From: Sheldon Rampton <sheldon.rampton(a)verizon.net> Reply-To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org> Date: Thu, 3 Jun 2004 10:52:00 -0500 To: wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Can we ban 172 now? And VV too! Stan Shebs wrote: The people who think that Abe *initiated* personal attacks should take another look at the title of this thread. This entire discussion is taking place in the context of an attack on Abe in which a proposal is on the table to ban him. Moreover, the discussion here has been mean-spirited and unfair. Abe posted the text of an article he wrote about the failings of the Soviet economy. I read the article, and I could see that it contained several clear, strong criticisms of Stalinist policies that hurt the economy. Nevertheless, Fred and others responded to the article by waxing nasty and sarcastic. They cherry-picked phrases out of the article that made it sound like Abe was blaming workers for poor productivity, and then threw in gratuitous accusations of being an apologist for dictators because in their opinion Fred's article didn't say enough about the Soviet gulags. As far as I can see, Fred is the one who initiated this attack, and he did it dishonestly. He has a different POV than Abe, and he's trying to resolve it by having him banned and by warring about the content of his article on this listserv. Sure, Abe shouldn't have called Fred "senile," but in the overall context of nasty discourse that has characterized this thread, I don't think Abe's comment stands out as being more egregious than the insults that have been thrown his way. --Sheldon Rampton _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l(a)Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

Stan Shebs wrote: The people who think that Abe *initiated* personal attacks should take another look at the title of this thread. This entire discussion is taking place in the context of an attack on Abe in which a proposal is on the table to ban him. Moreover, the discussion here has been mean-spirited and unfair. Abe posted the text of an article he wrote about the failings of the Soviet economy. I read the article, and I could see that it contained several clear, strong criticisms of Stalinist policies that hurt the economy. Nevertheless, Fred and others responded to the article by waxing nasty and sarcastic. They cherry-picked phrases out of the article that made it sound like Abe was blaming workers for poor productivity, and then threw in gratuitous accusations of being an apologist for dictators because in their opinion Fred's article didn't say enough about the Soviet gulags. As far as I can see, Fred is the one who initiated this attack, and he did it dishonestly. He has a different POV than Abe, and he's trying to resolve it by having him banned and by warring about the content of his article on this listserv.

Sure, Abe shouldn't have called Fred "senile," but in the overall context of nasty discourse that has characterized this thread, I don't think Abe's comment stands out as being more egregious than the insults that have been thrown his way.