A man and his wife took to the corner of El Camino Real and Castro Street Monday evening to protest Wo’O Ideafarm’s latest protest.
The couple blocked Ideafarm’s billboard, which read “2007: I got mine so f— you,” with makeshift signs that carried a decidedly cheerier message: “Merry Christmas.”
Both the man and woman declined to give their names, but said they had driven by Ideafarm — the Mountain View man known for his proclivity for provocative public speech — and took offense at his latest message.
“There are so many other words in the English language,” the man said, referring to the expletive on Ideafarm’s sign. The man said he had no problem with Ideafarm expressing himself, but added, “He doesn’t have to say it this way.”
The man and woman said they would not want their son, who is in elementary school, to read the profanity on Ideafarm’s sign. And so, in protest, the two created their own signs and stood on the corner of Castro and El Camino, holding their posters up so that they would block Ideafarm’s two identical wooden placards.
Ideafarm, who said that the couple were violating his right to free speech with their act, called the police in an attempt to learn their names and ultimately sue them.
“They are blocking my signs,” Ideafarm said. “They are out here to silence me.”
An officer on the scene, Sgt. Art Roberts, told a photographer and reporter from the Voice that media coverage of Ideafarm’s interactions with Mountain View police would only encourage the local transient.
Ideafarm denied that his “campaigns,” as he calls them, are publicity stunts and dismissed the notion that he is only hungry for attention.
“I’m actually a recluse. I’d rather be in Idaho,” he said. “But I have work to do.”
That “work,” according to Ideafarm, is to get the people of Mountain View to quit living selfishly. “It’s going to work,” he said, referring to the signs.
The woman holding the “Merry Christmas” sign disagreed.
“Everyone’s first human instinct to this is that it is offensive.”
