Hinderaker Did The Right Thing
...in the first place.
Well, maybe not the first place. Having over twelve years of online debate experience, I've long since learned to separate "wheat" messages (civil, substantive posts) from the "chaff" (insults, invective, sneering hatred). As a general rule the latter are easy to ignore because it doesn't take long to identify them.
However, on a message board, when you're a rank & filer as opposed to a member of the Forum staff (i.e. a system operator or "sysop"), you don't have the ability to delete or remove personal attacks, so you have to deal with them in some way, shape, or form. When it comes to emails, which nobody sees except the sender, recipient, and whomever is cc'd on them, I would think that the "chaff" would be even easier to dump because they're no "audience" for the sender to play to.
This is my roundabout way of questioning why Brother Hinderaker subjected himself to reading through all the "inexpressibly vulgar and vile" left-wing missives over the absence of commentary from him and his two Powerline colleagues regarding the Jeff Gannon tempest-in-a-teapot.
I've seen its like many times; we used to call such mass invasions "the flying monkey brigades." Sometimes they would leave huge messes to scrub off the board. Other times they would even succeed in driving wedges between staffers. One occasion of the latter resulted in a full-fledged staff split and the departure of the losing side (of which I was one).
And then there's my long, storied history with some California raisin who employed the nom de plumes "Wake4Democracy," "Eyes2Windward," and a final flurry of aliases after he had worn out his welcome and we kept locking him out as fast as he kept slipping back in. This is the individual who, it should be remembered, assumed my identity and proceeded to make an even bigger ass of himself than he usually did all in a pointed attempt to trash my personal reputation and good name. One of his aforementioned pseudonyms was "Blurred Fist," which should tell you all you need to know.
I rather doubt there's any chance of the Powerline guys being turned against one another. But, as Hinderaker admitted, they'd never been subjected to a mass lefty attack, either. Given PL's success as a megablog, that fact frankly astounds me. But, in any case, now they have, and now that Rocketman has, you should pardon the expression, lost his cherry, he should know better in the future than to wittingly plow through such rabid hostility.
But I would urge him not to regret sending those two "irate and intemperate replies." Even if they were somewhat misdirected, as a symbolic, cathartic gesture, it was something that needed to be done.
The pity for me is that Rocket Man didn't include a link to the one that got published on a site called "Minnesota Politics." I hunted all over their establishment, and I'll be hanged if I can find it.
Something tells me it would have made my day.
Well, maybe not the first place. Having over twelve years of online debate experience, I've long since learned to separate "wheat" messages (civil, substantive posts) from the "chaff" (insults, invective, sneering hatred). As a general rule the latter are easy to ignore because it doesn't take long to identify them.
However, on a message board, when you're a rank & filer as opposed to a member of the Forum staff (i.e. a system operator or "sysop"), you don't have the ability to delete or remove personal attacks, so you have to deal with them in some way, shape, or form. When it comes to emails, which nobody sees except the sender, recipient, and whomever is cc'd on them, I would think that the "chaff" would be even easier to dump because they're no "audience" for the sender to play to.
This is my roundabout way of questioning why Brother Hinderaker subjected himself to reading through all the "inexpressibly vulgar and vile" left-wing missives over the absence of commentary from him and his two Powerline colleagues regarding the Jeff Gannon tempest-in-a-teapot.
I've seen its like many times; we used to call such mass invasions "the flying monkey brigades." Sometimes they would leave huge messes to scrub off the board. Other times they would even succeed in driving wedges between staffers. One occasion of the latter resulted in a full-fledged staff split and the departure of the losing side (of which I was one).
And then there's my long, storied history with some California raisin who employed the nom de plumes "Wake4Democracy," "Eyes2Windward," and a final flurry of aliases after he had worn out his welcome and we kept locking him out as fast as he kept slipping back in. This is the individual who, it should be remembered, assumed my identity and proceeded to make an even bigger ass of himself than he usually did all in a pointed attempt to trash my personal reputation and good name. One of his aforementioned pseudonyms was "Blurred Fist," which should tell you all you need to know.
I rather doubt there's any chance of the Powerline guys being turned against one another. But, as Hinderaker admitted, they'd never been subjected to a mass lefty attack, either. Given PL's success as a megablog, that fact frankly astounds me. But, in any case, now they have, and now that Rocketman has, you should pardon the expression, lost his cherry, he should know better in the future than to wittingly plow through such rabid hostility.
But I would urge him not to regret sending those two "irate and intemperate replies." Even if they were somewhat misdirected, as a symbolic, cathartic gesture, it was something that needed to be done.
The pity for me is that Rocket Man didn't include a link to the one that got published on a site called "Minnesota Politics." I hunted all over their establishment, and I'll be hanged if I can find it.
Something tells me it would have made my day.
posted by JASmius at 3:03 PM
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