Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Potential powder keg: Will Alex Plank and Wrong Planet be connected to another shooting spree?

I've just read a post that concerns me a great deal on that well-known neurodiversity website Wrong Planet.  Apparently someone who is quite unhappy and possibly psychotic has posted a rather angry rant it reads:

 No idea if anyone reads this, but then, this about me venting, in the first place.

Damn lying bigot NTs. I hate you. I hate you all.

You're destroying everything of value. Betray. Treason. Lies. Explointing. Your world. Not mine.

No more false compromises. No more. Never. Not with me. I detest you.

Betraying the very core values of humanity. Yeah, that's what you're good at. Lying. Lying all the time.

Honesty? Honor? Loyality? Caring for your next fellow human beeing?

No, always looking for your own advantage, exploiting others.

Great society.

Give me one, just ONE reason why I shall not take my gun and kill as many of you scum as I can. And yes, I have a gun, beautiful 9mm Para. And enough ammo.

f**k you, NTs.

The world would be a better place w/o you.


To anyone reading this, the implications are rather scary, particularly in light of the recent stories suggesting the strong possibility that Adam Lanza had Asperger's syndrome and actually did go out and shoot people.  I wonder what wrong planet CEO Alex Plank's reaction will be.  Will he delete this post and ban this person from wrong Planet?  Will he report this to the authorities as well as the poster's IP address, so possible preventive action can be taken, regardless of whether or not this is an idle threat and the person really does not have a weapon and whether or not he will make good on his threat to kill people?  As regular readers of this blog know, Plank has banned me from posting on his website just because I had the handle "ND Just say no" and posted ideas that did not jive with Plank's anti-cure, ND philosophy.  

If this guy is on the level, this would not be the first time Plank and Wrong Planet have been involved in this kind of thing   In 2006 Alex Plank and Wrong Planet  were sued when Wrong Planet member and poster, William Freund broke into an innocent family's home and shot and killed two people.  Freund after the shootings committed suicide.  Shortly before the murders Freund had posted on the Wrong Planet website that he was lonely and needed a real friend and that he was contemplating suicide.  He also said that he planned to hurt those who had hurt them.

At first, Plank refused to comment on the shootings and Wrong Planet's involvement.  Later, he alleged that he had tried to contact Freund's parents and tell them about the post but he was unsuccessful.

Tonight's post is eeriely similar to this and is frightening to me.

In case Plank gets wind of this and deletes the post and anyone ends up thinking I'm just making this up as a vendetta against the ND movement (who I will concede I loathe, including Plank), I've made a screen shot.  If I can figure out how to post it on this blog post I will.  I'm also going to contact the FBI or any other appropriate law enforcement agency about this.  I hope that Plank and other WP administrators will do so as well.  Particularly in light of the Freund incident.

Unfortunately, Plank does not have a track record of good judgment, I'm remembering the Zachary Lassiter incident where an individual was claiming that autism speaks pressured an online store to remove his t-shirt that he was selling which was unflattering to AS.  Plank, a foe of autism speaks and a cure for autism put this story on the front page of his website.  This was later proven by yours truly to be a bunch of baloney. Unfortunately, in spite of this, autism speaks, has chosen to fund Alex Plank's autism talk TV.  Also, they handled the William Freund case particularly badly.  You can see a thread on Wrong Planet if you google William Freund where in October of 2005, Plank questions who Freund is.  I don't know if Alex's friends really tried to contact Freund's parents or not, but it would have been good judgment to report Freund to the FBI or some other authorities and it's possible two lives would have been saved (maybe three including Freund's).  I figured out how to post a screenshot and here it is below: 

Alex, if you happen to read this, I hope we can put our differences aside and you'll do the right thing and not only ban this person from commenting but report him to the appropriate authorities.  If you don't, I certainly will. 

Addendum:  As can be seen above, i've uploaded the screenshot in question in case wrong planet denies this post ever existed.  I've contacted the FBI and reported this.  I've been told they will send this to the appropriate field office and agent.  Finally, I've emailed Alex Plank at his wrong planet email address advising him of this and suggesting he take appropriate action against this individual, Cephalod and I've cc'd a copy of the email to John Robison just in case.

13 comments:

A better future for all said...

Jonathan

The post is still up and I gave my response on the thread. We have disagreements on many things but in this I find agreement with you.

The only thing is it hasn't been verified that Adam Lanza does have Aspergers or not. Other than that, I can't refute anything you say here.

I believe some things are greater than our beliefs and differences like seeking objective truth, our souls and our humanity. Do you agree with and understand what I am saying?

jonathan said...

Yes, I checked again late last night and post was still up, I guess I will have to check it again. It was late at night here (early in the morning) and I had just called the FBI so I was sort of out of it. Alex Plank has not responded to me yet, John Robison wrote me back saying he'd contact him.

All I can do is wait and hope Alex Plank and Wrong Planet will do the right thing and handle the matter better than they did in the william freund case.

Anonymous said...

Thank you Jonathan. If we've learned anything through the past horrific events, it's that these statements need to be taken seriously. Thanks also to A better future for all. It's nice to know that in spite of our disagreements we can pull together to do what is right.

Anonymous said...

Cephalod said in the next post;

I will NOT go out and shoot any people, ok?

Why?

Because that would violate MY core values.


There is no threat. TY.

jonathan said...

There is no threat. TY.

Well, the FBI has been spending time reading this blog post apparently, so they are taking what this person said seriously. I'll leave it up to them or any other appropriate law enforcement agency to determine whether this constitutes a threat or not.

However, in light of the William Freund case, and Plank and company's poor handling of that, I do believe this merits some attention as I've said before.

Anonymous said...

It seems likely this person was trolling as their communication seems like an attempt to manipulate other people on the spectrum into admitting similar sentiments with their communication.

It is also a "dead" giveaway that the person that just responded here with the acronym TY for thank you that was used in his previous comments on WP is the same individual.

The spelling of offence indicates this individual was not from the US, so they may not fear the FBI, but the investigation will not likely be limited to the US.

The quote below belies what was said in the 2nd quote by this individual in what seems as a carefully veiled manipulative communication.

More than likely they are smart enough not to use a home computer to gain this type of attention, but they might be surprised at how efficiently law enforcement, internationally, works on an issue like this.

Quote from the link you provided to WP, from this person:

"Generaly, I'd agree. But that would imply a calmed down, reflected, thought over rant. Which would make the idea of venting, of a "rant" absurd. Wouldn't it?

And I DO feel like I just wrote. Including both, my original and my "addon" comment. I do not apologize for that. Not here.

Do I need to add that this is not about interpretation but all meant literally? No reading between the line. Just what I said.

No offence given, none taken.

Thanks for your reply. And again: I simply mean that."

M.J. said...

It looks like the post was removed from Wrong Planet.

Unknown said...

Anyone that can post onto or cares about the Wrong Planet is not autistic.

John Best said...

What is Ari Ne'eman saying about this? Do you think Ne'eman put him up to it?

jonathan said...

@ Kent Adams it's possible you're right about that.

@Foresam Funny you should ask. I don't think Ne'eman put this crazed poster up to this, but he recently made a youtube interview touching on these issues, rather ironic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fb09fU2mQs

Anonymous said...

Thank you for giving the authorities the warnings!

BTW, "f**k you, NTs.

The world would be a better place w/o you."

*also* makes me think, who *does* this creep want to clean up after his fellow aspies? Does he expect other aspies to want to do such mundane work? Ha!

......I'm Anonymous said...

Borrowing from Jeff Foxworthy, if you refer to other people as NT's, you might not be autistic.

Anonymous said...

As someone who knew the Freund family personally, I can tell you that no one ever could imagine the actions that William chose to take that day. William had been bullied at school. He was 5'0 and 112lbs when his parents brought him into a gym for personal training. It was suggested that he join his high school wrestling team also since he knew the assistant coach. William worked hard in the gym and over the years got up to 180lbs at 5'7.
Seeing the news with William on the TV was a huge shock. The responsibility lies completely with William. Not with Mr. Plank. He did what he could to contact William's parents and authorities.
This Wrong Planet website is a great place for people to share their experiences. When moderators of the site have concerns, they do all they can to help. To say they didn't "handle" certain situations well is ridiculous. They report dangerous and questionable content. That's it! They don't try to counsel the poster other than to seek advice from a professional. In both cases, Wrong Planet did exactly what they were supposed to do.
To try and shift blame onto the website is misguided.