Just had a Freeper encounter.... - Democratic Underground

The Doctor.

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Tue May-23-06 10:10 PM
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Just had a Freeper encounter....

And I look forward to cultivating this relationship.

This isn't going to be one of those knock-down, drag 'em out stories of someone getting laid out in lavender or publicly humiliated. This is more important because I'm working on opening a door into what is almost certainly a closed mind. And I would hope that all DU'ers take such an approach whenever possible.

When I went into the corner gas station tonight I noticed a new face behind the counter. This is nothing unusual of course, mini-mart employees have a fairly high turnover rate. This one seems to have a higher rate than others, but I'd like to think it hasn't anything to do with me scaring them off or anything... so let's not dwell on that.

The one girl had been there for a few months and recognized me quite readily. Neither of the two brighter young people I enjoy chatting about politics with were there tonight... again - let's not dwell on why. But there was a young man I had not seen until tonight working behind the counter. He was tall - about 6', lanky, light complexion, short brown hair, brown eyes, and a honker that wouldn't have fit on any other face but his own.

He didn't immediately strike me as dull... which is unusual as my freeper-radar, or 'free-dar', tends to go shrill whenever anyone who's ever needed movies like 'Zoolander' or 'This is Spinal Tap' explained to them, or has ever purchsed five 4oz cans of tuna at 89 cents each because it was cheaper than buying one 20oz can at $4...

But in this case his disposition was made quite evident upon my first comment when I was asked by the regular girl, "So how are you today?"
My usual response is to say, "Fantastic!", "Fabulous!", or "Groovy.", but today wasn't all that stellar, so I reverted to the most negative response I ever give;

"Well... I didn't wake up in a Korean Prison Camp this morning..."

To which she gave the response I would expect; "Well I guess that's good then."

And that's when, seizing upon my 'prison camp' reference, our Freep-boy chimed in;

"Did you hear what we found out the Russians (I'm sure he meant 'Soviets') used to do to people in their prisons?"

My fellow DU'ers, I have all of you to thank for the cumulative indignance and outrage instilled in me through the tireless efforts of those in the reality-based community to inform that filled me at that moment, and myself to thank for the restraint I summoned to only let slip this one, little, question;

"You mean like what we do?"

He paused short, and looked quizzically at me (OK, freepers don't look 'quizzical'- let's say 'dumbfounded').

Freep-boy: "What do you mean"

Me: "Well... nevermind. Tell me about what they did."

FB: "They used to do stuff to people, where they'd make them stand for 24 hours straight without sleep or anything... in their own crap!"

(You... Can... All... Imagine... My... Shock.)
I shit you not, he really did say that, to which I of course replied;

"Yeah... Like we do."

FB: "What do you mean?"

Me: "Do you read the news?"

FB: "Well, yeah... what are you talking about?" (Fox News Rocks!)

Me: "You haven't heard about the secret prisons set up by the CIA in the old Soviet Blocs. We use them for extraordinary rendition."

(now here's the part I found suspicious...)

FB: "That's awesome!"

Me: "What do you mean?"

FB: "We have to do that, you know... if someone has information we need, we gotta get it. We gotta bring 'em right to death... just to where they think they're gonna die... that's the only way to get it."

Me: "And of course we hope we have the right people."
(His eyes baste over)

FB: "Well we should just kill them all."
(no shit folks)

So at this point, not wanting to resort to just calling him an idiot, I turn to the girl behind the counter to his right who has been paying wrapt attention (a first) and say, "Wouldn't that be just so easy?"
She stares.

Me: "It would just be so much easier just to be able to do that, don't you wish it were that easy?"
-She wants nothing to do with the question... as I'd hoped.
Me: "Unfortunately, it's far too complicated a situation to handle that way... what a shame that is, right?"

FB: "Complicated? What do you mean?"

Me: "Well, it's something you'd really have to want to know... and there's quite a bit to it."

FB: (mildly incredulous) "I wanna know... tell me."

I turn to the girl; "I love filling people in on the real nitty-gritty, but I can only educated people who want to be..." Back to him; "Do you really want to know?"

FB: (Finally assuming open body language) "Yeah... I'm all ears."

Me: "Ok, first you have to know some things... have you heard of 'reserve currency'?"

FB: "What's that?"

Me: "Ok, hold on... do you know what an 'Oil Bourse' is?"

FB: "Oil 'burst'?"
(again... I shit you not)

Me: "No... 'B'..'O'..'U'..'R'..'S'..'E'- 'Bourse'."

FB- "No... so tell me."

Me: "let's start with 'reserve currency' because that's pretty important..."

I then went on to explain what reserve currency is, why the US dollar has been the world's reserve for many decades, and how important it has been to our economy.
He nodded along listlessly for a while, but not without some grasp of the concept... this was encouraging.

Then he asked what that had to do with what I was 'talking about before', and I asked him if he was going to be in during the week. He said that he would so I told him I'd be back, but in the meanwhile if he seriously wanted to know he had to go online and look up 'reserve currency'. (oh shit... I forgot to tell him how to spell it!)

And at that, I left the store.

If I can bring a kid like this into the light, it'll be worth it. I don't hold out a lot of hope, but I'm going to take this very delicately.

He doesn't know it yet, but he's just become a hobby.

This is going to take a while, but I will report on my progress.