one more for Terrance

[Jasper Fidget]

You're kind of an angry guy, huh?  You're pretty consumed with this notion
of knowing people's "real names"--as if that will somehow enforce civility,
and as if civility will somehow make people like you more--but the only way
to enforce the use of "real names" on the internet is to require the use of
a credit card (and even that is not certain); further, "real names", or at
least names that offend you less, will do nothing to foster civil and polite
discussion in what is essentially an anonymous forum.  Do you think posters
to The Well don't fight amongst themselves?  Certainly, users get kicked now
and then, but the criteria for that is extreme, and none of the regular
posters here would qualify.  Would you grant some Authority the right to
kick members whose opinions differ from yours--or who deviate from some
defined rule list?  Would you grant them the responsibilty of forwarding all
posts that conform to the rules, and deleting those that do not?  And how
might one "take responsibility for their words" other than by defending them
to detractors?  The kind of behavior you would like can only exist where the
threat of violence accompanies it--so impulses are better governed--or under
Authoritarianism where the threat is the same.  Are you Authoritarian?
Would you like to weed me out?

Jasper Fidget

----- Original Message -----
From: "Doug Millison" <millison at online-journalist.com>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Monday, October 15, 2001 6:00 PM
Subject: one more for Terrance


> Terrance,
>
> Of course I have called for Pynchon-L to be a moderated list, repeatedly,
> that's well known, and only a handful of folks have ever agreed with me
> when I've done so -- if you recall, that's why "Morris" first started
> calling me List Nanny and why rj/rjackson/jbor/? first called me a "List
> Nazi."    I still think it would be a good idea to make Pynchon-L a
> moderated discussion, where people would have to sign up under their real
> names (the way they do on The Well) and take responsibility for their
> words, and where the trolls could be discreetly weeded out. I still think
> it would be a good idea, and might woo back some of the Pynchon scholars
> who have abandoned this list. A moderated discussion need not be boring,
or
> even without conflict -- check out PSYART for an idea of what it might be
> like. On a moderated list, we wouldn't have to put up with the likes of
> "Morris" and "Malign", Scratchit, Fester, Dingleberry, and the rest.
>
> It's only proper that when you bozos start laying down the law about how
> and what people should post to Pynchon-L, you should be reminded of your
> tendencies to want to moderate the discussion. Logic never has been your
> strong point, however. Speaking of logic, yes I do understand that this
> kind of post might never see the light of day on a moderated P-list, and
if
> that's the price that needs to be paid to do without your snot-nosed
> whining, and to do without the rest of your pseudonymous crew and their
> braindead insults, so be it.
>
> You'd spend your time more fruitfully in the archives looking for what
your
> buddies rj/rjackson/jbor/?, kai, "Morris", Malign, and the rest used to
say
> about you on Pynchon-L, if you've forgotten, and remind yourself of the
> kind of untrustworthy slime they really are.  On the other hand,  you've
> demonstrated that you are just as two-faced as they have been, so I guess
> you've finally settled in with the right crowd.  I do hope you enjoy the
> company.
>
>
> Cordially,
> Doug "You're Not a Fascist" Millison
>
>