Friday, October 15, 2010

Censored

On Fri, 15 Oct 2010 15:17:25 -0600 Mark Barna wrote:


>Hi Spydra,
>
>I appreciate your interest in The Pulpit, but in recent weeks you
>have been making personal attacks on other Pulpit bloggers. I have
>received complaints about you from other posters and felt action
>had to be taken.
>
>You mention Richard B. as a colleague of yours. As you many know,
>Richard B. has the same email address as ManitouMon and
>TruthForce, both of whom were banned by our comments editor. He
>cannot post on Gazette.com, so he's chosen to post on The Pulpit
>blog.
>
>If you can refrain from attacking others and remember the Golden
>Rule, you will be allowed to post on The Pulpit.
>
>Best wishes
>
>Mark Barna
>Gazette Religion Reporter

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: spydra@hush.com
To: wayne.laugesen@gazette.com, jeff.thomas@gazette.com, mark.barna@gazette.com
Date: Fri, 15 Oct 2010 17:14:36 -0600

Mark,

I already wrote you once personally in response to the Chagoya
article you posted, expressing my sadness and outright grief with
regard to the anti-Christian sentiments you persistently foment and
encourage on your blog; your only response was to begin deleting my
comments in retaliation. With all due respect, please show me what
I wrote prior to your Chagoya article that you perceived as an
impermissable attack.

I did not indicate Richard B. as a "colleague"; I did, however,
notice that his complaints about the number of gay stories you post
were similarly taken down. His sentiments echoed mine, and were
not inflammatory in any way - certainly not nearly as inflammatory
as those you permit against Christianity. As such, I felt and
expressed a sense of kinship with him. I do not follow the soap
operas of the people who comment on your blog, and know nothing
else about Richard B., the others you mentioned below, or any of
the others who comment on your blog.

Mark, I recognized you at the demonstration James Tucker
coordinated in protest of "Journey", the boat made out of black
people that sat in front of the county courthouse for a year; I was
standing right beside him as you interviewed him. I'd always
wanted to meet you, believing that if only I could share a word
with you in person, it might help bridge the enormous divide that
exists between you and I...and so when you were finished, I
approached you.

"Aren't you Mark Barna," I asked. "Yes," you said with a smirk
before walking away dismissively...and I will never forget the
amused lack of empathy that was evident in your entire demeanor.
When the Gazette finally ran its equally unsympathetic story about
the sculpture's eventual removal, the vitriolic anti-black comments
were so toxic they made me weep.

When this newspaper was still called the Gazette Telegraph, it was
my teacher; I learned to read and write while gazing at the words
printed thereon. This paper taught me about freedom of speech and
freedom of the press; forty years later, I cannot believe what the
Gazette permits when it comes to insulting blacks and Christians
and Doug Bruce and conservatives, and what it protects and censors
when it comes to liberals and homosexuality.

Believe me when I tell you that I have refrained, tempered my
words, and held myself back; if anyone complained about something
I've said, it's because they couldn't think of a clever enough
retort. It would seem that some people can dish it out, but can't
take it, and I've been unfairly silenced for nothing more than
speaking my mind.

Certainly, Mark, I'll follow the Golden Rule - that's the one where
people are to do unto others as they would have others do unto
them, right? But will you do the same?

- spydra

15 comments:

  1. Crap!Unadulterated crap. You need help.

    ReplyDelete
  2. thank you for some very intersting insight.


    Pastor Roy

    ReplyDelete
  3. While Mr. Barna does not publish articles that are expressly pro-Christian, I am curious how that is the same as anti-Christian. His stories have never been pro-any one religion, but that is not the same thing as anti-Christian. Objectivity is not the enemy of Christiany so much as it is simply non-Christian.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Too often, people assume things exist in a strictly a binary or black and white view of the world. For example, if you are not a Christian, it is too easy to assume that you are an ANTI-Christian rather than simply non-Christian.

    There is a world of difference between anti and non. To be anti-Christian implies actively working against Christianity. To be non-Christian simply means that you are not Christian.

    ReplyDelete
  5. spydra


    you did something that many was trying to do for a few years. Prove the conection between ManitouMon and
    TruthForce.

    Pastor Roy

    ReplyDelete
  6. Roy:

    Just add that evidence to the credibility level for those "two" individuals. I had previously suspected that their use of language was too close for casual strangers that just happened to meet at a local hospital and Spydra has now posted the smoking gun that would seem to satisfy the need for a chain of evidence with their commonly held e-mail address.

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  7. I've been telling Pastor for YEARS that moN and TF were one and the same. It took Spydra (and Mark Barna) to bring the truth to light. Perhaps now he will listen to me.

    ReplyDelete
  8. What we do know about moN and TF amd richard b, all used the same email address. Could mon and TF be married? An just use the same address? Could the 3 live in the same house and use the same email address? An could all 3 be the same person?

    All we know for sure is that they all have the same email address. Until further information I will not make a sure decission. On this issue.


    Pastor Roy

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  9. Pastor, there is a simple problem with your question. If they are married, then Mon lied when he said that he [a] met TF at the hospital and [b] lives in Manitou Springs as [c] TF said he hand his wife were married in 1980 and [d] live in Fountain. Their statements regarding their marital relationship contradicts one another.

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  10. Let me start by saying...I don't know what Richard B., TruthForce, ManitouMon said or did to stir everyone up; I really never followed that situation...and every time it was alluded to, I thought "how inane; what a silly and insipid disagreement." I don't care if those three people are one and the same; all I know is that I agreed with Richard B. and many of the comments he left on The Pulpit.

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  11. Good morning, Spydra. It just happens to be that, by posting that e-mail to you from Mark Barna, that you have stepped into a proverbial hornets' nest regarding Mon and TF due to some past contentions that they were one and the same person. Unfortunately, that letter references those disagreements and distract some people, myself included, from the actual purpose--your disagreement with Mr. Barna--of your blogging the letter.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Spydra, thank you for your site..... I understand your disagreement with Mr. Barna. What happen is he was force took deal with Richard B. and you were caught up in his dealing with him. I am sorry about that.

    Bill, one Mon and truthfroce issue, you are right she did lie about the relationship between them. If they are 2 different people. I am still wait to heat back from them. To get their side of the story before I will make any judgment on the issue with them.


    Pastor Roy

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  13. My point is...who cares if they are one and the same person?

    I still have no idea what this/these person/s said or did that was so offensive -- please clue me in.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Spydra,

    There has been a lot of controversy in the past regarding TruthForce/Manitoumon. They have been noted for instigating flame wars in the various posts and forums on the Gazette and had been caught in various mistruths that they posted on the Gazette. They were also known to not post for long periods at a time, only to start posting personal attacks when they spotted any postings from certain people that they made their animosity for known.

    As a gay man who has AIDS, I was a frequent target of smear campaigns of theirs, such as false assertions that I am a cutter, trying to spread AIDS-infected blood to others to cause them to contract HIV, and that I supposedly hate Jewish children (that would be hypocrtical of me since I, too, was once a child).

    Manitoumon was most fond of bragging that I had been banned by the Gazette until Jeff Thomas stepped in outright called hir a liar and stated that I had never been banned. In addition, as Pastor knows, I used to post on his Forum while Manitoumon kept trying to have Pula ban me from there because of my not being a Christian. It has only been in the past few months that he and I have been able to communicate with each other after a series of fights which always had Manitoumon as an instigator.

    I assure you that these are examples of their nicer behavior. Their actual offenses were much worse.

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  15. Spydra, I too weep, not just for people who don't know God, but that you have to endure anti-Christian sentiments. May God comfort you, it is His fight.

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