Monday, March 19, 2007

Purging is HOT!

My latest post got censored by the ProgBlog Moderators. Why? I'm not sure.
ProgBlog moderator Scott did leave a comment saying my post was "incendiary" and that I had "gone overboard on the title". Look for the original post on my blog and decide for yourself.




Jason Cherniak, recently characterized as "the laughing stock of the blogging community", has purged pro-Palestinian blogger "Audacious". Reason? Well, according to Audacious certain ads run on the Audacious weblog didn't sit well with Jason Cherniak.

It's hard to believe that Jason Cherniak, the God of Liblogs, would accuse another blogger of running ads for the NDP when Cherniak does the exact the same thing on his own blog; he even runs ads for the same political party. Maybe a slight difference is that Jason does get paid for the ads (Jason is soo smart), where audacious refrains from accepting money from other political parties.

Anyone who has paid any attention to both blogs will have noticed the different takes these bloggers have on the P/I conflict. Jason's fallacious blog entry "what is anti-Semitism?" shows where he stands; entries by audacious had more of a pro-Palestinian bias. Could this be the reason for the purge? Will we ever find out the real reason?

14 comments:

Jason Cherniak said...

Your initial post suggested that I could not be trusted because I am Jewish and Audacious Ontology has complained about Israel in the past. That is why it was removed, according to Scott's comment. As for the rest of your comment, you should do some research on Werner Patels before you start linking to his drivel.

Erik said...

I never said that you "could not be trusted because you are Jewish", neither did the post suggest this.

Your "what is an anti-semite" and my post suggests that you are most likely biased and that your reasoning stinks.

Start working on the basics, Jason, or you will become "the laughing stock of the blogging community".

Nuff said.

George said...

Quod erat demonstrandum -- thus it is proved!

George said...

Now Jason is trying to tell you, Erik, who you can link to. He wants to take control of your blog too now.

Man, I am so glad to be independent.

Erik said...

Werner Patels said...

Now Jason is trying to tell you, Erik, who you can link to. He wants to take control of your blog too now.

Indeed, Jason should do his own research before linking to this junk (Jason Cherniak said: Eugene, Chomsky is a Holocaust denier. - see this page for more Cherni-yak nonsense)

At issue, Jason, is of course WHY Audicious was removed. But you rather attack fellow bloggers for anti-semitism than shedding some light on the purge of an pro-palestinian blogger.

As for the reason why my post was removed, I don't think we can trust your judgement on it; not because you are Jewish, but because your actions stem from an immature, closet Conservative, suffering from megalomania.

George said...

Save your breath, Erik, he's too thick to understand reason.

Oh my, you have just linked to me again. Cherniak will now muster the entire force of the Israeli army and nuke you and your blog. Alternatively, he will call on his buddy, Kinsella, and have him write a libellous column in the National Post about you.

;)

Erik said...

Alternatively, he will call on his buddy, Kinsella, and have him write a libellous column in the National Post about you.

That would make my lawyer happy.

George said...

LOL

Psychols said...

Was this post purged too Erik? I tried to vote for it on progblogs, but cannot find it there.

I am surprised that Tribe has started purging posts from an aggregator that calls itself progressive. Progblogs is going to become pretty sad if Tribe is the going to start approving posts. He lacks the wisdom.

Erik said...

Hi Psychols,

I don't know what posts are being purged or not. There are no guidelines either; it's up to the progblog moderator.

It's sad to see posts being censored by moderators who don't seem to know what progressive means.

The worst thing of this? Scott didn't even have the guts to tell me in person my post was going to be purged. I found out myself; suddenly my post was gone. futsie.

Nice folks, those moderators, but hell they are not progressive.

Have you ever considered leaving ProgBlog?

Erik said...

y the way, there are more people out there that think ProgBlog is far from progressive when it comes to their purging/censoring practises.

Read Sid's comments at the bottom of the diary.

Here's some of it (I think he's progressive enough to not mind):

Wow, this "community" is really full of the most unwelcoming people. Some folks really need to think about the golden rule some.

To continue the school comparison [comparing ProgBlog moderators to "cool kids"], if you really want to, at my school, the cool kids weren't actually able to remove students at will, you seem to think they were, perhaps they were at yours, but, since we are being stupid and ignoring the actual issues, I think its a valid point. The cool kids removed ZERO students from my school by fiat, so if you want to continue down that road, the PB cool kids are infinitely worse than the high school ones, at least mine. As to trying to say the moderaotrs don't piledrive people, congrats on the straw man, I never said anything like that, my point was you called my high school soft and I responded.

Also, I should correct my "cool" statement, you folks aren't the cool kids, you are just acting like the cool kids, it typically happens with the majority of people, when given power, they tend to abuse it. It is a useful function in society for there to be folks who try and watch those with power and question them and how they make their decisions. One might go so far as to say the originations of the blogosphere spring directly from this.

I am upset as I see a very hidden process with no rules or regulations or transparency. I don't know what the definition of progressive is, but I know that the way PB has dealt with this is the opposite of whatever one might deem it. Unfortunately, whenever I try and point this out, I am personally attacked by moderators and their supporters. I figure Dawg is due to come and wretch at me some as he seems to enjoy ignoring facts and dealing with personal attacks instead.

In the end, it all boils down to the thing that bothers me the most in any organization, be it a pro-life group that favors the death penalty, or a Harper government official with his/her mouth open. Hypocrisy sucks, and for a group to call itself progressive while it has no rules or transparency and has hidden votes to ban people, brags of so-called moderator forums that the users will never see, all the while featuring someone like Cherniak, is straight up hypocrisy and it sucks.

As to the indifference vs. thinking its OK, I misread your point LKO as the RM statement was in my mind and I thought you were referencing it, I would agree that if the moderators were voicing that it would be OK for this to happen, it would most definitely not be good and I would support.. well I don't know what I would support, but it certainly would not be them.

Finally, in terms of "progressive" and what is "allowed" in a progressive blog, perhaps a good starting point would be the hate speech laws that exist in here in Canada. I would suggest that if the posting does not breech our hate speech laws, that the progressive thing to do would be at worst condemning speech that falls short of that. Banning folks for speech that falls far below this standard is not a progressive value.

Finally, IANAL, but have too many of them in my life, and I would suggest that a legal precedent has been set here at PB that the owner may regret big time. By banning someone for a post they wrote on their blog (importantly not in a diary) that is aggregated here, PB essentially showed it is possible for them to act like an editor and "control" what appears here. Thus if someone like Kinsella wanted to be a jerk about a post that was aggregated here, he would sue PB and be able to show that PB in fact acts like a publisher as they have control over the pieces that appear. Not that I necessarily agree with the above, but it certainly would be something I would consult a lawyer about if I ran PB.

OK, one last point, if being anti-semitic is enough to get one the boot, logically we can see being ant-semitic is very bad and I think everyone can agree on that. Would it not then follow, that falsely labeling someone an anti-semite rivals this in "badness" and should also be an offense that gets one the boot?

Psychols said...

Hi again Erik,

I considered leaving progblogs but decided it would be more appropriate to stay so that I could complain about the banning and promote my favorite topic (the free and open exchange of ideas). Now I plan to complain about the censorship.

I didn't find your post about the censorship but your "How Progressive is ProgBlogs?" post is there. It already has 4 votes.

A post I made yesterday did not show up at progblogs, but I think that was a technical glitch so I have reposted it.

Have you considered leaving Progressive Bloggers?

Anonymous said...

Wow I got quoted here!

The craziest thing I've heard now is Dr.Dawg saying that they will only ban people if the person they insult is PB member, that is why its OK for Cherniak to call Chomsky a holocaust-denier and anti-semite.

He actually posted that!

That should be enough for his permanent removal as a moderator, he has no concept of morals and ethics with this statement.

It also flies in the face of the RM ban as he did not attack a PB member with his comments.

Oh well, I have been going through and bookmarking blogs from PB so I can remove PB as a bookmark, I am really tired of Scott's whining everywhere and then pointing to Wayne if we have a problem, does Wayne ever actually speak for himself? And does Scott actually enjoy the role of yes man to non-partisan (read Liberal) Wayne?

It has been amusing to watch Scott's transition from unaffiliated to Liberal, it's like watching a caterpillar turn into a slug.

I am thinking a real progressive aggregator may be required, one that is actually open and transparent. I could probably have a similar functioning site done in a week or two in my spare time, hosting would be the only pain.

Lately I have been quite enamored with the algorithm used for the front page, I would love to see the code for it, watching how it works, well it makes little sense unless you have people constantly hand-tweaking it, which considering what has happened here with Scotts silent purging (I wonder how many other times he has done this..) may actually be the case.

Anyhow, back to work, I have been being stalked by PB moderators so we should see them back here soon, or maybe they will hide and peck on their private moderators forum.

Erik said...

Hi Sid, thanks for posting.

Can't tell how happy I am with you visiting my blog. It's my birthday today, so it's a nice treat!

Also a bit short in time....but wondered about the following:

I am thinking a real progressive aggregator may be required, one that is actually open and transparent. I could probably have a similar functioning site done in a week or two in my spare time, hosting would be the only pain.

I've got some space left to host. Is space the only problem? I do have PHP and MYSQL options as well. Anything else to worry about?

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