Posted by lil' jimi on May 31, 2004, at 3:26:58
In reply to re: Lar's block, posted by gabbix2 on May 30, 2004, at 16:32:20
this has come to me slowly here ... very slowly
it seems to me we have peculiarly inverse symmetry being dealt to us with this issue:
on the first hand
we had an incident where dr. bob had chosen to reduce a poster’s block without any mention to babble posters ... ... this had specific consequences for many posters, myself and larry included ... these consequences were negative personal impacts for myself and for lar ... ... ... my attempts to post about these inadequacies failed to meet the standards of civility and i was banned ... posting about it now is extremely complicated emotionally for me ... ... the fallout from that incident raised a significant hue and cry about administration’s stealth process for reducing her block ... ... ... dr. bob allowed as he would consider informing the babble posting public before exercising his discretion by reducing a blocked person’s sentence ...the particulars of that poster’s block; the quality and magnitude of the negative impact on babble caused by this poster’s actions, make for the sharpest contrast imaginable to lar’s block ...
this, when added to larry’s instrumental contributions to the discussion in the first incident ... about the inequity of not informing the babble community ... come to mind with fresh relevance now ... ... because it was larry who insisted that we should have an open process when the reduction of a block is being considered ... larry championed this innovation more than anyone ... ...
you see dr. bob not only allowed this poster to have her block reduced ... ... he was complicit in her returning to babble with a “new” identity with which to perpetrate her masquerade ... ... and we were told that this was indulged because dr. bob felt she was going to be supportive and could make a positive contribution ... ... there was some debate about this to say the least ... ... i tried to make my contributions to it ... ...
on the scale of the magnitude of possible malignancy of actions for which a poster could be blocked, where 10 would be the worst and a zero would not be blocked ... ... lar was a one half on his worst day ... ... as for this other poster, our rules of civility prohibit me saying any more under threat of i forget how many weeks of ban which hang over my head from my past crimes ... ... every one of which was committed under the influence of this particular issue/case ... ...
on the second hand,
we find
one of the most beneficial of babble posters who was/has been consistently and genuinely supportive in exceptionally useful ways for untold large numbers of posters and readers,
who i first got to know when he came to my rescue when i was panicked out of my wits by our subject on the first hand (see above),
who was the major force and voice of reason in addressing the inequities of dr. bob’s actions allowing her to return unannounced ... ...
who had barely rubbed the rules rough at all ... ... and then, ONLY for the protective benefit of those who someone was trying to panic ...
was banned for 6 weeks
for being in violation of a technique of language construction ... ... for which he was not afforded the graciousness of a commonly used “please rephrase” ... or any gentler warning or guidance or support ... ... only summarily shown the you-are-blocked exit, thank you very much ... ...if the potential for being supportive is still a criterion for reducing a block as dr. bob said it was for this other person, then larry has long ago earned a lifetime immunity from blocks ... ... or at the very very least to have this block eliminated ...
(with some plausible explanation for the leniency given to others, but which larry has to go through this subjugation to be considered for, maybe?)
i am trying to point out the day and night differences between these incidents and the posters involved
... besides being posters, there are no salient parallels ... ...
one, babble needed to be protected from ... ...
the other, babble needs the protection of.and that lar fomented and instigated having ban reductions done openly .... .... ....
seems ironic ... feels ironic
.... this inversion of things in this peculiar reversed symmetry
... ... it feels even odder to me ... ...
... how must it feel to larry? ...
... (what must he be sending to dr. bob, as he must be reading all of this with the special interest of those who have been judged and sit outside while their judgment is discussed?)this near perfect symmetry of what might pass for poetic justice to some gives off too much of the aroma of contrivance ... ... you know the badly written scripts in the movies where in protagonist suffers his comeuppance as the reversal of his situation has the shoe on the other foot? .. ... ... is it hard to imagine that there could be a possibility of trumped up charges brought on order to perpetrate such a deliberate plot twist?
perhaps only i, in my weakened, unrecovered mental state would see any of these things ... ...
but what force would free my fragile friends from feeling that these fragments fit the form of such an easily imaginable malice?
blocks have an essential role for babble: not an issue.
reducing blocks is not an issue because it has been done, at least once that we know of.
discussing reducing blocks is not an issue because we are doing that now.the only issue is larry’s block:
why did you propose to reduce larry’s block, dr. bob?
what point did larry make in his emails to you that moved you to consider reducing his block?
shouldn’t we be discussing that (whatever it is) if we are expected to make a contribution to your personal deliberations about larry’s fate?
was it merely the request to reduce his block that made you broach this issue here?
should we be discussing the particulars of your decision to ban larry?
are we to search out the inadequacies of the process you employed for banning larry?what do you feel would be worthwhile to have discussed here about reducing larry’s ban?
are we just going through the motions here? merely paying lip service to the notion of having this discussion?
is this just a matter of form?how is discussing reducing larry’s ban meaningfully useful to anyone?
it can not be because anyone has reason to fear lar is going to skulk into babble under some other guise to garner the ill-gotten confidence of unsuspecting posters and have them at the disadvantage ... ... this is where we experience the absurdity of the attempt to reverse the circumstances from the first hand ... ... we could put that shoe on the other foot, but it does not fit ... ...who could need to be protected from larry?
if this discussion were to be able to help get larry’s ban reduced (eliminated is too much, right? ... uh, like why?) surely that should be as good as done ...
but, independent of this or any other discussion, reducing or eliminating lar’s ban is solely up to you, of course, dr. bob, so that by any objective measuring, what we write now can hardly matter ... ...i do find this ironic element here deeply perplexing ... .... .... ...
has this been too long? ... sorry ... ... i am just staring to get warmed up here ...
take care,
~ jim
poster:lil' jimi
thread:346427
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20040527/msgs/352296.html