Locked Topic

[Cail]

The whole mess stinks, and will leave a stain on the FBI for generations.

Imagine if you will, what would have happened had a special prosecutor been appointed to investigate Obama's birth certificate? Or whether or not he was a Muslim.
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"There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences." - PJ O'Rourke
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"Men and women range themselves into three classes or orders of intelligence; you can tell the lowest class by their habit of always talking about persons; the next by the fact that their habit is always to converse about things; the highest by their preference for the discussion of ideas." - Charles Stewart
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"I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison
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[Avatar]

[Zarathustra]

Wow, getting banned for calling someone a "tosser." What a way to go down!
I've been called a racist and other offensive (to me) "-ists," and never saw anyone get banned for it. What a shame.

I'm not arguing against the decision. It's not my place to decide. And I don't condone Cail's words . . . but they're just words. In the end, Cail's last act here was to win the argument that those who opposed his speech want to silence him. I guess if you have to go out, proving a point against your opponents isn't such a bad way to go.

Take care, Cail!
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Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche

[SoulBiter]

Banned from the Watch seems a bit extreme. Maybe banned from this specific area of the forum or even a temporary ban for 30 days would be more appropriate.

But hey... no body put me in charge nor would I want it. I for one will miss his insights.
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"He torments himself sufficiently."

**"You can deny if you will but the "hens" didn't just happen to show up when they did, by accident. "**

"All of the above is my opinion and thus shouldnt need to be supported by anything other than more of my opinions. "

We miss you Tracie but your Spirit will always shine brightly on the Watch

[Savor Dam]

The hosting software for the Watch does not support forum-level bans, except for those forums which are only open to a limited circle. At one point, I believe Syl did have the Tank set up as a limited-membership forum that you had to apply and be approved to even see, but it was logistically unwieldy and not terribly popular.

As for a temporary ban, mods did consider this. There certainly had been warnings issued by admins for prior incidents, such as suggesting someone have intimate relations with an ovine (I'm paraphrasing...), but that apparently was not sufficient deterrent to keep his posts civil.

I don't see the "Tosser" post as anything but the straw that broke the camel's back.
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Love prevails.
~ Tracie Mckinney-Hammon

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
~ Rainier Maria Rilke

[Skyweir]

Well I for one am glad that Cails banning was not just because of a one off use of the term ... Tosser.

That would be unreasonable. I do not believe such a decision was or could have been made on the basis of a one off under the cuff comment.

In contrary, it would take a repeated and established pattern of disrespecting, condescending, lack of civility and a dismissal of warnings and calls to refrain from such behaviour.

To be honest my view is that a lack of civility, ad hominem attacks is unnecessary and unacceptable in any community forum. It does nothing for membership retention nor does it encourage broad member participation.

With every community there are the most basic of rules. Cyber forums included. Most would not tolerate a lot of what has been and to some degree is still tolerated here.

I personally think such a decision is not one made lightly or easily. I also think that committing to being civil and engaging civilly is a good thing .. not at all a bad thing. Im sad that Av HAD to make that call, not something any mod or admin ever wants to have to do.

I believe we all signed up to an agreed standard of behaviour and to the process that is in place to moderate behaviour where SELF MODERATION is not exercised.
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health and healing

'Smoke me a kipper .. I'll be back for breakfast!'

EZBoard SURVIVOR

[Ur Dead]

So he is ban from the entire Watch board or just this forum?

Did he treat people the same way on the other sections as he did on this part?

If he did not then it seems the ban(The entire board)to be along the lines of dictatorial instead of corrective.

Just speaking out on this.

Something that Martin Niemoller wrote.
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What's this silver looking ring doing on my finger?

[aliantha]

He's banned from the whole board. It's not possible to ban someone from a specific forum, except in cases (like the Writer's Forum) where you have to be asked to be let in.

Av was crystal-clear in his post, I thought. He'd spoken to Cail repeatedly about his posting behavior. Cail would clean up his act for a little while, but then he'd be right back at it, insulting people he didn't like (and people who would call him on his crap). So the "corrective" part had already been attempted, and it hadn't worked. Hence the full-on ban.
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EZ Board Survivor

"Dreaming isn't good for you unless you do the things it tells you to." -- Three Dog Night (via the GI)

https://www.hearth-myth.com/

[Ur Dead]

Wow.. thanks for the info.
I knew a lot of boards in the early years where you could selectively shut out people from sections. Guess they never kept that option.
(latter 1980's, early 90's era)
Was he banned before?
I though Kevin was the board owner?
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What's this silver looking ring doing on my finger?

[Savor Dam]

I would be enthusiastic about having a Watch where we could easily open or close various fora to members based on interest or close them off in the rare cases such as this.

That isn't the software we are running on...and there are multiple challenges to getting to such a state. How would we pay for it? What would it take to migrate the almost-two-decades of Watch archives to the new platform? Who would do this?

Vain has mad skills, but isn't all that engaged. Av is also deeply skilled, but already is giving a lot of his substance to us already, Can we really expect him to take on this large task? Who else might do it competently and for free?
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Love prevails.
~ Tracie Mckinney-Hammon

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
~ Rainier Maria Rilke

[Avatar]

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Cail's penchant for "colorful metaphors" gave me my Custom Rank. I'll always have that to treasure.
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[[Syl]]

Hmm. That's better than "Pedant."
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"It is not the literal past that rules us, save, possibly, in a biological sense. It is images of the past. Each new historical era mirrors itself in the picture and active mythology of its past or of a past borrowed from other cultures. It tests its sense of identity, of regress or new achievement against that past.”
-George Steiner

[TheFallen]

I have to say that this feels orchestrated, at least in part. And it smells of deliberate incitement too - for all that Cail obviously has to take responsibility for being thus incited.

A sudden influx of lurkers, conversations and "comparing notes" specifically about one poster held in private - and (here's the point) not just amongst mods either - followed a mere couple of days later by a perma-ban.

None of this smells particularly good to me.

Also - and I'm almost reluctant to say this, but will - I thought this was Hashi's Tank to moderate? Apparently not though.

In my very firm opinion, this recent decision absolutely should have been Hashi's to make, while he's wearing the hat at least (nobody else wanted it, remember?), and not taken over his head by some grand high council of the elders. This doesn't do much for his authority or the regard he's apparently held in by his mod peers... but it's not for me to take umbrage on his behalf though.

However, the sheer irony in someone being banned in a thread that claims that progressives look to stifle the expression of "wrongthink" won't be lost on many. There's one way to change the leaning of the Tank for sure, if you don't like the current slant of prevailing opinion.

Here - as in life - it seems that "it's not what you know, but who you know" that applies. Reinforcements summoned and vendetta won? Possibly a mild overstatement but still...

Shame - I'd have hoped for better from KW.
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Newsflash: the word "irony" doesn't mean "a bit like iron"

Shockingly, some people have claimed that I'm egocentric... but hey, enough about them


"If you strike me down, I shall become far stronger than you can possibly imagine."
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* I occasionally post things here because I am a fan of SRD.

This should not be considered as any condoning of the hypocritical, snowflake, bleeding heart, white guilt-ridden, compulsively virtue-signalling and totalitarian prog Left woke zealotry which some try to force upon this forum.

[[Syl]]

Lol. Yeah, I heard vague (at first) mentions on Facebook and came to see what the news was, popcorn in hand. I don't think there was any cabal, as I got here after the decision was made. Yes, the active mods did deliberate beforehand, and I think that's to be expected considering the gravity of the situation.

And no, Hashi wasn't present for the decision, but that's because, apparently, he was otherwise occupied with RL stuff. It happens. As someone who was around when mods first became a thing (perhaps even the first mod? not sure on that one), modships aren't fiefdoms. You're there to help out, but the big decisions are still made by the admins. And a lot of the smaller ones like smiting spammers and whatnot when the mods aren't around. And yeah, I was heavy handed as a mod, but I said I would be going in and still got the green. But I especially find that statement amusing, because when I was on the other end of it, PMs between members and to admins and other mods would fly whenever I came down on someone on the right, and I got plenty of flack out in the open on top of it. If it was Esmer or maybe Null, no problem, but if it was anyone on the other side... well.

The incitement part also amuses me, as even though I don't see it here (other than some people expressing the intent to keep putting up with it until someone decides to do something about it), I know that the tactic has been deliberately used by people who are or will be upset by Cail being banned. That's irony.

And all that doesn't even address the history, albeit one complicated by years of time and ensuing social interactions, that goes beyond any single mod and was the core of Avatar's decision. "Pedant" was a reference to that, and as long as there have been rules at KW, that's been strictly forbidden, yet it always seemed to me that anyone with enough time under their belt or politically aligned friends willing to whitewash it can bend that rule past any useful meaning.

Me, I've always seen KW as a microcosm of our greater society. I got tired of seeing the one reflected, rather than refined, in the other. And I've met Cail IRL. He seems like a good guy. Thing is, KW still isn't real life. Some people want to be able to enjoy a political discussion that doesn't devolve into HuffPo comments territory. And some people find that stifling. *shrug*
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"It is not the literal past that rules us, save, possibly, in a biological sense. It is images of the past. Each new historical era mirrors itself in the picture and active mythology of its past or of a past borrowed from other cultures. It tests its sense of identity, of regress or new achievement against that past.”
-George Steiner

[TheFallen]

[lucimay]

that's not the case at all The Fallen. did you not read this post from Av?
I think he was perfectly clear that what you're proposing may have happened most certainly did not.

[Zarathustra]

I am glad to see so many people return. But I agree with TF that it seems they returned to gang up on Cail more than to debate. Maybe Cail deserved it. But that doesn't negate the point about others' motivations. I'm sure there is a lot of high-fiving going on behind the scenes about the ability to silence him. I bet people were feeling good after that happened. (You know who you are. We're not stupid. Hints are meant to be taken.)

Clearly, Ali showed up to get Cail banned. She explicitly asked for action to be taken, when Cail wasn't even talking to her. This was done out in the open for everyone to see.

I know that Cail wasn't explicitly banned for his political views, but he *was* banned for "saying the wrong thing." And I'm sure that those who disagree with him politically are happier about it than those who don't. You're lying to yourselves if you deny it.

There are a lot of things I wish I could get people to stop saying or doing--if I weren't philosophically opposed to silencing people. It's human nature.
Wayfriend's dumb signature about this being a platform for white nationalism is clearly meant to antagonize and imply that some of us here are racists. But should everything that pisses people off be grounds for silencing them? Apparently not. Not if you're vague and passive aggressive enough about it to have plausible deniability. And you know what? That's fine. I'd prefer to let people say what they want. If I wasn't warned to stop "trolling" WF, I'd have no problem with him trolling right back. I really do think people should be able to say what they want.
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Meaning is created internally by each individual in each specific life: any attempt at *meaning* which relies on some kind of external superstructure (God, Satan, the Creator, the Worm, whatever) for its substance misses the point (I mean the point of my story). -SRD

Remain faithful to the earth, my brothers, with the power of your virtue. Let your gift-giving love and your knowledge serve the meaning of the earth ... Do not let them fly away from earthly things and beat with their wings against eternal walls. Alas, there has always been so much virtue that has flown away. Lead back to the earth the virtue that flew away, as I do-back to the body, back to life, that it may give the earth a meaning, a human meaning. -Nietzsche

[Vraith]

[lucimay]

well yeah...
"go fuck a sheep" MIGHT have been the "wrong thing to say"!! lol!!

Ali didn't show up to get him banned, and neither did i. but i know those of you who think we did will think what you think regardless of what we say.

hopefully, in the coming days and weeks we can move past it and maybe get along better. that's what i'm hoping for, anyway.
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you're more advanced than a cockroach,
have you ever tried explaining yourself
to one of them?
~ alan bates, the mothman prophecies


i've had this with actors before, on the set,
where they get upset about the [size of my]
trailer, and i'm always like...take my trailer,
cause... i'm from Kentucky
and that's not what we brag about.
~ george clooney, inside the actor's studio


a straight edge for legends at
the fold - searching for our
lost cities of gold. burnt tar,
gravel pits. sixteen gears switch.
Haphazard Lucy strolls by.
~ dennis r wood ~