Cafe Pharma's Sarah Palmer Tames Boogalou Shrimp

Occasionally, I visit the Cafe Pharma discussion boards to see what's going on. But, frankly, after a nasty run-in with a few anonymous posters there -- see "Banned from CafePharma!" -- I haven't visited too often or dared to post anything under my own name.

Since then, I have exchanged a few friendly emails back and forth with Sarah Palmer who is the administrator of the site. Zookeeper or Animal Tamer may be more appropriate titles.

Last month, Sarah apparently banned a Cafe Pharma member who went under the pseudonym "Boogalou Shrimp." As I noted in a post made by Jane Chin on her Pharma Rep Clinic blog, "In his/her online profile, Boogalou Shrimp says his/her interests are 'Leg humping.' Since joining on 11 September 2006, Boogalou Shrimp has made 3,212 posts to CafePharma; an average of more than one post per hour, 24/7."

Boogalou Shrimp tried to win over people with posts like this: "Is John Mack an asshat or a fagbot? I can't decide?"

But Boogalou wouldn't be banned for something so innane as that. Yet, Sarah won't say why this person was banned. The following Cafe Pharma thread documents the banning:

I'll ask the question everyone wants to know
Why was Boogalou Shrimp banned?
--medrep1850

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What's the deal. Sarah? You provided a damning case against Clem, the Black genocide agonist. The litany of Clem's rantings that you posted put his apologists in their place, thus shutting them up.

Now the Shrimp's been banned.

Let's see "your evidence" that you have compiled on Shrimp.
--thehairyfiddler

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Sorry, but we cannot always divulge the reasons why posters are banned. There is no single reason in this case. The "final straw" had nothing to do with anything on the Political Discussions board. I'm sure he knows very well why he was banned. --Sarah Palmer

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But certainly you can cite generalities for your decision, right? What "posting policy" did he violate? You don't have to be specific, here.

In his defense, he did a damn good job of fending off the calvary of white racists that stink up the political boards on a daily basis.

"The "final straw" had nothing to do with anything on the Political Discussions board."

Again, can't you share generalities?

"I'm sure he knows very well why he was banned."

Did he threaten to kill someone? I never saw a pattern of rule breaking with him. Maybe he melted down after having a few too many. Shit happens, ya know.
--thehairyfiddler

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Sarah you lost all my respect. You must be kidding me...can't give the reason? I'm also black like shrimp and am consistently attacked on your site by racist. Why don't you do something about that?...or did you decide it's better to ban the black guy so the bigot's don't have a target? The latter is the only plausible reason I can think of and that's why you won't give a reason. You're just as bad as the bigots!
--Anonymous

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Whatever. It's so funny...I get accused of being a flaming liberal by some, a bigot by others. Some have said I am black, and now I have a cold blue eye I'm just running a site with very busy message boards, where we have to make many daily decisions on how to make the boards the most usable for our visitors. I can assure you this - Boogalou Shrimp was not banned because of his race, or even because of anything having to do with racial/political discussions, race baiting, etc. You of course may believe as you want to believe, but don't expect me to answer your continued ranting when you have already been given your answer several times. --Sarah

See what I mean about "zookeeper" or "animal tamer" being more accurate descriptions of Sarah's job?

There are over 14,000 registered Cafe Pharma members, of which as many as 1,100 may be online at the same time. The site currently hosts nearly 150,000 threads and over 1.5 million posts!

Whatever we call Sarah's job, I don't envy her. Sarah, I am sorry I argued with you in the past about your administrative decisions. Keep up the good work and ban away!