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@drafterman
Without commenting on Zeichen, I will attest that RM does become unusually and inappropriately fixated on certain people. Back on DDO, he became fixated on me because I get him lynched in a Mafia game and he hounded me for months, apparently unable to separate reality from fiction. Here, I had to ask him to stop @ing me because my mailbox was filling up with his mentions of me for stuff that had nothing to do with me.When I did, he decided to pester me in PMs, prompting me to jump on the "we need a block" bandwagon.Now, while I agree that engagement can exacerbate the issue, let me assure you that, since joining here, I haven't engaged him. Save from: 1) asking him to stop @ing me; and 2) asking him to stop PMing me, I have not engaged him at all, yet I still end up being the recipient of this spamming and weird behavior.
I can easily imagine Mike being exasperated with all this inflammatory talk of what members have done or said off site. We can't seem to stop dragging DDO history into this. I know I find it hard to resist bringing it up sometimes. But it's just not his concern. I think how we're judged here should be earned by our conduct here only, and that goes for Zeichen and RM. Knowing how a member has behaved on other sites is certainly useful for one's own reference when dealing with that member, but it should be neither relevant or actionable to the administration. In my opinion, of course.
As for RM's behavior here, he @'d me a few times in the debate voting thread as well, but quickly desisted. I admit I have very mixed feelings about publicizing these PM's. But I see that you did have to tell him three times. Did he permanently stop afterward?
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@EtrnlVw
I think Catholicism is the first religion/denomination I've ever heard you disapprove of.
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@Zeichen
I don't see anything wrong with the content or speed of his five replies. I have however witnessed him say he would rejoice at your suicide and would find you disgusting if you submitted to him sexually. No one can say he's been an innocent party in this. I'm certainly not suggesting the hostility has been one-sided. I'm saying there is an option available to you that might limit further disruption, and that is ignoring each other. Do you disagree? If so, what's an alternate peacekeeping suggestion for the interim? There's no telling when active moderation will be implemented. The block function only works with PM's.
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@Zeichen
How does the above comment warrant him calling me a "psychopath"? It was a benign post, which has been met with an opprobrious response. I do believe that I reserve the right to contest false accusations made against me, and defend what is true.Now, it is true that RM has harassed me and made the most heinous and inaccurate comments about me -- which is deeply unacceptable. Quite frankly, you need to recognize who is the primary instigator of our disputes. His response(s) to me in the "homeschool" thread would be a sufficient place for you to start.
I see nothing in that one comment that warrants particular offense. It seemed like his post was inspired by more than just that remark or your history in this thread.
It really wasn't my intent to armchair arbitrate all your past personal fights like some counterfeit authority, but I suppose I have only myself to blame for getting involved. Very well, the Homeschool thread. You were the first to bring him up personally by saying:
- intellectual cohesion (for example, those who do not attend school may end up like RationalMadman, in that they will have scattered and disorganized brains).
I'm suggesting that you leave things like this out of future posts. He's not going to leave them alone, for the same reason that you won't leave attacks against you alone. This is just inviting a completely avoidable altercation. Until we have mods, I feel the most responsible thing we can do as members is to not start shit or go looking for trouble. If he instigates first, that's a different story. You both have the right to defend yourselves. But until that happens, I think it would be best for the forum if you ignored each other and refrained from mentioning each other. Is that asking so much?
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Why do you believe we have an all-powerful higher self?
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@Zeichen
If he makes a post that is not addressing you, I think it would limit the flamewars if you did not reply or initiate an interaction. Is that unreasonable?
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@Zeichen
think you should stop responding to her when she pokes you, Radman.RM has been harassing me for months
I'm saying in many cases you are the one who @'s him first. I think some of this drama could be avoided if you stopped commenting on his posts and just left him be. Is there a reason this course of action isn't worth a try?
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@RationalMadman
I think you should stop responding to her when she pokes you, Radman.
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@Polytheist-Witch
The trick would be to set up taking care of the target just as the purge starts. Then getting to a safe place quickly. Perhaps inviting them out of the city to a safe house and then using that to do what you wanted. At this point I can't think of anyone I hate bad enough to put that in my wyrd. But you never know.
I admire your cold calculation. It sounds like you can get shit done. Like if there was a serial rapist whose high priced lawyers got him off, and I was planning to take him out on Purge day because I 100% knew he did it and would keep doing it, I'd be like let's call Poly, we need her on board right goddamn now.
Though in that case, it would be difficult to lure the target to a remote safehouse because there would presumably be no preexisting relationship with the serial rapist to exploit. He wouldn't trust you. Furthermore I imagine slimeballs like him would be particularly wary of vigilante justice on Purge day, and would make their positions very defensible. Quickly taking him out and retreating to safety would be a challenge.
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@Type1
When people anticipate a low standard of debate they are not incentivized to engage. In the case of your debates, I think that may be a factor.
Activities you don't personally enjoy are not pointless activities. If you want to judge our time here by tangible productive output, then everything we do on this site is pointless. Your formal debates don't count for anything IRL. People are here simply for stimulation and enjoyment. Some people enjoy the debates, some people enjoy the forums.
Personally I prefer the less restrictive and more open and informal environment of the forums. Formal debates represent a commitment I'm usually too lazy to make, though I do read many of them.
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@Greyparrot
Would you trust the voters' judgment as much as Mike's?
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@Nd24007
I'm afraid "me too" is all I have to offer. 😟 I go through the same sleepless spells. They've lasted for about a week before. It sucks. You spend the night watching the clock and counting the hours until the sun comes up and you have to go to work/school/whatever, where you'll be confronted by people who got a full night's sleep. The bastards.
I've never found anything that really works to treat it. I just have to wait it out until it goes away on its own. It's not fun.
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@vagabond
The ghosts obviously only respond to necklace spinning commands. Absolute malevolent monsters who tear your house apart to terrorize you, until a dude with a necklace walks in.
Srsly tho I may be misunderstanding what he meant.
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@XLAV
There's probably not going to be someone everybody trusts. It will have to come down to Mike's judgment.
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@DebateArt.com
I agree with 1hard. Will you be appointing a member to act as a de facto authority?
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@Outplayz
Don't know what you mean.. What do you mean "he acted like the 'ghosts' did his bidding." Who are we talking about?
Sorry, I meant it sounded like your friend was giving the ghosts verbal commands ("spin it", "stop it") and they were obeying.
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@EtrnlVw
I'm guessing you don't find many Christians who are open to the idea that Christianity supports polytheism.
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@Outplayz
So he was acting like the ghosts did his bidding.
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Thanks, just needed a bit of extra clarification. So this is kind of like how in Hinduism there are many gods but they're all expressions of Brahman.
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@EtrnlVw
What do you mean when you say monotheism only came about as a misunderstanding of polytheism?
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Shit, I didn't even say sorry your friend died. My bad.
I don't know how natural magnetism could move the necklace on command either, unless it wasn't natural magnetism and someone was controlling it. And your friend was sitting beside you not doing anything with his hands, right?
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@XLAV
This thread be like at the FBI's watchlist.
We are harmless innocent lambs. Harmless innocent lambs talking about whether they'd become bloodthirsty psychopaths in a fiction universe. Totally normal harmless innocent lamb stuff.
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@Outplayz
Ah okay, I thought you started spinning it when your friend said to. I wasn't getting that he was talking to the ghosts.
Sounds like a spooky experience, man. I guess my first thought would be magnetism. Any chance that was at play?
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For example, the Catholic Encyclopedia states, "Formal dogmatic atheism is self-refuting, and has never de facto won the reasoned assent of any considerable number of men. Nor can polytheism, however easily it may take hold of the popular imagination, ever satisfy the mind of a philosopher."
Dawkins: "It is not clear why the change from polytheism to monotheism should be assumed to be a self-evidently progressive improvement."
I must say it isn't clear to me either. Do you believe polytheism is somehow less evolved than monotheism? If so, why? And if not, why do you think others do?
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I'm having some trouble visualizing. Was it just a chain/cord, or was there a medallion on it acting as a spinning weight? Were you spinning it like a lasso, or holding it like a pendulum and spinning it?
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@Outplayz
By right and left spin do you mean clockwise or counterclockwise?
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@Buddamoose
Precisely. We've all seen how little it takes for people to turn into animals. They just have to see that everyone else is doing it. Riots, mobs, mass frenzies. I think almost everyone is capable of violence. The movies touch upon that element of the human condition even though the premise is so silly.
Also I would totally find a safe place and bunker down as well. The danger is too great. But I wonder how many people would still abstain if their own safety was somehow no longer an issue.
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@David
If you're reading the Hebrew Bible from a Christian perspective, you'll get an entirely different interpretation than you would from a Jewish perspective. Jews believe in an Oral Torah as well as a written Torah. The Oral Torah helps explain the meaning of the mitzvot and how they are done.Example: An eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth.One may erroneously assume that if I poke out someone's eye then my eye would be poked out also. However, the Oral Torah explains that this is a fine and not to be taken hyper literal.Another example regards the death penalty. In actuality, the death penalty is extremely difficult to carry out. The Talmud notes that a beit din (court) that puts someone to death once in every 70 years is considered to be a bloodthirsty court.
Looks like I forgot to respond and thank you for your answer. 🙂
Isn't there great potential for distortion, re-imagining, and human error in oral traditions? How do you know the teachings of these traditions are the word of God if it doesn't say so in a written document regarded as holy?
P.S. Your profile picture looks familiar to me for some reason. Is it from something I might have seen or read?
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@Zeichen
When you watch the Purge movies you really need to suspend your disbelief because the underlying premise is absurd and untenable. But once you get past that I find them to be entertaining. Particularly when the purgers are people you wouldn't normally expect to be psychopathic.
Does anyone remember the high school girls in princess dresses. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAxf1HKf5ac Gotta admit, they were pretty freaky. And hilarious. They bedazzled their assault rifles. I'll repeat that. They bedazzled their assault rifles.
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@Vader
I can definitely respect that. But you can ask broad contemplative questions in a religion forum, like why did the world make a majority transition from polytheism to monotheism.
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@Stephen
This is a 36 minute video of Arnoud van Doorn explaining himself and his conversion in his own words. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LS9FmIQ0Ns Skip past the first minute, it's introductory preamble.
I'm not through it yet, but I'm finding it quite interesting.
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Much preexisting dislike in this thread.
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Why do liberals who respond moderately never seem to count.
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@drafterman
We haven't yet heard eth allude to anything beyond the simple feeling of revulsion itself.
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@Polytheist-Witch
I think I'm a Libra.Me too.
I've been told Virgos and Acquariuses are our rivals. My theory is they envy us because we have objectively cooler heraldry. Your thoughts?
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Let's talk about this Arnoud guy. The total 180 he did on Islam is interesting. From anti-Islam to Muslim. https://www.carbonated.tv/news/from-an-islamophobe-to-a-muslim-arnoud-van-doorn-ex-leading-member-in-farright-dutch-politician-geert-wilders-party-accepts-islam
Some petty criminal charges on his record:
In February 2014 Van Doorn was sentenced to pay a fine on leaking secret documents to the press, possession of an illegal flare gun, and for selling soft drugs to minors, in 2014 it was raised to an extra 240 hours of community service. Van Doorn claimed to have sold the soft drugs in order to catch a drug dealer, although the judge called his explanation "very implausable".
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@Zeichen
I think the only way to be self-honest was to prove your point. The other option would've been to get offended and heatedly defend myself despite inwardly being able to see where you're coming from, which would not be self-honest. I don't regret my choice.
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@ethang5
A homosexual who is not a hypocrite would say you can't control your sexuality and your involuntary responses alone do not make you a bad person, although I feel they'd be in their rights to ask you why you felt the need to make a comment on their sex life. Bit personal.
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@ethang5
Bigotry in this context would be maligning and devaluing the homosexual as a person simply for what they do in their bedroom that you find repulsing.
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@ethang5
- One would say it's male homosexuality he's repulsed at.
- Does this guy have superhuman control over what he finds arousing or repulsive? If not, then no, it's not bigotry.
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@secularmerlin
--> @CastinThe lightbulb is just a placeholder for any discernable physical effect whatever. Many things have observable physical effects that are not for my benefit.So far as I can tell I have never observed any god(s) doing anything. Certainly nothing that I could not think of another perfectly reasonable explanation for.How do we identify the difference between those things which exist and those which do not if not by the physical effect it has on our universe?Honestly even then our universe could simply be an illussion.
Obviously, I haven't observed any such phenomenon either. If there is a God, it does not seem to be one who is interested in directly affecting the small slice of the universe my eyes have touched. Most theists I talk to seem to think he acts indirectly. In the Bible at least, God seems to act directly many times. If one is interpreting the acts literally, that is.
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@Outplayz
You've seen things move on their own?
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@spacetime
That's actually a kickass profile picture. I will consider adopting it!
Dewit.
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1. Repulsion at the act is not bigotry.
2. You can be repulsed without being a bigot.
3. I think it's completely cultural, so I'd say learned.
4. No, being turned off by two dudes but turned on by two women is not bigotry either. The whole point is that we have little control over what we're sexually attracted to, and so long as it's fantasy or an act between consenting adults, it's amoral and no one else's business.
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@DBlaze
I find most mainstream rap and hip hop seems to have moved on to just sex and money. I don't hear a lot of songs about killing these days.
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