What Should I Do?

[DemocratSinceBirth]

Poll question: What Should I Do?

I work out four of five time a week at a local Bally Heath And Fitness in the Orlando area.....

There is this wing nut who is always prosletysing (or pimping) for the Republican Party... It's like this clown has no mind of his own and parrots everything out of the Republican National Committee...

For instance the other days he's telling this guy how great it was that we "liberated" Iraq... The other guy said he didn't feel any safer or happier about the liberation...

The wing nut guy made several points which I refuted in my head... I try not to get into heated political battles...

Here are the wing nut's points and my mental refutations:

Point 1

"Iraqi's are better off and they are free...."

(He needs to read Hobbes. People were free in a state of nature and because of the lack of security or a strong sovereign life was "nasty, brutish, and short."

Point 2

"Iraqi women are now being educated"

(I think he's confusing Iraq with Afghanistan where women were not educated under the Taliban.)

Point 3

"The Iraqi's created a constitution in months while it took us years"


( It took us years because we experimented with different forms of government, i.e. , a loose confederacy versus a strong federal government. Also, we didn't have our liberators (sic) looking over our shoulders as we created our Constitution. The Iraqi creation of their Constitution could be analogized to the French attacking the British forces in the colonies,liberating them, and then looking over our shoulders as we wrote our Constitution"

Point 4

" The terrorists want us all dead."

(Maybe some of them just want us out of their lives)

What should I have done?

[prodigal_green]

1. Other

Outlift him.

Let me guess--he is also the guy who grunts and yells while lifting. He works with a partner and the partner does all the work. Or, he does half-lifts, works upper body only--mostly biceps--and totally ignores his legs. When he does do legs, he does a few leg presses (bending the knees about 15 degrees instead of 90 or more) and wouldn't know a squat from a leg curl.

I'm a competitive lifter and we call these guys "gym weenies." The only thing you can do is ignore him and let his moronic actions speak for themselves. We had one like that at my gym. He was really loud. He dropped dead of a heart attack about 6 months ago.

Seriously though, it's up to you, but when I go to the gym, I'm all business. The only person I chat with is my trainer, and he is at least as liberal as I am.

[LynzM]

2. Until a couple of weeks ago

I usually kept my mouth shut. But then I started feeling like "why not try to counter this? why let this guy's voice be heard, and not mine?" I'm not usually very aggressive, I just try to present facts. A couple quotes I really like:

"If not me, who? If not now, when?" -unk?

"To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men." -Abe Lincoln

Even if you only plant a seed in one mind, it's one more...

[mobuto]

3. What should you do?

You should contribute to the John Kerry campaign.

http://contribute.johnkerry.com

[HFishbine]

4. As a matter of style and personal comfort, this is what I'd do

I'd print out a few web pages, articles, lists, etc. that you find representative of your views of the Bush administration, war, environment -- anything that's important to you. Then bring them to the gym. I wouldn't try to create a direct rebuttal to his agruments, that's a losing battle. And I wouldn't engage him verbally, you'll show greater class and avoid unpleasentness for the other patrons.

Once armed with your papers, you can then politely step up to him and whoever he's spewing to and say, "I couldn't help overhearing your discussion. I'm interested in poltics too and I happen to have some information you both might find interesting. Here. I've read it. You can keep it." Then move on.

[molly]

5. Print Will Pitt's Truthout article and give it to him

http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/032504A.shtml

tell him that you really-really need his opinion since he obviously knows so much about what is going on in the world.

[displacedtexan]

6. Politely complaint to management.

They don't want wing nuts driving away paying customers. There's too much competition for them to ignore complaints. They can ask the freeper to keep his voice down, at least.

[billybob537]

7. If you don't do something soon you'll loose selfrespect.

Try allowing him to think you agree with him but keep inserting facts into the conversation. This is one of my favorite games. You might even start him thinking for himself, I've seen a lot of this phenom lately. I'm pretty good size for a construction worker, so people don't usually offer a physical solution. Try what you think will help him out of his trance. Things like, " I'm glad Bush came along because that stock market thing was getting out of control." "At least he's Not a conservative" should derail his brain train. GOOD LUCK