Should able2know ban people for having untoward opinions?

You cannot ban anyone, despite their views. Its more valuable to allow someones views, no matter how insane or repugnant. Im a firm believer that, for the most part, the argument will disclose how insane the posters are just by letting then continue to post.
AS far as being inconvenienced in ones own arguments, the ignore function is a fairly good tool. The only thing wrong ith it is that, once you hit the "ignore" , you remove any and all posts that the offending correspondent has made.

While I think that Ionus is totally uninformd and is a royal pain in the ass in the area of the evolution thread, He may make some reasonable posts in other threads. However, I cant see them unless I look for the ignore symbol between posts by others.

This isn't necessarily so. There are several people i ignore, maybe four or five. I don't need help to do that. But i don't tolerate their opinions because i don't see them. I simply don't read the drivel they post. And i made my decisions because it is my opinion that they post drivel far more than they post anything else, and that their purpose is to disrupt threads, to change the subject to themselves, or simply to abuse people.

I can recognize their rights of free expression without being obliged to subject myself to their stupidity or hatefulness.

No, I don't believe folk should be banned because of opinions.

I've been reading along the rape thread since the beginning and stopped posting when certain dipsh!ts would answer questions asked of them - as is their right.

I read, then mentally ignore the eejit postings - but to be honest, there is a morbid fascination in realising the huge differences of opinions or thoughts on subjects and that those people really DO exist or how naive some of us are.

The joy, or not such joy, of the internet is the vastly varying opinions which can make one very much more aware of the world and what's out there - whether it be politics, cooking, misogyny, whatever...

I do object to reading one poster who wants to kill every Italian and who rambles on about making the parents of a murder victim suffer... I do object to seeing ridicule or belittling of persons who have been raped... I do object to a lot of what I read - but I CHOOSE to read it

I don't like some members here who some people think the sun shines out their bahookie and can do no wrong... and likewise they don't like me - and.... so it goes, so what! Each to their own.

We used to have a self-confessed paedophile on A2K (course, he may still be here under a different name, who only knows!) - I chose never to engage with that person - but choosing reading how/why thoughts make people feel the way they do, no matter how disgusting or personally offensive to me, 'it happens!

Inasmuch as others object/ridicule/belittle parts of this community or find some threads equally nauseating - there is a balancing out of views in the bigger picture - and in real life - people are less likely to be so open about their views as they are as 'anonymities' here.

OccomBill - I really do get how passionate you are about the folk you view as scum of the earth, and I reckon many folk agree with you, as do I - engaging folk in these threads, tho, encourages them, it's almost as if they are baiting you, they enjoy to "play" - just as BillRM is doing to Rob now by asking Rob to ask him to leave (twittish little man that BillRM is, why don't you just leave BillRM, you don't need Rob to tell you too <eejit>)

IGNORE THEM...

I agree with JPB - anything you put on the internet opens you up to abuse on some level - whether you are nice or nasty - someone's gonna object along the line or someone is gonna use it against you, or call up an old post or something... there's always the possibility that your opinion is gonna piss someone off, even the people you get on with, they can piss you off at times too.

If the internet damages your mental well-being - switch it off or ignore those who cause you upset.

I remember when cjhsa was here and lots of folk despised his views - bit before my time, but I got the gist of what folk disliked - yet, when he wrote about his kids and other things that weren't inflammatory or to do with hunting and guns blah, he was "human"...

that to me is the problem with the ignore function and why i choose not to use it - i would rather see what peoples opinions are, even if I don't like it or reach for the bucket - because folk are human and even when they can be utterly intolerable for the most part, there may be another side to them - it wouldn't mean I would ever engage them in real life ... but then even the nice folk you engage in real life with could be wolves with a wooly coat a?

There is a community here - it's diverse and interesting, and like all communities, as has been said before, there's gonna be those who revel in being the misfits... if that's where they get their kicks - sobeit - no-one has to engage them.

You don't need to use the ignore feature - I haven't as yet - when it gets to "vomit" level on my feelings about what others post, I read on past it <noted, move past>.

I would agree to banning if someone is "stalking" another member and it can be clearly seen by the community and the administration

I would agree to banning if someone makes real threats against other members

and other bannable offenses that folk have already highlighted...

but those things are not about people having untoward opinions



If the community starts to ban people for their untoward opinions, being obtuse, obnoxious or having put their stupid head on for the day <or everyday>, well, there wouldn't be many people left here, would there? Especially in the politics and religion forums where the debates do get very heated!

so, NO!


<this is the internet - if it makes you scream and shout at your computer and start punching the keyboard (as some folk have made me do when I read them on the odd occasion) - then switch it off, read something else, do something else - the community can ban people itself by using the thumbs up/down and collapsing posts and can ignore the trolling if needed by placing the member on ignore - if a newbie comes along, the community is there to alert them if a newbie starts to get hammered by a troll - isn't that what the community does?>


long

Emphatically agree - and would add: the insane/repugnant crew should be encouraged to post; it's the best way to disprove/ridicule their nonsense: think of the "hollow-earth" thread - haven't posted there, but always read it for pure comedic entertainment

First, comment if Bill O is looking for the scum of the earth I would suggest that a mirror might be useful for him.

Second. I do not leave because I find this website interesting however it is a time sink and I would not be heart broken if ask to leave either.

God I wish I was a little man but I am 6 foot and sadly at this moment I weight in at 229. Yes I know your comment have nothing to do with my size but it was amusing in any case as being overweight is one of my main health problems.

PS good morning.

that requires a willingness to let people run their own lives, a faith that they will be able to figure out where the truth is, will be able to see the difference between good and evil. The rush to authoritarian measures as rooted in insecurity, and while this is understandable during this time where we are a part of a dying civilization it does not excuse our current willingness to run rough shod over everyone around us in the attempt to impose order on the ever increasing disorder.

It is also not in our best interest. The next civilization will not be birthed until we create it, and all of this law and order and perpetual hysteria is killing our creative energy. Any fool who dares to think outside the box is considered a threat and will likely face the hammer until they have been pounded into submission to the group think. But the group think is rooted in the dying civilization, in the trauma of its ending, there is no future in it.

It is the radicals who disturb us who will save us, if we are to be saved.

I thought you guys already have banned members, at least temporarily, for abusing other members. I see no reason for sparing abusive members just because they couch their abuse as opinions. Beyond that, no I don't think you should ban people for holding untoward opinions.

Jesus, your preaching is pathetic. You wrap yourself in the flag at the drop of a hat. And you come off as phony as a three-dollar bill.

Actually a philosopher would not incite a formal discourse on a member of a class, but upon the whole class itself, which would require a definition.
The definition of what a person is, and the relationship of "will." The distinction is important as it amounts to, assertion and denial of people in general.

An environmental acquisition system of a living organism is that system of an organism which must acquire something from its environment and process that which it has acquired for a product that maintains and promotes the life of that organism.

Now, this gives us the Scriptural Sacred Seven, among them is the human mind. '
That environmental acquisition system which must acquire from experience those forms of human behavior that can be applied as human will that maintains and promotes the life of the body.

Now, one might see that rape is one of many in the set of those expression which deny individual human will, i.e. the denial of the individual to begin with.
Taken to its primitives the definition means that one, as mind, supports life or death--the first because of function, the other because of dysfunction.

Rape is just one form of taking someone's life, stealing and lying are others. The most socially basic, is teaching children by rote instead of the development of their judgmental faculties.

One cannot support individual members of the class that leads to human death while denying the validity of others. The choice of life or death can not even be made on an individual basis, or a social one, for, those actions that lead to death are simply signs of a mind alread dead.
See Plato--asleep.
See Aristotle--a vegetable.
See Scripture--dead.
See Science--dysfunctional.

When we approach a problem via individual members of a class that is so large, one becomes an ant pissing on a forest fire.

I don't see why a cyberspace train wreck shouldn't receive a "very healthy view count". Judging by the crowds who ended up staring at the real-life car accidents I've seen so far, I would expect no less.

But what we have here is a case of a member sharing a personal story on a debate thread. The thread in question is titled, "Hey, Can A Woman "Ask To Get Raped"?" I agree that Bill's response to BBB was uncalled for. I agree that he's a dolt. I also see that he isn't the one who kept that portion of the thread going and that, once it was reposted by AM in all her dungeon, he did a mea culpa and said he didn't realize it was a personal story. Yes, I think he's doltish enough to have missed that fine point the first time through. You and your pals then took it into overdrive. She's STILL going on about what folks said to BBB! And, when asked for a link to the offending posts by Hawkeye she responded with a "if you don't know then I'm not going to tell you" type response. WTF?

BBB's ax was gored on a debate thread after sharing a personal story. That's unfortunate, surely. But, probably something to be expected here.

Y? What is the reason for that ?

I'm late to the discussion, but regardless of what behavior would result in an account being banned, I just don't think that banning an account is effective.

With the proliferation of free E-mail services, creating a new account is just too easy. Banning creates a minor inconvenience for the banned user (set up new E-mail and re-register with A2K), and a major inconvenience for A2k staff and users. (A2K staff then has to play whack-a-mole, trying to ban every account the idiot creates; A2K users who use the ignore feature have to endure a renewed blast of idiocy until the new account is ignored in turn.)

The ignore function works; cjhsa doesn't come around anymore.

Should able2know ban people for having untoward opinions?


NO!

You're moving the goal posts. You appeared to comment that the sheer quantity of submissions should be factored in, and I concurred and said I'd love to see the post count of the top 10 contributors to put things in perspective. Now upon realizing that the post count probably wouldn't support your Tu Quoque table turning, you're shying away from your original statement. Not fair play.

Whether or not the sheer volume of offensive posts should be factored in, shouldn't be predicated in any way on whether or not my behavior is worse and frankly, I do believe an accurate post count might sway some guessers on that opinion as well.

Gotta run.

I think he meant that if you do not ignore them you are making a choice to tolerate their opinions.

I tend to disagree with this assessment completely. The answer to the original question is so blatantly obvious, I consider it rhetorical... and certainly don't believe that it offers any justification for anyone to engage in verbally abusive behavior that would likely get their teeth knocked in, in virtually any other venue.

Would it be fair to say, then, that your problem is with abuse, not opinions? For a hypothetical example, if some members thought rape ought to be legalized, and if they presented their case in calm, non-abusive language, you wouldn't have them banned for it?

I never said you had a child pornography collection. Stop accusing me of things I never said.

Let's get away from the strawman that I want to impose an immediate ban on everyone who holds that opinion in the first place. It depends on how they went about presenting their opinion. Were they to start a thread of their own, and present their grotesque proposals with some class and in a straight forward manner to forewarn the passersby, I don't think I'd have any room to object whatsoever. If, on the other hand, they spam seemingly every remotely related thread with that opinion, I think that's entirely out of line. I do not think a free flow of ideas requires the freedom to put any particular opinion in everyone's face at every opportunity.