Now I remember what this reminds me of!!!

Saw this quoted elsewhere and it reminded me of a story a friend of mine did as a third-person look at certain pathological behaviors. We just called it 'The Gang Bar'....

I walk into a gang bar. Any gang bar. It will generally be filled with low-class violent, mentally-challenged types.

Say it's one with an artist in it - a poet I really respect and want to meet. He likes the place for the atmosphere - it helps him think. It doesn't really matter if he leaves - these gang types have adopted him as their poet - they'll follow him.

I have two choices when I walk in there. I can ignore the comments, the looks, the sneers. Or, I can take every one as a personal challenge, and fight everyone that even looks at me without respect. I can roll around on the filthy floor with one after another, or even all of them at once.

I may beat them, at least by my standards. I may get the better of them each time. Maybe I pin them, and while they're pinned, they may or may not cry uncle.

Or maybe I knock them out cold. Whatever the case, I beat them.

Except I don't. At least not in their eyes. Their goal was to get me dirty. To force me to roll around on the ground with them. To bruise me, tear my clothes, and generally mess me up. They don't care if I knock them out, they still figure they've won. They did what they wanted.

But I'm stuck and now I have to do it again. There is an endless stream of these morons, ready to fight me again, not accepting my victory conditions, or even that I've hurt them. To them, that's not the contest.

Meanwhile, I'm filthy, and spend a good portion of my time rolling around on the floor with the next moron.

Sure, I think it's fun that I can beat them. Show them my superiority. But it is slightly annoying that they never acknowledge that I've beat them. They never seem to realize that I'm much more skilled at fighting. They always use crude fighting techniques. They ignore my bruising punches, for weak little jabs of their own.

But, they always get me dirty. I'm never satisfied to just punch them once and move on, ignoring their weak little jabs, and stay relatively clean. Nope, every time they jab me I have to hit them back. Every single time. And after a few weak jabs and a few of my punches back, that's it, I'm rolling on the floor with them, as filthy as they are.

There are others in the bar that come to see the poet. They get the same looks, sneers, jabs that I do. The same flack from the gang members in the bar. Some of them are dressed as gang members, some aren't. But, there's one way you can tell the difference between the gang members and the other ones. The other ones aren't dirty.

Sure, they occasionally get tired of the comments, the hostile looks, the weak jabs. And sometimes they punch back - one quick, sharp punch, with good technique.

And, with that one punch, they win. They show that moron that they could beat them into unconsciousness if they wished, but it's not worth their time. They win in my eyes, with that one skillfully executed punch. They don't have to keep punching. All of us that are there to see the poet know that they've won.

And the funny thing? They've won with the morons too. Why? Because they aren't dirty. They didn't roll around on the floor in the filth. The morons keep giving them little jabs, but they easily ignore the morons, having shown that they've won to the only ones that count, the others there to see the poet.

Even the poet watches and judges us. All of us - the morons and those there to talk to him. What does he think? It's hard to tell. Maybe he notices the fights, or maybe he's busy with his poetry. But, we do know from past comments that he prefers us to keep clean.

But I can't. I can't resist jumping into the fight. I start with good intentions - the one punch that shows I could beat the morons if I wanted, but it ends up that's never enough. I get angry, or carried away. I have to get the last punch in, no matter how long it takes me, no matter how dirty I get. Every little jab they give me has to be answered. If I don't punch back, for some reason I feel that I haven't defended myself properly. I've let them get an unanswered punch in. I guess I am obsessed - because I can't allow that.

Sure, occasionally I force myself to not fight - to stay off of the floor - for a little while, just to show them I can. But, it doesn't fool anyone, even myself. After a little bit, I'm back there rolling on the floor with the morons - I have to be, they jabbed me, and I can't let them get away with that, can I?

Now it's getting to where the other ones there to talk to the poet see me as dirty so much of the time, that they've started ranking me with the morons. If I'm constantly rolling around in the filth with the morons, they don't really even notice any more that I'm much more skilled with my punches and technique than the morons are. I look the same to them. They laugh when I get up off of the floor, during one of the few times I'm not rolling around in the filth, and go sit next to the poet and try to be one of them again.

I give them all my excuses for why I roll around in the filth. I can't let those morons get away with jabbing me, can I? I can't just ignore them. I have to put them in their place.

They nod, and say they accept it, at least at first. But, eventually they don't even nod any more. They still watch me roll around in the filth, and move back from me when I come sit beside them and the poet to talk.

They just don't understand.

Or do they?

Can you say, "OffTopic"

Wow, you *really* missed the point of that, didn't you?

I mean, it was the first post in the topic--in a sense, it was the topic...if it was off topic, what is on?

Why are you ragging on me? Don't you have anything interesting to say?

You can't roll around and get dirty on the Internet. It's just electrons.

This is by far the most profoundly incisive post I have ever read in General.

I don't have any more words. Thank you, thank you, thank you for finding the words I could not even imagine to write. It's all so true.

/me sprays disinfectant onto forum webpages

I think quite a bit was said, oh dirty-rolling-on-the-floor person. Hint hint. Wink wink.

Analogy.

~Ulrika~

Who's the poet supposed to be? Philip Linden? @_@

Torley Torgeson

I only have one comment.

(that was it.)

Great read Cienna. (he says, getting up off the floor and brushing dirt away) There's a huge amount of truth in that. Thanks for the reminder.

Good stuff, Cienna.

-Ghoti

Oh..you can get VERY dirty on the internet!

I don't think you're trully unintelligent, so I have to assume you know a simile when you see one... Possibly I assume too much .

Actually, this post is giving you the benifit of the doubt Prok. You seem to have been cast in the role of the stranger walking into the rough bar, implying the rest of the forums are rabble. People less forgiving or polite might have cast you as the rabble.

And if a rough biker walks into a poet bar?

Biker dies.

Every time...

That was totally deep. *applauds*

He gets similied to death.

coco

Depends on if they're Beat poets, I s'pose.

-Ghoti

*rimshot*

Not to mention hot and sticky

*going out to get a life, BRB*

So let me get this straight:

In this bar you have a poet, some bikers, some poet wannabes, and someone who is believes he is none of them?

Hmm, this is Second Life so I am:

A giant fox/robot/demon with wings and a laser-eye dressed in a g-string dancing around going ^v^v^ HooWWWwwlllzzzzzzzzzzzzzz ^v^v^

And you thought you got dirty rolling on the ground.

--Jack Lambert

Prokofy, you have annoyed some people in SL enough that they will *never* forgive you no matter what you do.

But others are more forgiving. You have some culpability for how people treat you. Using griefing and forum alts won't help. But being nicer to people would.