DiscussMormonism.com

You gotta love it, folks. Not too long ago, uber-TBM mega poster "Charity" complained to the mods about "It occurs to me'"s use of a quote from her in his/her sig line:

charity wrote:it occurs to me, you may quote me in any post your wish. I do request you take a quote from me out of your signature. Context is everything, as I am sure you know. Or should know. Please immeditely remove it. I am also reporting it to the mods.

(emphasis added)

New mod "skylla," (any guesses as to the identity of this one?), swoops in to take care of the problem ASAP:

Skylla wrote:saw the report. I'll double check, but I believe we have a rule that you can't quote a poster in your signature without their permission. Please remove Charity's quote from your sig, It occurs to me. Thank you.

Edited to add: I removed it for you since I don't know when you'll be returning.

(emphasis added)

Wondering about the legitimacy of all of this, It Occurs to Me returns to add:

It occurs to me wrote:No problem. Do you think I was using it in a way that you didn't really mean? I thought it stood on it's own from whatever angle you look at it. And described both sides of most discussions here.

Skylla wrote: @ Dec 8 2006, 05:43 PM) *

I saw the report. I'll double check, but I believe we have a rule that you can't quote a poster in your signature without their permission. Please remove Charity's quote from your sig, It occurs to me. Thank you.

Edited to add: I removed it for you since I don't know when you'll be returning.

Thanks I guess. I just assumed I was following a precedent that was set up by Prof. Peterson. What's good for the goose and all that.

Is this a new rule here? Are you going to be applying this "fairly" across the board?

An excellent question! But do you really think that this sort of fairness extends beyond the cozy walls of the FAIR, er, I mean MA&D messageboard? Think again:

Charity wrote:I have seen that rule enforced for the entire time I have been posting first on FAIR and now here. And do you know that Dr. Peterson does not have the permission of those whose quotes appear in his signature?

For those curious, this is Prof. Peterson's current siggy line:

Daniel Peterson wrote:Anti-Mormon: “After all, Prof. Hamblin hasn't exactly been a model of professionalism and scholarship.” Mister Scratch (2 December 2006)

Non-LDS Scholar: “Hamblin’s book [Warfare in the Ancient Near East to 1600 BC: Holy Warriors at the Dawn of History (London: Routledge, 2006)] is a goldmine of information—both textual and archaeological—on ancient Near Eastern warfare before the Late Bronze Age.” Professor Robert Drews (Vanderbilt University)

(red font ibid)

Now, now---I'm hurt that DCP would label me an "anti-Mormon." Doesn't he know that I'm an advocate for positive change in the Church? There's hardly anything "anti-" about that, in my opinion, unless you mean "anti-the-status-quo"! Also, for the record, Prof. Peterson most definitely does not have my permission to be lifting my quotes like this. He knows I love him, but he's going to have to come over here to the level playing field if he wants my permission for such things.

Back to my original bolding of Charity's post: I agree that things taken out of context are often bad. In this case, the "badness" is all Prof. Hamblin's. Of course, I am referring to his "Metcalfe is Butthead" debacle, and also his losing of the Watson letter. Just for the record.

In any case, what was so interesting/entertaining/striking about the whole thread is that this appears to be yet another instance of the aptly named MAD board resorting to oppressive, Stalinist-type tactics where they are inventing rules out of whole cloth as a means of furthering their control-freakishness. Awesome, indeed!

As a final cherry on the top of this icecream sundae of a thread, The Dude brilliantly skewers the Good Professor:

The Dude wrote:

It occurs to me . . . wrote: @ Dec 8 2006, 11:03 PM) *

As to whether or not Dr. Peterson had permission, I don't know, merely assumed from give and take between he and The Dude, that he did not. Maybe I'll ask the dude to follow up on this.

Oh, that. Dr. Peterson did not have my permission. He had one of those "gotcha" moments where he thought something I said was a big admission and maybe a little embarassing to me (importantly, he cut my statement off at a comma so that it did not fully represent my view). Oh well. Rather than complain to the moderators, I updated my signature with something fun that Dr. Peterson said a while back about "Book of Mormon archaeology" being a joke in academia. LOL

I'm laughing right along with you, Dude!

I really like Charity...she is so charitable to other people.....Charity complained about to the Mods because I liked COWPIE
and I was COWPIE's cheerleader

I don't know where it is written, but I always understood there was a rule against using quotes without permission within the board. Of course if something is said on another board, you can use it in your signature line on FAIR/MA&D.

It isn't a perfect system. Dr. Peterson and I used quotes from each other without permission for almost a month -- since neither of us whined to the moderators, it stood until one of us decided to be "mature" and take it down. Yeah, it isn't a perfect system, but some system of control is necessary. Without it, everybody would be sporting silly quotes from Charity, creating a scene as monotonous as "bling" on rappers.

;)

The Dude wrote:I don't know where it is written, but I always understood there was a rule against using quotes without permission within the board. Of course if something is said on another board, you can use it in your signature line on FAIR/MA&D.

It isn't a perfect system. Dr. Peterson and I used quotes from each other without permission for almost a month -- since neither of us whined to the moderators, it stood until one of us decided to be "mature" and take it down. Yeah, it isn't a perfect system, but some system of control is necessary. Without it, everybody would be sporting silly quotes from Charity, creating a scene as monotonous as "bling" on rappers.

;)

The old board had this rule, the new one doesn't. This is why the mod Skylla wrote:

This is an old rule. I don't know if Prof. Peterson received permission from anyone quoted in his signature or not.

I'm curious. Why did you choose Charity's quote and why did you make the lettering so large? Did you think she would be flattered or annoyed? (My emphasis)

It was applied to "It occurs to me..." retrospectively. This rule does not even exist on the MA&D board. But then, the written rules are supposed to be "guidelines". Looks like when Charity objected it was applied retrospectively. There is no rule about quoting posters from other boards, unless the material is copyrighted.

Hi There,

I find it truly Amazing and a bit odd how the moderators at the 'FAIR' Message Board, now called the MA&D Board, will allow their LDS Posters to have quotes from Posters from other Message Boards without that Poster's permission, but yet they would banned people for what they wrote on other Message Boards that are totally seperate from their Message Board. Amazing! Simply Amazing and a bit odd from those 'FAIR' now MA&D Moderators.