In article <web.47ea6b2bbd0847b45a8888d90@news.povray.org>, 
nomail@nomail says...
>  If, as you imply, their behavior is objectionable, why emulate it? ... t
o
> "win"? ... win WHAT?  It's the pervasive sense of this or that group of p
eople
> being "The Other Side" which is one of the major root causes of reason be
ing
> superseded by emotional compulsion in the human decision making process. 
 If one
> is going to promote reason, the first necessary step is to BE reasonable 
to the
> best of one's ability.  Ignorance, fear, bigotry and hatred are the only 
real
> "enemies".  One doesn't cure a disease by despising the sufferer.
> 
Its not about winning. The kinds of people likely to read most of the 
stuff are "not" going to show up at the site, nor understand most of the 
stuff there, nor learn anything from it. So, its not like we are going 
to look bad to anyone that doesn't already think we look bad, for the 
most part. Some might, if embarrassed enough, start to wonder why the 
world is laughing at them. And that "can" be helpful. But, just to be 
clear, one should compare the level of supposed diatribe being used. 
Half the stuff people say is diatribe from us is just describing what 
**they** are actually doing. As for vulgar... Description of what the 
other side "actually" says and does is not vulgar, nor is using their 
own words against them. And if you want to argue name calling. Ok, some 
of that happens, but its more often from those like myself that don't 
have as many facts, details or sources to be clear about what we say, 
and *we* are still usually far more moderate in our comments than they 
ever are.

Basically, we call them Ignorant - they claim we meant stupid. We say 
they don't understand something, and shouldn't try to claim to, unless 
they learn about it first - they insist we just said that they should 
shut up and that we plan to make them. And so on. Even when we 
occasionally use words that *are* less than civil, they come back 
calling us Nazis, claims that we plan to send them to concentration 
camps, claims that *we* don't know anything, or said the exact opposite 
of what we actually did, etc. We state, one time, that its about time 
for scientists to stand up and start actively apposing them, and use 
some flowery language, and they start babbling about eugenics, stalin, 
pol pot, mao, etc.

But, as PZ himself has said. People that want to change things need both 
the mild and the aggressive. The mild to show people how things "could 
be", and the aggressive, to get people to question *why* there is a 
problem. Without Malcom X types, you don't get change, you get what 
science has dealt with the last 200 years, a constant threat by people 
who wanted to insert religion into things. We have been fighting the 
issue of evolution since the fracking Scopes trial, nearly 150 years 
ago, and the only progress we have made is *in* the scientific 
community. By pressing on, instead of both aggressively pointing out 
errors in the opponents views, but also making them look like the fools 
they are, we have instead allowed them to a) convince most people that 
they are not fools, b) undermine science education, quietly and not, in 
most places, easily noticed, by pushing for poorer standards *and* 
unqualified teachers, and c) actively working to blur the lines. And 
scientists, while this has been happening have been? Talking about 
overlapping magesteria, claiming that faith may be compatible with 
science, trying to find "allies" among people that would, barely more 
than 150 years ago, burned them at the stake, and basically bent over 
backwards to avoid actively calling shit shit, or the people that 
produce it so often liars, ignorant, or, often, even just "wrong".

So, PZ is the Malcom X of the scene. Dawkins.. Good lord, have you seen 
the guy speak? He's like Steven Seagal, just before he snaps your neck. 
"Now.. I am sure you really don't want me to do this...", spoken in a 
calm nice voice that is *just* loud enough to be heard. Anyone that can 
claim he is at all like the ID people claim, have never seen or heard 
him, and anyone claiming his books are as negative or bad as they 
supposedly are, have never read the damn things. And these people don't. 
They just buy the book, then skim the pages for things they can make 
"look" bad, "with ... a lot of ... elipses ..., which conceal ...", 
entire chapters in between them. BTW, the original quote of the above 
contained the first 3 chapters of Moby Dick. ;) lol Its hardly a 
diatribe, strawman, or anything else, to call them liars when they do 
that sort of thing. I am sure you can think of plenty of other entirely 
appropriate things to call them as well.

-- 
void main () {

    if version = "Vista" {
      call slow_by_half();
      call DRM_everything();
    }
    call functional_code();
  }
  else
    call crash_windows();
}

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