I don't know much about "AP'ing." Outside of sports betting, I'm probably ahead about 10K lifetime gambling in casinos, not counting comps or free room value or whatever. So I'm not sure I should be considered part of a clique or not. But let me throw this theory out there, me being a fan of Ockham's Razor and all.

You have a group of experts, with various specialties but all AP related, who say what kewlj posts regarding blackjack is credible. You have a civilian (two if you count "Singer") posting that what kewlj writes is not credible. The people posting that it's not credible have no expertise in blackjack.

Then you have the fact that kewlj tends to argue with everybody, occasionally regarding minutia. So he's argued with almost all of the APs on occasion.

Any civilian reader has to therefore decide why APs who have argued with kewlj would defend him as credible. Blackhole posits that it's because of some AP-wide cabal banding together to defend the reality of AP play. So why would APs do that? So they could continue to prop up anonymous reputations? To what end is that? Or is it that they are recruiting (as evil cabals do) behind the scenes, so as to lure the unsuspecting into partnering up with them?

Well, the only problem with the partnering up theory is one would think, after all these years and thousands of posts, someone would come forward if Axelwolf or kewlj or MaxPen or monet or mickey crimm or anyone treated them wrong or ripped them off. But I haven't read any of that. Nothing. Maybe the evil cabal killed them and buried them in the desert?

Thus, it all circles back to what makes sense, from the old Ockham's Razor perspective. Who is best able to evaluate a blackjack player's credibility? Other AP's, most of whom count cards and exploit casinos, or civilians with no blackjack expertise? Are the posts saying kewlj seems quite credible simply the evil cabal circling its wagons, or are they reality-based opinions by people who know more than the naysayers?

In my opinion, it comes down to Dunning-Kruger effects:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/b...-kruger-effect

In kewlj's case, I'm sure some gayness enters into it. Nothing challenges one's manhood more than having lost to casinos while others have won, unless it's having lost to casinos while gay dudes have won.