So why was Ammonius Saccus banned?

Lemur866 · December 28, 2006, 5:37pm

What I can’t understand is why Badchad hasn’t been banned for his admission in the other thread to cyberstaling Polycarp.

If that isn’t major league asshole behavior, what is?

Ban Badchad today.

rayh · December 28, 2006, 5:42pm

I do not think ignorant means what you think it means.

Atheists deny the existence of God, it doesn’t mean they do not know what God represents to other people and what attributes he is perceived to have.

pseudotriton_ruber_ruber · December 28, 2006, 5:52pm

So atheism is a rhetorical position? They merely say that God doesn’t exist?

Personally, I know what the rhetoric of “2+2=5” means, I think, but I remain happily ignorant as to any impact that has on human lives.

Crotalus · December 28, 2006, 6:01pm

You are a remarkable dolt. Ignorance is a lack of information or knowledge. An atheist is one who denies the existence of God. Surely even you can see that denying the existence of something is not a lack of knowledge of that thing. One can describe Santa Claus without believing in him.

Liberal · December 28, 2006, 6:08pm

You’re conflating agreement with what Jesus said and interpretation of what Jesus said. I agree that Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit.” But I interpret “born of water” to mean physical birth, as in a woman’s water breaking. Other people take it to mean baptism. The other people and I do not disagree on what was said, but on how to interpret what was said.

Is that concept within your intellectual grasp?

PunditLisa · December 28, 2006, 6:30pm

It is certainly your right to make unflattering assertations against another poster and then refuse to offer up even a nugget of evidence to back those claims. But it opens you up to ridicule and erodes your credibility.

Fine, then I’m taking back that Christmas bonus.

And if I want to point out how hypocritical it is for you to ask for evidence when you were too (lazy, inept, unable) to provide evidence of your own claim, then I will.

You refuse to provide proof because we’re too closed minded to accept it? That’s certainly an interesting debate strategy. And a nice attempt to deflect from the fact that you’ve got nothing.

You’re the one who brought it up, not me. If you can’t handle the burden of proof, then don’t take up the cause.

I don’t think you think it’s silly at all because from what I’ve witnessed, you lack a sense of humor. And that, my friend, is the most scathing indictment of all.

tomndebb · December 28, 2006, 7:13pm

Interesting interpretation. You’ve gone from a demand (back in badchad’s attempt to Pit me in October), that I resign as Mod in the next 13 minutes because of my obvious and blatant partiality and inability to treat non-believing posters with fairness to lying that I refused to admonish posters for calling badchad a troll and even that I persistently allow non-beleivers, generally, to be abused while constantly stepping in as Mod to “protect” believers, (whereas I do not recall seeing anyone call badchad a troll in GD and the name is permitted in this Forum), to whining that it would be “too much” work for you to actually provide citations for your claims to a “temperate” response that was an effort to avoid board disruption because you were only expressing an “opinion”.

I think the action we’re looking at, here, is generally known as backpedalling.

I’ve decided to help you out with some of your earlier claims. Since you first began spouting your anger in mid-October with an occasional hint that it was only recently that your eyes were opened to my true malevolence, I went back and took a quick look at all the threads in Great Debates in which you participated from August through early October:

The Case Against God OP: pseudotriton ruber ruber. posts by tomndebb: 0

Only 1,4% of Iranians goes to mosque OP: WildfireMM**. posts by pseudotriton ruber ruber: 1. posts by tomndebb: 0

Could I have any success claiming to be African-American? OP: pseudotriton ruber ruber. posts by tomndebb: 1

Ask another muslim guy OP: NMasta. posts by pseudotriton ruber ruber: 2.
q.v.: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7698467#post7698467
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7708716#post7708716
posts by tomndebb: 4, each addressing (as a poster) aspects of Muslim, Jewish, or Christian belief with no reference to atheism, atheists, atheist posters, or pseudotriton ruber ruber, specifically.

Why did Jesus DISappear when He did? OP: pseudotriton ruber ruber. posts by tomndebb: 0 (Posts by badchad: 6)

Rapex OP: Jumbo Jet. Posts by pseudotriton ruber ruber: 1
q.v.: http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7720493#post7720493
posts by tomndebb: 0.

What long-range planning by U.S. could have prevented WW II? OP: pseudotriton ruber ruber. posts by tomndebb: 4 (all addressing the thread topic)

Does religion benefit atheists? OP: pseudotriton ruber ruber. posts by tomndebb: 3 (all on topic with no disparaging of atheists)

A few thoughts on being an extremely liberal Xtian OP: Skald the Rhymer. posts by pseudotriton ruber ruber: 3. posts by tomndebb: 0 (with one Mod action to fix Quote tags)

Being brainwashed into a belief is not a good reason to hold said belief. OP: badchad. posts by pseudotriton ruber ruber: many. posts by tomndebb: lots
Moderating activity (first thread in the August/October period in which prr participated and tomndebb intervened as a Moderator): several admonitions and one Warning directed to Bible man with a couple of general calls for more civility. (And anyone who can read my posts in that thread as displaying a general hostility to atheists or atheism is squinting through the most distorted glasses at a fun-house mirror image of my posts.)

So, now that we have eliminated your claims for threads in which you have posted, how about some evidence that I was beating up anyone else simply for being a non-believer?

And before you begin whining that I am “picking” on poor, defenseless badchad, here are links to every Mod action I have directed at him:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7596564#post7596564
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7804528#post7804528
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=7857550#post7857550

It would seem from my cursory inspection that I have been fairly consistent. I’m sure that you will be able to provide lots of evidence that I am actually abusing non-believers, of course.

This is an intersting observation, considering that its author has been ranting and whining and biting my ankles for two and a half months over the fact that I noted in the Pit that another poster’s actions were “consistent with” trolling.

DrDeth · December 28, 2006, 7:13pm

Right. I asked the same question. Apparently badchad is getting some sort of special privledges on this board. I don’t know why.

Monty · December 28, 2006, 10:29pm

Entertainment value? It’s kind of amusing to see the pretzel logic. Strike that. Drawing the logic resembles a game of sprouts more than a pretzel. I have to admit that line a page back about Polycarp needing to look into a mirror to see the bad guys was funny. The humor is that it’s not even close to reality.

Cisco · December 28, 2006, 11:45pm

Thanks. I was shooting for humor.

rayh · December 28, 2006, 11:47pm

I think you got the kill.

Ensign_Edison · December 28, 2006, 11:49pm

Fucking beautiful, tom. You should Pit him and use that. That is some seriously irrefutable shit right there.

pseudotriton_ruber_ruber · December 28, 2006, 11:54pm

I’ll give you high marks for effrontery. I opened only your first link so far, and remembered well thinking (and why I thought) your bias was showing. W/o opening your other links (I will when I have time), it’s clear that your remarks about not lobbying the other Mods about your desire to have badchad banned for trolling have been, at the very least, inconsistent. No one will ever know exactly what was said in your private conversations (and I’m certainly not taking your word for what was said) but you’ve characterized those conversations in several disparate ways that make me feel very good about having criticized your own personal character.

As I keep saying, you’re on some kind of a campaign here, and some kind of coverup as well. I will read your links and provide a fuller response as to the dishonesty of both the campaign and the coverup. In many ways, you’d have been better off to have fessed up to your understandable biases (who among us is without sin, after all?) and resolved to do more even-handed Modding in the future. It was an error to have implied that badchad was trolling , as you do in that first link, but it is a more damaging error to have denied it later on.

Skywatcher · December 29, 2006, 12:02am

:rolleyes:

Stratocaster · December 29, 2006, 12:21am

This is a riot! A person who is not inclined to provide evidence for his assertions reacts to a masterpiece of summarized evidence by re-asserting the same unsupported nonsense! Dude, you’ve been completely exposed. Give it up. You’d have been better off admitting that you grossly overstated something, resolving not to be such a jackass in the future.

Sheesh. I can’t wait for your rebuttal, which will no doubt be a dishonest soft shoe that ignores the sheer tonnage of Tom’s reply, slicing and dicing posts out of context to demonstrate the indisputable evidence of Tom’s bias. Unless you don’t feel like it, that is. In which case you’ll simply re-assert your nonsense, yawning over your indifference in actually, you know, providing an actual substantive counter. For the good of the board, of course. :rolleyes:

Antinor01 · December 29, 2006, 12:30am

Psuedoruberism? Chadafarian? Ruberchadology? RuberRuberites? Badchadism?

The possibilities are nearly endless…

tomndebb · December 29, 2006, 12:42am

First, I have already publicly given you permission to seek the information about my comments regarding this topic from any staff (or more than one staff member) that you choose to believe. While it may be true that “no one will ever know,” it is equally true that you appear to be doing your best to avoid finding out. I do not give you permission to seek the texts of staff discussions, but a simple “Has tomndebb moved to suspend or ban badchad?” requires only a “yes” or “no” answer and I have no problem with agreeing to the publication of that response.

There is no inconsistency in my description of my conversations with staff. The basic sequence was:
badchad showed up after a long absence and immediately caught two Warnings from Mods outside Great Debates for personal attacks. At about the same time, I admonished him to stay away from personal attacks.

A couple of posters reported his actions and the topic of banning him was raised among the staff. At that time (late July? early August?) badchad had incurred no more than the two Warnings and was skulking around the edge of the rules in Great Debates without actually crossing the line, so the opinion I threw out was that we not take direct action (suspension or banning) until he had clearly crossed the line.

In October, having had to be told to behave himself once more, badchad chose to post a whiny little Pitting of me, in which he dishonestly characterized both my actions and my motivations. It is the right of any poster to Pit anyone, even (especially?) staff, so there was no reason for me to take any official action against him on that point.
At that time, early in his trainwreck, when you falsely accused me of attacking him, I noted that I had spoken against punishing him. I did, indeed, note that I felt that his behavior was consistent with trolling, but I prefer to ban posters for explicit actions, not a simple lack of value.

In the course of his trainwreck Pit thread, he made a number of further personal attacks on me, such that I felt that it would not be appropriate to respond in any offical capacity lest he get himself treated as a martyr (as you have so unsuccessfully attempted, even with a complete lack of evidence).

Further into the Pit thread, badchad admitted that he had been trolling Polycarp. A number of posters have pointed to (and linked to) that post as evidence that he should be banned, but the topic has not been brought up among the staff. I have no idea whether anyone has reported his comments (or the similar comments that he posted in the last day or so). I see no reports from the BBQ Pit since I am not a Mod in this Forum. Since his behavior has not been brought up in staff conversations and he has incurred no further admonitions in GD, I figure it would look too much like a vendetta if I were to raise the issue among the staff, myself. As I recently noted, he pretty much keeps to a tiny number of posts in a tiny number of threads in a limited number of Fora, so despite his lack of value, he is not really disrupting the whole board and I feel no pressure to take action against him.

Now you are free to twist all this around in any manner that you choose, (having demonstrated a certain skill in such activity in your numerous attacks on me), but there really is nothing inconsistent about my behavior or my reporting of it.

PunditLisa · December 29, 2006, 12:52am

Oh my, it’s like David is fighting Goliath. Except David has no brains. Or rocks.

badchad · December 29, 2006, 1:03am

Curiosity makes me really want to see that actual text. You not giving your permission makes me really want to see it.

However, for the record Tom, my OP in this thread had nothing to do with any actions you took against me, but was rather about your censoring Valteron, Cisco, TokyoPlayer and others in this thread here…

…as they were about to unload on dangermom, in a way that was well within the stated rules of the SDMB. The way I figure it, she owes you one, and they have every right to feel slighted.

Guinastasia · December 29, 2006, 1:17am

They’re pretty much the Jack Chick of atheism.

Topic		Replies	Views
Tomndebb is one weaselly mother fucker… The BBQ Pit	560	23156	March 19, 2007
Why has badchad not been banned yet? The BBQ Pit	208	10764	March 19, 2007
Tomndebb you are a hypocritical pussy. The BBQ Pit	746	32168	November 3, 2006
"Flights of Angels Sing Thee to Thy Rest..." [badchad banning] The BBQ Pit	155	8457	March 20, 2007
Tomndebb: clarification please? The BBQ Pit	89	4237	September 25, 2006

So why was Ammonius Saccus banned?

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