Jim’s off-topic comments

[Jim]

Now I’m thinking that Baha’is whose behavior in Internal discussions is repelling people from the Faith might actually know that what they are doing is wrong.

 

[Jim]

I do things sometimes that I know are wrong, failing again and again to resist the temptation, making up excuses for it every time. That might even be what I’m doing now, continuing to post in these forum for many months after I decided to give it up.

 

[Jim]

Maybe everyone knows what they’re doing wrong in Internet discussions, but they’re addicted to it.

 

[Jim]

(sigh) There will always be at least one Baha’i who will bite at any bait that drops into the water, vandalizing the discussion and sabotaging what I’m trying to do.

“With friends like that, who needs enemies?”

At least I know better now than to think that we have any common interests that I can appeal to, to reason with them about it.

 

[Jim]

I pahss the test.

 

[Jim]

This work might be too dangerous for one person aline.

 

[Jim]

I’m struggling with resisting temptations to respond to someone persistently harassing me and vandalizing a discussion I’m in, in blatant and shameless violation of forum rules.

Now I’m wondering ... could it be that they secretly admire me?

 

[Jim]

I’ve wondered sometimes what to do about the possibility that there might be some friendly personal interest behind some persistent personal attacks. The person might not want others to see their friendly interest in me, or it might be some kind of communication problem. I don’t want to encourage personal attacks by responding to them, but I want to respond to the friendly interest if there is any. I might have found a way.

Also, behind the personal attacks there might be some feelings of being stigmatized by some things that I’ve been saying.

 

[Jim]

One problem with leaving no stone unturned is that what I see always makes me sick.

 

[Jim]

I think I need to consider every person in Internet discussions as possibly being seriously traumatized.

 

[Jim]

I’m not thinking of anything that’s happening as RF being against me. I’m seeing what looks to me like a few people who continually post at me or about me with incriminating speculators about my character, capacities, motives and intentions. I’m thinking that might be partly because of the scornfulness in some of my posts. I’m considering now how to change that.

 

[Jim]

Sometimes I feel some anguish from what looks like hostile intentions towards me, but no one needs to feel sorry for me. It doesn’t last long or go very deep. Mostly I feel some anger and hostility about people persisting in posting at me and about me with incriminating speculators about my character, motives and intentions. I’m trying now to be more careful than ever about not saying anything to anyone or about anyone if I can’t do it with genuinely warm and friendly feelings.

 

[Jim]

My name is not Billy Jack.

 

[Jim]

I’m seeing some blind, stubborn, persistent prejudice against atheists, impervious to all information that could change it. I’m wondering how to respond to it, or if I want to respond to it at all.

 

[Jim]

I just did some searching on the Internet, and it looks to me like there is a lot of prejudice against atheists in Falun Gong.

 

[Jim]

I see it as a kind of combat sport with words, where ir doesn’t matter what the words actually mean to anyone, because no one is trying to understand what their adversaries are actually thinking, or help them understand their own way of thinking. No on knows or cares what anyone is actually thinking, if they actually are thinking of anything, when they say “evidence,” “proof,” “science,” “God,” “truth,” “faith,” or “belief,” because all that matters for the purposes of the game is saying the right words, Extra points for cleverly camouflaged insults and personal attacks across faction lines.