One of the main problems facing our country (and, yes, the rest of our world) is the prevalence of extraordinary ignorance coupled with narrow-minded bigotry that so many people seem to demonstrate. However, as we've said many times — often in response to comments left by those people demonstrating said ignorance and bigotry — the ingredient that often makes this already potent combination even more dangerous and unpalatable is the incredible arrogance that often accompanies the first two ingredients. Not only are these people stupid, hateful assholes, but they gleefully wallow in their own hateful ignorance like pigs in giant vats of shit. And through their arrogance, these people actually convince themselves that they are the "good guys" who are fighting for what's "right." Okay, sure — we've seen it too many times to count...but it never ceases to piss us off.

Case in point: Charles N. Valenti of Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. To be clear, there's nothing special about this guy — he's just your typical arrogant, ignorant, bigot who demonizes the ACLU — but when we saw his letter to the editor, we just had to vent. His letter is in reference to House Resolution 2679, which seems to have died in committee about a year ago. The purpose of the measure was as follows:

To amend the Revised Statutes of the United States to eliminate the chilling effect on the constitutionally protected expression of religion by State and local officials that results from the threat that potential litigants may seek damages and attorney's fees.

To sum up: by disallowing compensation for damages and the reimbursement of legal fees incurred by plaintiffs after successful litigation, the measure was designed to make it far less desirable for people to challenge religious issues that violate the constitution.

It goes without saying that we are not in favor of such legislation. It's already difficult enough for people to challenge unconstitutional government endorsements of religion; making it even more difficult is simply asinine. Charles Valenti, however, is stuck on the idea like Jesus on a crucifix. Glossing over the typical ignorant anti-ACLU rhetoric about communism and secularism that makes up most of Charles' letter, let's look at what this asshat is saying:

When the 1976 law titled "Civil Rights Fee Award Act," (42 U.S.C. Section 1988) was passed by Congress to encourage private lawyers to take on cases to protect civil and constitutional rights no one envisioned that its provisions would be exploited in a most evil and dangerous way. Because of a loophole in the language, which gave judges who heard such cases the option to have the prosecuting lawyers' fees paid by the government, the intent of that law has been subverted. This loophole was used by the ACLU not only to pursue obliteration of valid and valued civil rights but to obtain outrageous, immoral and evil "rights" such as abortion, homosexual rights, pornography, same sex marriage and a pattern of social destruction. To make matters worse, in so doing this entitled them to obtain millions of dollars of federal funds. They have cooperated with liberal federal judges to obtain establishment of "rights" that are by no means truly entitled, and the destruction of those that are, such as freedom of religion and speech.

We can see by Charles' letter that he fancies himself quite the defender of civil rights — just not those nasty "evil rights" like abortion, gay rights, and pornography. And what makes Charles' rights "good" and those other rights "evil"? Well, that's as obvious as it is simple: rights that Charles agrees with and practices himself are considered "good" and valid, while those that he disagrees with and doesn't personally engage in are considered "evil" and invalid.

As anyone with even rudimentary mental abilities can plainly understand, defending your own rights while wantonly pissing on the rights of others doesn't make you some kind of heroic civil libertarian — it makes you a hateful, ignorant self-serving asshole.

And what about the ACLU, which Charles seems to equate to the Injustice League, or perhaps a full-blown Hall of Evil? It seems that denying them a means to recoup their costs isn't a juicy enough punishment for their immoral ways:

Merely cutting the ACLU off from federal funds is not enough to cut off the damage they have already done to American civil liberties. Every effort must be made to have them declared un-American and disbanded.

So plainly, since Charles only respects his own rights and not the rights of all people, and since the ACLU defends all rights, including those he views as "evil," Charles believes that the government should forcibly disband the ACLU. Boy, we sure are lucky to have people like Charles looking out for us by deciding for us which rights are good and which are evil, and then destroying any possible sources of alternative thought on the issue.

Let's put this in perspective. Let's pretend that we have the same mindset as Charles here (although it hurts our heads to think down to his level). It's no secret that we don't like people like Charles (if you were previously fuzzy on this point, our use of the term "asshat" should have made it clear), in much the same way that Charles has made it clear that he doesn't like homosexuals, or pro-choice people, or people who enjoy pornography, or in fact anyone who's not just like him. Therefore, following Charles' logic, we should deem his rights to be "evil" and invalid. As a result, we could then go to his house and beat him furiously about the head and neck with a ball peen hammer until he learns to shut his ignorant fucking pie hole. In addition, we could demand that any groups that advocate for his rights be disbanded. With that, all churches in the United States would promptly be shut down, and organized religion would be destroyed. And if Charles didn't like that, well, tough shit — his rights are evil and invalid as far as we're concerned...remember?

People like Charles don't give a fuck about anyone but themselves, and those who are just like them. They are small-minded, hate-filled morons whose self-congratulatory mental masturbation allows them to pretend that they're superior to those they don't like. In point of fact, these folks, like Charles, couldn't be more wrong. A real civil libertarian defends the rights of all people, even those they may not like or agree with. Unfortunately, too many people can't seem to grasp this simple concept. Charles' behavior doesn't make him a civil libertarian, it makes him a supporter of bigotry, hate, despotism, and, put bluntly, crimes against humanity — what the hell do we charge people with crimes against humanity for, except that they attempted to (or succeeded at) stripping the civil rights of others (usually a select ethnic or sociocultural group) while forceably declaring the rights of their own group or their individual self? That's about as far from being a civil libertarian as it's possible to be.

We've written Rants that clearly outline our positions on certain issues — polygamy and incest come to mind — and we've explained that even those practices we aren't anxious to indulge in ourselves, and even those practices that we personally feel are repugnant (or, at the very least, uncomfortable) are rights we will fight for. A true civil libertarian fights for all rights; the only line to be drawn is where your "rights" infringe on another's. Does all of this mean that we — us, many of our readers, and true civil libertarians in general — are "better people" than someone like Charles Valenti? Abso-fucking-lutely. And we have no problem saying so.

This is the kind of bullshit that actual civil libertarians have to deal with all the time, and it pisses us the fuck off. Hey, we don't like religion, but we'll fight for the rights of those that we think are deluded to attend the religious services of their choice. And as much as we might want to hit people like Charles about the head and neck with hammers of various sorts, we wouldn't defend someone who violated Charles' rights by actually doing so, as that would deprive Charles of his rights to, you know, breathe and cogitate (that last in about the loosest sense of the word imaginable). So here we are, ready to fight for Charles' rights, while he sits back and declaims all rights other than the ones he wants — and all those who just want the right to the same freedoms that he demands, but who don't pass Charles' personal morality test — as morally inferior, and actively speaks out against those who would actively fight for his own fucking rights.

You know what? Fuck Charles, and all those like him. They don't deserve our help. The thing is, they get it anyway.

Love this part of his letter:

"Every effort must be made to have them declared un-American and disbanded."

Is there a legal precedure to have someone declared 'un-American?' What are the penalties for infringement of the Un-American statute?

As always, you guys are spot on; fuck Charles and everyone like him. They don't get it and they never will. They simply lack the cognitive ability.

A quick google shows this letter writer is no fan of free speech either.

[link]

Interupt,

Yes, yet more proof of Charles' asshattery. Take this for instance:

"The terrible evil that Hussein and his cohorts believe in and still practice is evidence for all to see. Our soldiers are there to remove it."

I know I'm probably reading way too much into this, but could he mean Islam perhaps? Does he think our soldiers are holy warriors bringing Christianity to these poor unfortunates?

Reading this reminds me of the immortal wisdom of Taxi driver. I think Wizard sums it up nicely

"l don't care what you do in the privacy of your own home. This is an American free country. We've got a pursuit of happiness thing. You're consenting. You're adult. But in my fucking cab, don't go busting heads. You know? God loves you. Do what you want.

I always interpreted that as a nice mentallity towards personal freedom, in a slightly obtuse way...

Good rant.

interupt said:

A quick google shows this letter writer is no fan of free speech either.

I read that other story. In point of fact, Charles does seem to be a fan of free speech, just as long as what you're talking about is in complete agreement with his own narrow little worldview.

In short, Charles agrees with the editor's views on Pope Benedict, and disagrees with the editor's views on Iraq and Ave Maria University. Accordingly, as Charles says:

So do us a favor: Talk about Benedict (hooray!), keep it buttoned on Iraq, and give us a little peaceful hiatus on Ave Maria University.

See? It's perfectly okay to free-speechify about the Pope since the editor agrees with Charles on that topic. It's only the two other topics that Charles demands silence on. Of course, if you agree with Charles on Iraq, you are more than welcome to make your opinions heard.

Special bonus: I also found another letter from Charles written in February 2005. Check it out!

Today, we see that the vision of President Bush to fight terrorism by introducing liberty to those deprived of it is a resounding success as the election in Iraq proves those people were praying for it and came out and voted in spite of the dangers Ted Kennedy tried to force on them.

This proves that President Bush has the vision to solve problems, that the Democratic Party and Ted Kennedy do not, and that we are lucky to be on the right side of that combo. This proves beyond a doubt that the Dems and Kennedy not only do not know the nature of the people in Iraq, they do not know real Americans either.

Yeah, things did seem to be going okay a little over a year ago. But given the utter clusterfuck that Iraq has now become, we wonder if Charles is planning a retraction of his gun-jumping, self-congratulatory letter. He's probably working it up now.

Hey, Charles: there's no hyphen in "asshat," just in case you wanted to use that term to describe yourself in your retraction.

If you want to know some of the real shit about Sir Charles ( piece of shit) Valenti contact me. I was married to his bulimic daughter.You will not believe the depth of this man's arrogance and need to control.