Any interest in a site for discussing philosophical and political matters?

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Hi folks,

a few weeks ago Angharad posted a very interesting question about transsexual people and terrorists. Unfortunately that discussion was stopped very early. I guess it was to avoid any flaming which surely would have come soon.
But like I said, it would have been very interesting to discuss that matter a bit further. I came to the conclusion that this site might probably not the best place to persuade such a philosophical exchange.

If there is any interest in having such discussions in depth, I'd like to provide a forum for that.
There will be of course rules to avoid unneccessary flaming or even hatred.

So if you like that idea, and are thinking about participating, please drop me a line.

Saphira

Comments

In A Word, Yes

I'd love a site where we could openly discuss things. Most people behave fairly well, even in a vigorous discussion, and I enjoy spirited debate.

Some people do behave badly, unfortunately, and anything worthwhile will always attract some flamers & a--holes. It's just the natural result of people who can operate completely anonymously. There are always a few percent who go a bit mad with the freedom.

How to handle this depends on what the community expects, more or less. Some communities are better able to weather having a few idiots roaming around commenting on everything than others. There are three ways to handle things. One, is to let the community self-police, and ignore or abuse the abuser at will. Two is to have a moderator who previews and approves each and every message. And, Three is to have an open forum, but one from which troublemakers will be kicked out and banned, after the fact of whatever trouble they cause.

In my opinion, method two is too burdensome on all involved, and the delay in message posting destroys the spirit of an open forum. Three is kind of hard to get right -- misinterpretations happen and people can get baited into overreacting. Number one is worth a shot, but you will lose some users who don't want to deal with the flaming and abuse. I have seen systems where users can click on messages to report abuse. Of course, that system can be abused, too, where people click on every message they disagree with. It all comes down to how much bad feelings can you, and the community that gathers to the site, learn to deal with, while still benefiting from the positive aspects of an open discussion.

If you start an open comment system, I do wish you the best of luck, the thickest of skins, and the most joyous of outlooks! I'd love to be welcome to participate, on an equal footing with everyone else. It'd make for an interesting experiment, if nothing else.

As far as communities go, though, the TG community, such as it is, is amongst the least stable and most sensitive. We seem to be at each others' throats far too often, over the least little things, and there are several people who are seriously at risk, including a number who have, over the years, attempted or threatened suicide. There are very real dangers, to real people's lives, in creating an evironment that can add to feelings of abuse, isolation or low self-esteem. I don't know how to deal with that. I certainly don't want to see anyone get hurt. Big warnings? An elaborate disclaimer that people would have to read and sign before they could participate? A screening committee for participation in the first place? An in-place crisis counseling team? All of the above? None of the above?

YES to OPEN FORUM

This community has issues. Erin's editorial stance is correct in this setting that she deals with enough issues every day without inviting more conflict.

However, we will always have issues unless we address them. One way to addredss them is open discussion.

A word of advice. One person's "hatred" may well be another person's honest opinion based on misconception or unknown biased.

Angela Rasch (Jill M I)

Angela Rasch (Jill M I)

Handicapping

...Fantasy Football statistics? Discussions of carburetor settings on Chevy's small-block 302 V-8 engine? Relative merits of names used by microbreweries in the U.S.?

Of course, I know a number of women at my favorite lesbian bars who are quite enthusiastic, let alone conversive, about subjects like these. Once, while sitting demurely on a barstool in a snug skirt, trying to look pretty, and touching up my lipstick and fluffing my hair in the bar's mirror now and again, I had to listen to an extended explanation by a female union electrician on installing wiring in some kind of old historical building with tiny crawl spaces behind the cosmetic ceiling. Still, I guess the topics would qualify as prototypical male pursuits.

Tried that, got the bite marks

erin's picture

When FM cancelled the Mosh Pit forum, I tried running a wide open forum for TG fans. It worked for a while but it became a meeting place for troublemakers to discuss how to disrupt this site and others by posting hurtful reviews. I killed the forum with extreme killing and banned the troublemakers from all of my servers - and provided info to other site owners to ban them also.

I won't get involved in such a forum again, much as I myself enjoyed it while it was working well.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Unfortunately ...

... the essentially anonymous status of the internet means that things on open fora can get very nasty very quickly unless very draconian moderation is applied. Then, of course, there are the bleats about limiting free speech.

I visit a lot of hobby sites(one hobby - several sites)and the only one that survives here in the UK is with very active moderation and even then it gets nasty at times. You'd be amazed (and probably amused) at the topics that get over-heated. A national federation closed its forum because of serious flaming and one nation-wide association has recently re-opened its forum but insisted that only real names will be allowed to prevent anonymous flames.

If it could work without animosity, it would be great but very few people here will want to register with a real name (if any) and without that I'm afraid it would end up being quite intolerable. I would encourage someone to try it but I wouldn't hold out great hopes for a successful outcome.

Geoff

Yes

erin's picture

It isn't the large number of people who would be willing to be civil, it's the few troublemakers and trolls who want to cause problems.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Passionate Dislikes

Another big problem with message boards are pairs of active participants who disagree on everything and love to argue. I don't know how many threads I have seen crapped upon because two people are unwilling to ignore each other and end up making the discussion about them.

It happens...

...and as long as it adds to an active discussion, why not just letting them going on. Yet if the majority agrees to end such a thread, the two arguers should accept that decision and stop, or they are stopped and risking a ban.

That is my idea about dealing with such an issue.

Saphira

--
>> There is not one truth only out there. <<

--
>> There is not one single truth out there. <<

Thank you very much for your comments and ideas

I really appreciate your input on my idea. Looks like some people really want me to setup such a forum for discussions. :)
Well, one thing I really want to make clear, is that this site will not be in competition to any topshelf forum. It should only serve as a place to discuss opinions and personal believes which might otherwise attract flamers to discussions here at BCTS, might upset too many people and would most likely make Erin's life more difficult.

The topics might be another point which is debatable. While I never would want to ban any topic, I'm hoping to keep things to a rather philosophical level instead of having discussions about how to fix cars or tuning engines, exchanging recipes or talking about the latest fashion.

So thinking about how to keep the discussions to a civilized level, it might be good, to require all users to register before posting and also logging every post being made, in case a legal issue shall arise. ( I really hope that will never happen, but who knows...). I'm aware that having to provide real names for registration will most likely discourage people from registering and participating, so I thought providing just a nick name and logging IP-numbers as well as access times might be enough for a start. That way people are anonym as long as no legal problems are arising. It might not be the best idea, nor does it provide any real protection against abuse, I think it would be a good compromise.

Erin and Geoff you are very right about the Trolls. There need to be a few rules to hold them at bay, even if it means banning them, yet I hope we don't have to take that approach too often. It also means, to create a guideline and rules for such a forum. ( here I'm very open to suggestions as you surely have more experience then me. please PM me about that )
As Pippa pointed out, I want this discussions to be open, although certain topics might not be publically readable, if there is a demand for that.

So I want to thank you all for your very kind input again. I'm looking into setting up such a site over the next few weeks.

Saphira

--
>> There is not one truth only out there. <<

--
>> There is not one single truth out there. <<

Not only TG topics

While TG topics might be probably in majority there, it would also be very nice to discuss completely unrelated views on the 'world' and society too. While some people might not like it, there is a world around us going on, regardless of what we do. So while we pursuing our dreams, we should not forget the rest of the world. One day, once we achieved our dreams, we might want to be part of that world again. ;)

so long...

Saphira

--
>> There is not one truth only out there. <<

--
>> There is not one single truth out there. <<