It works like this…a very public figure, James White, is obsessive about anyone criticizing him for any kind of theological or methodological disagreement they may have. So, when a lowly Facebook hangout like ours mentions White or any of his closest defenders, he has a supporter of his screenshot it, send it to him, and then he makes it public on his very public page. This intentionally increases the offense, signals victimhood, and solicits sympathy. Then – and this beats all – he claims that we are obsessed with him.
I woke up this morning with two posts about me/Pulpit & Pen from James White and so I thought, “Hmmm. How can I demonstrate what the reality is here?”
And so I did a video (above) and told the guys my plan (below).
Then, I went to a random word generator and had a random sentence made, and threw in the names of James White and Tom Buck, and a theological word to make it seem like it had something to do with theology. A screenshot of that is below.
Then, I made a nonsense post that means absolutely nothing, to watch the feigned and completely unnecessary outrage unfold.
There are close to 3 thousand members in my group and no one has liked or commented on the post all day because it means literally nothing. What is there to complain about? Or even opine about? It’s nonsense words just strung together. But…I know somebody who will screenshot it and take it to social media to use it as a club in their never-ending holy war against us. His name is Tom Buck.
- Insert Outrage.
- Take a screenshot (against our group rules) and flail it about publicly to signal your victim-hood while simultaneously saying “sic’em” to the pitbulls who love to attack for apparently no reason at all.
- Tag James White and pray he gets in on the fun.
- While taking a private thing and making it public, claim that we are the ones doing this for attention and not you.
- Obsess a little bit more. Repeat tomorrow.
Aaaaand….it worked (albeit Twitter, rather than Facebook). In the world of Twitter, once James White makes a comment and nods his head in a particular direction, his followers go to work. Now Twitter is a P&P bash-fest, fueled by Tom Buck and James White. We’re staying out of the whole mess, keeping our heads down and going about our work and haven’t tweeted out anything all day (which is typical).
Some thoughts from me.
For the record, I don’t like the back-and-forth either. But in James White’s universe, one is simply not allowed to disagree with him. While begging for civility in the kindest tones, he supports the type of juvenile behavior that stokes the furnace of immaturity on the Internet.
For the love of all that is pure and holy, please make it stop. Please stop hiding behind faux-maturity while encouraging your supporters and friends to engage in such juvenile antics while you keep your hands clean. If you want to discuss something substantive relating to the actual theological subject at hand, interact with my recent article on Hyper-Calvinism. Let’s all engage respectfully, without making everything about personalities.
While we recognize this website is very, very public, we’ve chosen not to post this in the Facebook group or on our Facebook page. Rather, we hope it sends a message that everybody needs to stop. For reals.
[Editor’s Note: *Well…James and the gang are keeping it up, still obsessing. So, I guess we’ll just throw this back up on the FB Page after all]
[Contributed by JD Hall]
