# Scott Plaid, Stand Up or Shut Up **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 2, 2005, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794 "2005-07-02T03:22:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 26
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/501 "2005-07-07T17:37:36Z")
> [@Scott Plaid](#): > > No, last post here, I promised that I would continue posting only question in Gd from now on. However, what with the bombings, I have been paying more attention to those then the board. I will still continue a question only format when I return to GD. [Horseshit](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6335426&postcount=212), knave. Not that it really matters, because I don’t really think you guys are accomplishing anything by only posting “questions” to elucidate the points of others. One can quite easily make his own opinion known ecen tho’ one limits oneself to posting interrogatories, can’t one? ---
**Author:** ![Sauron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce7236/32.png) [@Sauron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sauron)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/502 "2005-07-07T17:37:48Z")
> [@Scott Plaid](#): > > Quite true. However, the end result seems to have been just what I think it was. Out of curiosity – what do you think the end result was? ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/503 "2005-07-07T17:42:34Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > I know you don’t like the Bible, but there are some pretty good life-lessons in it, and one of them is this: > > Luke 14:7-11 A good life’s lesson is employing subterfuge to futher self-aggrandizement? And see? Another “question” which makes my personal opinion quite transparent. ---
**Author:** ![Metacom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecae2f/32.png) [@Metacom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Metacom)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/504 "2005-07-07T17:46:44Z")
> [@UncleBeer](#): > > One can quite easily make his own opinion known ecen tho’ one limits oneself to posting interrogatories, can’t one? Don’t you think it’s stupid to say that you can’t make your opinion known only through interrogatories? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![askeptic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb9ed0/32.png) [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/505 "2005-07-07T18:07:31Z")
> [@UncleBeer](#): > > One can quite easily make his own opinion known ecen tho’ one limits oneself to posting interrogatories, can’t one? Can one? ---
**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:** [July 7, 2005, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/506 "2005-07-07T18:12:29Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > Jesus saw how the guests had tried to take the best seats. So he told them: When you are invited to a wedding feast, don’t sit in the best place. Someone more important may have been invited. Then the one who invited you will come and say, “Give your place to this other guest!” You will be embarrassed and will have to sit in the worst place. > > When you are invited to be a guest, go and sit in the worst place. Then the one who invited you may come and say, “My friend, take a better seat!” You will then be honored in front of all the other guests. If you put yourself above others, you will be put down. But if you humble yourself, you will be honored. > > Luke 14:7-11 And you can get more tips like this in Jesus’s new book, _How to Win Friends and Rise from the Dead_! Buy it today! ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/507 "2005-07-07T18:33:30Z")
> [@](#): > > Since I seriously doubt tom will ever agree with the claim I made, regardless of who advocates it, I counted this one as being as close to a victory as possible. This is silly. I have agreed with you by name on both occasions when you have been right on this board. > [@](#): > > Also, I claimed that tom’s cites didn’t say what he thought they said. **InvisibleWombat** agreed with me, while not ruling on the other issues at hand. You still fail to read for comprehension. Let’s now return to those thrilling days of yesterpost and review [the thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=322456). - [You asserted](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293115&postcount=4) that Hollywood had corrupted the meaning of the word “hacker.” - [I pointed out that this was incorrect](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293488&postcount=11), that the word had a negative meaning prior to Hollywood’s dissemination of it. To support my point, I linked to an earlier thread in which **Una** had posted an extract from a pro-hacker dictionary in which they recognized the use of the word for unauthorized entry to another’s system. - [You then tried to quibble](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293526&postcount=12) over whether tresspassing was an OK thing to do. - [I then linked to a thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293640&postcount=13) in which three separate programmers noted their use of the word in a pejorative sense (I have provided the quotations, below). I now note that only two of them mention the 1970s and my knowledge of **Desmo** ’s experience came from other threads, but I still have two testimonies that the word was used in a negative way in the 1970s. - [You then tried to quibble over the word “malicious,”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293678&postcount=15) apparently believing that tresspassing is an OK occupation as long as no physical damage is done. - After a sideline exchange, [you again asserted (with no support)](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6293812&postcount=18) that it was Hollywood that changed the meaning of the word. - [I reasserted that Hollywood did not change the meaning](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6294002&postcount=21) while recognizing that there is more than one data processing culture and that it might have remained benign in the MIT-influenced world while becoming a pejorative in the rest of the business community. - There were then some more sideline exchanges about language usage. - [You then claimed that you did not like my citations](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6294100&postcount=23) (without providing a reason to dismiss them). (At least I think that is what you claimed, since the sentence does not appear to be in English.) - [I then noted the actual movies and TV show](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6294401&postcount=34) that brought hacking to the public awareness–all produced in 1982 and 1983–and noted that I had encountered the word “at least” five years earlier. (On a re-reckoning of actual dates, I note that I first heard “hacker” as a pejorative in the winter of 1976-77, so it was more than five years prior to Tron (in which I do not believe the word even appeared). - **InvisibleWombat** [then entered the thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6295704&postcount=37) to note that s/he had used the word benignly (without giving a year) _which did not harm my arguments, since I already recognized the separate MIT-influenced cultural usage_. \_ **InvisibleWombat** then (finally to your claim, above), asked a question in the same post regarding memories and chronology without providing (or even asserting) a challenge to those memories. (Note, in the quotations below, that **bdgr** and **ftg** are specifically referring to word usage in the 1970s.) - **RJKUgly** (whose computer eperience is roughly contemporaneous to mine) [then chimed in to support the 1970s date](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=6295845&postcount=39) _within the computer industry_ for the pejorative usage, so I did not return to re-assert my already attested memory. So. In a thread in which you were taken to task for blaming Hollywood for a change to a word’s meaning, I provided (or was supported by) citations by no fewer than four other persons that the word had a pejorative meaning _in some cultures within the computer industry_ in the 1970s. I then demonstrated that the earliest possible dissemination of the word by Hollywood occurred no earlier than 1982. In response, in this thread, you have claimed a “victory” over me in a discussion in which you have misrepresented a single question by another poster as having overturned my evidence. * * * Quotations from [Is it CRACKER or HACKER?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=160208) which **Scott** dismissed (probably without reading–or, perhaps, understanding). > [@bdgr](#): > > Well, back in the 70’s, when I first got into computers heavily, Hacker meant someone who obtained unauthorized access to a computer system. Thats what it meant to myself, my friends, and the computer professionals I knew back then…among them a guy from Sperry-Univac, and another who was head of computer security at a Nuke plant. > [@bdgr](#): > > > [@Urban Ranger](#): > > > > That’s just the opposite of what happened. Eric Raymond is correct, “hacker” originally carried a positive connotation, as it originated at MIT in the 60’s to 70’s. Read Levy’s Hackers fore more details. Any other usage is incorrect and is largely caused by the idiotic media again. > > Well, dont blame the media, because when I first heard the term in comon usage, you never heard that refered to in the media. > > Were talking pre-wargames here. Like I said, I can only speak for what I know personally…Around 30 years ago, hacker meant someone who broke into computers…It may have meant something differant at MIT, who knows. One of my co-workers is in the who’s who of computer pioneers and worked for univac back before core memory was even invented so maybe I will ask him what it meant the first time he heard it. > [@Desmostylus](#): > > I agree with bdgr. The first time someone called me a “hacker”, I took it as an insult. > > That was the only interpretation available at the time, i.e., someone that broke into accounts and databases. The code hacker interpretation came later. > [@ftg](#): > > Note that the use of “hacker” to mean “good at programming” originated at MIT. A lot of other places in the '70s, if not earlier, used the term much as it is used outside computing: someone who is really bad at programming. Since the “Hacker’s Dictionary” originated at MIT and, well, MIT is MIT, they insist that the alternate meaning was never used by anyone ever. Hahaha. > [@ftg](#): > > Like I said: “hahaha”. How can I be “wrong” in knowing for a fact that “hacker” to mean “really awful programmer” wasn’t used at a whole lot of colleges since at least the early '70s? Are you claiming that I suffer from a massive and ongoing memory fault? > > There was only one college I have worked at where some people used it in a positive way. Since a lot of us there used it in the negative, we got away with a lot of putdowns. Eventually the term “wheel” took over, but since it was applied to the same idiots, that didn’t work for long. (Long before “wheel” came to mean “good sysadmin”.) [Note **ftg** ’s reference to “wheel.” Wheel was appearing in magazine articles in 1979 about programers at universities breaking into other college’s computers. He dates hacker as a pejorative to the period “long” before that–placing the pejorative date more than five years prior to the Hollywood portrayal. ---
**Author:** ![Metacom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ecae2f/32.png) [@Metacom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Metacom)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/508 "2005-07-07T18:41:09Z")
So, **tomndebb** , which is winning: Your head or the brick wall? ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/509 "2005-07-07T18:57:30Z")
> [@Scott Plaid](#): > > Actually, what the link said was that it was now **socially acceptable** to misspell it in that way. Thus, I was acknowledging, via my link, that I misspelled it, but it was no big deal. After all, everyone else jumped off the bridge. Before, you just linked to something without looking. This time, I can only conclude that you’re lying. Not only does the page you linked to not say anything about whether it’s “okay”, the site is not a usage guide. It is based upon _observation_ of a linguistic phenomenon. The two perspectives on grammar - descriptivism and prescriptivism - are subtler than you seem to think, and while I am purely descriptivist in my views of grammar, that shouldn’t be taken to mean that it’s valid to pretend that there is no such thing as language error. The word “eggcorn” and the observance of them (along with the initial sighting of “social morays”) comes from the fine folks at [Language Log](http://www.languagelog.com/), which is a delightful read if you’re interested in linguistics, and the credentials of the authors are quite good. So I’ll use their methodology for quick-and-dirty evaluation of “social morays”. That is, I’ll Google it. “Social mores” is 95 times more common. Further, many of the links on the first page (at least) of results on “social morays” are references to it as an error, or humor based on puns (as in the old Far Side cartoon, captioned “Social morays”, depicting eels schmoozing at a party.) Spellings can change, over time, but not very rapidly. This is still very clearly an error - you misanalyzed a word that you first heard in speech as a different word. That’s a common phenomenon, but it doesn’t make it somehow “equally correct” to misanalyze it that way (especially since everyone’s misanalyses will be slightly different.) I don’t mean to push prescriptivism, but the idea that there’s no right or wrong is very limited when you refer to writing, because writing is by its very nature a learned activity. It’s something taught, and something agreed upon, in a more or less explicit way; it’s not part of a person’s natural linguistic abilities. It’s not really valid, then, to apply standards of _grammar_ (which _is_ very much inherent to the human mind) to _writing_ (and especially not spelling.) Your misspelling of the word does not reflect a regional word usage, or a word no longer used in standard English, or anything of the sort. It was a mistake, pure and simple. And while mistakes in writing are acceptable, you make more of them than the average Doper. I would guess that you make dozens of times more of them, frankly. It interferes constantly with our ability to understand you. You have to understand, as well, how foolish it makes you look when you decide you’re going to inform another person of something you think they aren’t aware of - and not only are they aware of it, but they’re able to point out just how much you screwed up in your attempt to explain it. You took a superior tone with **Sauron** , presuming to correct his understanding of something - acting as though he confused the words “morals” and “mores” - but in the process, you revealed that you don’t even really know the word “mores”. And **Sauron** did. It’s not just the mistake you made - it’s the presumptuousness of thinking to school someone else in something you very clearly don’t understand. You do that a lot, **Scott** , and it makes you look far more foolish than you probably are. (And I’m mentioning once again, for emphasis, that your claim that the link suggests that “social morays” is an acceptable usage, is false. The link made no such claim. And the Language Log folks, who are professors of linguistics, don’t explain their occasional sightings of eggcorns as anything but pure and simple mistakes.) > [@Scott Plaid](#): > > Personally, I think I am pretty damn smart. Do you get what we mean, then, when we say you’re not showing that to be the case? If you are smart, then _start writing like someone with your abilities._ Stop imitating the worst of teenage IRC idiots when you write. Take the time to freaking punctuate and capitalize like you’re supposed to. Why, if you’re able to write like an adult, do you persist in writing like a mentally-challenged child? You can see that people here have high standards for clear, readable, correct writing. Why would you think that your writing doesn’t have to be up to par? If you’re smart, try showing it sometime. > [@Scott Plaid](#): > > However, I while I may be delusional about that, I am not fourteen years old. Remember my teaching experience I mentioned, way back in the thread? Summer School, back in college. Well, that was not just some kinda “Man pretending to be a woman on the internet” thing. No, that was a statement that, should I come to a doperfest, I can physically remove the I.D. card from my wallet, and show it to anyone who thinks I am “14”. That’s too bad. I had chalked up a lot of your problems to age and inexperience. Trouble writing coherently is understandable in an adolescent. In an adult, it’s much sadder. And your insistence that your constant writing mistakes are somehow not a problem is stubborn, and peculiar as well, since we’ve told you time and again that your writing is often simply very, very difficult or impossible to understand. > [@Scott Plaid](#): > > Actually, I was under the impression I won, due to the other people on the thread agreeing with me. > Re:Your analogy : > Perhaps you are right. Perhaps you are wrong. I will have to think about it. Agreeing with your viewpoint and claiming that your argument is valid are entirely different things. Your politics are those of most Dopers, **Scott**. And frankly, there’s no shortage of people around willing to flame others just for disagreeing on political issues. Obviously in virtually any argument, you’ll have folks agreeing with you. Don’t construe that as endorsement of your argument, just of your opinion. The fact that many of us whose politics agree with yours are still not fond of your arguments should be particularly troubling to you. > [@Shodan](#): > > a week from Saturday at whenever HPatHBP arrives. You ain’t the only one waiting, brother. (I’ve been ridiculously excited all summer. I’m a nerd.) > [@Scott Plaid](#): > > The next one was a real dozy. Hacker vs Cracker I believe I was 100% right on the issues. tomndebb and Excalibre and others don’t agree. However, rfgdxm and agreed with me. Since I seriously doubt tom will ever agree with the claim I made, regardless of who advocates it, I counted this one as being as close to a victory as possible. Except _it wasn’t a debate in the first place._ I asked a straight-up factual question. And you didn’t manage to support a single one of your statements - you repeated something over and over, and you happened to have someone who already had the same opinion. You made up “facts” with no support, and you couldn’t support your claims in the logical points I challenged you on, either. I wouldn’t even call what you did “debate” so much as pointless bickering. You certainly didn’t “win” a damn thing. **Scott** , I mean it when I say that if this is what you consider a victory, you entirely lack the ability to judge those things. > [@Liberal](#): > > Jesus saw how the guests had tried to take the best seats. So he told them: When you are invited to a wedding feast, don’t sit in the best place. Someone more important may have been invited. Then the one who invited you will come and say, “Give your place to this other guest!” You will be embarrassed and will have to sit in the worst place. > > When you are invited to be a guest, go and sit in the worst place. Then the one who invited you may come and say, “My friend, take a better seat!” You will then be honored in front of all the other guests. If you put yourself above others, you will be put down. But if you humble yourself, you will be honored. > > Luke 14:7-11 That Jesus was a pretty smart dude. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/510 "2005-07-07T19:04:21Z")
So, **Excalibre** , which is winning: Your head or the brick wall? ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/511 "2005-07-07T19:04:48Z")
It occurs to me now that **Scott Plaid** attempted to argue in this thread that “social morays” was correct because lots of people use it (although they actually don’t), but in the “hacker” thread he was trying to argue on the basis of some amorphous authority that one usage of a word is right while another is wrong, even if the wrong usage is actually the commoner one. That’s all. I was just noticing the inconsistency. Move along now. ---
**Author:** ![askeptic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb9ed0/32.png) [@askeptic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/askeptic)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/512 "2005-07-07T19:14:51Z")
So, Excalibre, which is winning: Your head or the brick wall? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/513 "2005-07-07T19:17:53Z")
**Excalibre** , you’re accusing **Scott** of inconsistency? _::: gasp :::_ Next, you’ll be accusing him of incoherence. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/514 "2005-07-07T19:19:30Z")
> [@askeptic](#): > > So, Excalibre, which is winning: Your head or the brick wall? Gosh, remember when that sentence was interesting? You know, the _first_ time someone said it? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/515 "2005-07-07T19:30:08Z")
Scott: People may agree with your position (especially here on the SDMB, which leans the same way you appear to lean, politically - for the most part). Those same people do not agree with your ARGUMENTS. If you are pointing at the people that hold the same position you do, and using that as a tool to judge whether or not your arguments are valid, then you are using the wrong method. Here’s a for-instance: Joe may post a thread saying that the minimum wage should be raised. When asked why, Joe says that a decent society owes all people an above-average wage. And Joe might point out how many people agree with him that raising the minimum wage is a good idea - therefore, he has won! But while many people - here, especially - may agree that raising the minimum wage is a good idea, no one (except, possibly, you) would argue that all workers can get an above-average wage. Let me ask you this: you think of yourself as pretty smart. Do you think anyone else on this board thinks of you that way? ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/516 "2005-07-07T20:05:26Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > That Jesus was a pretty smart dude. So are you. I love Him very much, and your speaking kindly of Him means a great deal to me. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/517 "2005-07-07T20:08:34Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > So are you. I love Him very much, and your speaking kindly of Him means a great deal to me. Thank you. Please do your witnessing elsewhere, Lib. The main page says posts of this nature should be in GD exclusively. ---
**Author:** ![Excalibre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Excalibre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Excalibre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/518 "2005-07-07T20:28:04Z")
> [@UncleBeer](#): > > Please do your witnessing elsewhere, Lib. The main page says posts of this nature should be in GD exclusively. Oh, for the love of shortbread. That wasn’t witnessing. Anyway, **Lib** , I’m not Christian, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t see just how much wisdom Jesus had. A quick glance through the Gospels shows just how many great things Jesus said. I hope I’ve never suggested otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/519 "2005-07-07T20:54:53Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > Oh, for the love of shortbread. That wasn’t witnessing. > > Anyway, **Lib** , I’m not Christian, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t see just how much wisdom Jesus had. A quick glance through the Gospels shows just how many great things Jesus said. I hope I’ve never suggested otherwise. I don’t know what could account for the problems I’ve had with you in the past, other than my own judgmentalism and myopia. I owe you more apologies than I can likely recall. ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2005, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794/520 "2005-07-07T21:09:59Z")
> [@Excalibre](#): > > Oh, for the love of shortbread. That wasn’t witnessing. > > Anyway, **Lib** , I’m not Christian, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t see just how much wisdom Jesus had. A quick glance through the Gospels shows just how many great things Jesus said. I hope I’ve never suggested otherwise. And a quick glance thru a “higher criticism” text, or one of Gerhard Lüdemann books, shows just how many of the great things attributed to Jesus by the Bible are bullshit. Lib’s professing his adoration of his savior and proclaiming His greatness. If that ain’t witnessing, witnessing doesn’t exist. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794.md?page=25) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/scott-plaid-stand-up-or-shut-up/310794.md?page=27)