Those who have read my comments in other threads concerning the recent departure of David Wilkins, who offended somebody, may be interested in a message I received today from his antagonist, "robertmacdowell." I place it here in the hope the moderators will see a greater value in what this reveals about the latter individual, whom some readers seem to feel was ill-used by David and have jumped to defend, than in deleting it forthwith. (The moderators presumably have the ability to review personal messages sent through this forum, and can therefore easily confirm for themselves that the following is exactly what "robertmacdowell" sent to me):

"you use words like thin-skinned, confronting, offended, persist, and on and on. This suggests that you believe RyPN should be a confrontational and combative place: You want an RyPN where you have free license to heap abuse on anyone you think is wrong.

Perhaps you do not feel you owe anyone an education, maybe it really gets under your skin when someone errs and someone else kindly explains to them the correct answers, and the other person is wiser for it and thanks them. Do you have the manners, character and inclination to genuinely help a person in such a way?

Of course, kindly giving such advice also risks being read by experts who know more than you. You could find yourself called out as wrong and being corrected. Is that experience for you?

perhaps you might want to mull your own purpose for being on the forum."

Well, gosh. Seems like "robertmacdowell" has moved on from dispensing legal opinion without a license, to the field of psychiatry. Surely this sort of abuse through the personal message feature, particularly his last sentence, is not allowed on RYPN?

This has been lone of the most disappointing unnecessary battles I've watched here ever, and this includes the Ross debacle. All 3 principals are brilliant and have a lot of successes under their belts...….. but no matter how much any or all of them have no patience for ignorance and posers and make no bones about it, banning the general counsel for the Heritage Rail Alliance and IRM (among other things) is throwing away a resource that can do us all a lot of good - and over what? Hurt feelings? Can we collectively grow a pair to pass around to whoever needs it at the moment?

If we allow opinions of ignorance, fantasy, magical thinking, overtly impossible idealism, and just plain stupidity - which is much more offensive than calling wrong information out - but ban truth when presented boldly, we might as well all work in Washington.

Bring him back so we can all learn how the legalities of situations in our industry really work from the guy representing us in the trenches every day.

This kind of stuff breaks my heart. I am so grateful for all the advice I have received here in the short time I have been on this site. In fact, I have a WORD file where I copy all the advice so I can have it in one place.
The latest data I got was from the Hawaiian railroad, and when i am there this year, i will personally thank them.
I am in the process of restoring a 23 ton GE switcher.

While you guys are battling over word smithing on RyPN and hurt feelings, other guys are out in the mud and rain moving locomotives. Or raising money. Or making connections to get stuff to a safe haven. Think about that! RyPN has been a huge help in this effort by people doing ACTUAL work. Get off it.

J.R. May
(who spent about two hours today just trying to save two wooden passenger cars)

In another post (now, disgustingly, pre-emptively locked) I read this:

"Over the past few months, several individual users have contacted me either via RYPN, private message, Facebook or in person, all with similar complaints against Mr. Wilkins. It shows a pattern of behavior that is not healthy to this forum. So in the interests of fostering greater civility and nurturing a professional atmosphere, I had to take action.

"I would rather have not had to do this."

And indeed there is a more appropriate response than 'look what you made me do.' Those of us who have moderated forums in the 'old days' are familiar with it: it's called 'putting a poster on moderation' and usually involves a fairly simple setting in the site moderation interface which requires moderator approval before a member's posts will appear.

Banning is a serious response reserved only for those genuinely disruptive, or beyond question of zero value, to the provision of meaningful information. I can think of certain other people here, including (to my own shame) myself in an exchange with Matt Austin a few years ago, who could be said to fit that category of poster better than Mr. Wilkins even on his worst suffer-fools-gladly day. I am also frankly disturbed at the implicit impression that the ban resulted from personal opinion, a situation I have seen from time to time on the Kalmbach forums; cutting off a freely-given resource of the magnitude already amply demonstrated by Mr. Wilkins' contributions over the years particularly when a better and more appropriate option is available is not really something I can justify with appeals to perceived civility or whatever.

Yes, it's a shame 'we can't all make nice with each other' and behave in a fully civil and adult manner to each other. Don't see this action or the explanations put up for it so far helping much to achieve that except by default.

While I have relatively little cred in real-world saving, I think Mr. May in particular will vouch for my willingness to have travelled long distances at considerable cost to save a wooden car when necessary. That is a different issue from integrity in moderation procedure, and also from the perceived value of RyPN as a resource ... which, if anything, is crippled more than assisted by the controversy involving the Wilkins ban.

+1, and keep up the good work!

I am new here, so consider this an outsider's perspective. The internal squabbles between users on any forum are incredibly minuscule in comparison to anything happening in the real world, especially stuff on a deadline like the current ITM situation. RYPN is no different, and the (like it or not) niche world of rail preservation means unity is needed even more. Banning someone simply drives a wedge in deeper and does not solve anything, after all, what is to stop a banned user from returning under a new name? I myself once had to employ that tactic on another forum, and no one noticed until I brought it up in a discussion months later after someone else was placed on moderation, and later banned.

But for forum policing I still prefer the self-moderation system that the tech site Slashdot (news for nerds, stuff that matters) has employed since its creation in 1997. Just set your filter to 1, and all the crap disappears. No moderators needed.

I created an account here because I wanted to learn from and occasionally correspond with intelligent folks with whom I share a common interest, and both Mr. Wilkins and "robertmacdowell" seemed to fit that bill. Just like the real world it is impossible to agree with everyone all the time, but we somehow manage to make that work without the cops intervening in verbal arguments and blowing up one party.

What Dave said.......

Mr. Wilkins is entitled to offer his legal advice, but his spew of vitriol has never been welcomed. If his opinion is worthwhile, he needn't coat it in abusive, bitter, rhetoric, just to show us how much more "he knows".

I second the motion!

Post Removed by Moderator due to personal allegations/attacks that could not be backed up with facts, only personal opinion.

I must say that banning someone should be reserved for only the most extreme cases and I'd always vote to err on the side of transparency.

On the other hand being a moderator is a thankless job and all of us need to do all possible to show our support for those willing to take on the task.

Therein lies the dilemma.

If Mr. Wilkins demise serves the purpose of encouraging more civil discourse then it will have not been all in vain.

IMHO- Ross Rowland

Perhaps we should all re-read the Guidelines and the 'Rant' by Steaminfo at the top of the interchange?

Searching the forum's history for "onerous lawyer", yields only one result, your post above.

Searching the forum's history for "lowly Mcdonald's", yields only one result, your post above.


I'm not a lawyer, don't "play one on TV", and have never even been in the door of a law school or picked up a law book, but, if you are going to hurl accusations, your evidence had better be much more substantial than what you provide with your 1st two accusations.......
….Screen shots please! (anything short of that is just "hearsay")

As for any actions on 'Facebook', let any moderators over there handle those issues.
Moderators here at RYPN should be confine their actions to events which happen at RYPN, and nowhere else


Jeff Delhaye

Sure, we should be willing and able to take whatever someone else dishes out. Everybody is thick skinned until they unwittingly find themselves on the receiving end of one of Dave's personal chest pounding crusades.

How many groups or projects have all but stopped sharing their progress here and elsewhere because of this kind of vitriole when Dave has decided he is going to be the judge, jury and executioner?

As has been said many times before, we sure love to eat our own, and I've watched Dave do this more than once.

In the end, I am reminded that no one really knows how much you know until they know how much you care. You will catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

If we can't keep a normal level of respect here in our own ranks, how can we possibly ever work together to further our cause out there?

In the end, no one wins here. I am not celebrating this ban, despite all my desire to actually do so. Rick seems to be handling the Lion's share of the moderating so I would be inclined to cut him some slack. Until others are willing to step up and comoderate alongside him, I will not second guess his decisions.

Rob Gardner

There are FOUR moderators listed for this forum, and perhaps, if Rick, (who may or may not, be allowing his personal feelings to affect his view of the situation at hand), would agree to let the other 3 moderators handle any issues with Mr Wilkins, we could get back to the business at hand.


Jeff