I have done my level-best to ignore the rantings of certain individuals, as I have found myself too entangled in time-consuming and fruitless ‘arguments’. This is despite plenty of provocation (see this angry response to a harmless post I made, as well as another angry rant on another post that had nothing to do with him). It was impossible to ignore the latest temper tantrum from this particular person, who decided a post discussing criticism was aimed at him. His furious response (and subsequent responses) have served to prove that he was seriously stung by the truth of my words (no matter his denials of this, or he wouldn’t have reacted so passionately).

I think he believes that whenever he issues any kind of comment or remark, it is beyond reproach. He also believes that everyone distorts what he has to say, without ever considering whether or not he is doing the same to others (or whether or not his points are actually clear). Case in point, in one of his posts (which I have saved, in case he seeks to alter it later), he wrote:

He commits many crimes in his blogging and comment posting, as well as his email content…

I contacted him privately, via email, questioning his meaning, asking him to clarify his remarks, and suggesting that he should retract them if he cannot provide clarification. The text of my email is below:

I am writing to inform you that you have once again stepped over the mark, with unfounded allegations. You wrote of me (and I quote) ‘He commits many crimes in his blogging and comment posting, as well as his email content…’ 

Your accusations are now bordering on libellous. It is quite fortunate for you that pursuing any kind of legal action would prove futile, but nonetheless, my simple expectation is that you either provide examples of these alleged crimes, or retract your currently spurious accusations. This is not the first time you have issued unfounded allegations against me, and I am growing tired of you believing you can defame me without consequences. I have done my level best to ignore you these past few months, but you seem determined to provoke me, distort my postings, and now smear my character. 

I will ask you, plainly: what is necessary for you to leave me alone? What conditions would you deam acceptable?

Kind Regards,

Ben

How do you suppose he responded?

Well, via email, he had the following to say:

Actually, I haven’t. You post in public and are fair game. I do not mention you by name and you distort what is being done. You are just a crybaby who cannot handle the heat. I did not see you tell others who criticized and published false things about me to stop it. You joined right in.

So you have no leg to stand on. You are just another whining hypocritical person. Take it like a man and stop pretending you do not do worse.

Note the complete absence of any form of explanation for what my ‘crimes’ are, nor any context for his remarks, nor any attempt to address the other events where he has smeared my character. His reference to falsehoods about him is in itself false, for there is evidence to support at least some of the allegations against him. That is however, by-and-by at this point, and I am not getting involved.

He also issued a PS email, clearly written in a moment of additional pique:

P.S> Your distortion and taking out of context what I wrote and then inputting your own interpretation only has you upset at what you think I said. If you do not like it, stop posting

It would seem he wishes me to be silent, but no one makes him read my posts, and no one makes him respond, least of all as angrily as he does. I went to the effort to block him from reading my posts, which obviously greatly aggravate him, and he circumvented that block in order to continue ranting and moaning. He has made a rod for his own back, and at this point he is certainly not conducting himself as the high and mighty, good pious Christian he claims to be.

There is of course. Not content to ignore the questions and queries of my email, he decided to share my email publicly. That is of course his right, but before we get to that, and prior to reading his post, I sent him a further email:

I noticed that you completely avoided addressing the content of my email in any reasonable manner, then had the gall to suggest I ‘take it like a man’. You may not mention me by name, but you also make it clear you are quoting me, and you often do so in an incomplete, and therefore dishonest manner. 

The difference in our respective situations is that you and I both know the commentary about you carries truth. Was it in poor taste to discuss it publicly? I am prepared to concede that. Is the information false? No. I know that, and you know that, which is why you backed out of challenging the remarks of <redacted>. Your remarks about me, which you have rather cowardly refused to either substantiate or retract, prove your own stubborn hypocrisy. You have accused me of committing crimes, but you have declined to provide examples, and nor do I expect you to have the decency to retract your claims. You have accused me of passing your email address out to newsletters, without a shred of proof, and without the decency of a retraction. You accused me of wanting to redefine constructive criticism, because I reject any definition of constructive criticism that includes cruel insults (remarks you failed to apologise for). That is itself a demonstration of *you* redefining criticism, to enable you to be as nasty as you want, without consequences. 

All of this renders your ‘take it like a man’ remarks deeply ironic. You claim to be a good, pious Christian, yet you have lied, distorted my words, and generally conducted yourself in a vindictive fashion. Your reaction to my prompt about criticism was a case in point, my post wasn’t even aimed at you, bit you could not resist a snark-filled, misleading rant in my direction. 

You whine that I ‘cannot stand the heat’. What I cannot stand David, are your lies, nor your cowardly refusal to back up your various dishonest claims. Perhaps you should be a man for once, and take responsibility for your deeds.

On to his post, and the first few paragraphs drip with irony, and an astonishing lack of self-awareness.

Yes, we get detractors who do not like what we say and we normally just turn the other cheek and refuse to respond to their comments. But we will address one:

Well that’s straight away a lie!

I am writing to inform you that you have once again stepped over the mark, with unfounded allegations.

They are only unfounded because the author of those words applies his own definitions and interpretations to our words. He is famous for doing it and he has done it to other Christians as well. The words he is upset about are:

He commits many crimes in his blogging and comment posting, as well as his email content…’

This is the problem. That person assumed, leapt to a conclusion, and applied his own interpretation of those words without one, recognizing how the words were used, and two, clarifying first what was the actual intent of the message.

I emailed the author to seek clarification through examples, or a retraction, neither of which he did. So this claim I did not seek clarification is yet another lie. Two lies already…

We know that there is no hope of changing his mind about the actual meaning of that sentence because he feels that the one who misunderstands is the correct person while the person who actually said or wrote those words is incorrect in how they were intended.

That is one reason why we rarely address ‘feedback’ from our readers. You cannot reason with such people. They have made up their minds and refuse to acknowledge they were wrong in how they read the words. Everyone else is wrong but them.

It would never occur to the author of this that he could have clarified his meaning, but declined to do so. I quoted his own words, which were very plain and obvious, and if he left the door open for them to misinterpreted, he bears some of the responsibility for that. He has a habit of evading responsibility, and I don’t expect him to understand the staggering hypocrisy in his words. He used the term ‘crime’ to describe my actions. If he did not mean ‘crime’, he should have used a different term.

Your accusations are now bordering on libellous. It is quite fortunate for you that pursuing any kind of legal action would prove futile, but nonetheless, my simple expectation is that you either provide examples of these alleged crimes, or retract your currently spurious accusations.

Now that he purposefully or accidentally misunderstood our words, he becomes the bully and threatens us. His actions are not better than his perceived conclusion about our words. In fact, his leaps to conclusions, assumptions, and misunderstandings all lead to this wrongful behavior. he then throws in false accusations to boot:

I hardly threatened him. I pointed out, truthfully, that if he were in different circumstances, he could face legal action, and that is the cold hard truth. It is also the truth that he is fortunate it would impossible to carry out such action in current circumstances.

What false accusations does he think I have made against him? Let’s read on and find out…

This is not the first time you have issued unfounded allegations against me, and I am growing tired of you believing you can defame me without consequences

We have done no such thing and since he publically publishes his thoughts, he is open, like other public personas, to critiques that may offend his sensibilities. He never seems to learn that his material and BG’s articles are used as examples and are not and never have been personal attacks.

He needs to drop this act. He is not seeking ‘examples’, and he doesn’t even offer proper accreditation for either my writing or Bruce’s. He is ranting, moaning, complaining, and whining, and on top of that, issuing false accusations (such as the claim I was giving away his email address to newsletters, which is, to be frank, a load of bull on his part). If he were honest, he would either back up his claims, or retract them. I suspect he will continue to do neither, just as he won’t elaborate on the ‘crimes’, nor offer up the definition of the term he is using.

But he and BG continue to lie about our use of their public words. Once they are out there, they are free game, just like they have told us ours are. Yet, while they criticize, insult, and belittle others, they feel they are above receiving the same treatment.

We could provide examples but we are not going to stoop to his level.

He could provide examples, but he can’t, so he won’t. I have made no comment about his right to use my words. What annoys me is that he does not use them accurately or properly, and that his claims of ‘example material’ are completely dishonest.

It is not hard to ignore others. It is called turning the other cheek but he wants to get his attacks in and falsely accuse others. We have not smeared his character simply because he applied the wrong definition, one that fits his strategy and distorts what was written.

If he had used his intelligence he would have caught his mistake and changed his definition to what was actually meant. But he does not and continues his erroneous behavior by sending these types of emails.

If it is not hard to ignore others, then why hasn’t he ignored me and Bruce? He clearly gets very upset and emotional by our posts, to the degree that he has repeatedly manipulated our posts, and even told outright lies. What is hard to do is to ignore the numerous falsehoods, and then the serpentine twists and turns designed to justify them. I will repeat that he did not define his use of the term ‘crime’, and when asked via email, declined to do so. That’s on him.

I will ask you, plainly: what is necessary for you to leave me alone? What conditions would you deam acceptable?

What needs to be kept in mind is that he put an invitation up on his website for us to make a comment and that he had unbanned our emails so we could do that. So we responded. But true to form, he reblocked the emails and then sent us that hate-filled email.

There is nothing that can be said or done as we are not posting on his website and making personal attacks. We identify the author of the words so our readers know we are not making up the content, then address the content only.

I put out the invitation for him to explain his remarks in relation to constructive criticism (and to offer him the chance to defend how him calling me a moron and a joke were actually forms of constructive criticism). In his comments, he failed to do so. It is also a lie (yet another one) that I re-blocked him. I have done no such thing. He is free to comment; it is possible his initial comments will wind up in a moderation queue, but that is all.

Also note that he did not answer my question.

But people who like to distort what has been said refuse to see, accept, or acknowledge that truth and refuse to grant others the same rights as they enjoy. He puts way too much thought into what we are doing then twists our words so he can play the victim and then try to bully others who do the same thing.

He really has no legal basis for his email as his content is far worse when talking about us than what we have said to his face. We do not interpret his words to make them mean something they did not.

But we do thank him for this email as it gave us something to talk about. Later next week we will be taking a few days off because we need a little break from all of this ‘excitement’.

More pointless double-speak, and hypocrisy. This author lies, manipulates and twists, and then wonders why I hold him in such contempt? He ought to look in the mirror. He does not speak truth, and it is he who would dearly love to silence me.

We received a second e-mail from the same detractor but it is not worth commenting on as it is filled with the same delusional material. It is written by someone who never learns and thinks they are greater than God.

In other words, he has no answer to my reply, and will evade it in a classic, cowardly fashion, all whilst telling me to ‘take it like a man’. Ironic, no?

I wish, and want, to draw a complete line under this saga, but that depends upon him being a reasonable human being, instead of believing he can lie, insult, and defame me as much as he wants, all under false pretences, whilst expecting me to quietly take it.