It Matters What We Do
Filed Under (dee dee's posts) by dee dee on 16-04-2009
Okay I gave this a while. I had hoped that after a bit of time that the three parties involved would set everything aright. Hope springs eternal. Therefore, this is a follow-up to my prior posts: The Three Blind Men of SGP and The Tell-Tale Heart.
Heading the Bull Off Before the Pass
First, I fully expect, as Samuel has already done, to hear a chorus of complaints that all I do is call them liars. I have a rhetorical question: if they are, shouldn’t I? Their rejoinder is “Deal with the text not the persons!” Well I am sorry friends, but in Christianity (which they profess, but I don’t accept their profession), CHARACTER MATTERS. Hyperpreterists will often assume a worldly side-step of crying “ad hominem!” claiming that character issues should not matter in a theological dispute. In isolation, I agree. We all have black marks on our souls. But when there is a consistent pattern of unrepentant sin that is common within a particular group, it matters. In Christianity, character matters. In this debate, character matters. I don’t deal with unrepentant liars, and whether they like it or not, yes, I will bring it up. Repeatedly. It is easily stopped. Confess and repent.
Now, there are issues in my prior post that have been resolved with Michael Bennett. Michael has apologized for the “Whore of Babylon” e-mail, and I have accepted his apology. As far as Michael is concerned, that issue is water under the bridge. However, in his apology, he stated two untruths. I confronted him about them in an email, and even offered to have him simply admit it to me in private if he just couldn’t do it in public. Here is my email with some names blotted out to protect privacy (the context is that he wrote me to tell me that he only sent that email out to a few people and how someone else might have inadvertently received it):
Okay that is probably it. I certainly am not going to take the word of an unverified anonymous poster over yours if you say you only sent it to those three. I don’t know who she is, she has never contacted me outside of that one blog post.
What about the other issues in my post?
Do you now see that your statement about my “ugly picture” was prior to my joke? And knowing that, can you apologize for it? You don’t have to do it publicly though it would be nice if you did, even if only in the comments section to your post. If you do, I will acknowledge that and accept that as well.
As far as the discussions with Mr. Jones and Mr. Smith, do you really want to involve yourself in that? Since you were not copied on the emails and really only know one side, I would highly recommend that you leave that between Samuel and me.
If we two can resolve those two issues, the whole mess is over with as concerns you and me, which is what I would prefer.
Would you consider posting a link to my response at SGP? I think the readers should have the right to judge for themselves if I said anything appropriate. I forgave you for the picture incident, no strings attached. I am being misrepresented as if I didn’t by Chuck, who hasn’t bothered to read my response, and I rarely know what the heck Sam is on about. Someone should really let Chuck know that I accepted your apology and forgave you. I am thoroughly disgusted at Samuel, but that is no longer your concern.
If you cannot post a link, I give you permission to replicate my post in full (as long as it is in full) without giving a link. I do the same for any comments I made as well. Normally I would insist on a link. Not in this case because I think it is disgusting that Samuel is trying to turn a resolution between you and I into another fight.
That email was ignored. So, that one biggie is totally forgiven, and Michael Bennett and I are done with that. He does however refuse to deal with the other two issues. Just because you apologize in the beginning of a post doesn’t mean you can misrepresent things later in the post.
As you can see from that email, and from the links provided (specifically this one), Chuck and Sam scoffed at my acceptance and acted as if I did something wrong. Sharon Nichols tacitly agreed though I wonder if she even read what I said before posting. It seems as if she simply followed Sam’s lead and presumed he was being fair. I don’t think Chuck read it either. So Samuel has added to his misdeeds in this whole sordid affair.
As far as the list of Samuel and Jason’s behaviour related to Michael’s now-forgiven action—they both remain stubbornly unrepentant. In fact, Samuel acted in obvious bad faith and dishonesty in my private attempt to resolve the issues. I am going to leave that at that. If he wants to dispute that, I will bring out the examples. He knows what they are. He knows what he was trying to pull. And I was played the fool twice for trusting that this could be done in good faith.
Depending upon what Samuel, Jason, or Michael do or say, I may never speak of this again. I am planning on discussing it in a podcast which is the catalyst for this post. I do not wish to blind-side them. I lay my intentions out on the table. I do not intend to go over everything in excruciating detail, just as I have not in this post. I have already done that, the links are there for anyone to check. I do intend to discuss it more generally along with some other issues.
Hello Dee Dee,
Just a couple things.
You wrote: Just because you apologize in the beginning of a post doesn’t mean you can misrepresent things later in the post.
Sharon: I would agree with this. I do not believe it is proper to apologize to someone then go on to “misrepresent things later in the same post.” Now, I don’t know anything about your and Michael’s prior situation so I’m not saying yea or nay to that because I do not know the facts.
You wrote: As you can see from that email, and from the links provided (specifically this one), Chuck and Sam scoffed at my acceptance and acted as if I did something wrong. Sharon Nichols tacitly agreed though I wonder if she even read what I said before posting. It seems as if she simply followed Sam’s lead and presumed he was being fair. I don’t think Chuck read it either. So Samuel has added to his misdeeds in this whole sordid affair.
Sharon: Here is what I wrote:
“Doesn’t matter what DeeDee does with this apology Mike. You’ve done what you should do and it is the proper thing. God knows each parties intentions in all of this. People can play games, but God knows what the score is”
Actually, I wasn’t addressing whether or not you did anything wrong in your apology. I was encouraging Mike and reminding him that it doesn’t matter what you said in reaction to his apology, meaning that an apology is not affected by how someone reacts to it. When someone apologizes, the ball is in the other person’s court at that point and how they react doesn’t nullify the apology.
I don’t recall if I read your post before replying. I’m pretty sure I hadn’t, but I just can’t say for sure.
As for my last statement, “God knows each parties intentions in all of this. People can play games, but God knows what the score is”. I wasn’t singling any one person out. This was an across the board comment. It’s one of those, “if the shoe fits, wear it” kind of statements.
There ya go. Now you don’t have to wonder what I meant by my comments. :o)
Sharon
@Sharon, sorry that doesn’t fly (see below before thinking I am calling you a liar-I just find the explanation lame). Your comment immediately followed Samuel’s. Here is the portion.
You DID single me out and right after Sam made his disparaging comment. If you were being general, the next time, the wise thing to do would be to say something like this:
I haven’t read Dee Dee’s post to have an opinion on it. But in general it doesn’t matter what someone does….
and so forth. Maybe you should be a little wiser in how you post. But now Sharon that you are here, are you going to defend Sam in mocking my acceptance?
And as far as the facts, give me a break. Let’s start with the email. I have it. Michael threatened me first. I responded to his threat with a sarcastic comment. He is trying to claim that I said something sarcastic, so he was then just responding to me. THAT IS FALSE. This isn’t even something up for debate. It is an email. It speaks for itself. I posted the email in full in the articles linked above.
And with Michael’s second lie (which may not be his fault because he only know what Samuel tells him and Samuel has lied about this whole thing), I have also documented those.
We can go through them if you like Sharon. Let’s see if you have the integrity to say Samuel, Michael, or Jason were wrong on anything. Considering how upset you got with Brian Simmons with his comment, I find it beyond hypocritical that you defended the Whore of Babylon situation. What would you have done if that was done to you?? You would have gotten pretty riled I would imagine. Now what did I do when I saw your objection to Brian’s comment? I wrote Brian to alert him to your post and to tell him that I did not think his comment was wise.
Who is being consistent here?
Let’s go one point at a time, the email. I will start a new post about it in which I will post the email, and I will forward you a copy if you like. I will post what Mike said about that email after his apology. And then I will post my email request to Michael to retract his misrepresentation. I even told him that although I would prefer he did it publicly, I would have accepted it privately.
He IGNORED that email.
Let’s see how you fair with that one Sharon.
And we can discuss your disparaging comments at PretCosmos last if you like since you indicated puzzlement on that front. I will be addressing it in my podcast since you refused my invitation to write me and find out what I was talking about. Instead you said I would have to write you, that’s not how it works. And then you made it a public issue. Fine.
In context, your statement in that thread was at best worded with very poor judgment. If you say you didn’t mean me, I accept your word. But I would request you post in that thread and clarify what you meant. I am not the only one who read your words that way.
And frankly Sharon, if you are going to participate in a thread where the acceptance of an apology is being mocked you have an obligation to at the very least read the acceptance. Turn your statement around on yourself. Sure it doesn’t matter what people do with my acceptance, God knows the heart. All that is true. But how hard would it have been Sharon to actually read what I said before commenting, particularly since Samuel had given the impression that I did not accept his apology.
That is called responsible posting.
More pseudo-clarkian logic — Sharon, you were not “encouraging” Mike except to encourage him to continue to be smarmy. You have probably 5 posts on your new site supposedly relating to things I’ve said & not once have you contacted me to get any details & further, most of the stuff you posted has little to no context. Your site is little more than a feminine version of SGP…just a bunch a back-patters who have no idea what they are talking about & when confronted out in the open they either invoke “no talk” policies or do such rude things they get banned from sites because they are abusive to everyone that challenges them.
Morning Dee Dee,
First, a correction. I wrote, “Actually, I wasn’t addressing whether or not you did anything wrong in your apology”. It should not say ‘apology’. It should say ‘comments’, meaning your post in reference to Mike’s apology. Sorry about that.
It’s unfortunate you find my comments lame. I explained what I meant and I just don’t see what the big deal is.
Yes, my comments followed Sam’s on the thread. It is obvious my comments were some kind of reaction to Sam’s comments - but only so far as I’ve already explained. Yes, I did single you out by name. I addressed that in my prior post when I wrote, “I was encouraging Mike and reminding him that it doesn’t matter what **you** said in reaction to his apology”. So I did address this already but it also was meant as a general, across the board statement. And yes, it was obvious Sam didn’t like something you wrote which did contribute to my mindset when I wrote my comments.
Again, as I’ve already explained, my comments were intended as encouragement to Mike. I wasn’t picking on your reply to him. I did not want Mike to become discouraged because of any more fighting or negative comments which came about after his apology. He had done the right thing and I was glad he did. Your reaction to his apology, ***nor any other comments which followed***, would take away from his apology. I wanted to enforce that idea, so I posted what I did.
So you can take my word on this or continue to make more of it than I intended. Perhaps my communication skills aren’t up to par, but I also find it more than frustrating to have so many others ideas brought into what I said.
You asked me if I am “going to defend Sam in mocking my acceptance?”
I don’t believe it is proper to mock either an apology or an acceptance of an apology. If other issues are brought into the mix, it usually turns into a mess. If there are other issues to be dealt with, then by all means address those – preferably at another time. One thing at a time, you know? I don’t believe it is very good form to mix an apology or acceptance of an apology with a bunch of other stuff. On the other side of the coin though, if someone apologizes to me I try my best to give them some leeway in what they say and how they say it. If they want to elaborate in some details or give reasons for what they did, I try to be gracious in my reaction.
Previously I wrote, “I don’t know anything about your and Michael’s prior situation so I’m not saying yea or nay to that because I do not know the facts.”
That is wrong. I do know some things about your and Mike’s previous situation. More now than I did then, but the point I was trying to make was that I don’t believe I know **enough** about the facts to say yea or nay. Sorry about that. I know I worded that totally wrong.
You wrote: We can go through them if you like Sharon. Let’s see if you have the integrity to say Samuel, Michael, or Jason were wrong on anything.
Dee Dee, I really prefer not to get involved with the other issues you’ve raised. Those are between you and Michael, Sam and Jason. My comments are not directly related to those incidents so I prefer not to voice my opinion about those situations.
You wrote: Considering how upset you got with Brian Simmons with his comment, I find it beyond hypocritical that you defended the Whore of Babylon situation.
Sharon: Who said I defended that situation? I’m telling you right now that I did not defend that email once I learned more facts than was initially presented. Considering the bad blood between ya’ll I did have my doubts at first. But after I learned some more facts, I did encourage Michael to apologize.
You wrote: What would you have done if that was done to you?? You would have gotten pretty riled I would imagine. Now what did I do when I saw your objection to Brian’s comment? I wrote Brian to alert him to your post and to tell him that I did not think his comment was wise.
Who is being consistent here?
Sharon: I think we both were. I appreciate you writing to Brian about that.
You wrote,” In context, your statement in that thread was at best worded with very poor judgment. If you say you didn’t mean me, I accept your word. But I would request you post in that thread and clarify what you meant. I am not the only one who read your words that way”
Sharon: Hopefully I have explained myself better this time. Honestly though, I think much more is being read into my comments than is warranted. I mean, for goodness sake, all I said was it didn’t matter what your reaction was to Mike’s apology, ***the important thing was that he had done the right thing.*** If people want to play games, then God knows their intentions. Now really, I don’t know how much plainer it can get? I didn’t say anything in detail about your actual reply to him, which I don’t recall reading before I made those comments. I didn’t name names about anyone’s intentions or who was or was not playing games, if anyone even was. Like I said earlier, it was one of those “if the shoe fits, wear if’ kind of comments. So if someone wants to read more into my comments, so be it. I can’t do much about that.
Sharon
Sharon, I will write more later, I am running out, but I wanted to acknowledge your post which I think is a big step in the right direction of communication.
I want you to reconsider going over the other points. You are an admin at SGP, and I believe you have a moral responsibility in this regard. It can be done in private if you prefer.
Hello Roderick,
Rod, with all due respect, you saying what my intentions were does not make it fact. And what gives you the right to claim you know my intentions anyway? Did you not read anything I wrote? Or did you read it and choose to ignore it?
I fail to see what all that other stuff has to do with my comments to Michael. Can we stick to the topic at hand?
Thanks,
Sharon
FYI - to the readers. Sharon has kindly taken me up on my offer to have a discussion about the points I raised in private. In either event, whether we come to an understanding, an agreement on some things, or just it is a total abortion (which I don’t expect it to be, I think that in private without an audience that there is great potential for Sharon and I to have a productive conversation) I am sure one or both of us will report.
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