The Diaryland Haters Petition.

I was originally going to wait and not make the Petition public until I saw a continued trend in harassment at the Haters site – but the petition will only be around for a few months and I want to get as many signatures as possible.

If the Haters site ceases their harassment (bordering on libel) then I simply won’t give the petition to Andrew. There are many current topics running on the site at this time – and not all of them are harassment. I don’t wish to put duct tape over the mouths of the people who would not harass others, but simply state their own harassment-free opinions – but unfortunately there is no other way to go about this.

Even if the petition gets hundreds of signatures there is no guarantee that Andrew will shut the site down. I am hoping that through the overwhelming support of other Diarylanders there will come into effect a chain of events that will ultimately require people posting at such open Diaryland sites to leave their own (valid) contact information, in the form of an existing diary, valid email address and/or IP address. I believe this will significantly cut back the harassment because the people who make the most heinous remarks will not be allowed to stay under a veil of anonymity. The petition is set to the extreme of shutting down the site in order for compromises to be made between the petitioners and the Diaryland Administration.

Those who would oppose or support the petition are more than welcome to email me with their opinions and concerns. Also you are more than welcome to start a petition to keep Haters public – making a petition is not a difficult prospect. I would ask that those who oppose my petition please refrain from making generalizations about my reasoning – there are many ways for you to retort – emailing myself, creating your own counter-petition and signing it. Retorting with hurtful and ignorant comments not only invalidates your stance and other people’s stances around you; thereby forcing your own argument to lose some respectability, it also makes MY argument MORE valid.

I will also ask that anyone signing the petition to please sign once and only once – I would not have the signers potentially compromise the sincerity of the petition in that way. Let there be no justified accusations made of this petition! One signature per person, please.

I also request that you make your own educated decision. Do not sign the petition simply because your friend told you to: go to the Haters site and read their words and judge for yourself. If you have any questions or concerns remember you can email me with them.

I understand that I will be on the receiving end of much harassment because of this petition and I expect that. Please don’t get involved in any kind of argument involving the attacks on my behalf. I will not give the time of day to anyone who cannot email me themselves with their opinions – and I don’t want anyone else to either. Anonymous people are very cavalier with their statements and say things that are brutal and untrue. Such arguments can turn into vicious fights and I don’t want that over my head.

Supporters of the Diaryland Haters Petition need to make an example of themselves by taking the high road and not reducing themselves to their level of contempt. We are going about this in a valid and respectable way and hope that any proponent and opponent will do the same.

Thank you very much for your careful consideration of this petition. I hope that together we can make a small difference in Diaryland that will help many people.

-Betsey, April 1st, 2003.

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Feel free to view the source on this page and add the above speech to your own diary. (Viewing the source allows you to copy linking codes.) If you do not know how to view source or cannot identify the speech part easily (I have put some tags in that should be fairly easy to identify) feel free to email me and I will send you the speech as an attached document in a reply. I will greatly appreciate anyone who spreads the word about this petition. Thank you again!