An unedited right of reply to Troll overload.
Pete has offered me a right of reply to his post Troll Overlord.
I would like to address a couple of points,
Firstly, Pete mentions that I made some memes, or as he called them abusive images, of “people who post here whose identities are known”. Claiming that that was “very dirty from someone who is hiding behind a pseudonym” and “dirty and cowardly for someone who whines at any suggestion their identity could be revealed”.
There is a lot to address here, is it abusive or is it parody? Is anonymity cowardly? Did I whine about protecting my identity?
It is worth pointing out that all three of those pictures were self selected by the subjects, and used as profile shots, on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and a newspaper.
They are in no way “private” photos, all three face the open Internet, and all three appear in Google searches for the name used on this site. In short, there is nothing sinister in accessing these photographs, it requires no deviance or circumvention.
It is also worth pointing out that NZ has no publicity rights to protect a persons image, and the copyright on a photo belongs to the photographer, and clearly none of you took those photo’s. In regards to copyright, NZ copyright law allows a ‘fair use’ exemption for parody.
So is parody ‘dirty’ and ‘abusive’? None of those whose pictures I used seem to think so, two of you have said they enjoyed them and found them amusing (sounds like parody) and Pete copied his, and displayed them proudly.
I realize that you have your faithfull to address and protect Pete, but using such loaded language is doing no one any favours.
Is it a coincidence that those who have been the most aggravating are those whose ego dictates they be identifiable, and are also the same people to have been singled out by ‘another website’. ( I know that one person was “outed” by that site, but in all fairness she had made no effort at all to separate her new id from her original id that was her real name).
Now, as to my idendity. Did I “whine at the suggestion it could be revealed?” Well Pete, you know that’s not true. There has never been the slightest suggestion that my identity is to be revealed, or even could be revealed.
The fact of the matter is that Alan Wilkinson and Mike C incorrectly figured out that I was a) a woman and b) a reasonably prominent public figure. The ‘whining’ Pete says I did was not about my own identity, but the identity that was being attributed to me. I knew that they had it wrong, I wanted to see if they would ‘out’ a public figure. They did.
There is nothing dirty about pseudonyms; they are a fact of life in the modern age. It is my prerogative to keep my identity to myself. It’s a choice I, and nearly every other user of this site, has made. That you post under your real name puts you very much in the minority, both on your own site, and on the wider Internet. You have no real right to single me out or punish me for being anonymous it affects nothing. I cynically interpret your insistence that I contact you as an attempt to squeeze my identity out of me.
As to trolls, you have something of a problem there Pete, as some of your main contributors (looking at you Alan) are quite ‘trolly’, there is an undercurrent of snarky name-calling, and passive-aggressive abuse.
I’ll leave you with a word from the founder of WordPress, and ultimately the real owner of this site, “WordPress.com supports free speech and doesn’t shut people down for ‘uncomfortable thoughts and ideas’
I wouldn’t mind if you release the images, as then people can judge the for themselves whether they are or are not the “abusive images” you say they are.
As to individual comments:
Robbie: They were not “taken in by my game” it was a game of their own making, the only thing I controlled was the timing and that I knew they were wrong. Now it seems you’re ready for a punt on my identity too, I’ll say what I said to Alan “Are you 100% sure that you’re right?”. He seemed to think he was too. I’m sure you’re not.
Pantsdownbrown: Would you like to borrow a pitch fork and flaming torch?
Kittykatkin: I don’t think you quite realize how vacant you come across as, your comments are regularly off on a tangent from the flow of conversation and it’s clear that you don’t read what’s written. I also don’t think you realize quite what a troll you can be yourself, you constantly mention my name when I’m not around, you constantly call me names. Sort out your own garden.
Mike C: You still owe Pete an apology. This was your doing too.
You need to read things before you comment. I’m not sure you even know what happened.
Alan: “nastiness from a few people can’t be allowed to spoil things for everyone” Again, sort out your own garden.
Pete: When analyzing that tweet, and the others that were sent, don’t let your confirmation bias overwhelm you. I know you’d love it if you were right and I was one of those guys, but I’ve told you time and again I’m not.
Pete George
/ 2nd March 2016I disagree with quite a bit of this. I’ll address it when I get the time.
Ben Rachinger
/ 2nd March 2016I have a LOT of respect for your posting this! Very good points put across by MrMan around anonymity, identity and doxing.
Using publicly available information does count as doxing though. I know this from experience and not on the side of the Angels.
One thing though – Pretty sure PG is interested in crossing off who MrMan could be rather than who they are. Court ordered ignorance for the masses and all that.
Cheers.
bjmarsh1
/ 2nd March 2016Ben, that was a bit of a low blow! At least it was not a high tackle. I would rather you were on the side of the angels, but you chart your own course. Remember, as I constantly say, no one knows it all and no-one has the monopoly of the truth
kittycatkin
/ 2nd March 2016I won’t pay it the compliment of replying to it.
bjmarsh1
/ 2nd March 2016mrMan, or should I say mrBoy, as you come across to me. Your disparaging comment to Kittycatkin is not justified by her contributions in the last year or so. To me, you lack the credentials to make any observations of any weight about any subject you choose. Your future absence fromthis blog would be the greatest contribution you can make to it.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Well mrMan, I’m 99% sure that I do know your real identity, but since you choose to comment here as ‘mrMan’, even if I was 100% certain I would keep that info to myself. It is your right to participate here anonymously, and I respect that.
As for Alan and Mike, it may have been ‘a game of their own making’, but you are as guilty as they are for playing along. You are all equally responsible for any consequences of the ‘game’.
Mike C
/ 2nd March 2016@Robby
Well … I am now 100% sure 🙂
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Really?? You were two days ago, and were wrong then. So what has changed?
Mike C
/ 2nd March 2016This is hilarious 🙂
I can’t wait for Pete George to “come back and address this when he gets the time”. LOL.
Pete George
/ 2nd March 2016And I can’t wait until you front up on your part in all of this. It’s time you started taking some responsibility.
Mike C
/ 2nd March 2016@George
I know who they are 🙂
So I am not able to apologize.
Pete George
/ 2nd March 2016Well I’m not able to accept that. And you’re already back to saying you know identities, presumably without evidence again. It looks like you’ve learned nothing. If there’s anything from you about identities of anyone here again then any right to comment may be withdrawn until you show some sense of understanding and responsibility.
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016LAST TIME, I promise. But it’s crying out for it right now.
[That’s not a very good way back into things here, ignoring what I’ve said. How many chances do you expect? PG]
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Snort!
Dougal
/ 2nd March 2016Refer to my comment in Right of Reply..
kittycatkin
/ 2nd March 2016I still don’t know who mrMan are, but I am disappointed that they have reappeared.
Oliver
/ 2nd March 2016Kitty how could you not know? mrMans real name is [No names whether joking or not. PG]
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016That was a fictional character.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Not unlike yourself….
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016……Or you, and nearly everybody else here.
Oliver
/ 2nd March 2016I thought you were Bruce Wayne.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Whatcha mean? I use my real name here
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016Cute,
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Cute how MrMan? It must be really frustrating reflecting on your behavior here over the past few days, and realising that it makes you look much more immature than anyone else here. So much for your ‘big reveal’, huh??? 😉
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016There was never, or is never, going to be a big reveal. This is some rubbish of your own making.
I couldn’t care less what you think of me, and you’re not even thinking of me.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016I suspect there was, but you fucked it all up by getting angry and making a dick of yourself. Oh well, life goes on LMFAO@U 🙂
MrMan
/ 2nd March 2016When you tell me what you are certain of about me, you lose any credibility, as I know exactly how foolish you are being. And you seem to be under the assumption that I’m ‘somebody’. And If so, why would I reveal?
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016@mrMan
I didn’t say I was certain, I said I was 99% sure. And I don’t ‘assume’ anything, because that makes an ASS out of U & ME. So you are saying you’re a nobody? I’m not going to argue with that LOL
bjmarsh1
/ 2nd March 2016MOD. MrMan’s last comment deserves a red card.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Why’s that BJ?
Pantsdownbrown
/ 2nd March 2016What a farce this whole thing is – WHO CARES who Mrman is/isn’t?? What difference does it make? Why do some on here care about who Mrman is but not care who Rob, Oliver, Blazer etc etc may be?
Giving an internet troll with an obvious attention disorder more oxygen is self-defeating.
Iceberg
/ 2nd March 2016Amen. Ban the psycho and move the hell on.
Dougal
/ 2nd March 2016Freudian Slip…”his post Troll Overlord” or deliberate spelling mistake?
Mike C
/ 2nd March 2016@Dougal
Deliberate 🙂
kittycatkin
/ 3rd March 2016Ooh…you are awful ! 🙂
Alan Wilkinson
/ 2nd March 2016I’ll just say I treat people as I find them, mM – and from day to day at that. Perfectly happy either to reflect civility or whatever else I find back to the initiator. Cheers.
bjmarsh1
/ 2nd March 2016We really are getting nowhere as far as this topic is concerned. mrMan has been given too much space and too many opportunities to explain. Time for him/her to say Ta Ta!
Jeeves
/ 3rd March 2016Alas….Freedom of expression- meet BJMarsh.
You won’t get along….
Robby
/ 3rd March 2016Don’t get personal Jeeves, or if you want to, give reasons
Jeeves
/ 3rd March 2016@Robby
Read my other comments to provide context. The comment is self encapsulating. Its not personal- its a response to bjm- he doesn’t like a commenter and wants him banned.
Nelly Smickers
/ 2nd March 2016I really love reading and commenting on this blog, but have stayed well away from this particular argument because I always thought ‘doxing’ was something my grandad did to the new born lambs.
I just asked Wayne if he knew what it meant, and he reckons “it’s something based around the idea that the more you know about someone, the easier it will be to find his or her flaws”
To be honest, I’m still none the wizer 😦
.
Pete Kane
/ 2nd March 2016PG – the right of reply you have offered is very decent indeed. But from whom? I don’t know this person from a bar of soap, because this person decides to conceal their identity. And like it or lump it, an alias/non deplume is the concealment of identity. Meaningless.
Jeeves
/ 3rd March 2016Nom de plume.
In the old days, before the advent of the’pen’, scribes used a feather dipped in ink, a ‘plume’. Nom de plume… the name of the pen, the pen-name.
bjmarsh1
/ 2nd March 2016MOD. Pete, I have a feeling that you need to pull the plug onmrMan. This is your blog, and he/she has become repetitive and more than tiresome. Say goodby to mrMan everyone.
Jeeves
/ 2nd March 2016personally, I don’t give a flying fuck who any of you are.
I don’t care who you are , or if your children die of cancer.
I couldn’t give a fuck.
I don’t know any of you, so you’ll never enter my area of care more than my local dairy owner- because his loved one did die, and I feel a little bit sorry about that.
But it was no big deal- I knew her, and now she’s dead.
So I profoundly apologise in advance, if you care more about me and mine, than I don’t care about you and yours… but that’s just the way it has to be.
And by the way…. 17 children died last week in Peru, when their school bus slid off a cliff.
Ratty
/ 2nd March 2016what did I miss ?
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016Not alot LOL.
kiwi guy
/ 2nd March 2016“Kittykatkin: I don’t think you quite realize how vacant you come across as, your comments are regularly off on a tangent from the flow of conversation and it’s clear that you don’t read what’s written.”
Have to agree 100% with this bit.
Robby
/ 2nd March 2016You disappoint me KG, nothing but a quote and 7 words of worthless opinion. You should apply for a job at the herald LOL
Pickled Possum
/ 3rd March 2016For a person with a big brain KG you are sometimes just a Jerk.
Pete George
/ 3rd March 2016My response to mrMan:
It’s irrelevant where you got them from. You took someone’s image from elsewhere and added abusive or provocative text to them. You posted them amongst 30-40 posts on the same day, mostly abusive. The photos were used to attack people.
It’s got nothing to do with copyright. It’s to do with fair use here, and I think it was part of a period of sustained abuse so was unacceptable.
I don’t care how others responded, it was your behaviour I was addressing. And note that how people respond publicly wand what they feel can be quite different. Steven Joyce’s response to the dildo throwing is a good example of that. He may not have been offended or he may have not wanted to show it. Many people would be offended by an attack like that.
That sounds like a dirty accusation in the way you have expressed it. My aim is to protect Your NZ as a reasonable and a safe place to speak for everyone who respects that.
You talking about loaded language is a bit ironic.
“Whose ego dictates they be identifiable” is a cheap shot. I have chosen to be identifiable on principle, I am prepared to stand by anything I do or say and to me that was important in politics and in what I was doing. I think a blog run by an anonymous person or people has less credibility.
I’ve put my identity on the line, and it turns out at great personal cost due to the malicious actions of some.
I believe you did.
I agree that was unwise on their part, especially Mike C who is well aware of my views on guessing identities.
But you escalated it substantially by appearing to confirm it. I had no choice but to treat it as potentially true because of that, which took up my time, intruded on an MPs time, and changed some vague and silly speculating into something far more serious.
I agree in general. But if someone using a pseudonym attacks known people in a personal way then it can get dirty. It can get very dirty, and cowardly.
Using a pseudonym responsible is fine, hiding behind one to attack others is not.
I agree.
Probably but many people do choose to post under their real names or under pseudonyms that are openly connected to real people.
I didn’t single you out for being anonymous, you singled yourself out with your unacceptable and excessive trolling.
Most people use their anonymity responsibly, you didn’t.
That’s incorrect. As you know it’s easy to contact me or anyone without revealing your identity.
I didn’t insist you contact me. I gave you that as an option if you wanted to comment here again. You’d proven to be behaving quite irresponsibly and I needed an assurance that behaviour wouldn’t continue.
It’s a bit rich for you to point the finger at others.
I have decided to do more to limit the ‘freedom’ of some to abuse in order to give more freedom to the majority to comment without abuse.
That sounds fine. That doesn’t describe your behaviour.
I’m not going to do that. I will show somew of the comments you associated with people’s photos:
“Trolls be trollin”
“First rate Genius? Probably retarded”.
A petty personal attack. And ironic.
I agree.
I’ve never claimed or thought you were him. But your behaviour was quite similar to his in ways (albeit distinctively different characteristics), and it was feeding into the whole dirty attack type behaviour that they are infamous for. I was likening your behaviour to their behaviour, and your feeding of some of the worst around.
Nelly Smickers
/ 3rd March 2016This may also throw some light on the situation 😀
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Mr.+Man
MrMan
/ 3rd March 2016This one?
3
Mr. Man
The epitome of what every man wants to be or wishes they were! Pure walking sex!
you might be on to something.
Nelly Smickers
/ 3rd March 2016I just asked my hubby what he thort – Wayne reckons 4.
he might be on to something 😀