I’m sorry to keep this whole thing going but this Swymer family is really something else. Rachael Swymer, the daughter of Principal Stephen Swymer, has now resorted to sockpuppetry to try to make me look bad. Mithras has confirmed that she posted under another username. Of course she denied it, but she was busted red-handed.
Now, I know that schoolteachers are not necessarily familiar with the ethics of blogging, and I know her father tried to get the police to arrest me for exercising my free speech rights. Fortunately, the East Whiteland police department is familiar with the law. But there are probably some parents with children in the Great Valley School District that would be concerned about Rachael Swymer’s behavior, not to mention her emotional stability, if they knew what sockpuppetry really is. So, here’s a definition:
A sockpuppet is a secondary online identity used for purposes of deception within an Internet community. A sock puppet is a false identity through which a member of an Internet community speaks while pretending not to, like a puppeteer manipulating a hand puppet.[1]
Sockpuppets are employed to create the impression that support for a position is stronger than in reality, or to defend or praise an individual or particular side of a debate while hiding the puppeteer’s role. The key difference between a sockpuppet and a regular pseudonym is the conveyance that the puppet is a third party and thus not affiliated with the puppeteer.
The term was first employed on Usenet in reference to Earl Curley, who had used various pseudonyms to defend his character and arguments and to denigrate his opponents.[2] The term tentacle was also commonly used with similar meaning in Usenet through the mid 1990s.
In other words, Rachael Swymer created a false identity on a blog to make it look like some third-party was agreeing with her position. It’s an act universally looked upon with contempt in all blogging communities and it is a bannable offense.
It’s totally dishonest. Now, if her father had not burdened me with over $300 in fines for repossessing a piece of property from a thief that he refused to investigate then I might not make such a big issue out of this. If he had not tried to get me arrested, after I took responsibility for my actions, for merely posting my opinion about his job performance, I might let this go. If he had not enlisted the local police to call me up and ask whether I was coming to his retirement party, I might be forgiving. But his daughter is not just engaging in dishonest sockpuppetry. She’s insulting CBtE by suggesting he is to blame for the theft of his property. She’s unable to read simple sentences that explain that the property was stolen from someone else’s locker. And she is lying about what her father has done.
So, if you mess with me, I will mess with you. It’s fairly simple. Every parent in Chester County, Pennsylvania is going to know that the Swymer family is dishonest. All of Rachael Swymer’s student’s parents will find out that she has no ethics and that she is emotionally unhinged.
Sockpuppetry is little different from perjury. It is one of the most dishonest things you can do. This is especially true when you do it to malign someone else’s character.
I have to confess that I am somewhat surprised that the Swymers keep calling me a coward and lying about me and about the facts of this case. Have I shown myself unwilling to punch back?
