[sf-lug] How _not_ to do a retraction & apology (was: 200+ emails from test list)

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Bobbie Sellers (bliss-sf4ever at dslextreme.com):

 I chose that item becaue it was the original post to the email list
> that I made.  I did not have to go out of my way to post it because
> of the email list is right at hand.

You said this happened on _Test_ mailing list, and then checked with me
in private e-mail in December (which was appropriate and fine), but then
five months later _ignored_ my explanation that it hadn't been from
Test, but rather was some software bot trying to repeatedly unsubscribe
you from Test, resulting in many confirmation e-mails, and this time
(May 2023) posted a public and _still_ erroneous claim that Test had
been spamming you hundreds of time, this time broadcasting that claim to
_SF-LUG_.

_That_ is going far out of your way to malign me in public.  As
mentioned before:  Nothing that you say happened had any connection to
SF-LUG.  You just apparently found that a convenient place to take a
(wildly mistaken) swing at my and my system's reputation in front of an 
public audience, by portraying linuxmafia.com as a spamhaus.

> As you said I was in error when I posted it but you rapidly
> corrected that.

Without you _ever_ stepping up to say, "I erred, and I regret that."
Which, where I was raised, is what decent people do when they screw up
and wrong others.

Instead, you repeatedly talked around the point, and then ghosted me
when I politely reminded you of the unaddressed problem.  I was worried
that this unfortunate progression might have been a bizarre accident on
your part, so in a spirit of friendship and honesty pointed out the
problem, again, politely, in private e-mail.


> I am sorry I am unable to be sufficiently obsequious enough to satisfy
> you.

Wow.  First the non-retraction and insulting non-apology apology, and
now a fresh claim that I want you to be "obsequious". 

No, Bobby, I made no request of you at all.  I politely suggested
that _if_ you considered a public retraction and apology appropriate in
light of your claim having been shown erroneous, by evidence you or
anyone with a Web browser can easily confirm,, that it would be warmly
received, but stressed that I also urged you act _only_ if you actually
felt that way, and that otherwise please don't (albeit that my
friendship is not an entitlement, and might end).

I can now add that I also cannot presently imagine asking anything of
you, in the future.  Peace.


> After all you, Rich,

My name is neither Rich nor Richard.  Decades down the road, now, and
you're getting wrong my given name?  That's revealing.

> I am very sorry I excited your enmity.

Category error:  There are about 8 billion people who are not my
friends.  Close to zero of those also draw my enmity.  Lack of
friendship is logically distinct from enmity.

(Those are ordinary words and their meanings, comprehensible normally
even to people confused by SMTP headers.)

I would say rather:  Disappointment.  And now disengagement.

Bridge burned.