response 47 of 157:

Feb 6 05:22 UTC 2004

re: 45 

(I'm not sure if you've filtered me, but...)

I think revising history is potentially more offensive, and certainly more
dangerous than ourtight censorship. 

It's much too subjective, and it's unfair to make the staff (or any person)
be the arbiter of what is and isn't acceptable.

response 49 of 157:

Feb 6 11:49 UTC 2004

Janc, you toss around phrases like "My point is that to me, people matter"
and later make essentially the same statement about the feelings of others.
Great. So what the hell does that mean? Are you saying that my feelings
*don't* matter, or that you don't consider me a "person" because I think what
Valerie did was appalling? Your phrases are empty of meaning or else you are
subtly implying that some people (valerie and jep) are "more equal" than
others (ie. me). Guess what? You are right back to doing personal favors for
favored persons. If that's your philosophy, fine, but don't expect me, as one
of your "unfavored persons" to sit idly by while you seek favors for those
you prefer at the expense of *MY* words, which contained a tremendous amount
of *MY* thought, time, effort and "feelings." 

The way to balance and give equal treatment to valerie and jep's feelings,
versus mine and others, is to simply permit each of us to exercise
autonomy over our own words. What is so hard to understand and accept
about that? Each of us gets a little something and each of us loses a
little something. That is what life and principled compromise is all
about. I'm sorry you seem to have such difficulty accepting that. 

Keesan: Just so you know, I have already offered to make minor edits to my
posts to delete verbatim quotes. I am not willing to commit to any more and
I do not believe it is appopriate for staff to make editing decisions over
my posts.

response 51 of 157:

Feb 6 15:56 UTC 2004

Re resp:0: "Little of true value will have been saved and the concerns
of John and Valerie would have been utterly ignored, but we will have
stood firm against censorship. Valerie will not begin discussing
parenting again.  John will not begin discussing his divorce again."

And so, perversely, we'll have encouraged SELF-CENSORSHIP.  It will
create a "chilling effect" on people posting items like that again. 
It's not clear to me that this is a moral victory.


Re resp:14: In fact, it's the incessent personal attacks and cheap shots
against jep that caused me to rethink my original decision to vote
against his proposal.  At first I thought the opposition against him was
logical, but lately it's become obvious that a lot of it is simply a
mean-spirited personal attack.  I don't want to support or encourage that.


I'd also like to point out, in general, that use of words like "crap",
"asshole", and "pussy" is generally unpersuasive and poor debating
technique.  If you use them in your arguments, people are going to
assume you're talking out of your asshole and that your position is crap. ;>

response 53 of 157:

Feb 6 16:04 UTC 2004

Cyklone says that the he will feel hurt if the postings he made under
an pseudonym two years ago to John's divorce items are not restored.

John says that he will feel hurt if a discussion of the intimate details
of his feelings during his divorce is restored.

While I don't utterly dismiss Cyklone's concerns, I think the suggestion
that Cyklone, or anybody else, has as much at stake in that item as John
does is pretty far-fetched.  If I give more weight to John's argument than
Cyklone's, is that necessarily an indication that I have an unfair bias
toward John?

Maybe Cyklone can try to remember his words of wisdom and say them again
in another item.  John has no such simple option to assuage his concerns
if that item is restored.

response 55 of 157:

Feb 6 17:34 UTC 2004

I don't think it's been demonstrated that the absence of an couple old
items hurts us all.

response 57 of 157:

Feb 6 19:41 UTC 2004

Re #56: All good points

Re #55 and #51: As I mentioned elsewhere, I apologized for the name-calling
and intend to re-focus my discussion on the issues at hand. I worry you may
not however. To say "I don't think it's been demonstrated that the absence
of an couple old items hurts us all" misses the point I made to janc
yesterday. Do not assume that a given post can be replicated when the next
time it is needed rolls around. Users can die or stop logging on for many
reasons. One of the reasons I keep coming back to grex despite the
incredibly annoying attitudes of certain users is because there is a
COLLECTIVE wisdom that far exceeds the sum of the individuals. When you
begin to make value judgments such the one of yours I just quoted, then I
think you are way out on a limb. You're perception of the value of a given
post may not at all correspond to the value another person gives it. If
you want a "demonstration" if what I am talking about, re-read my posts
about the hypothetical addict item.

Incredibly, janc makes a very similar mistake in #53. If I die tomorrow,
or next week or next year, and someone comes along after my death
searching for help the same way JEP HIMSELF wished the same item existed
for him, then the damage is quite clear. Arguing "replaceability" (1)
misses the point that it is still censorship, and (2) misses the point
that such an assumption of replaceability is false.

Janc makes a similar value judgment when he says "I think the suggestion
that Cyklone, or anybody else, has as much at stake in that item as John
does is pretty far-fetched." How can I respond to that when you've already
made a value judgment about what I perceived the stakes to be at the time
I posted? In fact, if I were to use a religious analogy, I was posting as
if I was fighting with Satan for the soul of a loved one. I have stared
into the face of the jeps of the world when they are almost drowning in
their woe-is-me, how-dare-that-bitch, full-blown victimhood and I was not
about to allow jep to take that long slide down without one hell of a
battle. So to me the stakes were pretty high then. And if someone comes
along with a similar problem, the stakes will still be high for me. So how
dare anyone assuming I was pouring any less into my posts then jep was
into his. 

As for the argument about self-censorship, I'm not sure if there's a real
point you are trying to make. I think everyone agrees people should be
careful about what they post on a publicly accessible bbs. So in that
sense, self-censorship is exactly what we do want to encourage. On the
other hand, the flip side of what you say would in effect be saying "let's
discourage self-censorship by allowing additional items like Valerie's and
jep's and then lets give them full control to do a mass-censorship once
they realize there may be negative consequences for their failure to
self-censor." So like I said, I really must be missing the point you are
trying to make. 

And I think you are taking a term with very specific meaning ("chilling") 
and misusing that term to make your point, whatever it may be. In
particular, government is not allowed to act in ways that discourage
("chill") people from exercising their rights to free speech. I am not
aware that allowing others the free speech rights to respond to an initial
exercise of free speech has ever been construed as "chilling" the original
speaker's freedom of expression. 

I hope these thoughts help divert the focus from the emotional back to the
logical. I also hope they remind people that when arguments are fraught
with value judgements like "little value" or "doesn't mean as much to X as
it does to Y" you are slipping into the exact trap that free speech
advocates seek to avoid by opposing censorship. It is a trap best avoided
by making sure that each person has the sole right to control their own
words. With that right comes the sole responsibility for how those words
are used, at least until such time as copyright or other law permits
otherwise. 

response 61 of 157:

Feb 6 23:48 UTC 2004

Of course, that doesn't make any sense.  Because let's say Einstein didn't
have the authority to publish E=mc^2 (THe MSOT IMPORTANT FORMULA IN THE WORLD)
are you going to unpublish it!?

response 65 of 157:

Feb 7 00:47 UTC 2004

jp2, that statement may be true for you, but it definantly isn't true for
me.  Fear of being embarrassed tomorrow -can- chill speech.  I agree
wholeheartedly with aruba, that this was one of the most powerful uses of
community support that I've seen in a long time.  Trust builds a sense of
community. To support Valerie and Jep will help build trust in this
community, that we are a group that deals well with feelings as well as
data.  If I cannot trust people, I don't say anything.  I have feelings of
fear that keep me from contributing even innocuous bits. 

The mean spirited, gratuitious attacks have been a large part of the
reason that I voted with compassion rather than strict logic.  I don't
want to be a member of a community where logic is the only way we make
decisions. 

Community values are not always well expressed by adhering to a strict ,
rules-bound list of do's and don'ts.  Sometimes community values are best
expressed by being compassionate and caring, even if it makes you appear
less than perfectly logical.  Compassion and caring are not limited to
friends.  I've never met jep, but I don't want to cause more harm to him in
his situation.  It may not make sense to you, and you may believe you are the
only one who sees the truth, but making exceptions for people will not destroy
Grex.  

Fear of being embarrassed tomorrow by something I said that other people
then quoted and commented on is certainly sufficient to cut my
participation to a bare minimum.  Entries you have made clearly
demonstrate that you have no such qualms.  But don't assume you can speak
for me on this issue.  You can't.  

response 67 of 157:

Feb 7 00:52 UTC 2004

I beg to differ, jp2.  The _reality_ is that people have *already* removed
their text t keep it from being continual available.  One person has already
noted that he is unlikely to be as trusting of his fellow grexers as he once
was.

It is likely that some poor sucker is going to come along somwhen and spill
his guts, because he didn't see this discussion.  I think it extremely
UNlikely that any one who has even skimmed the discussion would trust honest
feelings to this crew.

response 69 of 157:

Feb 7 00:59 UTC 2004

Why bother?  Because what you say -now- may be useful to that person.  

I find it hard to believe that people would comment freely only if they could
trust that their words would be immortal.  That people wouldn't want to offer
advice, comfort and suggestions if those ideas were not enshrined forever on
Grex.  Are there really users who are so enamored of their own words that they
wouldn't contribute otherwise?  

So what if my advice is gone tomorrow?  I'm not writing for generations to
come.  I'm writing today, for the use of a particular person who is in a
particular situation.  If I want to ensure that my profound thinking is
available in perpetuity, Grex items are a pretty weak way to do it.