Hypocrisy and me.

[Lee Zeltzer]

Ok, death, taxes and hypocrisy; are something we all have in common. After several months of tolerance I have decided to take the controversial act of banning trolls.

Bradley and all his comments are gone. If he reappears under a new name with the same attitude I will ban him also. I will leave his other alter egos for now since they just reacted to him.

I my actions defeat the purpose of this board I apologize in advance but I think the distraction of obscenity was beyond the scope of Boquete.

[sunshine]

Yes, well done for banning the poster.

Trolls are common across the web. They just seek to create unrest and get responses. The key is not to feed the trolls. Thus that is why, if it were me, I'd quietly ban the poster and not even have these discussions. Trolls live for feedback/responses. That is what they get off on. The key is to ignore them....and ban them quietly as soon as they are spotted.

There is nothing to feel bad about Lee. You are absolutely spot on.

[Judy Sacco]

I have avoided joining this group because of Bradley. Thanks a lot for getting rid of him. He was crude and not funny.

[Bob Applegate]

so who the heck was bradley anyway?

[sunshine]

bradley, leroy and pedro come across as very similar....

if in doubt, chuck em out.

[Tracey Card]

Pedro is hardly "similar" to Bradley and Leroy in my mind. Could you expand on this Sunshine? As far as I have read, Pedro is not nearly as offensive and certainly not abusive like those two. You are being unfair. Explain yourself Sunshine.

[Richard Detrich]

I appreciate your intent to provide an open and uncensored forum, but in order to maintain that forum the community has a right to impose some standards. Banning "Trolls" is a good move! Thank you!

[Joy Koopman]

Hi Lee,

I completely agree that there should be guidelines regarding obscenity, etc. as it is not necessary and sex with animals, etc. isn't exactly what I want to read about. I love animals, but not in that way :)

However, there was another poster, who deleted his comments where the F word and B word, etc.were used and that individual is still a member. How do you determine whose comments are obscene, then ban - and when it's okay to have the user simply delete their comments and still remain a member of your wonderful site?

I'm all for free speach, but guess my point is that the rules should apply to "everyone".and am just curious when some members are allowed to simply delete their posts and others are outright banned. Guess the whole "trolling" thing is new to me.

Thanks for the good job! Joy

[Lee Zeltzer]

The two users deleted were in my opinion one user who's sole intent was destructive. It was subjective and I was forced by their obscenity to make the deletion.

Although I will not compare myself to the late US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart I will Steal his words regarding obscenity.

" shall not today attempt further to define the kinds of material I understand to be embraced within that shorthand description; and perhaps I could never succeed in intelligibly doing so. But I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that. "

It would and did take a lot to make me delete a user, if they choose to clean up their own posts that is fine with me. The less I need to deal with this the better.

[Dan Miller]

Lee,

Once again, I agree with you. Damn, I wish you would say something with which I disagree, so that I could argue the point.

I am a member of a writers' blog, Blogcritics.org. It is moderated, and all original articles have to be submitted to the editors before they are posted. The process is very efficient and quick. Comments on the articles appear without review, but are quickly deleted if they constitute personal attacks or gratuitously offensive. This process goes on twenty-fours a day, every day.

Blogcritics receives numerous articles for publication, and many, many more comments on them. Editing and moderating are very time consuming and demanding, and Blogcritics does a great job. No one person could possibly undertake this sort of thing, nor should you have to. Our community is a small one, and it is reasonable to expect mature conduct. For the most part, that's the way it is, and a poster who demonstrates the sort of conduct shown by the deleted poster(s) should be banned from the site.

Dan Miller

[Lee Zeltzer]

"It would and did take a lot to make me delete a user, if they choose to clean up their own posts that is fine with me. The less I need to deal with this the better."

I not not wish to be either moderator or censor. Just respect other people and keep topics related to Boquete. Profanity unless targeted at other people is not an issue to me. A discussion of brothels in Boquete or Swinging lifestyles in Boquete were never a problem with me.

What was a problem was when the profanity was used against individuals it became obscene and out of context of Boquete.

If that is not clear enough I guess I need to fall back to Potter Stewart's quote above.

[Dan Miller]

I disagree with you, but that's not important. You can say whatever you wish, subject to the constraints properly imposed by Lee.

As to profanity, it is a part of American culture, particularly among those unable otherwise to express their ideas. Folks who can't express their ideas without profanity should, obviously, feel free to use it to whatever extent they deem necessary.

Dan Miller

[Lee Zeltzer]

Read the disclaimer.

If you know someone who went to event you must be leroy or bradley or whomever because I doubt such an event ever occurred and if it did it had nothing to do with this OPEN FORUM except a mythical (I think) figure created a series of troll posts.

If by some chance you are a refined version of the same mythical figure stay around stay benign and contribute.