[LMB] changing topic somewhat off killfile

[paal at gis.net]

----- Original Message Follows -----
> > -------- Original Message --------
> > Subject: [LMB] Malfoy and killfile

Hmm, that as a subject line squicks me a bit, that is, juxtaposing
"Malfoy
 and "killfile." I -like- Malfoy's writings here... don't always -agree-
but it's worthwhile and thought-provoking if not always
comfort-provoking! 

> > From: "Andrea Charlton" <selinde2 at gmail.com>
> > 
> > Please: What is a killfile?
> > 
> > Is it anything like a shilleleagh?
> 
> A killfile is a filter, available on almost all e-mail readers, which
> drops e-mails from a given person into your trash bin before you ever
> see it.
> 
> The good part, clearly, is that if name at server drives you insane, you
> can pretend they don't exist without any effort of your own. It's not
> "cutting someone dead" in the sense of pretending they aren't there;
> to you, they really aren't. 

I don't killfile people, though there are a very very VERY few people
whose posts I mostly skip past in one particular non-SF/F forum and
there are two or three people who for a very limited time I put on
IGNore in an IRC forum.

There are also some cases in which I stopped reading posts from specific
people on particularly specific topics, who I considered had been saying
things of negative value which had incited me to aggrieved response....

> This can be a powerful social sanction under some circumstances --
> when several high-status people in a relatively closed group do it,
> for example. But generally you should only count on the "I myself am
> not bothered" aspect.
> 
> The bad part is that if name at server starts saying things you _do_ want
> to hear, you won't know it. You're missing parts of the overall

Sometime it gets seen in quote, though.

> conversation. Sometimes a killfile is too blunt and heavy an
> instrument for people who only partially bug you.
> 
> I've always believed that in e-mail and usenet groups, everyone has
> the absolute right to killfile anyone for any reason without having to
> justify it. However, any public statement of "into my killfile you go
> then, luser" runs serious risk of being tacky. A public plonking is an

It's usually the bombast involved that angers me, the smirking snerk
bullying tone involved, that -really- sets me off.  If the "nyah nyah
nyah Parthian shot stuff got left off, or if the person announced that
they were killfiling the person in another day, I would find it a lot
less offensive. 

> unfair as a way of having the last word (since there's no recourse).
> It also carries an air of "clearly *I* am one of the important opinion
> leaders in this group, and just you wait until everyone follows suit."
> 
> If someone killfiles you publicly, return the favor. Ideally in

I usually respond anyway, because it's being done in front of an
audience--and it's not the person who's killfiling me that I'm trying to
influence, it's the people who are reading the -attack- that was made on
me.  I'm responding to the forum and putting in my comments for the
record, that's one person killfiling me, and hundreds of others who are
seeing someone calumnifying me.  My response is to them, to try to get,
again, -my- perspective to them for balance and fairness--and make the
killfiler look like an abusive offensive jerk for having been an abusive
offensive jerk generally (the ostentatious vituperative smirking
announcement of "I'm beating the dead horse and since the horse is dead
there are no repercussions to ME!" deserves repercussions... and gets
them from OTHER people's responses.  Yeah, the person killfiled -me-,
but didn't killfile everyone else, and anyone who responds to my
response, might have my comments in their response....  now -that- is
one vicious thing to do to vituperative killfilers!

> private. Then go on with your life. 
> 
> I once killfiled a usenet poster in a group that was not about SF for
> egregious and pointless rudeness that was apparently rudeness for its
> own sake. I later discovered that this was a pen name for a minor
> fantasy author who was also on "keep these books forever" status in my
> bookshelves. I still mull that one over occasionally.

Being a good writer and being a good person are NOT the same thing. 
There are good writers who are scum of the earth (James Joyce for
example). There are really nice people who can't hack it trying to write
salable appealing to the public prose.  There are people who are both
good writers and good people--Hi Lois!-- and then there are people who
are scum and can't write, either.... (note that there were enabling
writers associated with the two books focusing on James Bulger written
by former lieutenants of his.... wow oh WOW were they scum of the earth
slime!  They were upset at Bulger because at the same time he was
telling them to never rat out to law enforcement, he was on the FBI's
baksheesh roll....  they weren't upset about being criminals, but about
being ratted out by someone who told them not to rat out...