Earlier: "... I constantly whinge ...
... [from bartleby.com, whinge = chiefly British to complain or protest, especially in an annoying or persistent manner; versus (US?) whine = to complain or protest in a childish fashion] ...
... about being banned. But it just sucks to be in this position,
because I can't edit
the encyclopedia, I can't go on a forum (which is admittedly not your
fault), I can't go
on IRC, all that's left for me to do is to go on the mailing list.
Pre-emptive counter to
"go outside": I do, often, and it sucks ... I don't like this any more
than you do. It's
more painful to write this than it is to read it, trust me. I'd just
like to get this over
with, so that I can go back to editing the encyclopedia. Then I could
talk about things
that actually mattered on the mailing list, instead of watching
through the frosted
glass of banishment ..."
Peter Blaise responds:
Regarding "... talk about things that actually mattered ..." I think discussions about banning always matter. Until we ban banning. Then we can talk about the next impatient, intolerant, un-accepting, non-equivalent consideration thing we do to each other.
Regarding "... It's more painful to write this than it is to read it..." I have no doubt, yet anyone here who doesn't want to read can just scroll on, and instead, we can read (or write) something we prefer.
But, I see that we do tend to spend a significant portion of our dialog reviewing the details of banning. I guess, after all, we still believe banning has positives that outweigh the negatives. Yet, the balance between the pros and cons of banning seems quite different for each of us, eh? So, I guess we'll just have to keep discussing the inner details of banning, case by case, ad infinitum, ad naseum.
I can't find the quote, but I think it was U. S. President Kennedy who is reported to have said something like, "If we make peaceful protest impossible ..." Can anyone find and finish the quote / idea? Thanks.