"Shut The Hell Up": On Bloggers Who Ban

I gotta say. I laughed my way through another Mountain Dew sinus wash when I read Ben Holder's comeback to some heavy-as-lead-bait Sue Polinsky dropped in a thread over at Joe Guarino's.

I've wanted to say that to Dr. Sue FOR YEARS.

I found it ironic in that Ben's come-back is essentially what some of Sue and her big-gun GSO blogging friends have been saying (in one form or another) to those of us who do not tote their water for at least the duration of my time in their "community" of like-minded friends.

My life and practice in my hometown were destroyed (unfairly and illegally) in full view of my family and friends. Our systems of medical and legal oversight are beyond corrupt, our journalists have sold out to the highest bidder, and I have been banging my head against the wall FOR OVER A DECADE. So I came to the blogosphere (at JR's invitation) for help.

But instead of help, I'm supposed to, "Get a life.", "Do something productive.", "Get some (psychiatric) help.", "Tell it to Bledsoe.", "Move on.", "Get over it".

Cone, local blogger-king and journalistic scion of the family whose name adorns the hospital that owns the practice that employs the physician I rescued that fateful night (and does a lot of over & under the radar cancer & coronary "business" with Randolph Hospital), cannot be bothered to use whatever influence he/his family may have to help get to the bottom of the matter.

Of course, Cone & company "wish us well". But let's review why I have a hard time believing that: "Whack-job", "Mouth-breather", "Bat-shit crazy", "Malignant Narcissist", "Liar", and (everyone's favorite), "Troll".

That, and I'm still sitting here three years after diving into the blogosphere, trying to get someone in the mainstream press to apply some heat to some local seats. What have these people actually DONE to CHANGE anything?

My last name may be Johnson, and I might be a young professional woman victimized by a bunch of rich white men, but I'm apparently not the right color.

And here's the message that goes along with the big freeze, "After you do (get over it/move on/etc.), could you possibly get all lathered up over what we want you to get lathered up over . . . i.e. the agenda of the "Pulpit forum", the TRC, that "racist" police chief David Wray, getting our hands on public records for the simple pleasure of reading (but you didn't have the right to see the PUBLIC financial records you requested from a "non-profit" during discovery), saving the War Memorial Auditorium, yadayadayada."

Along those same lines, for years, I've been begging medical blogging big-gun (Kevin MD), to link my blog. It hasn't happened because my blog conveys an ugly story that the corporate types now running medicine (and sponsoring Kevin's blog) do not want to get out to the masses: The White Wall exists . . . and doctors on the wrong end of a whistle might as well eat it. Medicine eats its young. Public service is a joke, and (especially in rural areas) is a revolving door. The regulatory & law enforcement agencies that are supposed to protect us (doctors and patients) do not protect us. And patients caught in the middle are dog-meat.

The medical blog aggregators these days are like our local newspapers. It's not about reporting news - it's about controlling it. It's not cool for a local hospital to admit it screwed up. Might be bad for business to admit badness.

The trouble with that line of thought is that people talk and know better and no one really "trusts the care you can trust". It's like that great Dumbledore line from Harry Potter: "What happened between you and Voldemort in the dungeon is a secret . . . so naturally everyone knows."

Everyone who knows anything about medicine in Asheboro knows Dr. Mary Johnson was done very wrong . . . and the hospital brass got away with it because everybody in a position of leadership or oversight in our mill town is in everybody else's pocket.

It's bad enough that Kevin has sold out to the suits for a smooth ride and good press. But I was banned at Medgadget, when I questioned . . . after a hospital CEO walked away with two of their annual medical blogging awards . . . the methodology of their poll. Turns out they don't have much of a methodology (at least for determining who is voting) . . . and they didn't really want to talk about or examine it. I was raining on the parade of deserving winners. My issues (as a medical blogger shoved to the side-lines by Kevin and his corporate friends . . . in other words, a "looser") were "personal problems".

Kevin & company want to pull back that veil. But only so far.

As a disgusted Randolph County reader of the N&R . . . saying that FOX news (or anybody else) buying the N&R and showing John Robinson, Allen Johnson and the rest of that race-baiting crew the door CANNOT HAPPEN FAST ENOUGH FOR ME . . . got me banned at JR's. Please note I did not call JR a name. I did not make any threats. I expressed an honest opinion . . . based on years of being treated like dirt by people who could help but won't.

Badge of honor.

When this year's subscription runs out, my Mother (sick of the treatment her daughter has gotten from the local press) plans to cancel her long-time subscription to my Father's hometown newspaper.

It begs the question, how many "ordinary" nobodies can cancel their subscriptions before there is more blood on the walls in JR's newsroom?

Now, Bubba has been banned at Cone's. It was a long time coming. In my opinion, it's a gift-in-disguise (and a challenge) to Bubba. My thoughts on the banning (as it relates to local trends) are published at Bubba's.

But I will say this. In light of all the flowery talk (from what Bubba calls "the usual suspects") about "free speech" and "transparency" and "accountability", banning commentary (in essence, banning people and their voices/ideas) is the exact opposite of what I was under the impression blogging was supposed to be about.

It's fine to moderate. It's fine to maintain blogrolls (although if you are one of the local big guns and you say you're about "community" and being "inclusive", you need to INCLUDE people rather than EXCLUDE them). It's fine to say, if you can't sign your name (even a fake) one, (1) you probably shouldn't be saying it and (2) it won't get published on my blog. It's fine to delete commentary that is offensive (i.e. bad language or threatening in tone), and say you've deleted it. But banning people from saying something before you even know what they're going to say . . .

. . . well, that's just wrong (not to mention as corporate & big-brother as one can get).

It's saying "SHUT THE HELL UP!".

And please note WHO in our local blogosphere is saying it.

3/3 Update: JR moves quickly to justify his actions. Which aren't really justifiable (note that Cone chimes in to justify his own). Hitting below the belt to get to a "higher plane" never is. But we'll get to that with post number 700.

Yes indeed, it's been 700 posts since JR invited me into the blogosphere . . . with the promise of something new and different in journalism.

It turned out to be the same old thing.

3/3 PM Update: The Mother of the GSO blogosphere chimes in at JR's. As she gears up for another "Convergence", "reaching out" includes congratulating JR and Cone for banning bloggers she doesn't like, and trimming feeds.

I've got news for Dr. Sue. I would say the same things to her face that I've said to her in these blogs. Indeed, if Sue had used a small portion of the time that she's spent trimming feeds and/or mis-diagnosing people online (the reference to the Arrington post is ironic in that I could wax poetic all day on the trauma her classic, beyond-mean-spirited knife-in-the-sternum might have caused to a less-healthy psyche) to direct more people/bloggers to Dr. Mary (instead of away from her), she might have actually changed a situation and a life for the better.

She might be "relevant'.

As it is, she needs to go vote for Edwards or something.