Explain this one, jodih...

The BBQ Pit
21

Ah Phil, I see what you are saying, I’m sorry that I didn’t understand it originally.

Look folks, I’m sorry I took the OP in this thread at its face value – I didn’t realize I was getting into a non-holy war, or that Satan was simply attempting to make yet another jab at jodih. I actually approached the OP, in my original answer, as a matter of semantics. Satan said:

Now, as a matter of semantics, these two statements are NOT saying the “exact same thing.” Can they both be interpreted as gross generalizations? Sure, especially depending on the context in which they are made. But as a lawyer in a country which follows the common law, I’m trained to look for logical analogies, and to look for logical distinctions. There is, at least from the point of view of a legal analyst, a significant distinction between the two statements. That distinction has been pointed out several times now, and it serves no real purpose to go over it again.

Now, again, if you go back to my first post in this thread, nothing more and nothing less was said than a direct answer to the question that I thought had been asked. A semantics question; a question of analogy and distinctiveness. I happen to get paid manny tens of thousands of dollars for my ability to see and articulate distinctions like these. And when I sit as a temporary judge in the trial court, or mediate in the Court of Appeal, these are distinctions which must be made and which can sometimes affect the outcome of a case.

What I did not expect, nor do I yet understand, was the immediately hostile reaction that my analysis evoked. On reflection, this is no doubt the product of the so called “non-holy war” I referred to above. Had Satan’s OP in this thread come in the midst of such a debate, I would have ignored it as the partisan argument it has now so obviously been revealed to be, for in debate certainly it would have been a legitimate point to raise. I have no interest in debating the evolution/creation argument, or arguing for or against what’s been going on in Kansas, or elsewhere, and so in the context of that debate I would not have made any comment. Unfortunately, however, I took it as a semi-legitimate question, and answered it thusly. And, when attacked in a manner which I felt was unfair, based on the hypothesis with which I approached this thread initially, I responded with a counterattack. To the extent that my counterattack was based on any misunderstanding, I apologize.

I’m not interested in the fight; it ain’t worth it. Nobody’s gonna change anybody else’s mind, and in point of fact, as I said, I don’t particularly care about the evolution/creation debate; it’s not relevant in my life. All I intended to do is what I initially did: come out and point out that, yes, indeed, there is a difference. Whether that difference is relevant in the context in which both statements were made was not part of the question asked, or of the answer rendered.

Satan, I’m sorry if you took my initial response as an attack on you. It certainly was not meant to be. I do think that the invective with which you responded to me suggests that I pushed some button, inadvertently, which I was not looking to push, nor which I would have pushed had I known it was there. Again, we can all only judge what the other person’s ideas are by what that person chooses to present in writing.

And y’know, as far as the name goes, I don’t think you’re making a fair analogy, or that it is fair to criticize those who look askance at the name, and draw conclusions based on it. The name “Satan” has had direct connotations of evil and anti-Christianity for hundreds if not thousands of years. Satanic worshipers, and Satanic rituals, are those which are directly in opposition to the Christian god. I submit that people’s reactions to it are as natural and predictable as it would be had someone on this board chosen to use the screen name “Adolf Hitler.” If you are trying to say that you chose the name in all innocence, without trying to provoke a reaction, or make the statement that it does make, I am sorry to say that it’ll take a lot of talking to convince me, and probably to convince others as well.

-Melin

22

Boy, talk about UNFAIR. I spend two sentences putting the thrust of the thread into a nutshell (see below),

and I get a sarcastic warm match head (thank you for the flame, BTW, Melin, now I’m not (exactly) a virgin any more :)).

Satan writes a diatribe (informed by posts from Melin and Majormd, and with assists from pldennison, and don’t expect me to quote those), and he practically gets an APOLOGY.

To contradict an earlier .sig line:

Maybe I should stick to long-winded, quote-filled, sentence-by sentence responses that point out the flaws and inconsistencies in the posts of every person who ever appeared to write a word that disagreed with what I wrote, reaffirming and as necessary, rewording my assertions until I’ve been here so long my server disconnects me three times while I’m writing, adn guaranteeing that I’ll be here until I can’t possibly get to bed and sleep long enough to be capable of getting up to my alarm clock.

23

Say, that looks pretty good, except for misspelling the word “and” in one place, and missing a comma. Just a second, let me fix it.

I think I’ll post it over on kellibelli’s thread about long .sig lines and see if she likes it. :slight_smile:

Maybe I should stick to long-winded, quote-filled, sentence-by sentence responses that point out the flaws and inconsistencies in the posts of every person who ever appeared to write a word that disagreed with what I wrote, reaffirming and as necessary, rewording my assertions, until I’ve been here so long my server disconnects me three times while I’m writing, and guaranteeing that I’ll be here until I can’t possibly get to bed and sleep long enough to be capable of getting up to my alarm clock.

24

::wonderment:: Wow, uh, oh my. Gee, Kaylasdad, I, uh, I - I didn’t know. I hope it was as good for you as it was for me. :wink:

I’m honored to have been “the first.”

-Melin

25

Yes, there are superficial parallels in the statements. Some of us can see more than that, however.

(1) You addressed this distinction by dismissing it. Saying that Rev. Glidden speaks for all Christians is like saying that the Kansas state school board represents all Americans, despite the fact that the NM governor is working to strengthen the teaching of evolution in NM public schools.

(2) The inflammatory nature of your statement has nothing to do with any distinctions, seen or not seen, between the degree of association between Rev Glidden & all Christians and the Kansas state school boards & the people of Kansas. Inflammatory refers to the fact that I personally find “mind-melded zealots” to be much more harsh & judgmental than “backwards idiots”. That, however, is strictly my opinion.

(3) SUPPOSEDLY is not my word. I said the Kansas state school board IS SUPPOSED TO represent the people of Kansas. SUPPOSEDLY has different connotations which do not apply here. I really dislike being misquoted.

(4) Rev. Glidden is not an elected/appointed official of all Christianity. He has no authority to speak for Roman Catholics, Lutherans, or any other faith of which he is not a member. Whether ARG is/was a kid, or the number of adults who lead flocks who are like Rev. Glidden is not relevant.

(5) Read (4) above again. Reverend Glidden was not elected or appointed to speak for all Christians. The Kansas state school board was elected, or appointed by elected officials to act for the people of Kansas. Candidates’ views on evolution should have been considered in the election. If you still cannot see any distinction between the degree of association here, I’ll freely admit to being wrong when I called you smart & perceptive in my previous post.

(6) I’ll ignore, for now, the fact that the number of people involved has no relevance on whether or nor your statement & Jodih’s statement said “the exact same thing”. Rev. Glidden is to people who think like the Reverend (or is it ALL Christians - you can’t seem to make up your mind just who it is Rev. Glidden is speaking for) as the Kansas state school board is to the people of Kansas. So while there may be “thousands of people who think like the Reverend”, there are millions of people in Kansas.

(7) No, I do not think he’s alone. It doesn’t matter if he’s alone or not when I’m considering whether you & Jodih are saying “the exact same thing” in your statements. Since you & Jodih are not saying “the exact same thing”, I have a point whether Rev. Glidden is alone or not.

(8) But your OP here in this thread did not ask readers to declare a winner in the Satan vs. Jodih war. It asked whether you & she did or did not say “the exact same thing”. When I or Melin point out subtle, but material, differences between your statements, you dismiss them, or bring up irrelevant extraneous questions, or, as now, ask us not to judge things on the basis of the statement in the OP of this thread, but on the basis of your debates in other threads. This leads me to wonder whether you were really wanting to know if you & Jodih were saying “the exact same thing” (you weren’t), or were you wanting to be declared the winner of the war, and bask in the warmth of the high fives, touche’s, and d’ohs that constituted the first few responses to your post.

(9) Since Jodih posted her words 2 months before the great war, why should anyone question them? You seem to think it’s a fine debate technique.

(10) If you & Jodih said “the exact same thing”, there would be irony. But you didn’t. I can nit-pick all I want & I will - I find it interesting that instead of “the exact same thing”, you’re now saying “nearly those same words”. Perhaps you are beginning to see some difference?

(11) You’re right. I cannot understand why Reverend Glidden’s statements could possibly be used to support the stereotype of Christians as “raving fundamentalists”, “the loudest group of people on the planet”, “the most intollerant”, and “the most self-righteous.” Since multiple Christian leaders have sought to distance themselves from

26

Amen Sister

That which a man had rather were true he more readily believes.

27

FWIW, Satan, people will infer meaning from a screen name. I learned early in my message board days that it is necessary to place a disclaimer in front of some of my postings because some people believe that I am a doctor IRL. IMO, it is absolutely ludicrous to assume anything from a screen name. But it WILL happen. Often. I cannot tell you how many times, on this board alone, people have taken my handle at face value, but the old “ECT” thread in the “Cecil’s Columns” comes to mind as a good example. My post addressed a legal concern, but another poster took to addressing my medical qualifications. I now put a disclaimer in front of any informatin I post which may be remotely considered medical in nature.

I’m not suggesting you disclaim your SN for religion topics. My disclaimer is out of concern for people taking my posts as qualified medical advise, which could be physically dangerous. I certainly don’t see any possible danger in posting as Satan (except that a certain fringe element may begin to worship you and/or slaughter animals in your name - but that’s a risk you take, I guess ;)). But don’t be too surprised when people try to read meaning into the name you’ve selected.

The overwhelming majority of people have more than the average (mean) number of legs. – E. Grebenik

28

I promised myself I was done with this

MajorMD, go read the thread we’re talking about here. Everything you bring up has been dealt with.

OF COURSE intelligent people wouldn’t draw those kind of conclusions. But here’s a newsflash for you- An overwhelming majority of people are idiots. The educational system today is rather hostile to religious beliefs (except Kansas, which is obviously too far in the other direction) and the people getting attention on the other side are nutjobs claiming that God will destroy Maimi because of gays! No one sees on the headlines “Polycarp is reasonable about evolution” or “Mainstream Christians welcome gays to churches”.

I’ll say it again. Glidden makes me look bad. And Jodih has been making me look bad. And now YOU are making me look bad.

And Satan, please man, let it go. This thing will consume the whole board eventually. Even the damn Melin thing came up again. Let it die before Loverock comes back.

-John
“It’s the Apocalypse all over again.”

29

Melin:

I think you and jodih make ALL lawyers look like argumentative, subject-warping, half-truth-speaking, mind-melded zealots.

Take that however the fuck you want. I could give two shits.

30

Yawn

Satan, you are either going to get over this, or you are not, and it’s pretty clear which of those you’re choosing. And that is something I could give two shits about. Feel free post further threads here in the Pit to try to breathe life into this dead horse, but you’re going to have to do it without my help.

Ask yourself if this latest shot really makes me look like any more of an idiot, or if it makes you look like someone who is entirely incapable of letting something go. Then act accordingly. Just don’t expect me to assist you in resurrecting this whole argument; I didn’t care about enough about it then to keep it going, and I don’t care enough about it now to revisit it.

31

And this post is supposed to impress us with your wit, erudition, and intelligence? Your ability to debate controversial topics in an articulate and reasonable manner? Your true lack of prejudice against anyone who disagrees with you? What’s the matter, little boy, did you get caught out playing in your game and it didn’t come out the way you wanted it to? Little Brian has said something that nobody really believes, and now he’s throwing a temper tantrum because he’s being challenged on it?

There’s an old legal joke: “If the facts are against you, pound the law. If the law is against you, pound the facts. If the facts and the law are against you, pound the table.” I think your table just split in two.

-Melin

 Phenomenal woman
 Bitch Corporate Lawyer
 That's me
32

Bullshit, as evidenced by the existence of this thread. Or did you just wake up feeling like Flip Wilson today?

Rich

33

I’m getting into this thread kind of late, but since my name has come up a couple of times, I’d like to repost something I wrote in the original thread:

To which Brian responded:

I know this is the pit, and I shouldn’t try to be reasonable, but I’m going to try any way. Brian, you (and your lackey, Monty) have repeatedly tried to lump me into the same religious/philosophical camp as Jodi. Why? I’ve told you repeatedly that I understood your OP. I’ve merely tried to explain to you how a reasonable person might misunderstand it. As a result, you have leapt to the erroneous conclusion that I misunderstood it. It doesn’t make any sense.

I accept that you believe your OP was crystal clear and nobody could possibly misunderstand it. Fine. We disagree. You think your OP was great, and I think it was written in a way that made it almost inevitable someone would misunderstand. I know you possess a logical mind (sorry, I know this is the pit and I should be nasty), so please use your logical mind to understand that just because I describe how someone could misinterpret your OP, that doesn’t mean I misinterpreted it. You can grasp this idea, right?

Getting back to the main point, IF you had openly acknowledged in your GD OP that you were making an over-generalization, nobody would have misunderstood you. The way you worded your OP, however, lent itself to the possible misintepretation that you adhere to the overgeneralization you articulated. If you can’t understand why this is so, then I’m afraid you don’t understand the art of communication very well.

It’s possible for a reasonable person to misinterpret your OP in the GD thread. It’s not just me who thinks so. Read back over the other posts in this thread, from VegForLife, Doctor Jackson, Phaedrus, Majormd, Melin, and pldennison. Of course, since this is the pit, you can simply decide we’re all idiots. But it seems that more than just one or two people think you could have been more clear, Brian. And if your point was to communicate with others, then isn’t this an indication that you could have communicated better?

If you’re not careful, Brian, people will get the idea that you are insecure, overly defensive and thin-skinned. These are not attributes one would normally attribute to a man who wants to be called ``Satan.’’ :wink:

(I know this is the pit, so I probably should have been more insulting. I just don’t see the point.)

(Sidebar to Monty: Every time you write something, I can’t help but laugh, because your posts are so off the wall. You think I ``immediately’’ attempted to hijack Brian’s thread? Get a grasp on the facts, my boy. Oh, I forgot. I’m the one who’s delusional.)

34

I just know I’m going to regret this

Temujin: You have made your point quite clearly, that Satan’s OP was worded in such a way as to not preclude the possibility of misinterpretation. You have done so with logic, reasoned argument, and validity.

However, I can’t help but notice that you continually refer to the OP, as though the OP had existed within a vacuum, and was not followed up, explained, contextualized, and amplified upon. To read only your posts on the subject, one might be forgiven for coming to the conclusion that Satan’s ire with jodih was based entirely upon her reaction to one specific post. To read your posts in the context of the entirety of each relevant thread, however, one might be forgiven for developing a suspicion that you yourself are carefully mentioning only the OP, possibly with the intent of obfuscating the fact that the firefight between Satan and jodih developed not within a vacuum bounded on all sides by a single post, but with a context of several exchanges, in which Satan made numerous attempts to clarify his position to jodih, clarification which jodih apparently was unable or unwilling to acknowledge.

I’ve stayed half an hour late at work (off the clock, kellibelli, so don’t worry about me :)), to write this far; I will decide when I get home if I need to go any farther.

To all: Please forgive me if that sounded like a Phaedrian promise ;), and also forgive me if my sentence structure (and length) were too bj0rn-ish. :wink:

35

Hi kaylasdad99,

I hope you don’t regret posting what you did. I have no problem with your criticism. My response:

I’ve addressed this concern in several posts. I have acknowledged that a great deal of explaining occurred, and I have repeatedly said that Jodi should not have carried on with the fight.

My whole point, however, is that Jodi was set up for a fight. If you look back at the first page of the GD thread, you can see how Brian did not merely respond to Jodi’s ideas in a straight-forward way. He blended his explanation with vague wording and snipes that were all but guaranteed to draw her into a fight. By the end of the first page, Brian already was attacking Jodi personally instead of responding to her in clear, easily understood language.

Jodi unwisely took Brian’s bait, and the fight escalated. She is equally to blame. But I believe it is unfair to lay the blame for this fight solely upon Jodi. It started in part because Brian wrote an unclear OP and did not respond clearly to Jodi’s initial questions.

And I don’t think it’s fair for Brian to call Jodi a ``hypocrite,’’ as he did in the GD thread. Why must he always resort to name-calling? If he has a point to make, he can do it without personal attacks. He should save those for the BBQ pit. The problem is that Brian doesn’t save his personal attacks for the BBQ pit. That’s another reason his argument with Jodi got out of hand.

That is not what I intended to convey, and if I was unclear, I apologize. Unlike Brian, I am willing to acknowledge that a reasonable person could misinterpret my posts.

Again, that’s not what I intended to convey. I have acknowledged that Brian made numerous attempts to clarify his position, but I believe he did so in a manner that was unclear and virtually guaranteed to provoke a fight. Here is something that I posted in the other thread, from Oct. 17:

This post was similar in tone and content to my other posts on the subject. Rather than ``obfuscating’’ the fact that the firefight between Satan and jodih developed not within a vacuum bounded on all sides by a single post, but within a context of several exchanges, I believe I ACKNOWLEDGED that fact. I thought my posts were clear in this regard. If not, I hope I have clarified for you what I meant.

The bottom line, however, is that Brian contends here in the BBQ pit that there is no difference between what Jodi posted two months ago, and what Brian himself posted in GD. But there is a difference: Jodi acknowledged clearly that she was over-generalizing; Brian left it for readers to assume. Not every reader is going to assume the correct things about a post that contains an over-generalization, and Brian should not have launched into Jodi for her comments. If he had wanted to, he could have responded in a clear, reasonable way.

He didn’t.

36

This thread itself provides further evidence that this is Brian’s usual method of operating.

-Melin

37

Melin… is so RIGHT all the time, isn’t she? If only everyone would just give her the last word! I’m surprised she hasn’t renamed herself Martyr#8.

38

Ordinarily, I’d let Melin speak for herself, as she is quite capable of defending herself without my “help”, and now will prabably have to do so in spite of my help.

But I know she is off-line IRL for several days & I hate the idea of letting something this ugly go unanswered more than I hate the idea of resurrecting this thread.

To summarize this thread, Satan asked a question. He chose what to include & exclude in his comparison, and asked a question.

When he didn’t like the answers he got, he resorted to attacking the posters, bringing in extraneous irrelevant information, and acting very injured when anyone suggested that his choice of screen name might suggest his own biases.

To date, I have yet to see any indication that he “gets” the idea that 2 people can look at the same statement & interpret it differently without either one being completely right or wrong. (And, yes, I did force myself to read through the original thread) And yet this whole thing was precipitated by his frustration that jodih didn’t “get” that her way of viewing his statement might not be the only correct one…where’s the irony now?

E.Romero, I have no idea what caused you to jump into this discussion so vehemently, yet so late. Melin was the first to point out the weaknesses in Satan’s analogies. Brian’s next post opened with “Melin spewed”… Pretty much takes this discussion out of the reasoned debate realm right there; thus it is approprite that either she or Brian be allowed to have the last word in the discussion.

There is no justification for any comparison between Melin & Contestant#3/Martyr#7; I’ll assume that “Martyr” is a snide reference to Melin’s bringing up her removal as a moderator and is both unnecessarily hurtful and unhelpful if your goal was to make Satan & his supporters here look reasonable.

Speaking, of course, strictly for myself, and not as an officially sanctioned representative of all Christians.

See your doctor for personal medical problems.

What was that kellibelli said about long sigs?

Sue from El Paso
members.aol.com/majormd/index.html

39

It would probably have to be Melin. I’m guessing that Brian has decided to follow Ai\ Yue- Ha
's advice to ‘‘please man, let it go.’’ My guess is that he stopped reading when it became clear most people posting here disagree with him.

40

Um… No. Most people did not disageree with me. But all of the people who DID agree with me have decided to let it go, as have I.

People who disagreed with me include you, jodih and Melin.

A few people are on the fence, and a lot of people knew where I wa coming from.

Read the threads, if you don’t believe me.