Open letter to Harp-L and Johnny T

["Scorcher" <scorcher@xxxxxxx>]

All these public lists attract a lot of "*NG"s - new folks, who aren't
accustomed to the norms of on-list behavior.

(For instance, it's generally considered rookie-ish, clumsy, ill-mannered to
post attachments or HTML to a list like this.)

Occasionally, one sees threads start that become games of "one-upmanship" -
you know, language becomes more heated, or the "joke" gets carried a step
further with each post. The post I complained about was one of those - there
was an earlier post this AM will coarse language in it, then yours came
along, a bit coarser still. And the comments attributed to Muddy were
unqualified, and may or may not have been said by him (I've read essentially
the same statement attributed to other OBGs). Whether or not Muddy said it
doesn't really matter; It didn't NEED to be posted here in it's complete,
unexpurgated form, and it certainly didn't NEED to be spelled-out for the
list (- for instance, 'mf' works just as well, and doesn't upset so many
folks). And, BTW, MOST of us here on this list have seen most of those kinds
of things - as I said, we're adults, and we didn't just fall off the truck.
One doesn't hang around with blues players, in bars, for long before hearing
that kind of language, or the oral history of such statements. In the right
time and place, I've laughed about that very anecdote MANY times. As have
MOST of us.

As far as referring to what you said as "free speech" - fine, call it that
if you like.

As far as referring to what I said as "censorship", though, you are wrong.
What you did was coarse - what I did was call you on it.

And as far as you only being concerned about impressing your kid and your
audience - I doubt if your gratuitous vulgarity impressed either.

BTW, "sophomoric" although it SOUNDS like it ought to refer to college,
actually refers to "immature, irresponsible behavior". For instance, I'm a
High-School drop-out, but I could still be "sophomoric".

My invitation to "take that stuff outside" was not a throwing down of the
gauntlet, Johnny - just a gentle reminder that there are appropriate places
for such discussion.

And, as far as me appointing myself the keeper of morals on this list -
again, I don't care HOW you behave "in the parking-lot", but there IS a
standard here, and you stepped over the line. I apologize if I embarrassed
you for calling you on it so publicly. No, I'm not the list cop, just one of
it's netizens, yet I feel entitled to point out bad behavior when I see it.
Any one of us should feel justified in doing the same without fear of being
shouted-down with "censorship" accusations.

Now, go play your a** off, and picture me when you do "Boom Boom (out go the
lights)"
- -Scorcher