The pedophilia thing again

I feel very strongly that one does as one damn well wishes on one's own blog.

That said, I feel it detracts from the honesty of posts to remove comments. Especially when dreadful little trolls come along seeking them and looking to feed their persecution complexes.

The correct response to comment trolls, I think, is always a grand flame. May I provide a sample I admire? Via Archie of the Archive and posted at Raincoaster's.

?I didn?t delete any part of your meaningless, pointless, worthless post in order to clearly demonstrate what you are: a crossposting, non-editing, worthless, dickless, brainless, gutless, mindless, ball-less, spineless, flaccid, obese, fish-belly pale, ugly, VD-ridden, moronic, bald, hunch-backed, flat-footed, odoriferous, obnoxious, fecal-smelling, buck-toothed, physically handicapped, fungus-infected, HIV positive, mud-packing, masturbating, whining, simpering, self-important, arrogant, egomaniacal POS that takes up more bandwidth than a despicable binary-poster, and for no apparent reason beyond seeing his own defecatory vomitus slithering down the screen in vile green rivulets.?

Posters who are merely impolite or threatening can be warned once and then fired off the thread.

As can pedantic, well-meaning dopes like my noble self.

It proves everything I ever said.
Have a nice life.
Goodbye.

Seriously, Mike, I think you're protesting FAR too much. It's your blog, and you will do what you want with it, but I am really disappointed that you (a fellow scientist) can't discuss such a topic in a rational, level-headed way.

I come to science-blogs for good conversation. If I wanted to read over-emotional rhetoric, I would buy a tabloid.

You're not the government, Mike. You don't have to follow the First Amendment on your blog.

exactly what Tukla said - First Amendment rights relate to the government. You control this blog, you get to say what's on it. That is your right. Anyone who disagrees is a fool.

People occasionally fail to distinguish between "having a right," and "being right."

You certainly have a right to unpublish comments and so forth, but are far from correct in doing so. You made your "comfort zone" clear in starting your post, you certainly knew the squick factor was high and that the topic would always include pedophilia to some extent, and went ahead anyway.

Closing the thread to further posts is always acceptable etiquette, in my opinion - unpublishing posts is not. Especially considering that you waded in with eyes open and arms open in invitation (after all; you put up the post, all comments are by definition responses to your initiation of the conversation).

Aside from the topic of discussion etiquette, however: what drove you to write that post? You made it clear on every line you did not want to involve yourself in this topic, and then you did it anyway. Personally, I do my best not to get worked up if someone else involves me in a conversation that tends to get my hackles up - and I certainly don't start such conversations. (I've rewritten this last paragraph a few times, trying to make it sound less... I don't know what it is, rhetorical, or confrontational, and I can't manage it, but the question is sincere).

Those are fair questions, and there are a couple of answers.

One - a big one - is that I thought I was a lot more comfortable both with addressing the topic and with having material on the subject available on my blog than I turned out to be. This is due in part to the fact that I have young children myself, and I only belatedly realized just how much material that I would not want my children to see would wind up in the comments thread. This was a mistake, and an avoidable one.

I wrote the post itself because I thought that the first amendment issues that were raised both in Shelley's post and in the mainstream media coverage were worth addressing, and that my perspective wasn't really reflected in anything else I'd seen on the topic. I hoped (very optimistically - another mistake) that the comments would remain focused on the first amendment issues and not on the nature of pedophilia.

I would have shut down the comments much earlier than I did, but I was in the field most of yesterday, and did not have the ability to watch the thread while the comments were being left. In retrospect, I should have realized that there were likely to be issues, and switched the comments to require approval prior to posting.

I do not like unpublishing comments, and I did not like doing so in this case. However, I was more uncomfortable with leaving the comments on the blog than I was with removing them, so that's the route I took. It was the less objectionable of two bad options, both of which were produced because I made some significant mistakes when I wrote the original post.

Keep this in mind; you have the right to your opnion, you don't have the right to be rude. Pedophilia is hot button issue and there's always somebody who'll take what you say in the worst way. I support anyone's right to delete rude and combative comments from his blog. I also take this opportunity the remind people of the phrases "fighting words" and "incitement to violence." Yes, it is possible to be convicted for making somebody else beat the crap out of you.