Political straw man memes and how they anger me

I hate this election season.  When people find out I'm LDS (Mormon, for those of you new to this), they often smile knowingly, tilt their head back a little and say something along the lines of, "Oh, I bet you're excited Mitt Romney's running, aren't you?"

No. No, I'm not. I strongly dislike Mitt Romney. He and his wife might be the nicest people in the world. I don't know; I've never personally met them. But, I'm liberal and, well, he's really, REALLY not. And for some reason people sometimes have a hard time getting it through their heads that I am LDS, have a strong testimony of the Church, and I'm not conservative. 

Crazy, huh? Apparently there are a lot of us Christian liberals, but people are still surprised when they find out I'm liberal. Not that I'm quiet about it... bring up touchy subjects like women's health issues and gay marriage around me and we'll have a fun chat. ^^ 

But my liberal-ness not really what I came to talk about. I wanted to tell you about Facebook.

Yes, Facebook. That wonderful political platform where Liberals and Conservatives, Green Party's and Libertarians alike can get together in a safe, online environment to debate rationally about political issues. 

Wait, no? Facebook ISN'T a platform for political debate? 

I understand that your political opinion is an important part of your life and, thus, something you would want to express on your Facebook profile. However, my fabulous friends (some more than other, well ONE more than others...) don't often post links to articles with well researched articles exploring issues, opinions, and plans of candidates. No, they post things like this:

LAWL!! Dats 2 Funi! Herp derp derpy herp...

Friends, this is what we in the educated world call a "straw man argument," one of the many (and it seems like the most popular) logical fallacies that make political debate so much "fun" to watch. Don't get me wrong, these things can be hilarious. The Unimpressed Willy Wonka meme is one of my personal favorites. However, the problem I have with memes such as these is that they seem to be all people use to demonstrate their political beliefs. When I only see these memes on your Facebook, I start thinking that these straw man memes are the only place you are getting your information for the up and coming election. Which makes me sad. And a little angry. 

It's doubly aggravating that most of my friends who decide to post pictures like these on their Facebook are usually Conservative, so, yeah. There's that.

For those of you who don't know what a straw man argument is, allow me to explain. Basically, it's when you oversimplify an opponent's argument, then attack this oversimplified version. For example:

This picture oversimplifies two issues and then attacks them by comparing them to Cuba, hopefully invoking bad feelings about fascist regimes. I could get into why this argument sucks (most developed countries of the world have something close to universal health care and, whoa! They aren't ruled over by crazy fascists! How do they do it!?! *sarcasm sign*), but I'm trying REALLY hard not to turn this post into a rant about my own political opinions. Failing pretty hard on that one, I know, but I really am holding back, I promise.

Conservatives aren't the only ones that utilize the straw man argument to piss people off. Us liberals do it, too. Take this picture comparing Rick Santorum to Osama Bin Laden.

Much as I dislike Santorum (really, strongly, dislike), I don't think he would go become some great dictator bent on killing and oppressing America.

So, lovely people, this is what I would like to ask of you: If you are going to post political whatever on Facebook, please, PLEASE let it be a link to an article of some sort. Those are so much easier to ignore than horrible memes such as these. If you feel the burning need to SHARE ALL THE MEMES!!!!!!!11, then please do it on sites meant to share fun little things like straw man memes. I personally like Tumblr.

 Otherwise, please forgive me if one day I finally break down and send one of those comments on your memes that I usually delete before sending. Most likely this will never happen, though I might post a link to this post to show you how I feel. ^^

And now a cat video because any "serious" post should have a kittens at the end to make people feel happy.