(and you have the same name as John Wayne’s birth name!)

I should point out that I’m a guy Marion not a maid Marian.

Other commenters – if I think someone’s just picking fights, I don’t respond to them. This doesn’t have to be a big deal. If it becomes a big deal, that wastes ENORMOUS amounts of time.

Indeed, what a bastion of rational thought this place is. Speaking of the sort of discourse going on here, bilbo has now posted someone’s personal information and is swearing regularly in the other thread. I’ll ask again: how does the moderation work here? Do you get a free pass if you defend the authors?

I will be downloading the Point of Inquiry (which has been a bit sparse lately).

But I must have perceived you as a threat, because now every time you post something, I feel the need to come here and troll you, call you and your readers names, and even go as far as to equate you calling something a “war on science” to some of my favorite NA bloggers’ tactics of justifying physical torture! Damn you, Chris Mooney, indeed!

But I’ll be damned if you don’t put together some very good interviews….back to Pharyngula!

You ask why I’m here. I was here originally because I didn’t think Mooney’s attacks on scare-quoted New Atheists were warranted. He never explained his positions or outlined a detailed plan going forward. He just appealed to “framing,” as if those seven letters said it all.

Now, he turns around and makes himself the PZ Myers of environmentalism. Look at his posts regarding AGW deniers: obvious anger and frustration, name-calling, accusations of ideological bias, violent imagery. You know, exactly the sort of tactics used by certain non-religious authors and bloggers when confronting creationists (i.e. evolution deniers).

This is seer hypocrisy. The only way it isn’t would be if Mooney has conducted some kind of framing research that demonstrated being mean works for AGW deniers but doesn’t work for creationists or anti-vaxxers. Since we never got any arguments or data back in the day regarding creationists, I think it’s safe to presume that none of it exists for antivaxxers or AGW deniers.

The approach (“framing”) is completely arbitrary! Mooney cares about the environment, thus AGW deniers annoy him, thus we get vitriol. He’s not passionate about medicine or evolution, thus medicine and evolution deniers don’t bother him that much, thus we get peace and love and accommodation and puppies.

That’s my problem, in a nutshell. But, feel free to ignore me, call me unreasonable, accuse me of only being here for an “agenda,” say I’m in a cult, call me autistic, and misuse the term ad hominem. At this point, I’m totally used to it from the commenters here.

Hehe. Good luck with P.O.I. Chris. Grothe will be a tough act to follow, he was a great interviewer. I look forward to listening.

I have no idea how the filter on discoverblogs work. Is that relevant?

Wouldn’t the point be to either (a) not call people sycophants until you find out why they want to download and pass on an interview and (b) to sort things out without worrying about finding the right name-calling to use?

I didn’t call you a name at all, I asked you what we should call you in return, since apparently only name calling is on the agenda. And yeah. I post that it sounds like a great plan for an interview and I plan to download it, and you call me a sycophant in response. Objectively, you’re lowing the level of discourse. By what pathway do you imagine you aren’t?

There is no possible behavior – even not addressing you WHATSOEVER – that won’t trigger abuse and ad hominem attacks from you, instead of information or reasonable discussion. Is that clear yet? Why are you here? Seriously. Why are you here? I personally don’t plan to respond to you, ever, again, except in the third person, as an example of the sort of person that comes here with an agenda and some sort of perverse chip on their shoulder. Here not to discuss, not to impart information, but to simply indulge in childish abusive trolling.

It’s really no better than the denialist behavior, frankly.