Suicide by moderator

[Rocinante]

Not cross but crossposting.

CycleChat

[Archived]

Anyone who values truth will have difficulty living a lie, so here goes: my name isn't Ian Onabike.*

I'm addicted to cycling forums. After a spell at Cycling Plus (and before that uk.rec.cycling), in 2005 I started Another Cycling Forum. That lasted about three years and remains parked in a nostalgic orbit.

Next came Not Another Cycling Forum, natch. My main project these days is slowly interviewing people. It's fun, interesting, and just my speed.

Until I was serially banned,** mostly due to my inquisitive nature as regards gender ideology — the free speech issue of our time — I also posted on other forums, chiefly CycleChat and YACF.

What makes NCAP (NACA for old-timers) attractive is the lack of moderation. This is rare.

It's obvious what my specialist subject is. I can talk politics at many, many other places if I want to; being 'gender critical' on a cycling forum has been pretty much verboten, making this an itch I needed to scratch, though technically on a cycling adjacent forum. I also had it in mind to give moral support to AuroraSaab after the appalling way she was treated by Multitool and Monkers. Multitool in particular was almost certainly responsible for a number of decent people leaving before he went back to YACF or wherever he usually indulges his social media Tourettes. Nazi! Fascist! Cunt!

I could've carried on, but it's not as much fun hiding in plain sight as you might think. This isn't a flounce, it's suicide by moderator. I must assume they won't be merciful. Dear mods: at least I never called you names.

It's a shame. Despite my avowal that I don't care about Trump, as an American with relatives who voted for him and relatives who despise him, I'd happily offer myself up once more as a sacrificial American. While I still can!

So this is probably adiós. I'll be under house arrest back home, if anyone wants to chat.



Rocinante was of course Don Quixote's old horse. I feel like him sometimes. It's also a spaceship in one of my favourite sci-fi shows.

*A real Ian: I told you so.
**Mo' meta blues


That skull ↓ was my way of saying goodbye on the main site.

[close]

YACF

Anyone who values truth will have difficulty living a lie, so here goes: my name isn't Ian Onabike.

I am addicted to cycling forums. After a spell at Cycling Plus (and before that uk.rec.cycling), in 2005 I started Another Cycling Forum. Ring a bell? That lasted about three years and remains parked in a nostalgic orbit.

The natural progression was Not Another Cycling Forum. My main project these days is slowly interviewing people. It's fun, interesting, and just my speed.

Until I was serially banned, mostly due to my inquisitive nature as regards gender ideology — the free speech issue of our time — I also posted on other forums, chiefly here and CycleChat, where I also offered myself up as a sacrificial American and have likewise made a confession.

Reregistering was an itch I needed to scratch. Unfortunately I couldn't scratch itches aplenty in the politics board, as that probably would've led to me being shown the door pronto by Messrs. Jeffreys and Hilberry. When you say in the registration agreement "Before you post, think about the kind of forum you want", which some may recall was my catchphrase, I know that what I want – a forum where opinions such as mine aren't beyond the pale – isn't what you want.

Hello and probably goodbye to LittleWheelsandBig, a nice guy who once did me a kindness, and fellow bicycle fount of knowledge Rogerzilla, even as he reduces me to a negligible footnote. Also Steph, whose living room I once crowded into with the early gang of FNRttCers. I've still got those French tapes. It's a shame we speak completely different languages now.

A number of YACFers would make fine candidates for 20 Questions,* even those who I know aren't fans.

Spoiler

*Nobody's keeping count.

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Rocinante was of course Don Quixote's old horse. I feel like him sometimes.

PS. No need to report to moderator, I've already done it.

[close]

[Shortfall]

Dunno if you can see this?  Seems like it's not as user friendly as Cycle Chat or I'm being a bit thick?  Anyway, what's up?

[Rocinante]

Hi there. I, and everybody who's anybody, can see you fine.

The software CC uses is very good. Problem is the cost. When you're in it for the money, and do well, that's not an issue. Simple Machines is a bunch of guys presumably doing it for the joy of programming.



"What's up?" is a question I'll have to ponder. Things move at a slower pace here...

[Rocinante]

"What's up?" is a common, informal English greeting that means "How are you?", "What is happening?", or "What are you doing?". It is often used as a casual, friendly way to say "hello" rather than a direct question requiring a detailed answer, with common replies being "not much" or "just chilling".

According to my haematologist in a recent phone consult, my MGUS [Monoclonal Gammopathy of Undetermined Significance] numbers aren't. Up, that is. Light chains ratio stable, too. I am north of my fighting weight. Having a tooth capped later this week. Probably not getting enough REM sleep.

Tried going for a ride earlier, but by the time I finished installing new front brake pads and doing all the usual little things one does to prepare, including distractions, it had started to rain.

Car getting its MOT next month. Tyres won't need changing like I thought. Kitchen being redone by the landlord this summer, against our will. They think it needs updating; I think they just want more rent.

Chompsky, who's 10½ years old now, doesn't see as well as he used to. Startles extra easily. I posted a video of him in the Pets board on the main CC site yesterday. If you dig around, you'll see he also made an appearance on the politics board towards the end of '24.



Isabel was last seen in her garden (and what a garden!), Ian having a flashback of Christopher Walken cooking octopus, Hamilton remembering a friend, Melissa watching tennis, Alan rolling his eyes, and Rich nmcal footumch.

What's up with you?

[Shortfall]

Working well beyond my expected retirement but sort of enjoying it. 
I was thinking more about your recent departure from the other p!ace.  It didn't seem to make a.lot of sense.

[Rocinante]

Ah, that. I'll get back to you later today. Meanwhile some hold music.

[Rocinante]

I was thinking more about your recent departure from the other p!ace.  It didn't seem to make a.lot of sense.

As in senseless, or inexplicable? I'd say the answer my friend is blowing in the wind, but that's not very helpful, is it.

First some history.

I became aware of CycleChat shortly after its launch in 2005, when it was struggling to achieve critical mass. ACF was going great guns at the time. As the Cycling Plus forum was faltering (before my blink-and-you'll-miss-it tenure as admin), Shaun started a quiet recruitment drive to his new venture. We even spoke briefly about it, but I can't for the life of me remember what was said. Competition was in the air.

My impression was that he wasn't really into cycling. He approached his forum like a business. No quirkiness that I could detect; just singleminded eye on the prize.

My forum was a labour of love. I was emotionally attached. Well, you know how that can go. It went.

At some point, I don't know exactly when, I then registered at CycleChat. I wasn't shy about confessing my quirks. Eventually I annoyed Shaun enough for him to bar me from NCAP's precursor Society Culture & Politics, though he stopped short of exorcising me from the site. That happened in 2021, triggering most of the content of this corner of NACF, me being an inveterate forumspotter.

I registered again the following year, immediately turning myself in. Didn't even get a thanks.

Two years later Slow Horse made it through and lasted a week on the politics forum before getting rumbled by Multitool Mein Tool.

Sure Jan. (Don't try to understand everything, just roll with it.)

Enter Ianonabike last September. He got fast tracked into NCAP after telling a mod he'd been on the BikeRadar forum, which was true. I saw no need to mention that I'd rarely contributed.

When Ian H mentioned the real me I gulped, but it didn't spark an investigation of the sort which dogs Monkers. Over the next five months I said pretty much what I wanted to say, given the constraints of not wanting to out myself again.

Then it was time to move on. The last thing I did was PM TheDoctor, another mod, with a link to my NCAP post and some Final Words, which were the furthest thing from Ha Ha.

I can live without discovering whether or not "Ian" was indeed banned as expected. There was a satisfying if rather belated channeling of Groucho Marx.

Spoiler

Having said that, in the unlikely event I haven't in fact been banned, I probably would go back for the pure fun of it. Moving on doesn't always mean leaving.

[close]

[Shortfall]

Thanks, that lends some.context.  Well I'll miss your contributions in NCAAP and I know Aurora will miss your support (She's amazing isn't she?). Maybe I'll stick around here for a bit.

[Rocinante]

She's a one woman Prosecco Stormfront. (I mean that in a good way.)

Prosecco Stormfront is used as a casual slur against MN specifically by certain types of smug left leaning people. It's yet another tactic deployed to reject what women are saying without having to dirty their ears hearing what that actually is. Another way for them to lie to themselves that of course they'll listen to women, just not that sort of woman.

Sound familiar? Gives me another chance to haul this out:

The five stages of victory
"A handy guide to tracking how gender ideologues are coping"

Nothing I can say about the violent [my link – here's another], fetishistic narcissism at the heart of trans activism is half as persuasive as what trans activists say themselves. Every time they speak, they make it harder for all but the most gender-addled politicians to continue insisting that every “transwoman” is a vulnerable sweetie nobly coping with the tragic, albeit puzzlingly metaphysical, disability of having been born looking exactly like a man.

[Rocinante]

I see my ad in the Classifieds (copied from a real eBay listing) resulted in my old frame landing in not one, but two baskets:



Paging King Solomon.

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