When arguments and the people portraying them are constantly misrepresented it’s a bit hypocritical to expect the target to be held to a higher standard. The fact that clothahump was here for 18 years and Starving Artist for however long points towards more of a general weariness than anything else.
Clothahump wasn’t a troll. He had unpopular and all too often stupid opinions but he really doesn’t fit any reasonable definition of a troll. Maybe at the end hie did some trolling when he got too frustrated? I’m not sure, I wasn’t following too closely the last few years, but Clothy was fine in The Cafe, IMHO and MPSIMS. He wasn’t prone to derailing fluffy threads like many of our past trolls.
**SA **somehow skirted the Don’t be a jerk rule for most of his time here, I don’t actually understand exactly how. Clothy was a different case. Trump seems to have pushed him over the edge.
As I mentioned in the other thread, past a certain point, if everyone is misinterpreting what you’re saying, that’s on you. Either tragically everyone in the forum is against you/too dumb to understand what you’re saying… Or you’re putting your opinion forward in a really bad way that makes it hard to understand.
Well, okay, let’s put it another way - Clothahump consistently posted the worst and dumbest post in any political thread he participated in. He then proceeded to either disappear or show that he wasn’t listening or interested in any of our arguments. Best case scenario: nobody engaged. I know Not Carlson tried extensively to get something resembling understanding out of him, with a degree of patience I find very impressive, and eventually gave up. If he wasn’t actually a troll, the effect on political threads was virtually indistinguishable.
OK, I can’t argue that. Honestly the political threads are barely tolerable with or without Clothy. We have posters on all ends of the spectrum that either nitpick and parse far too much or resort to dismissing alternate opinions and views with name calling.
It doesn’t have to be everyone or even a majority. A persistent, vocal minority is all that is needed to shape a narrative. I’m not saying that some of Starving Artist’s viewpoints weren’t anachronistic or that he consistently engaged in a productive debate, but others deliberately misrepresenting his viewpoint as a deliberate and long term tactic is also wrong.
It’s impossible to say you’ve never been a jerk because jerkishness is in the eye of the beholder.
However, some actions are universally regarded as so beyond the pale that most people can reasonably predict that most others will regard them as jerkish.
Things like mooning the deceased at a funeral, throwing quarters at the bride and groom at a wedding, or trying to discredit a sexual abuse victim by fucking a paper towel roll.
I don’t post often, but I check the SD for interesting discussions multiple times a day. I have done so since the late 1990s. This was a good decision by the mods, and long overdue. Thank you.
I’m sure I’m not the first to mention it on the boards, but it hasn’t been covered in this thread, so I’d just like to say that to all those who are concerned about the board staff shutting down free speech possibly causing people to leave, even if that were true, decisions like this one are not an example of that, and in fact are likely to encourage more members/participation. I think the emergence of a few posters in this thread with old join dates and low post counts is already evidence of that.
