Disturbing find on eBay

badneighbor wrote:I think the issue is that this society would support a person trying to make money commemorating a tragic crime. But if selling this is bad, then are all the 9-11 commemorative things that have been marketed also bad? I think this pin is tasteless, and won't go in my collection. But people have a right to say or sell anything in this country. Heck, I despise this but burning the Stars & Stripes is legal. I think it is a real sign of how ridiculous the liberalism in our country has become.

If this product offered any suggestion that it was memorializing the victims it would it would be a totally different story, but this company is simply exploiting a tragedy for its own benefit.

btw, pgengler, I agree with you that not everything I (or even a few people) find offensive should be banned, but in cases like this were the product is generally regarded as disrespectful, I feel that there ought to be some restrictions. Maybe I was a bit hasty in suggesting they be shut down, but they should not be allowed to be selling their product on eBay; would you like to see white supremacist propoganda being sold on there? I sincerely doubt it, but if you allow crap like these buttons to be sold, the other stuff will not be far behind.

Lirr168 wrote:btw, pgengler, I agree with you that not everything I (or even a few people) find offensive should be banned, but in cases like this were the product is generally regarded as disrespectful, I feel that there ought to be some restrictions. Maybe I was a bit hasty in suggesting they be shut down, but they should not be allowed to be selling their product on eBay; would you like to see white supremacist propoganda being sold on there? I sincerely doubt it, but if you allow crap like these buttons to be sold, the other stuff will not be far behind.

I may not like it, but that doesn't mean I think it should be disallowed. The fact that such things are indeed sold means that there is a market for them; if no one wanted to buy them, people would be less likely to list such things, because they'd be paying the eBay listing fees and not making any money.

Now, eBay, as a private company, certainly has the right to regulate what can and cannot be listed on their site. If they felt so inclined, they could create a policy forbidding any item with the letter 'e' in its name. That's their right, and it's their right to choose whether or not to ban or take down things like this. I don't see any reason why they should; nor do I see any reason why they should take down white supremacist propoganda, but they can, if they want. I happen to think it's generally a bad idea to suppress stuff, because things that are "generally disrespectful" to most are considered acceptable or even right by others. I don't see why the opinions of the majority should be able to suppress those of a minority; it can lead to people believing the prevailing opinion simply because it's the prevailing opinion. I personally happen to disagree with the views of white supremacist groups, but I do so because I understand, in general terms, what those views are, not because it's the general feeling of society that such groups are wrong (I heartily recommend reading John Stuart Mill's "On Liberty" on this general subject).

Anyway, the short version is: I may not agree with it, and most people may not agree with but, but I don't feel that means it should be banned or disallowed; but that's all trumped by the fact that eBay is not the government, and as such, is in no way required to allow anything and everything that comes across. Also, read "On Liberty."

All of this is mostly off-topic for this whole board, but it's nice to have diversions every so often.

pgengler wrote:All of this is mostly off-topic for this whole board, but it's nice to have diversions every so often.

haha, I think we should be safe becuase we have still addressed the issue of the railroad-related pins in every post thus far. Beyond that, I think this is a very interesting (and intelligent) conversation we are having here; we are both looking at the same facts and producing very valid yet radically different viewpoints; this is fascinating stuff!

Ok, back on topic (sort of):

pgengler wrote:Anyway, the short version is: I may not agree with it, and most people may not agree with but, but I don't feel that means it should be banned or disallowed; but that's all trumped by the fact that eBay is not the government, and as such, is in no way required to allow anything and everything that comes across. Also, read "On Liberty."

I think the problem here is that eBay will basically accept anything an everything people attempt to sell without discretion. This policy is wrong in several respects, the least of which is in relation to offensive material. For example, items of "historical significance" are often put up for sale on eBay in spite of being complete fakes (e.g. the # boards from 9001-02). Even people "in the know" can be lead on by a convincing description of a fake, and attempting to recover funds lost on such a transaction is almost impossible becuase as a private company, eBay is not required to surrender the seller's real name for a a lawsuit to be filed.

Lirr168 wrote:I think the problem here is that eBay will basically accept anything an everything people attempt to sell without discretion. This policy is wrong in several respects, the least of which is in relation to offensive material. For example, items of "historical significance" are often put up for sale on eBay in spite of being complete fakes (e.g. the # boards from 9001-02). Even people "in the know" can be lead on by a convincing description of a fake, and attempting to recover funds lost on such a transaction is almost impossible becuase as a private company, eBay is not required to surrender the seller's real name for a a lawsuit to be filed.

I think this is one of the reasons that eBay has been able to grow so much. If they had to examine each and every potential listing, especially to try and validate that items of "historical significance" are not fakes, they would never be as big as they are now, and some other site would have come along to fill in the role eBay is in now.

That said, they do have a list of prohibited items, and do specifically have a policy prohibiting "items that promote or glorify hatred, violence, racial or religious intolerance, or items that promote organizations with such views." So that pretty much means that propoganda from white supremacist groups is against the policy, and from what I've heard, eBay is pretty good about shutting down such auctions within a few hours after it opens.

I don't see this pin as fitting those criteria. I don't see that it promotes or glorifies the event, considering that it labels the guy as a "pyscho" (consider the negative connotations of that word). From the posts to this thread, it seems like some people do feel that it, in some sense, glorifies what happened. It's not really clear either way, and certainly nothing in the description looks to be trying to portray the event as a good thing, so I'm guessing that if eBay saw this, they would leave it (and they probably have seen it, I imagine, and probably due to the sheer volume of listings, applied a rather defined test to it and it passed).

As for eBay making it difficult for a buyer to recover lost funds, there are probably a couple of reasons for it. One is their inability to verify any of the listings, or the buyers claims of fraud. Rather than get involved, they sit on the sidelines. I imagine that if a criminal prosecution were to be pursued, they could be subpoenaed to provide the real name of a seller. Another possible reason (and I should emphasize, this is all speculation) is their profit motive. Sellers pay to have an item listed, and then pay a percentage of the selling price. Buyers don't bring any money to eBay, except that they're needed to actually buy things for eBay to get the percent of sale price. They may not want to reveal a seller who continues to sell fake or misleading items, because they're making money from them.
They also, whenever possible, don't want to deal with cases of buyers claiming to have been screwed, since, as I said before, they have no way of knowing that that person truly was. After all, if it were easy to get one's money back from a sale by alleging fraud, what's to stop people from scamming sellers by winning an auction, receving the advertised item, and then claiming fraud and getting their money back, while retaining the item? That would drive away sellers, and hence drive away revenue.

are those two m3s still in service

they still are in service

I am going to stir the pot, I know, but as a firm gun control advocate, I want to say it is my opinion that the fewer guns in circulation, the safer everyone would be. I shot skeet with a 12 ga. every weekend this past summer. My son is a licensed cop and carried a Glock .44 . I can not see where a bunch of commuters whipping out pistols and firing at a target from 360 degrees range, makes the train, plane, or bus, a safer place to be.
The nut who shot up the train and killed the innocents was able to obtain a gun as easily as any other citizen. It could be argued that in obtaining that weapon, he was exercising his 2nd Amendment rights.

Please don't attempt to convince me that nobody would get hurt if everybody had a gun.

Here's a recent photo of 9946 in service:

I just purchased one of those pins. I'll wear it to RMLI this Saturday. Anybody bad enough to take it off me?

Leading that train was 9907-8 and behind it was 9891-2 to which 9892 was the car where the shooting took place.

Forget this post, Neil did say 9891.

Folks:

I don't find fault with the person selling these items on ebay, it's that persons right to do so. However that said I personally find it offensive.

I also find it offensive that some folks want to know the car numbers where the incident took place, at this point in time what does it matter. expect for some who may want to say I rode in the car where those folks were killed.

I find it offensive is that you disparage Carolyn McCarthy. Yes is she is an advocate for gun control and will be for the rest of life, can you blame her after what happened to her wihen her husband was killed and her son severly wounded. (I won't go into the stupid comment about her funds coming from the UN)

I believe if you knew the complete story of Carolyn, and what she and a host of friends went through, perhaps you would change your mind. Someday if we happen to meet I will tell you. If you wonder why I know, its because Dennis McCarthy was and his wife is, best friends of my wife, myself, my family and a slew of other folks from Mineola,Queens Viilage and Cambria Heights.

I beleive this should end here and now and lets get back to doing what we all look forward to doing and that is to talk about the LIRR.

Regards,

Ray Jensen
Ft. Myers, FL.

I guess I don't mind the fact that people are interested in the MU car number. It is a significant event in LIRR history, albeit a damned sad one. My reason for knowing which cars were involved would be simply that of a historian. You would ask which K4s slid into a washout by Amott cabin (5406) or which C 420 turned over during the mid sixties (215). Historians want to know the number for just the reasons I've stated and other. Here's a really distasteful piece of information for you, Ray, and I mean it not as an offense, but as a reality. When the M3's are retired, don't you think somebody will want to purchase that car for display in a museum? Maybe not on Long Island, but it will be considered. To me, it is merely a place where history took place; not shrine, not a grave. It's history.

Rich, you do have a very good point.

Rich:

Your right in your statement that someday when they are retired they may be purchased for historical purposes. Except for some place on Long Island, I can't think of anyone who would want them because the event was not a nationwide historical event that effected history.

As I said in my last post as far as I am concerned its time to get back to better areas concerning our favorite RR.

Rich, by the way I did tell John Scala you were looking for him.

Regards,

Ray Jensen
Ft. Myers, FL