NJDavid, you have NO NEED to apologize. And no need to make up for anything... It was great seeing all of you over the weekend... what AN EIGHT PAWS UP WEEKEND.

I apologize and I promise to reign in CMDR CATCOP more but sometimes he can't help himself when he sees friends being hurt. It's just "our" natural instinct to protect those we care about.

So Commander Catcop says to borrow a quote from Webflyer "let's get back to Flyertalkin'"

Catman's back! Catman's back! Huzzah!

Islandcub, catspotter

Great to have you back on the boards, Catman .

One more time, from Punki. How could one say it any better?

"So, I will add my apology to yours, nathan. If I have ever hurt anyone by any of my posts, I am truly sorry and assure you it was not my intention so to do. I truly love FlyerTalk and the many friends I have met through my participation therein.

My presence on FlyerTalk was initally motivated by my desire to achieve a First Class experience as often as possible, and that most certainly includes a desire to achieve consistent First Class experiences on these boards. That can only happen if we all put on our Sunday-Go-To-Meeting manners and speak to each other in the same tone that we would speak to a gate agent when trying to get an upgrade."

I must agree. I said I would stop at this thread and leave something at the alter. It feels better already.

So.....to any and all who feel that they were clubbed in the noggin by my posts........I am sorry and offer my humblest and most sincere apology.

We do learn as we go; some of us learn at varying rates.

No malice was ever intended. I am hell-bent on being a better FT citizen.

There have been threads about posting when drunk. That should be followed by posting when tired, posting when frustrated at spouse, child boss, people who drive poorly on the 405, the 22, the 55, and the (dreaded) 91.

Thanks to all for putting up with the unattractive side of me; I will strive to be certain you see less of it.

nathan, sorry I haven't been able to spend the time here lately that I formerly did...just read this thread.

You are a true gentleman, and I for one am happy to see you back also.

Perhaps it is time to bring this forward again, given what's been said on the "open

letter to Catman" posting.

I happen to agree. If you will notice, I made a decision to edit comments made after my post on the Catman Thread by several FTers including FQTV. I have sent a formal notice to several members of the board that certain use of language and inuendos will not be tolerated or you will face disbarment from the board. That thread is no longer available for comment and will soon die.

There's apologies and there's responsibility. Both must be respected on this board. Thanks for the reminder.

This is helpful. I was ready to banish myself from the site for taking things too seriously yesterday when I posted a lecture on the Starwood board. I apologized there, and now I'll offer up my most sincere apologies for disruption and arrogance and continue to enjoy this community! You're all wonderful and I enjoy getting to know you... thanks much.

Randy, et al.:

If anything was sent to my e-mail address on profile, it will need to be re-sent with the "nospam" in the address removed.

Ergo, <[email protected]>.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you.

"There's apologies and there's responsibility. Both must be respected on this board. Thanks for the reminder."

Thank you Randy!


BTW- FWIW, I too, was rather surprised and dissappointed that the thread was entirely edited out. Having commented earlier and then been away, I had no ability to see what had happened all morning, so I'm still in the "dark." I'd just assumed that it got "ugly."

I realize you reserve the right to do so and absolutely respect that right. Yet, even as a former frequent victim of flaming on FT, I hope the end result is NOT to effectively discourage people from having fervent, impassioned, & candid discussions, which could well be what one might mistakenly take from this instance.

FlyerTalkers have many differing views and it is hopefully only the nastiness/flaming and NOT the expression of these divergent opinions that we all wish to eliminate!

Hopefully we will each show respect for one another all the time!

[This message has been edited by doc (edited 08-01-2000).]

While I respect your decision to do as you see most fit, Randy, by censoring FQTV you raise the very serious issue of censorship and its effect on the value of free expression in the marketplace of ideas.

IMHO, by eliminating FQTV's posts you have eliminated the ability of others to judge them and him on their and his own merit. His posts spoke loudly as to FQTV's ideas' merit, and you have eliminated everyone's ability to judge him and his ideas by them.

Private e-mail asking him to respect your forum? Yes absolutely!!!

Censoring his posts thereby denying us the ability to judge FQTV based on FQTV's ideas? Bad precedent.

Just my 2 miles...

The censorship was based on the language used, not the quality of the comments. When any of you join this board, you agree in principal that appropriate language be commonly used in dialogs. I for one don't accept the wiping your chin, suck up and on your knees mentality to be appropriate for this board and will render myself personally responsible for such decision. There were four following comments also deleted and they were somewhat retalitory to FQTV's comment as paraphrased above. If I were to have left them and only edited the language of the comment from FQTV, not one additional person would have been connected to what those comments were in regard to and in some ways, they may have lead to a furture round of dialog. Heavy-handed censorship? With almost 200,000 posts on this board, you can count on one hand the number of threads we have censored in two years. I'd say that's a very good record for non-censorship, one that not many boards could ever match. And they were not made for opinion reasons but for language and intent of harm. Had I deleted the entire thread would have been censorship....but I didn't do that because I think I believe in the same principles as you do.

The message: talk travel.

BTW, both Doc and kokonutz state the very essense of this board - content of opinion. In this edit, not one word of appropriate comment designated to the standards of this board was deleted. There was no direct or indirect comment about any frequent flyer program, any issue of travel or any issue of the state of affairs of travel in general. What did Doc miss? Nothing my friend, absolutely nothing of value. And I don't think I'm speaking for just my values.

[This message has been edited by Randy Petersen (edited 08-01-2000).]

All we can ever ask or expect from anyone, including you Randy, is that they try their very "level" best - and you certainly always have, insofar as I can see - with pretty darn overall excellent results! Thanks!

IMHO, we now ALL need to also try our very best to maintain FT as a kind and respectful place to exchange info and ideas so that censorship does NOT ever have to rear its' head again!

Let's all kindly please show respect for each other and our hosts and always abide by the rules!

Thanks again for providing the forum for all of us and especially for being so responsive to our needs!

Here. Here.

Thank you for your explanation, Randy. As I said, I understand and respect your decision. Just didn't want to let it pass without my typical whiney ACLU-type response .