Yes, Ethan has a major grudge with me due to my ideological stance. I cite all the evidence I will now mention and allow other posters to judge for themselves, asking them to be objective when doing so. However, this is not a strictly personal thing. It's what I represent, and what he goes out of his way to make me personify to himself and the whole board, that's important to understand this grudge.

Ethan recently said, and Markie made the same opinion (surprise!), that I'm pretentious for suggesting I'm a thorn in his side, or that I arouse the least bit of emotional ire in him (not in those exact words for the truly technical). Yet he seems like he cannot stop going out of his way to point out any extraneous detail about my ideology that he can to discredit not just me as a person, but my ideology in general. This, of course, is a very transparent and (yes) desperate attempt to turn as many people as possible on this board away from youth liberation as being viable, and ultimately to start questioning the pro-choice argument that largely supports youth lib... or, at the very least, get youth lib off the discussion itinerary on this and (hopefully) other MAP boards (he leaves it mostly to Nick Devlin to accomplish that over on the BL side of the camp). After all, Ethan is an avowed incrementalist.

This ire towards me is a result of the following:

1) I'm one of the most vocal people in the GL side of the pro-choice MAPs who has the temerity to challenge the ad populum attitude that he supports. That is enough reason for me to irk him to no end, and to identify me as some sort of major threat. As well as trying to make me appear to be the sole representative of so much that is said here. Many others here say it much better than I do on a regular basis, but my "loudness" seems to have caused him to pinpoint me the most (other than maybe Dante and qtns2di4).

2) He sees the pro-choice majority of MAPs in general as a huge thorn in his side and against his agenda to direct the MAP community towards a strategy that favors the anti-choice ideology. My being one of the most vocal members of the pro-choice community in the GL sub-camp that he works within causes him to identify me (and oftentimes also Dante for the same reason) as some personification of the Pro-Choice MAP and Youth Liberationist. It's simply easier for him to conduct his battle that way, by identifying a makeshift "leader" who isn't actually a leader so much as one of the loudest mouths amongst an ideological group who has no true leader, and needs none.

3) He can't stand the fact that I'm a Marxist, which also goes against the ad populum status quo, whose citizenry has been indoctrinated to dismiss any thought for the possibility of a fundamental change in the system as being (to use some of Ethan's words) "starry-eyed", impractical because of the status' cynical view of humanity as a whole - which is also a major component of the anti-choice ideology - and "unrealistic." As a steadfast mainstream liberal, Ethan has embraced the "centrist" view of his modern political brethren that has abandoned any platform which is remotely radical or revolutionary. Instead, they favor assimilating liberalism into the system as it exists and simply promoting incremental reforms (read: minor tweaking here and there, but little more than that under any circumstances, that won't change much of anything even over the long haul).

4) I'm pretty much the only Marxist on the board right now, but there are currently several anarcho-capitalists, so in Ethan's eyes, that makes attacking the vocal Marxist and Marxism an easier target for ideological discrediting than anarcho-capitalism right now, whose libertarian views are also very much at odds with the mainstream liberals and their frequent capitulation to the conservative mindset since the 1980s. There are a few anarchists here right now too, but none of them are as yet vocal enough for him to see as ideal targets; hence, he believes he can win them and many others over if he can just discredit who he perceives to be the "weakest link" amongst the several most pointy thorns in his side.

5) He correctly realizes that youth liberation as a general platform above and beyond any support for it within the confines of the MAP community is an inherent threat to the continuation of the anti-choice agenda and every policy it needs to legally and socially force younger people to live in a state of enforced dependence on adults and kept out of the political and labor arena where they would have major societal influence. This bothers him a lot, so once he discovered its popularity in the community, he has been on a recent crusade to rampantly get it stamped out of relevance here, his focus upon discrediting me personally as a major part of this campaign.

6) Few if anyone here questions his love for children (contrary to what Sadlife keeps saying). I do believe, however, that his protectionist attitude demands having no respect for the individual merits of younger people, and encourages the darker sides of love to emerge. The idea of respect and equality going along with love of children is very much against his agenda, and talk of it alarms and annoys him for reasons that are glaringly obvious.

If it's true (as Markie recently said) that I have a persecution agenda for thinking Ethan has recently singled me out and is trying to discredit me personally via thinly veiled ad hominem and ad populum rhetoric, then please note his recent spate of threads over the past few days since he realized how important youth liberation is to the pro-choice majority here. Note how important it clearly is to him beyond just a casual discussion of the issue to push his anti-youth rights agenda, and pushing the incrementalism so favored by the mainstream liberal "centrists" who now dominate the Democratic Party in the U.S. and the Labour Party in Britain as the better choice than standing behind any notion that would fundamentally change the status quo that he is comfortable within.

I think the evidence stands for itself that he has a major mad-on right now, and currently I'm his target of choice to discredit youth lib, the pro-choice ideology, any of the science that backs it up, and ultimately, any notion in our collective heads that fundamental change is desirable or even possible.

I'm quite proud to be the biggest of the many thorns in his side at the moment, and it's fun and instructive to watch his attempts to discredit me and everything I and many others here stand behind become the train wreck that it is. Keep it coming, Ethan! And take comfort in knowing that is difficult as things may ever get, I'll always be there for you ;-)