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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Constant Reader who wrote (23432)	8/20/2001 4:24:59 PM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

It has been said that in humor is the greatest truth. Actually, frankly, at the time, given the way she had been posting for a year or two, it wasn't in the least clear whether she was being funny or not. I know you don't get that from a few comments, and maybe she did think they were funny, but I'm not sure the liberal establishment accepts that defense. It certainly doesn't in the hostile workplace environment context -- tell sexist jokes and no matter how funny you think you're being, the court will find that you were engaged in sexual discrimination. Shall we begin quoting your various humorous posts as serious conversation? You're welcome to. Just make sure that where there is a LOL or <g> or smiley face or something in my post that you include that. If I'm being funny, I try to make that very clear. I'm sure I miss on occasion. But if you follow through the set of posts I put up, there's not a single LOL of <g> or anything inthem to indicate she was just kidding. And they were perfectly in line with the persona she was presenting at the time.

To: Constant Reader who wrote (23432)	8/20/2001 4:26:52 PM
From: one_less	Respond to of 82486

Hi CR, Even I thought they contained some humor. But, in context they made X's point that she did not value human's beyond their utility to her. I have found X to be quite thoughtful and clear, even personable at times, and very out of the blue mean at others. Seems to me I remember her identifying herself philosophically as a nihilist in the past (not totally sure, notice "seems"). Here is American Heritage the subject: " A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated." Seems similar to how X might self described her position on things. I kind of admired X's boldness about her nihilism and regard for what I consider principles of truth and living. I don't get this victim's advocacy mission of E's.

To: Constant Reader who wrote (23432)	8/20/2001 5:57:24 PM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Something about your message occurred to me while I was pounding away on the treadmill that hadn't at the time. What you didn't say seems as important as what you did say. What you didn't say was that the posts I cited didn't support brees's statements. I don't want to put words into your keyboard, but it seems to me that you are implicitly agreeing that from those posts it was not unreasonable for brees to have concluded, if he believed that X was writing truthfully and not jokingly, that his conclusions about X were one possible valid interpretation of her posts. Not the only one. Not necessarily the objectively "right" one (if such a thing exists, which X would probably argue against since she has argued, in general terms, that all right and wrong is subjective). But one possible valid interpretation. I don't want to belabor this point, but I think it is meaningful in moving the discussion from "did X ever say things that could have been construed to justify the positions brees attributed to her" to "well, yes, she said those things but brees should have known she was only joking." That does change the posture of the discussion somewhat, IMO.