From: by403@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Spiros Triantafyllopoulos)
Subject: Re: Hasan B Mutlu 
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, (USA)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 04:24:03 GMT



dave@jato.jpl.nasa.gov (Dave Hayes) writes:
> This is really an unclear standard. What is the *real* difference between 
> "exchanging opinions" and "furthering one's cause"? The following:
> [... deleted...]
> is not quite sound logic to me. A posting in comp.binaries of shareware is
> furthering the cause of the shareware author. A posting in rec.jokes is
> furthering the cause of humor. 

There is a difference between flooding the net with a post of binaries
for GEEWIZ.EXE and 600 KB/Week of insults, repeated material, etc.
Information is defined (by me at least) as something potentially useful
to others; GEEWIZ.EXE may solve fifth order differential equations and
save some poor slob his/her rear end. Jokes can help lighten up one's day.

But, stay tuned. If you saw OS/2 binaries crossposted to all binary
groups, from Atari (ouch) to Amiga (hmm) to DOS (yea!) to Mac (hmm) to
Next to Sun, along with INSULTS to the users of those OS's for not using
OS/2, how would you feel about it? Better yet, if the binaries are
posted once a week, for the most part don't work, ... you get the idea.

> You can't. But it seems that this goes on with many more people then 
> Mutlu. I see *lots* of postings which fits the above criteria. Sean Eric
> Fagen comes to mind...he ridicules anyone disagreeing with him and refuses
> personal mail. On top of which, my using him as an example will probably
> get a scathing response from him. Do you see *me* clamoring for his 
> removal from the net? 

He stays in the 'proper groups', though, doesn't he? So did Joacim
("Greeks were better off under Ottoman occupation") Martillo to some
extent, and at least he's off the net for now. Just because the net has
'tolerated' abuse before it does not mean it should tolerate them again.

But, as Mutlu would say, wait, there's more. You say Sean Eric ridicules
anyone disagreeing with him, etc. Fine. I have not read Sean's postings
in a while now. But he ridicules individuals, not entire ethnic groups,
religious groups, nationalities, etc. 

Let me put it ONE MORE way. Forget the analogy above. Would you accept
as part of normal Usenet life if the Neo-Nazis, or the White
Supremacists, or the <your least-favorite-group-here> gets on the net
(goebels@fuhrer.org) and posts drivels after drivels against, say,
various minorities or ethnic groups often targeted by them?

Do you/anyone else/me have to wait for the KKK to get on the net to see
the point above? It's THAT simple. 

> (Actually I welcome such spirit. Makes life more interesting.)

Me too. But there's a line somewhere. And I think the line was crossed.

> >It is this lack of two way communication in good faith that essentially
> >distinguishes Mr. Mutlu from the rest of, ah, let's say, spirited
> 
> Really? I see no such distinction. You have to give me better grounds
> for a distinction than that. 

Easy. Mutlu has been on the net for a while now. Maybe a couple of years
that I remember posting in his current mode, probably more. When he
stayed in soc.culture.turkish things were fine, nobody complained. Now
he's posting in, say,  soc.culture.(greek turkish soviet arabic
yugoslavian jewish europe),  soc.history, talk.politics.(mideast soviet
misc human-rights), news.admin, news.groups, and even on soc.culture.
australian and bulgarian on occasion. 

In his early days Mutlu stayed off attacking other ethnic groups while
he was too busy with the Armenians. Now he seems to have found extra
motivation (read hired an assistant :-)) and he drivels away all around.

Top that off with the fact that most of his drivels/insults are geared
towards entire ethnic groups, that his posts are for the most part 
repeated (like clockwork, I'd say) selective (ask Rob Milson on this)
quotes, or even quotes from sources that DISAGREE with him (prof. 
McCarthy, one of his ex-favorite sources for instance) and you have
600 KB per week of pseudo scholarly texts, out of context quotes, etc
flooding all groups possible. 

And, of course, the coup-de-grace (SP!) is various forged posts, back
from the days where he was posting (faking) thru hbm@sarp.aic.com (he
lost his account at work for that I believe), to the days where he was
flooding the net thru the anonymous posting service at Berkeley, to the
days where he screwed up and posted his message twice or thrice thru
Berkeley, to the days where he had OTHERS flood the net in his name thru
Berkeley, to the days of "XYZ the Criminal of ABC", "XYZ the Terrorist
of ABC", etc.

> 2,000,000 readers to be sure, but not everybody reads his posts. His
> name may be taking up lots of disk space in the collective KILL file
> aggregate, but I'm sure less and less people read his posts. 

Disk and computer costs and the such are irrelevant for most net users
who don't pay off their own pockets. Under the logic above, headhunters,
the KKK, or the guy who sells Juicers (tm) can post all they want because
strategically created kill files (/Juicer/K, /heads-r-us.com/K, /KKK/K)
would get rid of them. 

> Seen talk.abortion and talk.politics.guns ever? Should we kick all
> those "activists" off the net?

I see no 600 KB/week abortion flamefests on soc.singles, soc.culture.usa, 
talk.politics.*; I don't see 600 KB/week gun flamefest postings in 
sci.aerospace, sci.military, soc.culture.usa, rec.sports.guns, etc.

> >if the political parties did the same it would all be fine with you too.

Since I got no response for the line above, let me ask again. Would it be
OK if the National Democratic Headquarters (ndh.org) or the White House
(of COURSE they're on the net :-)) flood the net with 'vote-for-me' messages?
Would it be ok if XYZZY Computer company (xyzzy.com) floods the net with
'everyone else sucks except xyzzy' messages? 

Remember, we're not dealing with an individual flaming individuals;
That's fine. I've flamed/been flamed plenty in, say, sci.environment.
We're dealing with an individual flaming entire ethnic groups, religious
groups, etc. Why not tolerate the KKK in your opinion then?

> So put him in your kill file, IGNORE him, and don't give him any more 
> power than you have already given him. If he wants to waste his energy,
> that's his business. 

My key point, unfortunately, is that tolerating abuse will only create
more abuse. I can ignore him all I want. It did not work before, it will
not work again. 

Again, thanks for your comments.

Spiros
--
Spiros Triantafyllopoulos			by403@freenet.cleveland.edu
(Not really in Cleveland)			c23st@kocrsv01.delcoelect.com
Newsgroups: news.admin