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This will be my final interaction with this site, which I have supported for several years. I even tried to lead a capital campaign to help support it barely a week ago, contributing a significant sum of my own money. It was a good attempt at an experiment.

Unfortunately, the past few days have reminded me that several of the admins and editors of this site have agendas that I disagree with. As I noted in previous journal entries, I strongly value civil discourse. I will admit that having perhaps a half dozen outbursts in my time here (usually when I was also under some personal stress), but none of us are infallible. Other than that, in my thousands of comments here, 99% of them have been trying to be productive, insightful, informative, and occasionally funny. I have never posted insincerely. I have never argued in bad faith. Once in a while, I will also admit to going a bit overboard in responding to a post that was acting like a jerk by acting a bit like a jerk in return, though I probably only went overboard to that extent a dozen times or so at most. Again, 99% of the time, I was trying to maintain a cool head and help promote better discussion on this site. My post history is there for all to see.

Several editors and admins here over time have questioned their commitment to civil discourse. Note that I have never advocated for getting rid of ACs or deleting comments or anything on that level. I believe in the idea of free speech, but I also believe that a community has a right to choose to listen to said speech or not. I believe moderation is intended to be a way to highlight to the community types of posts that are more likely to be valuable to the community, along with noting those that are disruptive as well as of low value to the community. As a recent thread has shown, there's a lot of disagreement in the community about the appropriate use of downmods, particularly (but not exclusively) the use of "troll" mods.

One takeaway I had from reading through the hundreds of comments on that thread is that there were several members of the community who used "troll" mods for things that aren't strictly trolling (according to some standard definitions), but they felt they had no other choices among the moderation options that fit the problematic quality of said posts. Quite a few of those posts were upmodded, many to +5, indicating that many in the community approved of these non-standard uses of certain downmods to address problematic posts. MartyB took a pragmatic and reasonable outlook in his first editorial commentary too -- calling some individual moderation decisions "small potatoes." I agree with him that no moderation will ever be perfect, and some people will always moderate in a way that other disapprove of. I've also argued in the past that individual moderation of individual comments should have less impact on community consensus of reputation (i.e., "karma"), particularly from one user directed repeated at another user. We seem to have solved that problem through occasional intervention with modbombs, but I think it's a larger problem that karma should truly be a reflection of community consensus from many users over time, while individual posts should be downmodded (or upmodded) at will for their quality, without a strong judgment that effectively is an "award" or "punishment" for behavior.

Janrinok was a notable dissenter in some of this early discussion, arguing that inappropriate use of moderation is a severe problem here and effectively viewing it as a sort of free speech issue. I sincerely disagree that it is anything like a free speech issue. Moderation reflects community consensus around posts. If we feel that a single mod is giving too much power in foregrounding or hiding some posts, then maybe we should consider expanding the range of post scores a bit. Janrinok seemingly doesn't get (or is willfully blind to) the fact that bad actors can overall lower our discourse here significantly, regardless of whether they meet some strict definition of "trolling" or whatever.

Janrinok the other day said:

If we cannot strive to meet the standards that we set ourselves 4 or 5 years ago then many will leave our community. One of the ways that we maintain standards is by having a moderation system that allows comments to be identified as being of good, or bad, quality.

We do NOT have moderations that allow comments to be identified as "bad." We have moderations that allow comments to be identified as "good," as well as punishment moderations that identify things that aren't really comments -- just games that trolls and such play. Actual comments that are "bad" -- like displaying factually incorrect information, or comments that are basically "non-responsive," or comments that clearly don't even understand an issue that's being discussed -- we have no way of downmodding those without using a questionably appropriate "punishment" mod. I'm not saying we should necessarily have such moderations as downmods. Maybe they should be neutral (like "disagree"). I don't have the answers. But we don't actually have effective ways of identifying bad comments, only disruptive interactions like spam and trolling that don't really even count as comments.

To be clear, I agree with Janrinok in that I don't want people to moderate solely based on difference of opinion. I do think it's right to downmod for several reasons I will outline below. Quoth Janrinok again:

If, however, that is what the community wants then we must be prepared to say goodbye to many of those who make valuable contributions to the discussions and, more importantly, are probably responsible for a significant part of the donations that we rely on to keep running.

Well, I'm leaving, because we aren't calling out the trolls ENOUGH. So take that as you will.

I know I'm not the only one because I spent much of the past week arguing with ACs and registered users on this site who feel that their voices are suppressed or that this site has been taken over politically. I defended this site, as I always had in the past, because I believed in the moral integrity at least of our site managers. However, I no longer believe that to be the case; hence my departure.

The Mighty Buzzard -- the other admin who was very active and vocal in the above-linked thread -- explicitly came out in favor of promoting hate-speech on this site. I know that "hate-speech" is a trigger word for some of you conservative folks, but (again) as I said above, I'm not arguing for any speech to be banned on this site. And I know that the term "hate-speech" is frequently used very broadly. But it is wrong to say, as TMB says, that "offense can only be taken, not given." There are things that civilized society understands are problematic within civil discourse. In the U.S., it is illegal to incite a riot. It does not fall under First Amendment speech protection to do so. One similar act in an internet forum is the type of speech that incites flamewars or otherwise disrupts discussion. I brought up the example of Jmorris (although I didn't name him), who commonly posts here both in insightful and trollish manners. But one thing he frequently does is to throw in some random anti-Semitic comment. This is not something one does in civil discourse. It's not intended to be funny. I'm not sure whether it's always serious or sometimes trolling, but it's just not productive to discussion here. It should be downmodded, regardless of any other contributions the comment makes. To not do so is like accepting a student in the class who volunteers to come up and work a problem on the board for everyone's benefit, but then urinates on the wall. You don't celebrate (or upmod) such behavior, regardless of how good his solution to the problem was.

And yet, TMB says it's not a problem. Maybe if such a comment gets to +5, we might consider modding it down as overrated, but otherwise an admin of our site is fine with high-scoring anti-Semitic comments here. In other comments, TMB made clear that he is also fine with high-scoring false information on this site. Yes, he argues that one way to combat false information is to provide correct information in reply. But he sees nothing wrong with that false information post continuing to have a high score.

Janrinok -- pay specific attention to that, because it is precisely what Azuma was trying to explain to you. That attitude is a "post-truth" attitude. It is an attitude where "all opinions should be heard," even when they are objectively and factually wrong. But it is a way that civil discourse is disrupted and ultimately destroyed as one cannot tell what is true and false anymore. We are living in a society where that breakdown is occurring -- whatever scores high in social media is what gets passed around as "truth." TMB wants that here as well. Furthermore, if such posts carry along a little extra negativity about the "Jews" or some other racial/ethnic/whatever slurs, no problem! As long as it a post says something of value, it deserves a high score in our community. We're supporting a bunch of jerks who just want to say something clever and then piss on the wall. Yes, that's what this site is.

You combine these things with an argumentation strategy that consists mostly of bluster -- just ignore any useful points or clarifications your opponents make, and steamroll through as if you are right, frequently acting calm while gradually pushing the edge to get people to accept more and more of your bullshit -- this is the strategy of self-identified trolls like Milo, who TMB supported in the past. Whether or not we want to use some sort of strict definition of "troll" that includes this stuff, it's a term that encompasses the behavior of people use self-consciously have used the word, like Milo. It's about a campaign of disinformation, of insincere argumentation, of getting people to accept bad actors as the norm, of pissing on the wall while objecting that you are a "good guy" for solving the problem on the board if anyone complains.

TMB has admittedly behaved himself a bit more in the past year or so, a trend which I have noted in the past. But when he comes out and says such things -- advocating pissing on the wall in this community as behavior that should be scored highly and not downmodded -- there needs to be swift and decisive action from the admins here. TMB is a liability to this site, specifically. In recent days, I've come to also question the behavior and opinions of other admins here too. I'd like to believe that the majority of editors and admins here are still acting with good faith, but with a known troll in your midst who is so prominent on this site, it is impossible to maintain integrity. I have come to realize that the ACs I fought this week to convince them of the values of this site, and even unhinged folks like Aristarchus, have a serious and legitimate point about the integrity of this site. As Azuma and others argued, the admins can't just ignore bad behavior from TMB and others in their midst, as well as the various occasional trolls here who are not admins -- they must call it out consistently and swiftly. And those who are granted privileges as admins, editors, etc. who cannot promote the integrity of this site need to be publicly called out and have privileges revoked, unless you want any user here to assume that their behavior is to be imitated and normalized on this site. (And it is not enough for TMB to say, "I don't have any say in what's posted" or whatever. He's one of the most prominent posters on this site and also everyone knows he's an admin of some sort -- his behavior needs to reflect the propriety of this site, if it retains any integrity anymore.)

I really did not intend this post to begin as a complaint primarily about TMB. Because he's only a small part of the problem. The problem here is the attitude that agrees with him, that doesn't value truth but instead is only about "winning" arguments, that encourages trolling and bad-faith posting on a whim, that says "meh" when disruptive and hateful speech is normalized. Once again, I am not arguing for censorship or deletion of posts. You have a right to say what you want. You do not, however, have the right to demand that others listen to you. As Acid Andy remarked insightfully on the "troll" mod thread linked above, I've seen very few troll mods on posts here that make legitimate arguments or state opinions in a respectful manner. (Perhaps the most insightful post among the hundreds there.) It's not about Emily Post fake etiquette, but it is about a culture of respect. This can be a place that enjoys an "off-color" joke occasionally without also promoting random anti-Semitic screeds. It can be a place that people can have sincere politicized disagreement without modding up false information. It can be a place that people assume good faith and try to respond with good faith, but also one that downmods those who act in bad faith or disrupt.

And sometimes those latter moderations can be wrong -- but listen to MartyB's original point above, as well as consider other ways to solve that moderation problem. Moderation should not be about reward or punishment: it should raise up the comments that are good for the community and lower those which are not useful to the community. That should be the intent, even if imperfect.

Lastly, I have severe concerns about the integrity of this site's governance. For years, as reflected in my posts, I have defended the integrity of process on this site. I do believe most admins and editors are likely acting in good faith. But my experience two days ago when I announced I was leaving created a rather disturbing situation. I do not feel it fair to leave this site without pointing out the potential danger to this community.

TMB posted one of his typical "ignore your points and just act like I'm correct and responded to you" posts, and admittedly I responded with a shouty and angry post. (That was also in response to some of his other posts referenced above.) I'm not proud of my reply, but I simply do not otherwise know how to react when an admin and prominent member of this community makes statements that so clearly go against what I believe about civil discourse. So, I wrote a journal post (not as long as this one) calling the other admins to action against TMB, to stand up to him. I also called out some of the stuff Janrinok said for criticism. I then declared I was leaving, and submitted my journal.

The next morning (yesterday), I woke up and just was curious to see the fallout, if any. I came to this site as an AC at first and tried to find the journal entry. It was gone. I logged in, and I still could not find it. I posted about it, because it was incredibly disturbing to me and a true affront to free-speech on this site. But I could see how after my attempt to run a sort of "pledge drive" last week, my financial and comment contributions, and my repeated defense of the integrity of this site... after all of that, a journal entry publicly announcing my departure due to severe problems with the admins of this site could be a public-relations problem. I never believed TMB or his allies would go so far, but there was the evidence in front of me.

I know that those reading this have to take my words on faith that I actually posted this journal, and it has been deleted. I know it's not TMB's usual modus operandi. I don't even know it was him. I just know that previously when I "took a break" from this site, I left for quite a while (and didn't even read comments), so maybe someone expected that I would do so this time and just wanted to get rid of the evidence. Now there's too many admins paying attention to this issue for something like that to transpire with this journal entry. (I hope.)

There are reasons why I specifically remember how I made this post and why I'm sure it was rightly submitted, which I've explained here. I don't have a screenshot or anything as corroborating evidence, but several things about this whole situation are weird (as I noted).

Some will brand me as a liar or conspiracy theorist or whatever for saying this. I know this. I'm just telling you, honestly, what I believe -- and that is that the integrity of this site is seriously breached and that I now believe it's possible many of the ACs (and even Aristarchus) who tried to tell me of the serious flaws in the management of this site are actually correct.

I leave this as a warning to the community. I encourage you all to seek out other forums and to leave this place, if you value integrity. Again, I can only offer my years of good comments and good behavior on this site as proof that I do NOT make such accusations lightly. Absent a serious audit and purge of some of the managers of this site, I see no other remedy.

I personally have also realized that my individual efforts are better directed at something productive online, rather than arguing about and rehashing divisive and polarized bullshit over and over. For years before I became active here, I contributed much more actively to a question-and-answer site online (which, notably, has much more successful moderation than here, though it's a bit more draconian, if entirely community-enforced). Yesterday, after alerting the community here of the breach of ethics, I spent a few hours there answering questions to help people who needed help. For the first time in a while, I actually felt good about my online activity. There are a lot of bright people here: I encourage you to consider devoting your energy to projects that will advance knowledge, value facts, try to understand others' positions rather than "win" arguments, and promote civil discourse in the world. The only way to save the world from the trolls is to adopt positive values such as these (which may not be an exhaustive list, but it's a good start).

I hope you all have nice lives. Farewell.

I've seen so many stories posted here and elsewhere in the past couple years about the new beef alternatives like the Beyond Burger and Impossible Burger. I've heard the Beyond Burger is less meat-like, so I've waited to hear of an easy way to try the Impossible Burger. With Burger King making a big launch of it earlier this month, I finally decided to give it a shot today.

I ordered the Impossible Whopper, and (because I don't really know that I could remember what a regular Whopper tasted like) I ordered a regular Whopper beside it for comparison. I've read a lot of reviews, and I was interested in trying the Impossible Burger as many reviews claim it's enough like real meat that you might eat one unknowingly and not realize it wasn't meat.

Let me also clarify that I don't eat a lot of burgers (maybe once or twice per month), but when I do, I like real beefy burgers. I almost never order them out, because I'm almost always disappointed. I'm the guy who has experimented with grinding his own meat and blending different cuts together to make a better burger. I usually don't go to that trouble, but I do like grinding fresh to my liking and cooking real beef. I prepare burgers generally with a minimum of spices and filler to let the meat flavor come through. I know what real beef tastes like in a burger.

And the Impossible Whopper tastes nothing like real meat. It wouldn't fool me for a second. Now, I'll grant you that the actual "regular" Whopper also barely tastes like real meat to me, but it's still quite recognizable as a variant on those awful frozen burgers that family member you don't like buys a giant box of and feeds you on the Fourth of July or whatever. (Everybody knows those cheap frozen burgers, right?)

What does the Impossible Whopper taste like? I don't know, but it definitely has a sort of "essence of veggie burger" quality about it. Don't get me wrong: I actually like veggie burgers sometimes and occasionally order black bean burgers too. I have nothing against the veggie burger. Nor do I have anything against vegetarians -- I don't eat meat a lot of days and occasionally go for weeks or longer without eating significant meat (sometimes only used in small quantities for flavor or something). But the Impossible Whopper tastes like a veggie burger. Texture is more meat-like, I suppose, and it had a nice char (which is difficult on some kinds of veggie burgers), but the flavor was unmistakably "not meat."

Here's the weirdest thing I noticed, though -- I expected the loads of toppings on a Whopper to hide the taste of the burger. (Some reviews I've read said this explicitly.) But I found the best "meat-like" bites I had from the burger were when I tasted the patty by itself. Some of it was the char on some bits, but somehow the burger by itself -- while still not quite "meat" -- tasted much more "neutral" and less "veggie" when I tasted it by itself. When combined with all the rest of the toppings though, for some reason the flavor immediately screamed out to me as "does NOT taste like beef!"

There's no way I'd mistake this for beef, and there's no way if someone handed me a burger that tasted like this, I'd just assume it was beef. Maybe, just maybe, I could buy the idea that this was someone's strange excessive spice/additive concoction that transformed a beef patty into something that tasted less meaty, but there is something unmistakably "off" about the Impossible Burger.

I'm not saying I didn't like it, mind you. I'm saying it didn't taste like meat. The actual "regular" Whopper patty was relatively flavorless, so I wouldn't rate that high either. And if you asked me to choose which one had the better flavor, I'd have to say it was pretty close to a toss-up (with the "real" one barely winning out) -- but that's because I actually don't mind eating the occasional veggie burger and don't mind the "off" flavor.

What I'm struggling to understand is the market for this stuff. I've had other types of veggie burgers I've liked at least as much as this burger -- they're less meat-like in texture and flavor, but they have good flavor too. But most people I know who are vegetarian/vegan for ethical reasons likely won't step foot into a Burger King, because of its huge connection to factory farms and meat/beef (which is environmentally costly), even if Burger King could grill the burger separately. And the other people I know who eat veggie burgers and such on occasion usually do so for health reasons to avoid so much red meat, but the Impossible Burger has nutritional facts that basically make it as "bad for you" as a typical fast food burger, along with some questionable new additives that are barely FDA approved.

Who is eating this thing? Why? For those people who may have had an Impossible Burger experience better than I am likely to have had at Burger King, would you suggest that I try it elsewhere? Or do you agree with this assessment?

I inadvertently excluded AC posts on my previous journal post. Apologies. And I don't think I can change comment options on an existing post. So I'm making another post in case others want to comment here. (And folks: let's keep the nonsense out of here, please. I'm opening comments up for discussion about the good of this site.)

As noted there, I have made a new donation (in addition to my previous subscription) of $200, and I've pledged to donate $100 more if we can get at least up to our semi-annual goal of $2000 by the end of August. See that linked journal entry for more thoughts on why we should do this.

Sulla has said there may be some Blackberry prizes available for those who donate, and he has donated $100 himself (as well as asking for someone to match him).

Will others join us? Challenge others? Pledge a match if we meet the goal?

[EDIT: Please continue discussion on this topic at this new journal entry. I inadvertently excluded AC comments here, and I don't think I can modify this post's comment policy.]

I've reflected a bit on a significant event that happened this week. To me, it was a really extraordinary thing. This week, SoylentNews went down for a while. I noticed something was weird when I looked at it in the morning, but by the time I had any opportunity to spend time on the site, it was live again.

A site like this that's powered entirely by volunteers experienced a significant hiccup, various solutions were tried, and it was resolved and restored as best as possible within a matter of several hours. That's really something.

And given that there seem to be questions about Slashdot's commitment even to anonymous posting and free speech anymore (let alone all the various complaints many of us left there for years ago), SN serves as an important place on the internet.

Because of that, I just made a donation of $200. I am already a subscriber to this site, but I donated again today. I'm NOT looking for any applause for doing so -- if anything, I'm hoping to encourage others to do the same. Perhaps even shame those who have never subscribed into doing so.

To that end, I will make a further pledge: IF OTHER DONORS CAN GET US UP TO OUR $2000 FUNDING GOAL BY AUGUST 31ST (roughly 2 weeks from now), I WILL DONATE AN ADDITIONAL $100 to SN.

The minimum subscription for a year is $20. That's less than 6 cents per day. Even if you look at this site once per week, that's 39 cents per week. Do you get any information or entertainment or other value out of this site? Why do you come back? If you do, please hit "Subscribe." I know from things said in comments here that many people make a lot more money than I do. If you can give $100/year, that's 28 cents per day. Think about how much you may pay for coffee or lunch out a few times per week or whatever, and ask yourself what value this site gives you. If you have some flexible spending money, give up a nice dinner out or two this month, and make a donation to SN.

Nobody asked me to do this. As many people know, I've had issues with this community at times. But the editors and the submitters and those who maintain the code and servers here -- they deserve our applause. And they need money to keep things going. Our Founders (according to the site info) incurred significant expenses to set this site up and have never been repaid properly. They deserve to. And the maintainers here deserve to have some extra cash in reserve in case things don't always go so well one year or something.

What did those guys who got our site back up the other night ask for? Nothing. In the long comment thread linked above, an AC made a comment suggesting a donation, and MartyB replied. Most other people just said "thanks."

But I see many usernames who said "thank you" who don't have a subscriber star next to their name. I know you can voluntarily hide it, but I wear it not to brag, but instead to shame others into thinking about subscribing. I realize some people may not be able to afford much or even anything. I know for some people even $20 out of their annual budget may be a significant expense to worry about. I want those people to be welcome here too. But consider -- even if you can only pay $5, that's something. That helps keep the site going.

(An aside: I also think it should be possible to "earn" a subscription to this site through volunteer work. If you are a site admin or editor and put in at least, say, X hours/year on this site, I think you automatically deserve to be identified as contributing to the community too. I would even be in favor of a special badge for that, but I also appreciate the egalitarian approach here -- so you guys at least deserve an automatic star next to your name, assuming you want to wear it.)

Also, lastly, I want to put out a call to the ACs of the world. Slashdot seems to be saying it doesn't want you. Most of the internet is saying it doesn't want you. SN welcomes you. Consider taking a moment and donating. I don't know if you can make an anonymous donation or not, or how that works, but I hope you consider doing so.

If you're already a subscriber, consider doing as I have done, and make an extra donation now. Give up a few lattes or pack a lunch a few times in the next few weeks, and give another $20.

I don't know if others have responded to MartyB's post, but the current ticker I see for funding says ~$210 out of $2000 for the second half of 2019. But that amount hasn't been updated since the site went down. I've already pledged $200 more toward that funding goal, and I hope others have too.

Again, I'll make another $100 donation if we can get to that goal by the end of the month. It's not a lot of money, but considering the time and effort put in by our admins to keep things running, it's well deserved. I hope others will step up and perhaps also offer a bonus donation. If we reach our goal quickly, I might consider an additional incentive for a stretch goal.

For the past couple days, the media has been digesting Robert Mueller's testimony before Congress. Once again, we have a fake situation set up for media. Mueller explicitly stated publicly at the announcement of his report that he wasn't going to add anything in future testimony. So, there was absolutely no reason to bring him to "testify."

It's clear (to me, at least, since I think both sides are being ridiculous in this whole fight) that Mueller was doing his best to sit there for a few hours and try not to add anything to what had already been said in the report, while responding to questions from both sides that were baiting him to try to get him to say something more than he had previously stated.

So, it was a failure for the Democrats, who clearly staged this in the hope to galvanize public opinion with a public face and soundbites, as nobody is actually reading the report. It was a mild success for Republicans in that Mueller tried not to go beyond his qualified and legalistic language as used in the report, so few people are going to hear this as a strong attack against Trump.

But the party "score" isn't important to me. I don't care who "won" in a preposterous setup. What shocks me, though, is the way Robert Mueller's "performance" is being analyzed. People are saying he's old, perhaps senile. (He is old -- that's undeniable.) People are saying he was "hesitant" in his answers, perhaps implying that he was unsure or maybe even (again) senile. He asked for questions to be repeated too much. Some are theorizing he might have some sort of illness.

I haven't watched the whole thing, which is a waste of time to see a bunch of Congressmen badgering a witness to get him to say something when he's on the record that his testimony explicitly was intended never to say anything more than already in his written report. But I did watch a bit of it.

And I would like to draw out a couple minutes from near the very beginning -- as the top Republican on the committee takes his first shot asking questions. I'm not even going to start at the beginning, but if you listened to none of the Mueller proceedings, have a listen to the exchange beginning here (and continuing for the next few minutes).

I would challenge ANYONE of any age -- even the most intelligent person in the world at top intellectual performance -- to sit in that environment for hours and deal with questions of that sort. Basically, every single Congressman there was out to get Mueller to say something beyond his report. The Democrats wanted to get him to be more forceful in condemnation of Trump's actions. The Republicans were hoping to trip him up.

And in that clip above is the first instance where it sort of happens. After badgering Mueller with arcane questions referencing multiple pages in the report in a rapid-fire manner (note that this Congressman said at the outset that he'd "talk slowly"), he gets Mueller into a semantic debate over whether "collusion" is a defined legal term that has a "colloquial" meaning equivalent to "conspiracy." Mueller said in his opening statement that "collusion" was not a defined legal term in federal law (which it is not), though in the report he admitted on some page that "collusion" and "conspiracy" are sometimes colloquially understood commonly to be similar.

The Congressman is trying to claim he's "reading the report" back to Mueller and that Mueller was now "adding to his report" by apparently denying that "collusion" and "conspiracy" are the same thing (which they aren't legally, though in some colloquial contexts they might be, which is what the report said), something Mueller claimed he wouldn't do.

This is all absurd. Whether or not the colloquial meaning or understanding of a term is "synonymous" with another term has no bearing on any significant legal question. But here we have a Congressman determined to trip Mueller up in a "lie" by "adding to his report," which Mueller is apparently supposed to have memorized enough to answer rapid-fire questions on this sort of semantic BS that isn't even relevant to an argument. Note that it didn't matter what Mueller said in response to his question, as the Congressman would have claimed he had contradicted his opening statement even if he had said yes, thereby claiming Mueller was unreliable. Even if Mueller had encyclopedic knowledge of every sentence in his report, there was no way to answer this question without the Congressman going on an irrelevant attack.

Now, again, in my opinion, Mueller was doing his best just to sit there and try not to say anything that wasn't in his report. That was his SOLE purpose, which the badgering Congressmen (from both parties) made exceptionally difficult.

To me, Robert Mueller doesn't look tired or ill or confused. He is hesitant because he's trying to avoid the sort of BS shown in this clip, and he knows he's going to be in for hours of it. Hours where he is gradually adding to an oral record that -- in addition to his report -- could then be cited and thrown back at him for any minor contradiction at any time.

If I were in his shoes, I would hesitate too. After a Congressman started acting like that and listed a page number in the report, I'd say, "Hold on... let me look at this..." and then waste three minutes on the page before answering. I doubt I would perform as well as he did at ignoring the flagrant BS spouted at me from both parties and simply adhering to what was already reported. After five minutes of this sort of BS, I would have likely said, "Look, it's in my report. I said I'm not going to add to that in testimony. I will therefore respond to every single other question with -- 'If the question is addressed in my report, the answer is there; if it's not, I have no comment.'" They'd probably try to charge me with Contempt of Congress but I wouldn't care. This was absurd.

And yes, I know from watching Congressional hearings that badgering is common. But both the representatives and Mueller knew this was a high-stakes day. They were trying their best to get him to say anything worthy of a "shocking!" evening news soundbite, but he didn't take their bait.

For that, Mr. Mueller, I applaud your service to the U.S. I'm not sure what to take away from your report, but for putting up with that BS for several hours, you should be praised and not ridiculed for your "performance."

Yesterday, something extraordinary happened in the U.S. Congress. I've spent quite a bit of time over the years watching C-SPAN (I used to use it to fall asleep when I would take a nap), and I've never seen anything like this.

Congressman Emanuel Cleaver from Missouri was serving as Speaker pro tempore, which means he was effectively presiding over the House. (For those unfamiliar, it is rare for the actual Speaker of the House to preside on a daily basis. It's typically a more senior member of the majority party.) Rep. Cleaver was doing his best to adjudicate the parliamentary shenanigans of both parties during a debate over a bill to criticize Pres. Trump over recent "racist" tweets.

This is difficult in the House, as there are rules in place that say you must debate in a civil manner. You can't call the President a "racist" in open debate. You can't call other members of the House names either. A Republican stood up and yammered on while clearly implying some members of the House were "anti-American." That got objected to, but was overruled on a parliamentary technicality, so the words weren't stricken. Then our current Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, stood up and yammered on about Trump's "racist" actions. The Republicans challenged that too, and they too wanted her words stricken.

One thing you rapidly learn if you watch C-SPAN is how much time is wasted in Congress. Most of the time Congress is "in session" is wasted. Either they're engaging in parliamentary delaying tactics or other BS, or members are standing on the floor yelling at an empty chamber, hoping to get a soundbite on the evening news.

Rep. Cleaver was tired of this. He was tired of the fact that members (including both Republicans and Pelosi) were literally standing up and saying things they KNEW would draw objection for being uncivil. And after this objection was raised against Pelosi, there was an hour pause while everyone talked amongst themselves about what to do.

Cleaver climbed to the Speaker's chair again, looking like he was going to read the parliamentary ruling on whether Pelosi was out of order. Instead, he said he was "making a statement" and said:

We don't ever, ever want to pass up, it seems, an opportunity to escalate, and that's what this is. I dare anybody to look at any of the footage and see if there was any unfairness. But unfairness is not enough because we want to just fight. I abandon the chair.

He then dropped the gavel and walked off. I've never seen anything like this. I've looked up Congressional precedent, and nobody seems to think this has happened in at least the past 50 years or longer. For the presiding officer to walk off the floor in disgust at how both sides were behaving... well, it's one of the first reasonable things I've seen happen in Congress in a while. I too am a fan of civil discourse, and while some here may think the Congressional rules of decorum are overly strict, they are intended to result in at least a modicum of civility in debate.

He later released a statement on the debate:

Like the vast majority of Americans, I’ve grown increasingly frustrated with the childish rancor of our public discourse. Our inability to conduct ourselves in a civil and respectable fashion has paralyzed the most powerful government in the history of the world, and for what? A 10-second soundbite on prime time news and a few thousand twitter followers?

If this is what our government has come to, then we are in serious trouble as a nation. My frustration reflects that of my constituents and the American people as a whole. I have spent my entire life working with people of all faiths and stripes in an effort solve real-world problems with concrete solutions, but never have we been this divided and this unwilling to listen to countering opinions or accept objective truths. [...]

I have unshakeable and eternal faith in what we can accomplish as a people, but we can only overcome these challenges as a union. I truly believe American democracy is the greatest experiment ever conducted by a society. However, a house divided against itself cannot stand, regardless of how strong the foundation. I call on all of my colleagues and all of America to listen more and talk less, to show compassion for those who are in pain, and to resist the temptation to fight when others wish to escalate.

I applaud Congressman Cleaver's words and actions. I only wish this action was getting more press today. I'm fed up with both major parties' crap too. This whole session yesterday was operated as a publicity stunt by both sides, and they should be ashamed.

And, I think this is the most significant "chair abandonment" in American culture since Archie Bunker offered Sammy Davis Jr. "HIS chair" on All in the Family, with no hesitation whatsoever. That episode was also a lesson where a black man was sitting in a chair listening to a bunch of stupid white people have a debate over whether something/someone is racist too. At least that episode was funny, though. (In my opinion, one of the best episodes in television history.) Congressional irresponsibility is just shocking and sad.

If the American people were actually interested in real change, rather than the sham of our current leaders or the false promises of our President (and past Presidents), this would become a rallying point away from the two parties. #IAbandonTheChair should be a hashtag flying high as people look to third-party alternatives. But alas, this will not pass.

Sorry about the following rant, but I'm just so tired of this nonsense. For those of you who have never had to deal directly with a credit bureau, please realize how awful this can be. Be prepared for days of potential headaches.

I went to sign up for cable internet a couple days ago. It's a long story, but suffice it to say that there was already an account at my address in the name of a person who hasn't lived at this address in awhile. Fixing this would've been a pain in the past, so I've been avoiding it. But rates for internet have increased, as typical with cable internet providers every year. I thought it would be a good time to finally just close out the previous account and hopefully get an intro deal for myself in the process.

Okay, so I can't just order the service online, since an account from that company already exists at my address. I have to call and talk to a person who insists on trying to upsell me and tries to "evaluate my needs," etc. when I just know what I want and what speed I want, etc. Then I am told they need to do a credit check. I ask whether I can just put down a deposit (which has worked for me in the past with many utilities, since I don't like giving out my SS# if I don't need to), but I'm told no. I give them my SS# and DOB, and then they tell me -- they can't check my credit, because it's frozen.

Right. I remembered that then. I froze all my credit bureau accounts after the whole Equifax breach thing came out two years ago or whatever. It seemed the only reasonable way to protect myself -- plus it saves me from getting unnecessary offers for credit. I rarely open new credit accounts or loans, and I have near-perfect credit (820-840 -- when you're in that range, any little thing makes it fluctuate up and down) as I've never missed a payment on anything, have held accounts forever, never carry credit card debt, etc.

I tell the cable internet person I'll need to call them back, and try to use Experian's website to temporarily "thaw" my credit. Except their online forms don't work. I try a number of things, but it claims it can't use the info I entered, and eventually they tell me I need to MAIL a copy of the page I just navigated to, along with copies of government ID and recent bill statements, just to get a temporary "thaw," so cable internet company can run a check on my (perfect) credit report. Meanwhile, my current cable internet is supposed to be ending this weekend.

Okay, so I tried to call Experian. I get an automated system (of course), with no option to talk to a real person. There's an option about credit freezes, but it only allows me to institute a freeze. No option to request a thaw through the phone. In the past with automated phone systems, I've often found if you just stop responding, it eventually connects you to an actual person. So I waited until it gave me the menu options about five times, at which point the prompt finally changed.

"You have reached the Fraud Department at Experian. We were unable to process your information from our automated voice system. We will respond to your request, but you must enter info for the following prompts, pressing 'pound' after each entry." Okay, so I figure I've reached a system that will allow me to leave a message or maybe even eventually connect me to a human, if I just enter the info. It asks me about five questions (name, address, DoB, etc.), and I respond to each one, pressing pound afterward.

At the end of the questions, the system announces, "We will now process your request to place a Fraud Alert on your credit file. We will also send your request to place a Fraud Alert to all the other credit bureaus." It says a couple more sentences, then announces "goodbye" and the line is cut off. At no point did the system indicate I was entering information to place a Fraud Alert on my credit report. At no point did the system ask me to confirm or otherwise acknowledge that's what I wanted to do. And when it was done, it simply hung up.

From what I understand, a Fraud Alert poses little problem -- it lasts a year and just means potential creditors will often go to extra steps to verify your identity. So I suppose it may not cause problems, but I really didn't want to do this. I look online to see if I can find another number for Experian to talk to a human. I got one from a trusted consumer advocate website I know and tried that. No luck. I see a lot of other websites offering random numbers to call, but I don't trust them -- I mean, if you call a credit bureau, it will often start asking for your SS# right away. I'm certain that desperate people who want to talk to a human probably get ensnared by identity theft schemes by calling some random phone number they find online.

So I figure I'll try something else. Out of desperation, I get Equifax's customer service number, and I'm speaking with an actual person within 30 seconds of placing my call. She was very nice when I explained what happened, but they couldn't do anything at Equifax until they received a Fraud Alert report from Experian. After sighing, I finally asked, "This may be a strange request, but is there any possibility YOU have access to a phone number where I could speak to an actual human at Experian??" And, miraculously, she says yes. I jot down the number and dial it excitedly. I reach Experian, which proceeds to give me an automated message that lasts at least a minute telling me a lot of stuff I don't care enough, but then concludes with "Goodbye" and hangs up. No human.

By this point it was late in the evening last Friday. I figure maybe I'll wait and have another go on Monday: maybe someone staffs the phones during normal business hours. No luck. The first number I called still never gets to a human. The second number I got from the consumer advocate website (to reach a human) has given me a busy signal every time I've called -- at least five times today. The number Equifax gave me does the same thing it did on Friday: it gives me a long automated message and then hangs up.

(I should mention that over the weekend, I tried using the automated system online to do a credit unfreeze again, and I was able to do it this time, even though I wasn't entering any different information. Why it didn't work one day but worked the next, I don't know. So I was able to get the credit check done with the cable company.)

Finally, I give in and decide I'll have to submit written documents. I spent over an hour today writing up a letter explaining what happened, then printing and filling out a form they had, then scanning that form along with proof of ID and a recent bill to my address to verify my identity. Thankfully, it seems Experian offers a place to submit a documents online, so I figure at least I can get this to them today (rather than mailing them), and hopefully head off this whole Fraud Alert thing.

Except, after entering all the info online, collecting PDF files of all my documents, etc., the stupid online form will not accept the uploads! It says it accepts up to 5 PDFs and TIFFs up to 15 MB total. I tried a single file (around only 1 MB), different files for all the documents, etc. No dice. For the TIFFs, it says black and white only (though not for the PDFs), so I think maybe this is going to a fax machine or something and convert all my documents to black and white. (I had scanned my driver's license, etc. in color, thinking it would be better to see my ID is valid with a higher-quality color image.) But even with the black and white documents, it won't work. And, of course, just like when I tried to request the credit unfreeze online, the error message it gives has no detail, so I have no idea what's wrong other than it won't accept the documents.

I used to think cable companies had set the bar for "worst customer service," perhaps along with the hoops it can take to resolve a medical billing error. But this weekend takes the cake in terms of poor customer experience. And what can we do about this as consumers? We're at the mercy of these companies that now basically control our lives through our credit scores. Once I finally get this error resolved, I will submit complaints to as many federal and state agencies as I can think of, but it will probably do little good.

I found the recent hipster story great: Hipster Whines at Tech Mag for Using His Pic to Imply Hipsters Look the Same; Wasn't His Pic. It made me think a bit about the broader implications today.

Hipsters get a bad rap, but they're really very similar to any number of "alternative" movements of yesteryear. As long as there has been human society, there have been "rebels" and "non-conformists." But being truly individual is a very a difficult thing. It's difficult to make friends, because you can't be fit into any box. You're unpredictable. You may agree with people on a number of things, and then you have logic that leads you off to a completely different path that those same people find confusing or even offensive.

Thus, most self-identified "individuals" paradoxically found communities of like-minded individuals. It's easier to adopt a pre-packaged aesthetic and set of values than it is to come up with a system on your own. Of course most hipsters have qualities that make them look somewhat "alike," even as they eschew mainstream fashion or whatever -- because it's easier to adopt someone else's brand of "non-conformity" than it is to try to be an individual yourself, which is scary and bold and where you have little guidance. Most people are sheep: they just gravitate toward different flocks.

In terms of my clothing choices and outward appearance most of the time, I'm somewhat of a conformist, in that I feel like standing out is generally counterproductive. I just want to be left alone to do my own thing, so I mostly dress conservatively, though I certainly don't place any value in "fashion." I get the cheapest functional clothes I can that still look professional, often drawing on castaways at thrift stores -- which are frequently even name-brand clothes from a couple years ago, but maybe the color or style is no longer trendy. I don't care... they're clothes, and I generally buy them for 1/5th or even 1/10th of the original price. They get the job done.

But when it comes to beliefs and ideologies, I truly don't accept anyone else's views unless they make sense to me and there's good evidence. Over the years, I've cultivated good friends who seem convinced I'm a diehard conservative, and other friends who are convinced I'm a diehard liberal. I don't lie. I just find it counterproductive to alienate people a lot of the time, so I listen a lot. I'm genuinely curious about other views. And I can often find threads of things I agree with or at least basic concepts I might go along with in any ideology, so I'll find ways of carrying a discussion forward along points of agreement... or often I just find myself playing a sort of "devil's advocate" with nobody on the other side. Some conservative person is ranting about something, and I'll toss in a few facts that would support their argument, even if I don't believe in their argument -- just to be social. And then I'll toss in a nuance they haven't thought of, just to stir things very slightly and see what happens.

With most people, it's very hard to change minds. The only way to do so is to gain their trust, and then maybe throw in some ideas they haven't considered and let them come to a new realization on their own. I'm rarely trying to change anyone myself -- I accept pluralism as a fundamental philosophy. But I do think it's important to inform, to take into account a broad perspective on facts, to know stuff and derive your opinions from knowledge rather than bullet points spouted from someone else.

If you really want to be a "non-conformist," the strongest thing you can do is be a skeptic in a Socratic fashion. Accept that there are always things you don't know, and be willing to listen. That's truly disruptive to ideologies, whether mainstream or "alternative" or whatever.

In my life, I've spent a lot of time going down rabbitholes and questioning my beliefs. For example, when "Intelligent Design" became popular in the late 90s, I spent a few months reading literature by Michael Behe and others, as well as textbooks on evolutionary biology, trying to understand what was going on. I never subscribed the the Creationist ideology, but for a while I was convinced -- and to some extent still am -- that questions of how we could evaluate "design" as distinct from randomness were interesting questions. But ultimately I realized the Intelligent Design people were mostly dishonest hucksters using disingenuous arguments to try to sneak religion into science classrooms, even if they had raised a few minor interesting points.

Heck, even in the past week or two, some post on this site got me curious about measles vaccines, and it led me down a 20-minute dive into research where I seriously started to question my blanket vaccine-positive stance. Could researchers and vaccine manufacturers seriously not be considering the cost-benefit analysis of the measles vaccine in terms of its effects vs. the disease itself? There were a few reputable citations, which I duly followed. And then ultimately I realized it was more anti-vaxxer propaganda and distortion of facts. But for about 10 minutes, I was seriously questioning a core scientific conclusion I had come to over the years. I even contacted a friend who knows more about immunology, though her immediate reply was she didn't know much about the measles vaccine. Soon, though, I realized the opponents (some of them with serious credentials) were calculating ideologues who weren't interested in truth.

If you bring me reputable evidence and links, I will consider the information. I will listen. I am willing to question my beliefs. That's what a true "non-conformist" should go with. It's not about standing out from the crowd. It's not about bucking the mainstream -- because sometimes the mainstream is right. That's something quite a few people on this site might sometimes consider. Is there really a reason to question the mainstream view -- which is founded on good science -- or are you just being a stubborn hipster-like person, feeling like there must be something wrong with the "mainstream," so you need to assert your individuality in a kind of aesthetic performance. (Even if that makes you sound like a conspiracy theorist.)

And often the mainstream IS wrong, or at least lacking nuance to the point that it's basically wrong if superficially correct. Yes, challenge the status quo. Dig into the details. You need to legitimately find your own way. More importantly, you need to find your own path to self-consistency... and sometimes accept that's hard and often not going to be like the pre-packaged ideologies most people live with.

Most conservatives love rules, until they have a personal situation where they really need to break one. Most liberals claim to be open-minded and to accept anyone, unless those people happen to hold conservative beliefs. Most libertarians like to believe in some militant individualistic philosophy, although they often subscribe to the same newsletters and are rarely very diverse.

Most people follow flocks. The hipsters are the same. Why should we be surprised? It's easy to make fun of the hipsters because they are so staunchly "non-conformist" while seeming to conform to stereotypes. But try practicing real non-conformity yourself. It can be surprisingly difficult. Many people here seem to self-identify as social misfits or people who don't care about the mainstream -- but that's just like hipster propaganda. It's easy to be "alternative" when you have your own flock of misfits to join. Try digging deeper sometimes when confronted with someone who thinks differently from yourself. Listen. Seek out more information and nuance. Draw your own conclusions.

I'll just leave you all with one quotation that I try to think about regularly, some wisdom from Charles Peirce:

“It is the man of science, eager to have his every opinion regenerated, his every idea rationalized, by drinking at the fountain of fact, and devoting all the energies of his life to the cult of truth, not as he understands it, but as he does not yet understand it, that ought properly to be called a philosopher.”

If I had to choose a Credo for myself, that'd be a pretty good one. I don't always live up to it, but I aspire to.

A recent news piece posted here ("India Man to Sue Parents for Giving Birth to Him") concluded the summary with a statement that while this man's case may seem odd, "there are philosophical grounds in support of anti-natalism." A link to an article by philosopher David Benatar was then provided.

But are there really "philosophical grounds" presented there? Benatar has been making this argument for well over a decade now, making occasional splashes in the media like a New York Times piece by Princeton philosopher Peter Singer in 2010 ("Should This Be the Last Generation?), a New Yorker piece in 2012 ("The Case Against Kids"), and then a sort of New Yorker profile in 2017 ("The Case for Not Being Born"). I say "sort of" profile, because David Benatar is so guarded about his privacy that you can't even find a photo of him online, and he basically only agreed to do the interview if he wouldn't be asked any personal questions. In the past, I suspected him of being a total troll who might have a wife and five kids and was making absurd arguments just for the publicity (and feared that personal information about him would undermine his arguments), but I no longer believe that. (I've seen statements online claiming he actually doesn't have kids.) Now I think he's just a bit nuts. Seriously -- if we don't believe him to be an idiot, I think the most rational conclusion is that he's clinically depressed and has an almost egomaniacal need to spread his illness to others.

So, to see a piece of his posted yet again here uncritically -- and even claiming it has "philosophical grounds" -- makes me a bit confused.

To be sure, there are philosophical arguments against having kids, especially for specific people. And perhaps there are philosophical arguments for reducing the overall population to decrease suffering. There might even be philosophical arguments from an environmental perspective that the earth would be "healthier" in some abstract sense without the species of humans on it. I don't think the latter would constitute moral arguments, since morality is a human creation for humans to judge, and if all humans were to die off, there would be no humans to judge the morality of that situation. Hence the future non-existence of humanity is at best morally neutral from that perspective.

Nevertheless, I can understand such arguments in an abstract case. However, "grounds" for antinatalism implies that Benatar presents at least a good foundation for the case that no one should have kids. Unfortunately, most of his arguments suffer from a curious illogic native to pessimists.

Let me repeat again that I think there are very good arguments for individual people to choose not to have kids, from personal preference or personal circumstances insufficient to provide for children to genetic predispositions for producing offspring who are likely to have serious medical problems. I'm even happy to allow for an individual making the personal choice not to have kids on similar grounds to Benatar's argument: an individual prospective parent may believe that there's too much suffering in the world and thus not want to have kids. (I'm particularly sensitive to the illogic in Benatar's antinatalist stance because I once held that personal belief myself, i.e., that I didn't want to have kids because of the state of the world. I no longer hold that belief, but I think it's a valid choice for any parent to make. It's quite a different thing for Benatar to try to argue for all humanity, however.)

I'll try to concisely summarize the key rationale behind Benatar's argument, because it's where the fundamental flaw lies. Benatar argues the following:

(1) For a human being to suffer is a moral wrong; for a human being to experience happiness/pleasure is a moral good.

(2) However, for potential future human beings not yet born, his calculus changes. For a not-yet-existent human being to potentially suffer in the future is a moral wrong, but for that same human being to experience future pleasure would be morally neutral.

Yes, that's the entirety of his argument. There's a lot of other smoke and mirrors around it, but really it comes down to the fact that he considers bringing a human being into the world with the knowledge it will suffer to be a moral wrong, while any amount of good the human experiences has no moral valence whatsoever. Thus, the moral wrong wins out: therefore, no one should have children. QED.

I'll get to his supposed justification for this rather illogical disparity in a moment, but note that the rest of the smoke and mirrors around his argument is not based in logic. It is just repeated appeals to a pessimist (if not depressed) mindset. To be clear, I'm a realist. I'd never consider myself an optimist. But Benatar gives philosophy a bad name by trying to pretend his arguments are based in rationality, rather than pessimist irrationality that stacks the deck. From the piece linked in the SN article, this is Benatar's position:

Considering matters carefully, it’s obvious that there must be more bad than good. This is because there are empirical asymmetries between the good and bad things. The worst pains, for instance, are worse than the best pleasures are good.

This isn't reason. It's opinion. Yes, Benatar makes valid points that our memories tend to be selective, and we tend to remember good things over the bad. (Hence the many "good ole days" arguments that often are based on a nostalgic past that never existed.) That is a human psychological bias, but weighing the good and the bad for an individual's suffering is up to an individual. Benatar wants to make the decision for everyone, though: whether you realize it or not, your suffering is worse for you than any positive things you have in your life. And if you don't believe that, you're just giving into a sort of delusion.

But this is all window dressing. To get back to Benatar's asymmetry: the crux of his argument that for anyone to have a child is morally wrong, you have to grant his assumption that knowingly having a child that may suffer is wrong, but knowingly having a child that will experience positive emotions is morally neutral. When pushed on this, Benatar falls back on some weird concept that the calculus should be different for non-existent beings compared to living humans. There's never any good justification for this.

The problem is that this differentiation rests on a confusion between reasoning about actualities and reasoning about probabilities. I agree with Benatar that if we know the possible outcomes of our actions, and if we know that a particular action will result in great suffering, perhaps we have a moral obligation to avoid that action. The problem is that we don't generally know all of the future. Do we let our children play outside? Well, if we do, perhaps a child experiences a particular photon of ultraviolet light that causes a mutation that will eventually result in malignant skin cancer and death in a few decades. But if we don't, perhaps the child is dissuaded that day against physical activity and ultimately will develop an obesity problem with no exercise and will die early. This is the Benatar way of looking at the world -- anything and everything will ultimately cause suffering. Forget enjoying the sun or playing with friends: you will all suffer, and that's all that matters.

But surely if it is a moral evil to do something that will cause suffering, it must be a more good to do something that will cause happiness. And Benatar grudgingly admits this, but only for real people who exist in the world. For non-existent possible babies, only the potential suffering matters.

To be clear, I am absolutely NOT arguing that anyone has a moral duty to procreate, nor would they incur a moral duty to do so even if they knew a child would experience great happiness in life. So it's illogical to then suggest for that no one should procreate simply because of the possibility of suffering. (Of course, to Benatar, it's not about any possibilities: he's stacked the deck to conclude that everyone is always suffering horribly on-balance in their lives, and they are merely delusional if they think otherwise.) Again, I'm happy to agree with Benatar in individual cases: maybe a couple who knows they will very likely have a child with a severe congenital defect that will lead to a life of great suffering has a good reason not to have kids. But there's no reason other than illogical pessimism to claim this must apply to all humans.

Furthermore, if we accept Benatar's premise, then we should argue that no one should ever take any action, because at some point it will produce suffering for someone. And that suffering can apparently never be negated by any potential good our actions might do.

Which is, of course, absurd. But this is Benatar's argument: we all are continuously contributing to future suffering of humans to various degrees. (He says that repeatedly in his writings.) If taken to its logical conclusion, Benatar should have committed suicide the moment he came to this conclusion to prevent the further suffering he is causing humans by existing. Anyone who agrees with him should also immediately commit suicide, if you were to follow logic and reason. One might even make an argument that we should painlessly murder all other humans who might be suffering (which is apparently everyone). Benatar does stop short of calling for that, on reasonable grounds that basically it would be interfering with other's rights to make decisions for their own lives. Apparently others are allowed to choose to live (even in deluded suffering), but they are not allowed to legitimately believe their happiness outweighs their suffering. To Benatar, they are merely deluded.

The only reason he offers for not committing suicide himself or advocating it for all others who buy his argument is because supposedly "death is bad." Seriously. That's it. Read the links I put up there, and you'll see no real fleshing out beyond that. He even goes to the absurd degree of arguing that humans shouldn't have any more children because it will result in a 100% death rate, and death is bad.

There seems to be no religious element in Benatar's reasoning, so it seems absurd to conclude that death is worse than nonexistence. Death is simply nonexistence, unless one believes in an afterlife or whatever. So once again Benatar wallows in illogic: we must accept that nonexistence is better than existence for all future humans, but the nonexistence of death is somehow "bad" and worse than that.

Huh?

Well, it's actually pretty clear why Benatar makes this piece of illogical argument. Because if he advocated suicide for everyone (let alone possible genocide of the poor and suffering), his arguments would be universally condemned and portrayed as a Jim Jones-style lunatic. So, he's forced into this weird netherworld of argumentation where nonexistence is morally neutral, except when it is caused by death, which is somehow "bad" in some nebulous way.

To conclude, I'll happily agree with Benatar that there's a lot of suffering in the world. I'll happily agree that some potential parents may make a personal decision not to have children for all sorts of reasons, including Benatar's position. But it's one thing to make a case that parents should seriously consider the potential downsides of having kids; it's quite another to argue that it would be a moral good for the human race to go extinct because for anyone to ever have a child is a moral evil.

And again, I'm not even saying the further existence of humanity is a moral good. I'm not arguing that anyone should be persuaded to have children. But Benatar seems to have gained the support of lots of people who apparently don't think logically about what his argument actually rests on. I truly do not understand why he is still alive, if he were rational and truly believed his argument. (His only justification is based on "death is bad" and some weird analogies -- he seriously says it's like going to a bad play... if you had known it would be bad, you might not have gone at all, but once you're there, are you really gonna stand up and leave in the middle?)

Life is not a play, though, though in this case it does sound like a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing. The only rational way to excuse his refusal to commit suicide in the face of the argument he presents is to conclude he suffers from a sort of megalomania that he must spread his pessimist ideas and convince others that his irrational arguments are true.

I am committed to reason, and therefore I can't stand for such ideas promoted here without challenge.

I deliberately stayed away for a few days after my farewell post. I didn't even want to read the stuff I thought might show up in comments. But I finally decided to.

And I mainly wanted to post one more time to say THANK YOU to the many thoughtful and kind replies. I do know that 90+% of the people who post here are good folks mostly. And even though I've disagreed with many, we try to get along. Unfortunately, that 10% of trollish folks are overrepresented in how often they post and the vigor with which they (pretend to) argue.

A few of the trolls actually agreed that I should leave or take a break, which doesn't surprise me, because it will make their lives easier to sow discord here.

Anyhow -- to all the kind folks who posted replies saying that lamented my leaving -- all I'll say for now is that I'm going away for the moment. Maybe I'll check back in in a few months and see whether I want to participate again. But for now, I need to quit SoylentNews.

As for the rest of the replies...

Thanks to all the trollish posters for showing up and proving my points so well. It's good to have exemplars of the behavior so clearly right there under my post.

I'm not going to reply in depth to most of that, other than to say I'll freely admit I didn't behave kindly in the last thread I participated in before I announced I'd be quitting. In fact, I explicitly mentioned in my farewell journal that what frustrates me most is that I don't like the kind of person I become when having to fight against the trolls. I don't like yelling at people. I don't like being nasty. It's not in my nature, but when replying to people who act that way, I sometimes become a jerk too. I don't enjoy that.

But what I have NEVER been in any post on this site is insincere. (Except in occasional sarcastic posts, which I often mark to avoid misunderstanding.) But in that final thread, I was accused of "lying." And while I've been contemplating leaving SN for at least a month now, that sort of accusation is the final straw. Because I truly believe in what I post. I try to be sincere and to take others seriously, even when they act like jerks and post incendiary nonsense. And while someone could accuse me of being in error or misunderstanding something (in which case I'll rethink things, and sometimes I've even replied to posts to say I realized my error and changed my mind), I have never intentionally lied. I have never argued in bad faith. I have never posted merely to provoke.

And those few characteristics, dear folks, are the characteristics of what I called out as "trolls" in my farewell post.

To me, a "troll" is someone who posts more with the intent to provoke a response than to promote rational debate. I think that's a definition in accord with the old definition of "troll" commonly used on forums going back decades. More specifically, the difference between a "flamer" and a "troll" is that the "troll" also tends to post things he/she doesn't believe to provoke replies. In other words, trolls post in "bad faith." But I think the "flaming" and "trolling" often go hand-in-hand, so I don't tend to draw a huge distinction. If you're posting just to get people mad and reply in response, as far as I'm concerned, you're basically a troll.

But there are other related behaviors that are frequently used by trolls, even though by themselves I'd say they don't quite constitute "trollish" behavior. These include "debate tactics" which are designed more to "win" an argument rather than promote civil discussion. Such things might be useful on some sort of forum about debate (and I was on debate teams in the past, so I understand them), but they aren't about pushing the argument forward. They are about "winning."

I personally am more interested in learning the truth about something or coming to a more nuanced understanding of an issue than about "winning" a debate at all costs. But troll-like posters will often do things like deliberately ignore valid points in an argument that they can't dispute, while focusing on irrelevant minutiae to take control of the discussion and make it look like they are winning, even while ignoring the most salient points. They will selectively choose posts to respond to for similar reasons -- rather than actively discussing valid argument points, they'll attack posts that are less fleshed-out (while ignoring crucial points made in other posts), again to make it look like they are "winning." They'll also cherry pick data they often know is misleading or incomplete, but promote it as "the whole truth," again to "win" rather than to get at a broader perspective of what's true. Lastly, they get aggressive and combine ad hominem with other similar strategies to dismiss the other side and make them sound stupid (or provoke a response that makes them sound irrational).

If you want to participate in a debate club, those strategies can sometimes help -- until you get called out by the other side for behaving that way, in which case you'll lose in a debate that's being judged. Unfortunately, in the real world, we can't have rational judges on the sidelines judging these things and calling out bad behavior. Instead, people who "win" arguments are often the most persistent and those who adopt the strategies I mentioned.

Mr. Buzzard in his response to my previous journal rightly points out that this is part of natural human behavior. Lots of people want to "win," and they will adopt strategies to do so. But my point is that the majority of those who read posts probably don't care about who "wins" a debate -- they want to actually understand what is correct, which side has better evidence, etc. "Winning" an argument should not be the goal of rational discourse.

And trolling in the stricter sense -- i.e., true bad-faith argumentation -- makes all this worse. The only people who seem to enjoy that, as I noted, are those who are in for the "lulz." They take some sort of bizarre glee in provoking others into pointless (and often incendiary) debates. I don't think that's actual a trait endemic to the majority of people in their "human nature," but it's common enough that it can ruin good discussion in a lot of groups.

Anyhow, I don't know how to fix this on a forum. And I'm not at all arguing for some sort of draconian moderation system. What I feel like is once a forum gets taken over by this sort of crap, I'm no longer interested in participating. And I agree with some of the other replies that this appears to be the "new normal" on the internet. Yes, trolls were always there, back into the heyday of Usenet and before.

But rational (and civilized) discourse is losing its place in general, even in places where it used to be taken for granted.

As to Mr. Buzzard's point that it is "human nature," there are lots of things we don't accept in civilized society that are "human nature." Human nature would say it's okay for a strong man to club a woman senseless and drag her back to his cave and rape her. We don't generally think that's acceptable in civilized society. Human nature would say it's okay to steal another's food (or any goods) if you have a chance and want them. Again, we generally don't think that's acceptable in civilized society. Human nature might even say it's okay to attack or even kill someone who annoys you enough. Again, we don't accept that's productive for civilization.

The long-term view of civilization in the past thousand years has been a gradual decrease in things like murder rate, violent crime, and more generally a behavior of respect toward others. These things are against "human nature," but they help us all get along better. More importantly, they help society as a whole get along better.

It may be human nature to want to "win" arguments. It may be human nature of trolls to enjoy discord. But it's not good etiquette. It's not promoting rational discussion. It's not furthering our collective knowledge or making our society better (on SN or beyond).

And when I say "etiquette" I'm not talking about Emily Post and using the right fork at dinner. I'm talking about assuming good faith in other posts. I'm talking about NOT posting in bad faith. I'm also talking about things like avoiding name-calling or other needlessly inflammatory rhetoric. I'm talking about acknowledging when you're wrong (or at least quitting the debate), rather than cherry-picking bullshit points to keep debate going and make it look like you're winning when you can't actually respond to the most salient evidence. These last things often come from a sort of "jock" mentality -- you want to win, and you may not know as much as someone else about a topic or understand it as well, so you resort to other strategies that subvert rational discourse but make it look like you're more dominant in the discussion.

There are places where civil discourse still happens. I've been to many academic conferences where there is formal discussion after talks. And I don't think I've ever witnessed a "troll" in that environment. Yes, discussion can sometimes become heated -- but that's different from arguing in bad faith.

It *is* possible to ignore what some might call an the innate human urge to win arguments at all costs. It is possible to behave in a more civil and rational manner in order to promote better, more informative discussion that benefits us all (rather than just providing satisfaction for those who want to "win" debates or entertainment for those in it for the lulz).

If there are a large enough number of rational folks on a discussion forum, I suppose we could all collectively mod all such "bad behavior" posts into oblivion. But there doesn't seem to be enough here who agree with me to overcome the tide of BS. Moreover, we have a number of participants here who behave in erratic ways -- sometimes posting reasonable and informative stuff, and other times acting like jerks and trolls. Those last ones are the most difficult, because they end up being rewarded by the system. They log in, accumulate karma, get bonuses, and then feel free to post crap intermittently which drags down discussion significantly.

Again, I'm not claiming I have a solution, other than self-restraint. Just like you don't just kill someone and steal their car because you want decided right now that you'd really like to have it, I believe you shouldn't post trollish crap on a forum just because you think it's entertaining or want to win an argument at all costs. Yes, I am comparing murder to troll-like behavior, in that I think both ultimately work against civilized society. And chipping away at civilized discourse with the latter is one further step on the way to dragging down society with it.

Some may not agree with this final conclusion. But given the effects that troll-like behavior is starting to have within our society and government, I think it's a harbinger of really bad stuff to come. So while I don't know how to fix the moderation system here or figure out a way to promote rational discourse without using draconian methods, I'm not going to take time to support a forum that clearly has a large number of people who value such trollish nonsense.

Take from that what you will, but that's how I feel. The only way to really change is to do better, to model good behavior, to call out the bad. I believe humans can do better collectively, but right now we're losing our way against the trolls.

Again, thanks to all who said kind things about my previous posts here.

Cheers to all.