Tangled threads (was Ad hominem attacks)

[davewitley]

> Amy Z:

> I still don't get the connection to Talisman's post,
> which, again, was in defense of that much-maligned
> class of people, Lawyers.
> 
>Tom, puzzled, responds:

> Talisman quoted the same rule on the –Feedback
> homepage that I cited above. I'm not sure how
> "lawyers" got involved. I think that was another
> thread in this discussion. 
> 
> I was never referring to lawyers, that's for sure.
> When I chimed in, I was talking about post #277. The
> whole lawyer thing must be related to something else.

The crucial misunderstanding is in message 384, in which Tom was 
replying to Amanda (383), who *was* talking about lawyers.  Here's 
384 in full:

*******************

Amanda wrote:
She didn't say "All lawyers are ambulance-chasing squid," she
said "there's a lot of lawyers and some are out looking for a fight."

Tom here:
I may be wrong, but I'm thinking that Talisman might have been
referring to a post from a few weeks ago that involved a soapbox and
general grumpiness which was, er, quite ostensibly of an ad hominem
nature and is still present on the list.

But again, I could be wrong. That wouldn't be a surprise at all. ;-)

-Tom

*******************

Talisman's post was message 373, which was quite plainly about 
lawyers, in response to an earlier post by Dicentra.  I think 
everybody else had long forgotten the exchange between Gwen and Joy, 
which, quite frankly, I think it pointless to discuss here.  I have 
every confidence that the admin team handled that matter offlist, 
and would expect to see no onlist evidence of it.

I think it's also worth reflecting for a moment on the original 
purpose behind this whole thread.  The admin team suggested opening 
the main list archives to the public, with two main aims in mind.  
The first was to allow prospective members to get a better 
impression of the list than they do now (Kneasy, Amy - not to catch 
their eye but to help them make better decisions, e.g. one could 
then be a lurker and never join at all); the second was to provide 
more options for searching the archive flexibly and efficiently.

Can I suggest that there are likely plenty of options for pursuing 
both these aims while keeping the existing archives private, and it 
would be interesting to hear people's creative thoughts for doing so?

David