Should Public Duende be banned?

[Zambales]

Choose one option.

[fschmidt]

If you are going to ask, at least link to the relevant threads.

[Zambales]

What threads?

[xiongmao]

No. I met him IRL and he's a nice guy. Maybe Winston needs his critics to debunk himself.

[Darrell_Johnston]

Whats with all the banning requests?. Why do you want to ban him @zambales ? What has he done wrong?

[Yohan]

No, he should not be banned. He made many comments which are very reasonable about life in the Philippines.
While I was often replying to his comments, I never had any dispute with him.

[OutWest]

Of course not. Admin is behaving poorly, a petty tyrant. It's called being an ass. Somebody is off their meds.
I guess I will now have to ban myself...

[Zambales]

Whats with all the banning requests?. Why do you want to ban him @zambales ? What has he done wrong?

It's a poll not a request.

[Zambales]

I'm guessing that the mods aren't PD's biggest fans.

There is an element of snobbery with PD and I can understand that he's capable of irking a few. Admittedly, he was wrong about Winston's conquests with women as only Winston and a fly on the wall could know.

The likes of PAG have been banned and then re-instated so why not PD? Surely he deserves a second chance too especially as he offers a lot to the forum.

[OutWest]

I'm guessing that the mods aren't PD's biggest fans.

There is an element of snobbery with PD and I can understand that he's capable of irking a few. Admittedly, he was wrong about Winston's conquests with women as only Winston and a fly on the wall could know.

The likes of PAG have been banned and then re-instated so why not PD? Surely he deserves a second chance too especially as he offers a lot to the forum.

He also generated a lot of very decent content for free. Maybe he does not want to do that anymore.

[Darrell_Johnston]

I'm guessing that the mods aren't PD's biggest fans.

There is an element of snobbery with PD and I can understand that he's capable of irking a few. Admittedly, he was wrong about Winston's conquests with women as only Winston and a fly on the wall could know.

The likes of PAG have been banned and then re-instated so why not PD? Surely he deserves a second chance too especially as he offers a lot to the forum.

what exactly did he do wrong?

[gsjackson]

Of course not. Admin is behaving poorly, a petty tyrant. It's called being an ass. Somebody is off their meds.
I guess I will now have to ban myself...

Yeah, I may have to ban myself too if this nonsense stands. Absolutely absurd coming from someone who purports to value free speech. Tell Dear Leader something he doesn't want to hear, then fail to retract and apologize, and it's sayonara baby.

It has apparently escaped Winston's attention that almost everyone presents his opinions as if they were dead certain facts. If this lapse in logic were grounds for banning, there would be no more internet forums. But Winston has developed a twisted little syllogism in which venturing an opinion that offends someone and couching it as a fact is evidence of sociopathy, and by God we can't have any sociopaths around here. And about this tortured logic he keeps asking "DON'T YOU SEE?" Yes, we see, Winston. We see the sort of social ham-handedness that PD was talking about.

[privateduende]

Hi guys,

This is me, PD. I contravened the good rules of netiquette by re-registering here. I have no intention to keep the diatribe up with Winston, as his arguments and mine are self-evident and we don't need to go through this again.

All I wanted to say is THANK YOU to all the long-term Posters who have been the voice of reason and asked for Winston to unban me.

I might sound snobbish now but no, even if Winston were to unban me, I won't be back in here.

I have spent a considerable amount of my time and effort interacting with the wide spectrum of online personas who populate this corner of the Internet. Some of them I agreed with, some of them I respectfully disagreed with.

I have always tried to keep the tones of my original posts or replies to a reasonable level of debate. I have never purported my statements as facts, just opinions, however strong and informed they might have been. The biggest mistake I made was to try to play the "tough love" card too much, not knowing that Winston was unable to get past it and read the genuine intention to help.

Despite all the friction and the insults, I maintain that Winston is an intelligent man with quite a lot to give to the world. He is sitting a bit too much on past laurels, oblivious of the fact that society is changing fast, life is passing him by and he needs to be back on a platform where he has social respect, mingles with respected people (Filipinos, why not, there's so many of them!) and dates women who are much closer to the intellectual and moral (if not spiritual) level he desires.

Indulgence might groom his ego, but indulgence doesn't solve anything in the long run. It's time he gives the best of him to the world. If and when he does, I can am pretty sure (again, not a fact, an opinion!) the right kinds of ladies will take notice, and then some.

So, this is my last post here. I wish all the best to all the good people I had meaningful, if not always smooth, interactions with: Gsjackson, Eurobrat, Outwest, Chanta, Momopi, Pete, Davewe, Yohan, Zambales, Ghost, Marcus Zeitola, and everybody else I am forgetting here. It's been a long and interesting ride and please rest assured that this forum, its contents and most importantly its people did - everything considered - play a major part in triggering the kind of life change I needed.

I discovered HA two days after one of the darkest, worst episodes in my life happened. It was my escapist dream, my secret "plan B". I felt I owed Winston and you guys much of the resolve I mustered, the insight I gained to keep the escapist dream alive, even if it costed me my ex-wife and my London career, and then steer towards this new Philippine adventure.

It is not an understatement to say that, without you, I wouldn't have been able to move on from the terrible things of the past few years, regain some perspective on my life and that modicum of serenity and satisfaction that everyone deserves.

Out of gratitude - and nothing else - I devoted quite a bit of my time writing, debating, helping. I felt I owed Winston the most, as he's the founder and the "poster boy" of the original HA manifesto. To that extent I made one last attempt to help him solve his existential dilemmas starting from the root cause. I am sorry it didn't work out and Winston turned his full-blown rage to me. My formula didn't work. I can only hope something else will, in the near future.

So HA people, once more, thank you for being my mirror (that's what they say about good friends), thank you for giving me the kind of endless ground for debate I needed to know myself better and...change.

Good luck with your lives, your loves, your fun and everything that comes with it. It's been good.

[Cornfed]

The whole thing makes Winston seem like he has a screw loose. To a lesser extent, PD seems to have popped a rivet too.

[Zambales]

I'm guessing that the mods aren't PD's biggest fans.

There is an element of snobbery with PD and I can understand that he's capable of irking a few. Admittedly, he was wrong about Winston's conquests with women as only Winston and a fly on the wall could know.

The likes of PAG have been banned and then re-instated so why not PD? Surely he deserves a second chance too especially as he offers a lot to the forum.

what exactly did he do wrong?

Second paragraph, second sentence. Winston was offended.