I found him in the DB and what did I do? ...
If someone publicly calls for the implementation of laws that would stone adulterers to death but secretly uses adultery websites to commit adultery then, in my opinion, that information (already in the public domain btw) is fair game. Despite this I still didn't take advantage of the data only I was aware of at the time. I could have written that data-exposé article days before that news report but I didn't. After the really crappy way he has treated me over the years, feeding out misinformation, calling me a troll whenever I call him out etc, I think my approach to this discovery has been impecible.
What exactly is it do you complainers think I have done wrong?
Alright. Finally got to a computer.
So here's my thing, Rationalizer. I don't think you did anything actually wrong, and I said so earlier. But you're also not giving off the impression of someone who was looking out for Hamza, and yet you're saying that you were. I can understand why some people find that a stretch. And I think stuff like this makes us look bad, along with most of the behavior I see when ex-Muslims/atheists try to engage Tzortzis (constantly commenting on their pages trying to lure them into debates, trying to force them to debate with us by employing, say, passages of the Quran about concealing the truth and other just off-color tactics). But that's my opinion. And I and others have gone into this in more detail previously in the thread. That's not on your shoulders, more of a general commentary that this thread started leaning towards, but nevertheless a real concern of mine.
So back to you specifically. First of all, one of our mods asked you why you care about this so much. I think that was a fair question, and your response to him was pretty rude. You also didn't answer my question, which is why you're searching for these figures in the first place. Is it to help them out? It must be, because apparently you were going to take finding them on the database to the grave, or so you seem to be saying. And you just posted on twitter today that you did it to help Tzortzis out. And you're
still continuing to help these people out, because you're asking around for a full database that is hard for you to find so that you can presumably perform more searches on them and warn them.
I'll be honest: I have a hard time imagining that that's the case. Considering the really crappy way you say he's treated you, I can't imagine that you did this research to help Tzortzis out. Perhaps you searched for him the first time out of curiosity and you genuinely thought that you should warn him and do the right thing. That I could've seen. Until you started asking around about the adultfriendfinder leak. You're going through all this trouble for someone who treated you like shit? That makes you a better man than I. In fact, that makes you a better man than pretty much all of them. And that, I hope you can understand, is part of what's hard for me and people who doubt your stated motivations to wrap our heads around.
Okay, so now there's other little things. You tweet as soon as it's out that it's Hamza you'd caught. You write a comment on Hamza's facebook statement prompting him to thank you for giving him the opportunity to make the statement. You say you want to dispel misinformation published by this god-awful trainwreck of a blog by writing your own article, which again, I could've believed was totally noble if you'd just pointed out that no, it wasn't email verified, and left it at that, instead of taking the opportunity to tell the tale of you catching Tzortzis.
I'm thinking about this from the perspective of Tzortzis for a second. So if someone that I totally fucking hated, who I thought was obsessed with me, who I called a troll and whatever else he's called you, heard about this Ashley Madison leak and decided to go search for me there (was he an easy find or did you have to use more than one of his emails?) and finds me, and decides to reach out and tell me to make a public statement, and then he makes a passive-aggressive comment publicly prompting me to reluctantly thank him for doing me this huge favor, and then he makes a blog post detailing how he caught me and giving his commentary on the issue, I also wouldn't be the most grateful person in the world. I know how it looks to Tzortzis and his supporters that you did this and then claimed to be helping him. I don't think it was necessarily wrong, but I'm also having a hard time believing that you were
just being a nice guy here.
If I were a betting man, what you said in your last paragraph up there is probably closer to the truth. Tzortzis is a pain in the ass, glorifies some terrible shit, you catch him red-handed, it's fair game. I'd agree. And to give him the opportunity to make a statement first is very good of you and more than you'd owe him by far. I'd agree with that, too. But anything beyond that is where you lose me.
Anyway, you're the one who knows what's going on in your head, and I don't. If you truly do just have this dude's back and you're that nice of a guy, I do sincerely apologize. Like I said, I do like you and I usually like your work. But hopefully you can understand why it's hard for some people to believe. Saying, “Yes, I found him, and I consider it fair game. I did give him time to make a statement first, though,” would have changed how I'm looking at this situation completely.
In any case, this is just my opinion. Don't let it get you disappointed. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, and you know best.