[Vision2020] See Y'all

[No Weatherman]

Mr. Hayman,

It is true that "both ball and court do not lie in the sole possession
of the player," but it is not true that they are a "shared phenomena."

A phenomenon is an occurrence — like a game or a conversation — but it
is not an object like a ball or court.

In this game we have a forum or a platform for people to exercise
their free speech which, according to your metaphor, is the ball and
court, and we have phenomena which is where your metaphor does not
correspond. Free speech is the phenomena, it's the "shared" occurrence
in the forum.

The difficulty confronting a few select members of this forum is that,
from the moment I entered the conversation, they have refused to
engage one single point of mine. IOW, they will not share the
phenomena.

Rather, they have opted to make ME the POINT of discussion much to
their perpetual angst because I will not bite.

Throughout this my point has not changed though it's had its assorted
hues. I want to discuss the issues but the great majority of the
others would rather discuss me, contra my intention to remove the ad
hominem from the equation and contra a means used by the founding
fathers.

In exchange for my contributions to this forum, which I have based in
fact for the most part, I have been called unbelievable names —
everything from "pieces of moral slime properly to be shunned by all
decent people" to "racist" to "pawn scum" — apparently because I have
not identified myself as I raise serious questions about Barack Obama.
So much for the ad hom.

In addition to this, two women who promised not to exchange with me
cannot stop from misquoting me as they dialogue with me, if only
indirectly. This creates a difficulty for me because when I respond to
them, one ignores me in order to misquote me again and the other just
insults me, oftentimes adding another misrepresentation to the
affront.

These two, to say the least, have been provocative and antagonistic
which says nothing of their repeated violations of the agreed upon 3
posts per day, an agreement that was only signed by me, apparently,
and is only enforced when someone asks hard questions about Barack
Obama.

The honest observer, however, will see that I have not treated others
at they have treated me and I have had profitable exchanges with at
least three regulars.

Therefore, when you call me "overbearingly rude," I confess to
overbearing at times (if this means flooding the forum with
information) but I am far from rude. This charge belongs to others.

My response to Mr. Hillebrand was direct but it was not rude, unless
he actually did not read all of the complaints about me as well as my
responses to them, in which case I confess I was rude but for other
reasons. No offense intended.

Where does this leave us?

I would say that Mr. Hayman has taken his free speech and gone home.
It's a free world, more power to him.

I am still here, however, and I invite anyone, even those who have
hitherto for insulted me, to engage any single point of mine. I
promise I will not be rude and I will not call you names.

I have lived by this rule with one exception, that is, Dave who called
Gov. Palin a "c*&t" and a "Christian terrorist" by which I properly
identified him as a "blithering idiot," and I intend to continue
living by this rule.

Vision 20/20 is the forum. It is the ball and court. Free speech is
the "shared phenomena" and it is only "shared" to the extent that
others participate. Sometimes this means reading only, other times it
means interacting with a point.

I say let's share.


On 10/14/08, Warren Hayman <whayman at roadrunner.com> wrote:
>
>
> Hello All,
>
> After responding to an anonymous posting earlier, I realized that I had,
> without thinking it through, violated my own ethics of communication. I
> thought about it. Reminded myself that this morning alone, in the midst of
> work, I deleted almost two dozen anonymous postings while sifting to find
> more important, or at least relevant (to me, to be sure) missives. The
> posting to Tim Hillebrand a few minutes ago pushed me over. The defense of
> postings and promise of the plethora of more within the missive fairly
> smacked of the "my ball, my rules" mentality found on elementary school
> playgrounds, even though both ball and court do not lie in the sole
> possession of the player. They are, in fact, shared phenomena.
>
> So, rather than deny the first amendment to any piece of writing, and given
> that I find the words within these posts overbearingly rude, unnecessarily
> agressive and pedantic, and, uh, in short, off-putting, I am outta here on
> the Viz until after the election.
>
> Warren Hayman
>
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