Quel dommage

[Sean]

Andrew, I fear that you are in danger of aligning yourself with our two resident trolls. I have no idea if you are as intelligent as you claim to be but I know that you are not stupid enough to realise where all the shit is coming from on this board.
TBH your ridiculous assertions are not lending much credibility to your claims of superior intelligence.

I think it is painfully obvious to all with even a rudimentary intelligence what would happen here if certain posters refrained from posting. Consider this:

Gob & Hen stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Quad and Lo (and sadly you too it would seem) keep spouting their bile and things continue as ever in that respect as the members respond to it. The number of posts and threads would drop dramatically as we would be without our two most prolific posters.

Quad & Lo stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Threads are no longer derailed by their concerted efforts to ruin this board so people don't have to respond to their trollish behaviour and thus pissing matches are reduced greatly. Members can get back to posting about subjects they wish to post about without having to wade through the shit.

Now... read those carefully (twice if necessary) and then tell me if you agree or not. I think your answer will speak volumes.

[Gob]

We could always ban Lo and Quaddy and see what eventuated?

[Sean]

You know what mate, I am on principle opposed to banning but if it came down to a situation where the survival of the board depended on it I would have absolutely no objection. Gar had this covered on the CSB when he stated that anyone who engaged in criminal activities on the board or tried to bring down the board would be banned.

I believe that those two are trying to bring down the board on behalf of their cowardly svengalis.

[Gob]

How about a temporary suspension of their membership to see how the rest of us get along?

[Sean]

I have no objections. Others may however...

[Gob]

Then we wont tell them

[Sean]

Mum's ze vord!

[Lord Jim]

It seems to me, that just looking at it in the abstract:

If a poster makes clear that their purpose for participating in a forum is because they despise it, and that their objective is to ruin it as a venue for debate, or to cause it to shut down....and then they engage in behavior designed to achieve those objectives...

A very strong case can be made that they should be treated exactly the same way as someone who was trying to achieve that same objective through hacking or spamming....

No admin of any forum would be expected to tolerate hacking or spamming for that purpose.

[Andrew D]

It is not my intention to be "aligning" myself with anyone.

I have not been saying much (if anything) in the bigskygal-Gob-loCAtek-quaddriver-The Hen flame wars. I have long since lost track of what they have been flaming each other -- with no apparent change during my absences -- about.

Now... read those carefully (twice if necessary) and then tell me if you agree or not. I think your answer will speak volumes.

I think that your comment speaks volumes. What is your basis for such a one-sided approach?

Do you really think that all of the flaming has been loCAtek's and/or quaddriver's fault? Do you really think that none of the blame can properly be laid on Gob and/or The Hen.

If so, then you are the one who needs to read things more carefully.

[Gob]

I have had Lo on ingore for many months, she still follows me about like an untrained puppy making litte messes wherever she goes. (want examples?)

Quaddy has stated he wants this site to fail, and will do what he can to ensure that, I find that disgusting.

[Sean]

It is not my intention to be "aligning" myself with anyone.

I have not been saying much (if anything) in the bigskygal-Gob-loCAtek-quaddriver-The Hen flame wars. I have long since lost track of what they have been flaming each other -- with no apparent change during my absences -- about.

True Andrew, you have not been involved in these "flame wars". Instead, you have been sniping from the sidelines whilst relentlessly trolling Lord Jim and BSG.

Now... read those carefully (twice if necessary) and then tell me if you agree or not. I think your answer will speak volumes.

I think that your comment speaks volumes. What is your basis for such a one-sided approach?

That is a childish attempt to deflect away from my question. Why should I answer your question when you haven't got the decency to respond to me?

I'll try again...

Gob & Hen stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Quad and Lo (and sadly you too it would seem) keep spouting their bile and things continue as ever in that respect as the members respond to it. The number of posts and threads would drop dramatically as we would be without our two most prolific posters.

Quad & Lo stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Threads are no longer derailed by their concerted efforts to ruin this board so people don't have to respond to their trollish behaviour and thus pissing matches are reduced greatly. Members can get back to posting about subjects they wish to post about without having to wade through the shit.

Now if you would be so kind as to give me your thoughts on those scenarios I will gladly answer any questions you have.

Do you really think that all of the flaming has been loCAtek's and/or quaddriver's fault? Do you really think that none of the blame can properly be laid on Gob and/or The Hen.

If so, then you are the one who needs to read things more carefully.

Honestly Andrew, you claim to be an intelligent man but I'm not seeing anything from you I would describe as intelligent... Instead I'm seeing things that claim to be evidence of a superior intellect but that in truth any muppet could find with Google...

[Andrew D]

If a poster makes clear that ... their [sic]objective is to ruin it as a venue for debate ....

If Lord Jim is so devoted to debate, why won't he engage in honest debate?

I have repeatedly challenged him to honest debate about whether the Guantanamo detainees are "terrorists" or "high value terrorists" or the other phrases he has used to describe them.

That would be a straightforward, honest debate. He would produce whatever evidence he believes supports his position, and he would articulate whatever reasoning he believes leads from that evidence to his conclusion. I would counter that evidence and that reasoning.

That would be a straightforward debate.

But he has, over and over and over again, declined to engage in it. Maybe he will this time; in advance, who can say?

And the same goes for the subject of John Yoo -- he described my meticulous argument as partisanly biased but declined to identify even one substantive flaw in it (as distinct from what he claimed was a substantive flaw in my characterization of one of his own arguments) -- and the same goes for public nudity ("a lot of peoplre don't like it" is hardly a substantive argument), and the same goes for prosecutors ....

And the same goes, and the same goes, and the same goes ....

As I have said on numerous occasions, I am perfectly happy to engage Lord Jim in real, substantive, honest debate. That would be debate in which evidentiary principles are equilaterally applied, in which the same standards of logic are applied to both sides, and so on.

But he consistently refuses my challenge.

And then he whines about people's supposedly trying to ruin this board as a venue for debate.

Draw your own conclusions.

[Sean]

Jim has got you on ignore. That is his prerogative.

If he doesn't wish to debate with you he does not have to. It is incredibly childish and petulant to stamp your feet and demand that he do so.

[Andrew D]

Oh, please.

I have been trolling Lord Jim?

Lord Jim started a thread about posters whom we miss. In his opening posting, he chose to attack me, even though I had posted exactly nothing in that thread.

And I have been trolling him?

I have been trolling bigskygal?

I started a thread in the opening posting of which I said exactly nothing about bigskygal. When I did mention her, I said nothing more than that she had not actually departed.

She came back with "massive prick," "loathsome," "toxicity," "pathetic," "smearing," "childish," and on and on and on.

And I have been trolling her?

Are you and I reading the same board?

[Sean]

Yes. In another thread you accused Jim of "relentlessly trolling" you since your return. I called you out on that as bullshit but you chose to ignore me.

At every turn you post venom towards those two particular posters. It has a tendency to reduce your credibility as a member who is interested in "real, substantive, honest debate".

[Andrew D]

Jim has got you on ignore. That is his prerogative.

If he doesn't wish to debate with you he does not have to.

Yes (assuming that he actually has me on ignore, a proposition which he has rendered rather dubious), he has the right to do so.

But in that case, shouldn't he really ignore me?

Does ignoring me -- or purporting to ignore me -- when he considers it convenient for him but not ignoring me when he considers it more convenient for him not to ignore me strike you as in some way intellectually honest?

If he wants to ignore me, fine.

If he wants to engage me, fine.

But if he wants to ignore me only when he recognizes that his position is failing in the substantive debate, but not to ignore me when he thinks -- wrongly -- that his position has some chance of prevailing in the substantive derbate, then he is a chicken-shit little twat.

And you know that as well as I do.

[Andrew D]

Yes. In another thread you accused Jim of "relentlessly trolling" you since your return. I called you out on that as bullshit but you chose to ignore me.

I don't recall your having "called [me] out" with respect to Lord Jim's having been trolling me.

But if you have some other explanation for his viciously attacking me in a thread in which I had not participated at all, I'd love to see it.

[Sean]

Horseshit! From the 'Asshole' thread...

Lord Jim has been trolling me relentlessly; he evidently has nothing better to do.

Care to elaborate Andrew?

I don't think that there is any truth in that statement whatsoever...

You responded to Gob who posted directly after me. Don't play the fucking innocent sunshine. You bleat on about "real, substantive, honest debate" but you're more interested in whining.

[Andrew D]

Gob & Hen stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Quad and Lo (and sadly you too it would seem) keep spouting their bile and things continue as ever in that respect as the members respond to it. The number of posts and threads would drop dramatically as we would be without our two most prolific posters.

Yes, you are quite right: If the two most prolific posters (and thread-starters) on this board were to be absent, there would be fewer postings and fewer new threads.

Quad & Lo stop posting for a week, everybody takes everybody off ignore: Threads are no longer derailed by [some people's claims of] their concerted efforts to ruin this board so people don't have to respond to their trollish behaviour and thus pissing matches are reduced greatly. Members can get back to posting about subjects they wish to post about without having to wade through the shit.

And which subjects are those?

Honestly Andrew, you claim to be an intelligent man but I'm not seeing anything from you I would describe as intelligent... Instead I'm seeing things that claim to be evidence of a superior intellect but that in truth any muppet could find with Google...

Really?

Do you honestly think that my series of postings about John Yoo could be found by any muppet with Google?

Do you honestly think that my writings about international law as it relates to Tibet could be found by any muppet with Google? Well, actually, they could, because I am a published author on that subject, and, yes, my published writings can be found via Google.

But do you honestly think that my writings about international law as it relates to Tibet could have been constructed merely with what could have been found by any muppet via Google?

I live on Sol III. Where are you?

[quaddriver]

We could always ban Lo and Quaddy and see what eventuated?

same think I told you: dead board. you got what, 6 people left? who you going to pick next. you have to have SOMEONE.

you cannot live without being a troll. EVERY board you have ever posted on - the same.

oh btw - how many times did I post on the new CSB again?