Phango - questions

[David B. Held]

Jeff Nowakowski wrote:
> David B. Held wrote:
>> I had a lot of help from my friends who led the way.  Obviously, I'm 
>> not as sophisticated as them...still, I hope I made my point.
> 
> What was your point?  That you are willing to post personal attacks 
> using one of the lowest tricks in Usenet, forging your name as somebody 
> else?

Yes, to make a point, I was willing to do that.  And if you weren't 
sophisticated enough to discover the real author for yourself, I was 
prepared to out myself.  I was putting you in Janice's shoes, so you 
could try walking a mile in them.  You only lasted about 5 minutes, so I 
fear the point was lost on you.

> "Reputations take a very long time to build, but are quite easily 
> destroyed, and often by oneself"

In case you haven't noticed, I haven't been working especially hard to 
win friends or standing in the D community.  I've always been too loose 
with my tongue to be a respected expert like Andrei or Walter; but on 
the other hand, it gives me the freedom to say whatever I think is 
necessary, no matter how unpopular.

> [...]
> I've already discussed the issue in numerous times.  I never endorsed 
> any public accusation of sock puppetry -- quite the opposite.  I'll only 
> add here that *everything* is a matter of uncertainty.  It's only a 
> question of how much evidence you have.  This entire newsgroup could be 
> the fabrication of one person.  Not very likely though.

Well, your backpedaling and equivocation is pretty transparent, in my 
book.  First you say:

     "By the way, the charge that one of the posts following yours
     was a sock puppet was legitimate."

Here, there is no "misconstruing" going on.  You clearly said: "Somebody 
accused you of creating a sock puppet, and that accusation was valid, 
not baseless."  I don't think it takes a lawyer to read it that way. 
You made it about as unambiguous as could be.  Then, you followed up with:

     "It was the first thing that crossed my mind."

Here, you say: "And I tend to agree with the accuser."  How do I draw 
that conclusion?  Well, it's simple.  The first thing that crossed *my* 
mind was: "Someone is playing a dirty trick on Janice, and then 
exploiting it."  Which means that if you had a different first 
impression, it must have been because you had already decided that 
Janice was guilty until proven innocent.  But you realized you had gone 
too far, so you decided to try to smooth things over with a CYA clause:

     "Doesn't mean you did it, but it's a valid suspicion."

And here, you make the weakest equivocation possible, with the way you 
followed up with a confirmation of your original claim: "Accusing Janice 
of making sock puppets is 'valid'.  I declare so by fiat."  Umm...you 
pretty much say: "I declare open season on Janice!  Anyone who wants to 
accuse her of sock puppetry, lock & load your .30-06 and put on yer 
huntin' gear!"

If you look at what the "sock puppet" said:

     "i love that - please release it to us all!
     can't wait to get it for all the reasons you put forth."

and:

     "yup - i'd do that too"

it seems just as likely, *if not more so*, that "Phango" was being 
sarcastic and mocking Janice, in just the same way that I was with you. 
  Who in their right mind thinks we are gullible enough to buy the 
endorsement of an anonymous poster with the fake domain name 
"phangowant.com".  I mean, seriously!

The very idea that someone would sit down and say to themselves: 
"Oooh...I got a good idea...I'll post something flattering about myself 
via an anonymous alias...what email address should I make up?  A 
real-sounding name?  Nah, too obvious.  Oh, oh, I know!  Nobody will 
suspect a thing if I use the domain name 'phangowant.com'!!!  Yes!!! 
It's a PERFECT PLAN!!!"  Clearly the email address 
"phango at phangowant.com" is transparent sarcasm.  It's insult enough to 
Janice *all by itself*.

What makes your attack particularly heinous is that this was not enough 
for you.  You had to twist the blade the other way by *accusing Janice 
of the being the perpetrator of an anonymous attack on her*!  You want 
to talk about low?!?  *That's* what I say is low, and what justified 
pulling a little prank to make a dramatic point.  The fact that I have 
to spell all this out is, frankly, quite tiresome and a little disturbing.

I think Janice was treated particularly poorly by someone without the 
balls to use their real identity, and then others who happened to 
disagree with her smelled blood in the water and went in for the kill. 
If I have to make a fool of myself to point this out, so be it.  I can 
live with that.  But don't try to gloss over what you pretty clearly 
said by equivocating with your weasel words.  You have no moral high 
ground here, despite the little escape route you think you made for 
yourself.  It's about as legit as me saying:

     "I accuse Jeff of being a big fat nincompoop!!!...possibly.
     But there is some room for doubt, so don't get mad at me.  Oh,
     and I don't endorse anyone calling Jeff a nincompoop, so that
     makes what I said before OK.  This ad paid for by the committee
     to re-elect David B. Held.  Hi, I'm David B. Held and I endorse
     this message...to the extent that it cannot be 'misconstrued'
     to mean something personally embarrassing."

Umm...yeah.  I'm not going to offer any apologies, because I don't care 
if people think I'm a jerk (and I fairly doubt that's a new sentiment, 
anyhow).  But I do think Janice still deserves one more...

Dave