Fight, fight, fight!

No, not the latest on a playground brawl from my day at school - more embarrasingly from adults who jolly well ought to know better! I find that the more patience I have with little people, the proportianally less I have with adults who seem more immature than the kids!
Try this one for size: The latest fight between the hormonal teenage attitude of certain Canalworld forum members and 'Victor' from the more respected news forum Narrowboat World. If I am led tobelieve correctly, there seems to be some feud between certain member sand that is what has brought on todays outburst of anger towards each other. There are some very influencial and extremely talented writers from both sides and it would be a shame if a few people ruin their reputations so my teacherly advice is 'steady on there people and calm down - now, shake hands and say sorry both of you!'

I follow both sites regularly and, (very occasionally now,) contribute to the Canalworld forum. Why very occasionally? Read Victor's latest comment and you'll see why - sadly, he is so very true!

On the 4th June 2007 I sent the following post to Jon - the site manager of the Canalworld forum:

Jon,
May I please respectfully request that you unsubscribe me from this
forum.

Since receiving the death threats from this forum some time
back over expressing my views on unlicenced vessels, I have significantly
lessened my contribution and monitored the threads without participating. It has
been interesting and extremely clear that the type of 'boaters' now dominating
this forum are those with little or no interest in the boating package and would
rather spend their time bashing BW or expressing extreme views that do little
but betray their motives for boating as a cheap floating house. I am, quite
frankly, astounded by the number of people who openly admit and support such
ideas as bridge hopping, owning unlicenced boats and finding 'loop-holes' in the
law. This is not a community I wish to be a part of and having spoken to many
genuine touring boaters, the opinion is shared that this forum is fast loosing
its way as a boating forum due to the fact that almost every post ends in
slating opinions to a personal level or openly advocating flouting BW or
national laws. It is a shame, as Canalworld.net used to be considered as such a
useful and friendly forum for boaters but the latest post in the Living afloat
section, together with the subsequent follow-ups are indicative of the type of
boater now residing here. Charles123 will also soon be off, as will, and are,
the many other level headed and law abiding boaters who simply want to share
interests and ideas. I feel there is soon the market place for a splinter forum
with stricter guidelines to be used only by people passionate about boating and
the canals of England rather then the many bridge hoppers and ex-travellers that
now lead the discussions here.

Thank you for the years of interest and help your site has
provided but I now find its usefelness or interest extremely limited. I will
continue to 'watch' the forum with interest, (tinged with a little sadness of
the obvious demise of the canals as a recreational heritage,) but don't ever
want the temptation of getting 'sucked in' to silly debates.
Kind regards,

Andy Edwards
http://www.khayamanzi.com/


Sent
04/06/07

I received the following reply:

Andy, I am not following. I did receive your PM a while back (which I did
acknowledge on the day but you obviously didn't get it). Unfortunately I do not
delete accounts/unsubscibe members as this leaves holes in topics where posts
have been removed. This is set out in the forum rules and guidelines.To which
thread are you referring in this message? Please provide a link. Many thanks, Jon

I sent him the link but heard no more of it - I certainly didn't get any further reply! Needless to say, 'Charles 123' has not been seen or heard of since and comments such as that of 'Victor' on Narrowboat worldonly goes to prove how my predictions are coming true.

Sorry folks but it seems Canalworld forum has now officially been hi-jacked and only a handful of die hard boating enthusiasts remain as regular contributors to that site.

I know I'm going out on a limb with my personal opinion and frank honesty here but as no-one reads this anyway, I don't think it matters what I say!

Now back to more 'safe' matters! The central heating has been worked over-time lately with the temperatures too cold for no heating but too mild for the stove. I did go and get a few logs at the weekend just in case!