THE PAVILION ANNEX

[Chuck Messer]

I'm sorry that this forum has to shut down, but I understand the reasons. Rick has had enough heartache and ass-ache in his own life without dealing with our shit. Steve certainly has plenty to tend to out in meatspace without having to come in and intervene when he's out of town.

I've enjoyed this place and the community here. If the bulletin board ever starts up again, I put myself forward as moderator. I'm no longer working 12 hour shifts and once again have a pitiful simulacrum of a life. Consider it a standing offer. I promise not to behead anyone who gets too far out of line.

Thanks to Rick Wyatt and Steve Barber for making this place work as well as it did. Helluva job you guys did herding us cats.

Chuck

[Douglas Harrison]

I support Rick's decision to shutter this place. And I'm sorry I did not act to improve the environment here.

Thank you, Rick, for what you've provided over many years.

Thank you, Steve, for your considerable, almost inexhaustible, efforts.

D.

p.s. Chuck, you'd be one fine moderator.

[Lori Koonce]

Gang

I've come to really depend on this place. I'd hate to have it go down just because one jackass can't behave.

So with that in mind I have a suggestion or two. First, expecting one person to moderate is ludicrous. I suggest a team, with one person making the final decision. I also think we need to put our "rules" in writing. You and I may not be able to communicate well, but we wouldn't be here if we couldn't read at some basic level.

It will take awhile, but the outcome would be worth it. FWIW I think Chuck would make a great moderator prime. I'm willing to be one of the subordinate ones if y'all will have me.

[Steve Evil]

I am deeply saddened to have lost this place, which I've been coming to for more than a decade now. No other forum is really comparable - Facebook doesn't cut it, and I'm reluctant to stick my nose too often into the Pavilion, being a total stranger to Unca Harlan.

My policy toward the place has long been to throw in my two cents when I felt I had something relevant to say, and keep my mouth shut when I didn't. I'll leave it to others to judge how successfully I've stuck with this policy. . . If I'd known it was endangering the board, I wouldn't have stuck with it.

I didn't feel it necessary to respond to everything Frank said, but I fell into the trap as well, and as long as everyone fell for it once, it ensured there would always be a Frank Church froo-fraw (sp?) on the go. He insisted on inserting himself into every conversation, mostly with irrelevant asides. For the most part, they didn't bother me too much, but it bothered me a great deal that interesting people were being driven away, and I always had to sigh when I saw yet another conversation derailed.

We probably could have handled this better as a community - I mean, did we have to prounce on everything he said? Most of it was harmless. But it was constant. It was never-ending. There wasn't a single conversation that was safe. No tone was respected, no thread left alone. Rarely if ever was there respectful exchange of opinion: everything came down to irreverence and irrelevance. I suppose that wears everyone down after a while.

Thing is Frank, people here tried to talk to you about it. Everyone here said something at one point. Everyone here took a stab at trying to explain it. But you just wouldn't listen. Did you have to insert your one liners everywhere? Did you have to try and make like of every single conversation? Did you always have to change the subject, or insert your opinion, even on books you hadn't read or films you hadn't seen?

Could you not have tried listening to people, to understand where they were coming from?

You've got a way of needling people to the point where they explode. As if you're looking for nerves to touch.

Do you remember years ago, when Michael Moore's Sicko came out? I posted how upset one of the scenes made me, and your response was "someone take your cookie?" Do you remember that? You, the most vicious critic of the US health care system, completely making light of something I took seriously. Why? Why did you feel that was an appropriate time to crack a joke? How about our "discussion" on Alfie Kohn? Remember that? You read one of his articles and fancied yourself and education expert.

Do you still wonder why I blew up during the Cristgau episode? Have you forgotten that it built up over time, that I asked you to stop, that I tried to explain why I felt it was no longer funny? No - you honestly seemed surprised. You really thought it was just a bit of harmless teasing.

But that's the point, isn't it? You really didn't care to know how I felt about it. And you seem to want to find that nerve for everyone here.

The damage of teasing isn't in what's said. It's in the persistence. A friend can rib a friend about something - but a friend knows when to stop. A bully keeps going.

Now we're all losing the boards. Where will you go from here?

[Kenneth Stevens]

Frank Church, the conversation assassin.

[FrankChurch]

I'm thinking about Diane not our petty squabbles.

I am a good bloke, believe it or not. She is too. Not a bloke.

[Tim Raven]

You invoke Diane and her stroke as a shield?

(Direct insult -- while understandable -- removed by Moderator. Sorry Tim.)

And I hope that the admins leave this insult toward you intact.

I guess there is more room for hate in this world.

Tim Raven

[Moderator]

I'm thinking about Diane not our petty squabbles.

I am a good bloke, believe it or not. She is too. Not a bloke.

Frank, you could not have posted a more shameless, self-serving example of why our actions have become necessary. And you do it by invoking Diane's name -- in a moment of personal crisis -- to trivialize the closing of the Forums, and by extension Diane's difficulties.

I recommended you not comment. Best to heed my advice.

[Mark Tiedemann]

My apologies. I tried a couple of times to simply ignore Frank, but some itches...

I've had the pleasure of making some of your acquaintances on FB, which, as noted above, is simply not the same, but better than losing touch altogether. Maybe this place will be resurrected again.

I sat as president of a board for 5 years, herding cats. I am quite committed to never stepping into such a role again, so the prospect of moderating never appealed to me. While on that board, I actually fired a couple of members and had I continued there was at least one more under my gaze for removal. When I left, so did she, so the two problems solved themselves. But it's always a tough decision.

I've enjoyed much here. Hope to see others of you elsewhere.

Not Frank. I don't need that.

[FinderDoug]

I'm thinking about Diane not our petty squabbles.

The tragedy here isn't that you've decided to shuck any responsibility for your behavior. That's pretty much any day you put yourself in the soup here.

The tragedy is that you used Diane - someone you have professed affection and concern about in the past - as a human shield, in her hour of need, and now that statement will exist forever. Can Rick remove it? Sure. From here. He can't remove any web-crawler's cache of it; he can't remove third party screen shots of it. It now exists forever. The vile use of Diane's personal hardship by YOU, to deflect discussion of your behavior here and the end of this board as a result, EXISTS FOREVER.

That Diane is probably one of the few people who repeatedly believed you were capable of better than you gave her is both ironic and sad. And if there's a blessing, she might not see what you did before the boards vanish forever.

But if you had any shame, you should embrace it now.

And if losing the forums is a petty thing to you, then they really meant nothing to you - and you could have gotten the hell out years ago, and saved everyone your nonsense.

I am a good bloke, believe it or not.

Sorry. I can only judge you by the evidence you've presented. Based solely on your 16,000+ post testimony, I'd say if you ARE a "good bloke", you could have sent that guy into the forums instead.

Goodbye, Frank. I'd say it's been fun, but that would be a horrible lie.

[Moderator]

All -

I am going to recommend to Rick that he merely "freeze" and lock the Forums, not delete them in their entirety. First, so much of what is posted here is valuable. I mean the honest discussions of issues and concerns. I mean Tim Raven's writing thread. I mean Andrew Rogers' visual artists' thread. I mean Jan's moribund but still fascinating discussion threads of Harlan's work.

I mean the personal histories and thoughts and comments which allowed this place, when good, to be such a badly needed site.

I don't think we should lose the existing content in addition to the loss of a future forum for our thoughts. Who knows, it might be a short lapse -- already a couple of people have come forward in the hopes of filling the gap.

But losing the backlog legacy and significant content was never my intention.

[Chuck Messer]

I think you've got a good idea, Steve. A moratorium would be better than a complete closure, and there are things I'd rather not lose.

Chuck

[Lori Koonce]

Dear Frank

While all the others want to dump on you for your shitty and totally unnecessary behavior, I'd like to thank you for something.

it is because of you that I finally lost the cockeyed idea that given enough of my time, and a bit of desire on the part of the other, that people can change. It took you a while a but you've proven me wrong. Thanks so very much for helping me grow up a !little

[Ezra Lb.]

Is there going to be an announcement over at the Pavilion? If so I hope we'll not carry the "blame" stuff over there. What's done is done.

[Douglas Harrison]

Is there going to be an announcement over at the Pavilion? If so I hope we'll not carry the "blame" stuff over there. What's done is done.

I agree.

D.