[Rant] Flame threads and factual accuracy

[Fred Cohen]

Sorry to post this to the list.  I would normally only post it in
private to the sender, but since the sender has decided to speak without
listening I guess the only way to get the message back to them is by
indirect communication.  Will someone on the list please forward this
reply to the original sender on my behalf?

...
> Fred Cohen:
> 
> You have no respect for the freedom or opinions of others.  You expect the
> net to operate under your terms and under your rules.  You want people to be
> "responsible".

I know it's a lot to ask - being responsible - but I think it's the only way
cypherpunks will survive in the coming environment.

> From what I have read here that seems to mean "punishable".

With rights come responsibilities.  If you want the right of free speech, you
have to use it responsibly - otherwise, you will lose the right - and quite
possible lose it for me as well.

> I do not like some of flames I have seen, but I do not threated legal action
> against them. You have.  I have meet the keeper of the list.  He is a very
> nice guy and i would not want to see him go through hardship because of some
> whacko with a faschist control complex.

Since you don't know me, you have no idea of whether these statements
are true.  Put yourself in my place.  I posted no messages to the net
and yet I was publicly accused without any cause of doing things I did
not do by someone who knew that I didn't do them.  When I complained to
that person *in private* he published my personal mail to the list.  As
a result, you and others on the list are publicly calling me names like
a whacko with a faschist control complex.

It's not a matter of flames - it's a matter of intentionally and
maliciously perpetrating a falsehood about me in a manner and fashion
designed to damage my reputation.  That's different than voicing your
honest opinion and different than frivolous speech.  It's within your
freedom of speech to say a lot of senseless things - but it's not within
your freedom of speech to intentionally perpetrate damaging falsehoods
about other people.

Your name calling is so outrageous that nobody is likely to take you
seriously, and for that reason probably is not libelous - at least not
at the level you do it today, but what Perry did was something quite
different.  His statement could well be taken seriously - he has not
denied knowing that it was a falsehood - and it was clearly intended
to damage my reputation.

> Fred -- Go somewhere else.  I suggest you get together with Dan Gannon and
> his ilk.  I think you will find him more to your liking.  (Or maybe the
> $cientologists.  They are into sueing anyone who disagrees with them. I am
> sure they will help you start a list with your control fetishes in mind.
> Maybe you can borrow a few of their lawyers.)

I have a better idea.  I have as much right to be here or anywhere else
as anyone in the world.  Anyone who says I don't could easily be accused
of being a "whacko with a faschist control complex", but I won't make
such accusations in public against you.  It is you who can't stand the
heat of openly discussing one of the central issues of cypherpunks -
responsibility and freedom relating to speech.  The reason you can't
stand serious conversation is because your position is unsupportable.

> BTW, Fred has been killfiled on my mailreader. I am sick of listening to the
> twit.  To understand what an honor this is...  He is the only person I have
> killfiled on this or any mailinglist.

People who close their minds to communication and choose to make one-way
proclamations doom themseleves to ignorance.

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