Should we broaden the topicality of this group?

[Richard Heathfield]

Philip Potter said:

Let's not get into who started the insults.

I'll give you a hint. It wasn't me.

In the last month you called him a frog, completely unprovoked.

It's always a good idea to check the truth of such statements before making
them. In fact, I did no such thing. (If you disagree, please cite the
relevant message-id.)

I'm guessing you didn't mean anything
other than simply "he is french", but it is difficult to detect tone on
Usenet so quite understandably Jacob felt insulted.

Not by me.

<snip>

 

[Philip Potter]

Philip Potter said:



I'll give you a hint. It wasn't me.


It's always a good idea to check the truth of such statements before making
them. In fact, I did no such thing. (If you disagree, please cite the
relevant message-id.)


Not by me.

Argh, my memory fails me again. Sorry.

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Philip Potter said:

Argh, my memory fails me again. Sorry.

That's okay. Hey, if it helps, here's a rule of thumb for you about my
posting behaviour. I cannot deny that I sometimes succumb to the
temptation to vent my feelings about certain subscribers to this group,
but I am never gratuitously offensive. You will not catch me poking fun at
people because of their race, creed, colour, or gender; you will not find
me criticising accidental misspellings, halting grammar, or fractured
punctuation. (L3375p34k is another matter, obviously.) I might hazard a
wry grin on occasion (if, say, a misspelling or tismype is particularly
funny - like the classic from Micah Cowan, "Perl is a great language to
break your teeth on"), but that's about the worst of it.

Okay, I'll 'fess up - I do occasionally exploit such gaffes with a spoof
reply, such as the one I wrote in response to someone who asked, in
comp.programming, "how to sand an email". But mostly, I ignore such minor
distractions.

Anyway, you certainly won't find me using terms like "frog", "kraut",
"nip", "chink", and so on[1]. Yeah, I know 'em all, but I don't think
they're terribly amusing.

THEREFORE: If you find that you are reading one of my more strongly-worded
articles, you can be sure that there is a long history of patience behind
the apparent short temper. I don't lay into people for the hell of it. I'd
rather be discussing C.



[1] And, just to be clear, I didn't use those terms in this article,
either. I merely mentioned them. I know you know this distinction, but
other readers might not. They might want to check out this rather
off-the-wall anecdote, which makes the difference clear:
http://www.unconventional-wisdom.com/WAW/ROBERT.html

 

[Mark McIntyre]

Mark, he has demonstrated a great many times that he is not in the
slightest bit interested in learning.

Not entirely, but largely.

Even though his default behaviour is massively anti-social and his
advice not only biased but often utterly erroneous, on the very few
occasions when his behaviour is /not/ like that, his respondents reply as
if hoping that *this time* he's finally seen the light and will behave
rationally and altruistically - in the teeth of many years' evidence.

I recall you have children. Presumably at some point you must have
gone through this with them too....

--
Mark McIntyre

"Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place.
Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are,
by definition, not smart enough to debug it."
--Brian Kernighan

 

[Richard Bos]

Richard Heathfield wrote: [snip]
Let's not get into who started the insults. In the last month you
called him a frog, completely unprovoked. I'm guessing you didn't mean
anything other than simply "he is french", but it is difficult to
detect tone on Usenet so quite understandably Jacob felt insulted.

Richard Heathfield did not call him a frog; that was somebody else.
(I won't add to the flames by identifying the offender.)

I will, then: I did. And I'll gladly call myself a cloggie or a
cheesehead, and Mr. Heathfield a Limey. If I _really_ wanted to insult a
Frenchman, I'd use a term of _real_ opprobrium, not a mild ribbing based
on the cuisine they themselves are so proud of.

Richard