Fascinating dreams you people have. Let's see, I don't remember all of the BD related dreams I've had lately, but the one that really stands out is one I had a couple nights ago where I dreamed that some new screennames had appeared on the 'Downs and were spamming the Mirth forum (and MW Survivor in particular) with personal attacks on me -- I don't remember what exactly now but they were posting quotes I had supposedly made which made me seem like a horrible nasty person, and ranting about how evil I am. I was extrememly upset and more than a little embarressed that I was the center of of all these flames -- I didn't even get a chance to respond to any of them, either, I had just logged on and there was such a massive amount of new posts and topics from these newbies that I couldn't even read them all. So anyway, I tried to PM Estelyn to beg her to delete all this stuff (okay, so I know B-W is the only Mirth moderator, but it was dream, not the most logical thing) but I couldn't do it because my computer started to go on the blink.
I'm not going to bother asking LMP to analyze this since I know exactly what it's about -- I've been on messageboards where that exact sort of thing happens for real. People make "alias" accounts and use them to mass attack certain people they have grudges against -- they'll dig up quotes that are years old, use them out of context, rant and rave about every little flaw or perceived flaw, hound all current posts, and generally make life on the board miserable for their target. It's particularly frustrating because you can't tell which of the regular posters owns the various aliases, though you can of course guess and surmise. I was never targetted personally, but I have gotten involved from time to time out of disgust for the whole sorry mess, which got me on their "enemies" list, apparently. They couldn't really find anything about me to effectively batter, since I wasn't the most active or easily misquoted person, but they did make a point to claim that they knew everything about me, and that I'm too young to have any real wisdom, and that I obviously think I'm smarter than everyone, and that in truth I know nothing, and so on ad nausuem, blah de blah de blah.
So I've drifted away from posting or even reading things at those boards, because it's all just too banal. In my dream, though I didn't know who owned the new accounts at the 'Downs, I was pretty sure it was those same losers somehow finding out that I was the same person, and this was vengeance for my getting involved in opposing their crusades against others. Only this time they'd actually figured out how to hit me where it hurts, by spoiling the 'Downs all because of me. (That's one of their favorite tactics -- they would cover the board in slop and when flame wars would erupt and people would complain about the unpleasantness, they'd loudly proclaim it the fault of their victim for not caving in and leaving the board.)
The abortive attempt to PM Esty was due to the fact that on these other boards the moderating is terrible (or virtually nonexistant, really). Here at the 'Downs it is wonderfully different, but in my little doomsday scenario no one was doing anything. Basically, the wonderful place that is the 'Downs was getting infected by the spawn of evil I've witnessed destroying other messageboards -- horrible, vile people and mods that do nothing about it.
And my computer, well, there's always the distinct possibility that it will go haywire at the worst possible time.
