On Aug 24, 1:56 pm, StarFur...@aol.com wrote:

Much silliness.

Against my better judgment, as the person for whose benefit this group
was formed in the first place, let me chime in here for a moment.

It's been said, repeatedly, that this group functions for all intents
and purposes as a private party. Those who the group want to hang
around are invited in to play; those who the group doesn't want to
hang around, or who behave in ways obnoxious to the hosts and guests
are not invited in to play. This keeps out the stalkers, the
obsessed, the dysfunctional, the abusive, and the general, all-around
jerks who get off on turning a group so toxic that nobody's left after
a while but the person and some of his associates or collaborators.
It's the slow poisoning of a group.

This newsgroup has been along for a very long time, operating under
the most onerous and difficult circumstances, and always honorably,
the moderators always ready to give the benefit of the doubt
repeatedly, despite often doubting the benefit.

And every so often, some loudmouth breezes into town and tries to make
the discussion all about himself, about how he thinks he should be
treated...he shouts at the moderators to maintain standards that he
himself shows no desire to meet, as though they were employees
answerable to him...when in fact they are not answerable to anyone
other than the quiet turning of their own considered conscience.

You say you got dog piled. Well, yeah, when you crash a party and
start behaving obnoxiously toward the guests and the hosts, you get
dog-piled. Where in this is the surprise? Where the unfairness? You
seem to feel you can act any way you want, and if anybody so much as
says a word about your boorish and inappropriate behavior, it's
*their* fault, *they're* being bad and unfair and censorious.

Nonsense.

The problem is you. You like being at the center of attention. You
like twisting arguments around so that you look like the offended
party when you are the one being offensive. You like making people
upset so that when they *act* upset you can gleefully point out that
they're being upset.

You want the discussion to be about *you*, about how other people
should live up to *your* standards (which are nonexistent) and justify
why *you* should remain here before you "waste your time" in the
company of such individuals. (In terms, I might add, that I find
curiously familiar.)

The people in this group have nothing to prove to you. The moderators
have nothing to prove to you. They have worked for *years* to make
and preserve this as a pleasant place for people to come and talk.
You are the one who has to demonstrate that he is capable of doing the
same.

You are a guest in someone else's home. Act like it. Or frankly, get
out.

jms