Old T4T forum is no more.

[pbrower2a]

(07-13-2016, 11:07 PM)jadams Wrote:

(07-13-2016, 08:49 PM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(07-13-2016, 08:34 PM)beechnut79 Wrote: I have often wondered if one of the reason that the old forum was shut down was because so many people had begun to use it for personal attack.

That often happens.

There was one creep, a vile antisemite (Holocaust denier) who accused me at a tough point in my life of being a homosexual child molester. Because I had no problem with homosexuality I let the accusation of homosexuality slide by. But child molestation?

I had recently been a substitute teacher and wanted to go back to that line of work after I had ceased being a caretaker for my recently-deceased mother who had died of Parkinsonism (she was in a nursing home and she needed either my father or me to be there so that she could be fed at he meals. I was scared that an accusation of child sexual abuse of any kind would ruin my potential for a career that I actually enjoyed.

I told that creep that I had gone to church. In a session in which people were talking about their concerns mostly of health and finances I noticed that the youth minister was getting little attention. My concern was very different from cancer, heart disease, and other often-terminal illnesses. The youth minister heard my concern, and we decided to pray... for the troll who was tormenting me. I am not a homosexual and I can imagine far worse, let alone a child abuser. The problem wasn;t with me.   After all, it seemed like something that one of my heroes, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., did about his enemies. Pray for the segregationist or the Klansman, the person who needs the most help from God.

I posted such on the Forum and he mocked me. "You, f@g! Praying for me! What a hypocrite!"

Maybe the power of prayer is over-rated.  Some people just don't get the message.

hi pbrower, i was so shocked when I could not find the forum.  Could not figure out how it disappeared so suddenly.  I tried emailing Howe but never hear anything.  Kept searching and finally found you when this place opened up.  I was surprised at my reaction to the loss of the forum as i rarely post anymore.  But love seeing the old familiar handles and seeing their posts again.  Especially since things are getting so deep into crisis mode.  Every once in a while I think I see signs of regeneracy, but it will be suddenly yanked away.  I think one side is just going to have to totally annihilate the other side before there can be any chance of getting anything done again.

When the Crisis ends, people like that creep either will dominate America (which I think unlikely -- same-sex marriage and related gay and transgender rights have won once and for all) or will be completely out in the cold, which is far more likely. That creep will know that he is an idiot in the original sense of the word -- out on his own, an army of one fool that the rest of humanity considers a useless, sick joke.

I predict that the Internet will become increasingly family-friendly, and someone who tries to use it to defame whole groups or libel persons will raise warnings.  But even as the Crisis Era well defines itself with a focus, someone like that troll will find out the hard way how unwelcome he is. He will end up off the grid, a pariah and not a world-renouncing hermit.