Hypocrisy in Cornwall

Haters of Israel rarely shy away from being hypocritical, so it's not surprising the haters in Cornwall not only shut down attempts at balance while accusing Jews of making everyone in Congress afraid of criticizing Israel, but doing iti at the same time their cohorts at the opposite end of the state of Connecticut were falsely complaining they were being prevented from making their case.

It only took a few days after I submitted a message responding to a juvenile anti-Israel message posted by Gale Toensing. The wolves quickly came out with dozens of hostile messages, many involving personal attacks in violation of their own ground rule: "No personal attacks, or profanity will be allowed." But I've been kicked of the Cornwall Community Forum hosted by YahooGroups.

The official grounds for booting me off was that I'm not a member of the Cornwall community.

No such requirement is given under their guidelines:

"This Discussion Page is designed to allow a free and open discussion of matters of interest to residents of the Town of Cornwall, CT. Comments are invited from year-round and weekend residents of Cornwall, people who live in the nearby communities in the Northwest Corner and from anyone else who loves and values Cornwall."

Indeed, the forum contains many people who do not live in Cornwall; it contains members who live thousands of miles away from Cornwall.

The real reason, of course, is that the Israel-haters could not countenance messages pointing out their lies and distortions.

Check the thread.

This is the message received kicking me off:

Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2007 09:42:58 -0500
From: Hendon Chubb
Subject: Cornwall Community Network

Dear Mr. Stein,

Nobody has supported your argument that you are really a member of the Cornwall community and the consensus is that you are not a qualified member. I have banned you from posting on Cornwall Community Network. Please feel free to log onto it at any time to read other people's messages.
Hendon Chubb
Moderator

This was my reply, which the moderator posted to the forum, although I couldn't read it there since I'd been kicked off:

I can't say I'm surprised. I did go to log in to read the messages of others and found that you not only banned me from posting, but have totally locked me out of the forum so that I am unable to even read anyone's messages.

I might also point out that, according to the description of the forum on its home page, residency in Cornwall or even the surrounding communities is not a requirement for membership in the forum. You have actually used an invalid reason for banning me. Although I have not researched it yet, I suspect you may be in violation of YahooGroups' rules.

To remind you, the following is the description on the forum's web site regarding membership: "This Discussion Page is designed to allow a free and open discussion of matters of interest to residents of the Town of Cornwall, CT. Comments are invited from year-round and weekend residents of Cornwall, people who live in the nearby communities in the Northwest Corner and from anyone else who loves and values Cornwall."

There is a ground rule you do have listed which was clearly violated: "No personal attacks, or profanity will be allowed."

A significant proportion of the messages posted were minimally veiled personal attacks on me; some were blatant personal attacks.. I personally don't really mind them, having some confidence that the fair minded people who are not part of the lynch mob recognize them for what they are, a reflection of the hatred of those making the attacks. They do, however, reflect poorly on both Cornwall and the forum.

The reality is this entire brouhaha has nothing to do with whether or not I'm a "member" of the nebulous Cornwall community; it has to do with people unwilling to participate in an honest and open discussion of the Arab-Israeli conflict, people unwilling to have their lies and distortions challenged.

So be it.

Shalom.