To whoever hacked into my Database

[Ian Kelly]

On Tue, Nov 12, 2013 at 9:27 AM, Antoon Pardon
<antoon.pardon at rece.vub.ac.be> wrote:
> Op 12-11-13 14:02, Ian Kelly schreef:
>> On Tue, Nov 12, 2013 at 2:09 AM, Antoon Pardon
>> <antoon.pardon at rece.vub.ac.be> wrote:
>>> So you are complaining about people being human. Yes that is
>>> how people tend to react when they continualy are frustrated
>>> by someone who refuses to show the slightest cooperation.
>>> So no rejecting such responses, particullarly by the person
>>> who caused them is not right. It is defelecting the blame from
>>> the primal cause.
>>
>> As you say you're a human, not a sheep, so stop pointing at the
>> behavior of others to justify your own.
>
> No, because often enough what is justifiable and what is not
> depends on the context and what happened before. Morals are
> generally not absolute so that a particular action would be
> either right or wrong no matter what the circumstances.

I never claimed that they are.  That doesn't mean that when somebody
misbehaves, you can do whatever you want in retaliation without regard
for others who might be involved.

>> "But he started it" wasn't an
>> excuse in kindergarten, and it still isn't one now.
>
> Then that kindergarten teacher was lousy at her job and would
> probably let the bullies maninupulate her in punishing their
> victems. That is what you get if you unconditionally tell
> people that "he started it" can't be an excuse.

Yes, when one kid is yelling at another kid because the second kid
pulled the first kid's hair, the teacher should just ignore the
yelling because, after all, "he started it."  I'm sure that won't
cause any disruption in the classroom at all, and having one kid
yelling probably isn't going to set any of the others off, is it?

As for letting the "bullies" (which I'll take as a metaphor for
trolls, since I've not once seen Nikos act like a bully) get away with
things, none of these threads have been about pursuing any sort of
justice, so don't try to frame the discussion as if they are.

>> Somebody has to
>> accept the responsibility to walk away and break the positive feedback
>> loop, or it will never end.  And I can't see Nikos being the one to do
>> that.
>
> Not my problem. Why do you come to me? I didn't contribute to this
> thread for about two days. That is two days of various contributors
> that didn't accept their responsibility and whom you left alone.
> If it wasn't a problem then that the positive feedback loop was
> maintained, then why is it a problem now? I'll start taking you
> seriously when I see you tackling the specific behaviour in a
> consistent manner instead of you tackling specific contributors.

My apologies then for implying that you have been actively feeding the
troll; I have not been paying attention to who is or isn't doing that.
 I replied to you because you've been very vocal on the topic, and
because you wrote things that I wanted to respond to, not to single
you out as the problem.  I'm not going to individually address every
single person who I think is contributing to the problem, because
that's not my job and I don't have time for it.  If you think that's
not being fair, then that's tough, but this mailing list is not a
kindergarten.  We're all adults here, and I expect that others who are
feeding the troll will have the maturity and self-awareness to
recognize that what I wrote applies to them without me having to
repeat myself a dozen times.

> If you leave a thread alone for four days while various contributors
> maintain a positive feedback loop then you are implicitly saying
> that such behaviour is not a big problem. So don't come complaining
> now.

I've spoken up on this issue before.  I'm not going to repetitively
respond to every single post or even every single thread that I think
is problematic.  If I did that, then I would be part of the problem.
As I said above, I chose to speak up now because you wrote things that
I specifically wanted to respond to.  For the most part however I
prefer silence in the knowledge that making noise just invites more
noise.  For that reason you can expect that I will drop out of this
thread again shortly, likely after this post.

>>> That is correct but is expecting too much from people in general.
>>> Expecting from frustrated people to act rational and constructive
>>> is just a recipe for your own frustrations.
>>
>> In my experience, conduct follows from self esteem and self worth, and
>> those things follow in turn from the respect and expectations of
>> others.  If I expect others to act like animals, then I disrespect
>> them, and so why should they behave any differently toward me or in my
>> presence?
>
> You are confusing realistic expectations with moralistic expeactations.
> In some circumstances it is realistic to expect people to behave like
> animals. You may see that as a sign of disrespect but that is because
> you assigned it a moral judgement.
>
>> By expecting others to be rational and mature I show my
>> respect for them, and so perhaps they will see fit to behave in a way
>> to maintain that respect.
>
> No you are not showing respect that way. You are more likely unable
> to empathise with the frustrations those people experience and are feeling
> smug because you can handle it in such a "rational and mature" way.

This has nothing to do with empathy.  I can understand why others are
frustrated and yet still expect them to control themselves.

In my world, treating somebody like an adult is a mark of respect, and
treating them otherwise is not.  Part of treating somebody like an
adult is expecting them to take responsibility for themselves.  If you
don't see things that way, then I think we have very different
outlooks on life in general.