Trannies are so hot right now, anyway. Like totally. Trannie. Hot mess. Trannie.

(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/13/americas-next-top-model-h_n_118682.html)

And

(http://defamer.com/366165/trannies-hot-messes-and-ferocity-snl-does-runway)

There's a way to get the IP address of the person who made the edits, and what edits were made. Compare that with the IP addresses from the commenters on that thread and you've got a match.

Then take that, run it through whois, make a few phone calls to sweet-talk a couple geeks, and get a customer name from the IP address.

Then show up at his house with your camera.

The expression oughtta be worth the effort.

A Wikipedia edit. As if cyber-vandalism is a way to win a debate. How lame they can get?

This probably doesn't need to be said, but keep your head up, Amy.

Frankly, Amy, I was suprised that you even had the "I'm not a racist" argument with those idiots the other day. It was beneath you.

The left has been stewing in identity politics for 30+ years now. While it may help to maintain their illusory sense of moral superiority, it also makes them irrational and obstinate to facts and logic. Just like any other religion does....

"In the name of affirmative action, abortion and gun control, Amen."

Amy says, "Then again, I'm reeeeal glad there's no reason for a prostate exam."

Ah, yes. Not so painful as a mammogram, they say, and no more humiliating than a pelvic exam in the stirrups. But bad enough, bad enough.

My doctor is usually apologetic about it but got mischievous once. Taking the latex glove off his right hand, he said, "Well, your prostate hasn't enlarged since last year." Then he held up the middle finger of his left hand, and said, "Or do you want a second opinion?"

As for the Wiki entry, it's probably good I'm not prominent enough to have one to be vandalized, considering some of the student evaluations I used to get from disgruntled flunkards. None of them were as amusing as a transvestite accusation, though.

I think the IP only shows up when there's an anonymous posting made on Wikipedia. I only post in my own name and edit in my own name, so that's what shows up.

I looked at a couple of the earlier edits back in July that included the transsexual phrase and they came from an IP address that is part of a block of about 200,000 owned by British Telecom and presumably allocated to their broadband users in London (based on the name assigned to that block).

Subjectively, I think this is the big problem with Wikipedia: as it has grown, it has grown more unreliable.

Given his handle (not sure what they call them now) sounds like he took umbridge (sp) at you classification of drug dealers. A slef professed meth producer would find the classification of dealers as pond dwelling scum offensive.

Getting the IP depends on how smart he is. He could fake his IP (and spoof his MAC) and you could show up at some poor dupes house who's guilty of nothing more than not securing his wireless connection.

I've refrained from saying this when commenters have linked it but I'm amazed that anyone takes Wikipedia seriously as a reference source. Yes, there's a lot right on it but, frankly, just knowing any fool on the internet can edit a so-called encylopedia puts it on my not a credible source of information list.

If you're a trannie, I'm going to have re-identify my sexual preference.
But really, the idiotic *childishness* of the edit is just pitiful.

Amazing that the person who edited your profile thinks that it s/he will have any influence whatsoever over what people think of you. Even the teachers at my kids' schools tell them, when they are researching things for school papers, that they are not to use Wikipeidia, as it is NOT a reliable source of information! o_O

Well, you know, if people are starting to spread insane rumors about you... it means you are starting to get famous! Who would bother if you didn't have at least some celeb. status? That's kind of exciting!

Amy a tranny - that's too funny. No doubt is was wishful thinking on someone's fault. I'm sure if you were, you'd look forward to and enjoy prostate exams.

Here's Amy at age 98 (not that this would happen in a church, but you get what I mean):

Toward the end of Sunday service, the Minister asked, 'How many of you have forgiven your enemies?'

80% held up their hands.

The Minister then repeated his question.

All responded this time, except one small elderly lady.

'Ms. Alkon? Are you not willing to forgive your enemies?'

I don't have any.' She replied, smiling sweetly.

'Ms. Alkon, that is very unusual. How old are you?'

'Ninety-eight.' she replied.

'Oh, Ms. Alkon, would you please come down here in front & tell us all how a person can live ninety-eight years & not have an enemy in the world?'

The little sweetheart of a lady tottered down the aisle, faced the congregation, and said:

'I outlived all those bitches.'

o_O

Thanks, Flynne!

The comment was the cyber version of writing something on a bathroom wall. Just as reliable and worth as much effort to track down. Someone with the maturity of a 14 year old is laughing at how funny he is while the rest of us roll our eyes.

Amy, this would be an excellent opportunity for you to prove that dummy wrong by providing photographic proof!

And what kind of "insult" is trannie anyway? The perfect editing choice would have been, IF one were so inclined, to say you were a mother of six kids with different dads all of whom were crack dealers. Gawd, what is the world coming to when idiots just can't even get insults right?!! ;-)

Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout.

Good point. And I have a soft spot for drag queens...a bunch of them used to review my outfit when I walked home in NYC. I loved it!

By the way, I recently met Ru Paul -- who is probably the most grounded person I ever encountered in Hollywood. Really a sweet guy. He's doing a show "Ru Paul's Drag Race." I got brought in as a potential judge, but I didn't get the job.

Oh, and yes, I know drag queens and trannies are different. And I've written about them:

http://www.advicegoddess.com/ag-column-archives/2006/05/who-wears-the-p.html

Oh Treach, c'mon, you're just hot for Amy and we all know it! o_O

Ya know Jim, she said a few weeks back that she would be taking a picture of it with a couple of those arts and crafts googly eyes.

Needless to say I was disapointed when the picture wasnt posted

"Oh Treach, c'mon, you're just hot for Amy and we all know it! o_O"

Well, heck, I'M hot for Amy, too!

Let's talk about her penis. :D

Well, heck, I'M hot for Amy, too!

Let's talk about her penis. :D

With or without the googly eyes on it?

Who isn't?!? (Besides the Wiki creep.)

It seems likely that the pussyboy who did this is here -- possibly Gavin M. (via the Brit IP):

http://www.sadlyno.com/about

See Treacher link, including a link to a Jackie Danicki shot of my butt!

http://blowingsmokethemovie.com/archives/2008/08/im_posting_this.php

Thanks, Treach. And Jackie...what were you doing down there?

The Wikipedia issue reminds me, to remind you to think, "Is this an information source or an editorial commentary?" - whenever you're reading anything. This step is often not taken in political debate; whether you're attacking Bill Clinton or George Bush, you still need to know what the hell you're talking about before you start arguing about the issue. In such cases, reason is rare.

Wiki articles do cite references. Don't miss them.

Here's the IP address and the trace:

IP address [?]: 212.124.244.131 [Whois]
IP address country: ip address flag United Kingdom
IP address state: Essex
IP address city: Colchester
IP address latitude: 51.883301
IP address longitude: 0.900000
ISP of this IP [?]: Savvis net Europe
Organization: Linklaters Business Services
Local Time of this IP country: 2008-08-15 17:23

More on it here:

inetnum: 212.124.244.128 - 212.124.244.191
netname: S263927-LBS
descr: Linklaters Business Services
country: GB
admin-c: NK494-RIPE
tech-c: DG3163-RIPE
status: Assigned PA
mnt-by: RIPE-SAVVIS-MNT
source: RIPE # Filtered

person: Nick Kendrick
address: Linklaters Business Services
address: 310 The Crescent
address: Colchester, Essex, CO4 9QH
e-mail: nick.kendrick@linklaters.com
phone: +44 01206 754141
mnt-by: RIPE-SAVVIS-MNT
nic-hdl: NK494-RIPE
source: RIPE # Filtered

person: Daniel Godden
address: Impressions UK
address: 7th Avenue, Team Valley Trading Estate, Gateshead
address: Gateshead, Newcastle
e-mail: danielg@jennings-dar.com
phone: +44 (0) 1226 285296
mnt-by: RIPE-SAVVIS-MNT
nic-hdl: DG3163-RIPE
source: RIPE # Filtered

Flynne, you're killing me! I was laughing so hard at that. The phone rang and I'm trying to swallow it back and be professional.

But fortunately it was my daughter. She and T were downtown and stopped in the cafeteria downstairs for lunch so I had a little visit (and one of our security guards looks like Santa so he's an automatic hit with T) that brightened my day. It's been busier than usual this a.m. so that was a nice surprise.

Oh, and T was here for take your kid to work day so he'd met the guard before but he was peering over the barrier at his monitors and we were kidding him that now he knows how Santa does that keeping an eye on you thing.

That's excellent, T's Grammy! Always good to get such a nice break in the day.

And there's no way Amy's ass could be mistaken, even by a blind man, for a man's ass! Hubba hubba! o_O

The line has been added several times over the past few weeks (can't believe people can be so pathetic as to have so little better to do), by the following IP addresses:

86.129.140.100
86.157.119.211
86.129.134.225
86.145.231.248

All UK, British Telecomms.

It seems likely that the pussyboy who did this is here -- possibly Gavin M. (via the Brit IP)

That would be quite a prank, considering the logistics of flying to the UK and back.

Well, "Sadly, No!" - how about you identify who on your entry about me posted from the IP address - 12.124.244.131

As that's the reference on the Wikipedia page where they added me to a list of transgendered people.

And if I haven't said it here...let me tell you how amazing I think it is that people accusing me of being racist call me transgendered without a thought, meaning it to be a derogatory thing.

For me, the fact that I'm not transgendered is simply a fact, and transgendered people have it really rough. Imagine if you were born physically one sex but felt that you were really another, how hard that must be. The one or ones really lacking in compassion are all the twats that kept editing that into my Wikipedia page without a thought as to their own ism -- bigoted, small minded, mushbrained asshole-ism.

Gawd. All I meet are tits-on-a-stick Dallas women. I gotta find an ass that can at least pass the 5 mph bumper collision test. Safety and all that.

I still say the most perfect pic of Amy is that one in France where she's at a bistro with a friend. Two words: day um.

David J/Amy,

Fascinated by this sleuthing!

But does this mean the following info posted to the Metafilter website (& which I thought rang vaguely true) is basically more wrong than right?

Internet. Huge chunks of the IPv4 address space are owned by multi-national corporations who may internally allocate similar IP addresses to locations that are physically distant.

apple.com: 17.149.160.49
apple.ie: 17.149.160.31

So, the same address block but physically separated by thousands of miles.

Then throw in VPNs, proxies, paranoid tor users, etc. It's kind of a lost cause in the general case.

Well, "Sadly, No!" - how about you identify who on your entry about me posted from the IP address - 12.124.244.131

Oh, 12.124.244.131. You mean Gary Ruppert?

Neither Gavin nor I called you a transsexual in our posts. Frankly, my money is on transvestite, not that there's anything wrong with that.

Well, Sadly, No is correct about one thing.

The “Lady” Doth Protest Too Much.

Chick with a Dick!

Awesome.

Pics please.

I'm a "lady" because I criticize something I see as a problem in the black community? Boy, you're a real free speecher.

So, you're saying that's Gary Ruppert's IP? Got an e-mail address for him?

And you left off the first "2" -- a copying error, I'm assuming.

212.124.244.131 is the full address.

Because, you know, if transvestites are allowed to call people 'transvestites,' isn't it bigoted to say that non-transvestites can't use that word?

Plus, how dare you assume that we are not transvestites.

I've been away in Seattle for awhile and not checked in on your column, Amy. Though your "Meating People" column really helped out a friend of mine who is new to dating again after getting divorced recently.

The timing of the malicious editing of your Wikipedia entry leads me to believe that it was likely done by "RC" who couldn't post any comment without letting his hateful venom smatter over his words.

As for Wikipedia, it's often useful but this is a vivid reminder to all of us that it cannot be depended upon and further supports the policies many schools have that Wikipedia can not be a source referenced by students in their work.

Nuns - no sense of humor.

Gary Ruppert is a pseudonym and probably is somebody behind "Sadly, No!" -- I found this out through my detective work, through someone who doesn't want their name or identity known.

Amy, I know how to put these rumors to bed once and for all: swimsuit pics!

Aw. Come one. This is science...well..no it isn't but it'd be super hot. Thermodynamics is a science.

Is it worth trying to engage these people in a good-faith discussion, Amy? Sadly, no.

And Jackie...what were you doing down there?

Providing a valuable service to mankind!

If you were transvestites, you'd know it's different from being transgendered.

Then again, the entry about me was really juvenile, not that smart, and not that interesting, so maybe you're all just dumb.

As I just said to the person who told me that Gary Ruppert is probably behind your site, I'm all for freedom of speech -- post stuff criticizing me on your blog, even do what you did to my picture. It's parody and I'm cool with that. What I'm very uncool are apparent attempts to intimidate somebody out of speaking freely like that Wikipedia entry. It didn't hurt me -- I thought it was funny. But I'm guessing that wasn't the intended effect.

And while I have a lot of compassion for transgendered people, who have it rough throughout their lives, I know and you know that that was posted in an attempt to derogate me by calling me transgendered. So, how about you not be lying twats in addition to being twats already?

Is it worth trying to engage these people in a good-faith discussion, Amy? Sadly, no. (Treacher)

Good point. And it submerges the appeals for swimsuit pics.

Gary Ruppert is a pseudonym and probably is somebody behind "Sadly, No!" -- I found this out through my detective work, through someone who doesn't want their name or identity known.

And the hits keep-a-comin! Whoever your anonymous pal is, let him know I said "well played sir, well played indeed".

Wow, a whois search and a guy yanking your chain. You're a regular Sherlock Homes.

And really, the guy who set up that IP block to resolve to the Yorkshire Dales? Bloody genius!

Neither Gavin nor I called you a transsexual in our posts. Frankly, my money is on transvestite, not that there's anything wrong with that.

I think my comment shows we know the difference between transgenders and transvestites.

The fact is, it was I who made the edit. I just liked the sound of it, and the mental imagery.

Heartland.

The fact is, I'm the REAL Gary Ruppert. I command all latte-sipping faux Rupperts to stand down.

Dang. After watching Shrek, I thought trolls were benevolent.

You know my real name, Gary, because I post under it. What's yours?

FYI, when I try, I track people down to their cell phone number in about 20 minutes -- as I did with a guy who signed me up for numerous mailing lists.

http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2006/03/10/making_crime_pa_2.html

You should also note that I tracked down my car thief and the guy who did a hit-and-run on my Insight.

Just be glad I have a book to write, and I'm working with my assistant today.

Weenies.

I'd hit it, and for a while. But I have a thing for naughty redheads.

I'm Gary Rupert!

Aren't "weenies" what started this whole mess in the first place?

Quite the contrary. What started this is a discussion by somebody who actually isn't intimidated by how you're supposed to pussyfoot around race, and how white people aren't supposed to be allowed to ever criticize anything about black culture. Not allowed!

The truth is, because I'm not racist -- nor am I bigoted about trannies as was reflected in the person who edited that into my Wikipedia entry -- I can talk openly about issues.

Commenters were shown evidence repeatedly that I'm anything but racist, including a quote from a Luke Ford interview, where he tried really hard to bait me into saying something bigoted, but the truth is, I don't hate anyone. I do see problems -- across society -- and I address them. I make people mad all the time, and I'm not afraid to. I had no friends as a child, and I'm way over needing to be liked. I have to respect myself for what I write, and if I do, that's all I need.

What shocked me was what mush brains some of the commenters on those entries were, asking me stuff like, because the majority thinks this way, shouldn't you conclude you're wrong. Earth is flat thinking, how elevated.

Aren't "weenies" what started this whole mess in the first place?

Whoops, perhaps I caught you wrong. Do you mean uncondomned drug dealer dick?

The truth is, because I'm not racist

Gary?

The fact is, "Gary Ruppert" is the well known pseudonym of Stanton Carlisle, a French Canadian living in London last I knew.

I had a rather nasty run-in with him a few years ago. Good luck.

Amy, give up. The Sadly, No crowd are completely and utterly devoid of intellectual capacity. Their preferred MO is the hit piece on anyone that doesn't toe their party line. They devoted rather a large amount of attention to Jeff at PW over the last couple years because they aren't smart enough to understand what he writes either.

So through the amazing power of her resaerch skills, Amy Alkon discovered that the first Google hit for Gary Ruppert was Sadly, No and jumps to the conclusion that Gary Ruppert is behind Sadly, No.

It would take about 5 minutes to figure out why this is hilarious.

Besides, everyone knows that Sadly, No is run by Floyd Alvis Cooper, Allen Butler and Annieangel.

Oh, regarding your earlier comments since you keep crowing about how nobody will debate you. Here you go.

I don't know anything about your religious beliefs, but what you are saying goes against everything that Christianity teaches. The debate you need to have is with Jesus, not anybody on the internet.

See, Jesus Christ was a dark-skinned man born to an unwed mother and associated with criminals. Are you saying that means His crucifixion was justified? Keep in mind he said that whatever you do the least of His children, you do unto him.

Either you believe life is sacred, or you're a Democrat. Which is it?

As a staunch Christian, I find what you said not so much racist as a despicable act of blasphemy.

Amy, you ever watch gladiator movies?

The fact is, "concerned citizen" is simply a fascist liberal who doesn't understand things here in the heartland.

The "J" in my name stands for Jesus - something liberals don't understand, but he is the salvation of his believers.

I don't see how the tranny edit of July 31 could be in response to Amy's comments (which, if not racist, are at least in incredibly bad taste) of nearly two weeks later. I mean, the intertubes are fast but not *that* fast.

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Amy_Alkon&oldid=229049582

This is exactly the type of misogyny and lookism that has made me and millions of other true blue Reagan Democrats walk away from the party of Obambi, the same party that would throw away votes in Michigan and Florida and disregard the hard-working Americans who live in Appalachia, the true blue core of freedom for this party and this country. You’d rather make fun of a bright woman than read anything daring to criticize an inadequate loser like Obama. I find this sad and offensive, and it’s no wonder why I’ve walked away from the Democrat Party. You’ll see the rest of us walking away from you too, when thousands storm out of the bogus convention in Denver. You will hear the pumas roar, and you will be afraid.

Amy you go! Such immature fools on the planet eh? And for the record.. NOT RACIST. Just factual.
geez ppl.

Amy, give up. The Sadly, No crowd are completely and utterly devoid of intellectual capacity.

I resemble that remark, good sir!

Amy, what did you do to that dog? Oh my god! The poor thing! You must let me take care of that dog, maybe get it a jar of peanut butter or something.

The fact is, Gary Ruppert is a well-known internet tradition, of which all internet users are aware:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPGb4STRfKw

I am aware of all Internet traditions.

They devoted rather a large amount of attention to Jeff at PW over the last couple years because they aren't smart enough to understand what he writes either.

That one post from June, 2006 certainly keeps paying dividends.

Uh, Amy. I think they got you again.

"SUV's are a compensation for her tiny penis."
"One of three hookers..."

concerned citizen jesus was born to a married woman and hung out with people the religious right of the time though to be unworthy of gods time and attention the only criminals he hung out with were thouse breaking religious law, and I dont recall him turning bread and fish into crack and heroin

Jokes on you thou because none is worth of gods time and attention otherwise you wouldnt have need jesus to die for your sins so you could get into a non-existant heaven

toungjacker, have you ever been to a Turkish prison?

Lets debate relgion sahll we citizen?

Here we worship a god who sent us to earth, forced us out of his presence to test us. And given no one gets thru life with out commiting one sin or another we are all destined for an eternity in the firey deapths of hell that our all loving, all forgiving god created.

But if you act now and say the magic words you can bypass hell be cleansed of your sins and spend the next few infinitys sitting around gods throne singing songs about how great he is for setting you up to fail.

How fucking narcissistic is that?

Your reward for a lifetime of abject, imposed failure is to praise the jackass who fucked you over to begin with.

Use you brain apply a little rational though and as some rather simple questions

Okay, I'll just say that Amy Alkon is actually pretty hot (and that she doesn't look like a man, obviously). On the other hand, I do think it's in really poor taste to suggest that a woman who was shot to death by a cop in her own home and was not suspected of any crime was in some way at fault for it.

Would you say a drunk guy in a black sweater stumbling around the middle of a poorly lit highway bears no responsibilty if he gets hit by a car on night?

Because being shot by the police is just like getting hit by a car with a driver that can't see you.

Amy is like an intellectually challenged Christopher Hitchens.

Stop speaking for us atheists, Amy. You're hurting our reputation.

Because being shot by the police is just like getting hit by a car with a driver that can't see you. (some guy using anonymous IP service)

Yes. In essential features, it is the same. Both the driver and the cop are engaged in lawful behavior that entails some degree of hazard. Both victims are engaged in foolishly risky but legal conduct.

The foolish actions of the victims reduce, or even eliminate, the guilt of the driver and the cop.

lujlp is right.

"Doctors are doing really nice work these days, huh?"

Not so much.

I thought Gary Ruppert was a little kid from Mexico? Now you tell me he's Stanton? WTF?

And if any of you really, really, really loved Jesus you would be out washing the filthy feet of Pastor Hagee, because being a good Christian means washing dirty feet.

Don't believe me? Ask Gary Ruppert how he makes his money in Mexico.

G'head, I dare ya, I double-dog dare ya, just don't shoot the dogs, they are just innocent bystanders after all, but go ahead and shoot the nasty slut with the baby in her arms, she sleeps with drug dealers and is therefore less than human.

Why does it smell like socks in here?

Why does it smell like socks in here?

I can think of several reasons why you'd be smelling socks, bri, and most of them have to do with your obvious brain dammage. If you're truly picking up olfactory sensations over the internet, you should probably see a neurologist. Or perhaps you simply need to change your socks.

See? I'm an advice goddess, too. This is easy! All I need is a column and I'll be collecting that sweet, sweet wingnut welfare just like Amy!

Amy's got a purty mouf.

They devoted rather a large amount of attention to Jeff at PW over the last couple years because they aren't smart enough to understand what he writes either.

Wait, Amy Alkon likes to slap people* with his cock, too?

*I'm guessing a poor black women who just got shot by the cops

Amy Alkon discovered that the first Google hit for Gary Ruppert was Sadly, No and jumps to the conclusion that Gary Ruppert is behind Sadly, No.

Actually, I called somebody who's acquainted with him. It's a small world, asshat.

I'll take anal bum cover for $1000, Alex.

See? I'm an advice goddess, too. This is easy! All I need is a column and I'll be collecting that sweet, sweet wingnut welfare just like Amy!

All you need to do is write to the point where you're qualified to do a dialogue polish on a feature film and a rewrite of the dialogue for a video game, earn a bunch of money doing both of those things, put every dime of that money into syndicating your column after all the syndicators turn it down, spend all the holidays everyone else is off having fun addressing envelopes and doing mass mailings on your apartment floor, seriously study psychology, reading everything from Freud to the present day, attend conferences around the world with Ph.D.'s in ethology, psychology, evolutionary psychology and anthropology, read the same journals they do, get to the point where they'll respect you enough to get you their studies before they're in the journals or certainly the popular press, and sweat blood honing your writing and journalistic skills to the point where you're up for journalist of the year in Southern California, against the LA Times top people, but then, sadly manage only to win first place for your column.

For being on the dole, I sure do buttloads of work. And you "Candy," what do you do?

All you need to do is write to the point where you're qualified to do a polish dog on a feature film and a rewrite of the dialogue for video porn, spend all the holidays watching everyone else getting off having fun addressing crowds of hobos and doing mass mailings to your apartment building, seriously study phrenology, earn a bunch of money doing both of those things, put every dime of that money against the LA Times top people, but then, sadly manage only to win first place for your column.

You go, "Girl"!

Actually, I called somebody who's acquainted with him. It's a small world, asshat.

Did he communicate via your fillings?

What Jeff said Bass-o-matic.

Its wrong that she was shot but had she not invited a violent drug dealer to live in her house the cops would not have even been there

Candy, you are as uneducated as you are stupid. All this, and arrogance too!

You are indeed, the total package.

Please do me a favor. Take your computer, put it in a box, and bring it to the Salvation Army. Tell them that you are too stupid for the Internet.

Or, Candy, alternatively you could just go around comparing kids whose mom just got shot and killed to lower order animals. It's good for Pajamas Media gigs, I hear.

Ms. Alkon, if you actually know the whereabouts of this Gary Ruppert, you owe it to all of the folks on the internet who've been victimized by this cruel troll to post some more detailed information about him. He's a black (sorry) mark on the internet escutcheon, and should be revealed for what he is so that he might suffer the slings and arrows which are his due.

As a menace to internet society and all.

Does he have a my space page? If so, can you provide a linkie?

Bri, I'm rubber, your glue!

That's basically your argument, isn't it?

Here's a clue: Stop digging.

Oops! You're glue, not "your". Preview is my friend.

"But does this mean the following info posted to the Metafilter website (& which I thought rang vaguely true) is basically more wrong than right?

Internet. Huge chunks of the IPv4 address space are owned by multi-national corporations who may internally allocate similar IP addresses to locations that are physically distant."

In most cases that is more wrong than right indeed - in most cases you can tell quite a lot from an IP address (and in the case of illegal behaviour with a bit of police involvement, you can in probably 99% of cases easily track the exact user - name, address, everything - ISPs all keep logs of which customers had which IP address assignments when and so on).

"So, the same address block but physically separated by thousands of miles."

This is actually generally unusual to do, most blocks are geographically close (and the vast majority of blocks are much smaller). Only the VERY large blocks (class A addresses, of which there aren't that many) tend to get split on a big scale, and even then not that often (a lot of that address space gets wasted). Finally, it doesn't matter, because with tools like traceroute, even if the block is split up, you can get a very good idea of the geographic location. There are major limitations on how easily you can split blocks, you can't split them any old how, due to the way subnet addressing works (and subnets are then usually fairly easy to geographically track ... you can't hide it, because packets have to be routable, and that inherently gives a lot away) - and likewise you can't have routing get too complicated.

We've had cases of people getting up to various kinds of mischief in connection with our company (e.g. pirating our software and lying about who and where they are) and personal lives (long story) and in various of these cases with just a tiny bit of armchair research we could track them down to the institution they were studying and in some cases even the building they were in, even while sitting in a totally different continent.

Note that this Amy page vandalism user posted under 86.129.140.100 yesterday, so it's possible that this is their current IP address as we speak. If you traceroute through to that IP it's obviously in the UK, you can see packets for example being routed through London BT routers.

"Then throw in VPNs, proxies, paranoid tor users, etc. It's kind of a lost cause in the general case."

No, not at all; only an incredibly miniscule percentage of web users use things like tor (which is actually non-trivial to set up), very few actually use proxies, almost all proxies keep logs, and most proxies are extremely localised (e.g. in your company or for your ISP) anyway. And even when you are using proxies, your actual IP address is still forwarded in the request headers - you aren't hiding your IP by using a proxy. It is extraordinarily difficult to truly be anonymous on the Internet, particularly if you break the law - it almost literally requires advanced hacker skills to be able to cover your tracks. Even some Tor exit nodes are known to be compromised these days :/

Its wrong that she was shot but had she not invited a violent drug dealer to live in her house the cops would not have even been there ...

Yes, she really should have considered one of the search engine billionaires clamoring to live with the female residents of the shittiest neighborhood in Lima, Ohio.

For being on the dole, I sure do buttloads of work. And you "Candy," what do you do?

I puncture the vanity of the stupid and very semi-famous, apparently. Or at least really get on their nerves.

"So, the same address block but physically separated by thousands of miles."

Oh yes, the other point on that, even if a corporate owns a large block, that very seldom means the average ISP will have access to those blocks unless they've been specifically 'leased' ... your average Internet user with a home broadband connection and your average office connection will not usually use addresses from those blocks (and if it does, it'll do it predictably) ... I mean, I will never, ever log on to the Internet and get an Apple-owned IP address, for example - only an IP from my own ISP.

"Then throw in VPNs, proxies, paranoid tor users, etc. It's kind of a lost cause in the general case."

Actually there are also sometimes other ways that users may give themselves away even when using things like Tor ... but I'm waffling on a bit much now.

You know, just yesterday I was in my own home, not breaking any laws. I didn't even realize that was foolishly risky but legal conduct, so I'd like to thank Jeff for pointing that out. But now I don't really know what to do. I guess I could *move*, but then I'd just be living at my new place, which would be "home", so that wouldn't solve anything. Feh.

Came across a product called 'Stealth Surfer' recently, David J. Have you heard of it? It's on a flash drive, I think ... don't know what the tech is but they claim it hides IP addresses.

I puncture the vanity of the stupid and very semi-famous, apparently. Or at least really get on their nerves.

Translation: "I'm a waste of flesh who can't claw his way out of mommy's basement".

You are indeed, the total package.

Comma alert! Get that man a Strunk & White's!

Actually, I called somebody who's acquainted with him. It's a small world, asshat.

Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:01 PM

Acquainted with Ruppert? And he thinks that Ruppert is "behind" Sadly, No? If this is the case then you need to stop calling people who huff inhalents. Anybody even remotely familiar with the oeuvre of Ruppert would think the idea to be hysterical. Frankly, while there might have been a single person who posted as Gary Ruppert in, say 2005, at this point there are so many parodists and copycats out there, I don't even think you can really say that there is a "Gary Ruppert." Though the guys at Sadly, No would know better than me.

Or acquainted with Sadly, No? You do know there are like 8 people who post over there, right. I hope you do, because it's in that profile that you linked to above. Again, how somebody familiar with those guys would possibly think that Ruppert is one of them boggles the mind.

It would take 5 or 10 minutes on Google to figure this out.

but I'm waffling on a bit much now.

Why, yes, yes you are.

I puncture the vanity of the stupid and very semi-famous, apparently. Or at least really get on their nerves.

Let us know when you succeed. Meanwhile, perhaps you could volunteer to help when I speak at the inner-city school.

FYI, every moment I spend on bullshit on this site is time I don't spend answering questions from people who write me for advice -- many of whom have nowhere else to turn (this goes especially for teens who write me, especially gay teens).

Also, anybody who maliciously changes my Wikipedia page is the antithesis of somebody for truth and free speech. People do that because they feel powerless to actually engage me in an adult way, which would require the intelligence and reason to debate me on the issues. It's just pathetic.

I don't want to ask them to lock my Wikipedia page, because I don't believe in that sort of thing, but I also am not going to be policing libelous statements constantly.

A note: I am on a book deadline now, but as you may have noticed from the way I went after my car thief, my hit-and-run driver and numerous others, if you piss me off enough, I'll sue your ass blind. And win.

I just took a telemarketer to Santa Monica Small Claims Court. An international company, based in New York and Switzerland. They sent their New York corporate counsel -- yes, some bigtime lawyer. And you know, I wiped the floor with his ass. In other words, I won.

Also, if you are British, your libel laws are very unfriendly. If I have to, I will give every dime I can squeeze out of your cowardly asses to a lawyer there to take and win a case against you.

You should understand that it's very serious to fuck with somebody's livelihood, which is what you're doing by editing untrue information into my Wikipedia page. And also, it's just yellow-bellied shit that says everything about what a turd of a person you are.

Want to debate me? Open up a blog and criticize my ideas, lowlifes. And do it openly, in your own name. Like I do.

Sadly, Yes, there is a Gary Ruppert. He exists as certainly as pride and ignorance and authoritarianism exist. Whenever there's a fight so hungry people can't get food, he's there. Whenever there's a cop kicking down a door and shooting a woman holding a baby, he's there.

Amy, Amy, Amy...

All of this brouhaha could have been nipped in the bud so easily. You could have replied like this:

"I realize now that my choice of words may have been rude and how some people might see it as racist, and for that I apologize. But my point still stands."

Done, done and done. Would that have been so hard?

And if you really felt the need for any follow up after that, you could have used your formidable research skills to come up with a listing of community and/or church-based counseling and assistance programs in the city of Lima, which could help people trapped in a horrible situation like Tarika find a way out. Other posters here have claimed such programs exist. What better time to publicize them?

Wouldn't that have been a better use of your internet soapbox than telling the Tarika's of the world, in effect, "Suck it up."

Why that is the very essence of free-speech advocacy right there!

Actually, I called somebody who's acquainted with him. It's a small world, asshat.

Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:01 PM

Acquainted with Ruppert? And he thinks that Ruppert is "behind" Sadly, No? If this is the case then you need to stop calling people who huff inhalents. Anybody even remotely familiar with the oeuvre of Ruppert would think the idea to be hysterical. Frankly, while there might have been a single person who posted as Gary Ruppert in, say 2005, at this point there are so many parodists and copycats out there, I don't even think you can really say that there is a "Gary Ruppert." Though the guys at Sadly, No would know better than me.

Or acquainted with Sadly, No? You do know there are like 8 people who post over there, right. I hope you do, because it's in that profile that you linked to above. Again, how somebody familiar with those guys would possibly think that Ruppert is one of them boggles the mind.

It would take 5 or 10 minutes on Google to figure this out.

Sadly, Bas, I fear Amy's investigation has been polluted by the three dirts.

"Also, if you are British, your libel laws are very unfriendly. If I have to, I will give every dime I can squeeze out of your cowardly asses to a lawyer there to take and win a case against you."

I believe the Poms prefer the euro to dimes these days, Amy.

Simba B: "Why, yes, yes you are."

One another note entirely, did you know that your name means "shit" in Zulu? There's your fun fact for the day.

Huh, I guess I pressed submit twice. Oh well.

Anyway, that's the two dirts. And I'm guessing that Alkon mixes them. Regularly (alas that the Editors nuked their archives).

David I do believe D.A. asked you a question up above. I know the answer, do you?

Was the two dirts, Bas. Amy's investigations uncovered the fabled third dirt.

Oh, please, Amy, enough with your bragging about your "inner city school." Anyone might think you were doing it for personal aggrandizement. I do what I do, and I don't fucking run around the internet bragging about it.

Note: For what it's worth, I don't think changing wiki entries is all that cool or clever. I assure you that I have no part in that, and I'd go bail no one on Sadly,No! staff is doing it either. It wouldn't be cricket.

Simba - do you know about that Stealth Surfer unit? They shipped me one for review but I haven't got around to testing it or even reading the literature.

I imagine that responding to troubled gay teens with good advice is a much better use of your time than arguing with people whose opinions you ostensibly don't care about. I mean, you're obviously pretty worked up about it, so it's unlikely that you really feel that this is beneath you, but still, the choice to wrestle in the mud is a personal one. If the other things you could be doing right now are better or more important, well ... let me just say that I'm going to do something more worthwhile in two and a half minutes. Something maybe a little boring, but more important than arguing on some blog at least.

As for the "own name" thing, though, that's asking a bit much. Many of us pseudonymous folks have been personally harassed or stalked in response to things we've written, and identity theft is always a concern as well.

Here's a genius -- posted that I'm one of three "drag queens" and that I had "gender reassignment surgery" on Wikipedia. Last time somebody did this -- old Derek -- he lost his job.

P address location & IP address info:
IP address [?]: 71.158.243.2 [Whois]
IP address country: ip address flag United States
IP address state: California
IP address city: San Francisco
IP address latitude: 37.764500
IP address longitude: -122.429398
ISP of this IP [?]: SBC Internet Services
Organization: California Pacific Medical Center..
Host of this IP: [?]: 71-158-243-2.ded.pacbell.net [Whois]
Local Time of this IP country: 2008-08-15 15:51

"David I do believe D.A. asked you a question up above. I know the answer, do you?"

No need to answer because if you understood enough of my original posts, you would already know the answer, and if you don't, you won't get it anyway. Products like Stealth Surfer just encapsulate some of what I've already discussed, and have their limited uses (and I presume make things like Tor easier to set up for Joe Public) but in my view only if you already know what you're doing - otherwise you are going to have a hard time 'hiding your IP address'. Tor isn't foolproof either, if you follow security news you would've seen the recent stink about a university study maintaining 'fake' Tor exit nodes and keeping logs and studying the traffic.

Heh. I'd never heard of it. I figured you were trying to set David J. up.

So much for trying to get in on the snark.

"Products like Stealth Surfer ... and have their limited uses"

Of course I was being generous here; from a techie perspective, my first response was "snake oil".

Sorry to disappoint, Simba ... I was just kind of geekily interested in the whole IP tracing thing ...

The fact is, stop saying I don't exist. I exist as surely as the sun will rise, the rain will fall, and Amy will make blatantly racist statements.

/Heartland.

Hmm ... looking at the Stealth Surfer literature, seems like it just stores cookies and such on a flash drive rather than your hard drive.

Well, D.A., let's put it this way—for most of us, stalkers techies like David J can get the name of your ISP, and the general administrative division of your ISP that you reside in. I live in Time Warner Cable Central New York, for example.

That's it. This "sweet talking geeks" thing upthread is bullshit because billing info is highly proprietary and the last thing an ISP wants is a reputation for giving out customer info.

Basically, all this talk about tracking people down by IP address is a bunch of empty threats. Which figures for this crowd.

Not true, Simba. They can totally track down the electromagnetic signature of our brainwaves and make our heads a'splode whenever they want.

(Actually, wasn't there something about hacking pacemakers a while back ... I think it was an exploit that was discovered on some pacemakers ... now that's actually scary)

sorry, i can't let this go on.

Just to be clear (or, as "gary ruppert" would say, "the fact is"):

gary ruppert does not exist as such. he may have once, circa 2005, leaving a trolling comment on a sadly! no post, but we ridiculed him mercilessly and he never came back.

subsequently he has become the fake bete noire of sadly no!--always there for the comedy.

so, that leads up to the 3:01 comment above from amy alkon. she claims to have "talked on the phone with someone who knows him [gary ruppert]".

with these facts in mind, it is clear that amy is either a) a liar or b) crazy. given there is no gary ruppert, or if such a person exists he hates sadly no with a passion, i'm going with the former myself.

meanwhile, i will bet a large sum of money that some of the people in the comments here are in fact sock-puppets of amy alkon.

and david j and others here who impugned the motives and/or integrity of the sadlynoites--candy and simba and other commenters at sadly no are exceedingly bright--i've had back and forth with them many times before. in fact i would dare to say that the sadly no comment section is about as smart a board as you will find in the world of internet snarkdom.

so shut it losers, to sum up.

I find it highly unlikey that any sort of bigwig corporate lawyer from New York was sent to a small claims case in California over a dispute that could be no more than $7,500. More than likely it was an overworked assosciate who was non-essential and could be spared for a few days and they probably sent him to make sure the right to appeal to a court of general jurisdiction was preserved.

But I'm just guessing on that. What I'm really wondering was 1) if the lawyer was admitted to the bar in California (I guess it wouldn't be that unusual to be admittted before both New York and California) or 2) whether you don't need to be admitted to the bar to practice before CA small claims and 3) why the company wouldn't just hire someone locally. Even if it was in-house counsel, you would think once you factor in the travel costs, that it would be cheaper to throw a thousand bucks or so at a local lawyer to make an appearance.

Aw, Robert . . . (blushes) One day I should like to buy you an absinthe.

But in the world of Amy's imaginary court battles, all the opposing lawyers are high-powered corporate bigwigs from New York!

Want to debate me? Open up a blog and criticize my ideas, lowlifes.

So one little boy did.

And now you know. . .the rest of the story.

The fact is, Bas, Amy knows as much about law as she knows about Gary Ruppert and good advice.

...with these facts in mind, it is clear that amy is either a) a liar or b) crazy. given there is no gary ruppert, or if such a person exists he hates sadly no with a passion, i'm going with the former myself.

Spoilsport!

There's a third option that gives Amy a tiny benefit of the doubt: whoever she called to confirm the "existence" of Gary Ruppert is playing her for a fool, and she fell for it.

So - liar, idiot or fool. We report, you decide!

No way, Candy. Amy's the Erin Brockovich of the PJ Media set ... or should I say, the AARON Brockovich!

gary ruppert does not exist as such. he may have once, circa 2005, leaving a trolling comment on a sadly! no post, but we ridiculed him mercilessly and he never came back.

The fact is, this should be modified just a bit. The One True Gary posted quite a lot back then. But Lord Gary hasn't been seen since about mid-06. Though Brad at Sadly,No! has pointed out a couple of times he actually returned (I'm guessing based on his IP), so he may be sort of the Hidden Imam of the blog.

The fact is, holy crap. I just noticed that Amy has a Paris Hilton dog. And it looks like Joan Rivers.

/Heartland.

The Erin Brockovich of Pajamas Media and the intellectual daughter of Camille Paglia. That's one hell of a CV, isn't it, D?

The fact is, the Republican electoral beatdown of November 2006 drove Real Gary over the edge. His trolling got crazier and crazier, with wild predictions of Glorious Republican Victory and all of us DFHs going off to Guantanamo Bay etc etc ad nauseum, and then he vanished after election day. It's my belief that Real Gary has not been heard from since.

That was the Golden Shower Age of Trolls at Sadly,No! Annie and Limpy and Jose Chung. Ah, the memories.

The idea that Amy talked to someone who knows Gary Ruppert is the most amusing thing I've heard in ages. Truly hilarious.

Hey Gang! How's it hangin'?

The fact is, I talked to someone acquainted with Santa Clause. It's a small world, asshat.

Oh, but another possibility is that Amy called fellow columnist Michelle Malkin.

Evidence: The unnamed advisor doesn't know what he or she is talking about, yet alludes to a vague and sinister conspiracy.

Or it could've been Charles Johnson. Actually, the list of possibles is too long for us ever to know. Ann Althouse? Jonah Goldberg? Wah.

Or it could've been Charles Johnson. Actually, the list of possibles is too long for us ever to know. Ann Althouse? Jonah Goldberg? Wah.

The fact is, if there's anyone in the conservative wankosphere who's a trannie, it's Charles Johnson. She's a very beautiful woman, too.

David J,

Thank you very much for your answers!
(I was the dummy who asked in the first place.)
They were greatly appreciated - as were the points others also raised.

Charles Johnson. She's a very beautiful woman, too.

Well, they say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but I'd say this strains credulity.

The fact is, I wish my partner would hurry up and finish his paperwork so we can go purchase the malbec my taste buds have been dreaming of all afternoon.

The fact is, is that if Malkin were who Alkon talked to, Malkin would have already put a post sulking about how the liberals were blaming her for all acts of wikipedia vandalism. Then she would postg a link to google maps showing just where she thinks Ruppert lives in London. Then, after the inevitable wackaloon throws a rock the some poor Chav's window with a note scrawled in crayon saying "Pakis go home" she'd get all defensive and bring up that one time Ingmar Lee posted her adress all over the internet and point out how liberals have potty mouths are hatefule and are the real unhunged racists....ZOMG!Q!!!!!11 A MUSLIM WAS ARESTED FOR SHOPLIFTING IN POUGHKEEPSIE THE MOHOMEDDAN MENACE OF ISLAMOFASCIMUSLAMISOCIALIBERLISM IS GOING TO OVERRUN WESTERN CIVILIZATION BLLAAARRG ZOMG!!!ELEVENTY1111111!!!!!!!!

So I think we can rule Malkin out.

"Most hilariously, somebody edited my Wikipedia page to say I'm a male-to-female trannie."

It is good that you have a sense of humor about these silly pranks.

"You should understand that it's very serious to fuck with somebody's livelihood, which is what you're doing by editing untrue information into my Wikipedia page. And also, it's just yellow-bellied shit that says everything about what a turd of a person you are."

Oh... wait.
Listen, if you are not amused and would like further information, information not generally known and certainly not available on the internet, about the people who run Sadly No, contact me at the email address below. I am a Certified Computer Forensic Expert currently working with foreign representatives and top level government officials. I have done extensive research on those responsible for several websites, including Sadly No.
Please encrypt all emails using pgp.

Ted Williams CCFE, CFEED

The fact is, I do exist. It was I who instructed a high-powered New York lawyer to fly cross-country to defend against a small-claims nuisance lawsuit. I only regret not sending out a whole law firm, so as to have a fighting chance against Amy's brilliance.

Heartland.

Don't listen to "Ted Williams CCFE, CFEED" -- he is not the real Ted Williams. I'm not sure who he really is, but using Locard's Exchange Principle I will determine his true identity in, no doubt, a very brief span of time. I am, however, a CFCE as well as a GIAC Certified Electronical Evidence Collection Specialist, ARCH 642-873, and more.

Ted Williams MCSE, CCNP, CCIP, CCVP, CCSP, CCDP, CCCP, INTJ, INRI, YHBT, YHL, HAND.

The first time, it was funny -- just the tranny thing. But persistently posting other stuff about me -- untrue stuff that can cause editors who might pick up my column to think ill of me -- persistently, is a problem, and I don't take it lightly.

Also, as I've said above, I celebrate and defend even the free speech rights of people who hate me and my writing and think I'm an utter idiot or a racist or whatever. And I support your right to criticize me and/or parody me, and if you do something funny, I'll probably link to it. I have a pretty good sense of humor.

But, don't post lies about me on a Wikipedia page, and keep reposting them so you suck my time all day when I have to go police them. Posting untrue crap goes against the spirit of Wikipedia, and it's a shitty thing to do, and when I have time, if you've libeled me in a way that's damaging to a career I've worked very hard to build, I'll nail you to the wall if I can in a court of law.

By the way, I did go after one person, a rather low-hanging fruit, because I could do it with ease. More on that soon.

Shalom, Gentlemen.

amy

that's my real name. feel free to come by.

you lied about the gary ruppert thing and then didn't mention it above. you are a mendacious wanker. i may put that on wikipedia. i'm happy to supply my real world address to you, as well as the address of my lawyer. he's a mean bastard.

and if that really is saul, then welcome to perhaps the greatest sadly! no troll of all time, better even than gary.

please amy, own up to lying about the ruppert thing. you have shamed yourself.

Wow. This is probably the biggest number of hits this New Jersey shemale has ever gotten, and all because of her drooling racism.

Imagine the site traffic she'd have gotten for being...I dunno, intelligent?

I am not Ann Althouse.

Oh give us a break Amy you never thought any of this shit was funny, and you'll use any sorry excuse you can to lash out at us.

By the way, I did go after one person, a rather low-hanging fruit, because I could do it with ease. More on that soon.

"Because I can"

spoken like a true sociopath.

Please elaborate on your Great and Glorious small claims court victory - cause of action, damages, identity of opposing counsel, and if you celebrated with a texas toast

/barf

I totally know Amy.

Simba B you are an idiot.

Sociopaths kill people for pissing them off, they dont bother to discuss it on the internet

As it happens, Amy, nobody at S,N! touched anybody's Wikipedia page. You found an IP address that resolved to the United Kingdom, of all places, and connected it with us through a chain of reasoning that only you understand. That's the first thing.

The second thing is that whoever has been messing with your Wikipedia page today, after your post on that subject and our link to that post of yours, you have a single, necessary remedy to pursue before filling the air with talk of lawsuits and 'going after' people.

This remedy is to ask Wikipedia to suspend editing on the page. Which you for some reason will not do, preferring to talk about 'going after' people.

The action that we are morally, ethically, and legally required to take regarding this vaporous Wikipedia problem of yours -- which you yourself refuse to solve -- is exactly zero.

We are happy to contribute that.

Sociopaths kill people for pissing them off, they dont bother to discuss it on the internet

Isn't he great, folks? Let's hear it for him!

do you know what a sociopath is ignatov?

Most sociopaths don't kill people. They are generally shallow authoritarian narcissists, not violent stabby-stabby types.

Sociopathy is a psychological construct that describes chronic immoral and antisocial behavior. The term is often used interchangeably with psychopathy. The phrase "luscious vagina" also appears at least twice.

I think it's at least three times now.

please amy, own up to lying about the ruppert thing. you have shamed yourself.

Lying? The nitwits from "Sadly, No!" said it was Gary Ruppert.

Where's the lie?

And I'm not sure what you did, but why not own up to it, and own up to what name you did it under?

The fsct is, Ms. Alkon has done more damage to her credibility and future prospects with this thread than any Wikipedia article ever could. Well, this and that whole racist thing.

If you knew anything about US law, you'd know it is almost impossible to sue for libel if you're a public figure (such as an advice columnist).

Furthermore, you would have to prove the allegation to be false in court -- AND prove that the person making the statement knew the statement was false when they made it. Part one could be proved by, you know, flashing your junk or lack thereof, but how could you possibly prove that this joker didn't know you were transgendered when they made the statement?

"Oh give us a break Amy you never thought any of this shit was funny, and you'll use any sorry excuse you can to lash out at us."

Do you have a little window into my head? I don't care about you in the slightest. Furthermore, I was laughing about the male-to-female tranny thing all last night -- to the point where my boyfriend was getting a little sick of me asking him what he thought of my penis, etc. The Wikipedia change was funny the first time. Then, people kept going in and posting stuff that could be damaging to me careerwise, to any editor who looks on that page for information about me. Not cool.

By the way, I did go after one person, a rather low-hanging fruit, because I could do it with ease. More on that soon. "Because I can"
spoken like a true sociopath.

No, spoken like a person who's not a victim.

Again, it's cool to start a blog and criticize me for my views, or say you think I look like a hag. Freedom of speech. I totally support that. It's not cool to post libelous stuff about me that can hurt my career, and that sucks my time as I have to go in and correct it. And then, it's not in the spirit of what Wikipedia is supposed to be -- an information source, not a source of lies posted by people who are apparently too dim and intellectually incompetent to debate me on the issues.

The story of the telemarketer I beat in court will be in my book. I write it when I'm not deleting lies posted by tiny little nitwits on my Wikipedia page.

If you knew anything about US law, you'd know it is almost impossible to sue for libel if you're a public figure (such as an advice columnist).

I know plenty about libel law, anonymous citizen, and I have an autographed copy of "The First Amendment," given to me by Eugene Volokh, when I need additional information.

Truth is a defense against libel charges. You can't just go around willfully posting lies about somebody, public figure or not. Also, it's unethical. That matters to some of us.

I especially loved this: "The fsct is, Ms. Alkon has done more damage to her credibility and future prospects with this thread than any Wikipedia article ever could. Well, this and that whole racist thing."

You know, I base what I do on my values and ethics, not on whether it pleases the mob -- especially not this mob. Personally, I consider it important to openly criticize things I see wrong in society, and it seems I used precisely the right language to do it, as it got the issue lots of attention. In my world, open discussion of ideas is good. And you know, they have speech codes in Europe and Canada. Do you think that makes actual racism go away?

What's been most shocking about this whole thing is how people responded to ideas they don't like, not with debate, but with underhanded behavior.

"Lying? The nitwits from "Sadly, No!" said it was Gary Ruppert."

At 3:01 PM, you claimed you called someone who knew him, and this anonymous person knew all about Gary, and his behind the scenes control of S,N ("Actually, I called somebody who's acquainted with him. It's a small world, asshat."). Either you lied about this, or your source did.

Or are you claiming your call was intercepted by the people from S,N, who then tricked you about Gary Ruppert?

I did call someone who knew him, and that person did not wish to reveal the identity of Gary Ruppert to me, but told me what I posted above.

Unlike the creeps attacking me, I'm not a liar. If I've erred or been mislead, please show or tell me, and I'll retract whatever I said that was wrong. I don't like to put out incorrect information, and I'm always eager to correct any mistakes I've made.

Here's the post that identified the weenie as Gary Ruppert:

Well, "Sadly, No!" - how about you identify who on your entry about me posted from the IP address - 12.124.244.131
Oh, 12.124.244.131. You mean Gary Ruppert?
Posted by: Sadly, No! at August 15, 2008 11:49 AM

Not saying you're actually either, but are there a lot of alt-press weeklies that would rather hire someone described as a racist than someone described as a transsexual?

This remedy is to ask Wikipedia to suspend editing on the page. Which you for some reason will not do, preferring to talk about 'going after' people.

Unfortunately, I did have to ask them to do that -- all because of a bunch of vandals who apparently don't have the brains to debate me.

I have a ticket open there, and have since early this morning, but they're all volunteers there, and apparently it takes them a while to get to things. What a pity that it's necessary to take this step due to a few undercivilized people. Personally, I prefer the free flow of information, as long as it's the truth.

"I did call someone who knew him"

"If I've erred or been mislead, please show or tell me"

Okay, using small words: Gary is a parody troll. About 50 or so people regularly refer to themselves as Gary Ruppert. So if you spoke to someone claiming to know who he is, that person lied to you, with rather effective results. You can learn more about the history and identity of Gary Ruppert in this very thread, mainly from about 4:30 through 5:00.

Not saying you're actually either, but are there a lot of alt-press weeklies that would rather hire someone described as a racist than someone described as a transsexual?

Being described as a racist doesn't mean you are a racist.

Speaking critically about problems you see in the black community certainly doesn't make you a racist. It does in the minds of people who are determined to see racism everywhere.

But racism is hatred of other races. I don't hate anyone. In fact, it's my feeling that it's a tragedy, what's happening the black community, that led me to post what I did, and my feeling that kids from the inner city don't have good role models that led me to start my program in inner city schools to help kids understand what it takes to "make it."

Now, how many racists do you know who volunteer an afternoon of their time once a month to help poor inner city kids understand that they shouldn't get pregnant young, and that with hard work, they can achieve a lot in the world...among other things?

I know so many of you dropping in here have your minds set that I'm a racist, but it's just not the case.

The info that it was Gary Ruppert came straight from SadlyNo!:

Well, "Sadly, No!" - how about you identify who on your entry about me posted from the IP address - 12.124.244.131
Oh, 12.124.244.131. You mean Gary Ruppert?
Posted by: Sadly, No! at August 15, 2008 11:49 AM

The person I talked to knows one of these Gary Ruppert's apparently. If the story of 50 people is actually true. I'm really not interested in any of you. I'd encourage you to stop behaving like mob yahoos and develop your minds and ability to reason, and we can have a civilized debate.

"Here's the post that identified the weenie as Gary Ruppert:

Well, "Sadly, No!" - how about you identify who on your entry about me posted from the IP address - 12.124.244.131
Oh, 12.124.244.131. You mean Gary Ruppert?
Posted by: Sadly, No! at August 15, 2008 11:49 AM"

That was them mocking you. Was that not obvious?

I've actually spent most of my day writing my book and column, and I've checked in here periodically, but I haven't been all that attentive to what's being posted here. I know -- the tiny little lives of a small mob of people now revolve around me. Whatever. Thanks for the traffic bump.

The number of people who have posted comments at S,N! under the name 'Gary Ruppert' may be in the hundreds. I don't know for sure because as a rule, I don't look at commenters' IP addresses. Our comment policy is posted and is somewhat widely known, and we take it quite seriously: We allow people to comment anonymously, and don't 'out'people who don't wish to be outed.

You, Amy, would be entitled to the same courtesy and security, were you to comment on the site. And so on and so forth, and I think this part is clear.

Ruppertwise, it's enough of a perennial running gag that Memeorandum has posted items about 'unmasking the real Gary Ruppert' without even explaining the joke. And in fact, yes, there is a real Gary Ruppert, and I'm not unaware of his email address and the city he lives in.

That said, if somebody is claiming to be or to know him, I would have to say that it's unlikely.

Thanks for the traffic bump

No, no, really. The pleasure is all ours. Honest.

Lying? The nitwits from "Sadly, No!" said it was Gary Ruppert.

Where's the lie?

And I'm not sure what you did, but why not own up to it, and own up to what name you did it under?

Amy, the operators of the Sadly No website are well versed in psyops, one of the founders was for a time a member of the Staatssicherheitsdienst, East Germany's feared "Sword And Shield". This person, who still resides in Germany, was a leading figure in Operation Scorpion, which was designed to pursue people who helped East Germans escape to the West.

Ted William, of Emergant Technologies, and I have been tracking him for many years.
I understand your anger and frustration, but if I were you I would be very careful about making these people angry. They may have lost their country but they still have many dangerous contacts throughout Europe and the US and they are willing to use them.

Maj Ed Ruse (ret)

I am not Gary Rupert.

Wow, you mean you take time out of trying to keep your pitiful ego inflated to talk down to black folk and tell them to stop having litters?
Amy, you're so awesome.

sorry, sadly no investor relations--i don't see how it is logically possible that amy alkon knows someone who either a) knows gary ruppert or b) knows enough about this whole thing to mock her by pretending to do so.

to imagine in particular b) as you have is to assume that a regular sadly- no reader also manages to be conversant with an obvious moron such as ms. alkon. does that really seem possible to you? that she's on speaking terms with someone who tools around on sadly no as obsessively as, say...i do? it just seems beyond the realm of the possible. and the chance that she knows gary ruppert for real, or someone who knows him, is obviated by the simple fact that if she talked to anyone with actual knowledge of a) mr. ruppert and b) his relationship to sadly no they would have pointed out she was being made fun of and her response would have been very different. Q E FUCKING D she's a damn liar and a low hanging fruit of her own devising. she deserves all the derision and none of the traffic.

i say good day to you sir! good day! [door slams, audience applauds]

I am not Gary Ruppert either, but I totally know Gary, and I told Amy all about him, and how he really runs S,N, no matter what they say, and neither of us is making any of that up. We in the Heartland, where Amy is from, don't make stuff up. Neither of us has enough imagination.

You guys are posting rather dull stuff about me and I really couldn't care less. I get that you all think your site is a huge scream, but it's not funny, and if it actually were funny, I'd link to the stuff you post about me.

All I ever cared about were lies about me being posted on Wikipedia.

You can't be a newspaper columnist and a blogger and be all sensitive about what people say about you, and I'm not. In fact, my hate mail is the most entertaining mail I get.

By the way, if I were as dull as some of the bloggers and commenters on your site, I'm sure I'd consider posting under a pseudonym used by 49 other people, too.

I've canceled all my plans for the weekend and am camping out in front of this thread.

I haven't had this much fun since the Christmas my Mom cut holes in my pockets.

I'm sure I'd consider posting under a pseudonym used by 49 other people, too.

Oh, that might even happen. It certainly did with Ann Althouse, bless her soul.

The comment posted in my name will be deleted and the IP will be banned.

What scummy behavior.

I'm so sorry all of you doing stuff like this don't have the humor or intellect to fight fair, but why not work on it instead of behaving like scumbags?

Some other loser just posted as brian. Also banned.

I've canceled all my plans for the weekend and am camping out in front of this thread.

I find it fascinating that you find this thread the least bit interesting. It's a bunch of anonymous people who don't have what it takes to actually debate on the issues gutlessly posting not very funny comments in other real people's names. Wowee.

Um, you ought to do what the last person did and intentionally misspell the name, preferably with a parodic link to a different website.

Otherwise Ms. Alkon is going to come back and she's liable to be mad. I'm just saying.

Is not.

...Oh, Amy Aikon. Oh, okay.

I missed that, and as a result, the joke is on me. Well.

What a bunch of losers you guys are! Your whole life tonight - and perhaps for days - revolves around putting up not very funny comments on my site?

Put stuff up under your own cowardly pseudonyms, but don't post under my name or slight switches of those of my commenters.

And tell me why you find this fun or somehow exciting? What's your life like that you find it entertaining to hang around here, spending hours, and hours, apparently, posting these rather uninteresting and unfunny comments?

Keep it up, smartasses. I'll ban every one of you fuckers!

I don't think you're a racist; I just think you kind of said something that combined a racist attitude with blaming the victim. Is it a bad idea to be sexually involved with a string of drug dealers? Duh. Does someone who does this have a problem? Maybe deserve a little sympathy? Certainly she doesn't deserve some France-visiting epicure saying she valued her life less than the person who shot her to death. Maybe more of the blame should be apportioned to the law-enforcement culture that endorses no-knock raids where paramilitary tactical groups kick in someone's door in order to serve a warrant? Maybe the cop who literally says he didn't look where he was shooting?
I just think it's a terribly unsympathetic point of view to take, is all.

Also, hard work just makes your boss richer. Smart work, that's the way to achieve (that or luck, of course).

Personally, I'm hanging around because I'm unbelievably curious as to who might've claimed to know Gary Ruppert.

Didn't know what he or she was talking about, framed things as a vague but sinister conspiracy...

New hypothesis: It was Patterico.

tell me why you find this fun or somehow exciting? What's your life like that you find it entertaining to hang around here

Why does the cat play with the cockroach?

Certainly she doesn't deserve some France-visiting epicure saying she valued her life less than the person who shot her to death.

Why would where I vacation have any bearing on what I am and am not permitted to say?

Why doesn't a woman who, by nature of having six kids by age 26, by five different drug dealers, and then who took up with yet another drug dealer, deserve to be criticized?

It's just a pity that nobody gave her a sense of shame for this behavior before she engaged in it. She might still be alive today, and she might be doing something with her life besides pumping out children that surely were neglected (I mean, this was a single mother at 26 with absent drug dealer daddies with six children). The fact that you don't criticize this suggests you are morally bankrupt and without judgement. If this woman were white, I'd be just as virulent in my criticism. The thing is, there's a pattern of this sort of behavior in the black community, and I suspect it was brought on, initially, by welfare payments.

You say I have a "racist attitude." So...this means you think I hate black people? How would you ever even know that? Moreover, on each of these postings, there have been numerous examples showing that I am anything but -- including a quote from a Luke Ford interview with me where he apparently tried to bait me into revealing racism. I simply don't hate anyone.

Why do none of you post under your real names? I stand behind what I say, and you're all this hit-and-run cowards, unacccountable for your postings.

tell me why you find this fun or somehow exciting? What's your life like that you find it entertaining to hang around here

Well, "Amy Aikon," if that is your real name... it's mostly because I'm having a ball watching Amy try to reconcile each of her increasingly contradictory statements about how "amusing" she finds this, but how it's "libel" and "damaging.," which shall, of course, result in a HUGE trial for BILLIONS in damages, and a climactic scene of Amy screaming "YOU'RE out of order!" in a packed courtroom.

Really, Amy...it was really just a tiny little fuck-up. I don't think you're a racist... just ignorant, arrogant and thoughtless. You could (and should) have chosen your words better, and you could (and should) have just apologized when it was brought to your attention... and even been grateful, as you claim to be when corrected in that hilarious "interview" with another alt-"journalist" everyone is cracking up over. Instead, you tie yourself in knots to justify your ignorant, hurtful statements, and to reconcile your absurd, contradictory follow-up statements.

And as has been noted... it's Pure. Comedy. Gold.

If I actually were the type to get enraged about something like this, it might actually be borderline funny. But, I'm not enraged, just mystified at all the idiots crawling out of the woodwork.

Here, I'll help you out:

1. One wikipedia edit calling me transgendered was kind of funny.
2. Repeated libelous statements are not. I pursue people who wrong me. At the moment, I'm writing a book, but if I feel a wrong is substantive enough, I'll go after the person after I turn it in.
3. Writing or speaking critically about what I write is not wronging me and is appropriate. Posting libelous statements on Wikipedia is not.
4. It wasn't a fuck up. I meant every word.
5. What a pity that nobody told Tarika Wilson that it's shameful to behave as she did. My point, in all of this.

Thank you for that, Amy. You are truly the gift the keeps on giving.

No, you know, you're totally right that having 6 kids by 5 different fathers (particularly when they're all criminals)is a bad idea and is indicative of some serious personal --and probably social-- problems. What I don't think, though, is that this means you place a lower value on your life than the person who kicks down your door and shoots you to death, which is what you wrote. As I said, though, I don't think you're a racist; while I do think that some of the language you chose to use is informed by racist stereotypes, the thing that bothers me more about it is the victim-blaming.

The Luke Ford interview thing is a bit odd, too, because in demonstrating that you won't say something bigoted he asks "what do you think about lesbians" and you respond something about how women shouldn't grow mustaches. I mean, what the hell is that? Luke Ford is an interesting writer, but I think he's interesting mainly for his contradictions, not so much for his insight. And, you know, for his ability to talk about porn without being an apologetic sleazebag or a sanctimonious anti-smut crusader.

I don't post under my name because of this: When you, as a blogger/pundit/columnist/advice deity say something controversial, that's your role. You get paid for that, and your reputation is based on people wanting to read you. Me, I'm just a guy who looks in microscopes and stuff, and I don't need any more crazed Friedrich Hayek enthusiasts telling me my home address (thanks, I already know it) or any more Scientology lawyers harassing my dad.

Finally, it's a beautiful evening out here, I like the fact that you spell "judgement" with an "e" (like I do) even though it gets the red underline, and it's all good.

The fact that you don't criticize this suggests you are morally bankrupt and without judgement. If this woman were white, I'd be just as virulent in my criticism.

In all seriousness now. Yes, that's a bad way to live, and one worthy of criticism.

I think where our ways part is in the notion, '...and therefore, it's her fault that she was shot to death.'

There's a real strain of Social Darwinism is the commentary you levied on this case. I mean literal Social Darwinism, the variety that escaped from Spencer and rampaged around the world for decades, leaving consequences that we mostly, for politeness, prefer not to talk about in appropriately vivid terms.

Not to make a ship in a bottle from the arguments that you actually made, but you have to realize the consequences of that sort of thinking. 'If you don't want to get shot by the police, then don't put yourself in a position where the police will shoot you' is a fine principle by which to live, but a very dangerous, immoral one by which to expect others to live.

Or do you not see that?

I don't even believe in the death penalty, but I believe that a woman who behaves as this one did, taking up with numerous drug dealers, including the last one, criminally endangers her children.

I don't know that the policeman placed a low value on black life. I do know that he worked in a dangerous area, where police protection for residents must be much-needed.

If you value life -- your children's lives -- do you live with a drug dealer? I don't think so. I think there was a flagrant disregard for the rights of Tarika Wilson's children by Tarika Wilson and by anyone who didn't use all their power to get her to change her lifestyle.

As for the Luke Ford question, I joke about everybody all the time, including myself. My assistant is a lesbian, and she's told me before that she's appreciated my support for gay rights.

I don't have a problem in the world with people posting comments disputing what I say. I have problems with those who aren't doing what you're doing, those who doing malicious little attacks anonymously. And I actually used to post anonymously sometimes in the early days of blogs, but I realized that doing it meant that I would say stuff I wouldn't say if I posted under my own full name. It means a lot to me to not behave that way, so I post as Amy Alkon, and if I can't say it as Amy Alkon, it doesn't get said.

Yes, she contributed to her own death and the motherlessness of her fathered-by-various-drug-dealer children. Is it right that she was shot? No, it's terrible. But, she wasn't living with a librarian. You imperil your children by associating with a drug dealer.

Doctorb reminded me... it's also hilarious how you just make shit up about a "friend" who is acquainted with Gary Ruppert, and how this helped you reach the conclusion that "Gary Ruppert" is "behind" Sadly, No! Since you have a pathological inability to admit error, you keep twisting yourself in knots to justify this patent and transparent falsehood, further bringing the funny.

And your repeated assertions that you don't have time to deal with the negative comments? Spread out over several hours and at least two websites? PCG, baby.

This is my site and of course I have an interest in it, but I believe my assistant left around 7 or 8, and I've been here more since then.

I do need to police the negative comments because some of these lowlife vandals are posting in close approximations of real people's names. You can say anything you want here as long as it isn't libelous, a copyright violation, or you're pretending to be another real person.

The Gary Ruppert thing is just dumb, and you can continue railing on about it if you please -- every post here is traffic and dollars for me from Pajamas Media's ads, so thanks so much.

I'm happy to respond to comments like Doctorb's above -- that's called intelligent debate. The rest of you who aren't capable of having it, perhaps you go stick your thumb up your ass and watch reruns of Jerry Springer.

But in a civil society such as obtains in America, we have very little control over the way criminals might behave. Our means of control over such things, the sort of broad, fumbly lever that we can use to influence things, is basically law enforcement.

It's not that simple -- and I'm a bit busy now in any case -- but we do, or should, have control over the way law enforcement officers are expected to behave. By the very nature of the system by which law enforcement is given legitimacy in America.

I think the police were stone-cold wrong to bring the SWAT team into a house with six children in it. That's an issue I've posted on before -- Radley Balko does great work on this, and he's absolutely right. That wasn't the issue I wanted to address -- it was the absolutely stunning level of child neglect and endangerment, and how it's just accepted as the way things are by far too many people.

Well, we agree that the "Gary Ruppert" thing is "just dumb." Where we diverge is the point where you started making up a "friend" to make yourself look like a crack investigator, but only made yourself look more foolish in the bargain.
The histrionics about "libel" on your Wikipedia page, and going after those responsible are hilarious. I imagine bullying and intimidation must have worked for you at some time and in some place, or you wouldn't keep trotting them out; nevertheless, it's a delicious hysterical frosting for the slices of egomaniacal cake you've been serving this week, and I can't thank you enough. However many dollars you're getting from Pajamas Media, I hope they double it! Keep up the good work!
Oh, FWIW, I'm taping Springer for the duration. You're better.

I didn't "make up a friend" because I don't lie, except maybe to tell somebody who's already out for the evening that they don't look ugly in their dress.

I called this person. Whether or not you believe it is your problem.

Note above, example of intelligent debate a couple of comments above yours. I've taken action against one of the people who posted libelous material about me on Wikipedia, because, in that person's case, I could do it quickly. I guess I'll hear more next week about what will be done vis a vis their posting on my entry. I also tracked a car thief for two and a half months through South Central L.A. and made him bring back my car. The cops later got him on a bench warrant -- and only knew who he was because I solved the case. I also tracked a hit-and-run driver, got the police to book him, then wrote a letter to try to persuade the Santa Monica prosecutor to prosecute him. The judge thanked me, and said without me, he wouldn't have been brought to justice. I also found an adopted friend's birth mother. I beat the New York corporate counsel of an international company in Santa Monica Small Claims because I did my homework, and he didn't. Any questions?

Again, it's appropriate to post here and tell me you disagree with me. It is wrong to post libelous material about me on Wikipedia. Also, your comments make my site boring. If you have something to say about the issue, have at it. Otherwise, go back into whatever hole you crawled out of.

I think the police were stone-cold wrong to bring the SWAT team into a house with six children in it

The weird thing is, this wasn't mentioned like 400 comments ago, or in the original article.

What a bunch of losers you guys are! Your whole life tonight - and perhaps for days - revolves around putting up not very funny comments on my site?

"Very"?

Yes, yes, you've made it abundantly clear that you don't consider what I have to say to be "intelligent debate." Shockingly, your opinion of my level of discourse matters not a whit.

I happen to agree that the person or persons vandalizing your Wikipedia page are turds. This is not behavior which I condone, nor in which I indulge. Your reaction to the "libel" (none of which is actually libelous, or remotely actionable) is, as previously remarked, the gift that keeps on giving.

As for making your site boring... would that I could take the credit...

My, but this hole is commodious!

Really, I hope every dollar from Big Kid Pants Media is a dollar less for Instapundit, but then again you'd have to work a click monkey all day to get a dollar out of that, unless it's the mid-nineties again and nobody told me.

Not weird at all. When it's your blog, you make it the main point. I've addressed that issue before. I chose to address another issue, and focus on that issue alone.

I find the mob tactics -- the Wikipedia vandalism and all the rest -- in hopes of intimidating me into saying what the mob thinks I should be saying to be absolutely deplorable.

Again, you want to focus on no-knock raids, get a blog on Journalspace and write it up yourself. Or just search Radley Balko's name and you'll find a piece I posted about it a while ago. Maybe more than one if you use other search terms (for pieces not posted by Radley).

The assumption that I should write about what you think I should write about is just stunning.

Here's the link to the Radley piece:

http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2006/07/18/three_stoplight.html

Balko's piece lists dozens and dozens of innocent people -- even elderly grannies or people with small amounts of pot for medical use or their personal possession -- who were hurt or killed after SWAT raids; many times, after officers went to the wrong address through sloppy police work or on the word of a snitch.

P.S. And good point, Treach.

And Arygay, regarding this remark you just made: "Yes, yes, you've made it abundantly clear that you don't consider what I have to say to be "intelligent debate.""

...you haven't debated a whit, intelligently or not -- you've simply foamed at the mouth about "Gary Ruppert."

Well doctorb did you stop to consider Amy never wrote any of the articles?

And this blog post is regarding the changes to her wiki page not the moron who got herself shot. Did you read the first blog she wrote on this? or check her site for blog items on drug laws? or was that too hard?

Because she was very clear that she thought this was a tragedy.

She wrote in her first blog about this story, and I quote "And while I'm not a fan of our drug laws, and I agree with reason's Radley Balko that these door-break searches too often have tragic consequences, and for those who are not perps

But it dosent matter because people like you dont care what she really said. You want to focus on how your feeling were hurt by what you thought she "really" meant

All you need to do is write to the point where you're qualified to do a dialogue polish on a feature film and a rewrite of the dialogue for a video game, earn a bunch of money doing both of those things, put every dime of that money into syndicating your column after all the syndicators turn it down, spend all the holidays everyone else is off having fun addressing envelopes and doing mass mailings on your apartment floor, seriously study psychology, reading everything from Freud to the present day, attend conferences around the world with Ph.D.'s in ethology, psychology, evolutionary psychology and anthropology, read the same journals they do, get to the point where they'll respect you enough to get you their studies before they're in the journals or certainly the popular press, and sweat blood honing your writing and journalistic skills to the point where you're up for journalist of the year in Southern California, against the LA Times top people, but then, sadly manage only to win first place for your column.

A note: I am on a book deadline now, but as you may have noticed from the way I went after my car thief, my hit-and-run driver and numerous others, if you piss me off enough, I'll sue your ass blind. And win.

I just took a telemarketer to Santa Monica Small Claims Court. An international company, based in New York and Switzerland. They sent their New York corporate counsel -- yes, some bigtime lawyer. And you know, I wiped the floor with his ass. In other words, I won.

I know plenty about libel law, anonymous citizen, and I have an autographed copy of "The First Amendment," given to me by Eugene Volokh, when I need additional information.

Y'know, for someone who is neither a transvestite or a transsexual, you sure do like to swing your dick around.

Y'know, for someone who is neither a transvestite or a transsexual, you sure do like to swing your dick around.

I guess I'd be much more popular with the mob if I kowtowed like a nice little victim.

In addition to all of the above, I'm also working to expose Bank of America -- and blogging a great deal about them in hopes of letting other B of A customers know what I found out.

http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2008/07/28/investigating_b.html

lujlp writes:

Because she was very clear that she thought this was a tragedy. She wrote in her first blog about this story, and I quote "And while I'm not a fan of our drug laws, and I agree with reason's Radley Balko that these door-break searches too often have tragic consequences, and for those who are not perps" But it dosent matter because people like you dont care what she really said. You want to focus on how your feeling were hurt by what you thought she "really" meant

Exactly right, lujlp. And thanks.

Notice, Amy, I haven't once claimed to be debating you; I've stated, for the record, that I am here solely for the never-ending amusement your antics provide. You showed us several days ago that you're not interested in "debate," and that you'd sooner create ever-more ridiculous chains of reasoning to support a discredited position than "debate." It's a waste of everyone's time, and I won't be a part of it.

And you might want to look upthread to see just who introduced Gary Ruppert into the discussion. (Hint: he was posting under your name.) If my pointing out how ridiculous it is for you to claim that Gary Ruppert is somehow responsible both for the "libel" on your Wikipedia entry and for Sadly, No! itself constitutes "foaming at the mouth," then I plead guilty. But that makes your claims, and the subsequent invention of a phone call to "someone acquainted with" Gary Ruppert, no less ridiculous.

It would seem you just can't help it.

Notice, Amy, I haven't once claimed to be debating you;

You're a vandal and a bloodsucker, about trying to take away the productivity of people who actually do something with their lives. I guess this gives you great pride.

There's debate just above -- with DoctorB and even with some SadlyNo! person. If you want to talk about the issues, I'm all for it. You're a liar and a time thief and a scumbag.

As for not being able to help it, yeah, I admit it, I'm a real bad candidate for victim. I've spent about a month and a half going after Bank of America, unfortunately, and there's more to that than I can post here.

And you know what, as a time thief, and a scumbag, I'm going to ban you, too. Anybody who wants to post here out of a desire to debate honestly, fine. Pieces of shit like you who openly state they're here to steal from me, you're out.

And I don't lie. Lying makes me feel queasy. And I really don't care who "Gary Ruppert" is -- but, you'll have plenty of time to speculate on it now that you're banned.

A word to any other "progressives" coming on over from "SadlyNo!" -- if you want to engage in debate on the issues with me, fine. All for it. Even if you disagree with every letter of every word I write. If I see you're just here to foil discussion, I'll ban you.

You know, I am neither a Democrat nor a Republican. I'm a fiscal conservative and pretty much socially libertarian, although, per Milton Friedman on open borders being a disaster in a welfare state, I'm not for open borders.

I do have to say, I know people on the right (who think I'm kind a nitwit for being against the Iraq war and some other stuff they're for), and people on the left (who, for example, find my ideas on health care plain wrong), but I have to say, in my personal experience, people on the right haven't pulled the nasty, anti-free-speech attempts at intimidation and silencing that people on the left have when they've disagreed with me. It seems there's no fascist like a "progressive."

I beat the New York corporate counsel of an international company in Santa Monica Small Claims because I did my homework, and he didn't. Any questions??

Yeah. What was a New York dude doing practicing law in California?

Why would anyone send a lawyer who mattered from New York to California over a small claims case that couldn't be worth more than $7,500?

What was the nature of the case, with relaxed rules of evedence and procedure, where you owned this unlikely dude.

Feel free to buy my book and find out.

Okapi Semen with Iced Grain Neutral Spiritses

Ingredients:
1 pint okapi semen, movingly mixed
1 can grain neutral spirits
1 Cynar, glazed

Stir all ingredients slurringly with ice, strain contents divertingly into a dizzy bukkit and serve.

Not to be snarky, but....

Ms Alkon,

You might spemd some time to google around about internet trolls and/or vamdals and what their motivations are. It sure ain't because they are ascared of your elite debating skills.

That is if you have the time to explore something so central to an activity you engage in.

The people that messed with your wikipedia entry could care less about what you say or how you say it. They could also care less about people who think you are a narcissitic fuckwit for thinking that all people should make the same choices you have made.

They are trolls. They care about the fact that you respond.

If you spent a couple of seconds on it, You'd realize that the people who mess with your wikipedia entry only care about messing with your wikipedia entry because they can.

Us? We're just mocking you for hitting yourself in the face. Repeatedly.

Um. I can say prettty confidently that I won't be buying your book.

All this talk about lawyers in California small claims courts has me confused. I've been to small claims court in California (I won. Yay me!) and there aren't any lawyers. You have to represent yourself.

A lawyer came and represented the big company, and a lawyer signed the letter when they sent me the check. Somebody had to represent them. I represented myself -- as I don't think you're allowed to BRING a lawyer. And frankly, I didn't need one. I'm a smart girl. I read the law and prepared a packet for the judge and a copy for the lawyer representing the big company. He didn't even read the rules closely enough (or at all) to know he had to bring a copy of his documents for both of us, so he couldn't give anything to the judge.

And, anyway, I believe, from what he said to me when we were supposed to exchange documents, that he only had a single quote on a sheet of paper from the telemarketing law -- the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 -- all 165 or so pages of which I've read. He ended up trying to defend his side off the documents I'd prepared. It was quite hilarious, actually.

Now, that kind of activity -- winning against a telemarketer -- is actually funny, and has a positive effect...possibly emboldening other people to show businesses in the business of being rude that we won't just all lie down like victims while they use our phone lines and hijack our time to increase their profits. Wasting somebody's time and libeling them...as pranks go, that's bullshit stuff.

I understand how hard it is for some of the scumbags who've been trying to muck up my site and vandalize Wikipedia to understand, but I don't lie.

Other details: I served the company through the agent for service of process in Sacramento, as they're based out of state (and you need a California address to be able to sue a company in Cali small claims). André-Tascha Lammé's site, killthecalls.com was extremely helpful, as was André-Tascha himself.

P.S. The ruling that allowed me to sue them in my home state is the International Shoe case.

I don't care what their motivations are. I spent the day writing part of a book chapter and my newspaper column. If these pathetic losers have nothing to do but vandalize Wikipedia, my page will be locked. It's locked now. All hail, losers with a lot of time on their hands.

You included.

Are you this big an idiot in real life? EVERYONE ON THE INTERTRONS IS A LOSER WITH A LOT OF TIME ON THEIR HANDS, EVEN THE ONES THAT TELL YOU HOW GREAT YOU ARE.

I'm getting a book out of my blog items. I got a nice fat book advance for it.

You?

I served the company through the agent for service of process in Sacramento, and they sent their New York corporate counsel. And I won.

Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 1:38 AM

This may be hard for you to comprehend, but any lawyer that was sent to deal with you in small claims court was by defintion not a bigwig.

Frankly I'm surprised they bothered.

Have you tried enforcing your judgment?

"Basically, all this talk about tracking people down by IP address is a bunch of empty threats. Which figures for this crowd."

I don't know if you're misattributing something I wrote, but I spoke of police involvement ... if there is even a hint of possible illegal behaviour, your name/address etc. can and will be revealed at the drop of a hat, and most ISPs very readily give up this information. In fact, many ISPs will give up your information at a mere lawyer's letter. This is also true of domain registrars who claim to keep your info anonymous (except for one or two who truly do anonymous domain registration). Finally there are sometimes other ways that people do give themselves away if they don't know what they're doing.

Have you tried enforcing your judgment?

Why would I have to? They lost, they're a huge company, they express-mailed me a check.

I'm getting a book out of my blog items. I got a nice fat book advance for it.

You?

Me? I've got to go back to work at some point.

This isn't a competition. I'm drawing your attention to stuff that's widely known. And I'm only mocking you a little bit. And only for being such an ass about it.

I will be charitable and assume you are merely mistaken, Amy. In California small claims courts one may consult with an attorney before or after trial and be represented by an attorney if a small claims court decision is appealed, but neither party can be represented by an attorney at the trial.

Why would I have to? They lost, they're a huge company, they express-mailed me a check.

Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008

For what? Calling you at the wring time?

I actually love being teased -- my boyfriend does it all the time. What you're doing is making my comments section super-dull.

but neither party can be represented by an attorney at the trial.

The attorney represented them and was allowed to do so by the judge. André-Tascha Lammé, who is something of an expert in this area, told me they might have a lawyer represent the company.

Again, I can understand that some of you sent here by that "progressive" site might be used to a lot of liars and unethical twerps, but I'm not one of them.

Bas-O-Matic, you'll just have to buy my book. And, it seems, you just can't. Well, you'll have to ask somebody who has bought it when it comes out.

You're dull. Go away.

Bas-O-Matic, you'll just have to buy my book. And, it seems, you just can't. Well, you'll have to ask somebody who has bought it when it comes out.

You're dull. Go away

You think I know someone who will buy your book?

Wow.

"You found an IP address that resolved to the United Kingdom, of all places, and connected it with us through a chain of reasoning that only you understand."

I think it's because on a SN page that she linked it states that Gavin lives in 'Cambridge'.

I mean, it's a slam dunk.

I had you as a trannie, but going the other way...
no WAY that hair's 'real.'
and that jaw!
O, yeah, bite me, puh-leasze!!!!

Which one of these things is not like the other?

Option 1:
You can't be a newspaper columnist and a blogger and be all sensitive about what people say about you, and I'm not. (Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:02 PM)

Option 2:
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 6:13 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 7:03 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:32 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:32 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:06 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:10 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:28 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 11:32 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 11:57 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 12:09 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 12:15 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 1:10 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 1:25 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 1:26 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:01 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:07 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:37 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 3:57 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 6:20 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 7:46 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 7:54 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 7:59 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:08 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:10 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:14 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:20 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:24 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 8:32 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:02 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:22 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:41 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 9:58 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 10:21 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 10:26 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 10:31 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 10:39 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 11:03 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 11:16 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 15, 2008 11:18 PM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 12:25 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 12:27 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 12:47 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 1:01 AM
Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 1:38 AM

You think I know someone who will buy your book?

I think you're a tiny little fascist who can't bear the thought that somebody would post speech that doesn't go along with the printed policy of the hilariously self-described "progressives" over at the pathetic and unfunny site called SadlyNo! sending over the mob of yahoos.

Here's the blog of tiny little fascist Woody, who apparently is a 62-year-old man posting cracks like this --

"I had you as a trannie, but going the other way...
no WAY that hair's 'real.'
and that jaw!
O, yeah, bite me, puh-leasze!!!!

-- on my blog. His e-mail: konopelli@yahoo.com -- which is how I found his blog.

Here's his profile:
http://www.blogger.com/profile/09205896988142798901

See, here's the deal, Woody. You are hiding under the cloak of anonymity. I'm guessing you're a tiny-dicked loser. I mean, what kind of 62-year-old man posts anonymous attack comments about a woman's looks on her website? Is this "progressive" behavior, trying to punish and intimidate me for speaking freely?

I don't post stuff I wouldn't say to somebody in person. It's uncivil to attack somebody about their looks. Also, I can't imagine somebody who posts anonymous attack remarks such as this having the balls to ever speak to me in public.

You are probably typical of the people Sadly Pathetic is sending over here.

And you know my name, as I have the balls you couldn't dream of having to post under it, with my picture right there, because I stand behind what I write.

You might try it sometime, cowardly loser.

And his blog is: http://walled-in-pond.blogspot.com/

Amy:

I'm talking about people's opinions, not people posting lies that can damage the career I've built as a columnist, journalist, and author.

If you think your career can be damaged by a prank edit of Wikipedia, what does that say about your career?

... is this the best you can do at trying to kneecap somebody with sleazy criticism, and you took what you had?

Kneecap? Sleazy criticism?

Whoa. Calm down. Take a deep breath. Hoooold it. Let it out slowly. Good. Now take another breath. Hoooooold it. Let it out slowly. Good. Now click this link.

It is utterly astounding to me how much time you've spent taking umbrage at every bit of teasing posted here, and how you still haven't figured out the wisdom of ignoring it. Most people figure this out before leaving elementary school.

And you call yourself an "advice columnist?"

Maybe I do get why you're so worried about your "career."

But please, continue. I haven't been this entertained since the last time I stumbled across … come to think of it, someone else with the initials AA.

It is utterly astounding to me how much time you've spent taking umbrage at every bit of teasing posted here, and how you still haven't figured out the wisdom of ignoring it. Most people figure this out before leaving elementary school.

The comments here and the lies posted on Wikipedia are meant to punish or intimidate me for speech not approved by the tiny little dirty pool players coming over from Pathetically So, or whatever it's called. No, I don't let people trying to intimidate me take over my site. Your post above about the lies posted on me on Wikipedia -- trying to make me out to be a censor, shows what a tiny little sleazebag you are. So, thanks, I think I won't be caring what you think is wise. Albert Ellis respected my work. It's his opinion and that of other people I respect that I care about.

My e-mail exchange with Brendan:

In a message dated 8/16/08 7:48:44 AM, bjkeefe@bjkeefe.com writes:

Amy:

The comment I attempted to post on:

http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2008/08/15/wiki_tranny.html

was evidently blocked by your "anti-spam software."

Based on the reaction you displayed to my first comment, I suspect
what's really going on is that you've blocked me from posting any
further comments, but for the record, here's the notification your
mt-comments.cgi page requested.

Brendan

My response: Actually, I spotted it in my spam folder and posted it, but now that you've made it clear, in that comment, that you, like all the other tiny little fascists, are just coming to my site to try to muck it up, yes, I've banned you. Anyone who wants to come here for discussion, instead of to foil discussion, in hopes of intimidating and punishing me for speaking in a way not approved by so-called "progressives" is welcome. Tiny little fascists can fuck the hell off.

Okay. This is a raucous, thrumming Internet that we all inhabit, and arguments in the comments of blogs are an ancient tradition as such things go.

The universal remedy to unwelcome comments is to delete them and/or to ban troublesome commenters. If that doesn't work, the solution is to close the comments to a post.

As I've mentioned before, we don't even do those things, except under exceptional conditions.

An example of a rare deleting-and-banning is when someone posted Michelle Malkin's address and phone number in our comments.

This is because it's quite a bit different to threaten, intimidate, or attempt to 'go after' people in real, non-Internet life, to post people's private addresses, numbers, email, or identities, than to squabble healthily on the Internet in common and accepted fashion. We don't like Michelle Malkin, but not liking someone isn't an excuse to treat them unscrupulously.

That said, I'd like to ask that you please don't post people's email addresses as a response to comments that they leave freely on your blog.

As for the Wikipedia thing, I don't know what 'low hanging fruit' you're planning to go after, or in what way you're planning to 'go after' that person, but it badly needs to be pointed out and underscored with a magnum-tip Sharpie marker that nobody is guaranteed a respectful and congenial Wikipedia entry. I'm personally glad that the page tampering has stopped. Crap like that can be funny for an hour or two, provided things return to normal afterward. The page is now locked to edits. Whatever was going on has now stopped. It's over.

If you 'go after' someone at this point, I can guarantee that public opinion will favor the poor slob who's being attacked by the vindictive public figure.

As what I hope is a corrective, look at our 'About' page and see what happened to our own Wikipedia entry.

f you 'go after' someone at this point, I can guarantee that public opinion will favor the poor slob who's being attacked by the vindictive public figure.

Well, boohoo. You post lies about me, you deal with the consequences. As it should be.

And clearly, I am not intimidated by a bunch of tiny little shithead fascists coming over here to try to silence me. I think it's a laugh that you call yourselves "progressives" over there, since clearly you're against the free speech of anyone who disagrees with you.

P.S. I don't post the e-mail addresses of people who civilly disagree with me. Those who attempt to vandalize my site, and ruin the discussion forum, well, I don't see that in quite the same light.

You might look into changing the label of "progressive" on your site, as it seems anything but progressive to try to quash speech.

And note that I'm fine having a discussion -- as you're engaging in above. Those who attempt to cloak their identity so they can attack me in a way they'd never have the balls to do to my face, well, they deserve exposure, I think.

nobody is guaranteed a respectful and congenial Wikipedia entry.

Obviously. And there was stuff critical of me on my page before -- which is fine with me. Critical and based in truth, fine. Lies maliciously posted in hopes of hurting me or intimidating me, no. I get that many on your site aren't for free speech, but intimidation of those who'd speak other than you'd like, but take it elsewhere, because I'm not buying.

You seem to attribute great power to the act of posting comments on someone's blog.

I think this is a fairly fundamental point: Free speech means that you can say what you like. Free speech does not mean that you can say what you like and nobody is allowed to make fun of you -- that the subsequent hooting of a crowd is somehow an illegitimate attempt to 'silence' you.

Because, fundamentally, that is also free speech.

On the other hand, this is absolutely your blog and not anyone else's, and you can absolutely delete comments, ban uncongenial commenters, and/or close comments entirely, according to your own liking and with no explanation to anyone.

S,N!IR:

This is because it's quite a bit different to threaten, intimidate, or attempt to 'go after' people in real, non-Internet life, to post people's private addresses, numbers, email, or identities, than to squabble healthily on the Internet in common and accepted fashion.

Clearly, Amy is not aware of all Internet traditions. But thanks, on behalf of future commenters, for trying to set her straight.

Amy:

You, like other right-wing blowhards, have got to come up with something else to cry out besides "CENSORSHIP!" every time someone pokes a little fun at you. That whine has turned to vinegar.

Posted by: Amy Alkon at August 16, 2008 7:00 AM

And you know my name, as I have the balls you couldn't dream of having [...]

This is hilarious in the context of this thread.

Plenty of people have made fun on me on my site, and that's fine. What's not fine is when it's clear -- because they make it clear -- that their goal is not simply free speech but to punish me for my speech, in some mob effort apparently spawned by your postings. It is also not fine that lies have been posted on my Wikipedia entry.

Apparently, you have been "progressive" for so long that you don't know fascism when you see it.

I do.

And I'll delete the comments of any of these yahoos who come here, not in an attempt to discuss the issues, but to intimidate and punish me for not speaking the approved speech, according to "progressives" -- and what a laugh that name is.

Again, because you seem to need to have it repeatedly, as you've yet to comprehend it: I totally support criticism of me, and even parodies of me and my site. What I won't allow is attempts to intimidate me from speaking or to punish me for unapproved speech.

Please do your best to comprehend this, as it's quite tedious to keep explaining it.

This is hilarious in the context of this thread

Thanks. It was intentional.

I find it kind of incredible that all you ball-less losers are coming here to accuse me of having balls. Well...yes.

A pity that I'm not the kind of lie-down-and-take-it victim you'd like me to be, huh?

You, like other right-wing blowhards, have got to come up with something else to cry out besides "CENSORSHIP!" every time someone pokes a little fun at you. That whine has turned to vinegar.

Right-wing, huh? Against the Iraq war, against capital punishment, fighting for gay rights and gay marriage, writing columns to clear up misconceptions about and humanize cross-dressers, volunteering at an inner-city school in hopes of making change...

Oh, and have I mentioned...I voted for John Kerry.

I also said in an interview with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review that you'd have to be "an autistic monkey" to vote for "that fundamentalist, anti-science George Bush." (Story by Dave Copeland -- a bunch of their staunchly right-wing subscribers dropped the paper after reading that remark from me.)

A bit hard to pigeonhole, aren't I?

You do realize the need to compliment yourself like this only demonstrates what a poor self image you have?

Amy:

You can keep repeating your perception that people posting mocking comments here are trying to "punish" you for "not speaking the approved speech," but that doesn't make it so. You're being teased, that's all.

It's incongruous that you keep putting yourself on a pedestal to proclaim how you "totally support criticism of me, and even parodies of me and my site," yet you're having another meltdown at every new comment.

When you think about it, your histrionics, your threats, and your publishing of people's private information says a lot more about your instinct to punish people for not speaking the approved speech, doesn't it?

Amy:

A bit hard to pigeonhole, aren't I?

Not at all. You're easy to pigeonhole. You go in the same slot as Ann Althouse, Mickey Kaus, and Glenn Reynolds. You think slapping a "Hello, I am not a right-winger!" name tag on yourself excuses your obvious attitudes.

I take offense to the suggestion that we would vote for George W Bush, but what's worse is the fact that we are not actually allowed to vote.

What I won't allow is attempts to intimidate me from speaking or to punish me for unapproved speech.

Please do your best to comprehend this, as it's quite tedious to keep explaining it.

What you keep explaining is that if you say something outrageous, it's 'free speech,' whereas if someone else says something outrageous in return, they're 'trying to silence you' -- i.e., they are 'against free speech.'

I hate to typecast, but this is an extremely common right-wing argument. I'll dramatize:

RIGHT-WINGER: Blar-har! Liberal traitors ought to be gassed in death camps.

LIBERAL: What?! OMG, you're a Nazi! OMG, shut up, you Nazi pig!

RIGHT-WINGER: Wooo, look who's against free speech. Who's the real Nazi, huh? Blar-har, Obama traitors Nazi Muslim terrorist Commies, lynchings, blar-har.

LIBERAL: Why don't you shut...

RIGHT-WINGER: You are banned! Banned from my blog! For trying to silence my free speech!

ANOTHER LIBERAL: Jesus, what the freaking hell is your problem with...

RIGHT-WINGER: Banned! Banned from my blog! I post your email address! I post your real name! Vengeance! Vengeance!

You see, if I can presume to speak for liberals, we're kind of skeptical of such claims at this point.

Argueing, disagreeing, and trying to shout each other down on the web is one thing.

Knowingly posting lies in an attempt to damage someones career is wrong and actionable under every state in the union and nearly every counrty on earth

What you keep explaining is that if you say something outrageous, it's 'free speech,' whereas if someone else says something outrageous in return, they're 'trying to silence you' -- i.e., they are 'against free speech.'

No, and I expect no less in disingenuous arguments from a sleazebag like you -- the sleazebag you've shown yourself to be with arguments like this.

I am absolutely fine with (and even encourage):

1. Anyone criticizing me or my ideas on a blog of their own.
2. Anyone criticizing me or my ideas on my blog.
3. Parody sites about me or my ideas.

What I will not tolerate:

1. People posting defamatory statements about me on Wikipedia or other sites.
2. People coming here, not in an attempt to discuss the issues, but to muck up my comments section with dross unrelated to the issues in an attempt to mess up my site and intimidate me and punish me for speaking in a way not approved by "progressives."

I've made this clear numerous times. It's not hard to understand.

And sadly, I make a real poor victim.

Moreover, I've posted that I voted for Kerry and all the rest. I know it makes it easier to send the mob after me if you can believe I'm "right-wing," because you small minded, tiny little fascist turds need that sort of thing, but I'm neither right nor left, but somebody who actually chooses from both parties to find the least sleazy candidate to get behind.

Amy, people are dillholes. Some disagree with you but are unable to explain their position. Some envy your success. People don't see the long, long path that leads up to a syndicated column; only the results. I think you should save your replies for people posting opinions on topics and not those criticizing you personally. They are not worth the time and I worry it only encourages them.

You look like a man. I heard rumors that you are a man. If it isnt true that I feel bad but that's the rumor I spread to.