> opt out of twitter (which seems like a self-abuse platform) and filter your email. Putting on blinders doesn't always work. As it turns out, I was involved i

> opt out of twitter (which seems like a self-abuse platform) and filter your email. Putting on blinders doesn't always work. As it turns out, I was involved in an incident on LambdaMOO many years ago that rather famously illustrates the point. Both Sherry Turkle and Amy Bruckman wrote about it IIRC. Basically I'd gotten tired of one person's nonsense, so I "gagged" them. They knew I couldn't hear them, so they'd follow me into a public "room" within that virtual environment and talk to me. They knew I couldn't "hear" them but everyone else could. My lack of a response to them, though I was active in the more general conversation, was interpreted as either assent or cowardice. Including when the person started accusing me of being a child molester. I eventually became aware of the shenanigans through others' reactions, but it was still an ugly situation. Refusing to hear what others had to say about me was not a solution. You know what they say: for every problem there's a solution that is simple, obvious, and WRONG. "You just need to..." is almost as bad as "actually..." in conversations among techies.