Fotheringay-Phipps is having a discussion with ITD about whether what he’s doing constitutes trolling.
Interestingly, he’s the one arguing that what he is doing is trolling. :dubious: I tend to agree, but am not holding my breath that he’ll get called on it. He seems to be a fixture here.
An attempt at suicide by mod, I think. I also believe that he’s betting it won’t happen.
Nah, that’s just his usual style.
I honestly can’t say I’ve ever paid any attention to that guy except for a few posts in that thread, but I don’t think he’s trying for suicide by mod.
He shows up now and again, just to defend some asshole in a Pit thread, and then disappears.
Just a public service announcement to say that the small gang of known wingnuts we have on board has recently grown by one, as we welcome our newest lunatic, Marci Al. We begin with this recent gem:
Good question, Marci! I don’t know of any. As far as I can tell, they are all a bunch of commies. If it wasn’t for Fox News and Breitbart, we’d never find out The Truth.
Next, we find out that Marci is an expert on climate change:
So that’s that. As far as global warning is concerned, no one knows anything, so probably it ain’t happening. Those who say otherwise are probably in the pay of those danged liberal hotbed colleges and universities. Marci gets her training from Fox News and teh Interwebs so you know it’s true.
This one is slightly more subtle and needs just a small bit of reading between the lines:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=830663
The question at hand is who is more valuable, a newborn infant (or one about to be born) or the adult mother. It’s posed as a question but the implications are clear: the world’s leading authorities on the subject are, of course, Catholic preachers, and so the answer is that the adult mother – who may have siblings, a family with a spouse and other children, parents, and relations, is of course worthless, natch. The mother must be offed in favor of the newborn and her life is of no value or interest to anyone.
The logic is ironclad if you think about it from Marci’s perspectiver: a newborn is a lot like a not-yet-born, and a not-yet-born may as well be an embryo or a newly fertilized egg, and we all know how preachers feel about abortion! In all cases, the mother’s life is worthless. By natural extension, after the child is born and starts growing up and becomes a real sentient human being with real human feelings and relationships, its life will become worthless, too. In fact if a female child grows into adulthood and becomes a mother herself, she may as well throw herself off a cliff – no one will care, or at least, none of the Catholic preachers will, praise the Lord.
So there we go. Even Marci’s not-obviously-crazy posts have an undercurrent of something disturbed, not to mention a suspicious ambivalence about Mooslems.
Yeah, I bowed out of that last one early. After a mod note.
Marci Al pinged my troll detector, as well.** FemmeJean**? Or that guy from New Jersey? Dating advice:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=830765
(I disagree on the cologne. “Clean” works best for me!)
For some reason I’m thinking it’s cammie from joisey.
I don’t have a comprehensive knowledge of that thread, but from the context it looks like he’s trying to get IDT to conclude that BigT has accused him of trolling.
To what end is anybody’s guess, since you’re allowed to do that in the Pit.
I read it as F-P pushing ITD to acknowledge that F-P was trolling and to do something about it. He said he didn’t care if he got banned. The moment seems to have passed. A darned shame. He turned that thread into a ridiculous romp through racist dreck. I recall now why I used to lump him in with Chief Pedant.
And he admits he’s trolling:
He goes out of his way to state that he is not taking a contrary position in order to stimulate discussion, he is not stating that he is, he is being contrary (and therefore has been hiding that), and the remaining conclusion is… that he is trolling. He’s working very hard to see what TBTB will do about this, I think. After ITD said she didn’t care about contrariness, I believe he’s betting that no one will do anything.
I don’t know if he’s trolling or not, and I don’t care. I’m just tired of dancing with him. But keep in mind that it’s really, really hard to get a mod note for trolling in the Pit.
Yes, I know it is. Clothy has managed to do it. I can dream. 
Merci to whomever pulled the trigger on Marci.
I tend to avoid weighing in on these things for a couple reasons. I rarely participate heavily in the Pit. I’ve done it a few times, but it’s not the type of discussion I gravitate towards. The other reason is that since I’ve joined the mod team I weigh in even less so as not to give the appearance of impropriety. That’s a personal choice really. That being said, I think the options you’ve laid out are not the only ones available. I’ll use myself as an example. I like arguing. I like identifying weaknesses in other’s arguments. And in some cases I do enjoy pointing out errors of fact. In response to a moderation thread in ATMB I remember someone saying that ‘no one likes a rules lawyer’ and my immediate thought was, hey, I like rules lawyers! I know that’s not a universal sentiment.
I’m strongly libertarian which means I align with many positions on the right, however in my extended family I have many members that are far right. When I argue with them, I can easily argue the leftist position and do so when they make weak arguments. That’s not necessarily being contrary though it can appear that way. For me, it’s enjoyable and it hones arguments. I think many of them believe I’m actually politically liberal.
That’s my take for what it’s worth.
And FXM got banned for trolling the Pit.
His Pit trolling probably gave him a short leash, but he was finally banned after he started bumping a bunch of zombies outside the Pit, and then admitted he was doing it to piss people off.
Yeah, there are definitely times when I argue with people who are “on my side” when I see them making a fallacious argument. This is often the case on the abortion issue. I’m as pro-choice as they come, but there are times when I want to scream at my fellow pro-choices: YOU ARE NOT HELPING US HERE!!! when they start going on how all pro-life people want to shame and torture women, and that’s the only reason they are pro-life.
Now we’re arguing that playing contrarian is ban-worthy?
God forbid one should have to confront the weaknesses in his or her argument. I despise this intellectual-lightweight version of discussion. It only works in an echo chamber where dissenting voices are ridiculed and tossed out. I expect better from this board and the intelligent people who frequent it.