Happy 4th of July

[Rían]

We have a 2-day celebration over here. A group of us head over to a neighboring city for their annual 3rd of July fireworks in the park event. We pack a picnic dinner and have a great time. Then we have a block party on the 4th of July with loads of illegal fireworks set off by our resident firemen and cops!


I don't know what to say about the JD situation ... I feel that he was definitely baited on purpose, which is REALLY wrong and cruel, yet he is still responsible for how he responds to it, and often it was really inappropriate, IMO. And I think that if he had been able to control his response better, then he wouldn't have been baited as much. Again, that doesn't excuse the baiters, but neither should a person be excused for their response to a situation. You can choose to ignore a jerk that makes provoking comments, or just respond in a polite and dismissing way. People choose how to respond, and some ways are in line with Entmoot rules, and some aren't.

I really, really enjoyed his posts when they were not made in anger - he knows a LOT, and is often a nice and fun guy. I've enjoyed chatting with him in IMs, too. I hope he will come back.

As far as the conspiracy - I really doubt that there's a "conspiracy"; I imagine some Mooters just reached a point where they felt they needed to talk to some of the Entmoot authorities about JD's angry posts - they seemed to be escalating. And to me, the important point is that it doesn't even matter if there was a conspiracy or not, because even if there WAS a "conspiracy", it would NOT work against a poster who consistently followed the Entmoot rules, and IMO, JD did NOT follow the rules often enough. (IOW, if there was a "conspiracy" to get azalea off the Moot, it wouldn't work!)

And as far as people not being able to handle his different opinions - well, I have radically different opinions than most people in at least 3 threads - Gay/Lesbian, Creationism, and Abortion - yet people seem to handle it just fine, and I handle it just fine - I realize that people have different opinions, yet they can still be my friends. When I'm provoked on purpose by someone that disagrees with my opinion, I choose to try to defuse it, instead of attacking back, yet I still deal with it (but in a polite manner) and that seems to work well. We've been able to carry on some in-depth discussions on some VERY volatile topics in a really good manner, even tho there's RADICALLY different opinions going on.

And BTW, JD has attacked me in a mean way (IMO) in those threads a couple of times WITHOUT my provoking him first (I've NEVER provoked him intentionally), and almost brought me to tears, yet I chose to "take" the wound and yet not wound back, and the discussion was able to continue, and we worked things out, and we stayed friends.

In the last week or so, it seemed like he was doing much better, and I was really suprised and disappointed to hear he had left. I hope he can come back and join the many valuable, intelligent, funny, compassionate Entmoot members that are here.

Well, those are some of my thoughts ...

[Last Child of Ungoliant]

Originally posted by RÃ*an
And as far as people not being able to handle his different opinions - well, I have radically different opinions than most people in at least 3 threads - Gay/Lesbian, Creationism, and Abortion - yet people seem to handle it just fine, and I handle it just fine - I realize that people have different opinions, yet they can still be my friends.

I am one of those with radically different attitudes?
but i hope that you still rate me as a friend, as i do you.
i believe people can have different views and yet still be
friendly, but enough siad on that.!!

[Rían]

Originally posted by Last Child of Ungoliant
I am one of those with radically different attitudes?

Yes, and

but i hope that you still rate me as a friend,

Yes!

as i do you.

Hooray!

i believe people can have different views and yet still be
friendly, but enough siad on that.!!

[Sister Golden Hair]

Rian, let me say that I agree with many of your points. And let me set the record straight in that I did not always condone JD's actions, and when I didn't I told him as much in PM or IM. JD has been a member of this community for nearly 3 years and I think most of the members were well aware of his political stands and his passionate and often opinionated posting style, but JD was not in the habbit of lashing out at people until he was attacked. IMO, he is not blameless, but had a lot of help. It takes two or more to argue and from some of the things that I read on the forum here and from some of the complaints issued by members at the end of his days here, the complaints were coming from the very people that were baiting and attacking him. When he's wrong, I'll say he's wrong, but as I said in the moderator forum: in all my years of moderating here and at SF-Fandom, never have I seen one member so singled out and picked on to the point that he is railroaded off the board. I think it's a shame. JD contributed a great deal to this community and was often helpful to the staff behind the scenes. He even had planned to help us figure out how to do bans and tech stuff if we were going to create the political sub-forum. If you have ever noticed his title with the "UNDERCOVER" in it, that was given to him for helping out behind the scenes.

All I can say is that he made some mistakes as we all have. He was not intentionally out to cause trouble, but sometimes trouble followed him. He was strong in his beliefs and also a fun loving guy. He always played a big part in the April Fools jokes and made his armies to attack the staff. Those were fun times and nomatter what some may think or say about him, he is a very nice guy and was an asset to this community, and I for one will miss him.

[Rían]

Originally posted by Sister Golden Hair
... in all my years of moderating here and at SF-Fandom, never have I seen one member so singled out and picked on to the point that he is railroaded off the board.

Yes, I definitely agree he was often singled out and picked on, and perhaps stronger measures should have been taken against the people that baited him ... yet a person is still responsible for their responses, and if he could have controlled his reponses better, I think the baiters (petty, infantile cowards that they are) would have backed off. And it seemed that smaller and smaller things were setting JD off - and from posters that were NOT the usual baiters, but were instead considerate Entmoot members - and they were NOT deliberately baiting him, but just making innocent comments, and were baffled and hurt by his angry responses, and the thread would just crash and burn.

I pretty much agree with what Gaffer said. And I hope JD can change a bit - not his opinions, but the tone of his reponses - and come back, for when he's not angry, he's a v. good poster.

[Sister Golden Hair]

And it seemed that smaller and smaller things were setting JD off - and from posters that were NOT the usual baiters, but were instead considerate Entmoot members - and they were NOT deliberately baiting him, but just making innocent comments, and were baffled and hurt by his angry responses, and the thread would just crash and burn.

Well, I think that it got to a point of where it had been happening so often and for so long, that he was just at the end of his rope with anyone that critisized him.

[Rían]

Yes, I can see that - and I hope he takes a bit of a break, gets back up to the top of the rope, and comes back to Entmoot and doesn't lower himself to the baiters' level with angry responses.

[Ragnarok]

I don't think the whole conflict between JD and others mooters was the arguments itself. Myself, and probably others were discouraged from posting our opposings views because if your opinion was different, the conversation would drag on for several pages. I'm not blaming JD because it takes two to tango :P but in all seriousness many people didn't want to get involved into such a heavy debate over petty differences. I think the main problem was on both sides, people just took things too seriously. And from there things got out of hand, things like this will happen between outspoken people with firm beliefs. Perhaps, it would be best that poeple be reminded to just relax, its just a forum after all. It is unfortunate that one of our prolific posters has left, I never really had anything against JD personally and sometimes it was fun to debate with him.

[BeardofPants]

Originally posted by RÃ*an
Yes, I can see that - and I hope he takes a bit of a break, gets back up to the top of the rope, and comes back to Entmoot ....

That is my hope as well. I sincerely hope he takes this time to enjoy life a bit more; hopefully avoid that stomach ulcer! and come back refreshed. Nobody I've talked to over PM or otherwise wanted to "run him off". I think of lot of us were just concerned, because he seemed to be cracking, and jumping on posters without instigation (Beruthial's Cat springs to mind). Actually, I was really surprised to hear that he left; he seemed to be much happier in post-style before he disappeared. I really thought that this "grouchy" glitch that we were all stuck in seemed to have passed.

[Sister Golden Hair]

Actually, I was really surprised to hear that he left; he seemed to be much happier in post-style before he disappeared. I really thought that this "grouchy" glitch that we were all stuck in seemed to have passed.

Well, the last straw was Ben deleted his post in the "Farenheit 9/11" thread in the Entertainment forum. I saw the post and didn't see where it was out of line in anyway. Ben though said that he only wanted people that had seen the movie to post, yet only one person that posted had seen it and JDs post was the only post deleted.

[gollum9630]

All you think that jerseydevil will eventually come back but you dont know everything that happened. In the Fahrenheit 9/11 thread in the entertainment forum he had a post deleted because he had not seen the filmn while others who had also not seen it did not have their posts deleted. He then reposted his post asking who deleted the post, only to be editted and finding out it had been Ben.

[BeardofPants]

Aha, that makes much more sense. I never saw the post, so I don't know whether it was justified or not. I'm sure Ben had good reasons though. *shrug*

[Sister Golden Hair]

Originally posted by BeardofPants
Aha, that makes much more sense. I never saw the post, so I don't know whether it was justified or not. I'm sure Ben had good reasons though. *shrug*

I told you Ben's reasons, and Ben and I discussed it in the moderator forum as well. He also said that he may have made a bad call.

[gollum9630]

Originally posted by BeardofPants
Aha, that makes much more sense. I never saw the post, so I don't know whether it was justified or not. I'm sure Ben had good reasons though. *shrug*

Its not that it wasnt justified, its that only his post was deleted while everyone else who posted without seeing the movie didnt have their post deleted

[BeardofPants]

Originally posted by Sister Golden Hair
I told you Ben's reasons, and Ben and I discussed it in the moderator forum as well. He also said that he may have made a bad call.

Like I said, I never saw it, so I can't judge either way. If Ben thinks he made a bad call, then the post should be restored. If not, well, time to move on.

[gollum9630]

Originally posted by BeardofPants
Like I said, I never saw it, so I can't judge either way. If Ben thinks he made a bad call, then the post should be restored. If not, well, time to move on.

i think that by saying he made a bad call he was refering to only deleting JD's post

[BeardofPants]

Originally posted by gollum9630
i think that by saying he made a bad call he was refering to only deleting JD's post

That *is* what I'm referring to, Gollum. Deleted posts can be restored from the mod controls. Unless of course, he deleted it out of existance.

[gollum9630]

Originally posted by BeardofPants
That *is* what I'm referring to, Gollum. Deleted posts can be restored from the mod controls. Unless of course, he deleted it out of existance.

The post was deleted because JD had not seen the movie. That was Bens reason, fair enough, the only thing was that everyone else who posted had not seen the movie. Why undo the deletion when to keep your policy on the thread you just need to delete the other posts

[BeardofPants]

Fer gawdssake, gollum, I agree. IF Ben thinks he made a bad judgement call, then he should restore it, or enforce the policy through the rest of the thread. However, I never saw it. Now, if you don't mind.....

[Mercutio]

Ok this is kind of late for 4th of July but I just remembered it.

My dad & brother were in the Scottish highlands over the 4th and attended services at a church (Church of Scotland). The pastor/priest opened up the service by mentioning that they should celebrate with their American brothers their (the Americans) successful overthrow of a tyrannical authority (England).


Understand?

The Scots wish they could've successfully overthrown the English gov. too!