Town hall meeting

ResearchMonkey said:
OK, so lets all be nice to each other. Lets not call a liar a liar. Lets be sweet about it and tolerate it lovingly. Lets accept demeaning innuendos and giggle about it, while being offended by clear language.

I do not see a problem with someone saying what they want to say. I do see a problem with barriers being placed in free expression and if someones is acting in a particular manner .... you should be able to respond in common language. If someone says something that carries an innuendo of personal insult, you can expect a response that contains the projection of the internalized personal insult. What part of free-speech is so difficult to understand.



Fuck-that, its neutered speech. --Maybe I'm just not as smart as you are. Maybe I'm a simpleton and not as elite as you are, a common run-of-the-mill-redneck -- so I should be excluded from the conversation? That I should I remain silent as long I communicate in a manner that is not up to your professional standards?

I see your point..... free speech should be limited to people who can meet an arbitrary standard that is acceptable to you.



I spend up to 16 hours a day focused on work at my PC. I come by here as I take a breath in between points of work as leisure. It's a forum on the internet. A place where theoretically someone can express their thoughts, ideas and feelings. --- internets, serious business.
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You don't have to accept demeaning innuendos nor direct insults at your person. In that you have the same rights as anyone else here. Expecting a certain amount of respect be given you as a human being does not infringe upon free speech. This is precisely why the 'report post' button exists.

Freedom of speech allows people to say things that you are personally against..but freedom of speech is not limitless. It stops precisely where it begins to infringe upon other freedoms.
It does not allow you to infringe on other people's freedom of privacy. You cannot, for instance, post someone else's contact information, pictures of them or their families, their banking information etc..without their permission.
It does not protect you from causing harm to others. You cannot speak libel against others, destroying their reputation through lies and innuendos amongst their peers (in this case, other members of OTC). It certainly doesn't protect any attempts to push pornography or hate-speech where it is not wanted nor where it is illegal.
It does not protect you from uttering death threats, threathening someone's health, their family or their friends..or their livelihood for that matter.

Now..most of those examples don't usually apply here, with the exception of libel. There are dozens of libelous posts per week in the RW alone, as of late.

As you saying that we should allow libelous speech on OTC? A free-for-all sniping competition where the person with the best insult wins?

You are free to express your throughts, ideas and feelings. You are free to argue against or for other people's thoughts, ideas and feelings. You are not free to attack the person. It's quite simple.
 
MrBishop said:
You don't have to accept demeaning innuendos nor direct insults at your person. In that you have the same rights as anyone else here. Expecting a certain amount of respect be given you as a human being does not infringe upon free speech. This is precisely why the 'report post' button exists.

Freedom of speech allows people to say things that you are personally against..but freedom of speech is not limitless. It stops precisely where it begins to infringe upon other freedoms.
It does not allow you to infringe on other people's freedom of privacy. You cannot, for instance, post someone else's contact information, pictures of them or their families, their banking information etc..without their permission.
It does not protect you from causing harm to others. You cannot speak libel against others, destroying their reputation through lies and innuendos amongst their peers (in this case, other members of OTC). It certainly doesn't protect any attempts to push pornography or hate-speech where it is not wanted nor where it is illegal.
It does not protect you from uttering death threats, threathening someone's health, their family or their friends..or their livelihood for that matter.

Now..most of those examples don't usually apply here, with the exception of libel. There are dozens of libelous posts per week in the RW alone, as of late.

As you saying that we should allow libelous speech on OTC? A free-for-all sniping competition where the person with the best insult wins?

You are free to express your throughts, ideas and feelings. You are free to argue against or for other people's thoughts, ideas and feelings. You are not free to attack the person. It's quite simple.
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Unless it's me, I am the official whipping boy. You forgot to mention that dude!
 
Instead of apologizing how about don't make bitchy posts...if you're in a bad mood or not feeling well or whatever...just don't post. If we all just let ourselves make bitchy posts when we weren't feeling the greatest and then turned around and apologized for them later the board would be a bunch of bitchy posts and apologies. For the record, I refrained from making this exact post the LAST time you made a slew of bitchy posts and then turned around and apologized and blaimed it on your back pain. I gave you the benefit of the doubt and wanted to make sure *I* wasn't just being bitchy. I have decided that a repeat performance, which I have the same feelings about (that it's unnecessary) means I wasn't just in a bad mood when I reacted last time. Therefore, this time I am responding.
 
There was a time when exchanging ideas on forums was great, there was a time when talking about anything was great, everything was fine and everybody got along.

Then there was a time when exchanging ideas became a quest for convincing the others of how wrong they are by means of excessive repetitive posting, quoting, name calling, so called arguments and freedom of speech, this is when everything started to go to hell.

Now it is just arguing for the sake of arguing, seriously, do you guys even read your own posts? do you realize how ridiculous and stupid you look? The debates around here are more similar to drunk talk where everything is repetitive, everyone is stubborn and finally everyone is in a state that is either pathetic, miserable or plainly dumb.

Give it a rest, no one is going to convince anyone of anything, we are all grown ups, our ideals were gathered from many years of living in our very own environment, a thoughtful post/copy&paste is not going to change that.

I'm positive we all have something interesting to say about a couple subjects, but we refrain from doing so and even reading the forum just to avoid getting splattered with the BS. I'd like the RW to be a forum where you could enjoy reading different points of view, and the readers were spared of the convincing/name calling/childish attitudes and general rubbish that surround most posts.
 
MrBishop said:
You don't have to accept demeaning innuendos nor direct insults at your person. In that you have the same rights as anyone else here. Expecting a certain amount of respect be given you as a human being does not infringe upon free speech. This is precisely why the 'report post' button exists.
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You of course are free to expect respect, it doesn't mean you will be afforded it. Respect, in my opinion, is earned. As you said, you need not accept a freely spoken insult, although insults tend sting more when there is some truth to it.

Internalizing and personalizing an insult happens in various degrees and uniquely to each to each individual. I may post something condescending to liberals in general. You, whom I consider a liberal, might take offense in a specific regard. While Spike may also take offense but for a completely different reason based on to his unique view of his liberal ideologies.

And may I say Bishypoo; you have earned a fair amount of my respect. When was last time I posted something down-tight-mean towards you, my liberal northern neighbor, specifically?


MrBishop said:
Freedom of speech allows people to say things that you are personally against..but freedom of speech is not limitless. It stops precisely where it begins to infringe upon other freedoms.
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Addressing the issues here in general. Where was anyone's individual freedoms threatened or violated as a direct result of something I have posted?

Butthurt, maybe. A rational person can reason an insult and accept what applies to them, and toss the rest.

For example, I made statements about Spike and his childhood which were fantasy. He clearly said that that kind of free speech was funny and ethical, that its OK to create and propagate lies to for fun. My directly confronting this issue by example became a legitimate point by created by him. Its was not pretty but clearly showed the hypocrisy of the method that he had already utilized more than once here on this forum. While I did make a point, I do not see where any actual harm occurred and there are in fact legal remedies if an offense had actually occurred.

What was powerful about this scenario is the fact that Spike felt is OK to libelous besmirch someone until it was done to him. ..... then it suddenly became far less funny. --- a "teachable moment" as they say these days.

MrBishop said:
It does not protect you from causing harm to others. You cannot speak libel against others, destroying their reputation through lies and innuendos amongst their peers (in this case, other members of OTC). It certainly doesn't protect any attempts to push pornography or hate-speech where it is not wanted nor where it is illegal.
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Interesting, I can only speack for myself here --- What hate-speech might have you seen? I give that I have made statements against islamofascist in general. I did not participate in slamming anyone here for their religious beliefs or color of skin.

MrBishop said:
It does not protect you from uttering death threats, threathening someone's health, their family or their friends..or their livelihood for that matter.
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Was this an issue here? I saw limited encouragement for self-destruction, mostly tongue-in-cheek. Telling someone to get AID's and die in a fire is does not constitute a threat. Maybe I missed it but I haven't seen anyones family or health threatened here. ......How wide of net are we casting or is this some grandiose fluff of enlightened bull-shit?


MrBishop said:
Now..most of those examples don't usually apply here, with the exception of libel. There are dozens of libelous posts per week in the RW alone, as of late.
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If by "late" you mean since long before I got here, then I agree.

MrBishop said:
As you saying that we should allow libelous speech on OTC? A free-for-all sniping competition where the person with the best insult wins?
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Should insults be allowed, yes. Does an insult win an argument, no. I have seen incidents where clearly someone is lying or proven wrong by mulitple people, witnessed by others and yet they continue to widen the debate and put words into others mouths all while stroking their peter in everones face.... certainly i do not see a problem with calling that type of fuck-wit a fuck-wit.

I see no difference than someone making a blanket insult that encompasses a definable and identifiable group people, often as a group that includes people posting in the thread. Often, this is where I myself might offend some readers, but that is a two way street and you might only be sensitive to traffic moving in one direction.


An insult is a tool used by humans in communication and occurs naturally, just watch toddlers play if you want to see it manifest. Of course there are those who like to pretend we above human nature and that we can snub our noses at those unpleasantries while fully placing them into well crafted innuendo and implied slights. -- I disagree, I believe it a fundamental part of human interaction that influences ones behaviors towards another. ie: earning respect so one does not get insulted.

This is major problem with society in my opinion; political correctness, neuters the natural process of balance of positive/negative reinforcement from social communications. -- welcome to the 21 century, evolution to eventually follow.



MrBishop said:
You are free to express your throughts, ideas and feelings. You are free to argue against or for other people's thoughts, ideas and feelings. You are not free to attack the person. It's quite simple.
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Sometimes my thought is: this [poster] is a fucking asshole. Sometimes my feeling is: I'm not going to let this fuck-wit get away with calling US Soldiers murderers of women and children. Or that I'm fucking-dumb-ass-knuckle-dragging-moron-flat-earth-fag-hating-jesus-cock-sucking-son-of-bitch because of my religion (would you like to discuss hate speech?)

You see, here's how it works:
  • With aforethought of malice poster A makes a veiled statement designed to evoke a negative emotional response from poster B.
  • Poster B then responds with the emotional response that was sought out by poster A.
That is how it happens here, the schoolyard and the floor of the US Senate.

Simply put, it is the human factor that gives us humor and happiness, anger and sadness. It is a spectrum that you feel you can control by controlling others speech? You cannot control the actions, feelings or thoughts of another human being without force, that is a fact.


Now if you want to talk about threats, how about this: I'm going to buy a ticket to Canukistan and you and I are going to be roommates for the winter.
 
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