I’m pretty sure that harrassing/threatening messages in PM are against the rules (and they’re also not really “private,” in that they are still posted on space belonging to the board).
Once again, who, aside from you, is claiming racism, or, pardon me, RACISM?
Yes. 300 points and I get a toaster, 900 and a set of golf clubs. What kind of deal do you get?
I just want to point out that neither I, nor anyone other than you, is responsible for whatever absurd, cartoon version of others’ political attitudes that you happen to come up with in your head.
Which part of the Bible states that persons who carry out abortions must be assassinated? The point you are attempting to make seems to undermine your case, not support it.
Oh, and BTW: threatening physical harm to other posters just because they happen to disagree with you is highly uncool, whether done by private message or not.
Nope! Like I said, let’s see what shakes out from all of this. It is sounding more and more like the “see no evil” thing isn’t really working out in this case.
Well, what usually happens when a total failure like this comes to light? The standard of military gravity is that the shit rolls downhill, no? Responsibility gets shoved down the chain of command until it falls upon some junior officer or, even better, some anonymous screw-up by an unnamed non-comm. And if that doesn’t work, you can always blame the iron grip of the liberal mindset, which has always been the guiding star of our military. Mmmm, yes. Quite.
How about alternative a? That nobody wanted to be the guy who signed off on turning this man loose? Nobody wanted to say “Well, we’ve squandered a fortune on this guy, training him to be a psychiatrist, but he’s losing it. He’s not some goldbrick, looking for the modern version of a Section 8, hoping to get out from under his uniform and into some cushy civvy job, but he’s genuinely a threat to himself and others.”
Because sure as shit if you do that, somebody is going to second-guess, somebody is going to say “How come you let this guy get away with this? You got any idea how many guys are gonna pull this crap, if they’re looking at a deployment they don’t like? What the fucks the matter with you? Let your record reflect that you are a soft-ass motherfucker and a bleeding heart liberal, who refused to get tough with this guy, and tell him to straighten up and fly right, shape up and ship out!”
Maybe it was political correctness, that’s possible. So are a lot of other things, singly and in unison. And we are going to hear the truth? When? Do we have the whole truth and nothing but about Abu Ghraib?
Not just carping students. From the linked article in Freddy’s link (post #74):
Private messages are only private insofar as the recipient chooses to keep them private. There is no reasonable expectation of privacy once the message is sent, particularly to a presumably hostile recipient.
However, I did not repost it in an attempt to “report” it. I just thought everyone else might like to know that this poster is a douche.
No, and I asked the one who contacted me about it not to make this a moderated issue, if possible.
As far as I am aware it’s against the rules to threaten other posters in threads, but not in PMs, and it’s not like he’s harrassing me - this is the first (and presumably last) private message I’ve received from him. Moreover, I was abusive before he was, I just kept it clean enough for the thread.
So now we have an Army doctor speculating on the motives of fellow officers. We still don’t have anybody saying, “I, personally, was afraid of appearing discriminatory.” We only have people saying that OTHER people were.
Well given we’re at war with Islamic radical extremists, it’s not THAT much of a leap to think that’s it’s war/terrorism related if the guy’s name is Arabic.
Is that racist to notice someone’s name is Arabic?
I don’t get what your point is.
A white guy’s name…OK, well, then given that very few white people are in the war AGAINST us, yes, it would be a logical assumption to think that it WASN’T terrorist related. Maybe he was just an angry shooter.
So what is your point? People jumping to conclusions (as they do every day about a gazillion things) are racist and thus worse than the guy who did the shooting?
What does it matter if they heard his name and drew an inference? Is that the same as shooting someone? Or lynching this guy or all Muslims?
People responding to the OP were definitely lamely and snidely saying he was racist.
As to whether this was “terrorism”…I don’t get that either. It’s a distinction without a difference. I doubt he had an official membership card from Al Queda (although apparently he tried to get one according to those racist rubes at ABC News), does that mean it’s just “workplace violence”?
Of course it makes a difference. A terrorist gets disappeared to a secret [/del]torture[del] detention facility in Syria. A murderer gets sent to jail, where he gets an attorney and a trial.
Does it make a practical difference to the people getting killed? Well, maybe not. However, it certainly seems as though people are jumping to all sorts of conclusions about whether he wasn’t tossed from the Army because he was a Muslim.
I’ll take that cop. Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t; that’s why upon further thought asked the OP a question (#42). I don’t think General Casey’s statement was bullshit. The OP does and, apparently, so do you. Why?
Of course it makes a difference. But Ol’ Bri here can’t see past his own point of view to see it.
And sorry, but jumping to the conclusion that the guy must be a terrorist and it was a premeditated act of Islamic terrorism doesn’t make any sense.
Then again, I don’t live in fear of terrorism.
So it’d be ok for me to tell someone in a PM that I’m gonna bash their teeth in (hypothetically speaking) and I won’t suffer any consequence?
That sounds like the Chewbacca defense to me.
I don’t see why you would or should. It’s the internet; it’s not as though you have any reasonable expectation of finding the person you’re PMing. IMHO, it’s different in an actual thread, because the board administration has to keep a certain minimal level of civility in our discourse, and also ensure it doesn’t get caught in the middle of legal issues if, say, Mr. briwhatever over there did try to gut me.
I wouldn’t make threats implied or otherwise.
It’s just interesting if, in fact, it can be the wild west on PMs.
Indeed. Apparently, it was. Despite the cries for blood from several posters who reported the quoted PM here, I’m not taking any heads today.
Both the rules on insulting other posters and the rules that apply to threatening other posters apply to PMs. As I see it, no specific Pit Rules apply to PMs–they aren’t posted in a forum. So the more restrictive, general rules apply.
However, when the violation is in a PM it’s up to the recipient to seek enforcement of the rules–or not. The recipient did not seek enforcement here, and nobody would have known about this exchange had recipient not posted the PM in this thread. That doesn’t make it ok to do it, but I’m going to respect RNATB’s wishes here. If RNATB had complained about the PM, whichever staff member got the complaint would decide how to respond. All that said:
bri1600bv: It is against the rules of the board to insult or threaten other posters in a Private Message. Avoid it from now on.
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Gfactor**
Pit Moderator
What, you think Arabs never get pissed off about anything else but the GWOT?
Also, I believe many if not most Arab-Americans are actually Christians.
Whatever you say about the thought process of people who jumped to the conclusion that it was motivated by religion, they increasingly seem to have been right.
This is the all-time funniest reply I’ve heard in over 10 years on the Dope. A guy who had been displaying signs of hatred and instability for some time, apparently now including trying to contact Al Fuckin’ Qaeda, and he’s just a natural disaster. Who coulda knowed?
On the other hand, Hurricane Katrina, an actual natural disaster, as we know was All Bush’s Fault.
BTW, I know all about military-bureaucratic stupidity and I am sure it played a role here. But a little common sense by someone who wasn’t scared to point the finger at an approved minority could easily have overcome it.
I guess we’ll be talking about this one in ATMB. I’m posting there now.
Mental illness is a natural disaster. That’s correct. Religion doesn’t make people crazy, and no one ever even tries to connect these dots when Christians do it.