Re: To ExtremeAntiSteereCoalition Et. Al.

From: A_Weisman (a_weisman_at_yahoo.com)
Date: 07/08/04 

Date: 8 Jul 2004 12:12:57 -0700

bob2221m@aol.com (Bob2221M) wrote in message news:<20040708080244.04107.00000872@mb-m26.aol.com>...
> <<
> Whoever you are, Lisa, Lisa impersonators, Lisa sock puppets, Lisa
> admirers (???) I have a modest proposal.
>
> Let's not start off on the wrong foot. Let's make a fresh start.
> >>
> Good idea. I don't have time to answer all your questions now, but I'd like to
> include the notion of mutual respect.

That's a road that goes both ways.

Better yet, there's no need to make it personal at all. It ought to be
possible to respond to people's ideas rather than who we think is
speaking. Then there's no need to praise or criticize the person. It
should be all about the ideas.

> This means not calling people "sock puppets" or ridiculing people's names or >attacking their alliances. Kathleen,
> for example, was a genius who lead a large group of Lyme activists and
> explained the chemistry for the rest of us.

Her IQ testing that she posted shows she is far from a "genius."
Please show me where she ever coherently explained anything? Using
terms that you don't understand doesn't mean she understood them or
made any sense. What she did was post a bunch of abstracts. Fine. But
the interspersed commentary and the connecting of dots into conspiracy
theories was bizzare off base and totally meaningless. Clearly a
product of her paranoid schizophrenia (just ONE of the psychiatric
diagnoses that SHE admits to).

I LOL when people say she made any sense. She didn't. Believe me I
understand the science and the chemistry. She didn't.

>Some of us who knew her before her
> Lyme destroyed her life and affected her thinking don't appreciate the nature
> of the attacks directed against her.

Do you think the DOZENS maybe HUNDREDS of people that she mercilessly
slandered incessantly appreciated her attacks on them bob? (notice I
am omitting the second "o" from your name). And it is very clear that
her psychiatric problems are long standing. She admits to having
psychiatric diagnoses going back decades, to childhood. She admits to
having been diagnosed psychotic decades ago. Before she claims to have
had Lyme.

See this is a problem, for me at least. I can't stand by while people
cheerlead a person like kathleen. At some level, yeah I feel sorry for
her. See my post on the thread "glad to see the end of the loon." I
meant it. I hope she's now getting the help she needs so badly.

But people who cheerleaded her were actually cruel. And cheerleaded
someone who singlehandedly and as a result of enablers/cheerleaders
was terribly damaging to the Lyme community.

And selfish. She and her friend Lisa hijacked this newsgroup for their
own twisted agenda and used it knowing that their incessant RICO
nonsense postings and McSweegan bull*** was preventing others from
using the group for sharing information and support.

Don't you see that they were all about USING Lyme to advance their own
agendas which had nothing to do with Lyme when it came to the abuse
allegations? The cross postings dragging people from child abuse
groups here.

Do you think it helps the Lyme community that she sent those bizzare
and incessant and harassing emails "all over the planet" in her own
words? Or her "data binders" going to Attorney General Blumenthal from
CT? Etc.?

As to all of her "accomplishments" and "productivity" and effect in
"chaning the political climate" I have one word to say:

NONSENSE.

She had NOTHING to do with the vaccine coming off the market. NOTHING.
She had NOTHING to do with the things she claims credit for. NOTHING.

All she ever did was damage any credibility that the Lyme community
ever had. How many journalists did she write to and contact by phone
who left the conversation convinced that if she represented Lyme
patients they must ALL be nuts? And that's right, anyone who would
choose her as a "leader" or cheerlead her actions would have to be
nuts.

It would be like advocates of the rights of criminal defendants
choosing Charles Manson as their poster boy.

I understand how sick she was. Is. How badly she needed help. I'm glad
she is getting it now.

But to defend her actions? It is like Rush Limbaugh saying the abuses
at Abu Ghraib were akin to fraternity pranks.

Come on bob. Did you see what she wrote to her children about their
father? That was disgusting. Did you see what she wrote to government
officials, scientists, researchers and doctors? Slandering their good
names without a second thought?

I just can't go along with this.

I don't know how you can?

I can agree to discuss ideas instead of people unless people are made
part of the discussion which for the most part they shouldn't be. I
mean it is one thing for me to say that I believe that 80% of people
who get Lyme SEEM to do fine with the mainstream standard antibiotic
treatment (though for the record I still believe the other 20% or
10-20% have chronic Lyme many featuring persistent infection and most
benefitting from long term treatment but perhaps not endless
treatment) and for us to discuss that idea. There's no need to call me
McSweegan or wonder who I am or question my credentials ("do you HAVE
Lyme if not you can't post"). Who is posting doesn't matter in
discussing those ideas.

When it comes to saying "Kathleen was a great Lyme leader, a genius,
and accomlished a great deal" well you can't avoid discussing the
person then.

By the way I have NO IDEA what you mean by "attacking their
alliances." Maybe you could clarify? :-)

>Maybe I'm asking too much, but if we're
> going to discuss Lyme issues the cruelty and abuse have to stop. Bob

It is a road that goes both ways. To the extent that ideas only are at
issue what you say seems to me to be reasonable. Of course when
someone disagrees with someone else without it being personal, if the
person responding takes offense and makes it personal, that is where
problems often begin.

It should be possible to vigorously debate, agree to disagree and
avoid taking it personally or making it personal.

But once those "rules of engagement" are violated all bets are off.

And I've seen it many times. MANY MANY times. Someone posts something
like "Lyme IS sexually transmitted and is transmitted by doorknobs and
pens." And someone like me responds by saying "the first part isn't
proven and it is irresponsible to say that and the second part is
scientifically impossible and absurd and even more irresponsible even
if Lida Mattman thinks it."

And the response is a vicious attack on the person who posted the
response. Then when someone responds to that attack THEY become the
bully?

I've seen it time after time. Like on Lymenut. They cater to the most
delicate sensibilities. So someone posts something absurd someone else
responds with some accurate information and the first person whines
and cries and attacks the responder and the responder gets booted for
flaming?

That isn't acceptable. It only results in catering to the weakest,
thinnest skinned and dumbs down the whole discussion for the sake of
someone who can't engage in a discussion without taking it personally.

Vigorous debate isn't attack. Attack is attack.

I can buy those "rules of engagement."

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