Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

FFS people, this was a good thing. take the win.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

Israel is using food as a weapon of war. Unforgivable.

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

People are weird.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

I did not have this on my fuck 2024 bingo card.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

You are here: Home / z-Retired Categories / Previous Site Maintenance / Let Me Explain Something to You Folks One Last Time Before I Seriously Lose It

Let Me Explain Something to You Folks One Last Time Before I Seriously Lose It

by | 237 Comments

This post is in: ,

I have been dealing with you whining bastards complaining about the word “socialism” tripping the spam filter for 6 years now, and I am seriously ready to blow my fucking gasket. We get the passive aggressive comments:

“Oh, socialism still gets me in moderation.”

“I see the socialism bug still has not been fixed.”

We get the belligerent comments:

“How fucking hard is it to take this out of the spam filter?”

“Are you people so incompetent you can not let us say socialism?”

And then the rampant douchebaggery:

“SOCIALISM SOCIALISM CIALIS SOCIALISM FUCK YOU JOHN COLE.”

Listen to me now, hear me later, understand me tomorrow. Unless you are a coder willing to come up with a spam plugin that can recognize the difference between cialis and socialism, GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK.

Period. I spend untold hours trying to fix shit. I spend hours dealing with people who do not think I have covered a subject enough. I spend hours policing the comments. I spend hours fielding emails dealing with your petty squabbles with other commenters. I spend untold hours dealing with other front-pagers bitching at me about things they want. I spend hours dealing with morons who do not realize that their own fucking browsing history is why they are getting ads for russian mail order brides or rick perry or butt plugs. I spend hours dealing with people stuck in the spam filter, and when ever someone emails me that their comment was lost, I dutifully dig it out and respond via email. I spend hours dealing with r-tards who want to spew their racism and misogyny and then get bent out of shape when I ban them. I spend hours dealing with everyone of you idiots who emails me because for 30 seconds the website was unavailable. I do everything I can to make this site a pleasant space for you all, I really do.

But I will not spend one more minute dealing with your fucking whining about the word “socialism” getting you stuck in the mod filter. You know it. Deal with it. Use the word socialism and expect to be caught in moderation until someone digs you out, because we are not going to disable our spam filter and put us at the mercy of every CIALIS spammer in Kenya.

So stfu, deal with it, or get off your goat-smelling ass, learn how to code, and give me a plugin that can tell the difference between CIALIS and SOCIALISM.

Until then, DIAF.

John +4

And if you think it will be really clever to use the word socialism in the comments for this post, and then bitch about it, I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on.

Reader Interactions

237Comments

  3. 3.

    Nom de Plume

    I’m getting the feeling that you don’t like running a website. Which is interesting, because you have for several years.

  5. 5.

    daveNYC

    I assume your spam filter can’t do if logic? Like if c1alis then run a second check to see if is actually soc1alism instead and if so let the comment through?

  6. 6.

    Mnemosyne

    I won’t take this post seriously unless you include the photo of Johnny Cash. You know which one.

  8. 8.

    tcinaz

    Hang in there John. The S word is a bad word today, and you have always shown yourself as bright enough to deal with squids. You will do it right. We trust you.

  9. 9.

    MattR

    Wow. Nobody ever created a plugin that allows you to create a whitelist of words that are always allowed (as long as they match exactly)?

  10. 10.

    eemom

    Seems like a curious hill to go batshit crazy on.

    Which reminds me, are you gonna fucking fix the fact that when you edit a comment now it just leaves you in the fucking edit window staring at a “Comment Successfully Saved” message for the rest of your life? Cuz that kind of sucks.

  12. 12.

    Citizen_X

    Sniff. You do love us, after all!

    ETA: What do you mean by before you seriously lose it?

  14. 14.

    Gin & Tonic

    I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on

    __
    Pics or it didn’t happen.

  15. 15.

    The Dangerman

    …I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on.

    So, this is pre-SLI (seriously losing it); what happens post-SLI?

  16. 16.

    Silver

    Yeah, wait, what?

    Strap-on? You sure that wasn’t a Freudian slip…like perhaps you meant to just stop at strap?

  20. 20.

    pragmatism

    I selfishly love a semi drunk but righteously angry John Cole. Every day you don’t rage quit this place is a gift. Thanks.

  21. 21.

    TaMara (BHF)

    Somehow, my shitty week and half just got a little bit better. John has called us all fuckers, all is right with the world. And now he’s added rusty pitchforks. Of course I never use the “S” word, so of course he’s not talking about me. But I have done my fair share of bitching at him this week about the redesign, so I will consider this a just punishment.

  22. 22.

    Richard Shindledecker

    Sorry for your pain John but this is a very funny post! And comments…

    Richard +4

  23. 23.

    shoutingattherain

    I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on.

    That is so going on my bucket list…

  24. 24.

    Bruce S

    “GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK”

    I don’t think the ALL CAPS is called for. It’s a perfectly reasonable suggestion – but you’re coming off as more than a bit hysterical when you put it like that.

  28. 28.

    Comrade Mary

    I spend hours dealing with morons who do not realize that their own fucking browsing history is why they are getting ads for russian mail order brides or rick perry or butt plugs.

    I obviously have very boring browsing habits. Must try harder.

  29. 29.

    Cacti

    I’ll settle for getting the space back between the paragraphs.

    The boner pill bug is just one of this site’s charming quirks.

  31. 31.

    pete

    @TuiMel: Kudos. That’s exactly what I would have said, except I hadn’t thought of it yet (and probably never would have).

  33. 33.

    Martin

    Anyone else get the sense that Coles cable took a shit right in the middle of Too Cute! Duckies!?

    Duckies are pretty fucking sociaIist, though.

  34. 34.

    Punchy

    Wait….people email you about squabblez w/ other commentors? Just whiskey tango fuckgloves do they expect you to do? Thats funny shit.

    Relatedly…..peeps actually pay atttention to the ads? What kind of dumbass has time for that?

  37. 37.

    eemom

    hey, how ’bout all the OTHER words that land you in the spam filter? Can we bitch about those?

    Can we bitch about ANYTHING anymore without being chased down and killed by a strap on?

    I mean if you’re gonna keep brutally crushing dissent like some ME dictator pretty soon we’ll all become terrified and flee for our lives and you’ll be left alone here with no one but Veritard and Fuckie’s ghost.

    Then you’ll be SORRY you were so MEAN.

  39. 39.

    Richard Shindledecker

    And they should quit their bitchin about the redesign – taint ugly and the graphics up top are a nice change.

    Thanks

  45. 45.

    TooManyJens

    @John Cole: But if the keyword filter is using this list, as seems likely due to the fact that we can’t talk about footwear or the mayor of Newark, that’s not Akismet. Even WordPress says “yeah, this isn’t great, use Akismet.” Akismet has much smarter ways of detecting spam than just keywords.

  48. 48.

    alicia-logic

    This is why I have Twitter. If Cole’s going to melt down, I want to watch it in real time.

  49. 49.

    dance around in your bones

    Chill pill, man. Take one. We luvs ya anyway.
    __
    A couple of ways to deal with the word:
    __
    soc.ialism or sociaIism
    __
    (well, in the old font, a capital I mimicked a lower case L…don’t know if this still works).
    __
    ETA: It does!

  50. 50.

    dead existentialist

    goat-smelling ass and give me a plugin

    Sounds like a song title. Care to elaborate?

  52. 52.

    danimal

    Can we get this man laid or something?

    I mean, he deserves it, and I really don’t want to read about a crazed Mountaineer chasing people around WV with a strapon complaining about boner pill spam…

  53. 53.

    Martin

    GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK.

    You know, you don’t have as many Republicans down here in the comments as you used to. We’re not really into that sort of thing.

  54. 54.

    Luthe

    We haven’t had a Cole rage-gasm in far too long. How else are we to know how much he loves us if he doesn’t call us assholes every so often?

  55. 55.

    TooManyJens

    @danimal:

    I really don’t want to read about a crazed Mountaineer chasing people around WV with a strapon complaining about boner pill spam

    Oh, like that isn’t better than 90% of the news.

  56. 56.

    gnomedad

    We need to bring back the ad where Pamela Anderson had three boobs or three legs or something. That was some classic bitching.

  57. 57.

    stannate

    C’mon, you mean nobody hear can recognize a good quote from “Entourage?” John was just channeling his inner Ari Gold.

  58. 58.

    Dork

    Im secretly hoping John gets to +7 just to see a rant about how hard chickens are to french kiss or a treatsie on why hot women in bars never go for the guys with 2 dogs and enormously fat fingers.

  59. 59.

    BGinCHI

    So let me get this straight: Marx worked all those years to offer an alternative to capitalist exploitation and it’s now out of bounds because the word for a cock-hardening drug is embedded in it.
    __
    That’s World Historical fuckedupness.

  61. 61.

    willard

    Well said. So, who’s getting ads for authentic Texas-style Rick Perry russian made butt plugs? Come on admit it.

  62. 62.

    Jibeaux

    I like sockalism better anyway, and I have a policy of not complaining about free things other than my dog. I iz a model commentator.

  63. 63.

    BGinCHI

    So let me get this straight: Marx worked all those years to offer an alternative to capitalist exploitation and it’s now out of bounds because the word for a cock-hardening drug is embedded in it.
    __
    That’s World Historical fuckedupness.

  64. 64.

    gnomedad

    Unless you are a coder willing to come up with a spam plugin that can recognize the difference between c1.alis and soc1.alism

    Well, most Republicans can’t tell the difference, but I guess that’s not really a high standard.

  65. 65.

    Aimée Hogan

    This is the first time ever commenting for me, but I do have to say, awesome tweak! I can definitely understand where you are coming from. I also have to say that I must add some of those things to my bucket list like the other commenters!

    Great site, by the way.

  68. 68.

    Bnut

    Is it possible to have a post where you share some of the better r-wing emails and posts you get? Pretty please?

  69. 69.

    blueintheface

    @Luthe:

    I really don’t want to read about a crazed Mountaineer chasing people around WV with a strapon complaining about boner pill spam
    Oh, like that isn’t better than 90% of the news.

    Actually, in WV, that actually is the news:

    http://www.wvgazette.com/News/20110502087

    (of course, now that I’ve googled West Virginia + goats + bath salt, there’s no telling what my ads are going to be now)

  70. 70.

    chris

    I can write a test that can filter “tea” but not “steam” by having it check for spaces before the ‘t’ and after the ‘a’. I’m can’t see why this would be even a remotely difficult programming problem.

    That said, anybody who bitches at a blogger who provides a comment service free of charge really needs to pause and have a moment of self-reflection. Really.

  71. 71.

    cay

    LEAVE JOHN COLE ALOOOOOOOOOONE!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Really guys, back off). I’ll buy John multiple drinks to get away from you all if he ever visits Santa Monica.

  73. 73.

    AA+ Bonds

    it will in fact cure your impotence

    I think it’s nice for liberals to be reminded of this

  75. 75.

    Marcellus Shale, Public Dick

    you know what they say about fucking yourself with a rusty pitchfork, there is no “wrong hole”

  77. 77.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK.

    Have I told you lately that I love you?

  79. 79.

    JGabriel

    __
    __
    John Cole @ Top:
    __

    I spend hours dealing with morons who do not realize that their own fucking browsing history is why they are getting ads for russian mail order brides or rick perry or butt plugs.

    __
    Oh.
    __
    I guess that explains all the ads I get for Tips on the Sexual Fetishes of 17th C. Latvian Poets.
    __
    Damn. I hope no one else on the internet finds out.
    __
    .

  81. 81.

    cckids

    John, gotta join in the love & say I concur with your attitude. This is why I don’t teach middle school, I’d let loose with a rant like this sooner or later.

  83. 83.

    Arachnae

    I almost never am moved to comment but really, people, how long have you been on the internet that you don’t know how to spell socia1ism? Haven’t you ever had to call gays ‘qays’ or Nazis (in a discussion of WWII, mind you) Naz!s just to defeat the mindless algorithms?

  86. 86.

    Face

    I saw on TPM that Dave Mustaine is a hardcore birther. From a guy with more track marks than album tracks, thats some amusing stuff. I wonder if he would find the BO berf certy in Hanger 18. Or maybe he was just being Almost Honest. He appears Angry Again, Sweating Bullets that Obama gets his Victory.

  87. 87.

    JGabriel

    __
    __
    John Cole @ Top:

    So stfu, deal with it, or get off your goat-smelling ass, learn how to code, and give me a plugin that can tell the difference between C1ALIS and SOC1AL1SM.

    __
    Cool. A new metric for the Turing Test.
    __
    .

  89. 89.

    Rathskeller

    @John Cole: John, I really love your web site, but seriously, don’t take this shit so seriously. You are basically in retail, and you have to deal with many people, and some of us are assholes, or just oblivious. Go hug your dogs.

    Here are two things to try for the S-word:

    – adding a wordpress filter (like this onethat converts “the-S-word” to “sokialism” or “aka Marxism” whenever it sees them. I’m assuming here that there’s a controllable order, and the WP filter would before Akismet.
    – Given your apparent rage level, I don’t recommend replacing Akismet with a regexp-based system that you manage yourself. It’s just too much overhead, and spammers literally make a living by beating systems like that. Coordinate systems like Akismet are best. However, you might want to look into other systems that you specify your own regexp-based exceptions. Basically anything that supports \b as a word boundary would be best, but there are other regexp variants you could try.

    Ordinarily I include a fake email when I post, but the one for this post is correct if you have questions, or alternatively, if you would like to tell me to go choke on my own vomit. I know a great deal about regexps, and next to nothing about WP.

  90. 90.

    TooManyJens

    @cokane: Oh, is that the new Sims expansion pack? I’ve heard great things about how you can take over the means of production. I can’t wait to try out the Bolshevik skin.

  92. 92.

    Nikita

    I checked the twitter machine one last time before bed and followed John’s link to this post and oh boy! I’m rolling around laughing my ass off right now. I don’t know why but I freaking love it when John loses his shit.

    Just donated to the site. Thanks for the site rebuild and thanks John (and the rest of the BJ crew) for all the work you do. You guys seriously rock.

  94. 94.

    kwAwk

    I rather enjoyed the ads for the Russian mail order brides. My and Tatiana have been married for 6 months now and we owe our wedded bliss to John Cole.

    Thanks buddy!!!

  96. 96.

    Martin

    @chris: Hell, thats easy – /[^o]ciaIis[^m]/
    __
    Catches anything that isn’t part of that specific word. That the filter is so easily fooled with the capital I makes it pretty damn worthless. He rally should just stick with akismet and lose the other one.
    __
    John, just go to wp-admin/options-discussions.php, and delete ‘ciaIis’ from the Comment Moderation box. Take shoės out too while you are there.

  99. 99.

    Pseudonym

    @John Cole: I’m a coder and I’m happy to look into this if you’d like. First step is knowing all the plugins you’re using. Email me if you’re interested.

  100. 100.

    gnomedad

    @Arachnae:

    Haven’t you ever had to call gays ‘qays’ or Nazis (in a discussion of WWII, mind you) Naz!s just to defeat the mindless algorithms?

    Well, the c1alis spammers know those tricks, too. That’s why I don’t see how the default filter is anything but a nuisance. The main defense here seems to be the handle/email combo.

  102. 102.

    Steeplejack

    If the spam filter is not using the list mentioned by @TooManyJens, and the problem really does lie with Akismet:
    __
    Less than 30 seconds on the Akismet site found this potentially useful form that you or your designated representative could use to, you know, communicate with the developers and see if they can help you with a solution, or at least explain why a solution is beyond the reach of our puny Western technology at this time. Balloon Juice is a big-time blog now, and I am reasonably confident that they would take some interest in helping you solve the problem, especially if it ended in some nice P.R. for them.
    __
    But, no, you’re probably correct to assume that they’ll go all ragey on you and tell you to “GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK.” Because that’s what people do.
    __
    Please post your mailing address. I want to send you the Teleflora “Big Basket o’ Salted Dicks” arrangement for your pain and suffering, and I’m sure others would like to do the same.
    __
    ETA: Socialism!

  104. 104.

    Martin

    @Pseudonym: Seriously, he just needs to go to that admin page I listed and delete the word from the list. Problem solved. For fun, he should put Tebow in there instead.

  106. 106.

    JGabriel

    __
    __
    Why would anyone buy Cia|is from a Kenyan spammer when shipping rates from Canadian spammers are so much cheaper?
    __
    .

  109. 109.

    Martin

    Even better, he should put Veritas on the list and knock the troll feeding down by 95%.

  110. 110.

    AA+ Bonds

    @Martin:

    That the filter is so easily fooled with the capital I makes it pretty damn worthless.

    Switching out one character didn’t work previously I don’t think

  111. 111.

    TooManyJens

    @JGabriel:

    Why would anyone buy Cia|is from a Kenyan spammer when shipping rates from Canadian spammers are so much cheaper?

    Not if you’re a Kenyan anti-colonialist, which obviously we all are.

  113. 113.

    JGabriel

    __
    __
    Martin:

    Anyone else wondering why Cole always has a strap-on at the ready?

    __
    Not until you mentioned it. And now I can’t get the image out of my brain.
    __
    Fuck you, you sick sadistic bastard.
    __
    .

  122. 122.

    JGabriel

    __
    __
    AA+ Bonds:

    Yeah, see, that’s new, that didn’t work previously

    __
    If you’re talking about the capital-I trick for sociaIism, then yes, it did work previously — not after the last upgrade, but about about two or three upgrades ago. I used to use it all the time.
    __
    .

  124. 124.

    Martin

    See, what’s really so sad about this episode isn’t just that Cole can’t figure out how to remove that one word from a list sitting in front of him, but that he’s missed the entertainment value of putting every Steelers opponents name on the list each Sunday, and so on. And that’s just a moral travesty.

  127. 127.

    AA+ Bonds

    Seriously this filter looks horrible as Martin has described it but I think John is saying you have to fix it for him for him to care

  134. 134.

    cyd

    Umm, this will probably get caught in the filter, but the following regular expression should tag “cialis” while letting “socialis*” through:

    [^s][^o]cialis

  135. 135.

    Martin

    Oh, and we told Cole how to fix this at least twice over the last 4 years. That it’s still a problem suggests that he leaves it on just to fuck with us and have something to rage over when he finds himself with a surplus of strap-ons.

  139. 139.

    handy

    What would be funny if a bunch of people here (wouldn’t have to be everyone) just posting spam-like phrases and comments, careful of course not to trip the filter. Here I’ll start:

    Wow good website. Such good discussion on this sensitive topic of Let Me Explain Something to You Folks One Last Time Before I Seriously Lose It. Check out my site some time.

  148. 148.

    Yutsano

    @Bnut: Do Dawgs count?

    I just whipped up a corn-black bean salad for work tomorrow. Delicious, but now I’m antsy to get the avocado in it.

  150. 150.

    Lynn Dee

    John Cole, you are just hilarious. It’s gotten to where, as soon as I see you’re ranting, I start smiling and I get ready to laugh.

    I gotta think you enjoy ranting. I sure hope you do. Because you are so damn funny!

  151. 151.

    greylocks

    You could do it with regular expressions if there were a filter that used regular expressions. I don’t know enough about WP plugins to know if such a thing is available. (I don’t know anything about WP).

  152. 152.

    humperdinck2012!

    I am still trying to work out which member of the Cole household uses a strap-on. My money’s on Tunch, but I don’t really want to speculate further as to how, why and to whom he might apply it.

  153. 153.

    ImJohnGalt

    Wow, between getting fucked anally with a rusty pitchfork, a mention of butt plugs and choking one out with a strap-on, there’s more homosexual subtext in this post than there is regular homosexual in your average “Family Values” Republican.

  155. 155.

    Comrade Mary

    @Martin:

    when he finds himself with a surplus of strap-ons.

    Can anyone ever truly have a surplus of strapons?

  158. 158.

    Comrade Mary

    @Yutsano: I still have cilantro left in the fridge after making a big batch of salsa and some curry. Must make my chopped salad ASAP because it’s a sin to let cilantro wilt.

  160. 160.

    Bnut

    @Yutsano: I’ve got a pork shoulder in the crock pot for barbacoa, flank steak marinating for Mongolian beef and 50 turkey burgers sitting in Worcestershire and and liquid smoke for tomorrow. And antipasto skewers. Love my job.

  162. 162.

    Tone in DC

    J. Cole: I despise all of you with extremist fervor. The filter is set up to stop the Boehner pills type word, you ingrates. Deal with it.

    Matoko, eemom, Veritas and Martin, among others: ZOMG B-J SUX!! We hate Cole (and we also want ponies)!!

    J. Cole (with blood pressure nearing 340 over 270): SHUT THE FUCK UP. Just use the word Marxist or something. No damn ponies, either.

    Complaining B-J commenters: WAAAAAHHHHHH!

    J. Cole: Argle bargle (about to have a stroke) FUCK ALL Y’ALL with a rusty strapon! As you die in a fire with the Moustache of Ignorance, Willim Buckley and Nathan Bedford Forrest.
    __/rant

  164. 164.

    matt

    social​ism

    FWIW, I submitted a bug report to WordPress, and explained to them how one might fix it. Never heard back from them. One guesses they enjoy messing with all those people who use social​ism wrong anyway.

  167. 167.

    randalms

    Awesome rant! And I think it means DONT use the S word.
    Must. Not. Use. S. Word. RESTRAIN IMPULSE!

    Soo shulll izzzzzz ahhhhhhhh

  168. 168.

    humperdinck2012!

    Have we moved from the age of champagne socialism to the age of cia.lis socialism?

  170. 170.

    amk

    Of all things to rant over, you pick this one ?

    .

    You have thick ears and thin skin when it should be the other way about as a blog host.

    .

    Now GFY with your strap-on.

  171. 171.

    Dirk

    Well, I just want to say thanks to John for all the effort he puts into the blog.

    I really appreciate it, I live in a crazy country and this blog helps keep me sane.

  173. 173.

    Comrade Nimrod Humperdink

    From every erection according to its abilities, for every erection according to its needs…

  175. 175.

    Comrade Mary

    @MattR: … and this is where I send myself to bed because I’ve composed and deleted at least three different responses to that.

    Night, all!

  176. 176.

    Vello

    You left out that they could read other blogs. If they don’t like it, I mean, they could just simply stop coming by for the free ice cream.

  177. 177.

    Phoenician in a time of Romans

    I’d also like to complain about not being able to post under my real name, Albert Alv1agral…

  178. 178.

    The Other Chuck

    bcialis

    That’s all. A little b in front. Fucking regular expressions, how do they work.

    Of course this being FYWP, that means I gots to spell it out cuz it gets all mangled and such. BACKSLASH-B-C-I-A-L-I-S all lowercase and such.

    Or hey, use a real spam filter like akismet, because even the WordPress people think the keyword filter is lame. The fact that you paid someone real money for a redesign who didn’t even fix the filter… I got nothing.

  181. 181.

    amk

    There are some fixes posted by PeakVT and wasabi gasp in the next thread that greatly improves the site.

    Way to go guys/gals.

  184. 184.

    Schlemizel

    @Rathskeller:
    Come on people – so-shall-ism does not equal marxism, not even close. I’ll put up with spam filters but could we please keep our economic theories straight?

  186. 186.

    Rosalita

    Ah, Balloon-Juice. Come for the politics, stay for the pets, become a lifer for the rants.

    Love you John, don’t let the assholes get to you.

  187. 187.

    El Cid

    __

    I spend hours fielding emails dealing with your petty squabbles with other commenters.

    Bunch of 5 year olds, it sounds like.

  188. 188.

    Corbin Dallas Multipass

    Akismet says it takes false positives as feedback as part of its API. If you have been sending “socialist” flagged moderation back to them as “ham” (their term for false positives) then this should resolve itself over time as I imagine their rules engine should be able to pick up on the idea of false positives. If your wordpress integration doesn’t work with the false positives then that is a problem – fix it. If it does, and you’ve been submitting “socialist” posts for a long time, then it is Akismet’s problem.

    If you are paying them money you should jump up and down like crazy, and if you are jumping up and down and they aren’t listening you should redirect this rage from your customer base to Akismet’s customer support email account (a la regretsy and paypal). If you are not paying them money, then you should jump up and down still, but I wouldn’t expect as much.

    You are right that there is no instantaneous fix other than breaking into Akismets headquarters and manually changing their code.

    API documentation citations:

    https://akismet.com/development/api/

    “To interact properly with the Akismet API your application should have a way for users to submit missed spam and false positives, in addition to making comment checks.
    The more data you send with each comment check, the better chance Akismet has of avoiding false positives.”

    I just took the time to read the akismet wordpress plugin and api you linked to, when you submit for comment check they offer no way to additionally add words to accept automatically (https://akismet.com/development/api/#comment-check). I am sympathetic to this lack of functionality.

    Maybe this was already covered, Maybe John Cole and Mgmt. already understand this, but I felt the need to document the past 10 minutes of my life analyzing the problem.

  189. 189.

    Corbin Dallas Multipass

    @Martin: Or this if Martin is right. I assumed Akismet was doing the flagging. There are a lot of people offering help here, that is nice to see.

  190. 190.

    estamm

    Wow, I had no idea that either of those words would cause a problem. If you want to write the S word, how about: “sochulism”?

  191. 191.

    Pudentilla

    I just want you to know that I love you. Seriously, if I weren’t a menopausal lesbian, I’d marry you and have your babies.

  192. 192.

    Soonergrunt

    I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on

    John, you SO need to add that to the rotating flag.

  193. 193.

    BruceFromOhio

    So stfu, deal with it, or get off your goat-smelling ass, learn how to code, and give me a plugin that can tell the difference between C1ALIS and SOC1ALISM.

    Its so much fun to collect requirements from the business owners and the end users.

    @Steeplejack: @TooManyJens: Of these things I will laugh all day.

  195. 195.

    RedKitten

    That was a lovely rant, John. I think a lot of people don’t realize just how incredibly difficult it is to run a political blog. Hell, just my short-lived experience running a mock political blog was enough to convince me that it’s not anything I could EVER do on a full-time basis.

    I hope venting made you feel better. You do good work, sweetie.

  196. 196.

    drew42

    Coder here. Does your spam filter use regular expressions? If so, you can do something like /[^o]cia…/

    (the ellipse represents the rest of the “C” word)

  197. 197.

    Belafon (formerly anonevent)

    I’ll have to try this rant when the people who pay me to program tell me to do something that is hard.

    ETA: It’s a little hard to accept this limitation, John, when so many other sites do not have this problem. I understand WP is different than having your own entire system, but it doesn’t even sound like WP has tried to fix it. 6 years.

  198. 198.

    flukebucket

    It is the rants that hooked me and the hope of a classic like this one that keeps me coming back. Now that I have seen an actual picture of John I can just see him typing away with a small drop of sweat on the tip of his nose and bouncing up and down like Limbaugh at CPAC or Brietbart at an OWS protest.

    Love, love LOVE IT!

  199. 199.

    Svensker

    I don’t see the problem. “Sockalism” always makes me laugh. Occasionally I forget and spell it the correct way and then I curse.

    But it’s a fugging blog, YKWIM? We’re dropping drone bombs on people and I should get upset about a spam filter? Jeez.

  201. 201.

    Mutt

    Cool, John. Ive been coming here at least daily for a few years now, and Im glad to say I’ve never added to your work load.

    I appreciate the hell out of the resource BJ is.

    Iv’e been posting links to your entries on FB, and digging the hell out of Anne L, Mix, Soonergrunt & the rest of your stable of champions! (I’m a vet, I’ve been turning my vet buds on to SG, our FB page is VVAW/OSS, if you have time for idle screen-staring)
    and so forth, on my political fb page (Nick Velvet) You drink, you swear, you don’t get laid enough, you are kind to critters, and care about peasants getting murdered over the horizon- not enough to make you recoil in horror from Obomber, tho. I voted against Gore, which meant a vote “for” W. Whocoodanode?

    Very ugly times. I got alerted to the actual nature of the Empire back in ’68, in the Mekong Delta, and have watched it ( and tried to jam my little stick in its spokes ) the next 40 plus years in horror. Unfortunately, I can’t summon up disbelief…..

  202. 202.

    Ron

    Personally, I don’t worry about the spam filter. It is what it is. I’m not a coder, so I couldn’t say how how hard it is to differentiate those two words. I have two thoughts though. Like others, watching John go on a full-on rage-fest is just awesome. The other is I have to wonder about the people sending John whining emails. WTF? I come here, read the blog, read comments at times, leave comments, and unless there were some extreme circumstances wouldn’t dream of whining to John about stuff. I’ve been caught in moderation a couple of times. I didn’t even understand why, but figured eventually someone would come, look at what I wrote and then lift the moderation. What is the big fucking deal with that?

  204. 204.

    brantl

    I’ve written code to detect phrases before, and the ability to detect whole word’s rather than falsely detect partial words in other words? Kid stuff. If your filter won’t detect the difference between those two, either it hasn’t been set up correctly or it’s just crap programming. Period.

  205. 205.

    Ash Can

    Gee, I’ve never e-mailed Cole about anything, and now I feel left out. I don’t care enough about any of the foibles of the site to e-mail him directly about them, as opposed to just pissing and whining about them in the comments. Maybe I should just send him dirty jokes, or recipes.

  207. 207.

    Shinobi

    I can’t believe that
    1. People e-mail you to complain about this shit
    2. You actually take the time to respond.

    You are too good to us John.

  209. 209.

    C Porter

    I was looking up DIAF in the lexicon, and discovered the alphabet row that’s likely meant to take you to the first instance of that letter, does not work for me. Safari 5.1.4, OS X 10.6.8

  211. 211.

    Susan

    Wow, I am awesome.

    I don’t do any of those things. I just read the site and get on with my day!

    Yeah Me!!!

  212. 212.

    Jay C

    GO ANALLY FUCK YOURSELF WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK.

    So stfu, deal with it, or get off your goat-smelling ass, learn how to code, and give me a plugin that can tell the difference between CIALIS and SOCIALISM.
    __
    Until then, DIAF.

    BEFORE you “seriously lose it”??

    Anyway, 209 comments and so far not a word of thanks to John for not only maintaining this bathroom wall of a site, but scrubbing the worst graffiti off, and, occasionally, re-tiling it at his own expense in time?

    Jeez! I’m just surprised he doesn’t get provoked into frontpaging more FU posts just from the frustrations of having to deal.

    So: from me, anyway: Thanks, John!

    S*C1@lI$t bastard!

  214. 214.

    LanceThruster

    But how do you *really* feel about it?

    Mebbe C!al!s is not right for you. Ask your doctor (before he’s fully co-opted into Obama’s soc!al!st system).

  215. 215.

    LanceThruster

    Mebbe Cial!s is not right for you. Ask your doctor (before he’s fully co-opted into Obama’s soc1alist system).

  216. 216.

    kindness

    It’s tough to be John Cole when the passle of cats he’s trying to herd turn on him. As with any good cat every single one wants to be the sole center of attention all at the same time.

    That is why the good lord gave mankind alcohol and green bud.

  219. 219.

    CynDee

    1. @TaMara (BHF): Me, too.

    2. @ John Cole: See, if the heart-and-soul original logo with the little guy and the little decorative element and the pleasant, hospitable fonts had only been left intact, all the technical fixes in the rebuild would have funneled properly into the bsbxst. Then on the way out after the fefist handshake, the socalist and such problems would have been properly re-flexed to create booblabbean stasis — and, presto– no problems.

    3. Anyway I’m sorry if any remarks of mine contributed to discomfort on your part, ’cause I wuv my host, my Pretty, and your little dogs, too. And SuperTunch.

    4. Now I have to go. I’m supposed to be working.

    5. Jeez, I’m sorry about these big backend problems. But you know, one can identify. I’m a tech writer who has almost left the business 7.3 times because Microsoft autonumbers and bullets, too, for Dogssake, have been blowing up since 2000, and Microsoft has never fixed them. Just the opposite — they’re so much crazier because they’re Smart numbers and bullets now. And don’t even talk to me about the TOC not picking them up. Sometimes. A technical doc is only as good as the reliability of its numbers and bullets. But, in the 21st century WE have to do them manually and charge the client 30% more just to avoid the stupid new traps in every release. Even an astronaut on the Space Station has to do them manually if she or he needs to use MS Word. Well, HOW WRONG IS THIS?? FYMSWORD!

    (Takes blood pressure pill.)

  220. 220.

    Fr33d0m

    Email me if you want me to fix your email filter so that all emails with the word Socialism are stripped.

  222. 222.

    Studly Pantload, the emotionally unavailable unicorn

    THIS is why I keep coming back to Balloon Juice.

  224. 224.

    Ash Can

    You all realize that Cole is bound and gagged and stuffed in the closet, and Tunch actually wrote this, right?

  226. 226.

    Nutella

    @Ron:

    I have to wonder about the people sending John whining emails. WTF? I come here, read the blog, read comments at times, leave comments, and unless there were some extreme circumstances wouldn’t dream of whining to John about stuff.

    You’re not a special little snowflake, are you? Or maybe it’s that you’re more than 5 years old.

  227. 227.

    rea

    It sounds like John could use some bloggy love. Considering all he’s done for us, we owe it to him him.
    XXX!

  229. 229.

    AntiCliche

    Regex-fu here:

    (?i)&92;b(?<!so)c[!1i]a[!1l][!1i]s(?=![tm])&92;b

    this will match the "c" word, but not if it is preceded by "so" or followed by "t" or "m".

  230. 230.

    AntiCliche

    Trying again. Was not able to figure out the escaping filter in 4 minutes.

    (?i)\b(?<!so)c[!1i][@a][!1l][!1i][$s](?=![tm])\b

  231. 231.

    Commish

    This is the best post since the one illustrated with Jesus flipping us off. Anybody got a link to that one? Now I want to read it again.

  232. 232.

    Hazel Stone

    OMG rape jokes are just so awesome! Especially to people who have been raped!

    This site, which I usually enjoy and find very informative, is getting to be increasingly hard to read over comments like this.

    The constant fat shaming posts are also not exactly fun.

    I get it that one of you writers is mired in self-loathing because you are fat and think that makes you ugly and unfuckable. I am sick of hearing it and the actually ugly implication that you think all of us other fat people are loathsome as well.

    Judging people by their appearance — that’s the unacceptable shit that the bad guys do, right?

    Casually throwing around violent rhetoric which makes light of sexual assault — that’s the unacceptable shit that the bad guys do, right?

    Please stop. I like virtually everything else about this blog. Thanks.

  235. 235.

    Neil

    That looks to have worked.

    I’m not a very competent coder, and this is probably a lame suggestion, but if it’s not hard to add a button that puts Socia[b][/b]lism (replace the square brackets with the gt/lt) into the post for you like it does with the other formatting HTML for you, people can press the Socialism button without going to the moderation penalty box for a timeout.

  236. 236.

    elvisgrace

    And if you think it will be really clever to use the word socialism in the comments for this post, and then bitch about it, I will hunt you down and choke you out with a strap-on.

    Remember to take your Cialis first!

Comments are closed.

Trackbacks

  1. […] This drunken meltdown caught my attention this morning. Two things struck me as odd about it. One was the apparent–and in no way veiled– contempt he has for his readers. The second was the ass-kissy reaction of said readers. Damn. Maybe if I had that many asses up m nose I’d be cranky too. Blogging is hard, assholes. […]