Hi Michelle Malkin,
There's a social network called Ravelry.com. It's for knitters. It's a website where knitters can search for patterns, yarn and stores to buy these things from. The social network also has discussion groups to fit many different interests. We had a few conservative groups on that website. One of the groups was called The Bunker. It was for unapologetic, sassy, conservatives to talk about knitting projects and current events. The group was originally to support John McCain in the election, but when Obama won, it became The Bunker, for us to deal with the next four years.
Well, the liberals on Ravelry did not like us from the time the John McCain group was created until now. There is a sort of kudos system for the discussions and liberals would always stop by to click the kudos that says "disagree." If one of our family members died from cancer, they'd click the kudos that says "funny." The liberals would harass the site owner, Casey Forbes, about our discussion group. Despite the owner complimenting our moderators on their fine job moderating our group, he decided to close the group down and blame our moderators. Meanwhile, the liberals still continued to troll other conservative groups to their hearts' desires, and all complaints about them were dismissed.
One member tried to negotiate with Casey Forbes privately. The liberals caught wind of this and one went as far as to find out where her kids go to school and threaten the lives of her children. We gave up negotiations.
Although many have given up on Ravelry as a place to voice our opinions, we have still used the website to search for patterns, yarn and ask knitting related questions. Today, when we tried to log on, we came to find out that we've all been banned and suspended.
http://www.ravelry.com/banned
"Your account has been suspended until further notice. Please direct inquiries to Craig at legal@ravelry.com."
One member who happened to miss the ban, happened to find this gem on their boards:
"
A group of users have been organizing together on another website and visiting Ravelry directly from it, disrupting normal site activities. All users of that particular site have had their Ravelry accounts (including any duplicate accounts) suspended until further notice. This is a serious action that we felt needed to be done to protect the Ravelry community.
All inquiries can be directed to legal@ravelry.com."
We do have an offsite Bunker now and we do discuss what happened and continues to happen at Ravelry. However, there are liberal groups on Ravelry who have offsite groups as well. The only thing Bunker members can be accused of is daring to link to forums on Ravelry, reading them and disagreeing with discussions. Considering how many people on this planet link to Ravelry and how many people disagree with discussions, this should not be considered "disrupting normal site activities." Once again, Casey Forbes is making excuses for the fact that he just doesn't like conservative people on his website.
This is getting very much disgusting. I'm one of the youngest Bunker members. Many of our members are mothers or grandmothers and are completely harmless. We've all been discriminated against because we think and believe differently.
Thank you for your time,
Melissa
ETA: March 24th. For anyone who happens upon this page, there is some very interesting proof of the treatment of Ravelry towards one of the banned members. It should prove as enlightening to anyone who thinks the banning was due to behavioral problems and was completely justified.
click here
Caraboo posted on Mar 14, 2009
| views: 3449
Comments
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anonymous said on Mar 16, 2009....
(LOVE) 1,000,000 You're not alone - I was also banned, as was my MIL, WHO NEVER ONCE GOT INVOLVED IN ANY POLITICAL DEBATE. She was banned because I logged onto my account from her computer LAST YEAR. I'm okay with them banning me - but banning people because they associate with me is down right nasty. -
Janedoe said on Mar 17, 2009....
If you were a nasty troll or a slobbering Obummer lover, none of this would have happened. /sarc
Noodle
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anonymous said on Mar 17, 2009....
I was banned as well--I have never posted in any political forum, nor do I belong to any political groups. My sister visited here over Christmas, and used my computer. She is banned, and I can only assumed that I am banned as well due to my association with her. I have emailed Ravelry to ask why I can no longer access my projects (and the PDF files I purchased from them). I have received no answer so far. My 13 year old daughter, who is not permitted to visit the forums, and uses Ravelry for finding new toy patterns to make, has been suspended as well. Neither of us needs to be on Ravelry, but some notice, and the opportunity to download the items I have purchased would have been nice. I would love an answer from Ravelry as to why our accounts have been suspended. Until I hear back from them, I will assume it is because we are related to a member whose political views do not 100% mirror the views held by the owner of the site. -
anonymous said on Mar 17, 2009....
it's terrible, and disgusting. It's not just because some people are conservative, or liberal, in my opinion..but if you have ever voiced displeasure over Nobama, you seem to have the big target on your back. I was an administrator of the NObama group there, and it was crazy how some were allowed to treat 'us' and I even asked TPTB to delete the group to try & cut down on some of the 'hate' that seemed to be posted with little that we could do (unless we wanted to be on the group every minute of the day), etc. what kills me is some can say they support our troops but not the war, but if we ever say we support our country but not the current president, that means we are a bigot or racist. it has all turned into this love fest for these young people that seem to have created a great website, eventhough their political views are somewhat....I don't know...questionable???...and I hate it turned into that. They put on their pants one leg at a time, like the rest of us. I, for one, am sick of the fan fare. -
anonymous said on Mar 17, 2009....
as one of those grandmothers, actually a great-grandmother, who has enjoyed belonging to the society known as the Bunker, I can attest to not only our harmlessness but our having been harassed, in some cases, to the extreme. This was a case of those who do not toe the political correct line {a term I despise due to the implication that if one is not politically correct, they're in the wrong..which is clearly not the case} being told, "we won, get over it" as bluntly as can be done. -
anonymous said on Mar 17, 2009....
I know this may come as a shocking revelation, but Ravelry is a free service with a set Terms of Service you agreed to when you joined. I'd suggest that if you didn't like their rules not to return but they seem to have fixed that issue for you. -
Caraboo said on Mar 18, 2009....
Their Terms of Service would be useful if it were written in a tangible manner and they didn't make up reasons to penalize members as they go along. Nobody who was banned broke the rules.
I'm actually a bit disappointed. I was hoping he would serve me court papers as well. I would love to see him explain to a judge exactly what I did wrong. I'm not afraid of the truth and if I go against someone, I prefer to be obvious.
When it comes right down to it, the website is more a playground for his friends than an actual business. He's wanted us to go for a long time and rather than do it in one fell swoop, he did it in many chops to make himself look like he's only defending himself. I wish he had the testicular fortitude to not hide behind real estate lawyers and actually speak directly to people. If he wanted(which he did not) to resolve issues with anyone, he could have done it on an individual basis. From what I have read, we were considering inviting him to our message board until we realized he just doesn't care.
Oh, and nice to see you've found my blog. I was starting to think your group was slipping. -
anonymous said on Mar 18, 2009....
Wow, you think he should have served your court papers? For what? That would be SUCH a valuable use of your US court system, for sure. Why not have EVERYONE in charge of a private website serve their problem members with court papers? That way, instead of dealing with them in an efficient manner, you can clog up the court system, waste even more taxpayer money, and show that people on the internet are more interested in finding out that their "rights" don't extend to violating the terms of service as outlined by the provider of a private website. That way, when the child pornographers get taken to court for violating the criminal law over the internet, they can then use your logic to argue that their service provider's terms of service don't apply to them because they have the right to do whatever they want. That's awesome. Good for you. -
Caraboo said on Mar 18, 2009....
Child pornography is against the law. Period.
What we were accused of, we didn't even do. The only thing we are guilty of is being conservative and being members of the Bunker.
He closed our group, pushing us to either start a new group where we can act like RINOs for approval or go to our own message board. We went to our own message board and he approved of this. Not even knowing what goes on at our message board, he banned us.
If you even want to compare this to pedophilia(omg what the hell is wrong with you?), this would be like as if Casey ran a website encouraging illegal pornography then said, "Well, your type of illegal pornography is causing too much trouble, so you'll have to go elsewhere." Then the members go elsewhere for their pornographic discussion, but remain members of Casey's website for the rest of their pornographic needs, and he decides to ban them anyway.
Hey, you brought up the porn, not me.
Casey caused his own problems, not us. If he's going to say he's low on staff, then he needs more volunteer support. It's not that difficult to obtain. People do this all over the internet, just to have something to add to their resumés.
Any traffic that may have come from the Bunker's offsite does not compare to the general traffic of the board. Regardless of any statements Casey has made, he never gave warning and he never gave information as to what exactly each member has done. If he can't even provide us information as to how our behavior is "vile," then we have no reason but to accept he is prejudiced against conservatives.
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Caraboo said on Mar 18, 2009....
No. My cousin was molested by her stepfather. How fucking dare you.
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anonymous said on Mar 18, 2009....
To anonymous (the loony one) - I'm surprised... thought you people thrived on clogging up the the court system with frivolous lawsuits and defending pornography. Of course, hiding behind "anonymous" is typical. Tammy -
legal_gal said on Mar 19, 2009....
I'd like to know if this is the same way you treat your friends if you're invited to visit them. Do you go to their houses, insult their spouses, get drunk, vomit all over their living room, and then expect that they'll be excited about you wanting to come back? Likely not, so why do you think that someone who has a privately-owned website - where they are not charging a membership fee, and which they can close at any time - should let you do whatever you want, piss other people off, and then give in to your childish demands because you're threatening to say they're mean by enforcing their own rules? It's not a public venue; they can make and change their rules at any time, and the only right you have is to choose whether you sign up or get out. Happily, they have made that choice for you. -
anonymous said on Mar 19, 2009....
Your tags have officially brought the funny. You complain about censorship yet you've deleted several comments posted here. Irony, you slay me. -
anonymous said on Mar 20, 2009....
"Your tags have officially brought the funny. You complain about censorship yet you've deleted several comments posted here. Irony, you slay me."
It's her blog. She can do whatever she wants to just like Casey, right?
Quit your whining.
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anonymous said on Mar 20, 2009....
I think it is very obvious just how immature and stupid you people are. Look at the tags you've added to someone else's blog post. Grow up. By the way, I'm on Ravelry, and I'm ashamed with the people who run it and the people in my own political group who have behaved like complete jerks. You did stalk, harass, threaten, and belittle these people - the posts here are PROOF. You're sore winners and you're also sore losers. People behaved badly on both sides, and only one side was silenced. To add insult to injury, these people aren't allowed to defend themselves or express their anger at being dumped by people with no evidence of wrong-doing. Now there is an active smear campaign going on by the people who run Ravelry and lies are being told to cover up the bad and impulsive decision made to ban them. These people are hurting right now, and instead of taking the high road, you people have gone out to all of their blogs and poured salt in an open wound. I'm ashamed to be associated with any of you. -
Caraboo said on Mar 20, 2009....
Thank you for the supportive anonymous posters.
I avoided reading anymore of this because after the pedophile statement, I just could not bring myself to read anymore. I did delete two comments. I did it because it was redundant and nonconstructive. We did follow the rules and anyone who would say otherwise either has been listening to what Casey and their friends say, or is a part of the group that was set out to destroy us in the first place. And anyone can say, "Well, it's Casey's website and he could do whatever he wants with it." However, many of the members he banned have lost money due to this banning and he might have to answer for that. Also, I am quite certain if one of you were suddenly banned from Ravelry, MySpace, Facebook or any other website without warning and were sent a form email, accusing you of being disruptive, telling you they have proof that they will not show you and then tell everyone on their website that your emails to them were nasty, you would not be quiet about it.
That said, one great thing about this experience is that it has brought all Bunker members, the outspoken ones and the quiet ones, closer together. While there may have been 30 comments a day on Ravelry's Bunker, our offsite has thousands of comments a day. In banning us, the Rubberneckers and their ilk have ensured that we will become more proactive in our political concerns and never stray towards the leftist path. I know I was once a moderate. I don't see myself being one again for a very long time.
I'm going to leave all anonymous comments up from this day forth. The world should have to see its Ravelry members for who they really are.
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