in our own homes making outrageous remarks, we don't know who has access to any site we go on.
The picture should be taken down. I reported it to the owner/moderator and rec'd no reply whatsoever. In fact, all he did was pat the OP on the back and suggested a more cruel death for the President. Shameful. It is difficult to understand how people who portray themselves as real Americans and real Christians can support postings suggesting lynching of the President of the United States. Hate his politics... that's fine. Disagree with his religious leanings... that's fine. Dislike how he has served his two terms in the White House... okay, we get it. To suggest his lynching... that is going entirely too far. If the owner/moderator doesn't have the backbone to at least remove such garbage, at least close the thread as it's become way more than a level-headed discussion of how the President's visit to Viet Nam is perceived.
I was agreeing with Shirl that the picture was totlly unacceptable, @Will Lawrence . I am not sure why you are quoting my post ? I think that the website who made this picture in the first place is disgusting, and it is not only disrespectful to the office of our President; the picture is also presented in a totally racist way, since it looks like the other people are meant to represent KKK. I am against it for both reasons. I do not know why admin has not reponded to your reporting the post, either; but he told us that he had company and was going to be on the road, so possibly he just hasn't had a chance to read anything that has transpired today. I also agree that this thread has gone WAY off what was intended to be a discussable topic, and should be closed or deleted at this point.
@Harry Kemp too late to delete. Just a bit of information for those who don't know - once you type something on a computer, iPad, smartphone or whatever it's THERE and will remain regardless of your attempts to cover your butts. This is especially true of the internet. People get prosecuted or fired every day because of emails, searches, forum posts. They can deny and delete all day long but it's not going to do any good. Sooooo go ahead. Have fun!
This behavior on the part of the owner/moderator is par for the course, proven by past experiences. He is either frightened, uncaring or wholeheartedly agrees with the poster and doesn't seem to understand accountability. This isn't the first time that complaints about inflammatory statements, poor taste, even unwanted sexual innuendo have been ignored by Admin. It's difficult to believe the excuse that he is "away" in light of past incompetent handling of his forum's content, and blatant disregard for anyone's feelings other than his own and his buddy's.
@Will Lawrence this site is visible to anyone who has access to the internet - not just members. And we all know how people talk Sooooo it would not surprise me one bit if/when the SoC Lynch Mob gets a surprise. @Ruby Begonia Bingo
Have you never been so offend or angry that your feelings and thoughts came from way out of left field? Many of us lost loved ones in Viet Nam, and I can not even imaging the pain caused to those who had to endure the atrocities while they were forced to be there. But I do know what it is like to be angry and have hateful thoughts toward those that have wronged me, mine, and my country. The man that murdered my son brought such feeling from me. I had many horrible revengeful thoughts toward this person, but I didn't follow up on any of them any more than Gary or Ike have. Sometimes we just need to express our feelings to get them out of our systems, and this should be a place that we can be ourselves. We all do it, and the rest of us try to help each other past these times. Good people can have ugly thoughts. It's human. It doesn't make a person unworthy of understanding.
I would not have posted such a photo, nor did I. However, the only people bringing racism into the picture are those who are objecting to it. I see no indication that anyone here cares what race Obama is, other than those who believe he should have extra protections due to his race. Everyone I know who opposes Barack Obama does so for reasons that have nothing to do with his race. In fact, he is the one who brings race into nearly every issue he has bothered to weigh in on since he was elected. Not so long ago a movie was produced whose premise was the assassination of George W. Bush and, had anyone posted a link to that movie, I wouldn't have removed that either. This forum wasn't around when that movie came out but whatever attempts might have been made at encouraging outrage fell on deaf ears pretty much everywhere. Discussion of that movie was not banned on Facebook -- in fact, it was promoted on Facebook -- and I don't recall anything about Barack Obama speaking out against that movie in any public forum. Was that because George Bush was white or that he was a Republican? This is not a children's forum and supposedly we're all adults here, so I would hope that everyone here is beyond being influenced by the depiction of a photoshopped image. No one has been harmed by the posting of that photo. Are you referring to it as a "lynching" as opposed to a "hanging" because President Obama is black? There is a long tradition in this country of hanging traitors, regardless of race, and hanging has long been a legal form of execution, still legal in some states, whereas lynching is conducted by an illegal and unruly mob. Regardless of whether or not you or I believe that the president's actions have been traitorous, that is a legitimate political opinion, and that is what I thought that photo represented, since that is the subject of this thread. To you, it may have represented a lynching, but I will suggest that the only reason that word comes to mind is because the president is black. When Jane Fonda visited Vietnam, several people on the right suggested that her visit was a traitorous act and that she should be executed as a traitor. The last time I saw Jane Fonda she looked white to me. Although I am opposed to capital punishment, I wouldn't have removed a meme suggesting that she be hanged as a traitor. I allow opinions that I disagree with. I didn't view the photo with any racial overtones but even in the unlikely event that the photo was intended to be a racist statement, that would be an opinion, and not one that I agree with, but opinions that I disagree with are allowed here. If President Obama were a member of this forum, then I would view such a photo as a personal attack against a member of the forum, and it would not be allowed. However, Barack Obama is not a member of this forum, but a public figure who has himself never refrained from attacking those who he disagrees with. As for my lack of response to your complaints, I have posted elsewhere in this forum that I will be driving friends around the state for the next week, rather than being online as often as I usually am. The last time I have logged into my Admin account, there were no complaints, and I have logged into that account since that photo was posted. In fact, I hadn't paid much attention to the photo, nor have I felt the need to complain about the several memes and videos that I have come across on Facebook suggesting that Trump should be assassinated. Comedians, musicians and public officials have suggested his assassination and thus far, no one has been arrested for doing so, nor are such topics banned by social media. It requires no backbone whatsoever to bow to political correctness. As a nation, this has been a common practice for a long time now, and a matter of public policy for the past seven years. As a result, race relations have been set back a few decades. Pretending that something doesn't exist doesn't make it go away. Racism is best combated through discussion, rather than through the suppression of discussion. Once again, I did not view this photo as being racist in nature. I viewed it as a political statement. Not one that I would have made but, because I am quite certain there have been more white people hung in this country than black people, I never considered that race entered into it. However, if it was intended as a racist statement, then I would suggest that racism is best combated through discussion than through suppression of opinion. If someone is a racist, isn't it better that he talk about it with people who don't agree with him than by enacting rules or laws that ensure that he can only express his opinion with those who are likeminded? Certainly, I would prefer that the discussion in this thread remain on topic. However, the photo itself was not off-topic. Those who turned the thread into a discussion of the photo rather than of the topic are the ones who took it off-topic, and I have posted to that before too. More than once, I have asked that those who object to someone that someone else has posted in the forum bring it to my attention privately rather than making an issue of it in the public forum, particularly when doing so derails the topic of a thread. Yes, I had seen the photo but I didn't view it with racist eyes. Because members of the forum chose, instead, to derail the topic of the thread, you have made it more difficult for me to remove the photo if I were inclined to do so, and I may have. I don't think that it was particularly clever or that it added anything to the thread, but if I were to remove it now, I would also have to remove the several posts that have been made subsequent to it. In other words, discussion of the appropriateness of a photo or how how quickly I may or may not respond to your complaints is off-topic in this thread, while the photo itself was not.