Re: How to NOT feed the kooks was OT Re: Someone's Legal Name

Ophelia wrote:
"George Shirley" <gshirl@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:g2Xxj.599$rC6.552@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Charlotte L. Blackmer wrote:
In article <fq72gq$5k18o_004@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Little Malice <Little.Malice@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
One time on Usenet, clb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Charlotte L. Blackmer) said:
In article <62n7c9F23urcsU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Ophelia <O@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
<snip>

If you were being attacked in this way, how long could you
restrain yourself from defending yourself?
Do a google groups search on my full name as a phrase - both with and without the initial - and get back to me on that. I've had one particular pet kook for over a dozen years now.
Wow. I'm really sorry about that, Charlotte. I witnessed one death threat to a friend 12 years ago and it scared me enough to stop using my legal last name. I can't imagine what you've been through. I feel sort of cowardly now...
You know, I would never think you were. There are a lot of good reasons to use pseudonyms, as I well know. Anyway, sometimes I am too damn stubborn for my own good ;). There are plenty of people using screen names who are "present as themselves" and not doing anything that would qualify as "hiding behind a keyboard". That last is, of course, a sad fact of internet life - it's a true mark of character to see what someone does when s/he is assured of being able to "get away with it", and many people on the Net fail that particular test.

In places with a good tradition of offline social interaction (like RFC!), there's less of that nonsense. Long-term also helps. (Mind you, Asshats Hiding Behind Keyboards are the reason that moderated web fora are so popular these days. I think most of them have taken to drive-by comments on blogs, or on news sites these days.)

If my kooks weren't basically cowards, I would have done the following:

1) filed a police report
2) change accounts and disappear for a while
3) target practice for self-defense

Now the thing I won't go anywhere near these days is posting from a work account or through an employer's system (and that counts posting through Google Groups). When I was first on usenet, I was on a company account. (It was early days, so there was no AUP then. But I will note that I was often there evenings doing system work.) It was, however, scary when I acquired StalkerBoy by the simple expedient of turning down his request for a date - he knew where I worked. In later days, I have become one of those people who sets up that sort of infrastructure at the office and investigates abuse reports, so I so don't want to go there. ;)

ObFood: Will read and interpret Internet headers for it. Charlotte


About 8 or 9 years ago an elderly woman who was a member of a mailing list I used to run decided she was going to "get" me. Lots of foul language, threats, etc. Banned her from the mailing list, started getting emails direct. Finally called the police where she lived and filed a complaint of stalking. In a few days they called me, had arrested her, she was undergoing psychiatric testing. Ultimately they let me know she had been hospitalized and was being treated for schizophrenia. Some folks on the internet truly are kooks. Anyway I never heard from her again and have no idea of the ultimate results of her hospitalization.


That is very interesting George. The police took your complaint seriously then!!!

I never asked and they didn't volunteer the information but I would be willing to bet that she had a habit of doing the same thing to local folks.

A very dear friend has a paranoid schizophrenic son who is about 47 YO now. When he's off his meds, which is frequent, he believes he is the "Holy Spirit" and goes about telling people all sorts of things he's going to do to them. As you would suspect he has been arrested several times and sent off to the loony bin. He's there now and has been for over a year, his longest stay yet. His poor mother worries about him constantly but there's nothing she can do for him now. I don't think he will ever come home again.

George
.

Relevant Pages

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    ... Charlotte. ... That last is, of course, a sad fact of internet life - it's a true mark of character to see what someone does when s/he is assured of being able to "get away with it", and many people on the Net fail that particular test. ... Now the thing I won't go anywhere near these days is posting from a work account or through an employer's system (and that counts posting through Google Groups). ...
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  • Re: How to NOT feed the kooks was OT Re: Someones Legal Name
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  • Re: How to NOT feed the kooks was OT Re: Someones Legal Name
    ... If my kooks weren't basically cowards, I would have done the following: ... filed a police report ... When I was first on usenet, I was on a company account. ... Will read and interpret Internet headers for it. ...
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