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David, I've spent a good hour and a half dealing with your charges against me, and this post is the last I'll send on the matter. Your email at least is courteous this time. If you can't see how it differs from the many posts you sent preceding it, there's no point in me explaining. Helpful that you at last say why Mark's post has been so important to you, but I persist in my view that it merely charts ways in which song and poem have been used, summing up rather than defining anything. It has nothing to say about their differences. So, in my view, it supports neither your argument nor mine. All I'd add is that there isn't, as you despotically claim, only one way of reading it - you're however as entitled to your view of it as I am to mine. But I'm still appalled at your behaviour merely because I had a different view to yours, or even because you thought, wrongly as it happens, that I'd changed my view. I don't even understand your last question. I apologised to the list because my post was so long and tedious and because the matter was trivial, and yes I do hold you at least partly responsible for the way this tedious matter has been drawn out. I was taking responsibility for my side in this quarrel. The apology was on my behalf. And I repeat it for this further message. I don't think anyone else would have found that hard to follow. You can make your own apologies. Or not. Jamie Sent from my iPhone > On 28 Oct 2016, at 18:17, David Lace <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > Jamie, you have made many points. I will try to deal with them. You say “I'm not commenting on whether you had reasons to quarrel with Geraldine but about the way you did so.” All I can say is in what way did I respond that was objectionable? You used her response to suggest that my criticism was in some way objectionable hence what you thought, presumably, was her justified response. So if you are now saying the reasons I quarrelled with her don’t matter, then show how the manner was objectionable. > > You then say “All this ghastly serious of attacks...” can you be specific. All I said was that you shifted position about Mark’s statement after causing much needless arguing, and that when this was pointed out to you, you made a plea to the list saying that I was being unreasonable and offensive to you, and how I was infringing the list's rules regarding good manners etc. > > You then say about Mark’s statement “You still haven’t explained why it has helped you to understand the differences between song and poem let alone why you saw at a “definition” which obviated any further discussion of the topic – in my view it merely lists various ways in which the two forms have been combined.” Why I liked his statement is because it made the point that songs are poems that have sometimes been sung and at other times been written to be sung—or words to that effect. This backed up my view that the two are the same. So to that extent it was a resolution to the discussion from my angle, and also a definition of sorts ie. it told us what a song and poem are. In the same way that the all definitions tell us what things are or mean. > > Regarding the emails sent to me by supportive people, you say “The “obvious reasons” you can’t mention them didn’t stop you publicising what was presumably written in confidence. I’m still foxed as to why they should apparently fear my annoyance.” Their content (apart from the one about you making a plea to the list, which I was given the ok to mention) is of course in confidence, other than to say that their tone was supportive. They don't want to remain anonymous out of fear. The fear thing I mentioned was to let you know that I have nothing to lose from crossing you, unlike others here who might fear you. > > You say “In your last you wrote “Most of the debates involving you in the past have resulted in you calling "foul" and making pleas to the list that the person you are confronting on any particular issue, and who you can't "put right" is being "unfair". (You have put three words in inverted commas as though they were my words.” I was only using quotes to show emphasis. I should have used italics. > > You say “You’re welcome to find the supposed incident, but I believe when you do you’ll see there were reasons for my protest which have nothing to do with the “petulance” of which keep accusing me”. You seem to be admitting that the incident happened because you say "there were reasons for my protest". But that they had "nothing to do with the “petulance” of which keep accusing me”. That’s what I’d like to find out. I can only go on how you are handling this current incident. > > You end your post with “Apologies to the list”. Why say this? Are you implying that it is my fault you feel the need to defend yourself against imaginary slights from me. > > > > > > > > ----------------Original Message------------------ > > Jamie McKendrick wrote: > > People can follow the thread with Geraldine if they can be bothered at 'This Place depresses me' April and maybe March 2016. I'm not commenting on whether you had reasons to quarrel with Geraldine but about the way you did so. > I don't actually think this is your normal way of behaving on the list, and I didn’t claim it to be so. Mostly you post odds and ends from the poetry world, and some of them have sparked off interesting discussions, so I’ve no quarrel with that. So only now and on that occasion have I made any objections to your behaviour. > > All this ghastly serious of attacks, then, because of your supposition that I have changed my view about Mark's post? What a weird obsession and how unbelievably petty. > If I had changed my view I see no harm in that. As it happens I haven't changed my view one jot, (I haven't seen 'the light') but I honestly believe you have misunderstood nearly everything I have written in response to it. I only responded to it because you insisted I ought to. I saw it and still see it as a humorous summary (and I didn't ridicule it in the least but commended its humour). I didn't claim it was "only a joke" or “wholly humorous”. I didn't say "he is obviously right". By asking "who's denying it's true?" (or words to that effect) I'm saying I'm not denying it. But then nor am I affirming it. To be honest I wasn’t especially interested in it but still can’t see why you should make it the pivot of the whole discussion. You still haven’t explained why it has helped you to understand the differences between song and poem let alone why you saw at a “definition” which obviated any further discussion of the topic – in my view it merely lists various ways in which the two forms have been combined. > I think this more than anything exposes your difficulty in understanding relatively straightforward statements in a conversational tone. (By which I mean with some irony and play.) There’s no harm in that, but there is if it sets in motion a whole aggressive way of responding. To take this point, which has already wasted so much time, any further would be worse than futile. But I do advise you if you want to pursue this, to print up my various responses and check with a friend whether you’ve understood them properly. > > Your response “And yes, those people who emailed me were real. And for obvious reasons I can’t mention them. And yes, according to one of them you did make a plea to the list a few years ago to cry foul and throw your toys out of the pram when you were losing an argument. I will now attempt to locate it in the archives, if only to settle the matter.” > > The “obvious reasons” you can’t mention them didn’t stop you publicising what was presumably written in confidence. I’m still foxed as to why they should apparently fear my annoyance. > In your last you wrote “Most of the debates involving you in the past have resulted in you calling "foul" and making pleas to the list that the person you are confronting on any particular issue, and who you can't "put right" is being "unfair". (You have put three words in inverted commas as though they were my words. Only the last of which I may have used, but you would need the context to see whether that was reasonable or not.) “Most of the debates” is now reduced to a single incident “a few years ago”, “people” has now become “one of them” – and you accuse me of dishonest debating tactics! > > I’ll ignore the rudeness of this. Even if “a plea...to cry foul and throw your toys out of the pram” doesn’t make a lot of sense syntactically and seems like the trolling idiom you find in some newspaper comment sections, I can figure out what you mean. The question remains whether it was because I was “losing an argument” or because I disliked the abusive nature of the argument, and you believe the first merely on hearsay, which is prejudicial to say the least. > You’re welcome to find the supposed incident, but I believe when you do you’ll see there were reasons for my protest which have nothing to do with the “petulance” of which keep accusing me. And if it’s only one incident why pretend that it is my repeated strategy? I repeat that I consider this a matter of importance, and with basic rules in place this whole annoying episode could have been avoided, and that the discussion could have gone ahead freely and without acrimony. > > David, I suggest we leave off this silly argument and return to the last question you raised, which was posed without any apparent animus, and to the discussion which all this has rudely interrupted. > > Apologies to the list, > Jamie