# I have promises to keep **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 1, 2005, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177 "2005-04-01T03:45:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Binarydrone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Binarydrone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Binarydrone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/41 "2005-04-01T20:07:30Z")
As this thread has wandered into this territory without my help, I won’t feel as if I am hijacking it. What I am hoping is that some of you folks can answer a question for me. Specifically, what did friend **Scylla** do to earn this sort of bile from folks? I do get that some folks find his writing overblown, and do not enjoy it (I suspect a small element of the green monster there, but that is just my opinion), and I get that some folks disagree with his politics. That said, some of what I am seeing here is terribly over to top. What gives folks? ---
**Author:** ![Homebrew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Homebrew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homebrew)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/42 "2005-04-01T20:19:11Z")
My comments were uncalled for and I [apologize, specifically to **Scylla**](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6011043#post6011043). I hope you get your woes sorted out. ---
**Author:** ![Hamadryad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6de8d8/32.png) [@Hamadryad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamadryad)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/43 "2005-04-01T20:23:57Z")
First: **BobNewbie** is hilarious. Second: If you post in the Pit, you should know it’s sort of open season…and it is the _post_ which is being ‘attacked,’ not the _poster_. Well, initially, anyhow. Third: If you look at it objectively, the essay masquerading as an OP really is… well, FRAUGHT. You can tell that the person writing it was completely and totally in love with the ‘sound’ of his own writing. Objectively, it reads like something a Freshman Comp student would write when given the assignment, “Write about despair from the point of view of someone you’ve never met.” Fourth: I understand that, when the post is translated from Scyllaese to English, it means he’s going through some hard times. As should be obvious, no one’s going to come in and say, “You’re stupid for having hard times.” I hope he gets through this whatever-the-hell-it-is reasonably unscathed, too. Fifth: That doesn’t change the fact that the post itself is laughable AND was OPd in the Pit, and thus stands open to whatever mockery people deem fit to throw on it, IMNPFHO. ---
**Author:** ![InvidiousCourgette](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e47c2d/32.png) [@InvidiousCourgette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InvidiousCourgette)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/44 "2005-04-01T20:32:35Z")
> [@Binarydrone](#): > > What gives folks? I can’t speak for others. I like Scylla’s writings. I am amused, however, when someone who is respected by many (including myself, not least for the blimps) is treated irreverently. I am sure many of us look forward to the day when we can conjure enough respect to be worthy of irreverance. Oh and props again to **BobNewbie**. ---
**Author:** ![Boldface\_Type](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b5e925/32.png) [@Boldface\_Type](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boldface_Type)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/45 "2005-04-01T20:34:48Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > I went for a run in the woods and almost got lost. > > There you are at 7am by yourself in the woods. You have been running for an hour and a half in the same direction, just thinking about shit, and you’re ready to stop, and your knee hurts and you are tired and as you stop to get your bearings you realize that it is very cold and you are not wearing much and you are soaked with sweat and only the heat of your motion has kept you warm thus far, and you know you are going to have to go back every step you came but you’re not sure when you left the path or where the path ended. This is why you should always carry a light but effective waterproof. ---
**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/46 "2005-04-01T20:36:28Z")
I’d love to go into detail about what Scylla has done to earn such nasty comments, but I’m busy right now. I need to go polish my Viper. IMHO, post your pity party in the right forum and you won’t have people calling you out. Pretty tough, eh? ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/47 "2005-04-01T20:40:26Z")
For a while, I thought the LiveJournal TrainWreckSpotting was pathetic - it was an ugly underbelly of pettiness and spite. But this thread has displayed its absolute necessity to exist in some form or fashion. ---
**Author:** ![BottledBlondJeanie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/0ea827/32.png) [@BottledBlondJeanie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BottledBlondJeanie)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/48 "2005-04-01T20:41:01Z")
> [@Hamadryad](#): > > First: **BobNewbie** is hilarious. > > Second: If you post in the Pit, you should know it’s sort of open season…and it is the _post_ which is being ‘attacked,’ not the _poster_. Well, initially, anyhow. > > Third: If you look at it objectively, the essay masquerading as an OP really is… well, FRAUGHT. You can tell that the person writing it was completely and totally in love with the ‘sound’ of his own writing. Objectively, it reads like something a Freshman Comp student would write when given the assignment, “Write about despair from the point of view of someone you’ve never met.” > > Fourth: I understand that, when the post is translated from Scyllaese to English, it means he’s going through some hard times. As should be obvious, no one’s going to come in and say, “You’re stupid for having hard times.” I hope he gets through this whatever-the-hell-it-is reasonably unscathed, too. > > Fifth: That doesn’t change the fact that the post itself is laughable AND was OPd in the Pit, and thus stands open to whatever mockery people deem fit to throw on it, IMNPFHO. Well yeah sure it’'s the pit so we should really pull out all the stops. Oh yeah, and we should snark about his writing style too. I don’t usually read **Scylla’s** stuff but I think anyone in a situation where there was BRAIN SURGERY on him or a family member shouldn’t get shit. I’m not for a kindler gentler pit, but for some reason this isn’t mundane or pointless and really shouldn’t belong there. For some reason now I know who those people are in the anonymous places who bitched and shit about Scylla and then did the Happy Dance[sup]TM[/sup] when he was gone for awhile. ---
**Author:** ![BottledBlondJeanie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/0ea827/32.png) [@BottledBlondJeanie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BottledBlondJeanie)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/49 "2005-04-01T20:49:30Z")
> [@Zette](#): > > I’d love to go into detail about what Scylla has done to earn such nasty comments, but I’m busy right now. I need to go polish my Viper. > > IMHO, post your pity party in the right forum and you won’t have people calling you out. Pretty tough, eh? I guess you’ve grown cojones and stopped bitching in LJ. You thought his viper storywas awful and demonstrated that he’s a shit. Fine. But calling this a “pity party” is fucking awful. If your least favorite relative had brain surgery would you tell him to stop wallowing in a pity party? Would you hark back to that time he said something rude about handicapped persons and say, “hey this guy deserves no sympathy”? Not unless that relative is out killing baby animals, aping, murdering or pillaging… And by posting it in the pit he’s open for critisicm? Normally I agree with this but this seems to be a bit more than “woe is me” if you can get past the part where you don’t like the way he writes it or things he’s written in the past. I suppose if I would have started a pit thread about my last miscarriage, which I think I did mentioon in one, I would have opened myslef up for comments about how I brought it on myself for being a bitch? Nice. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/50 "2005-04-01T21:15:20Z")
> [@Homebrew](#): > > My comments were uncalled for and I [apologize, specifically to **Scylla**](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6011043#post6011043). I hope you get your woes sorted out. Good for you! Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Hamadryad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/6de8d8/32.png) [@Hamadryad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamadryad)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/51 "2005-04-01T22:18:24Z")
> [@BottledBlondJeanie](#): > > For some reason now I know who those people are in the anonymous places who bitched and shit about Scylla and then did the Happy Dance[sup]TM[/sup] when he was gone for awhile. No, you probably don’t - they were only willing to say shit anonymously, remember? It really looks as though a couple of people have issues about LiveJournal, but I’m not sure why they brought them up in this thread. Scylla posted in his inimitable\* “Lookit me, maw - I’m writin’ so purdy!” style, and someone came in and pointed it out…and got piled on for not respecting Scylla enough. And as said someone pointed out, some of the people doing that were pretty purple about it too. > [@](#): > > And by posting it in the pit he’s open for critisicm? Normally I agree with this but this seems to be a bit more than “woe is me” if you can get past the part where you don’t like the way he writes it or things he’s written in the past. “Normally I agree…” But not when it’s someone everyone knows and adores. Also, I pointed out that once you get past the style it’s obvious there are probs and I hope he gets past those. However, the style really is melodramatic and precious, and I’ll stand by that if he couldn’t take the criticism of the style, he shouldn’t have posted it. I think he can take the criticism without comment or ignore it entirely. I was posting my opinion of the style because the notion that **BobNewbie** posted in this thread just to crawl up a (all together now) MUCH-LOVED-AND-WELL-RESPECTED-POSTER’s ass and couldn’t POSSIBLY have just read it and felt like commenting on the syle - which IS fraught - is ludicrous. If I posted about, I dunno, my MOTHER dying and wrote in a manner that was laughable, I’d expect THE MANNER to be laughed at. - not really. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/52 "2005-04-01T22:20:18Z")
> [@Hamadryad](#): > > If I posted about, I dunno, my MOTHER dying and wrote in a manner that was laughable, I’d expect THE MANNER to be laughed at. Really? I mean, I guess you’d be right to expect that, because there’s a lotta assholes around, but I don’t think they’d be right to laugh at you. I think they’d be assholes. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/53 "2005-04-01T23:22:18Z")
I don’t see many people piling on to **BobNewby** here. Most of the objections have been towards the far more personal posts made by **ElvisL1ves** and **Weirddave**. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/54 "2005-04-01T23:48:46Z")
I don’t think I have ever seen a thread that has so clearly violated the don’t be a jerk rule as this one. ---
**Author:** ![Binarydrone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3da27b/32.png) [@Binarydrone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Binarydrone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/55 "2005-04-01T23:58:32Z")
There have been many. I would love to go in to detail about them and post links. But I am busy. I need to go polish my Hyundai. ---
**Author:** ![Diane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2acd7d/32.png) [@Diane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diane)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2005, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/56 "2005-04-02T00:18:11Z")
> [@treis](#): > > I don’t think I have ever seen a thread that has so clearly violated the don’t be a jerk rule as this one. Really? And you’ve been around since 2001? Odd. ---
**Author:** ![TVeblen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@TVeblen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TVeblen)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2005, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/57 "2005-04-02T00:18:18Z")
> [@lezlers](#): > > From someone who is obviously short and lives under a bridge like **Bobnewby** , you just roll your eyes, but from long-time and respected posters such as yourselves? Not the way it’s done, **lezlers**. “Obviously short and lives under a bridge” obviously claims someone is a troll. The circumlocution doesn’t give the action a pass. Do _not_ do this again. TVeblen Pit mod ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2005, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/58 "2005-04-02T00:30:19Z")
> [@Diane](#): > > Really? And you’ve been around since 2001? > > Odd. Can you think of a better example? ---
**Author:** ![lezlers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@lezlers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lezlers)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2005, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/59 "2005-04-02T01:19:51Z")
> [@TVeblen](#): > > Not the way it’s done, **lezlers**. “Obviously short and lives under a bridge” obviously claims someone is a troll. The circumlocution doesn’t give the action a pass. Do _not_ do this again. > > TVeblen > Pit mod Goddammit, that used to be okay. I swear to god, I’ve been warned twice in the past few months for doing something that used to be perfectly okay to do. It’s starting to get frustrating. It appears it’s time to engage in a careful reading of the pit rules to see if anything else has changed over the past year or so. Anyhoo, I obviously jumped on **Bob** a bit prematurely anyway. If no one else interpreted the comment like I did, I’m assuming something’s off with my interpretation. Apologies to him and promise to not intentionally break any more board rules, **TVeblen**. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2005, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177/60 "2005-04-02T01:37:53Z")
I don’t know what to make of this one. This just really sucks. Thanks for the good thoughts, especially from those I’ve crossed swords with. I appreciate it. I’m sorry this thing is ugly and regret starting it. Maybe I should have known better, but this really surprises me that it got this way. Why don’t we just close it? It ain’t worth it, and it doesn’t really matter. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-have-promises-to-keep/297177.md?page=4)