I don't see Bruce as choosing sides, Jinx. To me it looks more like a boxing ref sending folks to their corner.

Isn't that Bruce standing over there with a can of gasoline. Good. I always love a 4th of July party in December.

BTW, isn't this somehow about Congressman? Funny how politicians leave when the riots start.

How am I choosing sides, by telling everyone to stop acting like this is a kindergarten playground, and stop these bullshit personal attacks.

Bullying and deliberately taunting someone is completely unacceptable to me. I don't care who it is, if I see it, I'll speak up. I have that right, just like every other member of this board.:eyebrow:

And you've been played, too. Played, played, played.

You can't deny it. You don't need to. We've all been played, and once again there are not one, not two, but three separate threads, all playing the game of the attention whoring, the most expert drama-producing victimization queen of all time.

Someone who can now, once again, sit back and claim, who, l'il ol' me? What did poor old me do to deserve this? Victim, I'm the victim, help help help!

But once again the point is, it's all about her.

The only way to win is not to play. And that's what I did; I took my thread and went home with it. You say "don't do this" but that's what I was doing, removing myself from the situation.

And ever the expert, she then deleted her thread in which her provocative little game was too evident.

And you know the most ironic thing about all of it?

You people who "speak up for her" think you are doing her a favor.

And you think she cares about you, in some small way perhaps; but you've been played. The point was to get enough of you to pick sides, until she could violate our general agreement to merely stay apart, an agreement which I had carefully stayed true to. And boom, instant drama.

You say, oh, just ignore it! But you've been played, and you don't understand what's happening here. Ignoring it is not the end for a drama queen. She continues to deviously provoke until there is drama. And the more drama the better. It is inevitable.

If you want to do her a favor, you will demand that she be gone, and to hopefully learn the lesson that such behavior is absolutely foul and reprehensible, not only here but everywhere. It is the only polite response to such gamesmanship. And perhaps the only hope for her as a human being.

If she's a troll, then the people who attack her are the ones that got played. If not, then they're just being jerks.

If you don't want a thread to be about her, respond to the issue she raises without any reference to her connection to it. Or don't respond at all. Responding by personal attack (which includes calls for everyone to pressure her to leave) is either playing into her devious plot, or it is irrelevant, or both.

I'm not "speaking up for her" here or doing her a favor; I just get annoyed when these little snark exchanges crop up. But I absolutely wouldn't want any of the people involved to leave.

Good call ....HP


and Bruce your being a good moderator. I see you as unbiased.

Played? I don't think so. Entertained? For sure. Personally I enjoy reading the next chapter of How the West Was Lost. I really don't care if it's true or not, because I've nothing invested but my time and the entertainment was worth that. The thing that seems to bother the people she annoys, is championing her causes in the first person, which they don't believe.

Mari's been here long enough so anyone seeing her threads, should know what to expect and if you see her post somewhere else, you know you can almost predict her position on most topics. I'd say she's not the only one.

UT, rule #3; If you feel that applies, you've got the button....in fact you're the only one that can make that decision.
You don't have to explain, you don't have to start a thread to discuss it.
Whatever you say, goes.

That said, as long as I'm a member of this board, I won't stand by, while someone bullies, or intimidates, another member.

what xob said.

It is your board, UT, and you can ban who you like for whatever (or no) reason. Otherwise, people can post here, people can respond, can ignore, can get annoyed, can do whatever ...

Isn't this board like a big party, with conversations in a number of rooms? If you don't like the conversation in a particular room, or you see that there is someone you can't stand in there, go somewhere else for a while. Or, like I said, it's UT's house, you go ahead and chuck someone out. But picking fights, I'd rather not see that ...

Come on Bruce. Throw the gasoline. Everyone is so hot and bothered over nothing that it will make a spectacular fire.

am I too late to mention 'the land of the free'.......?

It's only bullying if you think there is a victim.
It's possible that being a dishonest attention whore is unacceptable to some other members. I think you should afford them the same rights.

remembers to only be honest while attention whoring :D [being funny!] :P


[serious self says]
......also since I am opening my mouth ....anytime a person is called a name instead of dealing with the issue or addressing the behavior, it is bullying and when someone is being a bully the recipient is a victim . It dosn't matter if the person doing the name calling thinks they deserve derision or not.

in this case the "name" being called is an explanation of the undesireable behavior so i don't know if this is really bullying or not. but what the hell do i care? i can, and frequently do, ignore all posts made by some individuals because let's face it - after a couple of years you already know every single thing some people will ever say in their life.

lol!


at the time of writing, this thread stands at 42 posts......


DON'T PANIC!

it's ok Jay. threads like this get everyone fired up again for awhile. in a sick sort of way it is actually good for the cellar.