Mailvox: on “outing”

>Do your critics think that they’re really, really smart for figuring out your real name, Vox?

It’s pretty obvious that they’re just hoping to cause trouble for me somehow. “Outings” of names, home addresses and so forth are almost always done in an malicious manner by a critic. This can be seen in the way that the same individuals who make a habit of “innocently” outing their critics never seem to do the same regarding other individuals of whom they approve.

And it has caused the very occasional problem, or at least, what could theoretically be a problem if I was the sort of individual who didn’t possess any leverage in my day job. I suppose “the occasional discussion” would be a more accurate way to put it.

Of course, everyone always backtracks immediately when I respond to queries about my exotic ideology by asking them for a comprehensive list of what beliefs are acceptable to them and which beliefs are not. They usually begin apologizing profusely right after I ask them if they would like to receive my list in return.

Still, the fact that something isn’t a secret doesn’t absolve one of guilt for attempting to betray it. And what is the point of going out of one’s way to expose a name behind a pseudonym or a home address if one is not motivated by malice? Pandagonians, since Amynda doesn’t hide her IP address, her street address, her telephone number or her social security number, tell me, does this mean it is appropriate for me to post them here? If not, please do explain why not.

I note that by JF’s standard, once the information is out anywhere in any context, it is forever fair game. (I would think that the copyright page from Rebel Moon would have made for a better case than a decade-old archived newsnet post myself.) So, once Devious Diva’s information was released by the first individual, JF and those in agreement with him cannot reasonably condemn those who merely repeated what was at that point public information.

Auguste, fortunately, thinks twice before asserting irony:

One of two things has happened:

a) I’ve been banned – which would be ironic given the whole line of “complaining about something, and then doing the thing” and given the second comment above:

“Yeah, as spineless as her (their) removing non-conforming comments.”

So, nicely done.

Or, b), and since I’m charitable, I’ll just assume this is the answer, something’s going on with haloscan.

This isn’t Pandagon. You have to work pretty hard to even get a warning here, let alone a comment deleted. In four years of blog comments, only twelve people have been banned.