This thread will mean nothing to new members here, as I have been a member in the Fiero community for a long time, (formerly EDSB52 and then I’m Back)was with PFF virtually since its inception. PFF has a long history is the uncontested front-runner as far as Fiero websites goes.

My history with PFF has been rocky to say the least and I was suspended/banned several times until I opted out of here a long time ago as I don’t like heavily monitored posting boards. There is nothing wrong with heavily monitored boards and they are sometimes necessary and have their place, I just like the free use of language, free use of directed insults when I see them necessary. I personally feel that heavily monitored boards tend to control thought processes as well as behavior, so I respectfully avoid them as personal preference but understand that some people prefer that form of posting.

I’d like to state that I have no issues with PFF, with Cliff, wish all members well and I will not be coming here to visit and repost; it would certainly end up the same. As I quit posting here years ago I feel I reconciled any hard feelings, hope so, and I even threw Cliff a couple small donations. I have drawn from PFF as far as Fiero information and would do it again as long as it is still here, it is the best repository of Fiero knowledge in the world, IMO.

The history of PFF is filled with some people like me who were either voted unpopular or outright banned, so a couple got together and started their own forum. Some visit both forums to my knowledge. This forum is entitled, “Real Fiero Tech” and their moniker is and always has been, “Independence has been Declared.” The purpose of this moniker is to illustrate that they were sick of what they consider oppressive moderation here in PFF as with the voting scheme and overall presence here. They also have, “Welcome to the Jungle.” Hardly a jungle, maybe a jungle of moderation hidden behind the pseudo illusion of independence.

Well, sometime after it’s creation about 5 years ago I guess, I stumbled across it and joined. I would visit from time to time, go away, come back, etc. I really enjoyed it because you could swear and you could say what you want. To some, an unconstructive method of posting and general conversation, to others so freestyle that it breeds constructive discourse. I like the latter, not better, just better for me.

I liked the open style of conversation even though I disagreed with some, I wouldn’t be banned for that disagreement and I liked it that way. I took a lot of shots, gave a few, but at the end of the day we were all able to say what we wanted to whomever we wanted and I respected that forum for that latitude; I really thought that as negligible a posting board is in the scheme of life that they really did achieve, ‘Fiero posting board independence.’

Some of the topics and ideas over there are things like if you type, “PFF” the system automatically coverts it to, “Old Europe” as a dig to Cliff’s home region. They refer to PFF as, “Fagland.”
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One section is entitled:

RFT vs Teh World
We don't take no guff from Old Europe
Moderators: stimpy, Kohburn, Mach10

And one old thread OP is: It's so funny to see how many topics over there are about ratings right now. It's so funny. Oh no, I need a good rating. Someone like me.

Slaves to the Ratings bar you have become!!!!!!!!

REPLY: It's ugly over there.. Everyone is just trying to get everyone else to rate people how they deem fit.. "I say we all vote negative on this guy!" whatever...

REPLY: What you asssholes didn't realize was that once one of you fudge packers got your ass banned it eliminated the positive you gave your butt buddies. If they were close to being banned, they got banned. Sort of a cascading effect.

REPLY: Its quite obvious we dont' give a ****.

REPLY: Yeah, that's why you started your own forum. If you really didn't give a ****, you would have just walked away.

Then, when someone bashes you, you hack their post. God, you're such a wanker.

REPLY: Hey guys, I have been just chilling out hear lately and reading posts....I finally decided to post something of my own. It is soooo much more calm over hear where you don't have to worry about people giving you negatives and getting booted off the forum for posting things they don't want to hear. http://www.fiero.com/forum/Forum6/HTML/028338.html
The rating system is the stupidest thing ever and you can't even post **** without someone comeplaning or make fun of someone's riced up green car without getting a negative. So you might seing me posting here more often .....if you handle another Canadian on the forum and I will TRY to refrain from BASHING bush every second post.

REPLY: I just tried to reply to your thread with my other user name ,but it looks like Cliffbag Banned him.. I am going to hold off using my others for a while

In anycase welcome aboard.

REPLY: ya its nice to have a free forum.

you start spoutin' the michael moore communist bullshit, like you do on fagsland... You get it told like it is
you aint amarican but I bet u wish u is
haha you aiie tho, pizzo
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This thread really defines the intellect over there:

OMG just insane retardedness on Old Europe

Retardedness? Of course that’s shaun41178(2), one of the biggest antagonists over there. He is an example of what the so-called independence group disliked over here at PFF; they disliked what they considered a double-standard of behavior, so they emancipated themselves…..for the time being.

Another aspect is that they have a privileged users forum, something they would have hounded PFF for doing. I always laughed at it and said I was never invited and that it negates their independent, transparent image they were supposedly trying to construct. A long time ago they offered to let me in, I laughingly declined. I forget who it was, but 1 member was banned and emailed me to inform me that he was banned and told me not to believe their independence rhetoric. I didn’t know this member and just kind of blew it off, at that time I wasn’t visiting the forum that much anyway.

So, as time went on, I revisited the forum and as I do, political issues come up. Some engaged me, only 1 or 2 did so constructively and we had some good discourse. Most were unable to mutually maintain composure and threads became ugly, which was par for that forum. The moderator for OT was and is Brian who goes by DiggityBiggity. Without going into details for the sake of keeping this thread on topic, we had differencing political views and he was unable to defend his, so he became frustrated, here is a site that details that:

http://realfierotech.com/ph...opic.php?f=6&t=16173

The thread title is: EB... STFU...

So a moderator can tell its members to STFU and feel a sense of trying to keep peace. In his rant OP he wrote:

I'm sick of it... it's gotten out of hand. There are not many things in this life that I enjoy, and this forum WAS one of them... and you've finally ruined it.

I love politics... I really do, but I'm sorry, this is a ****ing FIERO FORUM!

Are we in Anything Goes? Yes... But G-D DAMNIT!! NOT EVERY ****ING POST HAS TO TURN INTO SOME POLITICAL TIRADE!! I don't want to come in here, and quickly scan every post... I like ACTUALLY READING THEM, and your ****ing rants are annoying, and they suck.

You're stuck in the left/right paradigm. You blame "repugs" for ALL the problems of this country. Wake the **** up, your cherished Democrats are just as evil.

I'm seriously sick and ****ing tired of it, and I think most of the other people in here are too. Go join Rush Limbaughs forum, and annoy someone else, because I'm sick of it.

I like the funny videos, I like the funny dialogue.. this is NOT a political forum. A political post here and there is fine... but you're seriously ruining my high.

Go **** Yourself

Your HIGHLY annoyed dictator

DiggityBiggity


So what the net result is is that he cannot rebut my arguments so he starts a thread to tell me to quit, then talks the main moderator into suspending/banning me. Within his rant is an argument about his politics as he’s telling me to quit talking politics. What he’s really saying is that I should quit having my perspective (censorship), not to quit talking politics. If he wanted me to quit talking politics he would just say that, not interject his take on my politics. He wasn’t moderating, he was arguing his side and using his position as a moderator to impose it on me, the very thing they complained about with PFF years ago and still do today. Is this independence? Sounds like a throwback to what they thought they were proactively departing from with PFF. I guess what they meant was that they still wanted dependence, just that they wanted others to be dependent upon them.

There are a couple concepts in the social sciences world that talks about this Real Fiero Tech independence model in relation to their alleged independence:

1) Many times when a country, regime or any other entity departs from or conquers an ideology, they become that. I could easily cite a few examples, but I don’t want to post a personal political perspective and ruin the purpose for this thread; I think we all can think of this phenomenon throughout history.

2) Sometimes the extreme ends become so distant that they reach around and touch each other on the backside and share properties. The examples here are PFF being too overly moderated per the RFT crowd, the RFT crowd forming a new polar opposite forum that was supposed to be a departure from censorship via over-moderation. In their quest to be totally free from censorship and moderation, they reached so far the other way that they became what they disliked in PFF.

Perhaps moderation at RFT should remove their slams of Cliff and write him an apology saying that they now understand the trials and tribulations of forum moderation, for they have become less independent and now a heavily moderated, censored forum.

This loss of independence isn’t absolute though, as we see, some members have the ability to act independently, such as p8ntman442:

REPLY: it takes 2 to tango diggity.

And then some want backdoor censorship, such as Will:

The "delete post" button is extremely convenient in the new forum layout.

See, this is the same affect as banning the member, just ban their writings and it’s the same as banning the member; it’s all censorship in a different package.

And then there are people with the best idea of all such as Aaron:

I don't particularly enjoy his rants (Like I voted), but I don't really mind them either. To be fair, I don't even really read them, I skip by all of his posts, as I'm not into debating politics.

There is a process for people who don’t like any other poster’s words; just skip them. When people want to ban members or delete posts, it’s just censorship, and there is really nothing wrong with that if that is the protocol for your venue or forum, but to call yourself independent from a forum like PFF for being so-called too ban-happy, too moderated, then to start your own forum and then become what you claimed you disliked is the ultimate of hypocrisy. I really don’t care, I think it’s funny and I knew it was a matter of time before it happened and it is only a 10-day ban. I’m done there and I don’t see myself further posting here as I don’t want to create trouble and my posting style probably would. I just want others to be aware that it took 5 years at most for the so-called angry defectors from here to become what they wanted to avoid being like; it was inevitable yet hilarious and laughable.

And then there’s the typical denial so present at RFT, this is from Fastback86:

I'd be all in favor of changing this forum's banning policy just long enough to ban Ebs.

You know, Fastback, you suck one dick you can’t, ‘ungay’ yourself; you ban one person you can’t ever declare yourself independent from censorship.

To PFF, I’m just posting this as a fair assessment of reality. There was a lot of smack talked about PFF in the past and over the years since for your voting style of moderation. Hey, it’s your place, your rules, you have never claimed to allow anything, anytime; it’s a free-for-all. A new member can easily see this forum is moderated by way of its voting system and it's personal opinion as to whether it is too moderated or not enough, but when a group departs due to their opinion that it is over-moderated, censored, etc., it is just the largest hypocrisy that can be levied to call themselves free of that form of moderation and control as they employ the same moderation. PFF and RFT have more in common that they have in difference; everyone realizes that except some of the few, denialist members of RFT.

[This message has been edited by I'm Back (edited 03-15-2009).]

[This message has been edited by Formula88 (edited 03-15-2009).]

quote Originally posted by I'm Back: I just like the free use of language, free use of directed insults when I see them necessary.

I find the "use of directed insults never necessary".
Just my for what it's worth.

[This message has been edited by Boondawg (edited 03-15-2009).]