Everyone {{{WAVE}}} and say Peek-a-boo! I see you!
Of course, many people do monitor threads to see if anyone is talking about them. They also bookmark people they believe talk about them and check. Some even regularly peek to check what the people they have placed on [IGNORE] might be said about them. Sometime it seems that someone with nothing better to do offers a special service alerting others to posts about them that the others would never have seen otherwise. There have been a couple of funny incidents when one such lurker thought something posted to a thread was about them and then went ballistic elsewhere about it only to find out that it wasn't about them.
I can definitely understand how such a thing can happen, particularly to someone who specializes in surreptitiously generating discussion about subjects and posters on a thread other than the one inhabited by the posters discussing the subject. Based on 10 years experience on SI, this is usually accomplished by not naming names and, if caught in the act, the instigator inevitably writes eloquent essays on the importance of internet etiquette (as defined and interpreted by the writer, of course). In this curious world view, using names, quotes and links while publicly commenting in one public forum on comments made in another public forum is considered "talking behind someone's back."
For some reason, I find this hilariously funny. Publicly talking about what someone wrote elsewhere in public and saying who wrote it is talking behind someone's back, but publicly talking about what someone wrote elsewhere while attempting to disguise the fact that an absent person is being discussed is not. Does anyone else find this illogical?
Of course, some defenders of this "not talking publicly behind someone's back" have also defended privately talking behind someone's back, because it is, you know, private. Well, it seems to me that, when I was a child, I learned that the latter was exactly what was meant when someone was advised not to talk behind someone's back. Until the age of the internet, I guess. Or moral relativism, perhaps, as in "Whatever I do is moral. Whatever you do is not." In any event, most people do it (talk privately behind other people's backs), but I'm surprised how many people are willing to shout from the rooftops that they not only actively engage in it but relish and cherish their engagements therein.
On reflection, I believe that talking about an absent person on another thread, or a discussion going on elsewhere, is not talking behind someone's back - it is discussing public statements of interest to those people participating wherever they happen to be. I also believe that talking about an absent person or discussion elsewhere, but disguising those remarks in some way (such as not naming names) is not quite the same thing, but it is definitely sneaky. The obvious intent is to hide the genuine target or subject of the remarks, as some defenders of such actions in the past, dating back before the introduction of the first coffee shop thread, have publicly stated.
Having said this, I understand that most people, including myself, are not always thrilled at the discovery that others are publicly talking about them elsewhere. When confronted with it, they can ignore it, invite the participants over to the place of origin, or join the conversation at the place of discovery. In my experience, any attempts to stifle unwelcome discussions tend to inflame and extend those discussions.(YMMV)
If publicly talking about public statements of absent people, or an ongoing discussion going on elsewhere, and providing links to those people and/or discussions is so obviously and positively reprehensible, I must ask why is that no one has spoken up, or organized opposition or a boycott of the tens of thousands (if not hundreds of thousands weblogs) read by millions of people worldwide. Almost all weblogs are repositories of discussions of issues raised in public elsewhere, ongoing discussions on other weblogs, and public statements about public statements made by bloggers, politicians, and other public and private persons elsewhere. Where's the outrage? The widespread condemnation by the self-selected protectors of propriety and internet etiquette? My guess is that they are too busy playing Peek-a-boo, posting copyrighted material to public forums without permission, not to mention linking to and discussing weblog commentary and authors, to have noticed.
Peek-A-Boo! I see you! {{{WAVE}}}} Caught you looking! You are so cute when you blush! |
