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What exactly does get you banned on Barbelith?

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33

22:05 / 20.08.06

Bad taste
A slight projection of your pitful state , cube ?

Mirrors can be dangerous things my friend , what do you see in me that reminds me of you ?

I think we both know whose really insane , I make no accusations of being ruled out by any one , thats your self pity talking in defense of me..

and you know exactly where you can put it because trust me dude you aint even in 50 miles of where I'm standing - even on your best day

22:05 / 20.08.06

Can you prove anything I say is wrong or false ?

No

You cant

No, I can't. But by what you say you are the only person ever to have had this physical problem. You've asked other boards about it, and come up a total blank. Even those with a passing knowledge of prolotherapy (basically, using toxins to stimulate tissue growth) and craniopathy (manipulating cranial bones) have nothing to add.
Your own website says that you, and you alone, out of everyone you have ever known except some guy (whom, I think, you insulted a few posts back) you've given a shitload of cash to thinks you are delusional.
This I know from your own site. Because I am not in any way qualified to continue this discussion, I won't. You're lashing out at us just as you have since your second post, and this is no longer about you, it's about us. Maybe WE have become THEM, but so be it. There are only so many times the hand of reconciliation can be extended. I'm off, and I hope you are, too.

22:12 / 20.08.06

Fair enough Olulabelle, toksik. As I said I felt a light-hearted response to 33’s comments was better than a vitriolic one (which was how I intended it), with the benefit that having already contributed my own thoughts above I didn’t feel I was wasting energy composing an ordered response when it almost certainly wasn’t going to be responded to with a similar courtesy by 33. I mentioned gloating and dismissive because that was how I assumed you had read it, and that was the tone I was actually attempting to avoid, and I would stand by my very brief reading of the poem of what I meant at that moment, but I agree that it’s not the appropriate place to discuss it, so I’m going to leave any further comment for tonight as I’m getting tired and I’ve probably sidetracked the thread for more than long enough.

22:12 / 20.08.06

33, I want to say...Oh I dunno. I've read your site and firstly I think it's valuable in that it's clear you can write succinctly and clearly, you just don't do so here. That doesn't help with arguing your case. I think there are people here who want to help you, or at least don't want to ban you but your style and your approach doesn't allow them to.

I wonder if we were to simply put what our problems are maybe you'd be better able to respond to that? You see people on this site don't like it when you write things which we feel are abusive and some of your comments about gay people and women have felt abusive to us. If you could see that, and apologise, then I feel sure we wouldn't be having this conversation about banning you. If you were to acknowledge that and not try to excuse yourself because you are unwell and (you feel you are) unable to put your point across then I'm sure we would move forward.

I don't disbelieve you about what you say has happened to you but I do think that if, as seems to be the case, you can write clealy enough on your site to make people understand you, you should try to do so here.

Can you see why people are upset? Can you apologise for that? Would you like to remain on the board? These are serious questions and I am trying to help, I really am.

33

22:13 / 20.08.06

No, I can't. But by what you say you are the only person ever to have had this physical problem. You've asked other boards about it, and come up a total blank. Even those with a passing knowledge of prolotherapy (basically, using toxins to stimulate tissue growth) and craniopathy (manipulating cranial bones) have nothing to add.
Your own website says that you, and you alone, out of everyone you have ever known except some guy (whom, I think, you insulted a few posts back) you've given a shitload of cash to thinks you are delusional.
This I know from your own site. Because I am not in any way qualified to continue this discussion, I won't. You're lashing out at us just as you have since your second post, and this is no longer about you, it's about us. Maybe WE have become THEM, but so be it. There are only so many times the hand of reconciliation can be extended. I'm off, and I hope you are, too.

Lashing out .. if lashing out means disagreeing or explaining so be it ..
You made accusations which you no admit are unfound or in other words an assumption about something you didnt really know ..
Just because the vast majority of sceintific folk dont believe doesnt mean there are others who dont .. and havent done since I did that site

No the guy i even gives cash to think im nuts.. thats the beauty of the arrangment

My best friend , and other friends i have dont but they are not scientists apart from 1 and some other folk i know..

see ya

Phex: Dorset Doom

22:23 / 20.08.06

33- whether you have a one-in-a-billion medical condition or not is not at issue here unless you want to make a case that your, quite frankly bizarre, condition caused you to become prejudiced against homosexuals, people of color and women. Once again you have completely failed to engage with this idea, and you have offered no apology to the board members you have offended. Instead you are trying to prove you have some medical condition which has no bearing on whether we should ban you or not.
Either 1) talk about why you felt your comments in various threads were justified or 2) apologise for making them and make a sincere effort to learn from this. Everything else is a waste of our time.

22:35 / 20.08.06

33:
i posted some direct questions you seem to have missed.
i have reposted them below for ease of review, and you can find them in context and with references here.

could you answer them, please?

1)
do you disagree with any of that? if yes or no, in what way?
...
2)
are you up for trying to turn it round, bearing in mind that this will often mean changing your opinion?
...
3)
do you feel that making peope feel crap is not real if it is done through the internet?
do you think that bullying can occur online?
how about racism and sexism and homophobia?
...
4)
do you think we should take your claim of limited time left as a reason to allow you to act in a way we have decided is unnaceptable from members of barbelith?
if so, do you also feel that terminally ill people in general should not be tied to the social contract in wider society?

22:35 / 20.08.06

Yeah, I am kind of repeating what Phex just said but, at this point, your options basically are:

1 - Stop posting on Barbelith voluntarily.

2 - Carry on posting here like you have been - i.e., in an ill-thought out, homophobic, racist, and sexist mode - and be banned, sooner rather than later.

3 - Apologise for the comments people have found offensive (and I would suggest the main three are the line on queers in the fashion thread, the line on black music, and your harrassment of Miss Wonderstarr). You need to apologise in a way that shows us you understand why those sort of comments are inappropriate here, and that you won't repeat them, or others like them. You also need to show an ability to engage with other people's posts, by which I mean, basically, to think about what other people are saying before you respond to them - we see little evidence of that from you, so far. If you do this you may develop into a welcome member of the community; and you would definitely get more out of the community than you otherwise will.

I'm sorry, but in this context your medical condition is irrelevant.

miss wonderstarr

22:59 / 20.08.06

I just want to note again that I don't want to be positioned here as a victim of harrassment. If it was just about me, I wouldn't make a big deal out of it. I'm not taking it personally.

The reason I object is that I don't think there should be an understanding that it's OK to talk about anyone's body in a crudely sexual way on Barbelith (unless they invite it, I suppose).

But I don't want this to become, "oh you upset Miss Wonderstarr, apologise to her", because it's not about that for me.

23:04 / 20.08.06

Is his medical condition really irrelevant in this case, though? I've read 33's website, in the hope of gleaning something about him. What I've learned is that he self-medicates for a condition which in his own words, the vast majority of medical professionals will not substantiate. These injections have resulted in his admittance to hospital several times, where he believes the staff are ignoring his condition-a condition that only a lone dentist seems to believe exists. What's worse, is that 33 is heaping money upon this dentist, who (IMHO, etc) is likely taking advantage of 33.

33 characterises his own life as being one where very few people listen to him. Barbelith, in his own words, is a place where he thought people would listen to him. This is, after all a place where people discuss elements of sub-culture and unorthodox medicine, media and so on. I view his topics and posts as attempts to get an "in" on the community, a foot in the door, so that more people will substantiate his unlikely medical condition. When this failed to materialise he apparently lashed out.

I think his anti-gay, anti-women, anti-race comments are unacceptable, but I honestly don't think that we're going to receive an apology from 33. I'm a gay man, and I'd love for an apology for the Matalan comment, but I think it's unrealistic to expect one from him.

33: I feel a great deal of compassion for you and the struggle that you believe you are locked in, but as you've had several opportunities to apologise and consequently, several opportunities to re-establish your currently slightly shaky membership and have failed to take them, I think you only have two options.

1- Leave the board and sort out your life, then return to Barbelith, apologise and resume posting.

2- Be banned. As things currently stand, I believe that this is the most likely thing to happen.

Finally, as another poster stated up-thread: It's time to have a "Psych-policy" thread. It's obvious that it is needed, and I believe that it make for interesting reading.
Hope my argument above is remotely cohesive and to 33, if any of my assumptions are deemed offensive, then I apologise if they hurt..but I stand by them.

*

00:00 / 21.08.06

Is his medical condition really irrelevant in this case, though?

Yes. Whatever his medical condition, it need not cause him to be abusive. If it does cause him to be abusive, whether or not that's his fault, he needs to not be here. The only issue as far as I'm concerned is whether he will interact according to Barbelith's extremely minimal rules of conduct.

I definitely want to have a thread in policy about how to deal with people whose health conditions affect how they interact on the board— primarily I want to learn for myself how to avoid ableism. Right now I'm convinced that it would be ableist to assume that 33's health conditions are to blame for all of his misconduct and disrespectful behavior here. I believe he's perfectly capable of making a decision to interact respectfully, but having been given the opportunity, he has not made that commitment.

ONLY NICE THINGS

00:23 / 21.08.06

To be fair to 33, he did apologise, sort of, for his comments about t3h gays, here. Unfortunately, this preceded a disqusition on how men with upturned collars are afraid to be men, and how "certain groups" (I think we can guess) seem to complain a lot about their mistreatment, not like the noble Native American, and we're off again, stopping off at the apparent accusation that gay men want to perform genocide against goths and punks.

He also explains there whether or not he should be given special treatment on account of his medical problems:

Should I use my ill health as reason for making the comments I did , the fact I am angry at my lifes lot .. no because i have enough soberity to know ultimately i take all responsibilty...

As such, I don't think his condition, whether it is mental or physiological, is something he wants to be taken as a form of special pleading.

Phex: Dorset Doom

00:47 / 21.08.06

Well, he posted it here for a reason and my only guess is that he wants the information in the site to be taken into account. But it can't be, and won't, no more than the fact that Mel Gibson was drunk during his little bout of geopolitical speculation to the LAPD makes him less of an anti-semite.
So the question is now, are we still going ahead with a ban? For the record 33 has not apologised for his comments and has not even acknowleged that they could be seen as offensive. We've also gone over Tom's time limit to get confirmation of a ban sent to him, so we have the option of giving 33 more time to come around. We may also want to start a Policy thread to debate how mental illness should be taken into account in cases like this.

ONLY NICE THINGS

01:11 / 21.08.06

Well, if somebody were saying that their illness might at times make them so unhappy or in pain that they crossed the lines of appropriate behaviour _which they knew existed and recognised_, I think that's not unreasonable. I think 33 is not quite saying that, but rather saying that he is very ill, he came here hoping to be able to talk about his illness and ways to treat it (with, say , ayahuasca), but at times his unhappiness with what he sees as unfair limitations placed on his freedom has added to his frustration at not getting what he wants from Barbelith, which has led to some moments of bad temper. However, I don't think this actually describes the situation, nor that outbursts of irritation are actually what is being protested.

However, he has also said:

If you have nothing to lose you would understand that you have every right to do or say anything you want..

Which seems to suggest, rather, that his illness (which, whatever sort of illness it is, is clearly disabling and very sad) entitles him to do or say whatever he wants. That's a very different claim, and not one a community can sustain.

paranoidwriter waves hello

02:19 / 21.08.06

Hi, 33, I'm back because you finally came back, and well...

if you are going to make statement then i would ask what you know about ligmaents or the skull matrix or indeed prolotherapy is , though its tad simple with this thing at your disposal..

So, ergo, if you're going to make statements suggesting there's a gay conspiracy to pervert male fashion, could you provide some (e.g.) employment statistics and other facts to prove you know what you're talking about?

Remember our first exchange?

Disco is My Class War

03:34 / 21.08.06

Sorry, 33, but a medical condition does not make it okay for someone to be a complete asshole.

Given 33's continued lack of any engagement or recognition that the various insults/harrassments etc were wrong, I think a ban is in order. Let's focus on the original behaviours (crystal-clear examples of bannable, almost everyone has agreed) and the prospect that if we don't ban you, 33, you're likely to keep making offensive remarks and creating more drama.

And people, enough with the guilt-ridden hemming and hawing over whether 33 is being taken for a ride. It is not our problem. If you want to discuss the site, please start a new thread. In the Conversation.

06:04 / 21.08.06

the guilt-ridden hemming and hawing over whether 33 is being taken for a ride

where was that?

ONLY NICE THINGS

07:58 / 21.08.06

Cube and Llama, above, both raise the possibility that 33 is being exploited financially by the person treating him. As Mister Disco says, there's not an awful lot we can usefully do or say about this one way or the other, although "guilt-ridden" is not I think a necessary way to read these opinions. In any case, regardless of the aetiology of these speculations, their utility is questionable. Since we get responses of the calibre of:

see what i mean

you give a monkey typewrite with spaces and sure enough his mind will with feed it with his own self potrayed fears ?

Who is blackmailing who blake ?

Are you trying to use my own website to blackmail others into trumpeting your cause to the masses ?

Well go ahead

I'm waiting

and

Bad taste
A slight projection of your pitful state , cube ?

Mirrors can be dangerous things my friend , what do you see in me that reminds me of you ?

I think we both know whose really insane , I make no accusations of being ruled out by any one , thats your self pity talking in defense of me..

and you know exactly where you can put it because trust me dude you aint even in 50 miles of where I'm standing - even on your best day

I doubt that on a practical level 33 is likely to take on board any suggestion that he look more critically at his symptomology or his rfelationship to his current therapist. Nor, indeed, would we be able to tell with any confidence that he was trying to communicate that he had.

11:43 / 21.08.06

I want to start a band called Gay Goth Genocide. Or a political movement.

The resistable rise of Reidcourchie

12:37 / 21.08.06

I'm actually not sure whether I have the right to express an opinion on this. I personally would not like to see 33 banned. The reason is that despite having heavily entrenched views in the past, posters on Barbelith have forced me to reassess and on a couple of occasions change my views.

Also I think that some of the views 33 has expressed bear discussion, I know many of you have tried and it is just a shame that 33 will not substantiate his views and discuss them in a reasonable manner. The problem would seem to be that he is so tied up in some kind persecution complex that he is unable to dig himself out of and engage with Barbelith as an equal instead of as a self perceived victim.

That said I do appreciate that the problem is he's being offensive to other posters. 33 is there no way you can hold that in check, by all means you have the right to your own opinions, you can even state them here though be prepared to substantiate them but there's no particular reason why anyone else should put up with abuse. If we were all in your house giving you shit I feel pretty sure you'd ask us to leave, yeah?

I also think the contents of his web site probably bear discussing as well, so it would be ashame if he goes just because he can't stop being offensive. The thing is 33 you're not being asked to do very much here at all.

14:44 / 21.08.06

Just came here by way of the Convo thread, then got wrapped up in the "Other Side of Eden" for a bit. I can't help but wonder if 33 is really the author of Eden, which I found pretty interesting, but whose tone I found considerably drier, more articulate, and more coherent than any of - well, really any single paragraph of any of 33's posts. While I'm not against banning 33, I wonder if it's even worth it - if this is just the kind of inanity that would magically disappear if we all just turned our rear ends toward it. But considering that we've already made hir the focus of a banning discussion there may be nothing left to do but ban. 33 seems utterly incapable of making sense, let alone engaging in any meaningful way with the board.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

16:03 / 21.08.06

Look at his website, which he linked to on the previous page, 33 is perfectly capable of expressing himself in a way that makes sense, he simply chooses not to when on Barbelith. At the risk of getting the Ganesh smackdown, This website claims that one in four people in the UK will suffer some sort of mental health problem. Now if we accept that as about right for most of the areas that people on Barbelith live in, there should be a considerable proportion of 1396 (a quarter of our users) who are making a nuisance of themselves. That's just not happening, no matter how narrowly you try and define mental health, no matter how you try and limit it to those forms of mental divergence that are anti-social, it just ain't happening here.

ONLY NICE THINGS

16:15 / 21.08.06

Sorry, but am I alone in thinking that this "gosh, how clear and succinct that website is" is a bit of an odd reaction? It's meandering, ungrammatical and semicoherent. Admittedly, less incoherent than 33 is usually, but that's because he's trying to respond to other people. Let him talk to himself a bit - like the analysis of noise bands - and he will make about as much sense as he does on the website.

17:03 / 21.08.06

Well, I find it nearly impossible even to follow one of 33's sentences from beginning to end, so by comparison the Eden website is as straightforward to me as an encyclopedia entry.

17:30 / 21.08.06

Sorry, but am I alone in thinking that this "gosh, how clear and succinct that website is" is a bit of an odd reaction? It's meandering, ungrammatical and semicoherent. Admittedly, less incoherent than 33 is usually, but that's because he's trying to respond to other people. Let him talk to himself a bit - like the analysis of noise bands - and he will make about as much sense as he does on the website.

Pretty much. I don't have a problem considering it the same person's work, at any rate.

18:50 / 21.08.06

me neither.
i think factor in the 'less important' nature of message board posting in some people's eyes and it is totally believable he would be marginally more coherent than he has so far been.

As Mister Disco says, there's not an awful lot we can usefully do or say about this one way or the other, although "guilt-ridden" is not I think a necessary way to read these opinions.

no, nor useful.
i dont like humming and hawing either, but hey.
let's move on.

33

19:39 / 21.08.06

i just wrote a great big message to this that got deleted..so i will condense..

I am sorry if i offended anyone Haus has got it just about right , there was no malicious intent at all .

My mistake and my executuion I suppose .. I am tired and a relapse last year after I did that site has contributed , along with failures / bad luck , in me becoming even more impatient and frustrated , angry

No excuse i agree but i think every human has its limitations and that site only details some of them ( theres more beleive it or not )

Again this is no excuse I cant really say more , I miscalculated and I amongst other things..

If anything I subconciously think I created a little dramr to try and distract myself and it that sense it could of been anything - i just took some admitted annoyances and connected them with things i knew little about it in the grand scale of things..

So thats it...

It seems a bit pointless now though id like to try and presue interaction with those that might be willing to still talk to me - esp about the problem on my site
i am not holding my breath..

Thank you at least for cosnidering my case

paranoidwriter waves hello

20:00 / 21.08.06

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

As sad as this sounds, 33, you just made my day. Of course, we'll have to see what happens, but that was really cool, what you just did.

Best wishes and good luck, comrade.

33

20:10 / 21.08.06

All the best to you too PN..

Thank you for offering to defend me

paranoidwriter waves hello

20:19 / 21.08.06

No worries, but we'd have lost. 'specially if you'd pleaded not guilty.

Oh and guess what? I did loads more research on your atomic number today, 33, which I hadn't done for a while and learnt a little about arsenic and even a tiny bit about GHB (long story), which I may still explore. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that over the time you've been here I've learnt loads, and will no doubt continue to do so. It's just the cherry on the cake hearing you make a genuine apology like that. I reckon, like me, you'll fuck up again at some point, we always do, but each time (hopefully) we get a bit better at dealing with it, innit?

You can also change your screen name, by the way, but I think you should probably keep it, or enjoy variations of it, as I'm starting to believe more about charging language and the positive power this can have on us all.

Again, best of luck with everything.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

20:25 / 21.08.06

Right, so are you actually apologising for the homophobia, racism and sexism?

33

20:35 / 21.08.06

Right, so are you actually apologising for the homophobia, racism and sexism?

I thought you had mystic powers ?

paranoidwriter waves hello

20:36 / 21.08.06

Psst... The answer is...

33

20:40 / 21.08.06

In any event before thats taken as some sign of deceit YES as I mentioned I apologsie ..

I realise your sour feelings towards me might enjoy the idea of prolonging what youd consider to be perhaps be a painful admission on my part but as I said there was no malicous intent to start with.

Your smart enough to figure out what I meant in any event wihtout needing to ask this , is there is anything else youd think I should apologise for while your at it ?

33

20:43 / 21.08.06

In any event before thats taken as some sign of deceit YES as I mentioned I apologsie ..

I realise your sour feelings towards me might enjoy the idea of prolonging what youd consider to be perhaps be a painful admission on my part but as I said there was no malicous intent to start with.

Your smart enough to figure out what I meant in any event wihtout needing to ask this , is there is anything else youd think I should apologise for while your at it ?

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