Head To Head
Log In
Register
U-Know! Forum »
CS Gas at Peaceful Protest
Log In to post a reply

133 messages
Topic View: Flat | Threaded
Merrick
Merrick
2148 posts

Re: CS Gas at Peaceful Protest
Feb 13, 2011, 12:21
Keith and Dave: everybody on this board disagrees with everyone else about something. The point of this board is to provide news and discussion for a certain loose aggregation of radical political perspectives.

That discussion means people *should* disagree with each other, as well as provide ideas and facts that support a given position. As many of us, myself included, have shown uncountable times here, we're quite prepared to disagree and be disagreed with as long as it's done intelligently and respectfully.

Everybody believes in ideas that don't stand up and it is the job of political friends to test one another's ideas and so disabuse ourselves of the stuff that doesn't make sense.

I did not at any point criticise Geoffrey for having a different viewpoint, so your charge is an inflammatory insult.

My first reply to Geoffrey took him to task for what I understood his position to be.

He told me I'd partially misunderstood him, which I accepted and apologised for in a friendly manner. I ended with a (hopefully) humorous football analogy as to why official complaints against the police are almost always a waste of time.

(In a nutshell, the police investigate themselves most of the time, and the IPCC is too closely aligned with the police for the rare occasion when it does the work itself).

He replied saying that people who see the police behave unacceptably or unlawfully should make a complaint. This is not a refutation of what I'd said but a reiteration of a point I'd just rebutted, as if I hadn't responded at all.

So I gave a more detailed explanation of my position with more supporting evidence.

I don't see anywhere up to that point where I had been at all insulting or trying to shut down debate.

He replied with a sarcastic remark that he had understood my point, which means his reiteration had been trolling, so I said so.

I did criticise him for his contradictory position of posting as someone who hasn't understood what has been said yet claiming to have understood it, and for deflecting the blame for the trolling on to those who pick him up on it. I stand by that.
Topic Outline:

U-Know! Forum Index