apology_to_silentbob_and_daxle Dafremen Dear S'Bob and dax, As I've said many times before, I am the first to fess up when I screw up, the first to say "I'm sorry" when I'm wrong. I really do think things through however, and so I usually don't have any reason to fess up to anything or apologize much. This Bob, dax, is one of those occasions when I do. It seems that free_expression can't be left to it's own devices. I have always fought, and will continue to fight, for free speech, but although I honestly see most of the reactive stuff that I have written as GENUINE artistic expression, I also see how a box of fleas has been opened by it, and the itch has become tedious to even an open mind. If free_expression is a hammer, then by defending it so strongly and indiscriminately, I have enabled that hammer to fall into the hands of homicidal monkeys. I see now that NOT EVERYONE CAN HANDLE true freedom of expression. NOT EVERYONE CAN DISTINGUISH between the real and the unreal, nor can they resist the urge to pound that hammer repeatedly across the same social boundaries without realizing when the limits of those boundaries have been sufficiently explored for the time. Like some bizarre researchers, they search for buttons to push and then push them, not to incite thought or to push ideas, but to live out their juvenile tendencies to tease, taunt and act out their feelings, using the shield of anonymous free_expression in order to avoid facing the consequences of that expression. (Consequence for our expression is something that I believe most of us that choose NOT to post in anonymity are always ready to face. Let this apology stand as an example. Let the voices of my detractors stand as another.) In a last ditch effort at pointing out the lunacy of this abuse of free_expression, I actually ENGAGED it, but succeeded only in fanning the flames of the idiocy. For these reasons, I feel almost entirely responsible for the continuance of these abuses. For that, I apologize. Particularly to YOU Bob.You were the first to try to put on the brakes when you called some of that expression "stupid." (See also: POETIC_ONSLAUGHT) At the time, I simply did not see how slamming the door in the face of ANY expression could be a good thing. I also felt that the "It's stupid" approach seemed too much like "I don't agree with what you're doing so it's stupid." I can't stand that sort of close-minded attitude, however, in hindsight, it seems that you weren't being close-minded, you simply wanted to stop the flood before it began, and THAT was the manner in wish you chose to express your desire. A monkey with a hammer can be a dangerous thing. A HOMICIDAL monkey with a an attitude, a hammer and nothing better to do is not only dangerous and ugly, but now grows boring beyond even MY considerable ability to bore. Some folks would say that I am this second monkey. I need only point to several examples to demonstrate that I am simply the former monkey, not the latter. Again, daxle, S'Bob, my apologies. Thanks for letting a go0fy carpenter monkey use your hammer. Daf - - 021025 ... kss ah, the old "apology as a way to ennoble myself as a martyr" trick. Next you know, you'll be insisting that you hate everyone. Nice one. 021025 ... kss reminds me of that old saying: "To a monkey with a hammer, everything looks like a typewriter" 021025 ... ROFL laughing my ass off while eating cupcakes 031013 what's it to you? who go blather from