Gentleman Enough to Buy You Lunch at Chili's! - November 20th, 2004

What is the political agenda of stupid_free?

There is no political agenda in stupid_free. We are a conglomeration of various opinions united in our quest to unearth stupidity.

Can anyone join stupid_free?

Yes. Or no. It depends.

What constitutes a “stupid”?

Stupid, in the context of this community, is a statement or opinion which the average person, applying contemporary community standards, would identify as brainless, deficient, dense, dim, dumb, foolish, half-baked, half-witted, idiotic, imbecilic, inane, laughable, ludicrous, meaningless, mindless, moronic, naive, nonsensical, obtuse, pointless, senseless, simple-minded, thickheaded, unintelligent, or witless.

There is some grey area and subjectivity here, so use your best judgment.

Will anything get me banned from stupid_free?

Only a very few things can possibly get you banned: Racial slurs. Deleting posts, deleting comments, disabling comments. Posting spam. Harassing users or commenting without permission in their personal journals. Internet vigilantism. Anything that directly violates the LJ TOS. If you've been banned, you're a complete and total moron.

How should I construct my post?

Your post should include the names of the major players, links to the posts and comments you are speaking of, and a brief synopsis of the stupid. You may add commentary, so long as it’s not soap-box ranting about your own personal agenda. This is a point-and-laugh community, not a rant community.

Where can I find good “stupid”?

This is Livejournal, where the stupid roam wild and free. You’re likely to find stupidity everywhere you look, but a good place to start is in large communities where many members are likely to have opinions rooted firmly in intolerance. While there is probably lots of stupid in personal journals, we ask everyone to confine their efforts to open forums and unlocked posts in communities.

There's some great stupid in a community I'm in, but it's locked. Can I post it anyway? I'll just copy-paste and take screencaps, m'kay?

No. Open community posts only.

I saw some great stupid when I was trolling someone's personal journal, can I post about that?

No. Open community posts only.

What if I am stupid? Can I still get involved?

Yes! In fact, some of our funniest contributions are from our stupid associates. Click these links for examples of real-life idiots right in our ranks:
http://community.livejournal.com/stupid_free/83204.html?thread=3440900#t3440900
http://community.livejournal.com/stupid_free/79287.html?thread=3131575#t3131575
http://community.livejournal.com/stupid_free/77562.html?thread=3005690#t3005690
http://community.livejournal.com/stupid_free/15805.html?thread=218045#t218045

I saw a really stupid thread on the IMDB forums the other day, can I post about it here?

stupid_free is for LJ community threads only. There are other communities for mocking stupidity found in the world and internet at large.

I posted something about someone I think is real dumb but everybody yelled at me and said they didn’t see the stupid!

You throw gum at the wall, not all of it will stick. Perhaps the post seemed really stupid to you because of your particular belief system, but that might not mesh with the bulk of this community’s members. *shrug* Don’t sweat it if they aren’t all winners. And you gotta have a little bit of a callous towards flames to participate in a mocking community to begin with because it does get heated here at times.

People are flaming me because of something I said, can I delete my comments or post?

Deleted posts and comments makes us bannifyingly sad. Toughen up. Or just stop reading and responding. Flames on LJ burn hot and out fast. If you’re not enjoying it, just ignore it.

I made a spelling/grammar/html boo-boo in my comment to someone, can I delete it?

Please do not delete comments, even for boo-boos. All we see is "deleted comment" and have no way to know if you threatened someone with sharpened sporks, or simply used the wrong form of there/their/they're. Everyone makes errors, just correct it in the next comment down and the universe will surely forgive you.

I saw a community specifically for purple cross-dressing space alien pig farmers! Can you believe that?!?!

While purple cross-dressing space alien pig farmers might seem outrageously stupid to you, we mock people for stupid things they say rather than simply what they are. We try not to poke fun at lifestyle choices on the whole, no matter how wacky they might seem.

Somebody made a post about me and I’m real mad and I think you’re all a bunch of meanie poopheads!

Everyone loves being agreed with. We all enjoy when our posts are received with a collective intarweb high-five, the cheers for our wit and wisdom echoing through LJ’s virtual halls. But occasionally a post or comment may fall short of its desired masturbatory goals. It’s not the end of the world. Dissenting opinions will not kill you. In fact, they might broaden your horizons. If you feel strongly about your thoughts and would like to expand upon them here, we welcome debate. You do not need to be a member to post.

But I possess skin so thin and arguments so flimsy that not even I can defend my statements!

If you’re so fragile that you cannot tolerate some chipping at the cracks your logic facade, you might want to re-think posting your opinions to open forums where countless strangers can read and dissect them. Go back to your personal journal and preach to your own choir. LJ communities are not for you.

You’re using MY words and that’s a violation of my copyright!!

Unless you are a lawyer, those words make you sound foolish and petty. What we do here in stupid_free is something called “satirical commentary” and your words are merely quoted for the purpose of clarification and critique. According to LJ’s TOS, you have a default copyright on the material in your personal journal. A comment or post to a community is a snippet of your LJ presence. We could all get lawyers and argue about Fair Use and Public Domain, but doesn’t that seem a bit excessive? Especially since you’d have to be pretty pretentious to claim your community comments are tantamount to “your work” and any reprinting here is done with full credit to you and without intent to profit.

I’m going to sic LJ Abuse on you and get your little community shut down because I can’t sleep at night knowing that people like you enjoy your freedom of speech just as much as I do!!! Because what I’m saying is important and what you’re saying is mean and not funny and I hate it!!!

Repeat this diatribe in front of the mirror. See how silly you look?

Someone is trolling my personal journal and I think they’re from this community.

Trolling personal journals is strictly prohibited in stupid_free. If someone from this community is commenting in your personal journal against your wishes, please contact us at stupid_free (@) hotmail.com and we will take action. If they are commenting anonymously, we suggest you opt for IP logging and disable anonymous comments. You can always change your settings back when it blows over (and LJ drama always blows over). If anyone posts anything you view as a threat, attack, or obscenity, please contact us immediately and we will assist you in following up with the abuse team.

I just read a post on stupid_free and it was SO stupid, I was thinking of going to that person’s personal journal and telling them (anonymously, natch!) they’re too stupid to live/have kids/own a hamster/dress themselves…

Trolling personal journals is strictly prohibited and a bannable offense. If you wish to comment to someone directly, do so in the community of origin. If you are unable to post to that community due to membership or posting restrictions, you should make your comments to the post in stupid_free and learn to live with the fact that the person might never know how you truly feel.

I’ve got some great shit-eating goat porn pics, should I post them here?

Congratulations, but no. This is not the place and your post will be swiftly and silently deleted.

Someone keeps posting shit-eating goat porn, can’t you guys make them stop/moderate membership/screen posts for approval…?

We intend to keep the community open as we do not wish to prevent non-members from replying to posts. An open forum is a successful forum. We will delete obscene/spam posts as soon as we can. If you think that we’ve not yet discovered it, you can email us at stupid_free (@) hotmail.com or lord.snot (@) yahoo.com. If it is pornographic or violent content, you may report the post to LJ abuse immediately.

OMG SPAM POSTS are ruining my friends-list view and now I have to leave the community or something because LJ life as I know it has been insufferably disrupted! Please, for the love of all that is holy, LJ-CUT!!!!!

Spammers love attention. If you don't give them any, they will go away. Please just scroll on past and we promise to delete as soon as we can. See one question up for more information.

OMG OMG SPAM POSTS SPAM POSTS DEAD BABIES INFECTED PRIVATE PARTS GIGANTIC FONTS AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! WHERE ARE THE MODS?????

I keep chaining sayonara_snot to the computer, but she's crafty and manages to chew herself free. We promise to delete as soon as we see offending posts. We swear. You can send us an email or comment in our journals to let us know what's going on. You can also report TOS violations to LJ abuse. You DO NOT have to leave the community. There are a variety of ways to circumvent offending images. Using this link:
http://community.livejournal.com/stupid_free?nohtml=1 you can view the community with the html disabled. You can also disable all images through Firefox; here's a tutorial on that.

Who are the brilliant minds behind stupid_free and how might I reach them?

The moderators and supreme-overlords of this community are sayonara_snot and lord_snot. You may lather us with praise and compliment through our personal journals, or via email at stupid_free (@) hotmail.com or lord.snot (@) yahoo.com.

Don’t you guys have anything better to do?

Sadly, no.

I mean, get a life!!!

We’ve tried life. We prefer this.

What are the Stupid Police and can I join them?

The Stupid Police are an elite band of tattlers. If you’d like to become a Stupid Police Officer, please submit resume, head shot, and psychiatric evaluation to the above addresses.