At 02:55 PM 11/20/2004 -0700 Warren Ockrassa wrote:
>Well, I tend to go by what I see. And when I see cycles of goading,
>prodding, and then complaining about results by someone, and then see
>evidence of that cycle commencing once more, I tend to assume it's
>going to proceed as has happened before. It's just pattern recognition,
>that's all.
For whatever it is worth, I did not expect a response from Dr. Brin from my
post, and if a response did come, I did not anticipate that I would
respond. My hope, is that at minimum, my post would cause him to
seriously reflect on the merits of his upcoming "Big Suggestion" essay.
At best, I would hope that it would cause him to engage supporters of the
President more civilly and reasonably on the List.
I am not particularly happy about the fact that Dr. Brin can't mention
prominent Americans who share my ideas, ideals, and beliefs without
accusing them of being:
-monsters
-traitors who are beholden to one of the worst regimes on Earth
-nepotistic frat brothers
-evil barons who still bread from the poor to fatten their wallets
-Machiavellian manipulators of idealistic religious-minded people
-all of the above
About the only thing left is for Dr. Brin to accuse Republicans of taking
pride in beating puppies. ;-)
But you can see where I am going with this. I am obviously on this List
because at one time I took an interest in David Brin's writings. I still
count several of his works of fiction among some of the best works I have
ever read. And if you think that I am happy about the fact that Dr. Brin
seems apparently unable to engage the 50% or so of the country that share
my political views reasonably, then you are mistaken. I don't enjoy
generating the above statements from him, and I think that my record will
show that I have overall attempted to engage in reasonable discourse with
him over the past election season.
>> Its interesting that you made a broad swipe, insulting 90%+ of
>> Americans,
>> including JDG and myself, and then cry foul when JDG says "Oh no".
>
>Where, precisely, did I do such a thing?
<quote>
The best way to be free from religious terrorism is to be free from
religion.
<end quote>
If you can't agree that people of faith would probably find the above quote
to be "insulting", then we will probably have difficulty in communicating
with each other.
At 12:05 PM 11/20/2004 -0700 Warren Ockrassa wrote:
>On Nov 20, 2004, at 11:53 AM, Dan Minette wrote:
>>> You, sir, are in no position to criticize him on his ability to carry
>>> on civil discourse. Your very first interaction on this list to ME was
>>> a sneering comment on my atheism.
>>
>> My memory was that it was a comment on your sneering athiesm. :-)
>
>My recollection was that his statement was, quote, "Oh no, not another
>one."
I'm sure that if you were not at the time, that you are at least now aware
that this List has long contained a small group of individuals who are
extraordinarily intolerant of religion. You managed to very quickly fit
right in with that small group. As Dan Minette, pointed out, my comment
was not sneering at your atheism, it was directed towards your sneering
atheism.
JDG
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