Grog

Roger, I don't see how it was that aggressive, certainly no more hyperbolic than terms used against Neil all the time. I have followed many of those exchanges and Neil takes a lot of abuse from McGrath, Hoffmann, and the like.

Roger, the ToS on Automattic suggest that the offended party contact the blogger directly on their blog, not by email. Watts did not do that. In order to file his claim, Watts had to read through those suggestions and ignore them. By filing the claim, he acknowledges that he did indeed read the terms.

It is understandable, because it is Automattic's policy. In fact, it is policy to comment directly on the blogger's site. There's a reason for that, a blogger might not check email before blogging.

Ultimately, it is because Watts filed a petty DMCA claim protecting a few insulting introductory comments to his list of links.

It seems that Watts has been caught red-handed in his attempt to deceive. Whether "Joel had no need to forge anything," doesn't matter. It appears from the evidence that he did forge bogus emails. So it could be that upon reflection, Watts felt a need to forge evidence, even though he may have not had an actual reason to.

If it had been a mere moment of blogger rage that resulted in an ill-thought out DMCA claim being filed, followed by a comedy of errors that led to Vridar being taken down by WordPress, then I would agree. However, the apparent attempt to forge an email all the while implying (and others outright accused) Neil of being a liar is really very contemptible behavior.

Up to the point of lying about sending an email, forging an email, and implying that Neil was lying, I would agree. After that, we part company on the "People will be people line."



It was damaging to free expression, potentially damaging. It also had collateral damage in that if Watts had told the truth and Neil claimed he had received no email, then Neil would appear to be lying. That is damage to Neil's reputation and there is no doubt that Watts had no regard for that when he made the false claim that he notified Neil and then apparently forged an email. It was also damaging in that Vridar had to spend considerable time and funds to get the site back up elsewhere.


Watts' actions have been fairly reprehensible. Why would anyone want to let him off the hook?
I disagree completely. Tom Verenna has implied all along, and even in that last post, that Neil Godfrey is dishonest. If anything, this case demonstrates Neil's honesty compared to Watts.

1.Watts claimed that he sent an email.
2.Godfrey maintained he had not received an email.
3.Watts produced a screenshot sent to Godfrey.
4.Godfrey continued to maintain that he had not received an email and was confused by the proffered evidence.
5.Watts continues to maintain that he sent an email to Godfrey, which Godfrey ignored.
6.Inconsistencies were noticed in the screenshot evidence which led to conclusions that Watts forged the email.
7.Watts has attempted to explain the inconsistencies, but the explanations have failed to explain the inconsistencies.


I think it is pretty clear what happened here. Wouldn't it be quite a coincidence if just the very email in question had suffered some sort of time glitch that made it appear to have been forged?

The easiest and best explanation is that Watts forged an email to make a) Neil look like a liar, b) cover his DMCA complaint and Automattic policies actions, c) deceive his friends and enemies, alike.

What else can be said?

hjalti

Roger, his system time shows the same time as the (supposedly) sent e-mail to Neil and his time and date settings is open on the screenshot.

Why is it "a bit extreme" to think that the guy changed the system time so he could "send" an e-mail at that time? :huh:

stephan huller

What is so depressing about this thread is that no member of a party - whether 'atheist,' 'mythicist,' 'believer' etc - seems to be able to apply any objectivity to the treatment of another individual from an opposing camp. In this particular case the mythicists have a point. The bottom line is that there was a creative commons license for the very use that Neil was making of Joel's writings. I don't see how this can be gotten around. Joel probably forgot that he had the CC on his blog and treated this as a Wordpress issue. I don't blame him for that because until now I ignored the implication of my own Creative Commons license on my blog.

Of course I don't walk around thinking I am Polycarp incarnate clubbing infidels over the head all day so I wouldn't try to 'shut down' someone for saying nasty things about me. But maybe if I did think that way I would at least try to find it in me to apologize for my mistake and put this behind me. I think it is extremely likely that Joel forgot about the implications of the CC license. But it is depressing that his 'friends' and like-minded in the 'believers' camp can't admit that he is in the wrong here because of it. The CC license changes everything. That's why Joel appears to have removed it from his blog subsequent to his 'outing' as the one who filed the complaint.

This issue is black and white. Had the internet not provided 'instant' information and people ended up 'picking up' the story as it was still unfolding and decided to make up their minds prematurely, no one would be taking Joel's side on this. I think he overreacted to criticism which it must be said drifted into personal attack (something I am guilty of too). In retrospect, I don't know that Joel tried to destroy Neil's blog. I think he just overreacted. Maybe he was mad, hurt, offended - whatever. It really doesn't matter though. 'Hulk will smash' still has its consequences.

Steven Carr

Nor was he connected to the Internet at the screen time he allegedly sent this email.

neilgodfrey

We are talking about someone who abuses, insults, misrepresents "mythicists". I caught Joel out in one of his comebacks in which he attempted to ridicule his targets "with facts". I do believe in holding to account "public intellectuals" who use their status to influence the thinking of a wider public.

There IS a time to call a spade a spade.

Here was my "personal abuse" in response to Joel of which you speak:

I then copied Joel's post here, and commented . . . .

As for your pearls of wisdom re Tom's slander against me, I can simply repeat: I challenge Tom to post the evidence on which he bases his accusations -- or allow me to post a defence on his blog. He won't. One reason is that Tom is exposed as falling into the same fundamental professional gaffes as his friends Watts and McGrath when targeting certain mythicists.

Roger Pearse

I think perhaps it honestly isn't clear to you what's wrong with your post. If so, perhaps I can offer a suggestion or two?

It's always good practice, when talking negatively about something someone else has written, to avoid discussing them -- even if they are lying bastards -- and instead purely discuss what they have written. Do it in such a way as to avoid personal remarks. Why? Because as soon as you say something like "Bart Ehrman is a liar", you lose your audience. It may be true; but you lose your audience. You will of course retain the haters, those who yell, "Hell, yeah!" in the comments; but these are not the people you need to convince, or want to reach. Once phrases like "liar! scumbag! troll! couchon! bastard! (etc)" enter the post, everyone switches off. That's why the House of Commons bans "unparliamentary language"; because it terminates debate. Discuss the scholarship, not the scholar.

What I try to do is make sure I don't use the person's name, or the word "you", very often in the post (sometimes substituting "we" for "you" works, by the way). It does make for a bit of extra work. But it reduces the temperature perceptibly. Everyone has ideas. One can refute an idea, and even the author may be convinced, provided that we don't make it a matter of his personal honour. If we attack him, we get nowhere.

If one can manage it, it is generally better to suppose one's foes are misled, rather than dishonest. It keeps things sweeter.

Just a suggestion.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Will Wiley

Howver if Joel removed the Creative Commons license on his site then it appears he intended to keep it down

neilgodfrey

The reason I quoted Joel's post in full was to show that he was the one calling his opponents imbeciles and fools.

The point I was making is that Joel calls mythicists insulting epithets, something I could and usually do ignore, until he claims to add a veneer of scholarly wisdom to justify his insults.

I was doing more than dissecting Joel's "intellectual argument". I do that all the time with full respect of the scholars. I am not in the habit of denigrating scholars whose works I discuss or disagree with.

I do believe that the name-calling of the Watts's and the McGraths and the Verennas Simply.Has.To.Stop. as Verenna would say.

It is quite okay, it appears, for Verenna, McGrath and Watts to carry on the way they do with their abuse -- no protests. But let me call them out on this behaviour when they couple it with blatantly lazy and sham claims -- treating their public as fools -- That.Is.What.Has.To.Stop!

Grog

I have been following these blog wars for some time and it really does get my ire up with McGrath, Hoffmann, and the like lump all "mythicists" as some kind of crank, nutter, conspiracy theorists. It does nothing for the tone of debate. It really does fall into the paradigm framework where instead of engaging in reasonable dialogue, the threat to the paradigm is shunted aside. I can list very many examples of the same happening in other fields, all of which the crank amateurs turned out to be correct (early habitation of the Western hemisphere, for example).

aa5874

But, in this very thread you called people scumbags, hypocritical, traitors, arrogant, vicious and dishonest.

See your own post #209

It is known that human beings can be dishonest--even clergymen and preachers.