Donaldshock (was Re: First Choices tiebreaker)

[Mike Ossipoff]

Yes, a new mailing-list would be a good solution. Not necessarily
moderated, though that would be ok, but at least with behavioral
standards.

Rob mentioned free-speech & censorship, but no one's saying
that Don should be arrested for or legally forbidden to
say what he wants. But I don't think the Supreme Court intended
to imply that, in the name of freedom of speech, a discussion-group,
such as EM, should be burdened by ignorant, arrogant blather, from
someone who consistently shows contempt for the rules of fair
discussion that he's been asked to observe, and contempt for
the list itself. And remember that we're talking about more
than just disorderly discussion, because it's disorderly discussion
with continual personal abuse accompanying the disorerly
discussion. (Someone could say that I've insulted Don too, but
not as a substsitute for legitimate discussion, and only after
Don's offensive behavior had been going on for some time).

So it seems to me that the best solution would be to drop
Don from the list, realizing that it wouldn't violate his
right to free speech. Next best would be to start another
list. Or at least a "group-reply" group, with its members
names in the Cc: line. Someone sends a message to each
member, and replies use the "group reply" option. In this
way it wouldn't be necessary for anyone to actually
set up a new list. Anyone willing to receive unfiltered
junkmail could remain on the list that Don is on.


Mike




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