Holding Court - June 23, 2005
by Barbara Branden
Something very ugly has been happening on SOLO, and it has not been done by Lindsay, Joe, or Jeff. Some members have taken the fact that Linz has made a mistake as a reason to indulge in a degree of Linz-and-SOLO-bashing that is shameful. I read charges that SOLO oozes malevolence, that it is a cesspool of mean-spirited personal attacks and filthy language, that it must now submit to Rube-Goldberg-like moderation policies that would turn it into a timid and lifeless shell.
This, my friends, is nonsense. I have been a member of SOLO for more than a year. I have been, and remain, filled with admiration for what the founders have created: by far the sunniest, happiest, and most interesting place on the Web, a place where all sane opinions (and some less than sane ones) are welcome. (Recently, a few members have begun insulting each other rather than dealing with ideas, and I believe that this must be stopped; it is not what SOLO is intended to be about.)
No one has objected more strongly to the single mistake - note: SINGLE mistake - that Lindsay has made. I intensely dislike the fact that he sometimes loses his temper and says things of a personally insulting nature to people that he should not say, and that his targets too often include people who are blameless. This is beneath him, it does damage to his image and to SOLO, and I sincerely hope that the present situation will be the occasion for him to reconsider this policy. But this is not a reason for some of us to introduce into SOLO the first real malevolence I have seen here: wild accusations and personal insults directed at Linz. I don't know the motives for this malevolence, and I won't speculate. I shall say only:
STOP THE LINZ-BASHING - NOW!
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