Trolls
We have a troll (or trolls) who has found our site, and his M.O. is anonymous hit and run. I originally planned to let this person identify himself or herself or face deletion of the comments posted. I then noticed some anonymous commenters were doing a pretty good job making fun of this person.
I am leaning back the other way. Why? Well, because in two comments now there have been veiled references to Fagenstrom and some undefined legal troubles.
Hey troll, we don't work that way here. If you want to identify yourself and make your allegations, I might entertain them. We certainly engaged Allen, a Sam Harris supporter, in a long and at least ostensibly reasonable discussion.
But I'm not going to let you come on my site and slander Steve Fagenstrom or anyone else for that matter. Complain all you want about what all have written about Sam Harris, but you are still faced with the fact that he is contending with his own words.
So, I'm going to delete your comments. I'll save them though. So, if you want to come back, identify yourself, and engage the discussion, I am happy to re-post them. This is not a public forum.
5 comments:
The Trolls have apperently gone to the next level and indicated to the Tribune that I have had "legal troubles" and there will now be a story about my "legal problems" so let me set out the story here and now as I remember it nearly two years later.
On January 2 2005 I was driving home on 1st Ave north after dropping my grandmother off at her home. The roads were very icy and it was about 20 below zero. I tried to stop for the red light at the intersection of 1st ave and 15th street. The car started to skid sideways as I applied the brakes and I decided it would be better to steer straight through the red light than slide through sideways. There was no traffic on 15th so I was not going to hit anyone.
I was quickly pulled over by two police cars, which seemed excessive for a simple red light violation. I got my insurance card and registration out of the glove box and stepped out of the car to wait for the officer to come talk to me. The officer instead immediately started yelling at me in a loud hostile and agressive fashion. He stayed by his car and I stayed more than 15 feet from him by my car's driver door. I calmly stated that I wanted to give him my license and registration. He kept yelling at me louder and louder to get back in the car. I tried to tell him that if I did that I couldn't talk to him cause the window would not roll down because of the bitter cold but He would not give me the chance to talk. I was also worried that If I got in the car I might get hit by someone else sliding through the same slippery intersection. The officer was yelling so loud he could not hear me. Next I heard him say he was going to arrest me so I turned around and placed my hands behind my back. That is the only movement I made during the whole encounter. The officer then approached me for the first time and put me in hand cuffs and took me to the jail. After sitting on a bench for about 40 minutes the officer came out and stated he would take me back to my car. I was never booked at the jail. At no time did I ever raise my voice or in any way make an agressive or hostile move. I was issued two citations. 1. failing to stop for a red light and 2. failing to cooperate with a police officer. I initially plead not guilty to both tickets and would have gone to trial but I was offered a deferal which is a standard deal where if you keep your nose clean they will dismiss the tickets. I took the deferal and the tickets were dismissed. So now everyone knows my criminal past
I guess I should add that anyone who knows me is aware that yelling at me is the least effective way of getting me to do anything. My father is the only one that gets much movement from me that way, and this police officer was certainly not my father.
I also want to add now that The tribune got virtually all of the facts of the event wrong, including the name of the officer involved. l
"This is not a public forum." I am sorry that I beg to differ with you. Blogspot.com is a public forum. It is open for the public to read, and post. That seems pretty public to me.
In fact, if you deem this not a public forum, how can you deem the Gore forum public? They are both forums. However, since I decided to visit the site on my own, I notice that you atleast must register to post to the Gore forum.
You're right. Blogspot is public. You're free to open a 'blog, and write away.
This site, however, is mine. I can delete your comments at will, just as the admin of the GORE site deleted Sam Harris's comments.
This forum is "public" in that anyone can read what I write. That does not, however, presuppose that anyone can post whatever they want. (You might want to go read the Forum Rules at GORE where JP Harris agreed he would not post anything that was "obscene, vulgar, sexually-orientated, hateful, threatening, or otherwise violative of any laws.") My rule is a little more strict than the GORE forums. My rule is that you can post any comment that I want to leave up, or else I will delete it.
The distinction seems fairly obvious. I hope you're not a lawyer. Or a Justice of the Peace!
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