Subject:
|
Re: Are we all too nice?
|
Newsgroups:
|
lugnet.off-topic.debate
|
Date:
|
Sat, 28 Oct 2000 06:40:48 GMT
|
Viewed:
|
308 times
|
| |
|
|
This seems like as good a place as any to hang my hat on this thread.
I find the question horrifying.
From the analogies offered about condoms in schools and needle parks, might not
the question be rephrased "Are we all too drug-free?" (or the other thing!)
I recognize Todd's skill at subtlety and connotation, and if it sounds like he
means "Are we all too repressed and civil?" I can see it for a rhetorical
question.
But I don't think there is too much civility, or that flames have to be
condoned.
Have other online forums managed to structure around the inevitable flames?
Some of the best examples I've belonged to since the 80s have set limits to
behavior and still seen acrimonious disagreements start as declarative
statements and end as condemnation, all over very small things.
I believe it's in the nature of the medium to slide into that. We could all
enumerate reasons why online debates can more easily get nastier than real
life. One is that people assume the other party is a captive audience and is
required to respond right away. Others have to be with how the medium
encourages sloppy writing (impossible to prevent, but why encourage it?)
And to change the medium, you have to take away some of the more abused
features of online communication.
That's all I had to say, the rest is implementation details.
------------------------------------------------------------------
One thing you could take away: no quoting of the other's message allowed. Has
been used effectively to stop flames from starting.
If you can't quote your opponent and can't respond in a line-by-line fashion,
you have the burden of constructing a whole thought of your own. The corollary
to this is that you have to restate the other party's opinion if you want to
refer to it. Third, limits like one round of messages per day, and waiting
periods. (Hey, Todd used a waiting period for this thread...)
These guidelines are really suited to keeping an already formal discussion,
formal. In any case they are always voluntary. (We are such a herd of cats here
that I have little hope.)
I personally have no use for a .flame group. I would not utilize it and would
hope not to get stuck watching it "like a train wreck--you wanna turn but you
can't look away."
|
|
Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Are we all too nice?
|
| (...) <snip> I've been hanging around RTL and Lugnet for years now. When I first heard about Todd's plan to create Lugnet I was extreemly happy, thinking foolishly that the kind of flamewars people engaged in would stay out of this place. Sadly, I (...) (24 years ago, 27-Oct-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
|
61 Messages in This Thread:
 
 
- Entire Thread on One Page:
- Nested:
All | Brief | Compact | Dots
Linear:
All | Brief | Compact
|
|
|
|
