I am sorry for anyone that I offended with the thread titled; “Who is up for another anecdote involving cruel adolescent behavior” particularly for the offensive language used in describing the incident.
The thread was not inteneded to offend any homosexuals or their family members.
I take the warning received seriously and realize that the thread was presented in a such a way that deserved a warning and closure.
The last thing I want to do is alienate myself from the SDMB online community so let me just say that the purpose of that potential “train wreck” was to say that I *could * walk away when bad behavior was going on especially to the degree it was happening on Saturday night.
That is all I will say about that subject and I will be more careful in the future.
We’ve all done stupid things. The important thing is to face up to them.
Ya know, like you’re doing here.
I accept.
I see after 8 views no one has answered, so I’ll be brave and step forward.
No, I certainly do not “accept your apology” but this thread made me open it even though I had pretty much decided not to open your threads anymore. But seriously, why would you care if we did or not?
That being said, this was a nicely worded little apology. However, I am getting a little tired of hearing all this adolescent stupidity. I defended you in your first couple of threads, thinking, everybody’s young once, and everybody’s stupid when young. But I never did the cruel things you’ve done and I still feel guilty about the handful of not-nice things I did.
You shouldn’t care about whether we accept or not, but for your own sake, perhaps you should try to be nicer. I am of the school that truly believes mean outside=sour inside. Or in other words, make other people unhappy and you’ll be unhappy too.
Thanks for the apology, though.
I wasn’t offended by it, but I am a little concerned for you; especially at a time like this, you need good friends and it sounds (if your description of their behaviour is in any way accurate) like rather a few of your buddies are assholes.
I have never been an adolescent boy (thank god), so I don’t know if your behavior is normal for your IRL peer group or not. I like to think not, since it often seems to involve unkind or illegal or downright stupid activities (and frankly I’m not sure which of the three bothers me the most).
In terms of the peer group here at the Dope though – well, we’re not, in general, people who tend to find your antics amusing or admirable, as surely you must have inferred from the usual reaction to your stories. So your behavior in terms of this peer group – unacceptable.
My advice is, if you want to pick which group’s values you should adopt, you should go for the Dope – (mostly) intelligent, (mostly) mature, (mostly) tolerant, and (mostly) supportive, instead of your IRL “friends,” who (mostly) seem like a bunch of nasty, stupid, short-sighted jerks. And if you decide to keep emulating your IRL “friends,” you should give up the delusion that you’ll find endorsement for their activities and values here at the Dope.
There’s a pit thread about your thread and it looks like a lot of people (including me) are defending your ultimate actions. You seemed to understand that your friends were assholes and you would rather walk home than drive with them. That’s a good thing and that doesn’t require any apology.
I agree with Mangetout that some of your friends are assholes. I know what it’s like to have some asshole friends (or in my case, friends who were behaving like assholes) during a time of severe grief. They are not what you need. They won’t help. Trust me on this one, I learned it the hard way.
I think that a LiveJournal account would be a good thing for you. Not because you did anything so terrible by posting that thread, but it seems like you need to get this stuff out, without having to have it up for scrutiny by a bunch of people who may not all be as sympathetic (or understanding) of what you are about. I’ve written things, just to “get them out,” only to delete them later. The writing of it helped me a lot, and after I started to feel better, I didn’t need to see a reminder of what I’d written anywhere.
The problem is, you can’t delete anything here, but you can on LiveJournal.
When you sign up for LiveJournal, let me know (my email address is in my profile).
Cajun Man was a little harsh when he closed that thread.
But, that being said, I feel I should remind you that when you hang around with assholes, you’re going to find brown stains on your shirt.
The threads you start never seem to go well for you. Have you considered just posting to other people’s threads?
It was thoughtful of you to come forward to make an apology.
How old are your group of friends, START? Assholery in teenage guys seems to ebb and flow, depending on the age.
In any case, be careful to pick and choose who your friends are, okay? You seem like a decent young man, don’t let them taint you.
I think Cajun Man was quite right to do what was done. It was quite thoughtful for you to make this apology START. I won’t accept it though. Put what you want in a thread because it doesn’t matter what you say it’s what you do. Or rather what you didn’t do in this case. IMO tolerating crap like what your “friends” did in the other thread is almost as bad as doing it yourself. You knew what they were going to do. If they hadn’t pissed you and your friend off you would still have been with them. If you want to show us you feel bad about this, then stop doing it. Plain and simple. I know it’s easy for me to say. I know what peer pressure can be like but especially after what has happened recently you shouldn’t be getting into situations like this.
Take it easy, keep yourself clean and take care of yourself START.
Daniel 
Hi START, how’s it going? I generally enjoy reading your stuff. You say what comes to your mind, and it comes out as a genuine voice. Too much hesitation or over-concern sometimes prevents people from expressing themselves with spontaneity. I often have that problem; it’s called writers block.
But one thing you have to be aware of is who’s reading your stuff. Of course we’re all in “cyberspace” out here. But a large proportion of people, on this board or anywhere else, are gay, whether you know it or not. And a lot of other people may not be gay, but have seen their gay friends hurt in various ways by really mean-spirited people.
I don’t think you intended your thread to be mean-spirited, but you have to keep in mind that gay-bashing is a very sensitive subject, and a very serious one. Also, you don’t know if there are any really homophobic people reading, who might interpret your writing as justification for ridiculing gay people. Sometimes when a thread like yours gets started, it veers the wrong way and can turn into a gay-bashing thread (not here on SDMB, but potentially elsewhere).
So just keep in mind that there’s a wide audience out here in cyberspace. You want to keep being spontaneous, but you also have to be careful not to start something that could turn ugly.
I also agree with the others who have said that some of your friends sounds like total jerks. Lose them.
Also, I was sorry to hear of the death in your family, and I hope you and your family are OK.
comes in from just reading that thread
START, it was a pretty stupid and childish thing to do. But I think you’re aware of that, and you know how to deal with it.
I accept your apology, for what it’s worth. Just be aware, I think, that you may have to work a little harder now to earn back some of that respect you lost.
I don’t think you have anything to apologize for. I just want to commend you for doing the right thing and confronting an injustice.
What injustice was confronted? 
Did you read START’s OP or did you just skim it like Cajun Man and assume you already knew what it said? (Sorry, Cajun Man, if you’re reading this, but you acted prejudicially in that thread.)
His newfound “friends” were acting like jerks so he told them to cut it out, and when they didn’t, he refused to stay with them. He later ran into the guys they were harassing and apologized to them.
Unless someone points out exactly what you did wrong, I don’t feel you need to apologize, START.
As they say in the South…" Bless Your Heart"…
I just reread the thread and now I think I need to offer START an apology myself.
START, forgive me?
Respectfully, what he did wrong was to continue to hang with his friends after they had harassed the guys in the park, compunded by continuing to hang with them after they loaded the SuperSoaker with piss, clearly with the intention of spraying the "gay"guys. (Do we know they were gay?)
:rolleyes: START is like 15, cut him some slack. He did that right thing, and also waited long enough to do it (ensuring they were true assholes and not just joking) as to not commit social suicide.
Nobody got sprayed with the Super-Soaker that may or may not have been filled with piss. No harm, no foul.
Your thread title suggested that this would be an interesting, amusing story about yourself.
You would have got a much better reception if you had called it ‘START learns some of his friends are rude’, or put it in the Pit under the title ‘I pit bigoted adolescents’.
Growing up is not easy, but talk about this stuff, with adults you respect, to learn why you were out of line.