I think it's about common sense. But I guess it's always in the eyes of the beholder.

But even then I don't think the first post on this topic -and what is stated- justifies it

Off Topic: gave away a 2 goal lead but were lucky to keep it a draw. Made me very happy. Not suspected they would win a point

In the real world, the fact that Meat is human does not need to be pointed out. The fact that it has been "pointed out" here, over and over for the past nine years, has sensitized ME to such a degree I often dread coming here. I can hardly imagine how I'd feel if all these so-very-kindly "shared" posts were about me.

EXACTLY! even if you don't feel as if you were part of the 97%, a friend or someone you know would be included, so you would still care. At least I hope my friends would care.

:twisted: It's equally pointed out by members as an excuse for when he takes off, like in the post at the start of the thread.

i.e. You can't blame him for taking things personally and fighting back, he's only human.

The answer's a simple one: make this not a discussion forum. In its current form it should be fair for any member to discuss or comment on any aspect of Meat Loaf's public appearances and/or artistic output, as long as those comments are not intentionally rude or inflammatory. Otherwise, it's just a section of enthusiastic users telling the other users what they can and can't post. Which feels as oppressive as passive bullying.

I react to life and others as an individual. I am never going to take offense on any but a personal level. My interpretation of Meat's post is that he himself felt personally offended by some here, and was addressing those people only.

.

Ha ha, oh look, you found two thumbs up!!!!

Carole

maybe this is all a publicity stunt to promote the record and get us excited voer the title "brave and crazy"

Your simple answer would work well if Meat were not on this forum. But he is, and he has been hurt, for the umpteenth time, by comments about his voice. Maybe this concerns you less than the feeling of "oppression" you have at not being able to say whatever you like. If so, you are among those I mentioned earlier, who don't care about him as a person; otherwise you would not want to see him hurt. And you would not view efforts to encourage honest but non-hurtful posts as "bullying."

.

Or maybe he was genuinely mad at how phenomenally good we thought he was vocally from '87-94 ?

... and now you can't read it because it was deleted for no good reason ... but how can you criticise what you didn't see ?

Why, does no one but Eric Vetro have ears ? I could equally say your (no doubt) positive opinion of Meat's voice is invalid because you're not professionally qualified.

To be honest I'm beginning to doubt that Meat is a nice guy ...

Why - 97% includes almost everyone - why are you able to take the moral high ground ?

So what exactly does Meat have to do to cause offense ? It appeared somewhat offensive to me ... how can you say no offense was intended when everyone was told to go to hell ?

Who here doesn't care about Meat ? Its nonsense. Are you going to name names then ?

LOL ...he sure is, though! (brave and crazy) :D

.

I'll be there in the end !! You're just too awesome, you are such an amazing and wonderful person I could never give up on you !! :D
I Can't find the right words to say to you what you mean to me and how I feel about you, the above sums it right up that's the best I can do to say this...You're beautiful Meat !!

'' You know I'm gonna stick with ya when the hard times hit'' !!!! ;)

Marleen X:D

Everybody here cares about Meat and have stuck with him through thick and thin. Some of us for many dacades too. Some of us however refrain from making statements as if we know him personally when we only ever really get a snapshot at his professional and artistic life.

Soem of us also have opinions that we like some of his output more or less.

The very fact we buy it and continue to do do so; that we still go to shows and enjoy them should suggest that we are not being necessarily critical of the stuff we like less, just that we are more enamoured with the stuff we like more - and that extends to vocal performances too.

Some people here are so "black and white"....

A publicity stunt for a 1% of his fan base? Sure...

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Forum Runner

Meat, you're absolutely right!

I'm only reading through stuff here but today I have to post my opinion.
Most of the people here just write bullshit. When you see all this bullshit, for me it was only a matter of time until Meat reacts to it.

It's all about winding Meat up, he deserves better.
Let him be and listen to Madonna instead!

ps:
I don't care what you think about what I've said, 'cause most of you have no clue what they are talking about. Inform yourself about policy you wanna talk about or simply keep yourself quiet. thank you

well well been away for a few days & come back to this took me a while to read posts have not seen other thread & not seen facebook entries & i am not remotely intrested as its meats personal choice & his own opinion .like we all have on here now & in the past ref meats voice so he gave as good as he gets no problem with that i'll take it as constructive criticism like we all give to him it amazes me how many people took offence meat is person not just a celebrity(oops)rock ledgend lets all just move on & look forward to a new album & a uk tour
dont do politics on here i'm here for the music & friends that enjoy it with me

someone please start a happy thread...hey how bout..what songs do we think he will sing on the Christmas album???:)

How the hell can someone dislike the suggestion of a happy thread ???... Good Loaf !!!

Everybody has the right to react and object to statements they regard as unfair or hurtful. The problem is that Meat Loaf usually does it in a very disproportionate way. Unfortunately he does not discuss but lashes out most of the time. I guess that hardly anyone would have an issue with him disagreeing or being upset with something if he expressed his views in a more adequate and less aggressive way.

I was wondering exactly the same thing :(

How about this:

Try to be better than the typical human.

Usually those are the ones that end up being revered.

Btw, seeing as Mitt Romney lost the election I wonder if it was all worth it for ML in the end. Too bad he couldn't have backed a candidate that had a chance of winning. Frankly, Romney was the best of a really bad (and batshit crazy) group of candidates.

I think WE can put the debate TO BED.

Obama won.

:twisted: A little off the topic here (so I can see me deleting my own post if needs be :facepalm: ), but I don't think you can meassure if it was worth it to Meat based on Romney's success (well, failure).
Standing up for what one believes is it's own reward, and Meat did that.

As for political preferences, see off topic :wink:

But the thread is not about who wins the election, it's about Meat's post here :wink:

wish romney won. makes everything that has transpired here seem pointless and uneeded. Good fans for lost cause of this ordeal and it didnt need to happen. Mosntro, allrevved up, bostonangel :(

whatever happened to pudding?

:twisted: I don't think a fair minded fan has a problem with the actual endorcement, Chris.
I think the issue is how Meat dealt with the fall out. To not reassure those who could have used it concerning which of Romneys policies he believed in (and the ones he disagrees with), to edit his facebook page (which I can understand) and his reaction here when he visited the forum.

His endorcement was well meant and honest, and I can back him on that, even though I don't share his views. It's having him insult the fans so badly that has got a lot of feathers ruffled.

Did you read the post you just quoted? The bit about posts not being "intentionally rude or inflammatory"? I keep stating this over and over again, and the replies come back regurgitated.

As for not viewing "efforts to encourage honest but non-hurtful posts as "bullying" - that's not what I said at all. Ever. So please don't accuse me of that, or as part of your 'you're either one or the other type of fan' mentality. Because I find that kind of oppressive too. And annoying.

Is ML endorsing him the only reason that you wish this happened?

Would you have voted for Obama otherwise?

Or do you simply not vote due to a desirable candidate? Like me.

Last I checked the world supply of pudding has not been depleted. You can go to your local grocery store to buy pudding for you sustenance. I kind of wang some now.

i`m sooooo wondering if I`ll get invited, even though I live far north in little Norway.....I`v been nice...I`v been good...I`v been a really good Girl ;-)

If you are a true fan of someone in this case Meat Loaf and I have been for years .you are a fan for their music and their talent , and whatever their political views are their business and is nothing to do with anyone else , I have read some articles where Meat has been slated and some awful things have been said by people who are meant to be fans , at the end of the day everyone is entitled to their opinion and this includes Meat Loaf , what happened to free speech ?

Apparently it only exists if you're called Meat Loaf.

I'm thinking about changing my name.

Seems pretty clear that Meat was intent on upsetting those he feels are too negative and would very much like them to leave. I'm only guessing but it seems that he blew up to force the people he feels are negative to come out or just go away.
I think he would rather have those who are super critical leave and not post at all and he forced the issue with the shotgun approach.
Right or wrong that is how it appears...

Like a few other fans throughout this thread I rarely post on this forum anymore, it is a shame because I enjoy how Meat interacts with fans and to be honest he was one of the first, and actually still is one of the very few artists who I see interacting with fans via a message board and that speaks volumes to me about how much he does appreciate the fans even if there is the occasional rant.

I do take issue with the opening statement, having been a forum admin for over ten years on bigger message boards it is something that I would have locked straight away and not allowed to escalate like this has done. That's just me though and I'm sure the admins/moderators here have reasons for keeping it open, after all freedom of speech, etc. I don't think however it is fair to call out 97% of your fans on this board for being whatever, some of them on here are critical, perhaps a bit too harsh, whatever but it's your tightest fanclub on the internet and the people who hang around on boards like this are always the harshest critics. I hang around on the Mike Portnoy/Dream Theater boards loads and they take an absolute hammering from their fans, they all love the music and albums but if James has an off night live he'll get hammered for it, and Mike Portnoy is (And especially now that he isn't in the band anymore) always getting it in the neck.

I'm sure it's what comes of being famous and in that limelight, far be it from me to tell you how to act but you've dealt with criticism before and surely you can just shrug it off. As I said maybe people were a bit harsh but it's so easy to come across as harsh when you let your fingers run away with you and not reread what you write.

The politics thing, I was surprised when Meat endorsed Romney, but he explained his reasoning and I can appreciate that. Being from Britain I only hear the more extreme ends of the views on both sides, I personally would have been an Obama supporter were I American but we have the freedom to choose, hell I voted Conservative over here in the UK last election. (Yes I do regret it.) Of course people should have respected your choice, but your threw yourself out there into the public eye with your support and politics causes people to go a bit over the top. Again the internet has unfortunately lead to people being a bit harsher then then normally would be, hiding behind anonymity and nicknames, not that I think people should be forced into giving their real names but it does make it easier for people to be nastier.

At the end of it, I am and will continue to be a Meat Loaf fan, regardless of political support (Unless you like... become a Nazi or something then I'll probably have second thoughts) or any bad performances because it was your music I was brought up with and that I have loved for years. Yes as a fan I'll be critical of some moments, and at the end of it you're human like I am so I'll disagree with what some of your views may be.

I don't think it is fair at all for you to come on here and call out your fans or argue with them regardless of what they might have said, if you had an issue surely you should have spoke privately to a moderator and got it sorted that way. Instead creating this kind of public mess doesn't help anyone, it's just caused petty arguments and doesn't exactly look great for any Meat Loaf fans who might come across these forums.

Some of your sleight of hand when cleaning up a thread still bamboozles me.
You've still got it!

At least he still likes 3% of his fans.:-)

If was about his political views this would be true. The problem wasn't with his politics, it was about his generally bad behavior on so many levels, which reached a peak when he insulted 97% of his fan base. As a fan even if you didn't feel like you were one of the 97%, one of your friends had to be. He then tried to soften that message by saying the figure was highly inflated. IT was too little too late. The damage had already been done and people had already been hurt. The problem was also that Meat was using his free speech yet not allowing his fans that same option - to speak freely. When fans spoke out against that, he then insulted those that dared excercise the right to free speech, calling them "his enemies." The whole free speech thing works both ways - it is for the fans as well as Meat.
Every single time someone says it is simply about politics, it shows that they haven't been paying attention and reading what others have to say to find out what is going on. That only brings the whole heart of the debate and the feelings that go along with it back to the surface again.

I think Meat has been hanging around with idiots like Donald Trump too long. What a moron that man is, showing his true colours mocking the electoral college system, saying it is not a "democratic" vote. Would a vote by 90% white men be "more" democratic?? And I'm sure he wouldn't have made a squeek had Romney won.

Wanna have a stab at naming them? ;)

I'm tempted, but think I'll leave it! ;)

It seems several people have already declared themselves as being part of the 3% club in this thread. :-P

If Meat does invite the fan club to a rehearsal I fear a riot in the crowd. :-)

To true! At least 25% have declared themselves to be part of the 3% LOL

It is tempting; I shall resist as well :idea: :lol:

A number of people have said they took no personal offence because they knew Meat wouldn't consider them hyper-critical, negative or against him in any way, me being one of them. I don't indulge in percentage talk because personally I dismissed the figures Meat quoted as nothing more than exaggeration in the heat of the moment. Like many who have posted here, I know he wasn't including me, that's all ;)

It does highlight how important it is to win the popular vote as well as the electoral one, and last time I checked, Obama won that too.

That kinda "trumps" Trump's argument if you ask me.

I hope Meat does understand he has no real enemies here, and I can understand how honest opinions can be difficult to swallow when it is you who is being talked about and you (quite obviously) care deeply and quite rightly, about issues such as politics and how fans view your career.

I increasingly get a picture of someone who wears his heart on his sleeve, and whilst I can't say I agree with some of the statements he has made here, or appreciate the tone of these responses, I do respect the fact that he is honest, works hard and clearly cares deeply - you just couldn't get that mad if you didn't.

I think the time has come for a little perspective now. Yes Meat does appear to have a heated temper at times, but also I've seen plenty of genuine kindness in his postings - concern fo Pudding after the New Zealand earthquake last year and wedding-day messages both on-stage and on here for example.

On balance I know he is a good guy, but also a man of emotional extremes. (too many concussions ;O ? ) It is this that probably makes him the performer we love so much in the end, so I ain't going to criticise too much. We are all flawed, we all get hurt sometimes and all have the capacity to hurt back.

The "blame game" just becomes pointless and immature after a while....

I think this has probably gone on long enough now, so I call for a bit of balance from the critics in the same way to the way I called for the similar from one or two of the more sychophantic among us in an earlier post.

I think that's me done on this thread, it is getting repetitive and silly.

If Meat wants to discuss anything I've said which may have unitentionally annoyed him in any way I'll happily discuss it via email. I ain't going to get into a slagging match on the board without offering the opportunity to discuss things confidentially beforehand....

In any social situation - and this forum is a social situation - there will be debate about things. The person who loses their temper, their cool, and resorts to shouting, swearing and insults owes the people at that gathering an apology.

That anyone would defend this behaviour is beyond me. I've admired Meat for years to the point that friends have pulled me up on constantly extolling his virtues - but where decent manners are concerned I wouldn't waver whether it was Meat Loaf, John Lennon, Jesus Christ or Mother Hubbard who was shitting at the dinner table.

As for this crap about how he was basically doing an experiment on us all? Well, I'm not a rat and this isn't a laboratory.

Understanding isn't agreeing, endorsing or even condoning; nor is forgiving.

.

That I can endorse wholeheartedly

Okay - tha last one was the penultimate post on this matter.

In the social situation you described - the person who resorts to that kind of behaviour usually looses the argument. I don't think Meat was in the right here, everyone would have welcomed his measured thoughts on the issues that he aparrently took offence to.

I don't think I'm necessarily defending Meat, Just saying that the level of recrimination is getting daft now, and the slightly bipolar nature of his artistic output is what attracted is here in the first-place after all. What's the point in getting offended at an internet post anyway? Meat is still Meat, you are still you. we all still think what we thought before about the issues in hand.

I'm sure Meat is a good guy. Perhaps difficult to live with sometimes but a good guy. I'm also sure those of us who discussed the issues which drew the reaction did so in an honest and legitimate manner. It is a fundamental right to disagree and I don't think any party here would argue with that. The recriminations are just going on too long, becoming self-indulgent and it is getting petty now.


one last thought - this is Meat Loaf. An artist, musician, actor, performer, lover, fighter, businessman, liberal, independent, republican, conservative, commune-living-hippy, charlie manson hitchiker, friend of Steinman (who's sexuality and political affiliations are freely discussed and remain searchable on another forum), a soft-ball coach, charity worker, philanthropist, employer, employee, registered trade mark, husband, father and many other things not in the public domain.
If I had been trying to hold that identity together in the public eye for the last 40 years then I'm sure i'd have some conflicts - cut the guy some slack and ask yourself the question: can you say you would never spout off on a web forum if you saw something you rightly or wrongly percieved as threatening or ill informed?



That's all.

Meat congratulates President Obama on fb page, have a look...

:twisted: I think his last post on facebook is very telling towards how he's feeling.
Especially the last paragraph.

I think it shows he's a decent human being

Is there more than one Meat Loaf? That is totally contrary to what he said just a few days ago. I need a drink...

Not really, he admits he lashes out in the heat of the moment when he is attacked with lies and intolerance. We know this already so yes it's the same person.

:twisted: It sounds to me like a guy who's blown a gasket, realized he's over reacted, and feels sorry for his actions.

Over reaction and remorse for it is not something that is exclusive to the rich and famous. :wink:



I think a post like that posted here would go a long way to healing the wounds here, but personally I know how he's feeling, and I don't need to hear him say it.

If he chooses to say it here, it would be appreciated.

It's not always easy to apologise because you f*cked up, that's why it sometimes means so much.

At the end of the day, he f*cked up, simple as that.

He felt rattled and blew his top, some people are great at holding their tongues, others not and clearly he's not. Does that make what he said excusable or any more pleasant to read? Absolutely not, it's actually quite offensive, but who here hasn't ever gone mental and come out with stuff they regret?!

The guy f*cked up. Move on.

At least it's a sane post. Nothing like
So I just hope he came to his senses. At least his facebook message deserves credit. Nothing like that nutcase of a Trump.

In the end it takes a man to accept defeat. Romney did it graciously and I think Meat Loaf did the right thing too. He understands that now the contest is over there is no use at demonishing the President. No matter who you voted for, after election day you all need to work together to get something done.

Fair enough, Meat worded that well :cool:

I'd contest that he found "lies and intolerance" here, but I guess "Truth resides in every human Heart , and one has to search for it there, and to be guided by truth as one sees it. But no one has the right to coerce others to act according to his own view of truth". The problems start when you afford others the right to live by that mandate even when it doesn't sit easily with your own interpretation of truth.

"Truth" is subjective - I am a scientist and all of science comes down to subjective interpretation until peer-review (or just plain consequence, i.e aeroplanes flying, or atoms splitting) leads to to a general acceptance of facts.

More talking and less shouting is never a bad thing when conflicts between individual truths occur.

Love Ya Meat.

Rich.

where did meat say Obama was spineless? :|

In here somewhere

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Forum Runner

You didn't read carefully. I was differentiating between discussion of how Meat uses his voice and discussion of his voice itself. Some have confused the two, and made statements about Meat's voice based on his singing on a given occasion, e.g. the last moment of "America the Beautiful" in Defiance.

We all have ears to hear him sing, but only Meat himself and Eric Vetro (and any other professionals he may employ to help him care for and develop his voice) are qualified to criticise that voice.

This is not a trivial distinction. And for the purposes of this board, the fewer sweeping generalizations made the fewer heated arguments we'll have.
　

Sorry, anyone with an appreciation of music is qualfied to criticise.

The question for me is the degree of relevance of those criticisms. Objectivity is significant - Vetro by his being on the payroll is not necessarily objective - he is just employed to get the most out of the current voice.

He isn't doing a bad job either, but completely objectively?

Nah, sorry. Meat gives everything. It's good enough for me, but is my opinion objective? no.

There have been times in Meat's career that even negatively bised critics have had to conceede that performances were objectively outstanding. You don't share a stage with Pavarrotti otherwise.

Meat has vocal ability capable of being the best objectively. More recently "outstanding" has been a more subjective appraisal based on effort, cultural significance, and fandom - not that that isn't something to be immensely proud of.

Uh, first post.

"Where lies can't hurt me
The flesh desert me
No in or out
No loss or doubt
No living with or doing without
Where money ain't the power king
And kindness is the most precious thing"



Just Sayin'

:/

So we're getting into semantics here ... and assuming that the performance and the voice are separate things, where one is qualified to criticise the performance but not the voice, if I understand you correctly ?

The two are inextricably linked surely, and its difficult to say if the performances are consistently good or bad, this doesn't reflect the condition of the voice. This is hardly a 'sweeping generalisation'.

Seriously? :roll: Please, speak for yourself and not the rest of the people here. There's so much to address in that one short paragraph that I don't even know where to start. In fact, I don't even think I want to. :evil:

How did this go from MEATS political VIEW to his VOICE?

Read Meat's posts along with the rest of this thread, and hopefully that will help you understand.

Excuse me, I have read the WHOLE thread. But wasn't this SAME topic discussed days ago in another thread about Meat endorsing Mitt? SORRY but it seems to be going in circles...

:twisted: Like this..............

:wink:

Meat why dont people respect your choices? i dont understand? been a fan of yours from the 80s and always will music and acting is what i like! i dont like it when people bring in personal things! #respect hope your well meat loaf :) ... one of the REAL fans!

Sorry, but I (or anybody else) have the right to critique anybody that I (they) like. If the person of topic chooses to get offended than that is there choice and their problem.

And heated arguments are fun. It's the same reason why political debates are fun. There's no point to having a message board where everybody agrees all the time.

If Meat sings that bad as he did at the endorsement to the extent it is embarrasing for himself and for me as a fan then you can bet your bottom dollar I will be honest and tell people his voice sucked. Call me Eric Vetro if you have to. ;-)

If I would say he was amazing it would completely undermine the times I said he was amazing when it actually was. There would be no point in honest opinion and you might as well turn this into a kiss ass adoration board as someone suggested.

I think there's a large number of people here who would like that very much :roll:

I'm appalled at all of this.

I've never seen anyone treat their fans this way. If this was a test to flush out the "enemies," I'm not playing. You can't take back words. I'm very disappointed.

I've got better things to do.

I agree. It's time.

Eric Vetro, you are not.

Sent from my HTC Incredible S using Forum Runner

Heated arguments are NOT fun. Discussions ARE and it's perfectly possible in life to have a discussion where opinions differ without it resorting to a heated argument.

Something that seems to happen rather a lot around here. :roll:

I agree with this. I think most of us have made whatever point we have decided to make and now things just seem to be going around in circles. I think it's time to move on too.

I'm sure several people would have liked to have had this thread locked the minute it started and simply forgiven Meat no matter what he would have written. Actually just a few posts back proved exactly that some people have NOT had a chance to make their viewpoint clear just because they do not log in every two seconds.

Just because someone does not share your viewpoint doesn't mean to say they should be silenced.

I'm not talking about the people that are commenting on this matter for the first time, I'm talking about those people that seem to keep on about it but you're right, they shouldn't be silenced. After all we all have the right to say what we want.

I'M SORRY I SPOKE.

Fair enough I understand what you are now saying but I've seen the "let's move on" thing lead to only thing on this site.... and in actual fact that didn't stop Meat. :-P

I have fallen into the "time to move on camp".
Don't you know this thread was started a whopping FIVE days ago!
Amazing how one can get "bored" with it all. :zzz:
I hope if Meat explodes again it is when he channels his frustrations into a super-charged performance for the fan club. :-)

And since FIVE days someone who came to this board on Sunday just to be rude to its users has missed the opportunity to apologize and repair some of the damage that has been done by that action. Go to a webside, insult "97 %" of its users and leave the people you attacked argueing among each other. Nice...

Anyone surprised by the lack of any reconciliation message, let alone an apology in 5 days? Anyone? Bueller...Bueller

tienes razón - you're right
but i guess there won't be an apologize and this thread will die as time goes by and i guess it will happen again. the question is how many of the users/mod/admin will get more and more tired of this in the future?
:devil:

It wasn't actually 97%, that was an exaggeration - a devious yet genius ploy to find out who was a real fan and who isn't. A scheme...better, a master plan, if you will. If you're offended, you're just a part of the problem!

Remember? :twisted:

That's indeed very clever. Just leave it to the victims of your wrath to figure out to which degree you "exaggerated" your numbers and who actually belonged to which category. That way you can easily shift the responsibility for your actions on to someone else. Brilliant! :twisted:

... create civil war, and watch the forces of good overcome the forces of evil, with only the righteous, the loyal true fans, left standing ... :twisted:

So does he really not want our money? Or was that an exaggeration too? If you are in the exaggerated 97% you are not supposed to buy the CD right?

It looks like some of you are just around here for the fun of trolling. On one hand you complain, that we're running around in circles and on the other hand you're doing your very best to stir the pot again and again. I'm not yet sure what to do, wether I hand out a few trolling infractions resulting in a ban or simply lock the thread. You'll find out soon enough.

I was starting to think along the same lines, but I don't think banning or thread locking is such a great idea. Just a wild stab in the dark but maybe asking them not to inflame the topic further might be better than dictating :shrug: - which is kind of how it comes across.

This is Rainer's site, he hosts it, we are here at his invitation. He doesn't "come across as a dictator" to me. I think he is firm and fair, and I think to post that is rather out of order, and not within the forum guidelines. If I have any issue with Rainer's decisions, or those of a moderator, I contact them off the board as requested.

Exactly.

It's not out of order, Caryl. It's a discussion forum, and if it's going to stay active and have users engaged in discussion, silence by way of claiming ownership isn't going to go down that well. If you create something within the public domain dedicated to a popular artist, you have to accept that they're going to want to use it for debate. I'm glad that R set this site up in the first place, but I do think that on occasion he can come across as being a bit dictatorial. I'd like to be part of an equal community. Where people are treated equally. The fact that this thread is still open and relatively un-edited is a positive step I think, and I'm pretty impressed that R and the mods have gone there.

I think R is fair and just on this forum, he has never been dictatorial. I agree with him that recent posts have been very much troll like slagging off Meat, it's been like a bunch of stupid teenagers egging each other on. I think some bans would be entirely appropriate and are actually long overdue, so in that respect R and the mods have been TOO fair to some people.

I think the question then becomes 'where's the middle ground?' I know that I don't come here to offend and provoke Meat Loaf, but I also know I don't come here to gush over everything he says or does. If I have an interest in part of his performance or technique (or a song, or a record, or a video), I want to talk about that and see what other people think. Sometimes I want to hear from the other side of the opinion so I can adjust my own views to things I might not have been aware of or thought about before. I don't come to this site to cause the owner any offense, and I don't come here to intentionally offend other users.

I can't speak for anyone else, but that's where I'm coming from.

I guess these are fairly unprecedented times.

The artist whom the site is named after, and whom we all love and admire, tells everyone where to go, in response to reactions to his endorsement - which to many was provocative - and to a thread which was respectful enough, but not to his liking.

Perhaps some people are annoyed / upset and would appreciate an apology - as I think one moderator suggested in a recent post.

No one has posted in the abusive style that Meat has, so perhaps people just need to be cut some slack if their posts are somewhat annoyed, upset or even cynical ?

Only my opinion.

And I expressed my thought on this forum where people frequently bang on about freedom of expression, and Rainer was referring to trolling, not discussion.

This thread has veered well away from "the other side of the opinion" so that you or anyone else can adjust their view, and headed into repeating the same opinions, which seem aimed to fan the flames and keep the pot stirred.

I just put two people on my ignore list. It works very well, whatever they post, I won't be annoyed by it as I just don't see it. :)) Meat Loaf could do the same and put the 97 % forum members he loathes (or whatever the "correct" percentage is - I don't know it since he didn't bother to reveal it) on his ignore list as well - if his main problem with this forum is indeed posts he feels hurt and offended by. Attempts to "find enemies" and control what is being said and who uses this forum might become difficult, though. ;)

I've tried to ignore this ... but I just can't ... this is like diving in the penalty box to get footballers sent off ...

Fact is, I'm asking all the time. And some people simply don't get the message. Freedom of speech doesn't mean that you can test us or me how long it takes until explosion.

Any more even borderline trolling in this thread and it's GONE. And that might include a ban for the troll as well. This includes:

• Meat went over the top. He apologised on Facebook, a platform with a way bigger reach than this one. It was mentioned and acknowledged in this thread and you can now either accept this apology or not. Either way, if you're waiting for another apology here, then you're shit out of luck imho. Accept that Facebook apology or not, but move on. Any more posts whining about an apology, see above.
• Coming back after years of absence for a snide remark is a prime example of what I'm talking about. Any more of that will result in permanent absence of the absentee.
• Leave the 97% alone. It has been scrutinised thouroughly. Read the thread.
• Anything else that I feel is off topic to this thread, for example the current state of your ignore list or any other remark of that quality. The forum allows to you to edit your post within 60 minutes. Use the edit function. Btw., that was a hint.

Regarding the middle ground mentioned earlier. I'm looking for that for more than ten (10) years. There is none. Common sense? Missing as well.

I'll give you a hint: Read my recent posts, understand them. Try to answer my question (to Adje) for yourself. And then read and understand Paul Crooks's recent posts. This might give you an idea where Meat and Paul are coming from and how to find that infamous middle ground.