It saddens me to post this at this time - however all of you are aware that the site owner and I cannot seem to have opposing opinions without getting personal.

I have absolutely no animosity towards anyone here even if you do not agree with me and my opinions - that is what makes America great and I am all for a spirited argument.

I have met a ton of great folks here and made some good friends and shared a lot of information. Great bunch of people.


I am placing myself on a self imposed time out for a while... I will see you all from time to time and please keep in touch. If there is anything at all that I can do for you - please contact me.

a DOT gunguy AT gmail DOT com

Pinnacle

You could have at least put this in the MN CARRY ISSUES, under the title, SITE OWNER, SITE RULES AND PINNACLE.

Anyone got a better heading?

I moved it to the Non-Gun Freefire Zone because it was not an "MN Carry Issue."

My temptation was to move it to another topic, but I successfully resisted it.
[ETA: not, however, permanently.]
All in all, I think that Pinnacle has made a good choice to take a break, although I'm not entirely sure that he really needed to make a second curtain call after the first one --

-- and, speaking as just a guy, I'm not looking forward with any eagerness to a third.

ETA: he has a distinctive viewpoint, and while I think I've made it clear that, much of the time, I think his viewpoint is cosmically and sometimes comically wrongheaded, I do think it's a good thing for such viewpoints to be represented here. Andy "Pinnacle" Shapero, though, can represent his viewpoints elsewhere; he's not welcome here, no matter what handle he slithers in under.

Pinnacle,

While I may agree with you that Joel's choice of posts may have not been what I have done and may have brought personal disagreements expressed verbally to the forum (which I think was poor judgment based upon his passions more than his good sense) I think you should just let it blow over and get over it. I know that in his position as site owner he has a lot of control here, but he is also "just a guy" that is passionate and has never deleted or edit your post unethically to support his assertions. IMO you should called him out on what you thought he got personal about (which you did) and many have agreed, but now you almost sound like a victim. I believe we all get too sensitive. I mean no disrespect. I would just lay off the Sleeping Lion for awhile and keep posting fun facts or something like that. That would show many IMO your depth of character.

Others,

Maybe I am foolish for posting my opinion here as after reading I see I may have pissed off both Joel and Pinnacle in the same post. :shock::shock::shock::shock:

Nah. Takes a fair amount to piss me off, actually; Pinnacle had to work pretty hard -- both on and off the Forum -- to pull it off.

When people fear to post something lest it anger the powers that be, the forum is in deep trouble.

I think that fear is unfounded and Joel can be reasoned with. Everyone has their buttons and their limits. It's just that Joel's demeanor here is so benevolent until things reach a certain point and then the gloves come off.

It IS possible to disagree without being disagreeable after all.

Long way of saying: +1, jaysong, well said.

So, are you admitting that Pinnacle DID piss you off, and in retaliation you took it to a personal level, no longer debating the issues?

Just an inquiring mind.

Nah. I'm stating, quite clearly, that he managed to piss me off -- he worked pretty hard at it; see above. Of course not. I've been working very hard not to retaliate, and succeeding, just as I'm working very hard not to ask you -- just as an inquiring mind, you know -- the obvious sort of question that you're tempting me to.

Remember: Pinnacle took his own time out; he wasn't locked out.

I've been more than willing to discuss the issues -- including the issue of how much candor there's been in Pinnacle's (and others') pravda that they were only nagging me and Andrew about going on the radio out of their tender concern for Scott Treptow's welfare. In fact, I've been more than eager to discuss a lot of the issues -- how it came to be that there's been a scurrilous campaign to badmouth Rebecca Treptow, and what the source of that disgraceful campaign might have been, for example.

And I'm still willing to -- including the rhinocerous in the corner: who it is that's so upset at the public criticism of this particular bully cop, and why it is that they've got their panties all in a twist.

Retaliation would be, well, easy -- I could lock him out in about ten seconds, and, despite the temptation and his passive-aggressive personal attacks, have refrained. I'm not sure that I should be so patient, mind you, but there you have it.

I've been focusing on the issues; it's been difficult, granted, with all the behind-the-scenes nonsense that some folks have been engaging in, and which they cry crocodile tears when I notice, but I'll maintain.Of course.

Adios Pinnacle.

Your input will be missed.

And whats that?

I'm always surprised by these fights; we supposed to be having fun.

But the disposition of Friendy/Treptow could have implications for Minnesota Gun Law, and people who have worked for years on Minnesota Gun Laws are naturally going to have strong feelings and hopes about the case.

Pinnacle has unique knowlege of firearms and is very helpful to us, I respect his decision, and hope he will come back in the future.

I've made one post too many a couple of times myself, I'll have to work on it. Sometimes it's best to wait a day, because it's easy to start a fight, especially on the internet, and hard to end it. And I can't see it coming.

When you ask somebody a "have you stopped beating your wife" type of question -- as you did with me, with that "are you admitting . . . " silliness -- what's the obvious retort?

It's a very cheap rhetorical trick, and you really shouldn't do it.

There was no cleverness intended by my question, you answered it.

I certainly agree that there was no cleverness in such a cheap rhetorical trick; I don't agree that it wasn't an attempt at tweaking the site owner, as you know quite well that it was.... as are you, obviously. If you needed a demonstration that you can engage in a fair amount of passive-aggressive tweaking without getting banned, you've now gotten it.

You've also gotten, perhaps, that your own nose is eminently tweakable, as well.

It's entirely possible to disagree with me on just about anything without coming close to being banned from the board; given some of the folks around here, we get demonstrations of that pretty much every day.

There have also been some folks who have been under the impression that they're allowed to close off discussion here, and they've been shown to be wrong, as well.

On the other hand, the sort of dishonesty that some folks have engaged in -- saying one thing on the board while rather different things off of it -- is going to have be done very carefully without it coming back to haunt those folks who have done just that . . . not in terms of being banned, but in terms of being shown to have engaged in some pretty arrant hypocrisy.