Do you generally agree with what the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) does?

If the mission of the ACLU were to preserve the Bill of Rights I would support them 100%. Since it isn't, I don't.

Oh, sorry if that explanation text is a rather flattering to the ACLU. I grabbed it off their web-site.
anonymous, I'd love to hear what you think their mission really is...

It is pretty much always the case that I either agree completely or I want emotionally to disagree but know that they're right.

I think their mission is to preserve a couple of the first ten amendments, help preserve a couple more under certain specific circumstances, help erode a couple and ignore the rest. Overall, I think they're doing a good job, but they're not nearly the defenders of liberty that they make themselves out to be.

I generally agree with their positions on the cases they take on. I am somewhat troubled by their extreme focus on the First Amendment.

The ACLU doesn't try to protect all of the US Bill of Rights, they pick and choose. I'd rather keep the whole thing.

But I'm glad they are there to do what they do. I would rather live in a world with them watchdogging at least some of our rights and providing legal assistance for people whose rights are abridged, than not, even if their record is not perfect.

I am not familiar enough with it to know.

anonymous, I'm curious which of the amendments you think they are actively trying to erode? That is a hefty accusation.

They're OK, but they pick the wrong battles. Generally I think the specialist organizations (EFF, AI, CLUH) do a better job with their issues.

Sometimes the suits are ridiculous and sometimes they are useful.

They continue to fight the wrong battles. It is not unwarranted government control that they are fighting, it is people who in small communities who wish to be left alone that they fight.

The Bill of Rights doesn't give us the right of freedom from unwarranted government control, exactly, while it does give us freedom of speech and religion, which are where the ACLU focuses. It t is precisely people in small communities whose prejudices, rigid belief structures and heavy investment in the status quo leave no room for expression of other opinions and ideas. Yes, those people would like to be left alone to infringe on the rights of others who haven't the money or the power to put up a strong legal fight for their rights. The ACLU provides that money, that power, the visibility and the resources for these people. I may not necessarily agree with their priorities or think they do the best job possible, but I would not want to see them disbanded. We have rights in this country that are very special and wonderful and difficult to maintain and we need constant prodding and reminding of their importance.

hunter: your statement about what people in small communities are like is in itself prejudiced.

elijahblue, your comment is unwarranted.

You seem to imply that she meant to impugn small communities by assigning to them the negative traits she lists. Had this been the case, she would have added a comma to make it an unrestrictive clause: ".. people in small communities, whose prejudices, rigid belief structures and heavy investment ..". This would be analogous to "chairs, which are red".

But hunter actually said ".. people in small communities whose prejudices, rigid belief structures and heavy investment ..". This is a restrictive clause, analogous to "chairs that are red", which does not imply anything about chairs in general, except weakly that perhaps red chairs exist.

Ah, the difference a comma makes.

seth:

rheingans said that people in small communities just wanted to be left alone, and hunter said that it is "precisely" those people in small communities who need to be targeted.

If she were trying to make a distinction between people in small communities who are prejudiced and those who are not, she would have said that it is those people in small communities who are prejudiced who need to be targeted by the UCLA or some such.

If I try to read her sentence the way you would have me read it -- with everything from "whose" to "ideas" as a restrictive clause -- it is not a meaningful sentence at all. To use your analogy, it would be like saying "it is precisely chairs that are red".

Read it again and I think you will see what I mean.

elijahblue, I am most puzzled as to why the University of California, Los Angeles would be targetting people in small towns and what form this targetting would take. Perhaps deploying their film school students to do an expose? :)

Seriously, though. While I admit my dislike of small town life is probably coloring my opinion, I think that small towns do run a special risk of small-mindedness (although I certainly don't think everyone in small towns is small-minded) because of the relative lack of diversity and of strong media presences and the tendency (true in larger communities, but not to the same degree) of the power structure to be smaller, more cohesive and more closely involved in whatever issue is under discussion.

Curses! My hubris has undone me again!

hunter: ha ha. I guess I have a touch of dyslexia. I hope you see the irony of prejudicially calling a group of people prejudiced.

They can be a bit extreme actually.....and that is coming from a sexual minority!!!!

I am a lazy individual and usually don't care to find out much about the world I live in.. humans and their activities generally depress me...

I love it when they stick up for minoprty groups, but I'm never too happy when they give equal aid to the KKK and other Hate Groups.

I am sometimes astonished by what they wind up defending, but when I think about it carefully, I almost always wind up agreeing that even if I don't think the people they are defending are right, I agree with the principle that says they should be defended.

I agree completely with their mission, but I don't know about EVERYTHING they do. I agree with the things I know about.

Yes, but I wish they had more power. lol

I find it interesting that they believe in the first amendment and not the second. The purpose of the second amendment is to allow me to defend myself from my government should that need ever arise.

rheingans: the ACLU is trying to be the organization that defends you from the government should that need ever arise.

In general, I'd agree with that type of organization. I don't know very much about it, though.

They haven't pissed me off yet...