I've received more complaints in the last few days that I have in probably the last year about over-the-top posts in this forum. ALL of these have been related the horrible shooting over the weekend. Every single one of them. If find this not only to be absolutely disgusting but more than a little disturbing. Somehow, some way, you have managed to turn a terrible tragedy into another way to prove your political point and you should all be incredibly ashamed of yourselves. I don't care if political pundits are doing it or talk show hosts or whoever. They will ultimately have to answer to their own consciences. This is about the people in here who, despite all the generally childish bickering, I thought were mature enough to act like semi-reasonable adults when something like this happend. Clearly, I've overestimated many of you. It should come as no surprise given the broad, asinine generalities many of you make on a routine basis so long as it serves your own ends. It should come as no surprise, frankly, given the way the vast populace of America shouts angry rhetoric at strangers often having no clue what they are even talking about in the first place. The most worrisome part for me is that I've begun to question the assertion that I've always made that this only happens on here because of the anonymity and the distance provided by the internet. I've always believed that, were we all to meet in person as many of us had in the past, we'd set aside the online bickering because a normal person doesn't start screaming like a crazy person about politics in public. But, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe some of you are so filled with hate and anger that you would walk up to someone who you knew from this board to be a "rival" (and I hope the utter silliness of using that word is not lost on you) and punch him in the face simply because he believes abortions should be illegal or because he thinks immigrants should be given citizenship or because he thinks Obama wasn't born in America or because he thinks Palin is not intelligent. Is that what it has come to because, if it has, I recommend shutting this forum down and pretending it never existed. Then you could all scatter to the winds and fight the same ignorant battles in the comment sections of blogs and newspapers and ClutchFans wouldn't be responsible when one of you acts like a for real idiot in public. I suppose it should be no surprise considering I once got death threats from a forum poster simply because he thought Clutch and I were the same person and he was angry for getting banned. But, I had hoped he was just some bored, angry person and not indicative of a larger problem. But, when I see people using the deaths of innocent people to make their point so soon after the tragedy occurs, I have to question that assumption and think, well, maybe many of you are crazy. Maybe many of you are sick and in need of anger management. Maybe this forum, which was meant to put all the loonies into a play pen and keep them out of the Hangout, wasn't such a good idea. I don't know. All I do know is I have had it with this forum, the complaints and, most importantly, the inane ranting and raving that solves no problem, rights no wrong and serves no one. The irony is that what many of you are shouting about so vehemently is as Shakespeare most eloquently put it, "full of sound and fury signifying nothing." You're all a bunch of impotent blow hards with so much time on your hands, you can spend hours fighting with a ghost on a basketball bulletin board about Islam. It would be hilarious if it weren't so god damn stupid. All I know is you need to justify your existence on this board not just to me or Clutch, but to yourselves. If your only contributions are insults and arguments without the ability to aquiesce or even agree to disagree, than you probably need to look in the mirror because my guess is the ******* on this board is an actual ******* in real life and you might want to consider another hobby.
Were any of them about posts in which someone was repeatedly called Hitler and Nazi, or were people called something worse than that? Of course you are right that people should tone it down in general (myself included) and I applaud you for your post, but I am curious what is so special in terms of offensiveness about the shooting thread? I'm surprised to hear that there were so many more complaints about that one in particular, because while I can see that the tone in that thread in general is rather aggressive, the posts did not seem much more or less offensive to me than what has become the usual tone in the monkey poo forum. Maybe the posts you are referring to are already gone? Or maybe that thread is just being read by more people who usually don't venture into the D&D and therefore are more shocked by the tone, thus the higher amount of complaints?
i'm feeling the love bigtexxx. i apologized for my immature posts referencing your brother over the holidays. hopefully you accepted. why don't we take this opportunity to extend the olive branch...agreed?
Good Post Jeff. We should limit the number of threads certain trigger happy posters can make about the same topic in this section.
You know some of this stuff would come back to the Hangout, so I don't think shutting D&D down is a good idea. But -- and not to be belligerent about it in a tone-it-down thread -- the moderation philosophy of letting trolls say whatever in the D&D with impunity is what makes it the cesspool that it is. So, you booted someone yesterday, but there are a number of guys who should have been booted long ago. I don't know how you hope to achieve your aims here without changing the moderation philosophy. My guess would be daWhopper for spamming the thread with pics every 2 minutes. But, if it was him, he was only banned from D&D, because he's posting elsewhere.
dW's pics made a point, one that was constantly denied by those who made the accusations of Palin/Tea Party complicity in the first place. that sort of slander should not be allowed to stand unchallenged.
tragedies can spark political discussion, see Katrina threads. the woman was a politician, how could it be avoided. yes the my side is better than your side arguments are pathetic, but this shooting can not help but spark a discussion on political rhetoric which has been out of control in this country since the Clinton presidency.
I haven't been here for as long as most but I can tell there is a rollercoaster type of vibe to this forum as far as the type of rhetoric that is spewed out here. 1. Member goes over the line. 2. Members who are in agreement with original poster come in to fuel the flames even more. 3. Members who disagree enter the debate feeling backed into a corner and infuriated with the OP's statement. 4. This continues for a period of time while posters continually get more angry. 5. Admin steps in to put out the fire. Ban a member or 2 (Only for them to return in time or under a different name). 6. Things calm down until step 1 comes up again. Da_whopper was actually very nice and civil in his first few posts. I honestly don't think he was used to conversating with so many people to the left of him that he felt like any disagreement with him was a personal jab. His posting style deteriorated over time into an all out conservative anger fest. I say this, not knowing if he was the one banned. Jeff... I might recommend temporarily locking the D&D for periods of time if multiple posters get out of hand. It is natural for discussions to get heated in an arena that isn't constantly moderated. Unfortunately, some of our posters seem to completely disrespect any view that differs from their point of view rather than debating or discussing.
it's been out of control since the Bork nomination. and it's not just about a congresswoman, but a federal judge, and a little girl, and...
the challenges, counter points, and insinuations however, were waaaaay over the top, to the point of being offensive in a discussion overlaying an incident that left 6 dead and 14 injured. The "talking points' : political rhetoric, gun control, race and religion could have been discussed elsewhere -- if really necessary -- ideally in a more civil manner.
slander: 1. saying of something false and damaging: the act or offense of saying something false or malicious that damages somebody's reputation 2. false and damaging statement: a false and malicious statement that damages somebody's reputation 3. utter slander against somebody: to make a false and malicious oral statement about somebody There is nothing slanderous about posting a picture by SarahPac.com Please be more specific basso.
somebody posted a pic of palin's ad on the first page of that thread, but without reading it again, i don't recall too many people pinning the blame squarely on palin/tea party. most people were arguing that the rhetoric, whether it was a direct cause of this tragedy or not, should be toned down by both sides.
Jeff: Thanks for the thoughtful comments, and for the most part I agree completely, and have avoided this forum other than maybe four or five posts since the 2008 election for reasons i think you are describing here.. I do think that the political discussion after the shooting was inevitable - tasteless as it may seem to discuss Sarah Palin's website in the immediate aftermath of a murder of a nine year old girl and shooting of a congresswoman, there has been an extended worry about the 'new normal' of violent imagery in political rhetoric that clearly came to a head upon the shooting of Rep. Giffords. I am not sure it was just 'using the tragedy to make a point' - i do think it was a precipitating event that tweaked of a worry that alot of people - myself included - have held for some time - that political communications have indeed become violent, irresponsible, inflammatory, and provocative of highly unstable people like this unhinged and misanthropic piece of mental health wreckage in Arizona who shot these people. I don't think it was just trying to make a political point, I think it was a moment alot of us had feared and anticipated, and were trying to make sense of. The connection or lack of connection between the murders/tragedy and the politics that surround it are, i think, a legitimate point of discussion. I don't think it is disrespectful to those who died or were wounded to talk about the environment that surrounds the murders, be it this tragedy, Oklahoma City, or 9/11. The fact that some people discuss it with no taste or consideration of others is not surprising and, to me, more offensive than the timing. But I don't want to shut down legitimate debate because of the bile being expressed by the more coarse or crass participants in the discussion - that's speaking generally, not specifically to CF.net.
