It's precisely because David Franks posts his stuff without moronic hostility, dreadful spelling and poor grammar (well, some of the time) that he's a problem. It's easy to deal with the sort of morons who clutter up the YouTube comment section - you just ignore them. But when someone like Franks comes on and starts making assertions they need to be countered, lest the morons out there take him seriously.
I don't think he's bright enough to be doing the whole thing as a wind-up, and I appreciate he might well see all these posts as slights to be endured on the road to martyrdom, but his absurd assertions (backed by the strength of four technical certificates) can't go unanswered.
I would far rather the Mudcat didn't have a racist in its midst, but as it does, and he's a thick-skinned and prolific poster, then he shouldn't go unchallenged.
I concede that it's a bit sad; here we have an unemployed nobody posting largely drivel, and around the world there are people devoting time to pointing out that it is drivel. If the clock were turned back 20 years then he wouldn't have his status as global village idiot, and it would be down to someone in his adopted home town to tell him to feck off and take his pencil away.
But this is the internet, and everyone's voice carries as far as the next person's even David Franks. And because this forum is - by and large - populated by reasonable folk, people like Franks risk gaining spurious credibility by association.
For all those who are tempted to misquote Voltaire on the right to free speech, I'd counter with Churchill (or even Mark Twain or good old Anon); "a lie can get halfway round the world before the truth has a chance to get its boots on."