Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!phri!dasys1!msmith From: msmith@dasys1.UUCP (Mark E. Smith) Newsgroups: soc.women,news.sysadmin,misc.legal Subject: Re: Larry Lippman vs. Mark Ethan Smith Message-ID: <1602@dasys1.UUCP> Date: Fri, 9-Oct-87 22:04:00 EDT Article-I.D.: dasys1.1602 Posted: Fri Oct 9 22:04:00 1987 Date-Received: Mon, 12-Oct-87 01:40:36 EDT References: <1939@midas.TEK.COM> <1514@dasys1.UUCP> <7070@eddie.MIT.EDU> <7078@eddie.MIT.EDU> <2074@kitty.UUCP> <995@maynard.BSW.COM> Reply-To: msmith@dasys1.UUCP (Mark Ethan Smith) Organization: The Big Electric Cat Lines: 64 Summary: Larry Campbell sticks her nose in. Xref: mnetor soc.women:7660 news.sysadmin:398 misc.legal:3067 In article <995@maynard.BSW.COM> campbell@maynard.UUCP (Larry Campbell) writes: >to illuminate. I also find Mark >Smith intensely obnoxious, but that alone isn't reason for me or anyone >else to try to deny her net access. How >[...] >Larry Lippman is a jerk (or worse), or the quote is accurate, in which case >Miss Smith could well be looking at the wrong end of a solid libel suit. > >I don't think there's much more worth saying until we hear Mark Smith's >statement regarding the above quote. Well, Mark? What say you? It happens that many years ago I had a close friend who had a friend whose name was the same or phonetically identical to Lippman's. This friend, who had once been busted for pornography, regaled me with tales of his friend Larry, whom I've never met. When this Lippman came on the net and was incredibly rude, made thinly disguised personal attacks, and disregarded netiquette for the purpose of disrupting soc.women, I noticed that this one also was a defender of pornography and wondered if they could be the same person. If you'll go back to my original article, I stated that if this is *not* the same person, I could hardly be held liable for mistaking one defender of pornography for another of the same name and similar attitudes. Now Larry Campbell sees only two alternatives. She suggests that either this is the same Lippman I'd heard of, or that I'm facing a libel suit. Miss Campbell should study the original article, and the responses by others, before she assumes that there are only two alternatives. Lippman has suggested there might be a mistaken identity and given several reasons why, but has not denied being the same person. I agree that there might be a mistaken identity, as I stated to begin with, but if we are awaiting anyone's denial, it would be Larry the Lip's, not Larry the Camp's, or mine. Porn is a nine billion dollar a year business in this country, despite the fact that nobody we know ever buys any. And my local phonebook has 4 Lipman's, 4 Lippman's, and 2 Lippmann's, so if I made a reasonable mistake in thinking that this defender of porn is a person who is also a defender of porn and has the same or a similar name and similar attitudes towards women, I could be expected to apologize, but I doubt if I could be held legally liable for such a mistake, if it was a mistake. Of course I wonder how many computer professionals can swear under oath that they never produced porn for friends. Never ran off a printout of a naked woman? Never showed an x-rated video for business associates? Well I'm proud of all three of you, but you're not the ones involved in this little discussion. Look how many men take particular delight in exposing my sex. Do you think they are not doing that because I'm a woman? Do you think that they do this without thinking it harmless and good clean fun to sexually expose women? I highly recommend Anthony Astrachan's 1986 book by Anchor Press/Doubleday, entitled, "How Men Feel," for an excellent exposition of the reasons men sexualize women, particularly in the workplace and in other places where sex is not relevant, like here. And if anyone is confused as to why Miss Campbell used diminutive terms to refer to me, and why I used them right back at her, I recommend reading the past year of articles in soc.women. Please direct follow-ups only to soc.women. Come to think of it, wasn't Campbell one of the ones disturbed about cross-posting? ;-) --Mark -- Mark Ethan Smith {allegra,philabs,cmcl2}!phri\ Big Electric Cat Public Unix {bellcore,cmcl2}!cucard!dasys1!msmith New York, NY, USA {philabs}!tg/