A Tale of Cupcakes & Cretins

Here's a funny thing. You'd join a Facebook page called “Respectful Debate & Sharing Group” and expect it to offer just that, right? Oh how foolishly optimistic of you. Instead what you'd find is that the admin team remove you for confronting homophobes, bigots, reality dodgers and atheist baiters, then blame you for the most pathetic of reasons.

Let me give you an example.

The below picture was posted by one of their members, Barry;

It doesn't raise a topic, it doesn't come with any suggestion of debate, it's a straight attack on atheists and hardly respectful. So I commented to that effect. The page owner, Janel, defended it, to which I said that she would as she isn't the target. She then threw in the tired old veiled threat of “You do not have to be here if you don't want to be.” This is cowardice, it's the pathetic “If you don't like it, leave or be removed” tactic.

Then Barry piped in with the equally tired old canard of “the problem is your conscience has been pricked and you don't like it so are fighting back.” No, Barry, my conscience is clear, I'm fighting back because I'm sick of morons like you taking potshots at atheists on that page (and others) and getting away with it constantly. For all I was sorely tempted, I didn't swear, I didn't blaspheme and I didn't break any rules.

It's not as if the idiots know what the word 'warning' means as, right before booting me, one of the admin, Keith Lythgoe, had thrown his dummy out of the pram defending the OP and telling me to stop complaining, that the admin were “not in the mood”. I wasn't given a chance to reply, I was removed whilst I was typing (probably a good thing under the circumstances, given I was equally not in the mood for their shite and was going to leave in a vitriolic venting of shock and awe proportions that makes this blog update look like Beatrix Potter!)

I'm sorry, the admin team are “not in the mood”? Then perhaps you shouldn't be fucking admin if you can't deal with individual cases competently, instead lashing out at me because you're having a collective baby sulk over what others have done and I played no sodding part in!

My patience with that page and its band of banal bosses has worn thin since I was recently suspended for a few days, again by hair-trigger Keith. Do you know why? It's because I referred to a disgustingly homophobic bigot as “Cupcake” jokingly a few times and as “Tweedle Dumber” once, when he waded into a thread where yet another member was talking utter bollocks and tried to outdo him. We are talking here about people whose comprehension levels would worry a toddler.

So you'd be lead to believe it's fine to be a homophobic bigot, it's fine to make really offensive comments even aimed at other members who are gay, yet if you call them “cupcake” you're removed?

Well, yes, that is precisely the case, as the admin Keith Lythgoe put it in a PM to me...

“As far as homophobic remarks are concerned, myself and the other Christians express our convictions about that without hateful or demeaning language.”

Really? Who is to decide what is offensive, the one telling the homosexual they have a choice, that they're sinful etc and should change, or the one having to sit there reading it? I'm not gay, nor am I black but I'd be confronting them the same way if they were making racist comments. This bullshit about expressing their convictions is just an asinine way of defending posting offensive crap and not having to defend themselves. “It's my belief” is a shield too often raised by the bigot, usually as they wave a Bible in the other hand.

Well, Keith, why can others not express their convictions? Calling somebody “cupcake” is hardly offensive, it's not like they were called a “poisonous little bigoted piece of filth”, which is frankly what my convictions make me feel they are, yet I would never have posted it.

An example of how respectful their behaviour is towards gay members, this was fine by the admin;

They attempt to fool atheists into thinking they're open and inclusive by having an atheist admin, but it's abundantly evident that whilst he's the only competent member of the admin team he is there merely as a token. His presence is a way for them to dodge accusations they're a bunch of god obsessed, biased arseholes who actually have no respect for atheists or anybody not fitting their narrow minded ideal and so freely allow their fellow delusion dwellers to insult and attack them.

Doubtless Janel Sara, Keith Lythgoe and Lisa Goodson, the three Christian admin, would contend this claim. Yet what of the mass purge of around thirty members that occurred just days ago? Many of these members had demonstrably done nothing to warrant removal, I know for a fact that some had not even posted for several weeks so could not have broken any rules! It appears the admin have descended into a state of paranoia over people reporting posts and members, so went about arbitrarily banning innocent people. It's a shame the idiotic arseholes didn't instead boot those who were the cause of any reporting; the homophobes, the bigots and the baiters.

It's unfortunate but that page was pretty good until a few months ago when the page owner, Janel, took the shortbus over to another page, “The Battlefield”, and stocked up on what can only be termed the window-licking scum of society. Since then the page has become a piss poor imitation of The Battlefield, which itself is a piss poor imitation of an insane asylum crossed with a blocked sewage pipe.

Keith, if you're reading this you said you don't hold a grudge, remember? Neither do I. I do, however, have a blog upon which I can express my convictions. Must be awful not being able to delete this and boot me out without warning. Perhaps had you not blocked my rather than have the decency to discuss this via PM on Facebook I'd not be writing it, but both you and Janel did, so I am. It's not like I was ever rude or abusive in PM, as you both know, so you had no reason. I can only presume you blocked me rather than justify yourselves, which is typical.

Karma's a bitch. Talking of which, say hi to Janel and Lisa for me.

Oh, yes, here's the thread that got me permanently banned, minus Keith's little rant as he removed me before I could screencap that;

[Click image to enlarge]