Regarding Billdo’s original thread about MonkeyMule’s mooching: All of this talk about whether Billdo violated some sort of rule by discussing an off-board incident on the board misses the point.
A common “people management” technique is to issue a general admonition, even though it is mainly directed at one person. This avoids embarrassing the individual, gives the individual notice that his misbehavior has been noted, and serves as a reminder to everyone else that such misbehavior won’t be tolerated. If the individual doesn’t address the problem, then other measures can be used. But the “general warning” usually works quite well.
So, I’m guessing Billdo meant that thread as that kind of general admonition, figuring that it would find its target. (And of course, as he already said, that it would make for a good thread on its own merits.) It didn’t work. Other measures, like private emails, were taken. The results were not good. And MonkeyMule wound up on a bunch of people’s shit lists. Seems to me like community self-policing worked as it was supposed to.
Shayna and wring have repeatedly said that the mods would certainly have shut it down if they had known it was about a real-life incident concerning a doper. But what makes them think that the mods didn’t know about it? I don’t know how to say it in official logic-speak, but just because there’s no evidence that they knew it was about a doper, it doesn’t mean that they didn’t actually know. They could well have known and just chosen not to do anything about it. Stating what the mods certainly would have done smacks of junior-modding. Especially in a case where the rules are intentionally flexible and everything is taken on a case-by-case basis.
And to those of you suggestiing that Billdo is pissed over the mooching of a mere hamburger–that’s ridiculous. Billdo’s generous to a fault. I suppose he does expect a “payback” for his kind and charitable acts, but not in the way that so many of you seem to think.
Billdo expects that his generosity will be repaid with generosity–but not necessarily to him. He’s a giving person, and he gives freely. He expects others to give freely. If they happen to give back to him directly, cool. If they give to others, that’s cool too. If everyone gives generously, then everyone will receive generously.
I codified this philosophy in what I call “Karmic Moving.” I’ll gladly help someone move. When they thank me, they usually offer to help me move, if I should ever need the help. I tell them to help someone else. Then, over the inevitable beer and pizza, I explain my theory: If they “repay” me by helping others, then those others will “repay” them by helping still others, and so on, until it’s like a giant pyramid scheme of willing movers. I suppose Karmic Moving works, because every time I’ve had to move, I’ve had people come out of the woodwork to help me. (And Billdo’s schlepped way more than his fair share of my crap over the years.)
That’s why habitual moochers piss him off so much. They screw up the system. Besides, I don’t think his assessment of MonkeyMule was based entirely on one incident. If I recall correctly, he had mooched unapologetically on several previous occasions.
Knowing Billdo as well as I do, I can say with certainty that he weighed the decision to speak out very very carefully. I haven’t talked to him about this (he called me earlier, but I blew him off because I was watching Escape from New York. I’m such a jerk sometimes.) but when I do, I imagine that I’ll be subjected to a lengthy and detailed play-by-play of his decision making process. I expect that he weighed the pros and cons carefully. One of the obvious cons is that a lot of people might think he’s an asshole for saying something. I guess that was outweighed by the fact that he had the opportunity to save the larger community of NY dopers some grief. And the idea that he had some vindictive motive is just laughable.
p.s. to Billdo: You got cojones, man. I never would have had the guts to speak up like you did. Rock on!