Thursday, October 27, 2011

Sanctasanctórum


"Comment moderation has been enabled. All comments must be approved by the blog author."

That’s what one occasionally (or should that be often?) can read when trying to comment on the blog content of one’s choice. Now why on earth would a blog owner want to moderate comments? Beats me. I think it’s stupid. I think it’s useless, and a waste of time.
Not that i’m one of those brave warriors who will defend free speech till their last breath has been taken away from them by the mob. Far from that. For instance i’m not an addict of what is written in Amendment I to the United States Constitution. I would rather take to the streets and slice the throats of the participants of a KKK gathering, than to go on the barricades to defend their right to contaminate the environment with their foul and stinking messages.
Don’t get me wrong tho. I can understand why some forums and groups want to moderate their incoming messages and comments, as there’s a lot of spamming going on in those areas, while bots r regular visitors too.

I guess moderation was set in place by Nanshakh the time he, many years ago now, created his group “Princess Myrina’s Galley” (now AST) for reasons just like that. He also excluded free membership. It was up to him to approve or deny an application for membership. After i came aboard, i never felt the urge to change all this. Partly cos i couldn’t care less, did understand his motives, and also cos i am a lazy person at heart. But once a person was approved, we hardly ever, no matter its content, disallowed his/her comments/messages. And rest assured that during the years we had our share of lame, hateful, foul, fascist, disgusting, racist, off topic, and insulting ones. We simply dealt with those in a grim and highly appropriate fashion, often creating that way passionate, intense and interesting exchanges of thought as well as great verbal lashings.

So yes, sometimes moderation can have its place in forums and groups. Especially when the membership, like it does in AST, is running into the thousands.


But for blogs like the ones in for instance the adult sections of Blogger and Wordpress? Come on. There’s no membership. Only so called followers and friends. And from what i’ve seen so far, they rarely exceed a hundred or so per blog. What u say? U’ve more than that? Ur list surpasses the 300 mark? Caramba, u must be the exception to the rule. Felicidades! Go go go, use it for an excuse to moderate ur fabulous blog.

The amount of comments can’t be an issue either, as they’re mostly very limited, and mostly only coming from a few diehard regulars. Besides, many bloggers r working their creation on a daily basis, and could easily remove any contribution they dislike on the spot. Not that i would be in favor of such action myself, but it is a possibility, and wouldn’t consume much more time than moderating. Probably less.


Still, many blog owners have the moderation tool in place. But why? Here r a few reasons/explanations (rationalizations and defenses, lol) given by some of these protectors of morals, prudence, and politeness. And i quote from:

1) John

"The comments are getting off topic and, to be frank, becoming a bit ridiculous. Comment directly on the post or a response to a comment directly about the post or I'll set up pre-post screening to keep the off-topic banter to a minimum which I prefer not to do."So there u have it. For John it’s the off topic thingy. Still, for years, he safely kept his moderation tool in the dark corners of his blog closet. So why bring it out in the open all of a sudden now? Lemme explain.


Sir John considers himself an alpha male, very proud of being submissive. In short, he’s a SAM. Quite recently he switched on his pre-post screening gadget cos he was fed up with Raposo and urs truly to constantly (well….um…..not that constant eh?) using his blog for exchanging our thoughts regarding his never ending litany about FLR’s, and other stuff. More than once we (i significantly more than Foxy) teased and ridiculed poor Johnny. Naturally only with the best of intentions. And we never called him names either. We had to u know, cos Master John rarely joins his audience in an ongoing discussion himself. Constantly he’s asking silly questions, but almost never responds to answers given. One could say we were the ones who kept his blog a bit lively and less of a bore. Real social workers, that’s what we were. He hated it tho, couldn’t understand the humor behind it, nor the sublime educational momentums which came with same, and thus eagerly grasped the opportunity to come up with this “off topic” nonsense.

John belongs to the “but people”. They say they hate to use the moderation tool, but nevertheless put it in place, blaming others for having forced them to do so. It’s one of the lamest attitudes people can have.
2) Saratoga

"Yes, I censor reader comments, and for good reason. You wouldn't believe the hateful drivel some readers expect me to publish, much less read.

Trust me, we're all better off for comment moderation."
This was posted by him on my blog two years ago, completely ignoring the subject of this particular blog, which was my departure from this world. Talk about off topic, hehehe. He would have never allowed me to do so in his blog, lol. Yeah, it’s a long lane that has no turning.

So this time it’s hateful drivel that causes the necessity of moderating comments.


Like John, Sara is presenting himself as an alpha male, holding his views in high esteem, and considering himself an expert on femdom or what he believes is femdom. Searching for a compatible female, he routinely reports about his adventures with his dominant hopefuls, as well as the failure of these women to live up to his expectations. He made it his quest to constantly assess the “domme quality” of women he meets online or in r/l, and regularly bombards his visitors with so called femdom videos, mostly portraying lame, mainstream, and commercial “domme action”.

One can only wonder what kind of “hateful drivel” people would want to send to a site like that. His reason is bogus.

Just the other day he came up with yet another one for keeping moderation alive on his site, namely, to avoid his blog to become a quote pad for my posts. What a found. Really cute and ridiculous. But again: Mea maxima culpa.

U want to read “hateful drivel”? Look no further. It’s right here. Waiting for u to read in the comment sections of my prose and poetry, name calling included. No moderation in my blog, u know. No matter how disgusting and lame, i would never remove them either. I let them sit and rot there in all their glory and filth, for the same reasons as in AST. I want people to read them. I want people to know about the ugliness and stupidity of their fellow cyber citizens. Maybe even learn from it? After all, it’s the reality of daily life. No sugar coating or sweeping under the rug in my place.


3) The Butler"Recently, I had a few comments on the blog that got quite frankly insulting, humiliating, and beneath the standards for intelligent conversation. That, and the writer used text-speech (u no wut that is), which I find annoying in the extreme. I think the poster was miffed by my disagreeing on a certain subject, and just couldn't handle it.

The comments were posted by someone who styles herself as a "dominant woman", but it seems to me that she is more like a "selfish bitch". It takes finesse to be a dominant woman - she is in control of herself and she is not insulting to others, especially those who are not in her domain. The only time she stoops to insults is in a scene where it is appropriate, otherwise it is a sign of a lack of culture and control, and that is clearly not what a Lady is about.

Anyway, this caused me to change the policy on the blog so that I modify each comment. It's a shame that it has to be this way, as free-written comments encourage a lively exchange of ideas. So, no insult intended Dear Reader, it's just something that I have to do."
Grrrrrrr, this is not one, but a truckload of reasons for closing the door to his blog.


The Butler is yet another one of these “but people”, always on the forefront to cheer free speech, but forced into censoring by evil people like me, who r insulting and humiliating him and his brave, humble, and righteous visitors. And if that’s not already enough horror, also mercilessly trampling the “standards for intelligent conversation” into his sacred d/s ground, using objectionable “text-speech” on top of that. Yes, there was no other way for this butler person than to exercise his right of moderation, for him to rightfully halt and censor this selfish bitch lacking any finesse and control.

Gosh, i made him do this all by myself? Wow, how powerful i am.


And just the other day, this last one :)


4) Submissive to My Southern Belle
"PS. My decision (the closing of his blog) has nothing to do with Ayesha's recent discovery of my blog, although she is responsible for my moderating of comments now."Got it? Good!


A word of caution. Not only men have a thing for moderation. Women sometimes get a kick out of it too. Especially SAF’s and pseudo FLR aficionados, a.k.a. MommyDommes, r notorious for it. I think it compensates a bit for the nagging contradiction, and almost unbearable feeling that comes with it, of not being dominant at all, but still, under pressure of their SAM, having to act like one. It’s a crazy thing actually. On the one hand we have males wanting to put their goddess on a pedestal, vowing to be of eternal service to her, only living for her happiness and satisfaction, and on the other hand females who, instead of taking advantage of that silliness and calling their “slaves” to their self-imposed tasks, r trying to please their men by posing like someone they’re not. Der oylam is a goylam, lol.

And now for the real reason why people want to moderate comments.

Observe the title of this blog. That’s what moderation is all about. U don’t understand? Lemme help u out.

Blog owners who need to moderate comments, r scared to death that someone would come in and disturb the safety of their comfort zone, their paradigms, and convictions. They can’t stand criticism, nor cope with same. They hate all humor, except their own. Their open mind closes the moment someone is questioning their views, is teasing them, or dismisses their definition of for instance femdom. Why is that? Their comfort zone, paradigms, and convictions r very fragile, rarely based on original thinking, and thus easily shaken by outside forces. They don’t want the latter to happen. Fear it immensely. So what do they do? They moderate. To them, their blog is a sacred place, a sanctuary, a refuge, and the one and only thing where they can enjoy being in charge, as a servant, a slave, a femdom, a pig, a hero, whatever. Of cors they will never admit this. Way to dangerous. Could be the end of their house of cards, their castle in the air, their cardboard dungeon, their carefully built personality. Instead they come up with, and hide their real motives behind, what they believe r socially accepted reasons for having the moderation tool in place. They need support. They need praise. They need people to tell them they have the right to moderate comments, and did the right thing when setting up that pre-screening banality. They need to be applauded and praised for their attitudes, beliefs, and actions, and couldn’t live and function without that. They don’t want to come to their sanctuary and find comments like mine. They want to feel safe and pampered. Not made fun of. Not laughed at. Not be confronted with a different truth than their own. So what do they do? They moderate. Yep that’s what they do. No intruders allowed. No trespassing. No antagonisms. Period! Up with the fence, virtual razor wire on top, protecting a non-existent reality.


Of cors, these people, men and women alike, r not nasty and bad people per se. Just a bit silly and confused. In a way they’re even somewhat special, cos, in contrast to all the other vanillas, they broke through a barrier and sniffed at a way of living completely alien to their actual one. They were able to locate somewhere in the more enlightened parts of their limbic system their potential to live as a femdom or a slave, but couldn’t manage and develop same, hindered as they were by their vanilla culture heritage. They simply lacked the guts and energy to push further, and start up the process of mentally disconnecting themselves from vanilla norms, values, laws, protocols, and other debilitating elements in their world. In other words, they couldn’t make it, and messed up the opportunity! They settled for a surrogate instead. And in their despair for having done so, many keep on trying to convince themselves, and others, they didn’t betray themselves at all, but r living the real thing and not only a pale shadow of it. They’re quite successful in that, as their brothers and sisters embarked on the same mission, and r doing the same thing, making the outcome of it look genuine. Together they’re reinforcing each other, keeping the illusion and lie alive, often even not recognizing that it is a lie. Moderating comments is simply one manifestation of this erroneous behavior, as well as a result from that.

At ease now, and watch the video. Great lyrics too :)


Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Day of days


This week (sunset friday till sundown saturday) we (i mean us Jewish people) celebrate יום הכיפורים (Yom Kippur). It’s the day of atonement, of repentance, of reconciliation, of forgiving and seeking forgiveness, of cleansing, and of other beautiful things.


It’s the one Jewish holiday which practically all Jews, wherever they make their home on this planet, observe, even when they’re not really considering themselves religious.


Religion is certainly not for me. From what i read about it, and saw for myself, it does more bad than good. Still Yom Kippur has meaning for me. It reminds me of where my roots r, of the rough and sweet times i spent with one of my greatest loves in that small strip of the land of my ancestors surrounded by enemies, of the atrocities done to my people from ancient times on up till now, of the incredible resiliency of most of my people, keeping their humanity under the worst possible conditions, their lust for life, their creativity, their inventiveness, and their unequalled ability to really see the three sides of a coin. They endured the most horrible things, and still were able to turn a desert into a lush garden.


Unlike others tho, i will not forgive nor seek forgiveness for my wrongdoings. I will not allow any cleansing, nor do i need one. Atonement, repentance, and reconciliation may be of value and a purpose to others, but not to me. Not cos i couldn’t subscribe to their beauty per se, but, apart from my personal experiences, cos of what happened at places like Babi Yar, where, on the eve of Yom Kippur, more than 33000 Jews were slaughtered by the Germans and their filthy collaborators, or the Yom Kippur War of 1973 when, on the most holy day of the Jews, some Arab nations deemed it appropriate to attack Israel.


Someone once urged me, instead of seeking revenge, instead of embracing "an eye for an eye" philosophy and course of action, to put the past and my hate behind me, and try to be the bigger person. But i don’t want to be that person. I even would hate to be one. I don’t want to forget the past. I don’t want to sooth the pain. I don’t want to play down any horrific event just cos it happened a long time ago. I don’t want to belong to those who tell me that time heals all. I want the past in general, and my past in particular, to stay with me, to be one with me, to keep me on the alert, to not fall asleep and run over, when the human cockroaches of this world r marching again. And i don’t want to be absolved from my wrongdoings either. Some time ago i dedicated a blog to this "being the bigger person". If interested, go here.


I know my views, attitude and actions on this, will be inacceptable for some if not most, and will make me an outcast. Nothing new here. I'm used to that. So be it. Still i will try to keep following in the footsteps of the Masada people, and the Ones that make us remember Mila 18, of which one of their greatest son’s actions on the Golan in 1973 still makes me feel proud and confident, that the will to resist evil, to not allow defeat, and the perseverance of individuals, minorities, and oppressed people, can make a difference, can create a future, can even dictate the future, and can be the foundation on which a better world can be build. Alas we aren’t operating on a larger scale like that yet. Not yet, not yet.


I wanted to end this blog with a song titled Yoryim ouBo’hyim, a song belonging to the kind that pierces to the very marrow, which really has invaded my soul, and will stay there forever. Alas, embedding was disabled. So if u want to listen to it, click here. And in case u can’t understand the language, simply click “show more”, and u’ll find an English translation.
L'Chaim!