Opinion of James Monroe (poster)

[John Dule]

One of the many users on this site who is in clear need of therapy and/or medication, and yet is allowed to continue to post solely for the amusement of others. If we wanted to, we could try to improve the lives of people like this by conditioning their continued use of this site on seeking the IRL help they desperately need, yet so many users here are content to just allow the status quo to persist. Mental health is a serious problem in this country, and especially on this site. We should not hesitate to publicly identify users who exhibit signs of mental health crises and communicate to them that they require help this site cannot provide.

I know I've been guilty of it at times myself, but I'm honestly so sick of the way this site collectively laughs at mentally ill people. It's not funny, it doesn't help them, and keeping them on this site to post their ramblings just degrades the quality of our forum. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

[John Dule]

Are we sure this particular case is something that can be chalked up to mental illness? James Monroe was always a low-quality, but pretty ignorable poster. I think what he's doing now is just an act for attention.

Otherwise, I agree that lolcow culture is one of the worst things to come from the internet. I'm guilty of it myself and at a few points have been a victim of it. In that respect, I'm much more selective about how much I share about my own life these days.

He’s been posting schizophrenic delusions for years now, beyond even garden-variety 9/11 truther stuff. His posts are often garbled gibberish which he says is due to dyslexia, but it seems to come and go, and his more outlandish posts are usually accompanied by more egregious grammar. I am not a mental health expert, but the way he goes through these conspiracy theory episodes periodically signals something more than dyslexia to me. Idk if others with more experience with this subject agree.

Regardless of the form of his posts, the content is truly disturbing.

[John Dule]

Listen, let me be clear about my motivation in joining the forum. When I was looking for a outgoing forum dedicated to talking electoral politics there was not much of a space of a community in which they were majority young, nor where there was a significant range of diversity in the political views from the user base. The echo chambers of DU and FR were the opposite direction of what I was searching for in a vibrate political forum.upon searching I stumble upon this place where there was a discussion about the voting results of the counties in the poster state. The content was unlike what I often encounter on the internet, which is just hostile rhetoric of everyone convincing you that voting for their side was the right decision. That is what led me to begin my journey on this beautiful forum we call home.

Now, over the years I will admit my posting style to be very combative, I’ll apologize for all those that I have offended. The primaries and getting into discussions on religion were going against my principles of what I was strieving for in a community. Just a sign of the polarizing times we live in. The Trump era has brought so much toxicity that it inflects so much of our daily lives. Just remember that at the end of the day we are all human, we all make mistakes that we come to regret upon further reflection. There were times where I became my worst enemy among my loved ones, never mind all the strangers here who I have not face in person. I have struggled with some form of anxiety and depression that has been untreated by health officials. Just remember to treat your stranger as if they were a lifelong friend. We should come into harmony more often rather than start wars with our fellow forum users.

Let me end this by saying thanks to everyone here who joined and help foster a political space that has been a pleasure to be part of. Thank you all!

Even if you are currently doing a trolling bit like most of us (and myself included) suspect, there is some real irony to a guy with Assad and Putin in their sig who’s making threads pushing their imperialist talking points about “Ukrainians being Nazis” and “Assad never gassed anyone” bemoaning how toxic U.S. political discourse has become

He's not a troll. Schizophrenic people are particularly susceptible to conspiracy theories like these.

[John Dule]

Listen, let me be clear about my motivation in joining the forum. When I was looking for a outgoing forum dedicated to talking electoral politics there was not much of a space of a community in which they were majority young, nor where there was a significant range of diversity in the political views from the user base. The echo chambers of DU and FR were the opposite direction of what I was searching for in a vibrate political forum.upon searching I stumble upon this place where there was a discussion about the voting results of the counties in the poster state. The content was unlike what I often encounter on the internet, which is just hostile rhetoric of everyone convincing you that voting for their side was the right decision. That is what led me to begin my journey on this beautiful forum we call home.

Now, over the years I will admit my posting style to be very combative, I’ll apologize for all those that I have offended. The primaries and getting into discussions on religion were going against my principles of what I was strieving for in a community. Just a sign of the polarizing times we live in. The Trump era has brought so much toxicity that it inflects so much of our daily lives. Just remember that at the end of the day we are all human, we all make mistakes that we come to regret upon further reflection. There were times where I became my worst enemy among my loved ones, never mind all the strangers here who I have not face in person. I have struggled with some form of anxiety and depression that has been untreated by health officials. Just remember to treat your stranger as if they were a lifelong friend. We should come into harmony more often rather than start wars with our fellow forum users.

Let me end this by saying thanks to everyone here who joined and help foster a political space that has been a pleasure to be part of. Thank you all!

Even if you are currently doing a trolling bit like most of us (and myself included) suspect, there is some real irony to a guy with Assad and Putin in their sig who’s making threads pushing their imperialist talking points about “Ukrainians being Nazis” and “Assad never gassed anyone” bemoaning how toxic U.S. political discourse has become

He's not a troll. Schizophrenic people are particularly susceptible to conspiracy theories like these.

The Nazis in Ukraine is not a conspiracy theory. It has been well documented by many news sources that span from the right and left sphere of the political spectrum.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/ukraine-has-nazi-problem-vladimir-putin-s-denazification-claim-war-ncna1290946

https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/29/europe/ukraine-azov-movement-far-right-intl-cmd/index.html

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/neo-nazis-far-right-ukraine/

Please seek help. Your mother and I are very concerned.

[John Dule]

For what it is worth, I dislike polls about posters, particularly problematical posters. It is humiliating. I understand it is a long standing Atlas tradition and I have no potential power to ban it, other than perhaps lobbying Virginia.

I think the current policy is fair: the subject of the poll has the final word as to whether it stays or gets deleted.

But yes, it is remarkable that approval polls about posters have always been allowed, when you think about it. Most online forums would never tolerate them, but Atlas is a unique place.

It's also remarkable that at least 50% of them are made by one poster who claims to be a devout Christian, and yet who has turned casting the first stone into a compulsion.

[John Dule]

I don't mind the polls.  They give me a sense of where I stand with the Forum.

I gave him an FF because he was willing to give deserved pushback for people who attacked him by suggesting he had mental health issues because he came back with a somewhat reinvented persona.  He explained it and it's a coherent explanation; people do come to massive shifts in their political outlook due to events. and due to the fact that political parties change over time, and that change can be fairly quick.

Attacking people by suggesting they have a mental health diagnosis that (A) they have no credentials to diagnose, and (B) often have no basis is something that should be addressed by the mods, far more than looking for Excessive Hyperbole in posters they disagree with.  If a poster is going through a rough spot there are ways to handle this without openly posting, and there are,  I'm sure, posters that may have a serious condition that are decompensating, and it shows in their posting.  If I'm worried about someone, I'll deal with this very privately.  I'll leave it at that.

This poster is a 9/11 truther and actively supports Russian genocide of Ukrainian civilians, but that's ok because he pushes back against mental health stigma. So important.