Posted on 06/25/2009 12:41:23 AM PDT by ThePythonicCow
Good-bye.
A few months ago, I posted some information on bank financial strength. The post was a complex table and it took me sometime to make the post. Not long after, I forget but perhaps 10 or 20 minutes, the post disappeared. Figuring I made a mistake, I posted it again. This time I was pretty sure I posted it correctly. It disappeared within a few minutes. To verify that this was what was happening, I posted a third time. It again disappeared immediately.
I never received any feedback from FreeRepublic on this matter.
It annoyed me, but since I have always trusted FR, and since I have so far as I know maintained a sterling reputation here as a well behaved citizen for the eight or ten years I've been here, I shook my head in confusion and forgot that incident.
Just tonight I posted a more controversial post involving 9/11. It disappeared within minutes (after I had verified that the post succeeded).
Again, no notice public or private, before or after the fact. Just poof.
Good-bye.
I will cancel future monthly FR donations and leave. I cannot support a political discussion and news site which makes seriously intended posts by long standing contributors of good standing just disappear without notice, public or private, before or after.
The SanityIsland.us site, with some Daily Dose images, will remain around likely for one year, then go away without further notice. I may be reached via email at pj@usa.net (yes, I have excellent spam filters.)
Sites have a right to do as they please, but also a responsibility to stand up for the actions they take, at least involving participants acting in good faith. FR apparently is failing to honor this responsibility.
I would ask that in the future removals of posts made in good faith by members in good standing at least be recognized in private messages to the poster after the fact, stating the approximate cause for removal. Even a 'boilerplate' explanation would be better than nothing.
I wish this fine community and the good people here well. This nation is in dire need of honest reporting and discussion.
The title (thanks MARTIAL MONK for capturing it) was "9/11 FEMA videographer at Ground Zero goes public". The site was silviacattori.net.
But my request stands. The mods should at a minimum send out a canned private message when a member in good standing has a thread pulled, so that the user knows it was a deliberate pull, not a computer glitch or even a failure to even complete the post correctly.
It would have been right around midnight (mountain) because it was first in my IE history for today.
It does seem like an odd circumstance. Perhaps the Mod was being cranky?
One of the best things about FR is the willingness to allow discussion of various viewpoints. Those who want to enforce orthodoxy beyond the unalterable conservative values are actually the problem with conservatism, not the solution.
As John Locke - one of the core conservative philosophers - was clear to point out, ideas both good and bad should be debated. If an idea is truly bad, the debate will expose it. If it is surpressed it will be impossible to rebut in a manner that will be convincing. It is a basic first amendmant tenant.
Those who wish to stifle debate are America’s Taliban on the left and right with the same tactics and same goals.
I really wish you would stay.
cowhide may not be tough enough but you dont really have to go. After all, if you have fun here, maybe it has something to do with the editing (which is the very reason why you want to go)
I kinda like it, it adds to the drama.
Dat’s it. Dat’s what I saw.
Sounds reasonable, but I don't know how much additional work that would entail for the mods.
This reminds me of the Bill Cosby joke about how parents are not interested in justice, they just want quiet. Sounds like that is the philosophy of some mods, too.
I hope you change your mind.
Well said.
But even given that, any veteran here will tell you there are certain subjects/opinions that do not get a good welcome here.
I know for a fact that not all FReepers agree with the official conclusions about 9/11. There are some questions that need asking.
But it is totally up to Jim and the staff whether this is the place to ask them. I can definitely understand not wanting to turn this place in to a 9/11 debating site.
But forum admins should take responsibility for their actions. They don't have to debate them or put them up for votes or even engage in public discussion of particular details.
But silently nuking a message from a user who has over 7000 prior posts over almost nine years, all taken without such problems, is unhealthy for a forum.
Hopefully everyone can clear this up. Don’t need to lose a long time member like yourself.
Keep posting, many will keep reading.
not even good hogwash, and I am usually amused by good hogwash and slick conspiracy theories, but this one is pretty weak
As MARTIAL MONK reported above, if you managed to find an old link to the now dead post and clicked on that link, you get a message stating it was pulled, and (usually) a word or two stating why.
If that message had also been automatically privately messaged to me, as the thread poster, I would have been a happier camper.
And those are?
I read it a few days ago. A few interesting tidbits but no real smoking gun.
I have been away from FreeRepublic more this last year, and had drifted away from the FR position on 9/11 further than I realized. A "post pulled - garbage" message would have been sufficient reminder to me that I was outside what FR chooses to accept.
See ya . . . er . . .
no yitbos
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