Meerkat Prompts: The ‘Archaeologist’ Saga

Since the relaunch of Meerkat Musings, I have written 51 posts and pages (this one is my 52nd). In that same timeframe, Mr David Thiessen of Theology Archaeology has written nine posts, and three of them have been aimed at me and my content. In other words, within that timeframe, fully a third of his material has been about my posts, in some way shape or form.

You may be wondering ‘who is David Thiessen?’ A fair question. Long- time readers of Meerkat Musings (and The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser) will know of mine and Bruce’s regular tussles with him. In the past, Mr Thiessen and I have ‘discussed’ matters of theology, society, politics and science. In the wake of these debates, my presiding view is that Mr Thiessen does not believe he has been in error at any stage of our conversations and arguments. He is purposefully vague when it comes to addressing rebuttals, is prepared to overlook evidence (indeed, anything that contradicts him is ignored), and has operated in an openly hypocritical matter, showing his double-standards at nearly every available opportunity.

I have done my best to ignore him for several months, despite several desperate, attention-seeking gestures on his part. Unfortunately, his relentless harassment, incessant abuse of my material, and cowardly stance towards proper credit and accountability necessitate a response. It is highly unlikely that he will be man enough to so much as properly acknowledge this post (save for a meaningless, and ironic jibe about distorting his words), and he certainly lacks the confidence and conviction to link to any of my posts (he is so afraid of me that he won’t even refer to me by name), but I write it in the hope that maybe, just maybe, Mr Thiessen will look past his ego, and consider the possibility that his behaviour and attitude could be better.

There has been a lot of hypocrisy from Mr Thiessen down the years, but two of his more recent posts highlight this in great detail. I have taken the liberty of archiving these posts, lest Mr Thiessen should alter them in the future.

Copyright

It is painfully apparent that Mr Thiessen adopts a ‘do as I say not as I do’ approach to copyright. His site Theology Archeology has this page, where it states the following:

All pages and content at this site and our sister site, theoarch.wordpress.com are under copyright. Allowances for fair use are made but any wholesale use of the content, et al, at either site is not to be done without permission from us.

To negotiate a fair fee please contact us. Make sure to credit the source when using our material. Thank you

To be fair to Mr Thiessen, there is nothing inherently wrong with this notice. He quite reasonably wishes to receive credit where it is due for his work. With that in mind, why does he then get outraged by a similar notice on my own site?

Now when we get notifications of BG’s activities against us, we also check to see what MM is up to. We got a laugh as on his newly minted website design there is this little note at the bottom of the page:

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to “Meerkat Musings,” along with the internet address …and appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

He doesn’t seem to realize that those caveats have no legal authority and also violate proper copyright free use rules. We do not intend to quote any of his content as he distorts and bullies as well as misrepresents issues.

Leaving aside his demonstration of cowardice, what is different about my copyright notice, compared to his own? Why is it wrong for me to request proper credit for my writing, but perfectly fine for him to do so? Note that he failed to even copy my copyright notice correctly, deliberately missing out my website address, presumably out of fear. If my copyright notice has no legal authority, neither does his, and I will therefore reserve the right to copy entire pages of his site, whenever I deem it necessary. After all, this appears to be his position, and if it is good enough for him, it is good enough for me.

I await his usual histrionics, distortions and pretzel-like ‘logic’ when he attempts to ‘justify’ his hypocrisy.

Site Rules

The other recent demonstration of Mr Thiessen’s staggering hypocrisy comes in the form of rules of engagement. Mr Thiessen was angered that I was ‘tilting the playing field’, by introducing a rule for Meerkat Musings. That rule is that on matters of science, religious texts are not considered as admissible evidence. Mr Thiessen appeared to erupt in rage at this, however his own site rules state on this forum the Bible is accepted as a credible source and is considered truthful in all areas it touches upon.

Mr Thiessen has made it abundantly clear that he considers the Bible to be literally true, and he has made it clear that his site and its rules operate according to that premise. That is up to him, just as the rules of engagement on my site are up to me.

Mr Thiessen has asked questions of ‘MM’, but since MM is a fantasy construct of his mind, I will not be answering them. Should he grow a spine and ask his questions of me, I will consider addressing them. Any future direct engagement with Mr Thiessen is also contingent upon this request. We shall see what he is prepared to do.

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