Apparently Del. Robin Abbott only likes “friend”-ly comments on Facebook
By JR Hoeft | Wednesday, May 4th, 2011 | PolicyI rarely comment on threads left by delegates because, quite frankly, most of them have nothing to say.
So, I commend Del. Robin Abbott for:
1) Having a Facebook page
2) Friending me
3) Posting stuff where there can be an honest exchange of ideas
Oops! Not quite so fast on point number 3. You see, Del. Abbott didn’t appreciate my comment, so she deleted it on her Facebook thread.
Earlier today, Abbott boasted:
I am honored to have the support of NARAL Pro-Choice Virginia. This year’s General Assembly session has been a challenging year for protecting women’s rights. I am committed to preserving reproductive freedom in Virginia.
So, I merely asked a question – Who provides freedom better? – your mother for giving you the freedom to live your life, or NARAL, who attempts to give mother’s the freedom to take life away?
I guess that didn’t go over so well because the comment has vanished.
Apparently she wasn’t interested in nurtuing a dialogue. Of course, based on her post, it’s apparent she tends to prefer deletion over development.
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About the author
Conservative to the core; liberal with his opinion! J.R. has been involved in politics for over a decade and has worked on several campaigns in Hampton Roads. He has served on the Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Chesapeake and the Central Committee of the Republican Party of Virginia. He is also the director of “Blogs United” in Virginia. E-mail J.R.. Follow J.R. on Twitter.
Comments
17 Responses to "Apparently Del. Robin Abbott only likes “friend”-ly comments on Facebook"
Support for what? Is she running for something?
Sounds like the what I’ve heard on Bearing Drift about Mike Barrett’s comments…. I’ve heard he might be banned if he doesn’t stop posting critial comments. No?
Its her FB page so who really cares what she does with it? Deleating coments is her and your right but its only an issue on her FB page? Come on…
Delete William Bailey…
@william
Mike takes it to the extreme…
My first thought was that J.R. was the pot calling the kettle black.
But then I thought about it for a minute and decided Bearing Drift is pretty tolerant. I’m beginning to wonder if J.R. gave BK the power of the delete button.
But while I am still wondering about things, I keep thinking that those who engage in censorship should not complain when it happens to them.
J.R., I am not an expert on the English language, but perhaps she is just very strict on grammar.
As someone who frequently challenges some Bearing Drift positions, I was to chime in with support of JR’s position. If you want to have a presence in social media, esp. if you are a public official, then you have to respect the process of give and take. Otherwise, you are catering only to the constituents that agree with you (rarely more than 60%) and ignoring the views of the rest.
I admire Bearing Drift’s tolerance for opposing points of view. Over the time I have been a reader here, I have not seen any evidence of censorship, despite some rather extreme comments occasionally being posted.
Yes, I can delete comments. But why help the stupid by hiding their proof?
Brian,
Yeah, why hide the proof?
I’m going to quote J.R. here:
“Apparently she wasn’t interested in nurturing a dialogue. Of course, based on her post, it’s apparent she tends to prefer deletion over development.”
LD,
Feeling lonely?
Anyway, I go back to the point of this post – Abbott is 100% in favor of abortion, including aborting her critics.
So she aborted her post?
Delegate Abbott not the only legislator to do that.
Several months ago, I was participating in a comment thread on state Senator Steve Martin’s Facebook page. It was a lively discussion.
Then, suddenly, I noticed that there were replies to a comment I had left earlier — but my comment had itself disappeared. It had been deleted by the page owner, although he had neglected to remove the comments that referred to my comment, which must have had some people scratching their heads in puzzlement.
Most politicians social media pages are run by a staffer. It’s not unusual to see critical comments delegated. Sarah Palin’s page is fairly notorious for that. That being said, I can’t agree with the practice. It’s telling a lie about what the dialogue is, because it gives the false impression that everyobdy agrees with the politician. Newpapers also delete comments on our websites although we do it for reasons of bad langua
ge and comments that potentially raise libel issues. We usually note that the comment was deleted and why.
I agree with what the papers do, Steve; and we also face that same issue. It’s a very fine line. Not to mention the trolls.
I think my fellow candidates would be better served by defending their endorsements debating folks who take the time to post on their Facebook than just deleting comments that are critical. People like to see debate. And it shows you aren’t afraid of your record. This is unfortunate.
Anybody who wants to argue with me on Facebook is welcome to do so.
One person’s troll is another person’s speaker of truth. I will not deny that some people just like to get inflammatory for the love of it.
Troll is too readily bandied about just like the description bigot is. You fail to agree with me on certain topics? Well that is because you are a bigot. If you were only reasonable and were willing to listen to the reasonable arguments from their side, then of course you would agree with them. If you are not convinced by their arguments, you are a bigot.
My experience is that the word troll is starting to become pretty close to synonymous with bigot.
JR Hoeft : I agree, what you say is true
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