# I pit Bricker for admitting he plans to make posts that are "clearly and utterly unreasonable" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 1, 2014, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080 "2014-12-01T22:24:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/181 "2014-12-03T20:45:56Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > Are you a teacher? (ISTR that.) > > ISTM there’s a difference in this regard between disowning a poster and disowning the tactics being used by posters on your side in a specific debate (in which you’re participating). In Starving Artist’s case, it’s a distinction without a difference. Indeed with the rare exception of any off-board real-life interactions, _everyone here is their “tactics”_, i.e. one’s only interaction with other users is through the material one chooses to post and how it is phrased. You can say “I’m not dismissing Poster _X_, just the opinions Poster _X_ has chosen to express and the way in which Poster _X_ expressed them,” but if that’s all the interaction you ever have with Poster _X_, then what difference does it make? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/182 "2014-12-03T20:55:27Z")
Philosophy aside, finding a practical difference between between what Bricker was declining to do regarding Starving Artist and what Bricker was whiningly demanding “board liberals” do regarding each other requires a hair-split of Brickerian precision. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/183 "2014-12-03T20:55:31Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > In Starving Artist’s case, it’s a distinction without a difference. Indeed with the rare exception of any off-board real-life interactions, _everyone here is their “tactics”_, i.e. one’s only interaction with other users is through the material one chooses to post and how it is phrased. > > You can say “I’m not dismissing Poster _X_, just the opinions Poster _X_ has chosen to express and the way in which Poster _X_ expressed them,” but if that’s all the interaction you ever have with Poster _X_, then what difference does it make? I agree about that. I was making a different point. I’m saying Bricker (& now iiandyiiii) are not discussing repudiating as a general matter the tactics of so-and-so who is on your “side” much of the time. What they’re discussing is if you’re participating in a specific debate that so-and-so is also participating in, and so-and-so is using these tactics in support of your side of the debate, that you repudiate this specific instance of those tactics being used. Otherwise (they claim) there’s some implicit approval of these tactics, and at the least, you’re allowing your side of the debate (and by extension you) to benefit from these tactics without having to use them yourself. That’s not the same thing as having to take a general position on posters who happen to share your ideology (or something close to it) or the tactics of such posters. [Note that this is not my cause and I personally don’t intend to make a policy of calling out tactics of people who I am not in disputes with. This is just a comment on whether the disinclination to disown SA is logically inconsistent with the call being made here. It is not.] ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/184 "2014-12-03T21:11:35Z")
The implicit approval and the alleged benefit are too tenuous for me to summon much concern, I’m afraid, even if one wants to try to carve out a distinction between a poster and their posts, and I don’t so want. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/185 "2014-12-03T21:47:58Z")
> [@furt](#): > > Which is in own way more awful: I imagine him having a pleasant conversation with a stranger, making a new friend … and then seeing a “Bush/Cheney” bumper sticker on their car, narrowing his eyes and walking away wordlessly. He’d never do that, he’d look for the sticker first and make friends only if they didn’t have it on their car ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/186 "2014-12-04T01:05:05Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Ok, first of all bundling the humorist elucidator in that list signals horsepucky. I’m not saying that humorists can’t be criticized: they can. But you apply a different sort of analysis to P.J O’Rourke than you do to Bill O’Reilly. Now look what you’ve done. You’ve gone and blown his cover!! ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/187 "2014-12-04T04:33:19Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Just noticed: Bricker, on why he doesn’t disown the nuttiness of fellow conservative Starving Artist: > > Bricker’s entire complaint is based on a lie - if he doesn’t “own” Starving Artist and thus cannot “disown” him, he has no basis to demand that the people he calls “liberals” disown other “liberals.” I take this an an admission of his knowing deceit on the matter and figure the issue (at least as far as Bricker is concerned - I suppose we could debate how/if one’s political peers should be policed as a general concept) is closed on that basis. I haven’t asked anyone to disown anyone or anything. I have asked people to call out the use of specific tactics when they occur. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/188 "2014-12-04T04:51:58Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I haven’t asked anyone to disown anyone or anything. > > I have asked people to call out the use of specific tactics when they occur. Ah, Bricker, you’re so predictable. Your comment was in specific response to this: > [@Starving Artist - we remember you](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starving-artist-we-remember-you/706204/5): > > While many of the conservatives on this board can’t quite bring themselves to actually criticize or disown him, it’s rare that one of them, especially among the thoughtful, will support him or rely on him in a debate. That should tell you something. It’s so like you (and Starving Artist, actually) to pick a single word out of the context and go all tunnel-vision on it. You don’t have to “disown” Starving Artist or anyone else, but you are demanding that the people you call “board liberals” criticize each other, no? Since you don’t feel compelled to do this for your fellow conservatives (to no apparent ill-effect), it makes you at minimum a hypocrite but I’m happy to just call you a whiner who calls foul after he’s lost. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/189 "2014-12-04T08:53:33Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Just noticed: Bricker, on why he doesn’t disown the nuttiness of fellow conservative Starving Artist: > > Bricker’s entire complaint is based on a lie - if he doesn’t “own” Starving Artist and thus cannot “disown” him, he has no basis to demand that the people he calls “liberals” disown other “liberals.” I take this an an admission of his knowing deceit on the matter and figure the issue (at least as far as Bricker is concerned - I suppose we could debate how/if one’s political peers should be policed as a general concept) is closed on that basis. > [@Lobohan](#): > > Bricker certainly does outright lie on occasion. Ok, this is a pet peeve of mine. Look I get that we’re in the pit and I’m claiming there’s a rules violation. But methinks an accusation of lying should be backed up tightly. Lobohan made an unsubstantiated claim of it. Ekers didn’t establish intent: hypocrisy after all is generally considered to be something else. I think you guys throw that word around too much. (Bryan Ekers’s post just above this one: no problemo.) **MfM does it too!** I rarely use that word here, but for full disclosures sake [I did so](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17948331&postcount=527) about 15 minutes ago in one of the cop threads. But I think when a nonposter photoshops an opponent’s protest sign, that is transparently an intentional fabrication, or a lie. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/190 "2014-12-04T10:13:40Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > Ok, this is a pet peeve of mine. Look I get that we’re in the pit and I’m claiming there’s a rules violation. But methinks an accusation of lying should be backed up tightly. Lobohan made an unsubstantiated claim of it. I have previously substantiated that claim: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17918586&postcount=7839](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17918586&postcount=7839) You only had to ask. 😃 > [@](#): > > Ekers didn’t establish intent: hypocrisy after all is generally considered to be something else. I think you guys throw that word around too much. (Bryan Ekers’s post just above this one: no problemo.) Bricker’s intent is to obfuscate his utter failure in the ID thread as the result of liberal gang fucking. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/191 "2014-12-04T10:25:35Z")
> [@VarlosZ](#): > > Actually, by ‘what must it be like to be **Der Trihs**?’ I wasn’t referring to catching a lot of crap on the SDMB. I just meant, you know, day to day, living life in his skin, in a world where you’re basically in a Hobbesian dystopia, an unceasing war of all against all. Police, soldiers, politicians, religious people, conservatives, etc. – the dominant motivation for most of the country is sadism. Explicit sadism, that is, as in they like making other people suffer the same way I like watching _Mad Men_. It doesn’t sound much more delusional than many right-wingers, who think Democrats want to increase poverty to get more votes, that all Blacks are criminals, that Obama supports terrorism, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 12:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/192 "2014-12-04T12:00:29Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > Bricker’s intent is to obfuscate his utter failure in the ID thread as the result of liberal gang fucking. To be fair, some of the arguments used (the ones I used, for example) are politics-blind, in the sense of they’d work just as well if Democrats were introducing voter laws and/or rules to discourage voters they don’t like, and indeed Democrats are historically no innocents in this regard. I agree about Bricker’s dishonest intent, though in addition to the scorn that he whines is not being self-policed (while he is disinterested in doing the same), his gang-fucking wasn’t so much from liberals specifically as from rational human beings. He finds it easier, no doubt, to simply presume that people who disagree with him are liberals and cling to his comforting belief that liberals are always wrong, therefore the disagreements must be wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/193 "2014-12-04T14:28:16Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > The implicit approval and the alleged benefit are too tenuous for me to summon much concern, I’m afraid, even if one wants to try to carve out a distinction between a poster and their posts, and I don’t so want. You’ve either lost track of the context or are making a logical error. You’re not just disagreeing with Bricker here, you’rer accusing him of being a liar based on an alleged inconsistency. In that context, whether you agree with his rationale here is irrelevant - the only thing that matters is whether that rationale is being applied inconsistently. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/194 "2014-12-04T14:43:51Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > You’ve either lost track of the context or are making a logical error. > > You’re not just disagreeing with Bricker here, you’rer accusing him of being a liar based on an alleged inconsistency. In that context, whether you agree with his rationale here is irrelevant - the only thing that matters is whether that rationale is being applied inconsistently. I’d be prepared to generously grant that he’s only a hypocrite, if he hadn’t made such a personal trademark out of accusing others of hypocrisy, ie he’s lying about how serious an issue it is because he practices it himself to no ill-effect. We could nitpick and hair-split about which negative descriptors Bricker has earned, but it would waste even more time and effort than we’re already squadering on him. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/195 "2014-12-04T16:08:54Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Ah, Bricker, you’re so predictable. Your comment was in specific response to this: > > It’s so like you (and Starving Artist, actually) to pick a single word out of the context and go all tunnel-vision on it. You don’t have to “disown” Starving Artist or anyone else, but you are demanding that the people you call “board liberals” criticize each other, no? Since you don’t feel compelled to do this for your fellow conservatives (to no apparent ill-effect), it makes you at minimum a hypocrite but I’m happy to just call you a whiner who calls foul after he’s lost. But I do criticize Starving Artist, and Shodan, and Terr, for poor argument. I’ve done so repeatedly. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/196 "2014-12-04T16:30:35Z")
And now if you simply stop doing it for liberals, then everything will be fine. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/197 "2014-12-04T16:30:39Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > I have previously substantiated that claim: > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17918586&postcount=7839](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=17918586&postcount=7839) No you haven’t. I know you believe it was a lie, but it wasn’t. Keep bringing it up at every opportunity though. Saying it over and over makes it truthier. You should make a poll. One of us will be surprised at the result. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/198 "2014-12-04T16:33:08Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > But I do criticize Starving Artist, and Shodan, and Terr, for poor argument. I’ve done so repeatedly. Great, because from now on it’s mandatory. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/199 "2014-12-04T16:38:13Z")
Ah! So, you _have_ a “Be A Dick” license, then? Updated and verified by your unstintingly correct and non-partisan approach to debate? Still, your evidence is compelling, your list of ideological allies evoke admiration and approval, persons of sterling character, tolerant and reasonable, each and every. Did you hesitate a moment out of modesty to suggest that you stand amongst them, as an equal? Might it not be presumptuous to imply that you are the equal to such unanimously admired paragons as these? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080/200 "2014-12-04T16:44:31Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > No you haven’t. I know you believe it was a lie, but it wasn’t. Keep bringing it up at every opportunity though. Saying it over and over makes it truthier. > > You should make a poll. One of us will be surprised at the result. It would be easy to challenge. Find a statement of Lobohan’s praising the actions of the Massachusetts legislature. Heck, find such a statement from any Doper. There must be at least one. I’ll give you Der Trihs. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-bricker-for-admitting-he-plans-to-make-posts-that-are-clearly-and-utterly-unreasonable/706080.md?page=11)