Harry’s Place

Hi, David, I have a better idea.
Why don’t you apply that policy to some threads instead of to all. And you mark them so people know which threads are moderated and which are not?
Alternatively, why don’t you open two threads for each post, one moderated and one unmoderated. Then people will not complain that you delete what they write, because there is always the sewer thread for them.
Think about it, I think it is better than just moderate everything.

Isn’t it possible somehow to bring in a system where certain posters can be filtered (ie their content appears blank) by an option ?

That’s what happens on advfn the huge shares BB, see eg :

http://www.advfn.com/cmn/fbb/filter.php?epic=PET&cb=1231851479

Perhaps you could ask your host ?

Too much effort!

I want to do it randomly, so that nobody knows whether or not I’m going to swoop in and delete.

BTW, if you need a good tree surgeon, look at the ads on the right.

Not sure if you have to register on the link above, sorry if so.

I always thought it unfair to judge a site by the contents of its (unmoderated) comments thread. I think your personal embarassment is misplaced. However, I don’t think it at all unfair to moderate comments either, and you are the Boss Hoss here.

The problem will be that once you start, every thread will devolve (further) into a discussion of what got dumped and why.

Which is why filtering is better, people can’t complain about mods, they just eventually realise they are being ignored by everyone and eventually go away.

Loathe as I’m am to say it, even him from Hong Kong makes occasional worthwhile posts. But the experience of >i>him does mean I think this measure is overdue and is to be applauded, as long as the basis of the pruning is upon relevance and what it adds to the thread. What I hope doesn’t happen is the, shall we call it the Hundal-manouevre?; where replies get deleted and commenters get called names solely on the basis they had the temerity to disagree with the original poster.

So to sum up: pruning on the basis of relevance = good. pruning on the basis of ideology or intolerance of wit or sarcasm = bad.

So do I - and I explain to people that the blog is not its comments thread. I also make a point of not criticising other blogs for THEIR comments thread. However, people don’t necessarily see it.

What I really want, here, is a comments thread that is worth reading. And that may well require pruning.

I will delete any complaints about pruning. That should solve that problem.

MMN: Brett will have a look at this.

I like the idea, I’ve found the posts about the situation in Gaza and elsewhere very interesting, but thecomments threads don’t interest me because they just descend into juvenile personal attacks.

That’s a shame because it would be interesting to have a forum where you can discuss personal ideas. How about deleting any comments that make perosnal insults against another poster, as opposed to debating or discussing what they actually said?

Great! This is what I’ve been thinking for some time. I wholeheartedly endorse this.

Go for it, the relentless malevolence of some of the acid fingered knobs out there these days can be a bit wearing on sensitive eyes like mine.

There was this moderation idea that once got discussed at LGF as really satanic and wonderful.
You delete the comments you don’t want for everyone except for the poster himself. So Flanker, for example, will post and post thinking that people read what he writes, but nobody will answer since his posts were quickly deleted. After a few days of completely unsuccesful trolling, the guy will do something productive with his life.

There was a newspaper site that adopted that method for a while.
I think I once made a comment to David T. about it.

It all sounds a bit clinical and controlling to me. I appreciate the problem but I fear the proposed solutions might make for worthy, earnest but really quite dull debate or (even worse) consensus.

I find most of the topics discussed here interesting but quite depressing. Occasionally a more light hearted remark can lift the gloom a little, hopefully without detracting from the thrust of the thread.

You’ve just got to trust me!

Loathe as I’m am to say it, even him from Hong Kong makes occasional worthwhile posts.

I beseech you in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.

DT, so far as I’m aware, authors can only delete comments on their own posts. Or do you have some superhuman blog author status that allows you to prune in every corner of the garden?

fabian - the advfn.com site filtering feature is similar, if all the other posters filter idiotx then idiotx has no audience. Even if he doesn’t realise it and keeps going on the other posters don’t have to read his garbage.

Or do you have some superhuman blog author status that allows you to prune in every corner of the garden?

He’s powered by Mossad obviously! “Mossad Tree Surgeons. Pruning the parts of trees other tree surgeons can’t reach. Gharkhad trees a speciality”.

Another feature that LGF uses is comment rating, is there the technical ability and werewithal (I know Charless is a geek when it comes to that sort of thing) to implement that sort of thing round here?

The trouble with that approach MMN, is that you end up with the digg phenomenon, in which mischeivous filtering is engineered.

Brownie: yes I think I do have superhuman status.

I beseech you in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.

I could be. I’m having a light-headed moment it seems as I realised I agreed 100% with one of your posts in the Learning to live with Islamism thread.

The trouble with that approach MMN, is that you end up with the digg phenomenon, in which mischeivous filtering is engineered.

Well actually the other thing is you have to register as the site needs to record your preferences.

“So Flanker, for example, will post and post thinking that people read what he writes”

Oh please, as if this site really could track where I am… Besides even if you could I would notice right away, I already know who ignores me and who doesn’t, it really is simple.

That said, HOORAYYY I love derailing pretenders, Gene already admits to censoring and David T was always claiming to hold out, but not anymore.

PS I want to be the first to be officially censored, please prune this post.

David T

“You’ve just got to trust me!”

Indeed!

As someone who has been ‘a bit naughty’ with my comments I had recently decided to moderate myself and I can think of at least five posts in the last two days where I never pressed Submit since writing out my candid feelings was enough that I didn’t mean to send.

I really would like you to ban the “C” word since I feel its use tends to set a standard to which some will drop (and I have to admit I did). I think “F… Off” is probably acceptable.

I’m not sure if I have fallen foul by content or opinion though as I haven’t checked.

I am ambivalent whether allowing Antisemitic spam has any place because that is what tends to wind people up and generate heat - and yet its free speech.

If I have offended I will try and do better. Apologies.

im against any censorship on principle.

why not let the thread work itself out and then a 5 days later go back and delete to your hearts content keeping whatever comment you thought was worth keeping.

Questions…

1) Is this new policy in relation just to this thread, or a new MO for HP henceforth?

2) Assuming it’s the new MO; will the moderator be just David T for all posts, or will all posters get to moderate their own threads?

Maven, as a serial user of the word, I do happen to think it has its place. Normally preceeding the word ‘Hundal’. *laughs*. But seriously, swearing is one of the greatest features of the English language. A well-placed exclamatory swearword can be worth its weight in gold. Or verbiage.

“I really would like you to ban the “C” word since I feel its use tends to set a standard to which some will drop”

No way! Surely there are times when *only* that word is appropriate?

I for one think the world would be a poorer place without some of Morgoth’s earthier rhetorical flourishes and his ingenious, disturbingly vivid metaphors. “9mm headache” is my favourite, although not in this case, directed at a fellow commenter.

Half of the comments posted on this thread are ‘a waste of space’ - get on with it then.

Two other major blogs - Iain Dale and Guido Fawkes - have introduced stricter approaches to comments after laisez-faire commenting meant people stopped reading them.

Let’s try and see what happens.

My powers are waning somewhat recently MikeS - there’s just too much on this blog I fully agree with to incessantly post. Being a wit (full or half) takes up a lot of energy. Even baiting Young Andrew no longer appeals like it did in the old days. I’m content now largely with the occasional billet-doux directed towards his rhetorical head (which one, don’t ask). Perhaps the tide is turning in my favour just as it did for Churchill.

That was a Joke btw, Sid, if you’re reading.

Fuck me, I’ve just realised the levels of self-absorption in this post is approaching Benij levels. I’m doomed.

“im against any censorship on principle. “

Censorship is about supressing views. I don’t think we’re aiming to supress views. Any view can be expressed constuctively.

“I really would like you to ban the “C” word since I feel its use tends to set a standard to which some will drop”

No way! Surely there are times when *only* that word is appropriate?

DT has used the term “Fuck Off” himself on more than one occasion, so if lanaguage is going to come into it it would be useful to know who is allowed to say what.

David T - why not just ban those people you have recently had to tell to eff off ?

You know who they are.

BTW one of them is now ruining that good thread you were talking about. His latest nonsense is :

Its important that Hamas remains armed at this stage.

I bet there are lots of people who have stopped commenting on HP because of him.

*Testing, testing…*

1, 2, 1, 2, p p p , b b b
Fuck off David T

*ahem*

I completely endorse this

I shall make an exception to myself here by making a plea to David T on aesthetic grounds - that the ‘fuck of Benji’ mantra be sacrosanct - that is, that it be delete exempt. Even if it pertains to a post that suffers that fate.

Oh and Benjibot can be quite funny too.

The proble is, sometimes, simply by commenting (here and elsewhere), without wishing to hijack a thread, someone responds to a comment, which you respond to to clarify/rebut, and suddenly a ten twenty post discussion ensues that looks liek sucking the air from the room. All of which is just to raise a note of caution to the effect of please be fair, and beware that some ‘off topic’ comments are driven by a need to clarify/rebut anothers comment that may not appear so off thread…

http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/

For an example of laissez-fair BS see this today

Agree 100% David - its the way forward. BTW every online community that I have thought worth reading has been pretty strongly moderated. Its done them good.

Censorship is about supressing views. I don’t think we’re aiming to supress views. Any view can be expressed constuctively.

true as that may be, constructive like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. what harm is there if a thread is allowed to run naturally and anything viewed as embarressing is later removed? 5-6 days later.

A blog isnt its comment thread but how a blog treats its commentors says alot about the blog. You need look no further than the BBCs “Have Your Say” which should read “Tell Us What We Want to Hear” to understand how stultifying persistent deleting can be. And deleting is in truth censoring - Sy what you like as long as you say it in an approved way.

Good idea; Long, long, long overdue!!

It will be nice to be able to post on the ‘topic’ rather than the people who are trying to make themselves ‘the topic’.

Ive been bashing on about this for months.

MattG

I guess that means that we lose things like Irene’s weird descent from annoying troll to protocol-citing loony. Not much to lose if that means we have a better forum for debate.

I hope it also means that we lose comments like Ranger’s yesterday. Linking to the sex life of Mohammed as s/he did just raises hatred and prejudice, and as you’ve rightly posted, we also need to confront the haters in our own ranks.

I hope though it doesn’t mean that we lose too many jewels like Flanker’s comment last night re the intellectual brilliance of his trolling. Made me laugh anyway.

Although if you’re looking to prune, he’s Japanese knotweed

And in the spirit of Glasnost can I make a confession to help cleanse my soul.

I am (was) Benjibot.

MattG

I think there is a touch of megalomania about this David. You don’t want to end up like drink soaked whatsisname or richard silverstein.

I think this is the right approach but I woul prefer it is uyou gacvve some reason for deletion even if it was just a single word or short phrase such as ‘Deleted: racist abuse’ or ‘Deleted: off topic’. I think it is reasonable to ban posters too so long as you mention that that is what you have done. Lenin Seymour is sneaky about this and will suddenly ban a poster in the middle of a debate if he thinks he or she is making headway in the wrong direction but will not mention it. This is his right and I wouldn’;t complein except that it leads to ‘I see that X can’t answer my points’ type comments which go uncorrected and that is really annoying.

“Brett adds: Great! This is what I’ve been thinking for some time. I wholeheartedly endorse this.”

Keeno.

I have lost count of the number of people, from all sides of the argument, who have said that they never read the comments, or have stopped commenting themselves, because when they have dipped their toe in, they have discovered a cesspool.

So what? Who needs such righteous old biddies anyhow? So they dipped their toe in, discovered a ‘cesspool’ and stalked off indignantly? They sound rather constipated, blinkered and boring.

But there is the pobeleme ( and I suppose I,m guilty thereof ) of wandering threads that get highjacked and degenerate into nonsense, even if the subject matter at the outset was of a serious nature.

“what harm is there if a thread is allowed to run naturally and anything viewed as embarressing is later removed? 5-6 days later. “

Because trolls and tantrums derial threads and discourage others from contributing.

i agree completely and if i end up getting my comments deleted, so be it.

have you ever considered the idea of hosting a forum as well as the blog? it would give the opportunity for debate that lasts longer than a day or two, and might relieve some of the pressure on the blog comments if people can release steam elsewhere.

I am glad you took this decision.

Hmm, could be a good idea in view of some of the more abusive commentating I have seen here.

In principle though, I’m against it. Censorship is one of the reasons that most good Irish writers were not read in Ireland for a good many years.

David T

Red Deathy’s point is worth bearing in mind. He has been a moderator on the SPGB discussion forum so knows the tricky nature of such moderations.

Well, I don’t want to use the words slippery slope, but–

See, David T, there’s one thing that can certainly be done without your having to ponder it — deleting posts with foul language, ad hominem attacks and nasty assessments of fellow commenters.

What worries me, however, is the possibility of deletion because something is off topic.

Actually, each post has both an explicit message and an implicature; and many comments that are labelled as off-topic are actually on-topic because they’re responding not to the explicit message, but to the implicature.

For instance, when someone says “Hamas uses human shields,” there’s a clear implicature that Hamas is less moral than Israel because they use human shields and the Israelis don’t. If I respond that Israel has used human shields thousands of times, it’s not because I want to divert the subject to something else; it’s because I want to show that using human shields is hardly a practice unique to the Palestinians. I have similarly defused many other attempts to dehumanize the Arabs.

Of course, you may argue that if someone quotes the Protocols they should be banned, but, where do you set the threshold? If you delete a comment because it’s flatly wrong, soon you’ll be deleting other comments because you think they’re made in bad faith — with the end result of a boring blog where everyone agrees with everyone else.

That’s why I would suggest that moderation be based only on the reasonable requirement of no personal attacks.

I’ve been doing on the threads to my posts what David T proposes, on a limited basis. While I try to allow for a wide range of opinions– including those I find repellent– I don’t hesitate to delete comments I find trollish, off topic, unnecessarily nasty to other commenters, or just plain silly. (Undoubtedly some of my comments over the years have fit into all those categories, for which I apologize.) I don’t believe I’ve ever deleted a comment which was seriously on point, no matter how much I disagreed with it.

Deleting comments on our blog is not censorship. Censorship is preventing you from expressing your opinions on your own blog.

As one of the worst offenders of OT-ism, I would ask that if a tangental argument keeps interesting and ‘civil’, then it remain. One of the joys of HP at it best is to find learned people moving the debate along in a variety of directions and avenues. But then I am biased on this point. Otherwise, full steam ahead

For my sins, I did call Seymour Paine a cunt many a time. I do stand by that, though.

Apologies for my occasional ad hominems, irrational association of the word ‘cockweasel’ with Denis Macshane, split personality, verging on the BNP ranting, and all my other sins.

I do have this to say though: it was my experience at uni that, to use a false typology, the left rubbished the ideas of others and drowned out debate. Although I was never anything more than minimally involved in politics there, I was discouraged from participating by what I saw as the ‘radical factor’: individuals who would play devil’s advocate and attempt to ensnare the entire debate. I have seen that here sometimes.

Harry’s Place does an excellent job though of generating the sort of crucial debate that no longer takes place at Westminster. This is crucial and it would seem a shame if some comments were culled because of the personal attacks.

“Deleting comments on our blog is not censorship. Censorship is preventing you from expressing your opinions on your own blog.”

Richard Silverstein says exactly the same thing to justify deleting posts he disagrees with and suggests you get your own blog if you don’t like it. And he is a cunt. A lot of posters here seem to see the ideal blog as one where everyone basically agrees with everyone else barring minor, delicately expressed deviation, which seems a bit pointless.

I’ll have to think about the whole idea of pruning before I conclude whether it’s a good or bad thing. However, I’ll say this: sure, you can say that you’ll only delete rude / racist / irrelevant / whatever comments; and it’s your blog. But it’s a slippery slope. And yes, even he from HK makes worthwhile comments sometimes. For goodness’ sake, even I do.

Tangentially - no, it isn’t tangentially: was Hugh Oxford’s post about Enoch Powell removed? I can’t find it. Maybe I am looking in the wrong thread. But imo, this seems like a classic case of not allowing people to say what you don’t want to hear.
If I am looking in the wrong thread, apologies. If I am not, then it seems to me counterproductive and counter to what the strapline says.

We know, Matt ;-)

Exactly what Maven said at 1:33, to the word.
Should we arrange to meet over coffee? Or will it be too frightening to see oneself staring back from across the table? ;-)

I will add my twopence.

Personally, whilst I am a huge fan of Harry’s Place, I am largely put off by many of the comments to posts and I do not contribute that much. The comments that put me off the most include the following two categories:

1. use foul language. Whilst swearing may be common in the English language, to me it is simply vulgar and almost always unnecessary.

2. Unnecessary and provocative attacks on Muslims such as those that repeatedly comment that the Muslim Prophet was a paedophile because he had a child wife.

I may disagree with him, but I have never been offended by anything that Benjamin says, I find him very polite and the attacks on him often knee-jerk and ridiculous.

I do not mind a personal attack, if it is in place, providing it does not come with the use of vulgar language. I post to a different forum quite regularly that is very stringently moderated on personal attacks and as such, when someone posts utter nonsense, I may want to say something like:

“You have not got a clue what you are talking about, you are an embarrassment to the educational establishments that you studied at, you are wrong because of a, b and c. Why don’t you go out and purchase a book and try and read it.”

Sadly, I am not allowed to do that and I do find it quite frustrating.

I do not necessarily mind off topic comments providing they have some relevance to the general thread. For example, if there is a thread on the leadership of the SWP and the purges that have occurred and I wished to comment about Stalin’s purges and make a comparison, I would hope that it would be reasonable. Now let us say that the someone disagreed with me about a comment about Stalin and the discussion moved on to discuss Stalin and his purges, by now the discussion would be quite off topic, but it is a conversation and it is part of the flow.

Thanks Mikey.

First thought: it’s a bit like a publican who decides whether they want someone in their pub. Good policy as it make life bearable for the other drinkers. Second thought: is this a kneejerk response to the present situation in Gaza and the strong feelings on all sides? Perhaps things will calm down once Obama is in place? Wishful thinking perhaps. I have been visiting Craig Murray’s site and there is a debate about this going on there. He is being accused of leaving up anti-semitic posts.

I agree with David T that it comes down to trusting the authors of this blog to (with occasional lapses) do the right thing. If you can’t do that, perhaps it’s best (if you wish to avoid unnecessary frustration) to find another online forum where that’s not an issue.

Mikey

follow your own advice and read a book.

You do nothing but imply communists, like myself, are unhinged murderous loonies. Whenever I show your anti-communist rants (in your HP blogs) to be nothing but a huge fart, gaseous wind-bagging from a know nothing fool, you always clam up.

You will welcome David T’s pruning. Saves you the embarressment of being shown wrong.

A lot of posters here seem to see the ideal blog as one where everyone basically agrees with everyone else barring minor, delicately expressed deviation, which seems a bit pointless.

I don’t think so, I think they see the ideal blog as one that doesn’t have abusive trolls on it. There’s a world of difference between expressing disagreement with a post and being abusive and hostile towards its author and the site it’s posted on.

By the way, and this is very much off topic, I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate David T, Gene and the team for such a splendid blog. I view myself as someone who is reasonably well informed, but I regularly have things brought to my attention by posts on this site that I was not previously aware.

This particular post is the 100th post to this site this month and I believe that may exclude the Arts section. The record for a month, per the available data in the drag down menu on the left-hand side is 187 posts and that was in July 2005. We are on course to smash through that figure.

I do have one request, DavidT, Gene et. al. are open to accept Guest Posts, I know as I have submitted many that have been accepted. This month, understandably, there has been a massive focus on posts surrounding the Israeli action in Gaza and issues that have arisen from that conflict. Whilst this is fine, I would like to see more posts on other subjects as well.

I contributed one post on Pol Pot and his victims but it might be good to see a post on the Tamil Tigers which are in the news, or a whole host of other newsworthy subjects. I am sure that there are many readers to this blog, including many contributors that have enough familiarity with one subject to write a post about it, I would be delighted if they submitted it in for publication. What is the worse that can happen? It gets turned down.

Finally, I would like to say a particular thank you for a previous guest poster and now a full poster to this forum, Edmund Standing on doing such a great job with his posts on the British far-right.

Unnecessary and provocative attacks on Muslims such as those that repeatedly comment that the Muslim Prophet was a paedophile because he had a child wife.

Stephen Fry: “You’re offended? So fucking what?”

I understand your predicament, David, but I have a caveat. CiF too is “moderated”, but many there see an agenda in what type of material is being spiked — and well there may be. Admittedly it’s gutter stuff, but some of us come here as well/instead of for a good argument that might prove enlightening. So your new policy will be under hot-eyed scrutiny — a DavidT Watch sort of thing.

Might I suggest instead a clear and concise as well as detailed set ot monitoring codes and acceptable standards of debate that could feature on the home page. Perhaps readers themselves could be invited to contribute suggestions.It would eliminate to a large extent the accusations of bias which will surely follow.

Rather that than the arbitrary approach on the BBC radio series which terminated panellists’ waffling on the grounds of “hesitation” , “deviation” or “repetition” .

Oh, and fuck off Benji

May I offer

Referring to myself, spgb gray says:

You do nothing but imply communists, like myself, are unhinged murderous loonies

They are.

I agree with pruining.
There are times however where David should get his chopper out.

Does Mikey want everyone to show undue and extreme deference to L. Ron. Hubbard as well?

Every time you apologise for the likes of Mohammed, Jevohah, Hubbard et al, its a blood libel upon the enlightenment. What is it with leftists and deference to irrationality anyway? c.f. our Maddy of the Sorrows. Richard Dawkins would be ashamed of you, Mikey.

He has been a moderator on the SPGB discussion forum so knows the tricky nature of such moderations.

Off topic but highly satirical comment deleted.

Morgoth states quoting my earlier post (in italics):

Unnecessary and provocative attacks on Muslims such as those that repeatedly comment that the Muslim Prophet was a paedophile because he had a child wife.

Stephen Fry: “You’re offended? So fucking what?”

Morgoth’s posts were some of those that I had in mind.

In off-topic world….

Thanks Wardytron for a comment you posted t’other day. I was mildly surprised to see you tell posters that I am not a racist. Kudos sir. I had thought it was bleedin obvious I am not a racist; it’s nice though when a post like that appears. As for you saying you think my politics is loopy, no offence was taken

David T,

John M’s point of ‘Deleted: racist abuse’ or ‘Deleted: off topic’ is the way to go, and Mikey sums it up nicely, as much as I might object to Benji he’s polite, even Zin argues without too much abuse.

If you are doing to prune, do it lightly on sensible people having a bad day and rather harsh on yahoos out to vent, and of course vary it from thread to thread.

Morgoth’s posts were some of those that I had in mind.

You know what you remind me of, Mikey - those clueless Swuppie idiots handing out hijabs at protest marches or making women sit at the back of a hall in a Respect meeting. In both cases, you (and they) are a Traitor to the Enlightenment - you are tolerating and encouraging Irrationality. Women died to get the vote and equality in this country, Mikey, and there you are completely abandoning hundreds of years of progress just because you are afraid of offending irrational loons.

I agree with pruining.

Pruining is ruining a blog through pruning.

Tim

“I agree with pruining.
There are times however where David should get his chopper out.”

LOL at you. I doubt even Mrs.T has called *it* that.

LOL at you. I doubt even Mrs.T has called *it* that.

Thimble?

*hides and runs*

Because trolls and tantrums derial threads and discourage others from contributing.

You are overlooking the fact that trolls are an essential part of the commenting ecosystem. I cant think of anything more sterile than a polite series of comments all backing up and elucidating the post.

In one of Kostler’s books (Yogi & the Commissar??) he describes a scene at some Tashkent Auditorium in the 1930s when after a set of the most boring speeches someone asked for everyone to rise then read out something by Stalin followed by Shouts of Hurrah! & “spontaneous” clapping which went on and on and on because everyone was too scared to be seen as the first to either stop clapping or sit down.

That scene lingers in the memory.

Its difficult to get a little pregnant.

I cant think of anything more sterile than a polite series of comments all backing up and elucidating the post.

Exhibit 1: Crooked Timber….

I don’t mind being pruned - Gene prunes me all the time and Wardy once banned me altogether for impersonating Benji.

Just ten minutes before this post appeared I had committed one of the sins that DavidT is expressly targeting, namely an off topic comment aggravated by being (almost but not quite) the first one posted on a thread. I naturally assumed that I was in trouble with the boss but it turns out that apparently, in this case, not: at least my offending comment is still there (a sneer at Hugo Chavez on the Five Comments thread). David, let me just add that if you had deleted my post I would not have felt aggrieved, and if you want to delete it now, go ahead. Please feel free to prune anything of mine at any time. It’s your football, as you so eloquently and succinctly put it.

I agree with most people here that pruning is beneficial as long as due caution is exercised. Over at The Economist, for example, which unpruningly indulges a worldwide readership, comments sections can soon become literally unreadable from sheer size. Here’s an example from the current print edition, a think piece on the historical background to the present Gaza offensive. It’s now been up for four days and has attracted over 600 comments so far, some of them as hate-filled and vitriolic as anything I’ve seen here at Harry’s Place:

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12899483&source=most_commented

Haaretz is another case in point. Being a daily, the turnover of threads is obviously much quicker than at The Economist. Even so, a fair number of them manage to score over 100 comments before they’re overtaken by something newer.

Rostam beat me to it.

You lefties have to learn to accept life and humanity as it is, with all its warts and flaws, and enjoy its vitality even if its manners would sometimes disgrace a pig.

I give it a week. These commie utopias where everything nasty is abolished always come to grieve very soon, flying as they do in the face of human nature.

I think the reason the thread worked is that we were debating with Benji in a serious mood and other arguments between other normally sane non-trolling commenters. Flanker was no where to be found, neither was HB, and that just-too-stupid TheIrie.

In short I think the thread worked because the people we should have banned long ago didn’t bother to show up or didn’t bother to write much.

Talking about how people treated each other with “respect and courtesy” is to miss the point.

I don’t mind being pruned - Gene prunes me all the time and Wardy once banned me altogether for impersonating Benji.

I guess there comes a time in the life of every successful blog when it begins to take itself too seriously … but in any event I too recommend Comrade Censor Gene as the first Banning Commissar … he is efficient and diligent. What should not be allowed especially in these times is deviationist comments … and hooliganism.

I don’t mind being pruned - Gene prunes me all the time and Wardy once banned me altogether for impersonating Benji.

I didn’t know it was you. If I’d known it was you there’s a chance I wouldn’t have done it. Not a huge chance, obviously.

David, let me just add that if you had deleted my post I would not have felt aggrieved, and if you want to delete it now, go ahead. Please feel free to prune anything of mine at any time.

See? It’s already like deluded party members are turning themselves in the Cheka and paying out of their own pocket for the bullets that will blow their brains out in some dank cellar.

Very, very creepy.

See? It’s already like deluded party members are turning themselves in the Cheka and paying out of their own pocket for the bullets that will blow their brains out in some dank cellar.

Very, very creepy

Very funny and your point is well taken.

“I agree with pruining.
There are times however where David should get his chopper out.”

LOL at you. I doubt even Mrs.T has called *it* that.

I would be very disturbed if Mrs Thatcher had an opinion on it.

Sea Kitten, I love your comment <3

Bear with me this link is quite relevant you just need to give it a minute

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=jTnfqEpKsGI

I agree with the pruning. Too many threads are affected by monomania i.e certain people will consistently derail any thread about a muslim, or a predominantly muslim country, to be a debate about muslims or islam in general, as if being muslim completely defines every important feature of a person or group of people. The same is also true with anti-Israel or US obsessives derailing any thread about anything bad anyone has done anywhere which can be suggested to be not as bad in some way as something the US or Israel once did or may do in the future. These are the things which most desperately need sorting out because they put people off and ruin threads.

Mikey has admitted he thinks I am an unhinged murderous loon; he basis this on propaganda - “Communist” lands are Communist because they told him so.

Mikey - I am Donald Duck, I dance tango. You must accept that as true; I am telling you so.

What a faux writer and intellectual he is.

Hey that’s nothing, Gray. Back before I had ever heard of Harry’s Place our unhinged troll “resistor” was calling me a sayanim on Aziz Poonawalla’s old blog. In other words a paid up member of the Jewish conspircy. O.o

Thanks for that Rostam - Tashkent hasn’t changed an inch in seventy years!

I enjoy your unmoderated comments threads. I hadn’t realised there was a blog above them. Now I see it, it’s pretty dull.

I didn’t know it was you. If I’d known it was you there’s a chance I wouldn’t have done it.

Yeah, yeah that’s what Stalin told the relatives of his victims too.

I cant think of anything more sterile than a polite series of comments all backing up and elucidating the post.

I don’t think there’s a danger of that happening here.

Lol, it wasn’t the link that put me into moderation. If you mention banned trolls then your comment goes into moderation. So we DO have a few trolls on the banned list!

You do nothing but imply communists, like myself, are unhinged murderous loonies. Whenever I show your anti-communist rants (in your HP blogs) to be nothing but a huge fart, gaseous wind-bagging from a know nothing fool, you always clam up.

You will welcome David T’s pruning. Saves you the embarressment of being shown wrong.

About as classic a case of ‘No comment needed’ as I have seen in many a day.

I suspect it might be a bit like common sense - where everyone thinks they have the right amount.

I’m sure most people are expecting others comments to be pulled as their own are obviously a worthwhile and positive

I don’t mind as I’m only here for the duration of the repulsive Israel and ‘Jew’ bashing period we’re in. Life’s too interesting.

I have never been offended by anything that Benjamin says

Well, you see, there’s the rub: different things offend different people.
For example, I find ignorant antisemitic comments offensive, however polite the language. Prissy style doesn’t save such comments from being hate speech, as far as I am concerned. Other disagree, no doubt.

Morgoth: since the Left is the irrational antithesis of the Enlightenment, making individuals subservient to an abstract ideal dreamt up and controlled by a self-appointed elite, I don’t find it surprising to see who they cozy up to. Repulsive, but not surprising. Communism is a religion, one with prophets and priests who have sole access to the ‘truth’ - and with human sacrifice. There is not much to choose between it and the cult of Ba’al.

Mikey - I am Donald Duck, I dance tango. You must accept that as true; I am telling you so.

Surely for this analogy to work one of the biggest countries in the world (184.6 million people in 1917) would have had to have had a revolution which called itself Donald Duckist (tangoist splinter group) then the rest of the world’s Donald Duck impersonators (bar about 70 in Clapham) would have to accept the primacy of UDDTR (Union of Donald Duckist Tango Republics) as the world’s leading Duckist group (many would indeed accept it to the extent of selling out their own governments to the Duckissimo in the hope of one day achieving world Strictly Duck dancing?

(I’m going to get banned again aren’t I?)

The same is also true with anti-Israel or US obsessives derailing any thread about anything bad anyone has done anywhere which can be suggested to be not as bad in some way as something the US or Israel once did or may do in the future.

If we’re talking about, say, the US’s war in Iraq, and someone states “the Iraqi militias subject their prisoners to humiliating treatment,” there’s nothing wrong with responding “so does the US.” This doesn’t mean it’s not wrong to humiliate prisoners; it means such treatment is the norm in all wars, and it’s unfair to present it as a behavior peculiar to the Iraqi militias.

At this point, some people will try to stop one by claiming “You’re a troll; the subject here is the Iraqi mistreatment of prisoners!” That’s why off-topic-ness should not be a reason for comment deletion.

after reading the comments of the sea kitten, I would like to reccomend him/her this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxZCt0PKUw0

Nearly Oxfordian

you know diddly squat about communism.

“an abstract ideal dreamt up and controlled by a self-appointed elite”

is what you wrote above. I hope people have begun to realise by now that Leninism (which fits your quote) is not communism and has been opposed by real comminists, like myself, for a century.

We can do the time-warp again too, when the Manifesto of the Communist Party by Marx and Engels spoke of working class self-emancipation. It is a concept alien to Leninism, which has indeed a self-appointed elite

but in any event I too recommend Comrade Censor Gene as the first Banning Commissar … he is efficient and diligent.

My grandfather was a Stalinist, so I suppose it’s genetic.

Graham

you can be pithy at times.

The biggest joke I’ve seen was the Great Dane Peter Schmeichal on “Stictly Come Dancing”. I would love to know what Preben Elkjaer and Brian Laudrup made of that.

HB - the problem about whataboutery is that it nearly often ignores proportion and intent. Al-Qaeda in Iraq killing and torturing opponents at will as a matter of policy is NOT the same as abuses in a generally well run army that are properly dealt with by internal legal structures.

Wilfully comparing things that are not the same when you know this kind of difference exists is just pointless trolling and should be pruned as much as possible.

spgb gray,

You are like a broken record. Your comments remind me of the joke about various mother’s watching their sons who had all passed out at officer training corps. One proud mother turns to another and says:

“Look at my son, he is the only one marching in time. When everyone else is marching right, left, only my son is correctly marching left, right.”

And so it is with you. The ideology behind the Soviet Union was Communism, the ideology behind China was Communism as it was with so many other states. Hundreds of millions of Chinese people lived under Mao in a Communist country. Who are you to tell them that they are wrong and you are right?

I had great hopes for Schmeichal’s son - but he doesn’t even seem to be able to get in the Man City team (now really testing David T by going off-topic about football…)

Who are you to tell them that they are wrong and you are right?

A member of the strictly internationalist (and we don’t want any of that nasty small-minded nationalism) Socialist Party of GREAT BRITAIN of course (and don’t you forget it!)

Mikey

the stupendous BS argument! “What you say is wrong because a majority think something else.”

You show yourself up as a faux when you assert China was built on Communist ideology. You laughed me off when I actually questioned whether you had read Mao. If you know your Mao, you will know he was against Chinese feudal classes and against Imperialism. He wanted to be rid of those. He wrote of an alliance of peasants, workers and CAPITALISTS…under the political power of the Chinese Communist Party.

That is why I call you faux, Mikey.

Did it ever cross your mind that a country with capitalists and workers, which China has, can in no shape or form be called communist?

When Lenin was saying in 1918 that state capitalism was the way forward for Russia, did it ever cross your mind that Russia did indeed become a state capitalist country?

Has it ever crossed your mind to actually listen to a communist who has spent much of his life denouncing murder, political prisons, Leninists and has been advocating democracy, freedom and communism?

No. Didn’t think so

HB - the problem about whataboutery is that it nearly often ignores proportion and intent. Al-Qaeda in Iraq killing and torturing opponents at will as a matter of policy is NOT the same as abuses in a generally well run army that are properly dealt with by internal legal structures.

Here you’re begging the question in that you assume that in Western armies abuse is never policy. How do you know? Things that are crystal-clear to you are dubious to others.

The whole point of many posts is, precisely, to (implicitly) claim “THEY do horrible things that WE are incapable of.” In that case, presenting a reasonable number of instances of US (meaning ‘we’, not the United States) doing those things is a valuable contribution to the debate.

Graham

we don’t think Britain is any greater than the High street in Clapham (where HO is) is higher than other streets.

You might notice that we usually call ourselves “The Socialist Party” these days. Trust the Militant , who tried to sell themselves off as the Labour Party, to try passing themselves off as us. Militant call themselves “Socialist Party”. They do though have to use “Socialist Party of England and Wales”. SPEW…rather fitting, methinks.

But you still name yourself after a country Gray (or have done for nigh on a century anyway.) Still perhaps now you are adapting to the modern world just as Mao did in his own way. I think you are on a loser insisting that “communism” is “owned” by a few worthy types in Clapham however (although it would be as IMPOSSIBLE for you to admit it and still hang on to delusions of relevancy as it would be for the Pope to admit his doubts about the existence of God. ) Mao, Lenin, Stalin, Castro and Uncle Tom Cobbly adapted Marx to their own contexts and were therefore “Marxists” to a greater or lesser extent. And before you say it I know, it is the working-classes who “own” socialism and we must wait for them to decide when.

Oh well back to the X-box…

HB - so you think eg its OK to bring into a discussion of what to do about Zimbabwe, Mugabe and food shortages the fact that the US govt messed up with Hurricane Katrina with the “point” that Bush is bad as well or somesuch idiocy ?

Even if in your example there was some hidden policy of Western armies to abuse prisoners to get intelligence that one example of a bad policy does not equal morally the murderous and inhuman many general policies of Al-Qaeda.

No one in their right mind would look at Abu Ghraib on the one hand and Al-Qaeda on the other and say - oh they’re just as bad as each other.

Although (unfortunately) some uneducated people seem to.

Over a billion people in Russia and China were in Communist states - agreed by all as Communists with the exception of the 25 members of the SPGB.

Not only this, I have biographies on Lenin, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot and all say he was Communist as do my books on the Vietnam war say it about Ho Chi Minh.

Now what is going to be, SPGB and his motley crew of 25 who have their AGM in a telephone box in Tooting or hundreds of millions of others and numerous notable scholars and university professors?

I agree but will you prune insults to people whose views you disagree with.

I wouldn’t cut off HB, Benji or Flanker, frustrating and/or moronic as their posts can sometimes be. I do think, however, that posts like “miss irene”, favorably quoting the Protocols, should be removed, as they stir things up for no good reason at all. Also some of the more unhinged anti-islam rants, though i admit i am not sure where to draw the line on that.
and to add my voice, the blog is great!! i’m addicted.

Graham

there was a lively debate on the letters page of the Socialist Standard a few years ago about the “S word”. The jist was: drop it, as the word confuses, means all sorts of things to different people.

I think I made it fairly clear the other week, when we debated this, that socialism did have a very unambiguous definition pre-1917 Russia. I can’t remember the book; Karl Kautsky said the worst thing that could befall socialism is if it became synonymous with Bolshevism.

Socialism today is equated with Bolshevism (or else Labour/Social Democracy). The SPGB, from 1904, is not being pedantic when it defines socialism. You only have to look at the anti-communist rants of Mikey et al to see why a clear definition of what is and what is not socialism is required. Ah hell, even the most psychotic person in human history - Herr Hitler - called himself and his party socialist.

I think I made it fairly clear the other week, when we debated this, that socialism did have a very unambiguous definition pre-1917 Russia.

Well we were not talking here about socialism but communism. But I think I made it clear the other week that socialism had many meanings pre-1917 and that Marxist “socialism” was only one of those meanings.

HB - so you think eg its OK to bring into a discussion of what to do about Zimbabwe, Mugabe and food shortages the fact that the US govt messed up with Hurricane Katrina with the “point” that Bush is bad as well or somesuch idiocy ?

It depends on the context.

If you say “in black cultures, it is acceptable for a government not to take care of their people in critical situations, while in Western democracies no one is left to perish,” then yes, bringing up Kathrina would be very on topic.

there’s nothing wrong with responding “so does the US.”

There is nothing wrong with it, indeed, if there is nothing wrong with unhingeness and monomania. If I said, for instance, that the Chinese dams are an ecological disaster, you would be sure to respond with “So is this-or-that in Israel”.

Nearly Oxfordian

is what you wrote above. I hope people have begun to realise by now that Leninism (which fits your quote) is not communism and has been opposed by real comminists, like myself, for a century.

LOL. The usual silly special pleading we always hear from the absurd leftist splinter groups. Leninist-Communists screaming at Communist-Trotzkyites: You are traitors, you are running dog hyena imperialists - WE and only WE are the true anointed Communists.

Before you accuse other people of ignorance, which you display here every time you post, do kindly list the special features of your particular delusion which are not described by “an abstract ideal dreamt up and controlled by a self-appointed elite”.

Hey, while we’re sticking it to the SPGB can I have a gratuitous dig at the Trots as well?

Especially as this is a thread about tolerant and polite discourse in a civlized manner?

I’ve just finished reading “Young Stalin” by Simon Sebag Montefiore and besides very much enjoying it and appreciating it as a fine, scholarly work, I was most struck by the way that Stalin, not Trotsky, seemed to epitomise the true Bolshevik “spirit”, for want of a better term.

Modern-day Trots always like to give the impression that their hero was the true inheritor of Lenin’s mantle, while Stalin was some Georgian yokel and mediocrity who appeared almost from nowhere one opportune morning in 1917 and through strange cunning managed to seize Lenin’s crown when the old bastard finally died in 1924.

In fact, Stalin just as much as Lenin built the Bolshevik party and expressed its true character through the vast, gangster-like enterprises he ran in the Caucasus, while Trotsky was still a whiny, preening little bitch trying to organise a small coterie of cultists around himself, ie. the Menshevik Internationalists.

Anyone else read this book, think’s it’s good, and is willing to derail the thread even further by telling me their thoughts about it and Uncle Joe himself?

has been advocating democracy, freedom and communism

These are irreconcilable. Communism is contrary to human nature, which has been the huge paradox from day one. You can only impose it by anti-democratic means. Instead of accepting reality, you keep banging on about how you will make the sun rise in the west by sheer tenacity and democracy. It won’t work. That is why people laugh at you and at Don Quixote.

If you say “in black cultures, it is acceptable for a government not to take care of their people in critical situations, while in Western democracies no one is left to perish,”

Yes but no-one would say in Western democracies no one is left to perish, would they ? That would be stupid. No one who points out ills in the bad country X thinks Western democracies are absolutely perfect, just better to X in some or many ways.

Here you’re begging the question in that you assume that in Western armies abuse is never policy. How do you know?

The point is that YOU think you do know, e.g. about Israel, even though you have no clue as attested by scores of posters who live or have lived there. Equally, because you hate the USA’s guts, you will always decide that abuse is policy in the American army, even you have no idea about what goes on there.
That is why your ‘what about’ about Israel and the USA always falls under the category of trolling.

Nearly Oxfordian

you skirted the point. I do not see myself or fellow comrades in the SPGB as a self-appointed elite. Communism cannot come into being unless a majority want it and work for it. Such a movement is democratic.

Leninism is the antithesis of this. Even if Leninists were as pure as snow, that minority could never achieve socialism.

Majority, informed, democratic action=socialism

Is that too hard for you to understand?

A good blog is like a pub, with regulars who know each other, who can converse even heatedly without chucking bottles, are welcoming to strangers and can distinguish between banter and abuse. The pub does need some regulation so that when you put your head in the door, you don’t see the usual dreaded, pissed loonies bellowing at everyone. Mind you, there are some old lags you get some mild affection for, especially as they are targets for witty put downs. There are even some of the deranged, like the recent protocol believing Irene who should be allowed to roam about, because their presence is an education to those of the punters who have lead a sheltered life.

The landlord sets the rules. He is discreet about chucking out or barring as he wants a lively atmosphere but the violently abusive, or the insanely repetitive, or the incessant bore who repeats the same thing eg about Muslims, Islam, Mohammed etc at the faintest opportunity, should be told to cool it or they risk being barred.

So it’s a matter of standards. I don’t think our host David T is looking for a gang of yes-punters and I’m happy to leave it to his discretion.

If he ever deletes one of my comments, he is a tyrannical, unreasonable arsehole, and showing the authoritarian knuckledusters under the liberal suede gloves.

This thread has actually turned into the very thing the post was written to criticise. I feel like it’s some sort of huge conceptual joke that I’m not in on.

Is that too hard for you to understand?

Your sneering superiority, not so very rare in the oh-so-democratic world of far left politics, cannot change the fact that you - and 25 mates in Tooting - don’t get to decide what communism is.

Yes but no-one would say in Western democracies no one is left to perish, would they ?

No; they would IMPLY it by pointing to instances of people left behind in non-Western societies only.

The point is that YOU think you do know, e.g. about Israel, even though you have no clue as attested by scores of posters who live or have lived there.

Another fallacy. For instance, Fabián, who lives in Israel, didn’t know that Sderot was partly built where the Arab village of Najd once stood.

My bias cancels the other guys’ bias and we all learn more.

I don’t have a problem with foul language; but consistent use of it can make someone look a little extreme.

Part of me thinks this blog should be unmoderated; and where moderation is used too much blogs do end up as an echo chamber.

So I suppose my position is if it’s on topic it should stay (regardless of the language used); but that commentators should not be personally abused.

Nearly Oxfordian

you are using the same trashy argument as Graham. “25 people in Tooting” didn’t define socialism. It had a clear definition pre-1917 Russia, as stated.

The people who want to muddy waters, apart from Leninists, are - naturally - pro capitalist lickspittles such as yourself.

Just turn on the TV everyday and see how one of the world’s powerful economies, Capitalist China, is always called “Communist”

No; they would IMPLY it by pointing to instances of people left behind in non-Western societies only.

You’d be a rotten doctor. “What seems to be the trouble?” “Well Doctor Hasbara Buster, I’ve got this terrible pain in my side.” “Oh, so the rest of you is in PERFECT HEALTH, is it?” “No, I didn’t say that, all I said was…” “But you IMPLIED it by pointing to instances of pain in your side only.”

It had a clear definition pre-1917 Russia, as stated.

Where? I want chapter and verse. Marx wrote just a few hundred words on communist society, and left it to his later disciples to fill in even a few of the blanks, eg. Lenin on the lower versus higher stages of communism.

Face it: Marx wrote almost nothing about how communist society would work because he didn’t have a clue about it, and neither does the SPGB, 150 years later. In that light it’s disingenuous to pretend that the Bolsheviks went off the rails when there weren’t any bloody rails in the first place.

David, you are a funny geezer. You would undoubtedly be deleting a lot of your own comments then, won’t you:-)?

You’d be a rotten doctor.

And you’d be a rotten semiologist.

POLITICIAN: “There exists a race of wealthy hook-nosed people who are harming this country because their loyalty is elsewhere!”
OBSERVER: “Fuck you, antisemitic cunt!”
YOU: “Wait a minute. How do you know he means the Jews?”

@David T

I see that I was right about the Five Comments thread after all.

This move clearly has either a Neocon Zionist Expansionist or a Cryptotrot-Islamofascist Alliance agenda. I haven’t quite worked out which yet, though.

This thread has actually turned into the very thing the post was written to criticise. I feel like it’s some sort of huge conceptual joke that I’m not in on.

It was based on a fallacy. That other thread was good because our worst posters didn’t participate, that’s all. Instead of this pruning nonsense, they should just be banned.

This thread is bad because HB is here, simple. Now imagine if TheIrie was blathering on too. I’d mention the spirit of trolls past, but that puts my comment into the moderation queue.

I agree that the abusive and frankly nasty bring down not just the thread but the whole pleasure of visiting this site. The simplest self-imposed rule is not to respond to provocation, stick to the thread topic and support posters who have something useful or pertinent to add. Do not devalue your own itelligence by decending to exchanges of playground insults.

Jokes I like. But I was not joking when I told Brett and Gene to stay behind. And David T. can be a right little blighter too!

“Thanks for your comment! It has been placed in the moderation queue, and if it is approved it will be published here soon!”

Except that his/her comment is already posted. Rastalion is right, you are truly hilarious.
But at least we now know what words get flagged by your moderators. Who would have thought your last name would be one of those.

This is way off topic (or maybe not), but I think the whole argument with spgb gray is rather beside the point. His views are kind of silly, but he’s a sincere anti-Leninist. It would be good to be able to challenge genuine Leninists/Trotskyists/Stalinists/Maoists in the comments once in a while, but never seem willing to defend their views here (e.g., Zin on Budapest 1956 or Prague 1968). You’d almost think they were embarrassed or something.

Sea Kitten

if you know your Marx and Lenin, you will know Marx (Critique of the Gotha Programme) said lower and higher phases of communism, whereas Lenin (State and Revolution) said the lower phase was commonly called socialism. Lenin deliberately distorted Marx; he had to really, as the Bolsheviks were implementing state capitalism, under one party rule.

Socialists are a bit adverse to saying socialism will be like this (making blueprints, as it were): we aren’t soothsayers, and it would be undemocratic for a minority to say this is how society should be.

What we do say is all should enjoy healthcare, education, food, housing, peace and so forth. The way to get that is to abolish classes and unite as a world

Thanks for completely dodging the question, SPGB Gray.

Gene, point taken.

Over and out.

“You’ve just got to trust me!”

I make it a point never to trust anyone who says that I have got to trust them :~))

David, I agree with you that there’s no need to engage in personalised insult or rudeness here and I like Fabian’s idea of a separate sewer thread (pity that CiF doesn’t have one of those… hang on a minute.. CiF is its own sewer thread).

And, having mentioned CiF, I don’t want Harry’s Place to “aspire” to CiF’s level of meglomania in respect of moderation. What assurances can you give me that it will not if you choose to go ahead with this? I agree that some of the hate-filled rubbish posted here lowers the tone of debate but why not ignore it unless it’s actionable?

Sea Kitten

not dodging. http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/pdf/saapa.pdf

It’s a .pdf by the way.

I’m on the Production for Use Committee of the SPGB too. No secrets in the SPGB, you know

Comrade Censor Gene!

I wish to report the discovery of a conspiracy by known deviationists to misdirect this “pruning thread” from its role in educating readers in rightthink as part of this blog’s 2nd 5 year plan. I identified and emailed for your attention the names of these conspirators together with proof that their deviation which has critically damaged this thread was planned well in advance. I demand Comrade that you ban them forthwith.

It is my duty Comrade to bring to your attention the fact that these deviationists come from a politically unsound background and present a threat not only to the well being of this blog but to the movement and peoples for which it stands.

With Comradely Salutations, & Greetings!

Will jokes be removed, for lowering the tone of the thread or for their inherent badness?

Did you hear the one about the SWP contingent who set out to go to the demo, but deviated into some industrial site, and fell into a vat containing chick-peas, tahini, garlic and olive oil.

As a giant blender mixed them together, they shouted out, “We’re all hummus now.”

Hello David!

I’ve thought for a while that the (good) quality of HP’s posts was let down by the (not so good) quality of the ensuing comments. For what it’s worth, I am one lurker who’s a little more inclined to wade through the threads knowing they’re being moderated.

As a giant blender mixed them together, they shouted out, “We’re all hummus now.”

Wont surprise the comrades here that KB Player was first on the list emailed to Comrade Censor Gene.

Censura o la Muerte!!

He was a superb writer and immensely funny, vile old git that he was. The quality of unpleasant poster (I hesitate to say “troll”) has declined greatly over the last couple of years. We’ve lost the guilty pleasure one could derive from the elegantly expressed yet abhorrent views of of WJ Phillips and we’ve acquired (I hesitate, again, to say “gained”), well, Nearly Oxfordian. Need I say more?

Two questions: what happened to WJ? How can I read the hurryupharry.bloghouse.net archives?

The Last Days of Harry’s Place.

Don’t say I didn’t forewarn you. Ages ago.

HB No; they would IMPLY it by pointing to instances of people left behind in non-Western societies only.

No they would not - what on earth are you talking about ? If I lived on my own on the Moon and criticised country A what would that imply about the society of the Moon ?

There is no logic or sense in this HB - you are talking gibberish.

David T - a prime target for permanent pruning here, I suggest. This guy is a “whataboutery” fool.

The Last Days of Harry’s Place. Don’t say I didn’t forewarn you. Ages ago.

Steady on old chap. Lets not exaggerate.

HP is still a pretty tolerant place where all kinds of foolish ranting is allowed.

Hopefully the management will have a go at censoring/deleting/cleaning up the cesspool or whatever you want to call it and after a while decide its not worth the candle.

We’ve lost the guilty pleasure one could derive from the elegantly expressed yet abhorrent views of of WJ Phillips and we’ve acquired (I hesitate, again, to say “gained”), well, Nearly Oxfordian.

No, what we’ve gained is you: unprovoked, irrelevant and completely misdirected personal attacks.
So … fuck off.

Another fallacy. For instance, Fabián, who lives in Israel, didn’t know that Sderot was partly built where the Arab village of Najd once stood.

The fallacy is yours. Just because Fabian didn’t know one particular concrete factoid which you happen to know because you spend your entire life googling with the sole purpose of finding negative stories about Israel, doesn’t negate the fact that he (and I) know vastly more about Israel as a country and a society than you will ever know. It’s the difference between being knowledgeable about a subject, and being able to trot out glib answers to pub quiz questions.

My bias cancels the other guys’ bias and we all learn more.

This is a strong contender for the silliest comment on HP ever. Bias is bias. It’s the lack of something, not the presence of something. It’s not like a negative and positive electric charge. You might just as well say that your ignorance cancels someone else’s ignorance
You are biased, which is both a cause and an effect of your ignorance. Fabian is knowledgeable.

It is not the “merely” nasty and abusive posters who degrade the level of the discussion - it is also the men, and it is always men, who resort to personal comments about their own and other men’s private parts. I would delete these at once as well and ban the posters - as well. I also think long boring posts off topic should also be moved to a side bar.

I used to run a mailing list along these lines. Personal abuse and in particular abuse about other posters’ physical attributes were banned while long boring off topic posters were shunted into their own siding. It seemed to work quite well.

More power to your elbow etc

The people who want to muddy waters, apart from Leninists, are - naturally - pro capitalist lickspittles such as yourself.

And people like you, when they lose an argument and realise that they can’t get everybody to convert to their view however much they stomp their feet, always resort to throwing their toys out of the pram ,and to screeching - and dumb - epithets like ‘capitalist lickspittle’.

Thanks for that Rostam - Tashkent hasn’t changed an inch in seventy years!

I enjoy your unmoderated comments threads. I hadn’t realised there was a blog above them. Now I see it, it’s pretty dull.

Your are most welcome Craig.

How are you getting on my old codger? Still chasing the girlies.

Saw your “Zionism is bullshit” speech on 10 Jan. (2.10)

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=zt4S8AGPGfk

really …. thats gracious of you - given that you and the rest of your pro-Hamas platform speakers are eminently more deserving of that epithet.

I’m sorry you feel that way and in the spirit of this post I’m almost tempted to withdraw my comment, but what I wrote was pertinent to the subject at hand. David T mentioned people who have stopped reading the comments here. I used to read Harry’s Place very regularly and now I don’t, largely because of posters like you and Maven. No great loss to Harry’s Place you might say - and you’d be right, of course. But I used to enjoy reading this blog and now I don’t, so forgive me if there’s a tinge of irritation in my tone. And let me preempt you: it’s not because I disagree with your opinions; it’s how they are expressed.

I used to read Harry’s Place very regularly and now I don’t, largely because of posters like you and Maven.

fair enough - but why not read the posts and skip the comments if you find them irritating.

I do that all the time whenever I have to read some slime post on CiF.

In fact I never bother to read the CiF posts because I know that they have all been censored to meet with this w*nker’s approval.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=6NAl6h8qJA8&feature=related

but I think the whole argument with spgb gray is rather beside the point. His views are kind of silly, but he’s a sincere anti-Leninist.

Did you never get the rather silly and dated old teacher talking about his favourite (off-topic) subject just because you could?

Have many disagreements with Gene, but he is on the button with the SPGB guys here, they are hopelessly utopian, but always intelligent, well-informed and witty. And their tradition is pre-Leninist and impeccably democratic.

To agree with a previous poster: WJ Phillips was repugnantly anti-semitic (genuinely, it hardly needs saying but the tag is tossed around far too liberally here) but an amazing writer. Like a sort of minor, less excusable GK Chesterton. Nearly Oxfordian is merely attention-seeking and irritating.

On a more positive note, on the thread David mentioned there were some contributions from Neil W. More comments (or even guest posts) from names of yore such as him, Muffin and Alex Higgins would definitely bring things up a notch.

Gene,

I also do not see a problem with someone who claims to be an anti-Leninist Communist. What I find futile is someone who tries to pretend that Lenin was not a Communist. If spgb gray had an argument beyond saying that virtually every Communist leader in history was not a Communist - he may have something to add, even though I would still disagree with him. Trotskyists hate Stalinists but they do not spend their whole day trying to argue against someone who refers to Stalin as a Communist.

Sea Kitten

yes, I have read Young Stalin but I was not enamoured with it as you, I had to struggle through it. Having said that I do think it is a worthwhile read.

Your point is taken about Stalin following the Leninist tradition. Trotsyists try and pretend that Lenin was good and it all went horribly wrong with Stalin, i.e. they defend Lenin. Any decent book on Lenin or the Russian Revolution and its aftermath (e.g. Richard Pipes, The Russian Revolution) will have a good discussion about the Cheka and the Red Terror. Labour camps and extermination camps were developed under Lenin. Lenin was simply a mass murderer. Anybody who calls themselves a Leninist has a lot to answer for.

I applaud this new policy and I reckon it’s already led to N.O. being a little less spittle-flecked than usual. I’d guess that N.O. is one of the prime motivations for David T bringing out the gardening shears.

I do hope that’s not antisemitic of me, N.O…

How sweet HP are

look at the pwetty SPGB member. Of course, none of you have even come close to answering, let alone looking at, the global capitalist crisis .
Mock me, by all means.

HP is too busy being a fog horn of Israeli propagnda.

Where was the blog about the UN man saying Israel is commiting war crimes? Where is the blog about the UN school, destroyed and snuffing out 40 lives, NOT housing Hamas - HP went topless and waved blue and white cheerleader pom-poms there

What’s with everyone saying they don’t get irritated by Benji? This is clearly a lie. Is everyone getting into the correct love thy neighbour frame of mind before the deleting gets in to full swing? Well, he still irritates me. More consistently so than Morgoth and Nearly Oxfordian.

I too am inclined to trust Mr T, but with pretty much everyone taking this line it’s a fair bet that a month down the line half the people backing sensible pruning (of whichever bugbear they happen to have) now will be implacable opponents of intolerant and megalomaniacal censorship on the part of DT then.

As one of the more on-message commenters may I be amongst the first to sincerely apologise to the Central Committee for any occasional deviant tendencies that I may have exhibited. I will strive to do even better in future, comrades.

PS - The occasional pithy Anglo-saxon epithet is not a bad thing in my view!

Apologies for my occasional ad hominems, irrational association of the word ‘cockweasel’ with Denis Macshane,

No, that’s perfectly rational.

Mikey
“Your point is taken about Stalin following the Leninist tradition. Trotsyists try and pretend that Lenin was good and it all went horribly wrong with Stalin, i.e. they defend Lenin.”
Trotskyists also try and pretend it had nothing to do with Trotsky. Certainly, you never see “Terrorism and Communism” on too many Swuppie bookstalls.

As a younger man, I used to think it would all have gone better if Bukharin had been in charge. Now I’m not so sure.

Ben

you would be a fool if you doubted Mr.T. I pity the fools, sucker.

This fool, David, is a lawyer. What else can you expect? They are a bunch of cunts. I bet David bills clients for “fuck you” missives in hundreds of pounds.

Oh bless

Mikey still doesn’t get it. There is no such thing as a communist leader. Oxymoronic, you know

you spend your entire life googling with the sole purpose of finding negative stories about Israel

C’mon, it’s not that I spend my whole life doing that. All I need to do is type in SETTLERS+”WEST BANK” once a day on a web browser. Sometimes SETTLERS alone yields a lot of interesting results.

Actually, you’re frustrated because I can do exactly the same thing MEMRI and CAMERA do without need of a budget and staff. You like MEMRI and you dislike me because I work for the competition, not because there’s anything particularly wrong in collecting negative information about your rival.

There is no logic or sense in this HB - you are talking gibberish.

David T - a prime target for permanent pruning here, I suggest. This guy is a “whataboutery” fool.

No whataboutery at all. You people write posts or comments with implicatures. My counterexamples are always necessary to expose the implicature.

For instance:

ZIONISTS:”These are pictures from the Hamburg pro-Hamas demo. Notice the ‘Jews = Murderers’ posters.” (IMPLICATURE: in pro-Israel demo’s you don’t see racist posters.)
ME: “But at the NYC pro-war demo they waved an ISLAM = CULT OF DEATH banner.”
ZIONISTS: Fuck off with your whataboutery!

It’s not a good thing for debates when there are constant calls for minority or contrarian voices to be banned.

CiF is an example of a website where draconian “moderating” takes place, whose true purpose is to tilt the playing field and skew the discussion. Those who are opposed to the Guardian’s positions get short shrift from the moderators. I can personally attest to that.

What’s to stop that happening here? In the end, moderated blogs become mutual-admiration societies. Better to allow everyone unfettered access and exposure.

Well, I’ve come to this thread late, but my view is it is not so much WHAT you say as the WAY you say it that turns comment threads into cesspools.

For instance, SWEARING. There is no need to swear. Whatever you have to say you can surely say without lowering the tone of language. The amount of swearing that goes on in this site discredits all who post and read here.

I suggest that all comments which swear be automatically deleted.

It’s not for nothing that the 18th century Enlightenment was able to develop because people agreed to temper their language and there was a culture of ‘polite’ values.

This enabled people to have very robust exchanges without descending into a cesspool.

‘Polite’ values are a cornerstone of liberal democracy. Thuggery snuffs it out.

Craig
Thanks for that Rostam - Tashkent hasn’t changed an inch in seventy years!
……………………………
Just demolished by an earthquake in 1966.

You people write posts or comments with implicatures. My counterexamples are always necessary to expose the implicature.

This doesn’t make much sense to me to be honest. Please explain more fully.

@devorgilla,

I completely concur with you on swearing.

@spgb gray

Saying that Stalin was not a Communist leader is pointless. Why don’t you take it up with numerous authors? Do come back and let us know about any responses you receive.

Also, why don’t you think of becoming a Wikipedia editor? Anyone can do it. You can start by altering the entry for Stalin to delete/change phrases such as “Stalin installed communist governments in most of Eastern Europe.” We will all be able to see your edits and how many times they are reverted - for the simple reason that you do not know what you are talking about.

@Mike S

On the subject of Leon Trotsky’s Terror and Communism and the SWP, I will say that I do try and attend the SWP’s annual Marxism event at the University of London Union. It was there,a number of years back, that I purchased my copy of the book. (New Park Publications, 1975)

Regarding Bukharin, I guess you mean that man who said “we must all be agents of the Cheka”?

Oh God, you linked to Bogdanor.

You’ve been going to MArxism since 1975? You don’t get that for murder.

Oh God, you linked to Bogdanor.

You’ve been going to MArxism since 1975? You don’t get that for murder.

I suggest disemvowling (a la Boing Boing), or replacing the post with an insult in square brackets (a la DSTPFW), or just the word “pruned”, rather than deletion without indication that the comment existed. In the interest of transparency.

For those crying “censorship”, someone deleting comments from their blog isn’t censorship any more than you refusing to pay for me to publish a book of insults directed at you is censorship.

What’s with everyone saying they don’t get irritated by Benji?

I don’t recall saying that. Quite the reverse.

look at the pwetty SPGB member. Of course, none of you have even come close to answering, let alone looking at, the global capitalist crisis .
Mock me, by all means.

You have run away from every argument, and called me a ‘capitalist lickspittle’. Do you have any idea how ridiculous you are?

HP is too busy being a fog horn of Israeli propagnda.
Where was the blog about the UN man saying Israel is commiting war crimes? Where is the blog about the UN school, destroyed and snuffing out 40 lives, NOT housing Hamas - HP went topless and waved blue and white cheerleader pom-poms there

Ah well, where would silly boys playing ’socialist’ on Tooting High Street be if they didn’t come out with the occasional ignorant antisemitic screech?

I suggest that all comments which swear be automatically deleted.

Sounds reasonable, impossible to implement consistently in practice.
For example: the Tooting communist (is that a swearword? technically no, but I am happy to concede that I am not using it as a compliment) calls me a ‘capitalist lickspittle’. I regard the second word as an infantile swearword. He would no doubt say that it is a factual description based on Hegelian analysis of my degenerate socio-political Weltanschauung.

Mike S,

I actually linked to an article that Paul Bogdanor had scanned into his web site. The actual article is as follows:

S. Melgunoff, “The Record of the Red Terror,” Current History, November 1927, pp. 198-205

Do you have a problem with that?

I have not been going to Marxism since 1975, the book I picked up was published in 1975 - I picked it up much more recently than that!

Too much effort! I want to do it randomly, so that nobody knows whether or not I’m going to swoop in and delete.

The surprise element of the coming terror is its most brilliant aspect!

So far it looks like no one has been deleted. But the suspense is getting too hard to bear.

Is this the calm before the storm?

the commentors shudder in fear …. they can see the glint in Comissar DTs eyes and know that on some thread at some time when they least expect it the Comissar will unleash his scissors in a mad frenzy …

I contributed one post on Pol Pot and his victims but it might be good to see a post on the Tamil Tigers which are in the news, or a whole host of other newsworthy subjects.

Hear, hear! I’d like to see something on the Tigers too, viz. the particpation of all the mainstream parties in the ‘Terrorfest’ at the ExCel last year.

Nearly Oxfordonian:

Fair point. I meant just the crude illiterate ones: f’s; b’s; c’s; s’s. One of my objections to swearing is, apart from the crude and agressive ‘tone’ used, there’s so little imagination in the use of the English language which it utterly destroys like a kind of mind virus.

I once got on a bus (top deck) occupied by 14 year olds just escaped from school about 4pm and was horrified (from an educational standards point of view as much as anything else) how limited their vocabulary was, and how boring and unimaginative their use of English was, viz:

‘Did yae see that f’**g b*****d c**t f**g on about f*** s***e tae that wee c**t o’ a f**g b*****d c**t?’

‘Aye. F’**g s***e. Shouldv’e f****d off, the c***t. F’**g s***e, man’.

Etc., etc.

Thus ‘capitalist lickspittle’ is offensive and unhelpful in developing debate (what does this phrase mean, exactly? What’s his point, exactly? What does he base this ‘view’ on, exactly?) and might be removed on that basis since it means to insult, not to engage in debate, but at least there is a modicum of imagination in use of the English language which in the example I’ve just given is clearly illiterate. These really crude words are easy to spot. Perhaps the offending terms could be deleted, if the message still makes ’sense’ without them.

Beyond crudities and obscenities, I’m not in favour of pruning. You don’t have to read the comments thread, just stick to the main discussions. One of the reasons I read comments threads, is to get some kind of handle on what, in an uncensored environment, people are actually prepared to say. Unpleasant though I often find this task, I’d rather know how low some people are prepared to go rather than be left with a more optimistic and upbeat view of social reality than is actually the case.

If you were to go ahead, then I think John M’s points ‘deleted: racist abuse’; ‘deleted: off topic’ would be the way to go (provided we add, ‘deleted: foul language’) because in the interests of liberal debate and transparency it is important to know the sins for which one was damned.

I feel very strongly indeed about freezing people out and not doing them the dignity of telling them why.

This would allow posters to pause, reflect, and perhaps re-phrase or re-focus their comments.

What is ‘off-topic’ to one person may only be because he/she doesn’t ‘get’ that this point is less tangential than it seems, it may be that that poster is just several steps ahead in gauging the implications and needs to ‘explain’ the relevance of their point better.

On the subject of WJ Phillips, my guess is he died. And of course with him would have died Luniversal, Millard Foolmore, Albion4Ever, Puzzled, Jack the Bear, Effra, Love Supreme, Jacob de Haan, Matt O’Halloran, Gorblimey, A Thought, Paleo Man, Heterodox and many others I can’t remember.

Devorgilla,
I agree with you in principle, but I am still saying that it’s fuzzy. Would you delete Anglo-Saxon four-letter words? Which ones? Only those relating to genitals/sexual activity? What about ’slut’? What about ’slutty capitalist’? What about ‘capitalist stooge’? What about saying the same thing in French: would that make it erudite and imaginative enough?

I feel very strongly indeed about freezing people out and not doing them the dignity of telling them why.

Well, I treat abusive trolls and monomaniacal bores with haughty disdain, but unfortunately not everyone else does, so they get answered. Just ignore them, and they’ll go away only works if everyone does it.

Rostam - wait till you’re airbrushed out of the threads.

May I suggest the following guidelines

1. No personal attacks.
2. No vulgar or discriminatory language, no crude sexual insults.
3. Long boring off topic posts may be cut, at moderator’s discretion.