First they came for the racists, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a racist.
Then they came for the serial abusers, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a serial abuser.
Then they came for the persistent trolls, and I did not speak out--
Because I was not a persistent troll.
Then they came for.... who's next on the ban list?
Check out the "How Wide is the Rubicon, Anyway?" thread.
1: Watch out, urple! Bad cooks could be next.
About ten years late, but thank you.
I'll still remember with fondness my first memory of Unfogged comment threads is Bob trolling everyone by claiming the Obama administration was worse than Pol Pot.
In fact the Rubicon is an open drain you could wade across without getting your knees wet if you didn't mind having industrial waste all over your trousers.
I'm in charge of spotting those. Not seen one yet.
9: He was wrong in details and attribution of intent, but he wasn't wrong about liberal's willingness to resist fascism.
I'm not a regular commenter these days, but I skim about 75% of threads. Indeed, I just got around to reading the Rubicon thread. Banning was the absolutely right call.
I will just say bob is one of the commenters whose comments I did my best to skip, and the easiest given his obvious writing voice.
I usually skipped his comments too. What was odd: he occasionally had periods of lucid, interesting comments, almost as if from a different person.
16 - cosign. I wondered if it had to do with medication (or is that unfair?)
he wasn't wrong about liberal's willingness to resist fascism.
Hold on, what? Knowing bob, I can't imagine that he had any belief on the question other than "they won't have any."
Is your reaction to the last 14 days really that liberals aren't resisting fascism? What a steaming load of horseshit.
I was going to write 18, but decided against. Bob's absence creates an opening for a batshit Unfogged liberal-hater, and if Eggplant wants to take on this thankless task, I don't want to discourage him or her.
At least theoretically, it's a job that could be done without all the lies, derp, abuse and inability to listen that characterized bob's commentary.
It's been straightforward (to me at least) that Bob has shifted since the election to adopt even more extreme views and more frequent posts. The only logical interpretation that comes to mind is the purest motivation of trolls: the easiest way to get someone to notice you is to be unpleasant, contradictory, and highly vocal. It's sad, but it was getting nearly impossible to read most threads, to the point where I was going to ask about that Bob-deleting script.
Bob has shifted since the election to adopt even more extreme views and more frequent posts. The only logical interpretation that comes to mind is the purest motivation of trolls: the easiest way to get someone to notice you is to be unpleasant, contradictory, and highly vocal.
Another logical interpretation was that Trump getting elected freaked him out just like it did everyone else. Trolling is his defense mechanism.
The poor dear must have been just terrified.
But you aren't being abusive! Speaks well of you.
Too little, too late. For my entire life Democrats have worked to normalize the right and marginalize the left. They chose propriety over survival and trusted in established procedure despite a bad faith opposition.
And yet, somehow being freaked out by Trump led him (and Eggplant apparently) to exclusively attack Democrats. What fucking horseshit.
Is "fascist" considered a compliment by you, F?
Yeah, well, I'm not thrilled that bob has been banned, but there it is.
Whoa, lots of references to "banning" bob in this thread. I don't see that word in the OP at all. bob has not been banned from the blog. He's probably reading this right now--how is that a ban? What's been instituted is extreme vetting of comments going forward. Comments that do not meet certain quality standards will be deleted. But it's not a ban.
Bob Loblaw's law blog is still ok, though.
33: bannings happen by decree, not by technical means, around here.
I see two obvious responses to 36. I'm not sure which to use so I guess I'll go with both.
1) yes, I understand, banning happens by decree, and if you read the OP again, you'll see there was no decree. LB did not say anything about "banning" anyone.
2) I thought this was obvious but in light of 36 maybe it's not: I'm not being serious. I was obfuscating around bob's ban like the current administration has been obfuscating around a certain other "ban" that has recently been in the news. IOW, comment 33 was an attempt at humor. That is all.
32: Dude or dudette, I knew what that was gonna be. (Nice to see you, by the way.)
I was going to say something like this on the Rubicon thread but I was traveling and didn't have much time for anything other than one-liners and canoodling about Persian translations.
Bob called me a 'weathervane' and that's probably a fair cop. I care about what people around me feel and care about, even when I disagree with them, and it affects what I feel and think about things myself. Even if I continue to disagree.
But I agree with the ban on bob.
I was conflicted earlier because I think I was drawn to a bob of the past, clouded a with nostalgia and sentimentality for the early days of the blogosphere and for a certain kind of revolutionary theatrical performance that I've long since abandoned (but from where I took my long standing pseudonym). That bob probably never existed anyway. Combine that with a shared interest in Japanese culture and film and well...
But I hadn't fully realized just how much hurt he had caused in the past. To people here that I care a great deal about even if I've never met many of you. And how his present behavior continued to disrupt this community. I value this community a great deal and his presence was poison to it. He would destroy it if he could. That much he made clear in the end.
There's a reason why comity is an Unfogged catchphrase and he never seemed to share that spirit. And I can't ever remember him using it.
Anyway, at the risk of VSOOBC I ended up supporting the ban in emails before it came down but I thought I should say something here even after the fact.
I hope some of those who left because of his presence come back and lurkers who shied away from commenting comment.
My two cents FWIW.
This might be the only thread I've commented in in 2017. I've cut back for various reasons, but opening a thread, seeing a bunch of bob comments, then mentally filing that away as a "bob thread" not worth coming back to didn't help. I'm not wading into the Rubicon, but I'm sure I'd have been for the ban too.
I'm with Barry at 44 and Standpipe at 29.