How lenient should we be to lies?

[temporal1]

In the world, my understanding is, it’s ok+legal to use more than one name, nicknames are common, as long as - -
it’s done with no illegal intent.

There are times when one is asked for every name used, example, passport applications, forwarding USPS mail, etc.

Claiming one’s own death surely must push boundaries. Moral, if not legal.

Like R7ehr, i’m not certain of anything. i respect mods’ and members’ observations.

Possibly unlike many, i received PMs and emails from MPC that reflected a chatty non-forum (critical) persona; no good ol boy style. contact eventually ended, so to speak. Not wrt death. He referenced his PC wife often. My parting “feeling” was he’d used me to some extent, then, having established himself (esp with Robert) departed. Where he’d been critical of Robert, and others, after i urged him to give the forum time, he then found him useful. As it seemed.

Robert isn’t here to deal with this. i’m not sure how he would respond to it. he would be hurt.

i cannot imagine a motive for this sort of behavior.
however, these sorts of things happen. compulsions to deceit. often tied to theft/other. not always.

Ian Roberts is a high profile example.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?t=8339

[JohnH]

While i find it plausible that JohnL and MaxPC could be the same person, I find it equally plausible that out of a million senior Appalacian men, two of them could quite simply be drawn to Mennonet.
And if we did take two religious senior men from rural Appalacia, who share a curiosity about conservative Anabaptists, and forums, it might follow that they are both sometimes forgetful, and share other characteristics and interests as well.
And the fact that MaxPC wanted to foster the illusion of a community of Plain Catholics, isn’t evidence that the next elderly person is MaxPC.

All that to say, I am not convinced either way. Either way.
I did take MaxPC more or less at face value on most of his stuff, and even though I didn’t and don’t believe the illusion that he wanted to propagate about Plain Catholics being a widespread phenomenon, he may have simply been exaggerating.

MaxPC claimed to be British, not Appalachian.

All available evidence has pointed to them actually being located in Georgia, although I guess technically the northwest part of that state is Appalachian.

[temporal1]

Scotland, as i recall.
i thought he/his family was mainly in Tennessee?
Wasn’t he impacted in the big fire (in the Dolly Parton area?) Pigeon Forge?

2016 / Campground Ramblings
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?t=44

Yes indeed; the tragedy is especially difficult as most of the businesses in Gatlinburg are family businesses and the sole source of income for many. My wife knows the city manager who also lost her home in the fires and so we have a connection of friendship. The mayor lost his too.

Dollywood is the largest employer and they make it a point to hire only locals as Dolly Partin wanted to provide jobs for "her people" in the mountains. Until Gatlinburg and Dollywood created a tourism industry, the poverty and substance abuse problems in that area were rampant. As one individual was quoted: "We're a tough people. We'll rebuild."

You can keep on top of their breaking news at this link.
http://www.wbir.com/mb/news/local/gatli ... /357912872

2016. It doesn’t seem that long ago.

[Neto]

While i find it plausible that JohnL and MaxPC could be the same person, I find it equally plausible that out of a million senior Appalacian men, two of them could quite simply be drawn to Mennonet.
And if we did take two religious senior men from rural Appalacia, who share a curiosity about conservative Anabaptists, and forums, it might follow that they are both sometimes forgetful, and share other characteristics and interests as well.
And the fact that MaxPC wanted to foster the illusion of a community of Plain Catholics, isn’t evidence that the next elderly person is MaxPC.

All that to say, I am not convinced either way. Either way.
I did take MaxPC more or less at face value on most of his stuff, and even though I didn’t and don’t believe the illusion that he wanted to propagate about Plain Catholics being a widespread phenomenon, he may have simply been exaggerating.

I personally tend to think that Max was projecting wishful thinking, hoping that if there really WERE Catholics who were interested in living an idyllic lifestyle similar to his concept of Amish life, that they might also be lurking on MennoDiscuss, and might contact him. This could then possibly result in a real 'Plain Catholic community', even if they weren't able to all live physically close to one another. I can attest to the fact that there are indeed Catholics who live very simply (in isolated rural or river communities in Brazil), but they do not dress at all like the Amish (as the website Max pointed to depicted).

I do believe that Max really was a Catholic - his defense of Catholicism would have been exhausting if it was all just a made-up persona. As far as inconsistencies that others on MD (and here on MennoNet) observed, from what little experience I have had with Catholics, it is anything but 'monolithic'. I would further suppose that even an educated British Catholic could not feasibly know everything about Catholicism in all of its forms, in ever country and small communities within those countries. (As I mentioned before, my own clash with him was in reference to what I termed 'Folk Catholicism' in North East Brazil. One of my sisters-in-law is from Polish Catholic heritage, and I visited in her parents' home, and will say that their practice was very different from those 'spiritist' Catholics in Forteleza. Then in Bible college I had a friend who came from Dutch Catholic background. Different again.

Rather than making accusations about individual members, if it's really that important, then the Admins here should add a requirement that every new participant fully identify themselves (at least to the Admins) before they would be allowed to participate. And so we should all have our accounts locked until we have ourselves complied with the new rule. (I am a member on at least one forum that DOES require that everyone use their real name.)

I'll start. I am Ernest Buller, and here are some links to an article on which my wife & I collaberated:

https://daneverettbooks.com/wp-content/ ... verett.pdf
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/a ... 086/466199
https://rrg.caset.buffalo.edu/infostruc ... Acknow.pdf
https://www.jstor.org/stable/1265693
http://roa.rutgers.edu/files/121-0496/r ... verett-RTF
https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... ucture_in_
https://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstre ... sAllowed=y
https://theswissbay.ch/pdf/Books/Lingui ... 0%28Dixon%
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/server/a ... 2a/content

etc. (Not multiple different articles, mostly just references to a single article, and at least one unpublished work. I didn't look at it all closely. I'm not bragging, just putting this up here to show how an educator might be able to prove their identity w/o disclosing anything that is not already available on-line.)

[temporal1]

i agree, Neto.
if i’m mistaken or have misspoken, i’m sincerely sorry.

because i know i’m easily deceived, i try to be cautious, but, i’m not very.
for instance, i need to stop using google.
https://forum.mennonet.com/viewtopic.php?t=8931

[JohnH]

Part of the reason I don't think MaxPC actually existed was his steadfast refusal to meet with an open invitiation to meet with a priest... and a bishop... about Plain Catholicism. They were both curious and intrigued about it.

His excuse was to claim that the bishop wasn't "allowed" to meet with him and would get in trouble with the Vatican for doing so. Considering the bishpo at the time had a personal relationship with Pope Francis and was entirely allowed to meet people anywhere in the United States, since that was his jurisdiction, I found this excuse particular incredible.

[ohio jones]

Since this has turned into a "bash JohnL" thread, which is not in keeping with the purpose of the forum, let's hit Pause for a bit.

We have asked JohnL to address some of these things with the moderators (John, check your PMs).