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Abusive and/or trolling members
Brian
Detroit, MI Moderator
For all those who had to put up with the garbage from that "attasaranam" character - my apologies that it took so long to address.
If that stuff comes up, and you feel a user is posting irrelevant, weird mumbo-jumbo, then please feel free to PM or email me and I'll get it taken care of sooner!
Thanks!
B
If that stuff comes up, and you feel a user is posting irrelevant, weird mumbo-jumbo, then please feel free to PM or email me and I'll get it taken care of sooner!
Thanks!
B
0
Comments
Over the decades of my involvement with various 'religious' and philosophical schools, I have watched extremism and absurdity expressed as the 'right interpretation' become the mainstream. Both fundamentalist "Shariaism" and "Jesusology" give example. In both cases, we have simply shut our eyes and ears to the fanatics until they have become too powerful. If we had laughed at them years ago, we might have been spared a lot of pain, particularly if we had been prepared to engage them in debate.
As far as I can see, from such reading of the sutras as I have been able to access, Gautama (like Jesus) never simply excised or squashed opponents. Nor did he resort to violence in any form. He simply returned, over and over, to teaching.
There can be no doubt that the whole question of the 'soul', which is deep in the Western mindset, is one which we, as Buddhists, are often called upon to discuss. That we should come up against 'gnostic' Buddhists should not be too much of a surprise. Chinese or Japanese, Indian, Tibetan or Mongolian myth structures are used as teaching aids, and adopted by us, Westerners, because of their venerable age. Why not Christian myths? I suggest that it is because of personal prejudice.
I find the whole tone of the recent (and earlier) posts from the Buddho-gnostics to be unpleasant, but, then, so are some of the spoutings of others with whom I do not agree. The mix of personal attacks and arrogance is distasteful, even offensive. It obscures what could be a valuable debate.
Perhaps, Brian, your action is the better one but it worries me: if we can censor and excise differing opinions, how can we object if our own words are treated similarly by others who may find our opinions unpalatable?
I would be interested to know what was getting attasaranam's knickers in a twist. Obviously he has an agenda and some members recognized it straight away. I am curious - what was his point?
::
Gautama and Jesus may not have simply squashed them but did they let them into their communities? (A real question, I don't know the answer.)
Those with differing opinions need to be engaged in dialog and not just cut out, but how do we engage someone who isn't willing to be part of a dialog? How do we engage without allowing abusive behaviour or letting "them" dictate the rules?
Simply ignoring doesn't work, that's been the main strategy of a lot of Christian denominations (because no one took the fundamentalists/neo-conservatives seriously at first) and now there's a real issue in a lot of churches from what I've heard.
Personally I'm relieved that he's gone (until he comes back with a new username and ip-address) because I wouldn't have felt comfortable staying in a place where I'd have to worry about getting attacked for things I posted (and I realise that's my issue, not the site's), but I see Simon's point as well.
This is our Sangha.
Were the terms and teachings and vocabulary used by this character kind? Did they create peace and harmony?
These are not my words. While it is true that many of Buddha's teachings flew in the face of what was commonly accepted at the time - many of his teachings began with endearments. His desire to impart his knowledge to others in this world that he seemed to care for.
Are we dogs to be whipped into submission until we take up another's leash - one who seems just as ignorant (or moreso) than others here?
I believe that someone who wishes to impart the teachings of the Buddha will use the teachings of the Buddha.
-bf
If we can learn to voice our opinions to him with out becoming angry at the things he has said to us then we have learned somthing very important.
Stand up for ourselves but without anger. Being able to stay calm in the moment.
I personally have a long way to go in learning to do this but it is good practice for me and I hope that one day I will be able to hear everyones opinion and be able to respond only with love, compassion and kindness....
My father can put someone in their place with the kindest voice and words and they have no idea until they think about it later that they have just been told off. But now that I think about it .........he doesn't do it with love, compassion or thinking kind thoughts...
Maybe not such a good example......
I also don't think I have been a member of this board long enough to say he should have been allowed to stay or made to go. I don't know all of the past history on this issue.
I was just voicing food for thought............
I don't consider it censorship. I consider it housekeeping. If anybody wants to read that kind of stuff, they are free to go to hjs site. If someone comes in here and posts a bunch of spam about cellphone pricing, I delete the posts and ban them too..
I filter things through the eyes of a "new user" - I put myself in the mind of my own self back when I was absolutely new to buddhism. Or, to put it another way, I read things through the eyes of a child. If the general content is helpful and increases my knowledge of buddhism, then it stays. If it is pointless, scares me off, gives me blatant misinformation, or tries to sell me something, it goes.
"attasaranam" was not here to help anybody, that's for sure. The general tone and purpose of his posts was inflammatory, not helpful. That's why I did what I did.
Many thanks, Brian!
Adiana:thumbsup:
I mean... come on, really... who here needs this sort of crap? I don't believe enlightenment comes from being bashed in the head by the business end of a baseball bat.
-bf
I do believe that attasaranam (soul-refuge) has had his 'knickers' in a twist for quite some time. He is also known as AncientBuddhism on yahoo.chat and is also known as Ken Wheeler. He is the author of the website attan.com. He is admittedly a neo-platonist who seems to think that the Buddha had the same thing to say as Plotinus. He also wants to prove that Buddhism has the same goal as the Upanishad's & is basically just another part of Hinduism. He is a self-proclaimed Pali-scholar who seems to translate in order to fit his own views. He draws off of 50+ year old sources who have since been corrected & moved beyond along with those of Vedantists & Theosophists. He feels that the currently accepted view of anatta in Buddhism is the same thing as Annihilationism & Materialism. He considers people who take this view as soul-destroying demons (his words, not mine). He has yet to ever answer my questions as to whether he actually practices the 8-fold path. My guess is that he doesn't. Considering the practical nature of the teachings, this makes his opinion less than authoritative.
Beyond that, I'm really not sure what his MO is. Sounds to me like a nice big case of megalomania. Or that he feels he has 'the truth' that 2000+ years worth of dedicated buddhists have somehow missed.
Also, this individual is only interested in 'dialogue' until you disagree with him. Then he becomes very abusive & condescending.
_/\_
metta
It has been borne in on me that many of my positions are 'marginal'. I trust that I have not upset anyone on this subject.
My own work on the notion of 'soul', I carry out elsewhere, out of respect for the mainstream Buddhist view on the subject.
HE IS A HOOT!!
I guess thing here is that this is not merely a matter of someone stating their opinion. We had a 15 page long debate on this subject in relatively friendly terms with very little to nothing being deleted.
In this instance, we had an individual who was a known instigator who flooded our boards with 6 or 7 original threads all basically on the same subject. This individual is known, to those who have encountered him before, to be quite abusive & condescending and was responsible for shutting down the Tricycle message board (with the help of a few others) & possibly other message boards. He is known for calling his opponents all sorts of names and tauting an authority on Buddhism & Pali that may confuse the 'new Buddhist' into thinking that the suttas say what he says they do. He relies on his own translations (which are not held in high esteem by the Pali community) and overwhelms those who have not studied these issues with them. He is really quite disturbing.
So, while he is just fine to have his own views and to express them, the behaviors that he uses to express them are not. I would expect myself to be treated in the same manner by a Buddhist forum if I flooded their boards with multiple threads on the same topic in which I conducted myself in an abusive and condescending manner towards the members.
_/\_
metta
Sometimes even negative attention... is still attention...
-The Morality Police.
Yeah, but at least your notions are interesting (well... sometimes
You could carry on your notions of the "soul" here - I'm sure many would be interested in what you had to say.
-bf
I wasn't there, but from what I've heard he, Zenmar, and a few others basically overwhelmed the board & harassed everyone to the point where the admin decided to shut things down. I'm not sure how long this lasted or whether it's back up, but imagine about 3 or 4 people like attasaranam creating threads & feeding off one anothers points here. The whole board would basically be thrown into debate & conflict. Now add some threatening PM's towards admins/users as well as prank phone calls & I could easily imagine why board might get shut down.
_/\_
metta
Palzang
I am certainly not the kind of person to keep silent when I disagree with someone, and I am obviously prone to saying inappropriate things. If I get a little heated and have an argument with someone, a simple reminder helps to calm the situation and gives me time to think about what I might have said, and apologize whenever necessary. Nevertheless, if I were to repeatedly spam this board with multiple posts centering around the same topic, and systematically insult any member who commented on my posts, I too should be removed.
Promoting divergent views, alternate translations, and theories concerning various aspects of Buddhism are certainly encouraged. Even when the majority of members disagree with what is being presented, as long as it is offered in a reasonably polite way, we are more than tolerant. Debates, arguments, and misunderstandings are inevitable; however, that does not mean that the administrator and/or the members of this board must put up with maliciously personal attacks after a person gets too out of hand—or simply has some sinister agenda.
Sincerely,
Jason
I'm disappointed.
Our enemies do provide us with the opportunities for practice but we don't need to invite our enemies to come live with us knowing that all they want to do, and will do is create conflict and hurt to us and everyone else.
I've been researching attan.com for months and I can tell you that it's garbage. There's no other way to put it. And I don't say that because I don't agree with his view on the soul. I have no idea what he's talking about when it comes to that or much of anything else. My opinion is based on reading what he's written that does come across loud and clear and that's his truly filthy violence, hatred and racism. After all this time I still haven't come across anything that has even a remote connection to Buddhism whatsoever. It's all just the rantings of a deranged individual full of hatred and vitriolic. His agenda is not Buddhist in any way. He wants to upset and divide us and cause suffering. He uses personal insult to do so. That's why he came here. That's his payoff.
Why would we invite such a person to come into our sangha, insult our fellow sangha members and cause hurt and division among us? To learn from him? To learn what? To protect his right for free speech? He already has his own website full of his "speech".
The purpose of a sangha is to support each other on the path. Why would we invite him into our sangha? I just don't get it.
Just a thought.....:)
I believe that him posting in Buddhism 101 and not Buddhism 202 tells alot about the purpose of his visit. Instead of trying to debate the nature of the atman, he is trying to rewrite the nature of the atman in Buddhist thought, which may prove extremely confusing to those who have a keen interest in Buddhism, but are only beginners.
As one once misled by extreme Buddhist teachings that seem to steer a little too much to the path of self-defilement, I have also once been misguided to follow the path of self-indulgement. But in the end, I find that the true path I can walk on is the Middle Path.
I replied to him, even though I knew of his actual motive, and the brief story of his Presecular Buddhism, in an attempt to force him to concede himself to the Dharma, even as I knew I had no possible reason to win him, only being a teenager without any literacy of Pali. Yet I had felt that the Dharma alone would serve my means.
My take on how we should have handled him was that as soon as his "anti-Modern Buddhism" threads surfaced, they should immediately be moved either to a central location where it is clear that it is not a new stream-enterer's reading material (unless of course, they are ambitious enough) or that we force him to post all his arguments on a single thread that would make it alot more easy to check on him.
His offensive language is, of course, a problem. As I had once told him that it would not be very nice for us here, trying to build a multi-faith environment for him to use such direct insults, I was wondering if the moderators could censor his post fairly to remove any clear personal attacks. Of course, it might take extra effort, but it can also lead to a positive improvement in the quality of our posts, while we do not deny him the right to a different opinion (as we inevitably do when we remove his whole thread due to a single inflammatory remark). Yet, if anyone is to be blamed, it will be himself for not following basic courtesy, leading to his views not being recognized.
I have attempted an email correspondence with him to carry on the unfinished business we have on the site. I think we can expect his return again as soon as he gets bored elsewhere, and now I trust that with the collective views of the whole NB Sangha, we will know how to- Heh-Heh...
In short, I reckon that when he returns, we kindly invite him to do a complete exoneration of his teachings, like the way we do when we introduce Buddhism, in a structured manner, listing down the Four Noble Truths, the Eightfold Path and the importance of walking down the Middle Path. This way, we can at least reduce the chances of him using any foul language, and very nicely "helping" him to check for consistency in his teachings. And if it is not consistent, I say we expose him publicly and quickly spread word of the thread to the major Buddhist forums to end his stance. Amen!!!
Of course, the last paragraph is just my view, and I am sure that perhaps, it may not be very Buddhist to backstab an enemy this way.
Since these posts seemed to fall into the "Dark Zen" mode of thinking ( I can't say for sure since I'm not a proponent of Dark Zen and really don't know anything about it) - I honestly believe that if someone came in here discussing their thoughts - there would be no problem. We have Zenners, Tibetans and Thervadins in here that all seem to get along with each other and play well. They discuss their views - others respect their views (when presented with a level of civility) and that's it. We all recognize that others here follow a different flavor of the Path.
There was no attempt to join this sangha. Just someone bum-rushing the rest of us, ramming their thoughts and opinions down our throats and then ridiculing members when they questioned or disagreed with him/her.
The Buddha taught. I've never read a discourse where the Buddha started off with, "You cretins!, shut up and sit down, cuz I'm talking goddammit!"
Even the Apostle Paul said, "Let us reason together."
-bf
Wow... :rockon:
Adiana:type:
I agree with Brian that discussion forums are not free-for-alls. The purpose of having moderators on a forum is to help maintain a space where productive discussion can occur. I've seen boards go down in flames, and I've seen boards that are over-moderated. It's difficult to strike a balance, sometimes.
However, there are some people who make a game of stirring the pot on the internet, and there are also some well-known folks who have earned a reputation as pot-stirrers within the buddhist forums, causing several forums in days past to fold.
Since I didn't see the exchanges here, I can't say whether this is what was happening, but some of the comments made in this thread give me reason to suspect that it might have been the case.
Whether we like it or not, there will always be people willing to twist religious ideas into bludgeons for the purpose of abusing others. History is full of examples of this kind of thing, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that people still do it today. As another teacher once pointed out, we will know them by their fruits. I'm not talking here about a few misguided posts from a new student with misunderstandings, but of patterns of behavior that, over time, clearly point to an intent to confuse, obfuscate, and incite.
Do we, in the interest of "compassion", allow this kind of abuse to overtake the spaces in which we hope to encourage productive discussion? Only speaking for myself, I see nothing compassionate in standing idly while allowing our spaces to be overrun by those who would hijack it for the purposes of abusing others.
Yes!! Excellent post, SWW. I couldn't agree more and thank you for stating the issue so clearly.
I'm sure we wouldn't like the day Buddhism becomes some kind of religion for hypocrites.