Was unbanning Libertas the correct decision?
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  Was unbanning Libertas the correct decision?
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Question: Was unbanning Libertas the correct decision?
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Yes
 
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No
 
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Author Topic: Was unbanning Libertas the correct decision?  (Read 12918 times)
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Kalwejt
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« Reply #100 on: January 16, 2015, 09:49:01 AM »

I'm increasingly disliking both sides of this

Also windjammer Wtf please don't repost my old tmi posts

I take Windjammer is the newest addition to The List?
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Simfan34
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« Reply #101 on: January 16, 2015, 10:44:35 AM »

I'm increasingly disliking both sides of this

Also windjammer Wtf please don't repost my old tmi posts

I did delete it...
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Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl
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« Reply #102 on: January 16, 2015, 11:22:13 AM »

No.

Not because I care about the sex stories or whatever. Libertas needs to get a Xanax prescription and relax. He defends himself against his detractors like he's on trial or something.

There are some posters here who are obsessed with putting him on trial before the moderators to get him rebanned. They need to chill out  (no prescription necessary) and give Libertas a chance.

Yeah I love how certain posters are acting like I'm some sort of paranoid nut who is only imagining being on trial and acting as if I am defending myself against voices that only exist in my head while everyone here is actually being oh-so-welcoming.

Um, hello? Do you see what the name of the thread you're posting in is? Having a thread asking whether I should be permanently banned (and slanted in favor of the notion that I should be banned) is as close to being on 'trial' as one could get on an internet forum. So yeah I'm going to defend myself since I really don't think I've done anything to warrant banning, yet currently 42.9% of forum posters believe I have.

Also I have a low tolerance for people who jokingly or mockingly say "go get a Xanax prescription and relax" due to my personal experience with drug addiction which I've acknowledged multiple times on the forum. Xanax is not a punchline to a joke.
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Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl
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« Reply #103 on: January 16, 2015, 11:27:36 AM »

Anyway on the topic of NYC/Times Square in the 70s/80s, I ran across this video:

Youtube | Times Square of the 1980's: A Short Documentary

It really isn't anything I would ever describe as a documentary...but I really like the song and the creepy little man that appear a few seconds after the 2:40 mark. From the lyrics, the song is about old 70s/80s 42nd street and the "junkies and the flunkies" who occupied it, but does anyone know what the name of the song is and who sings it/created it?

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Fmr. Pres. Duke
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« Reply #104 on: January 16, 2015, 11:29:02 AM »

It's fine he's unbanned but I'm surprised so few have picked up on the obvious that he's still a troll and a characature, albeit in different form.

Either that, or he's extremely lonely and just wants someone to interact with.
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Kalwejt
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« Reply #105 on: January 16, 2015, 12:08:11 PM »

Proposal: everybody just f**kin abandon this thread and move on.
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Grumpier Than Uncle Joe
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« Reply #106 on: January 16, 2015, 01:00:17 PM »

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Lief 🗽
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« Reply #107 on: January 16, 2015, 01:00:53 PM »

Al the reason so many look back nostalgically on NYC of the 1970s is because all the great films about NYC take place in the 1970s: Taxi Driver, Dog Day Afternoon, Annie Hall, Manhattan, The Warriors, Serpico, etc.
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Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl
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« Reply #108 on: January 16, 2015, 01:19:44 PM »
« Edited: January 16, 2015, 01:22:55 PM by Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl »

Proposal: everybody just f**kin abandon this thread and move on.

Ya I think I'm pretty much sick and tired of defending myself against lame and ridiculous charges of "trolling" or claims that I haven't changed...all of which are coming from people who just don't like me on a personal level.

On the other hand, I would like to start a thread on the tangent of a topic we went off on in this thread with regard to NYC/Times Square in the 1970s and 1980s, perhaps when I get home from work today. I've done quite a bit of reading and studying up on the era, along with enjoying fun, intriguing, or sometimes eerily disturbing videos and pictures, as well as the stories I've heard from my parents and grandparents who lived through it, and it is a fascinating time/place I would like to visit, even if I have to wear a bulletproof vest to survive it. Tongue
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memphis
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« Reply #109 on: January 16, 2015, 02:52:04 PM »

Proposal: everybody just f**kin abandon this thread and move on.

Ya I think I'm pretty much sick and tired of defending myself against lame and ridiculous charges of "trolling" or claims that I haven't changed...all of which are coming from people who just don't like me on a personal level.

On the other hand, I would like to start a thread on the tangent of a topic we went off on in this thread with regard to NYC/Times Square in the 1970s and 1980s, perhaps when I get home from work today. I've done quite a bit of reading and studying up on the era, along with enjoying fun, intriguing, or sometimes eerily disturbing videos and pictures, as well as the stories I've heard from my parents and grandparents who lived through it, and it is a fascinating time/place I would like to visit, even if I have to wear a bulletproof vest to survive it. Tongue
While Times Square has certainly changed, there is no shortage of seedy urban neighborhoods today. I'm not familiar enough with NYC to name a specific neighborhood (somewhere in the South Bronx, surely?) I guarantee it's out there. Finding it is half the adventure.
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Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl
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« Reply #110 on: January 16, 2015, 04:12:10 PM »
« Edited: January 16, 2015, 04:18:56 PM by Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl »

Proposal: everybody just f**kin abandon this thread and move on.

Ya I think I'm pretty much sick and tired of defending myself against lame and ridiculous charges of "trolling" or claims that I haven't changed...all of which are coming from people who just don't like me on a personal level.

On the other hand, I would like to start a thread on the tangent of a topic we went off on in this thread with regard to NYC/Times Square in the 1970s and 1980s, perhaps when I get home from work today. I've done quite a bit of reading and studying up on the era, along with enjoying fun, intriguing, or sometimes eerily disturbing videos and pictures, as well as the stories I've heard from my parents and grandparents who lived through it, and it is a fascinating time/place I would like to visit, even if I have to wear a bulletproof vest to survive it. Tongue
While Times Square has certainly changed, there is no shortage of seedy urban neighborhoods today. I'm not familiar enough with NYC to name a specific neighborhood (somewhere in the South Bronx, surely?) I guarantee it's out there. Finding it is half the adventure.

I don't think people who have nostalgia for the 'grittiness' and 'character' of pre-Giuliani NYC have that nostalgia over the high crime rates that happened to exist in the NYC of that era because we are all sadists who want to be mugged, raped, stabbed, or murdered.

It's the excitement, not the crime.

Certainly, as you mention, there are plenty of relatively high-crime places to go. Though I think even the Bronx is gentrifying. Certainly even the uppermost reaches of Manhattan are now safe for white gentrification. I remember going on a date with a guy, we met at a bar in Hell's Kitchen, "Vlada" I think the name was, where there was a free drag show (I hardly remember because as usual I drank too much, I said I would only stick to beer, but after a few beers I relented and had to try one of the speciality homemade flavored vodkas they had on display behind the bar in some sort of peach martini cocktail), then at 3am we took a long subway ride (I sat on his lap and we made out the whole time, but it still was like an eternal subway ride) up to his apartment in Washington Heights, we got off at like 175th street or something, or maybe that's where his apartment was, I don't remember. I was drunk and in his arms so I wasn't concerned about crime that night as we walked to his apartment. For whatever reason he keeps his TV on mute all the time and I got no sleep, up all night watching Seinfeld reruns without the voice. The next morning I stumbled out of there tired as hell with an incredible hangover, but I never felt unsafe as I wandered to and fro trying to find a damn subway station, any subway station, to embark upon the incredibly long and boring journey all the way down to South Ferry or Bowling Green (I don't remember exactly which train I ended up taking.) The neighborhood was diverse and vibrant, but I think even up there prices are starting to climb rapidly. (This guy lived in a shared apartment where he had one bedroom, which is why we had to be extremely quiet.)

Meanwhile there are parts of Staten Island, on the North Shore, especially the northwestern part (like Mariners' Harbor and Arlington, which are about 98% black and poor, no gentrification there) where going there is just asking to be shot. The latest trend that's attracted attention from that neighborhood are some lowlifes ordering Chinese food delivery just so they can murder the deliverymen. Pizza joints stopped delivering to those neighborhoods decades ago, now Chinese take out places won't deliver there either.

But nobody wants to go there just because it's "seedy" or because it has high crime rates. There's nothing exciting or vibrant about those neighborhoods.

Similarly nobody idolizes pre-Giuliani NYC because of high crime rates but rather the loss of excitement. Crime would have fallen anyway, just like it did in every other major city in the world. But turning Times Square into a G-rated tourist Disneyland where you're more likely to hear people with Southern drawls or speaking Swedish than you are to hear a New York accent was not an inevitability. I'm surprised Bloomberg didn't squeeze a WalMart in the 'new' Times Square to make the 'locals' there feel at home.  

And the New York accent really is under serious attack, especially in Manhattan where it's nearly been eradicated except among African-Americans and their own variation of the NY accent, thank to the invasion of Manhattan by the super-rich. Nowadays if you hear someone speaking with a New York accent you might as well just ask "which of the 4 boroughs are you from?".
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Grumpier Than Uncle Joe
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« Reply #111 on: January 16, 2015, 04:13:06 PM »

Please STFU
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Lief 🗽
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« Reply #112 on: January 16, 2015, 04:14:41 PM »

Similarly nobody idolizes pre-Giuliani NYC because of high crime rates but rather the loss of excitement. Crime would have fallen anyway, just like it did in every other major city in the world. But turning Times Square into a G-rated tourist Disneyland where you're more likely to hear people with Southern drawls or speaking Swedish than you are to hear a New York accent was not an inevitability.

This is a good point.
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Simfan34
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« Reply #113 on: January 16, 2015, 04:35:01 PM »

Squeegee men! Arson! Being stabbed! How exciting!

Proposal: everybody just f**kin abandon this thread and move on.

It's a Snowstalker thread. It is to be expected.
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Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl
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« Reply #114 on: January 16, 2015, 04:43:12 PM »

Similarly nobody idolizes pre-Giuliani NYC because of high crime rates but rather the loss of excitement. Crime would have fallen anyway, just like it did in every other major city in the world. But turning Times Square into a G-rated tourist Disneyland where you're more likely to hear people with Southern drawls or speaking Swedish than you are to hear a New York accent was not an inevitability.

This is a good point.

Ya this notion that anyone who craves some of the grittiness and excitement of pre-Giuliani NYC is an ignorant child who doesn't realize how bad crime really was in the 70s and 80s is utter nonsense. Nobody wants to go back to the days of two thousand murders a year. What we'd like back is just a bit of 'adult' edge the city used to have that Giuliani started eradicating and Bloomberg finished the job by making Manhattan into a playground for children and tourists with only the super-rich able to afford to live there.

Crime fell in NYC just like it fell everywhere else due to lead poisoning from automobile exhaust back when tetraethyl lead was added to gasoline from the 40s until it was banned in the 70s. Magically, when the people who grew up in the lead-free 70s became young adults (the demographic most prone to crime) in the 90s, crime rates began falling and continued to fall as the lead-poisoned generations aged. I had to edit the Wikipedia article on New York City to include this point to contradict the accepted orthodoxy that Giuliani and 'broken windows' policing led to the fall in crime rates. Crime peaked and then began falling under David Dinkins- although Dinkins shares part of the blame for the Times Square debacle since on his last day in office he signed the first deal to bring Disney into Times Square.



Btw, still haven't gotten an answer Sad....does anyone know what the song is in this brief little entertaining video that begins a bit after the 2:40 mark where this cool little creepy guy starts dancing? It's about "junkies and flunkies" on 42nd street ("the Deuce", as it was then known to New Yorkers):

Times Square of the 1980's
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Beet
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« Reply #115 on: January 16, 2015, 04:45:32 PM »

I think there's something appealing to the idea that the underbelly of modern society is a dark, uncontrolled place. Like, we can put a man on the moon, but we can't figure out why our kids are shooting crack. It appeals to the complexity of the human mind.
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memphis
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« Reply #116 on: January 16, 2015, 05:17:14 PM »
« Edited: January 16, 2015, 05:19:07 PM by memphis »

I'm not sure that Libertas has expressed well what it is exactly about the old Times Square that he finds so appealing. The usual narrative here in Memphis is largely the opposite. The "old neighborhood" that was once such a safe, clean place in contrast with the mostly abandoned ghetto one finds there now. This pattern has long ago spread far beyond the core city. The largest shopping mall in town (now long ago demolished) was in what used to be a postwar middle class area. Today, on American Way (in a bit of irony too delicious for words, the street the mall was on is actually named American Way) there may as well be signs that say "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here."
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The Other Castro
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« Reply #117 on: January 16, 2015, 05:17:48 PM »

This thread took a very strange turn
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King
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« Reply #118 on: January 16, 2015, 05:22:49 PM »

I think we should branch out Update and have Nathan and Libertas become roommates then liveblog it.
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Adam Griffin
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« Reply #119 on: March 10, 2015, 08:25:38 PM »

I haven't read a lick of this yet, but I'm sure that this perpetual GIF contribution of mine is sorely needed nonetheless:

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Oakvale
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« Reply #120 on: March 10, 2015, 08:33:38 PM »

...why was this bumped?
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