[pct-l] room4successrumor2ogres

[charliethorpe@worldnet.att.net (Charlie Thorpe)]

Hello All -

I find myself more than a little disturbed by events on PCT-L of the past
week.  I have sat on my typing hands for a number of days for a number of
reasons:

I guessed that Jim (Owen) might have spent the weekend at the Ruck,
I wanted to let our moderator have plenty of time to do his thing,
I wanted let the thread play on the list long enough to see where it is
heading, and
I wanted to make sure that I did not post in the heat of the moment.

I had hoped that we would see a change in the tone of Jim's postings.  In
fact, I had even hoped that Jim would sheepishly admit to a caffeine binge
during a late-night stand and would present a different face to the list.

It hasn't happened...and I feel that my idealistic (and perhaps naive)
views of my responsibilities of list-citizenship won't let me sit quietly
any longer.

Jim, I have enjoyed your postings on four different email lists.  I
particularly like your willingness to look at some of the "head banging"
issues related to thruhiking.  I find that I agree with much of what you
write and am always interested in reading your stuff.

Until now.  I have gone back and reread your responses to the way that
other folks have reacted to your "Thruhiking - What if...?" thread more
than once.   In this case, I think that you are way out of line.

I think this way for both ethical and practical reasons.

The ethical part comes from a realization that we have no "rules" for
discourse on PCT-L.  We have only a very basic "Intro" that we all get when
we subscribe.  No list guidelines, no list philosophy, no list policy, no
active moderation...no detailed "cando's" and "can't-do's" of any stripe.
We kinda have to make our own way using social conventions that have grown
up over time...from "netiquette" to the Golden Rule.  I must admit that I
kinda like the freedom that this gives us, but I also tend to feel the
resulting personal responsibility to do my share in helping to keep the
list a good place to visit.

It is my observation that your continued personal attacks on bj have gone
way beyond any form of "netiquette" that is practiced in any civilized
email forum that I am familiar with...and you dang sure haven't been
willing to follow the Golden Rule.  To be real blunt about it, it looks to
me like you are allowing yourself to slide into becoming an email bully.  I
do feel that there are important (and obvious) ethical reasons why this is
inappropriate behavior on PCT-L or any other list.

It is my considered opinion that you owe bj a public apology for the
unethical way that you have treated her on PCT-L.

The practical part comes from my convictions that email lists are a truly
significant modern phenomenon.  I am very interested in the way that this
highly interactive and potentially very iterative communication medium can
be made to work for us.  I very much like the way that email forums have
clumped up around different areas of interest (the PCT in this case) and
how they allow very easy and almost instantaneous communication within the
area of focus.

At a very basic level, our list can do quite a valuable job of sharing our
own direct knowledge about nitty-gritty trail stuff (gear, snow, recipes,
trail conditions, etc.).  At a different level, we can all share our
opinions about potentially important PCT-related issues...perhaps even
helping each other broaden our thinking on topics that we haven't thought
much about before.  At an even higher level, we can sometimes even do
something that is quite special...we can bounce ideas off of each other
until we all come to some new realization that simply wouldn't have
happened without the list.  For me, this all adds up to a pretty powerful
communication medium.

Being a practical kind of guy, it didn't take me long to discover a basic
binary "truth" for myself:

help the above communication process...GOOD
hinder the above communication process...BAD

The process is extraordinarily simple.  Somebody decides to post a message
to the list (either information or opinion).  This posting is ALWAYS an
invitation for others to respond (some might call it a "troll"...I prefer
to think of it as a willingness to put our stuff up for "peer review" <g>).
So somebody else does respond.

Responses can range from enthusiastic agreement to serious disagreement to
"hey, that made me think of..."  In the continuum between the first two
cases the fundamental "rule of logic" provides us with an excellent
yardstick to measure the validity of our response (in the third, anything
goes <g>).

One of the logical fallacies is particularly BAD for our email
communication process.  If you don't happen to be familiar with it, go to
Hogeye Bill's Dictionary of Logical Fallacies (www.hogeye.com) and look up
Argumentum Ad Hominem...IMHO, we are upperlip-deep in it right about now on
PCT-L.

One of the neat things about these email forums is that all parties present
the "face" to the list that they choose...we are always who we SAY we
are...no more no less.  The good news is that we are working with a "blind"
communication medium (no body language, no social context, no demographics,
etc.)...we all get to be the email "persona" we choose to be.  The bad news
is that we are working with a "blind" communication medium...we really
never have a clue as to who we are talking to.  What we write in our email
messages is EXACTLY all that the other guy ever gets.

Badgering bj about her "Rangerness" is silly...you don't have to be a
Ranger to respect much of the work that the managing agencies do (take me,
for example)...and...her Ranger tendencies are just one of the MANY things
that you don't know about bj.  She could be a 60 year-old
backcountry-hating latino male DIS spook who is hunting for engineers who
are security risks on government projects, for all we know <g>.  (Don't
worry, bj...I didn't give anything away...you don't "sound" latino to
me...)

You made the statement that bj made "nothing less than an unprovoked and
totally baseless attack on what I wrote" and have carried the discussion
off into what is becoming a very personal vendetta against bj.  I went back
and reviewed your original posting and the subthreads that some 20
PCT-L'ers have joined into...and then I went back and read them again.  I
can't find that "attack" anywhere.  I did find places where bj and others
had the temerity to disagree with some aspects of the content of your
opinions...shoot I even disagree with a couple of them, myself.  That's
what the list is all about...start out with some good ideas and then good
peer review helps make them into even better ideas!  If you don't want this
kind of peer review on your stuff, then post the messages to a web site
(great for one-way communication) instead of an email forum (great for
umpteen-way communication)!

I am in awe of your "Ogre" posting.  I couldn't believe it when I read
it...at least five pounds of well-crafted and creative story telling...and
five more pounds of some of the darndest rationalizing of bad manners and
poor list citizenship that I have ever seen.

Jim...please...step back and take ten deep breaths...and then consider the
chilling effect that your actions are having on the communication process
on PCT-L.  I have been puzzled for some time as to why this list hasn't
seemed able to ever to make it through a discussion of one of the "serious"
issues that has folks polarized.  I have come to the conclusion that PCT-L
is seriously hampered (neutered, if you will) by all the private sidebar
discussions that tend to take place when one of these issues is raised.
Abusive responses to postings we disagree with drives the discussion even
further underground.  Your actions contribute to the gutting of the
list...IMHO, that makes them BAD.

All that being said, I am encouraged by the clear thinking and
unwillingness to be bullied by some who joined in the "success", "room4",
and "rumors" subthreads.  I am not saying that I agree with all the ideas
presented...just that I admire the guts it takes to post when a bully is
out there using an email sledgehammer to swat email flies.  Gad...

I will be most happy to discuss any aspect of this posting with anyone.  I
reserve the right to bring any private email that I might get on this
thread to the public list.  I prefer to keep any such discussion on the
list so that we can get the appropriate peer review of all seventeen sides
of the issue.

That is all that I have to say about that.           ...For now <g>.

- Charlie II  AT (MEGA'93)
             PCT (Mex@Can'95)
        Chipping away at the CDT




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