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From: tim@hoptoad.uucp (Tim Maroney)
Newsgroups: alt.flame
Subject: Re: Illegal Flame
Message-ID: <3041@hoptoad.uucp>
Date: Wed, 31-Dec-69 18:59:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: hoptoad.3041
Posted: Wed Dec 31 18:59:59 1969
Date-Received: Sat, 26-Sep-87 09:30:01 EDT
References: <315@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM> <3967@well.UUCP> <2983@hoptoad.uucp> <8709190834.AA00278@chex> <3002@hoptoad.uucp> <18322@amdcad.AMD.COM>
Reply-To: tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney)
Organization: Sun Microsystems, TOPS Division, Berkeley
Lines: 45

In article <18322@amdcad.AMD.COM> phil@amdcad.UUCP (Phil Ngai) writes:
>In article <3002@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes:
>This isn't a flame so perhaps I will be flamed for it, but I really
>want to know.
>
>Tim, don't you think there is a difference between trying to get
>someone to voluntarily leave the network and going over their head to
>their boss and having them terminated? Not that I like the brahms gang
>but there seems to be a critical difference in methods here. 

Phil, first of all, which of the following sites of harrassment do you read:
talk.religion.misc, talk.religion.newage, rec.arts.comics,
soc.culture.jewish, soc.women, rec.arts.sf-lovers, alt.drugs?  I have never
seen a message from you in any of these groups or their predecessors.

Second, I think a thought experiment would be in order.  Suppose that you
enjoy going out to eat for dinner, and do so most every night.  Now suppose
that someone decides to follow you to each restaurant you go to, and blow
cigar smoke in your face throughout the meal, chortling after each puff and
saying "What's the matter, gook, can't stand the heat?"  When you finally
decided to stop going to restaraunts because there was no pleasure in doing
so, would that be a voluntary or a coerced choice?  Doesn't it seem likely
you would start asking the manager of the restaraunt to throw the person out
rather than let them destroy all the pleasure of a treasured area of your
life?

There is more to coercion than grabbing someone by the neck and forcing them
to do your will (a point many libertarians seem permanently closed against).
Harrassment is coercion as well, even if no physical restraint is involved.

>It's all very nice for you to flame people from the safety of a
>private machine run by one of the most liberal people around but it
>seems a little cowardly. I only hope Matthew gets an account with
>similar immunity one day.

If I ever commit any of the specific offenses I have described by the Brahms
gang, which clearly step over the line between flaming and harassment, which
you have not responded to, and which I would guess you did not personally
witness, then I would hope that John and Laura would have the sense to
refuse to participate in my criminal activities.  As it is, I haven't
discussed it with John, but Laura at least is well aware of the huge
differences in volume, intent, and method.
-- 
Tim Maroney, {ihnp4,sun,well,ptsfa,lll-crg}!hoptoad!tim (uucp)
hoptoad!tim@lll-crg (arpa)