Posted on 06/11/2002 8:27:10 AM PDT by BADJOE
JimRob and many of us other oldtimers are concerned that the viciousness of the personal attacks are getting out of hand.
The continued hyperbole could ultimately destroy our site.
Let's adapt ridicule, poking fun at our adversaries as the method of choice to blow off steam.
I just handled a disruptor on the Freepathon thread this way by asking him if he was bucking for Jim's $1.23 per hour job ( Jim's draw divided by 24/7/365 = $1.23 per hour). And yes , I told him Jim gets that much while sleeping too. The Moderators ultimately banned this poster, but we all had a few good laughs in the process. Ridicule really is the fastest, most effective way to shoot down a jerk. You have to think about how to do it, but if you will, we all will have a lot more fun.
A year or so ago I recommened we post all attacks to an imaginary Freeper, "Nincompoop" We could even get this guy his own Home Page, where we could go to look for the best put down of the day, and get many, many chuckles from all the shots this poor turkey will take. : )
What IS reasonable decorum? My basic philosophy has always been, if you cain't run with the big boys, get off the track.
Well OK some cases are blatantly flagrant. Yours Truly has been known to wax over the top on occasion...
What I think FR needs is a moderation system similar to slashdot's, but for official moderators only. Only 3 ratings: -1, 0, 1. The -1 would be assigned automatically to any post with English profanity. The reason why I think it would have to be official moderators is that I don't think the average joe on FR can be trusted with moderation powers. It would turn into a system of censorship very quickly. What would most likely happen would be a core of hardline rightists would moderate down any comment from someone with an anti-drug war, pro-pornography, etc comment. It would then get nastier when those people start retaliating and moderating down. Before you know it, we'd all have to be surfing at -1 to read anything....
All I'll say is that it's as if the conservative cause has been ripped exactly in half, and it's not the fault of any FReepers.
Good start. You're gettin' the idea.
*** ASH ALERT! ***
I don't quite understand your post. Possibly since I missed these disruptor posts.
When you, say this?
"Let's adapt ridicule, poking fun at our adversaries as the method of choice to blow off steam."
You mean Hillary Bill etc... and no more cat fighting about how great (OR NOT) Bush is?
There are those of us who voted for him but don't live every day to post day in the life photos of him and we rightfully question him outloud at times and his policies and we feel stuck in the middle of a flame war, to no avail of discussion.
IMO:There are die hard Bush groupies and die hard Bush haters. Weeding out who is disrupting/attacking and who is debating seems to be the problem. (This applies to the diehard Bush folks -and- the Bush haters.)
Basically, I agree... Whatever the proportion of the division, it's generally not the divided who were the dividers.
That's like blaming the pieces of the pie for the sharpness of the knife.
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