I agree with you that it's ironic that Civitas, of all people, would bring attention to a group of people that are to be applauded for exercising their right to protest the very ideas that Civitas opposes.

I still think that the format is dehumanizing and threatening - particularly when it's presented with data about individuals with addresses, employers and such.

Here's a challenge for progressives supporting Moral Monday. How about a website where the individuals have a "regular" photo of themselves and where they tell a little about their individual motivations for protesting?

There needs to be a way to diffuse what Civitas is doing and turn it into something truly positive - rehumanize the people who are "just another mugshot" at Civitas.

Judging from blog and media coverage I'm seeing, the effort's fallen flat. The attention's focused more on Civitas's tactic coming off like the worst parts of what hate groups were doing in the South fifty years ago, rather than the charts and "data" about the protestors they're trying to promote. Bloomberg Business called it "lame". And, of course, I've not seen any indication that extremist conservatives feel strongly enough to rally for counter-protests in support of McPope's policies.

The searchable and downloadable database of the protestors still concerns me a great deal. In the early 1990s, I was involved in some relitively minor LGBT political work in the state and was the recipient of threatening phone calls not only to myself, but to my parents, slashed tires and damage to my car, and even phone calls that were made to my employer.

The whole thing was caused by just one religious nutcase that saw my name in a paper and just used a phone book and some asking around to find out about my family and my place of employment. This wasn't in some conservative backwater in NC. It was in one of the state's supposedly more liberal metro areas.

I was lucky. I found out by accident who was doing it. The police couldn't prove anything so I could file charges, but they stopped when the police got involved.

If you've been through that yourself, you don't want to see it happen to someone else. And the way that Civitas is handing out personal info like candy to strangers should give everyone pause. Things are much more polarized than they were twenty years ago.

Should it discourage others from participating in Moral Mondays? No. But they should be prepared to keep themselves safe, document anything that might happen, and to not hesitate to call the police if they're threatened in any way.