It's simple, really, you see it's...no, I'm sorry, I have no idea.

Not that I'm any expert on contemporary lingo, but I think I've seen recently that "gay" has become a popular derogatory adjective for anything that doesn't work well or satisfy. I'd guess this is used primarily by homophobic straights, but perhaps also by "self-loathing" homosexuals?

I hate computer problems.

Anyway, I've never liked that word "gay" as a synonym for homosexual in the first place and I never use it. Homosexuals are either men's men (androsexual) or Lesbians (gynosexual). Men's men are straight (linear, angular).

Although the versions of Norton that I have seen do interact with the Recycle Bin, it is not Norton that causes the problem.

The Recycle Bin is a release independent feature of Windows (bug in my opinion) that causes DEL (i.e., the delete function) to behave as if it were spelled HIDE.

Items hidden (stuffed into the Recycle Bin, so to speak) no longer are visible as entries in a directory (folder) or icons on the desktop and therefore no longer exist to folks who are willing to ignore unpleasant facts. They are, in effect 'swept under the rug'.

Some products (Tweak UI for Win98) go a step further and allow you to hide the Recycle Bin icon on the desktop so that you can become completely unaware of the disaster brewing under your 'rug'.

I suspect that two things are going on here.

1) The folks who think that Norton is at fault, bought a machine with Norton Utilities pre-installed and failed to RTFM. Basically ignorant users. It's Windows that did it, not Norton.

2) As to the 'gayness' of the situation it is apparently their belief that it was Norton (Peter Norton) that screwed them, not their own ignorance of the Recycle bin purpose and what is required of the computer's owner/user in the way of periodic cleanup.

Folks who eat a lot and fail to make regular use of the potty often become bloated, i.e., full of s**t. This is why your disk is full, too much garbage in and too little s**t out.

I avoid the problem by using Shift+Del. That way the file is really, really gone and replaced by free space. (NOTE: If you are in the habit of deleting important files, ignoring the 'do you really want to ... message) DO NOT use Shift-DEL. Your 'mistaked delete's' will be saved in the Recycle Bin and if you are willing to learn how to make use of the function (still a bug) you can then UNDELETE the file.)

There are, in addition, many other garbage files and folders created and left behind by sloppy programing of many products including Windows itself that need to be weeded out from time to time. The prudent user of a computer will learn about these bits of garbage and find out how to perform the approprate housekeeping chores required to keep their disk drives happy and willing to serve.

I am not really certain, but it is just possible that proper handling of the Recycle Bin might be found by inspired use of the Windows HELP function. Try it, you may like it. I am also fairly certain the Norton has a bit of documentation on the issue.