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I've given this a lot of thought, and come to this conclusion: this apology is owed. I loathe apologising, especially in public, so rest assured -- I would NOT do it if I didn't believe it were absolutely warranted.
My last diary here was a godawful mess (DON'T try to open it, it has almost a thousand comments and it freezes even my computer. If you really MUST read the text, I suggest reading the near-verbatim version at MLW. I'm not being self-serving, the traffic can't do me any good with this disaster -- it's just ridiculously slow to open in its DKos version).
It was a mess not only in its execution but also in its inadequate "research," for lack of a better word. As is too often the case, I used as examples to support my thesis a situation and person that were hideously inappropriate to the issue at hand. Thinking I knew all there was to know about it, I blundered on into the fray, compounding the problem with my stubborn, willful refusal -- until it was FAR too late to undo much of the damage I'd done -- to listen when people told me I was missing crucial information.
However, before I proceed...
For the record, I absolutely do NOT retract the diary itself. I still think there is an oppressive air of "groupthink" here when it comes to troll rating, for example. More and more, it seems that a troll is who Group X says a troll is. More and more, it seems that the tactic of intimidation through group disapproval is an accepted method of "herding the cats" at Daily Kos. It saddens me deeply, because I had hoped for much more from DKos than the sort of atmosphere that punishes minority opinions, that shouts down dissent, that threatens with banishment anyone whose perhaps "batty" posts might "reflect badly on DKos," whatever that means.
I am not recanting my overall points, nor the theme, nor, really, anything I said that didn't have to do with the hrh situation.
There. On with the mission...
I thought I had read everything relevant to the discussion. I hadn't. I'd missed some VERY pertinent information. As a result, I fucked up at just about every turn after that point. You know how sometimes you take a wrong turn and then no matter WHAT you do, unless you go back to that very spot, you pretty much get more and more lost? Yup. That was what I did.
And so, dear readers, I feel it absolutely necessary to apologise publicly for my bullheaded, often insensitive, even more often arrogant and distressingly, thoroughly ill-considered behaviour in that diary. I have behaved a boor, and can only ask forgiveness of those whom I have offended or hurt.
I pretty much BURIED my totally valid points beneath a mountain of defensive insistence that people were reading more into my use of hrh as an example than they ought. As it turned out, they were pretty much dead on -- using hrh as an example was the absolute WORST thing I could have done to serve my themes -- and in so doing, I also offended and horrified a great many people.
Look, I've read it all now, I think, and it's STILL not as simple as calling her a troll and that's that. I was here when she came aboard; she loathed me, and gave me my fair share of misery. But as douchebaggy as her behaviour and commentary were, I would never have called her a troll.
But over the past several weeks, it appears hrh did a little magic genie dance and deliberately set out to BE a troll, regardless of the fact that she's as liberal as the next Kossack, votes Democratic, agrees with the majority of this community on the majority of issues. That's not enough here; some SMALL degree of civility is required of virtually EVERYONE who participates in this community -- yes, even the Great and Powerful Armando, some evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.
Having now subjected myself to the entirety of hrh's participation over the past few months, it's clear to me that by almost every Daily Kos standard, hrh chose to become the troll of which she'd for so long been accused of being all along. Disruptive posts, ad hominem attacks, posts designed seemingly with one primary motive -- to disrupt, sow dissent and set Kossacks at each other and at her, drawing lines of division where none belonged.
I've been on contact with hrh for the past couple of weeks, as she chose, inexplicably, to give me mild email updates on her apparent QUEST to be banned from Daily Kos. I never really read the links she sent, because, frankly, my life was far too complicated for my consistent participation at my OWN blog, let alone this one, love it though I do -- and I DO.
At any rate, it seemed to me that hrh had experienced a change of heart toward me, at least, so I took her at her word -- perhaps rightly, perhaps wrongly.
But at least one thing was definitely wrong -- and that was my decision to use the recent travails of hrh here at DKos as an example of how the troll hunters of yore have become, in my estimation, a vicious pack of enforcers who delight in lording their petty tyranny over the cowering masses... Well, you get the picture. Heathers, brownshirts, choose your metaphor -- none are accurate, none are fair -- but they all beckon to writers like me, who just love a juicy metahpor they can slowly strangle and kill, rendering it unusable for the next poor guy.
I compounded the ugliness once again by returning to MLW and listening only to those who agreed with my conclusions, drawn without some important missing pieces.
I made a grave error in judgement in choosing hrh as my picture of pure Kossack sullied by a witch hunt... She isn't a horrid person, but hrh made every decision that brought about her banning from DKos. And THEN... as if going back to MLW and whining to the home crowd weren't ungracious enough, I proceeded to indulge myself in a busload of nasty responses to nasty comments made to me, which brought MORE nasty comments, which in turn made me feel TOTALLY justified in returning fire.
I made a big fat mess, I behaved in an ugly manner, and there's just no excuse for it, goddamnit. I've mostly been able to keep to my resolution of 2 years ago to never say anything online to someone that I wouldn't say to him in person; it all went into the compost heap with the posting and discussion of my last diary.
So, I hereby offer my apology to the Daily Kos Community for my bad judgement and insistence on holding on to my wrong-headedness for far too long. In particular, I apologise to mcjoan and Armando for allowing them to believe, for however short a time, that I had actually weighed ALL the evidence and found hrh the victim.
I'm sorry, DKos. I fucked up and that's the best way I can put it -- I fucked up, and I am sorry.