[POLL] Abolish the "ignore" function.

[MacCruiskeen]

Mac--aren't you the poster who targeted, followed around, and hurled abuse on a daily basis at SLAD?

No. Dear god, where do you get this stuff? I never did any such thing. It is a complete and utter fabrication, a fantasy. It`s also insulting.

And am I mistaken or weren't you one of the several posters who (from another continent no less) ranted and raved for months about the mortal danger that the warmongering Hillary Clinton posed to humanity and how she was poised to start WWIII, thus effectively helping elect the Orange Menace who really is threatening life on the planet?

No. I did not rant and rave about her. Like 90% of the posters on this board, I said she was a dreadful candidate, a dreadful human being, and as a president, would be as warmongering as every other US president since Jimmy Carter.

(from another continent no less)

Oh please. Have you ever heard of NATO? Or of intercontinental ballistic missiles? Your president is the president of the planet, and your soldiers are stationed on my doorstep, not to mention your tanks and artillery and WMD.

This is like being cross-examined by the HUAC. Please take the minimal trouble to acquaint yourself with the board. And please have the minimal courtesy not to spread malicious rumours at my expense. And your very next line is a doozy:

An apology to SLAD and a humble admission of your mistake regarding our election might do a lot to rehabilitate your image.

Ah, you`ve convicted me now? That escalated quickly. You didn`t even wait for any answers to your "questions".

You cannot be for real, Heaven Swan. Stop demanding that people apologise for things they have not done. It makes you sound very likea police officer, a judge. and an executioner.

rehabilitate your image

ROTFL. Thanks for the tip. If I do sufficient penance for the sins you fantasise, I might yet become Lord Mayor of London.

[MacCruiskeen]

I wish Project Willow was around. I`m keeping her wise and very recent words in mind, in this very thread. And I`m outa here now. Enough time wasted on the disingenuous. (That`s a sin.)

[Elihu]

can we just cut throught the bull$h!t? this dream doesn't seem to me like a person. it seems to me to be a technique. if i were to ever meet it in real life i would only pray to get the drop. it's mo has been critiqued and deconstructed so many times by so many posters over a very long period of time, years. so really, it's not the central issue. the issue is that somebody, with power over the board, wants it here. jeff is absent, willow, ocho duece, wombat and drew have all begged off. who the heck is pulling the strings behind the curtain? and don't play dumb. we've seen the moderator powers wielded. there is a steaming pile of cyber bodies and the current state of the board to attest to it. and it just sails by on the second leg of the double standard. this ridiculous idiot could be taken in hand in moment.

That's a good one Sounder. Very good.

sounder is always good.

I think we need to think out of the box, in non-linear ways.

Posting restrictions won't solve the problem.

i agree with that. but it ain't that complicated. if there is one thing in this world i hate it's favoritism. whether from left or right it always leads to the same place.

[Spiro C. Thiery]

I'm torn. My first reaction was not to be convinced by Mac's reasoning and, like Cordelia, thought, "Just ignore it." This attitude didn't change much over the course of the pages until AD showed up and provided the case for the prosecution. It was an authentic QED moment, so much so, in fact, that given the nature of this forum (and fora in general), I thought it had to be a put-on. But regardless of the locus of our discussion, that is what trolls do.

Given that I myself have never applied the ignore function, although I have been tempted, and given the epiphany stated in the previous paragraph, you would think that I would be inclined to vote "Yes." But I'm still not sure that is a solution. Aside from that, oddly enough, there is a matter of coincidence related to the question before us that I have recently encountered that involved the tedious issue of arguing one's for-or-against-ness as it relates to a particular political approach which we as political subjects really quite literally have been demonstrated to have no control over. My point being that even here there is a pointlessness to it, I guess, given what was revealed in the thread about the apparent obliviousness of our host to this and a number of issues. That, and I am a non-voter. So I would definitely need stronger persuasion.

Having said all that. I strongly recommend that you, Mac, place AD on ignore. To be honest, I have serious doubts that he has done so himself. I think the demonstrative nature in which he states that he has is another part of the troll package meant to get under your skin.

Joke moved from the beginning to the end of this reply, so as not to derail my own comment:
I voted "No." because "Yes." refuses to demand that I state my reasons.

[MacCruiskeen]

Thanks, Spiro. It is good to see you here. Forget the ignore function. Look at the bigger picture:

- never a straight answer to any question. just a permanent runaround.

- jeff is absent & silent though he pays for the place

- dr volin is three years gone but still listed as mod

- willow has long since left in disgust, she talks of harrassment by board members irl and can only hint at what`s going on behind the scenes, tells us all to take care

- I and a million other posters waste hours of our time making EXACTLY the same point made by WR himself three fucking years ago (that AD is a troll) but get insulted and suspended by WR if we raise our voices about it now

- AD`s stuff suddenly migrates to the data dump and nobody knows if he was told to shift it, or by whom, because WR`s attitude is: "shut up and don`t ask questions, you dick, because i`m your boss now"

- toadies are safe, and welcome

- rigorous intuition is not encouraged here any more, nor is even accurate intuition.

-etc, etc, etc....
____________________________

What you don`t know can hurt you. And what you pretend not to notice can hurt you even more, in the long run. (see Bates / Double Bind)

[brekin]

Mac--aren't you the poster who targeted, followed around, and hurled abuse on a daily basis at SLAD?

No. Dear god, where do you get this stuff? I never did any such thing. It is a complete and utter fabrication, a fantasy. It`s also insulting.

And am I mistaken or weren't you one of the several posters who (from another continent no less) ranted and raved for months about the mortal danger that the warmongering Hillary Clinton posed to humanity and how she was poised to start WWIII, thus effectively helping elect the Orange Menace who really is threatening life on the planet?

No. I did not rant and rave about her. Like 90% of the posters on this board, I said she was a dreadful candidate, a dreadful human being, and as a president, would be as warmongering as every other US president since Jimmy Carter.

(from another continent no less)

Oh please. Have you ever heard of NATO? Or of intercontinental ballistic missiles? Your president is the president of the planet, and your soldiers are stationed on my doorstep, not to mention your tanks and artillery and WMD.
This is like being cross-examined by the HUAC. Please take the minimal trouble to acquaint yourself with the board. And please have the minimal courtesy not to spread malicious rumours at my expense. And your very next line is a doozy:

An apology to SLAD and a humble admission of your mistake regarding our election might do a lot to rehabilitate your image.

Ah, you`ve convicted me now? That escalated quickly. You didn`t even wait for any answers to your "questions".
You cannot be for real, Heaven Swan. Stop demanding that people apologise for things they have not done. It makes you sound very likea police officer, a judge. and an executioner.

rehabilitate your image

ROTFL. Thanks for the tip. If I do sufficient penance for the sins you fantasise, I might yet become Lord Mayor of London.

Jeez doc, you don't like it when people act like police officer, judge and executioner? Not so fun, huh?
Thanks for reenacting though a cool scene from Silence of the Lambs.

[b]Hannibal Lecter[/b]: You know what you look like to me, with your good bag and your cheap shoes? You look like a rube. A well scrubbed, hustling rube with a little taste. Good nutrition's given you some length of bone, but you're not more than one generation from poor white trash, are you, Agent Starling? And that accent you've tried so desperately to shed: pure West Virginia. What is your father, dear? Is he a coal miner? Does he stink of the lamp? You know how quickly the boys found you... all those tedious sticky fumblings in the back seats of cars... while you could only dream of getting out... getting anywhere... getting all the way to the FBI.

Clarice Starling: You see a lot, Doctor. But are you strong enough to point that high-powered perception at yourself? What about it? Why don't you - why don't you look at yourself and write down what you see? Or maybe you're afraid to.

dada, QED. brekin`s latest and entirely typical "contribution" is the kind of dumb timewasting flamebaiting shitpost that is now welcomed silently endured here, because most people who would have resisted it have long since given up and left. It would be wrong to say it is beneath contempt, because it is in fact entirely worthy of it.

Been doin it since 2007. Maybe the board hasn't changed, but you have?

I appreciate the previous posts and perspectives.
I'm definitely not in favor of more bullying and meanness, although I do appreciate Dada's perspective which I've interpreted as that 'sometimes impolite honesty is necessary to combat oppression'.
The women and the past glory I was, perhaps mistakenly, referring to were certainly not snarky 'star' posters. I came here because of my research into the intersection of government sponsored mind-control and women's oppression and I was under the impression that there were quite a few survivors, child advocates, writers (like esteemed founder JW) on the subject who used to frequent this forum.
Your posts are making me realize that, like most calls to the turn back the clock, the apology I was envisioning probably isn't the great idea I thought it was.

From what I can recall there have been two posters who openly discuss their histories with government sponsored mind control. And no doubt numerous others who haven't disclosed or just lurk. An issue has been that this isn't a support, therapeutic or treatment forum and discussing such material can be triggering. Also, as this is a discussion forum with a speculative to woo bent, that in itself guarantees debating and differing points of view on the history, scope, and players of gov. mind control which literally no one will be in complete alignment with. So less of a therapeutic safe haven but more of a sympathetic to agnostic ear can be found here, but hardly a "safe space" for someone who may be struggling/processing such issue in their personal life and wants to share it with others on a public and opinionated forum. Most likely, my guess is RI is too much or not enough for many survivors.

*******Content advisory*******
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12637
Postby Jeff » Mon Jul 30, 2007 3:29 pm
These boards contain material that some readers may find of a disturbing nature.
A public forum such as this is not an appropriate venue for soliciting or offering diagnoses of ritual abuse, mind control, abduction, psychological disturbance or any similar history or condition.
If you have reason to suspect that you are a survivor of mind control or ritual abuse, the following links may be of assistance:

Heaven Swan wrote:

I do think apologies can help though.
Mac--aren't you the poster who targeted, followed around, and hurled abuse on a daily basis at SLAD? And am I mistaken or weren't you one of the several posters who (from another continent no less) ranted and raved for months about the mortal danger that the warmongering Hillary Clinton posed to humanity and how she was poised to start WWIII, thus effectively helping elect the Orange Menace who really is threatening life on the planet?
An apology to SLAD and a humble admission of your mistake regarding our election might do a lot to rehabilitate your image.

Re: the ignore function and copy pasta loving posters
Ok, so there seem to be three culprits here and I'll address each one separately. This is only my opinion and 2 cents BTW

SLAD
I don't and never have had a problem with her florid posting habits, on the contrary, her threads are one of the main reasons I check in here daily. Also, she seems to have started linking longer articles to data dump threads which effectively solves the problem that some might have had.

AD
This is another matter altogether--even though I do think that he does post material of value and am not calling for his exile. The problem I and perhaps others see is not just the sheer volume, but a repressive attitude coupled with a seemingly endless amount of time to dedicate to burying in copy pasta the contributions of those who disagree with him.
His research threads like TIDS and the monitoring of right-wing groups don't bother me at all. I even take a peek occasionally and have found things of value. His posting about far-right extremists may have seemed a bit obsessive, but he was right about the rise of the right.
If there were a way to rein in the number of threads he can start per day that would make a big difference. AD if you are reading this--LESS IS MORE--irritating your audience is not a good way to get your message across.
We do a have a responsive and understanding mod, so if he misbehaves on discussion threads we can report him, so if he continues down that road there is a way to stop him.

Frumenshen
This is not meant to hurt or offend in any way but I have to say that I don't like, and on principle won't open misleadingly titled threads. There may be gold in those threads but I haven't seen it. And as far as the search function goes it makes absolutely no sense to give threads bizarre titles unrelated to their content.
Therefore I'd like to respectfully suggest to Fruhmenshen (who is probably an amazing and brilliant person) that, for the greater good of the forum, he change his thread titling habits.
I haven't seen any other problems originating from this poster.

I'm pretty much in agreement down the line with the above.
But all we can do is request nicely (as you have done).

[MacCruiskeen]

Spiro, QED.^^ That`s the face of The New RI. Toadyism and stupidity, trolling and flamebaiting. That`s welcome here.

WR to AD, 31 months ago:

From the memory hole: Wombaticus Rex to American Dream, in October 2014, calling AD a troll and explaining to him why he had been suspended. Emphasis added.

That's a very funny question! You got suspended because of your entire online MO -- the passive aggressive snipes at people, stirring shit up and then acting like you don't see people responding, and overall, maintaining your stellar track record of being the most intelligent and subtle troll we've ever had here at Rigorous Intuition to date (with the possible exception of Jeff Wells, of course -- jury is still out on that one).

A great way to reverse that trend would be to treat the people in this thread who are asking you questions like normal human beings, who are just as smart as you, don't have "problematic" or "questionable" motivations, and would earnestly like answers from you! Give it a shot! Could be exciting.

That`s as true now as it was back then. In fact even truer, because it`s only gotten worse.

So I want to know why we have been subjected to AD`S trolling for so long. I want to know why honest posters have had to tolerate being trolled by AD, or else waste their time complaining about it, or leave the board in disgust.

[Blue]

I´d put some things a wee bit differently myself ("bullying"? no), but yeah, that`s a pretty good characterisation of this board at its best. A thread populated by (say) barracuda, Project Willow, Jeff, JackRiddler, compared2what, WombaticusRex, sunny, Simulist, AhabsOtherLeg, AlicetheKurious and Slomo was a place where angels feared to tread and fools stepped in at their peril. It was a place where you were expected to know something, to say something worth saying, and to be capable of thinking straight and actually expressing your thoughts. It was full of right witty bastards who were very quick on their feet. None of them would have tolerated being drowned in copy pasta or patronised and talked down to. They would have told the perpetrator to fuck right off. It was a board with no time for trolls or timewasters or fakes or ponderous dullards. It was also, therefore, a place where anyone could be pretty sure of learning some things worth learning.

It was not a herbal massage parlour for the mentally challenged.

I would just like to point out a couple of things and then I'll bow out since obviously I haven't spent enough time here or read the right threads to understand the situation. But I will venture to say that the vast majority of people who come here have not spent thousands of hours reading everything and indeed miss things that others consider quite glaring.

For instance, Mac, I see you have Slomo on your list as someone who makes this place heaven. I distinctly remember him admitting to being an MRA and said the whole Gamergate thing was BS because men are objectified, too. That is an outright violation of the guidelines about sexism. Men continuing to deny that women as a class are oppressed. What happened in Gamergate was more than just nagging about big breasted animations. Women in the industry were stalked and received death threats.

Good luck with the Mensa club. Didn't mean to waste your time.

[MacCruiskeen]

Blue, since you addressed me: Nobody is asking you to bow out and nobody is denigrating your intellect, least of all me. On the contrary. Our few exchanges have never been less than civil. And for you to bow out because I included slomo on a list off the top of my head is just ... I have no words, because what is the point. Just this: That was not a list of people I always agreed with (!), and that was not why I made the list. Surely that was obvious? But I'm not going to stretch this thread with another massive microdiscussion. I'm going to bow out.

_________________________________

[Wombaticus Rex]

but get insulted and suspended by WR if we raise our voices about it now

Yeah, that stands up a single second of scrutiny, good call. Christ, I've suspended a dozen people this week alone for raising their voices about this. It's a massacre.

because WR`s attitude is: "shut up and don`t ask questions, you dick, because i`m your boss now"

That is my attitude towards you. You have earned it over the course of years now.

Other folks have questions? PM me if I don't see 'em.

[Iamwhomiam]

Who are the currently standing "2" no people so I can feed my paradoxical feedback loop?

50% of those two posters are certainly brekin, who would argue that the world is flat if I said it was round. I suspect that the other 50% is whom they am.

Funnily enough, both of them seem quite incapable of stating why they support the ignore function, while also failing to follow their own so freely-rendered advice (to me) on How To Deal With Uncongenial Posts (i.e., "just use the ignore function").

I've been wondering what Mac wrote that prompted 82_28 to ask his above quoted question. I found no earlier reference in Mac's comments to "2", so I remain puzzled by Mac's reply to 82.

Were you referring to the Poll? I generally don't participate in such poles and have not voted in this. If there's another explanation, please do explain it for me. Thank you.

[dada]

- jeff is absent & silent though he pays for the place

- dr volin is three years gone but still listed as mod

- willow has long since left in disgust, she talks of harrassment by board members irl and can only hint at what`s going on behind the scenes, tells us all to take care

- I and a million other posters waste hours of our time making EXACTLY the same point made by WR himself three fucking years ago (that AD is a troll) but get insulted and suspended by WR if we raise our voices about it now

Is this the set-up for the RI arg? Remember args? Seems like a lifetime ago.

What is the idea, here? That RI was chosen by some international cabal of opinion-shaping social engineers to be the premiere fringe-of-the-fringe leftwing conspiracy honeypot on the internet?

Let's go into that a bit. We've been message hijacked. Keyword hijacked, too. They're using us to control messaging, taking advantage of us, to set the fringe leftwing conspiracy agenda. Casual, impressionable minded, uncritical surfers look in, and have their political views influenced by a select few posters that are in on it. Others are aware of this horror, Jeff included, but their hands are tied. All they can do is drop hints cryptically.

Or is it that we became too uninfluentially influential (not an easy thing to do) and needed to be neutralized. This is done by forcing the board to continue, while receiving injections of noise and disharmony. Not only killing the board, but frustrating our spirits.

Or it's less subtle than either of those. They're just wasting our time. Keeping us here, wrestling with shadows. Managing all of us free radicals like sims.

So what are our options in this scenario? Get away from here. I'm certainly considering it. Stick around and take advantage of our premiere fringe status, using them using us? Not a bad idea. I think I'll do that, until I get away from here.

So my options are the same, with or without the international cabal involved. It comes to the same thing.

I'm glad I did this thought experiment, I found it to be productive. But is this what is being implied here? Is it something even darker? Are people being individually targeted... for, what, exactly? Is it something supernatural doing the targeting? Then it's no wonder I'm not aware of this, since I am the abyss. We should take care out there. Doesn't that sort of go without saying?

[peartreed]

The fickle forum format fanatics are frustrating friendly fellowship here.

Who cares if conventional commands like “ignore” or “hide” even exist as options, let alone their happening to suit each and every fixated fussbudget finding fault?

Taking issue with the tools is just an excuse to vent vitriol upon their latest victim who dared to veer away from venerated custom and past practice in presenting their prolific posts. Resentment of rebels who reject routine and revered rules is a revelation itself, illustrating the invested intolerance and rigidity of the self-proclaimed regulars, the senior circle, the pseudo-Establishment.

Self-appointed senior members masquerading as mods, or Wannabe Wombats, just add arbitrary, antagonistic authoritarianism to the otherwise affable ambience. It is the behavior of bullies, to bemoan, browbeat and belittle one’s betters. And to do so over inflated, inconsequential items of trivia is the very telling trait of overreach.

It’s usually a cover for the inner introvert, too insecure or inadequate to accommodate departures from the norm, uncertainty, or fear of change.

Let’s instead let individuals be uniquely nonconformists, participating and posting as their personality prefers, providing variety in their variance. Those who don’t like it because it constipates historical convention, confinement and control issues can simply leave.

[Elvis]

I voted "No," for PW's reasons, that's enough to keep it. (In the past, I've "ignored" a couple of posters for short periods, and it's not impossible I'd want to use the function again myself.)

The 2014 thread linked above by MacCruiskeen (quoting Wombat's "troll" remarks), as it turned to questions about Robert Parry, is a perfect example of the cagey "troll" behavior cited by Mac.

oh, and after reading that thread, StillRobertPaulson is my hero.

I use the "View active topics" view, so any thread with a new post, data dump threads included, appear near the top, or at least on the first page, of the "active topics" view. I think I see some constructive (or at least well-intentioned) self-organization happening, I'll just adapt to however it settles out.

[km artlu]

WR ~ you responded above to selected quotes from Mac. I believe much of the tension here would be relieved if you forthrightly responded to this:

From the memory hole: Wombaticus Rex to American Dream, in October 2014, calling AD a troll...

So I want to know why we have been subjected to AD`S trolling for so long. I want to know why honest posters have had to tolerate being trolled by AD, or else waste their time complaining about it, or leave the board in disgust.

Will you please respond to that?