You also had people like Goof Baller following me around and demanding that I defend every single take Greenwald ever had. But the problems I had with the way people were treating me goes beyond the Greenwald thread. Really it didn’t have very much to do with me at all, it was how the acceptable discourse continually narrowed and this viewpoint window was enforced with taunts and throttles and bans and demands to shut your dumb fucking mouth. I think the big turning point for me was when Mr. Wookie imposed a 24 hour throttle on the covid origins thread and banned me for a day for having the wrong opinion in his mind.
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Do you think I’m lying about this:
I quit the forum for a few months before the Captains were even a thing. Impressive they were able to convince me without even interacting with me, and when I honestly thought most of those guys disliked me. And several of them actually did until they got to know me better.
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It’s indisputable that moderation itself was a source and amplifier of many problems, and that Wookie’s bad faith abuse of his mod powers was particularly egregious and set the tone for others eg meb, potato and finally cuse, as well as giving him the tool to express against others projection of his own racism.
Nope, I agree that the throttles were dumb and that the overton window narrowed excessively here.
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A play in three acts.
The setup
MrWookie refuses to step aside for the good of the community, declaring “An anti-Captain never goes down without the ship!”
The Confrontation
jmakin takes a brief break from creepy staking and threatening victor in order to abuse sacred community trust and publicize private messages.
The conclusion
Cuse vows to bring peace through fairness but springs a trap on the enemies and eventually opts to libel the site’s favorite and most respected and trusted member and then disappear to form SPE.
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Well if you agree that the UPerton window narrowed drastically here then I don’t think there’s much left to talk about. Maybe I wasn’t treated that much worse on 2+2 but when I’m treated poorly more often because the acceptable discussion topics have shrank so I’m called a stupid fucking idiot who should shut his fucking mouth more often, well…then the downside of posting here became worse and the upside also became worse. And this was all apparent to me before anyone ever heard of the Captains.
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Where we disagree apparently is that I don’t think getting banned for a day or dealing with an annoyingly enforced throttle is an acceptable excuse for a concerted, united effort to shit on the forums for 2 years straight.
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I’m getting some major Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead vibes from this thread.
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I agree and I don’t think I’ve done that. A couple of three captains probably fit that description, I’ll certainly concede that.
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Wait lol wasn’t that the one where they were saying a lab-leak was totes racist and the non-racist take was them nasty ass bat soup chinamans?
There’s a lot of people here I like talking to and can’t talk to them anywhere else. Alex, Wichita, ChrisV, Bobman, econophile, spidercrab, clovis, Bruce Z, wiper, beetlejuice, JonnyA, smrk, many others who I’m sure I’m forgetting. Do I crave drama or the ability to talk to people I’ve been interacting with for many years? Again you probably know best.
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ban
talk about tying your hate boner into a pretzel and just going about your day
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Lol not to get too cute but probably my biggest takeaway and epiphany from all this is that people actually hate arguing on the internet. Like, hate with the burning passion of 1000 fiery suns.
They like to imagine that they love arguing though, and dear lord has that led to some wild stuff.
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I have no idea. Also you’re calling me a liar and a troll as you so often do, so again, talk to you never, toodles.
69.420% I just counted and double checked.
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No. You’ve made your distain for me entirely clear. I won’t forget again.
Like, you won’t even consider the possibility I’m telling the truth here? Well, OK. What exactly is the point of me talking to you in your mind? Or you talking to me?
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Bear in mind what I just said about me insulting people: Are you aware of how insulting this is?
A big source of this dRaMa is how casually insulting people are, almost seemingly unaware.
Again, I insult people. But if I was gonna tell somebody their reaction to online bullying/abuse was nursing unconstructive grievances and being histrionic, like, holy fuck I’d be prepared. I’d put on the headgear and mouthpiece because I knew I just said some shit. Just the question-begging framing is insulting.
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