Path: news.ais.net!stat
From: stat@eagle.ais.net (Joseph Dumphy) ...*
Newsgroups: soc.culture.irish
Subject: Guys, lighten up
Date: 16 Aug 1995 00:53:09 GMT
Organization: American Information Systems, Inc.
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Message-ID: <40rfhl$9rt@news.ais.net>
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I just read part of someone's > 19 page magnum opus, which just arrived.

First of all, he complains about my reference to someone maybe posting a request for the recipe for Boxty, and getting as his only response, a note from David Halliwell telling him that he is spreading race hatred by pretending that the Irish don't live entirely on bangers and mash. This, apparently, constituted a deadly insult.


It - was - a - joke, people


Get a grip on it. Obviously, I didn't seriously expect that to occur. It was a very mild bit of teasing, making fun of David Halliwell's long time argument that the Irish are all of English descent (hence, the reference to Bangers and Mash). I am well aware of the fact that the English themselves don't live entirely on that. Do try to develop a sense of humor. If my tounge had been stuck any more firmly in my cheek on that one, I would have chipped a tooth. And no, you shouldn't take that one literally either. Groan.

Some of you really should read the things that you have been posting, though.


After suggesting that people kill file those posting on the NI threads, I suggest that those wishing to do so refrain from posting on those threads themselves, lest they accidentally killfile each other. Common sense, really.

This becomes a threat, in some of your minds.


I suggest that people talk to each other about who is, or is not, a good person to kill file from time to time. Censorship? Hardly. When Chihowa negatively reviews a book, in effect suggesting that people not read it, he does make it harder for the author to be heard. Does that constitute censorship? Such a kill file recommendation is just such a negative review, of a poster rather than an author.

This suggestion became a threat to set up a blacklist, according to some of you.

An interesting claim. How many of you expect to lose your jobs, or be shunned by your neighbors because of such a recommendation?


I suggest that we set up kill files to keep some posts off our screens.

This is compared to Naziism.


I suggest that if this effort fails, a moderated newsgroup might be necessary.

This is compared to Hitler's final solution, in which 6 million of my coreligionists were murdered just for being Jewish. I am inclined to believe that the average poster who is so killfiled, will live a bit longer than Ann Frank did.


Gentlemen, if you don't wish to be referred to as fanatics, please don't act like fanatics. Your responses here, to incredibly mild actions, are so extreme and so out of proportion that they raise reasonable questions about your sanity. Remember also, that religious differences aside, I am one of you, partially. I am going to be more inclined to view you charitably, than most of the world will be. And right now, I think that some of you are in bad need of psychiatric treatment. Just imagine what a total outsider will think of you.


Path: news.ais.net!stat
From: stat@eagle.ais.net (Joseph Dumphy)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.irish
Subject: Guys, lighten up
Date: 16 Aug 1995 01:17:23 GMT
Organization: American Information Systems, Inc.
Lines: 56
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I would note, at this point, that our friend with the immense post, is quite fond of taking quotes out of context. He'll post something critical I wrote about someone, and neglect to mention the flame that I was responding to.

I do have the right to flame back, if I so wish.


However, he seemed to be under the impression that I bore someone ill will because I criticised the quality of his posts. Absolute nonsense. If one of the mentally handicapped students I got to substitute teach here in Chicago were to write an article, I probably wouldn't think to highly of what he wrote. Does it follow that I wish to see him hurt? No, of course not. The fact that I think that someone is writing crap doesn't mean that I don't care about him as a person, or want to give him a hard time. Just that I don't want to spend a lot of time reading what he has to say.

Simple enough?


Like it or not, I am entitled to my opinion about what you have to say, even if it is a negative one, and I am entitled to express it. If this bothers you, all I have to say is

GROW UP.


In the real world, I don't need your permission or approval to express an opinion. Who am I to talk about a subject? Who do I need to be? Anyone has the right. If that bothers you, that's your problem.

As for the comment that I am insisting that my point of view is the only correct one, of course I am. Of course, from time to time, in doing so, I will be wrong. That is the cost of being fallible. However, if I say that two contradictory points of view are simultaeneously correct, then I'm saying nothing at all. The demand that I do so, is a demand that I be silent, masquerading as a demand for humility.

In effect, I am being asked how I dared to argue back.


My response is, how dare you be so arrogant as to object to my having done so?

Enough said. Guys, get lost. You're boring me.


Joseph Brian Dunphy


Further flames, if noticed at all, will simply be used to entertain company.


Path: news.ais.net!stat
From: stat@eagle.ais.net (Joseph Dumphy)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.irish
Subject: Guys, lighten up
Date: 16 Aug 1995 01:28:26 GMT
Organization: American Information Systems, Inc.
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The promise to post something more interesting than this flamewar remains.

I'll be away for a while, and let the flamers get tired of the issue.

No disrespect to the group, but I also have some higher priority matters that have to be taken care of first.

I felt that some of the things here needed to be said. There are some tricks that flamers use, in the interests of rhetorical manipulation, and I felt that it was necessary to discuss them. By making people conscious of their use, I felt that I might help make them a little more resistant to their effects. If I bored some of you by doing so, I'm sorry. But if there's a better way to deal with this sort of flaming, it has yet to be found.

Please, just walk away with the message that followups to a post shouldn't be taken at face value. The practice of misrepresenting an opponent's position for inflammatory effect is a popular one here, and has to be recognised when it occurs. Never respond to a post that you haven't read yourself, OK?

Later, under more pleasant circumstances.


Aside : Sometimes, I wonder why I bother. Incidentally, I never did return. Breaking a promise? Maybe. But, I got away, and cleared my head, and remembered that this is the place where someone said that I wasn't white enough to be posting, and the only thing that anyone seemed to have a problem with, was the fact that I asked to be told if that was how people saw things there, so I could know whether or not I would be welcome to stay. No judgement, no complaint about exclusion, just a request that people be upfront about it, if they felt that this was a place for the pureblooded. This request was received, with what can only be termed an icy, bigoted, hostility. But, I'm not black, so that's OK, right?

I just didn't feel comfortable being in a place like that. And, if truth be told, it wasn't the first time I had gotten slurred in an online Celtic forum, which raised the question of exactly who it was, that I would be writing for. It raised another question : to what extent was the "rule" that I had to be a participant in a discussion, before I could comment on its appropriateness for its setting, one upheld in general, and to what extent was it a fabrication, pulled out of the air to rationalize pre-existing hostility?

On observation, it seemed that while the level of hostility was grossly exaggerated, some hostility would normally occur. So, it was a rule which I kept in mind afterwards.

[ Moving On ]





(*) Note : Those people at AIS never did learn to spell. Yes, this is an old account of mine. One that I was glad to be rid of.