Board Dynamics
 

Well, here we go again, more ranting and gnashing of teeth.

Just my humble opinion.
I think the very size and scale of the membership in this board has grown so large and cumbersome that very little of the orignal personality has remained. Very little is actually imparted in the way of information or even entertainment. I'm feel that Ze has always left to us to play and come up with new stuff, but it has become a very stale place for ideas.
I suppose I'm scribbling this after today's fracas, where once again, the loudest voices only were heard. Right or wrong, it was only the pile of irrelevance that gets heard.
I'm not a philospher, or a man of great highminded conversation, and I know we wont put the world to rights, but this is just tedious.
It seems to me (opinion alert), it seems to me that if someone has an opinion , valid or otherwise, it is never constructively dealt with.
And then there are all the judgments when everyone seems to try to be first not to judge.
Example : If an opinion was given of say "I dont like eskimos" the loud voices would defend all things innuit, and berate the opinioned person for having such a shocking rascist view, regardless of any explanation (which the opinion giver doesnt necessarliy have to give any of us). Others would just post large pictures of fatuous images.
Now, if the opinion was "I dont like republicans" because the loudest voices would be "hear, hear..well said...GWB is a such and such" and the opinion part of the general concensus of this large cumbersome gathering, barely a comment would arise.

I dont know, I'm rambling, but basically, is this place now too big and unwieldly to allow any single opinion not in line with the majority to even be heard without chastisement.

Whatever.

There seems to be a gang mentality going on. Squash who you don't like, bark at em, post really classy pictures. Yell shut up.

I tried getting one person corralled, one who totally corrupted any intelligent conversation and i succeeded in getting scrubbed off the board by the gang, I realized that my attempt might have been heavy handed, and even apologized to the person in question, but to not much avail. I got attacked for posting personal things, posting pics of my kid, and sharing stuff I did for a living. The clique makes it uncomfortable for anyone they decide not to like and impossible to apologize, impossible to exist.

So, I am relegated to sniper. I shoot only if necessary and get the hell out. Dodge isnt big enough for all of us, now that its the OK Corrall.

Isn't it amazing how it morphed into the lowest common denominator?

Question then....is it just because of the number of people here will inevitably tend to that position, or is it just because of any particular individual or sub-group of individuals?

Being that there is no Creed of Civility, the Clique rules the roost.

I'm not sure what "the lowest common denominator" is Aud...or if there is such a thing. Humans seem to have historically had a nearly infinite ability to be as horrid as possible to each other...and a just as infinite ability to rationalize their behavior.

Regarding the quashing of opinion, though; that seems to be perpetrated by a subset of individuals who show disregard for (for lack of a better term, I'm not a writter/wordsmith) "the golden rule". Or perhaps they do wish to be treated like laughing stocks themselves and do in fact follow the "golden rule"???

A portion of the board treats others on the board with the same respect they would if they met face to face, another portion of the board acts as though "anything goes" since this is "just a message board...get over it". I naturally feel judgemental about that since I believe myself to be in the former group, and because i'm a green as the grass hippie that believes all life, even all people deserve respect.

If a town meeting were held in real life regarding poor treatment of some member of the town, and an individual stood up and talked about dicks and drunks (possibly to distract from the discussion???...or water it down with irrelevance???)...they would be ejected from the town meeting. Here it seems to function somewhat in the reverse...those that try to adress the issue of "was someone mistreated" are barraged with irrelevant images, crys of "shut-up", and "who the **** do you think you are?". Regarding the last...we don't know...that's what we are trying to figure out. Who the **** are "those other people" The puppets and multi-characters? And are they messing with other people's heads? And is there any way to prevent it from happening. Perhaps we can't know, and quite possibly we can't prevent it...But silence about the issue just gives tacit approval of the behavior.

Wink wink nudge nudge, aren't We cool cuz WE arent the ones who got fooled.

^^^**** that.

Wink wink nudge nudge, aren't We cool cuz we aren't the N***** hanging from the tree.

^^^**** that.

A hang man came to town...but I was silent because he didn't come for me...
Till I was the only one left to hang.

I'm having a hard time accepting it. I've been reporting all this to SmartyPants who, in his wisdom, is just ignoring it... He used to be the moderator for an AOL forum, and AOL has very very strict guidelines for participation, which were up to the moderator to enforce. His way of dealing with most everything was to let things play themselves out - although he *did* delete posts by people who were just outright threatening or otherwise inexcusably unpleasant. We don't have any such guidelines here, and I have to admit, in this situation, the only obvious thing that's going on is "off-topic" activity, however sensitive those of us who actually know what's going are to the barrage of crap.
I wish we could think of a way to monitor the board that didn't seem like censorship. I wouldn't want to impose my personal sense of propriety on what's supposed to be a public board. But I wish we could do away with unkindness.

professor dinzdale with all due repect, why don't YOU and for that matter EVERYONE

1. INFORM US

2. HAVE SOME IDEAS

3. COME UP WITH NEW STUFF

4. CREATE THREADS ABOUT STUFF THAT INTERESTS YOU AND THAT MAY OR MAY NOT INTEREST OTHERS - IT DOESN'T REALLY MATTER



or is that someone else's job?


love and biscuits

-=zero

"If a town meeting were held in real life regarding poor treatment of some member of the town, and an individual stood up and talked about dicks and drunks (possibly to distract from the discussion???...or water it down with irrelevance???)...they would be ejected from the town meeting. Here it seems to function somewhat in the reverse..."

No kidding. Good point.

Dinz, Aud, Coff - I like you guys (and gal). :)
(Not meaning to lighten or retardize the sentiment of this thread. I agree with everything you guys said)

D'ope! Didn't intentionally exclude anyone from my warm, fuzzy circle of admiration. I was typing up this response right after Coffee posted his post.

how many people do you think would it take for a board where all opinions could be heard and respected?

this whole phenomenon of "shouting" is a common thing we see in group survival actually. to keep your place in a group you must either stand out, or go with the most popular opinion. it's natural group behavior as well as a survival strategy. it's instinct.

anyway, whatever happened to the boards that were inspired by this one? those had a smaller population, right? did the same things occur?

^^^ oddly and thankfully, no. We all get along like peas in a pod.

weren't those boards invitation-only?

then that's quite easy to explain!

I have been horrified by almost every regular user's behaviour (with the exception of Frieda, I think) at one time or another -- and that includes zero's, and that includes my own. When this happens, about 70% of the time I "say something" either privately or publicly. I like pretty much everyone most of the time -- but not when there's deliberate nastiness. Not then.

I know that everyone has their reasons for their hurts and grievances, and some of them go a long ways back. However, I do wish they could be put aside for the sake of creative expression. How possible this is, I don't know, but I do know that creative expression is almost impossible when people fear being mocked or sniped at with every post they make. I also know that I've been really mad at people, and been able to get over it, without even all that much effort.

As for zero, I've "known" him privately online for what? a couple of years?, and despite my being very very married, have never felt in the least bit threatened by any of our interactions. (At this point snake will interject that I'm simply not attractive, but she doesn't scare me either.) :p I have great big boundaries, and they're always out there like highway signs. I am not concerned that anyone is going to be able to cross them, anytime soon.

Peace.

Who is going to share any true thoughts or creativity here? I did and regret it big time, I have been called a non-creative whatever, your threads are lame Venus, get a real signature Venus? Very creative and encouraging for a newcomer. I'm actually one of few on here that was posting original photographs that I had taken and sharing links to my art works and designs, those links are all gone from here today though? I make a living off what I do so I don't doubt my talent at all but I do doubt some peoples reasons for being here (as I have stated before).

*I think a clear rule for newcomers and members alike should be that this is a place to share ideas; not an online dating service or a place to bash on people you don't agree with. ;)

Geezus Gawd, dont post anything personal here. Newbie rule #1. I made that mistake. Gee, who was it that posted personal agony, and somebody made a thread all about how whiny americans are? That was the most insensitive thing I ever saw on this board.

I posted re: a question of paternity, i got called a cvnt for making fun of somebodys rape. (wtf?) I posted pics of my child, i got made fun of. I posted pics of my art, and ditto. You can't win here. It's not the place to share.

I've actually horrified myself here. I have posted crap i regret. My buttons all got pushed. I've switched to zippers and I apologized for things i did, but Venus, nobody, cept a couple people will ever let it go. Get used to it.


So to fix it, what

1. INFORM US - You make fun of it & post really classy pics

2. HAVE SOME IDEAS - You bark at me

3. COME UP WITH NEW STUFF - Yeah, M. was a brilliant idea

4. CREATE THREADS ABOUT STUFF THAT INTERESTS YOU AND THAT MAY OR MAY NOT INTEREST OTHERS - IT DOESN'T REALLY MATTER - yes it does, it matters cause it interests me, so, I post it, and what, somebody blasts it to hell, or posts really lovely pictures of people who are drunk or yelling shut up.

Its their message board. Hope Ze liked it, cause it has nothing to do with him or us. Not that i speak for him. Just my opinion.

You can't have a pecking order if people don't get pecked.

While I sympathize, Aud, I have seen zero and fodder and a number of other people be on the receiving end of mocking, baiting, and name-calling. I haven't been able to entirely avoid it myself.

But like with every other damn thing, you are left with a choice for yourself -- either ignore the dumb sonsabitches and forge ahead regardless, doing your thing, or retreat into a shell. While I am not judging either choice, I am clear* in that it is a CHOICE. There is nothing inevitable or inescapable about it.

*I don't mean "clear" in the Scientology sense (shudder)

Hey Audrey, this reminds me of this chat room my friend from High School started a few years ago to keep in touch with everyone from our graduating class. There was this one guy on there that managed to drive everyone out, he was posing as other students and stuff and posting dumb nude photos and telling everyone to f*ck off; the last I heard of him is that he's unemployed, his wife left him and he's into heavy drug use. Just a good example of what kind of a person is behind the bullying and head games that can go on in chat rooms.
A few of us started another chat room where members only could view the threads and to join you had to sign a form which was sent to your home address; it sounds crazy but it worked and filtered out the idiot. :rolleyes:

Good idea! :D

No. There's more to it than that.

well, explain!

"this whole phenomenon of "shouting" is a common thing we see in group survival actually. to keep your place in a group you must either stand out, or go with the most popular opinion. it's natural group behavior as well as a survival strategy. it's instinct.

anyway, whatever happened to the boards that were inspired by this one? those had a smaller population, right? did the same things occur?"

Frieda - That last paragraph is your question, right? First let me say this - what does acting like a flipping idiot, and ignoring, insulting, making a joke of, or invalidating anyone's feelings have anything at all to do with "survival strategy?" As far as I know, none of us here are in Jr. High anymore, right? Your statement that some people are going along with others in order to survive, by acting like idiots doesn't fly in my opinion. That behavior is, overall, nothing more than immaturity (temporary or otherwise) and a lack of consideration for others' feelings. And even if there was some truth and reality to that statement (which there is, unfortunately), does that make it acceptable?

I'm gonna pm you.

from your post i understand that i might have not been clear in my own reaction to dinz' post. so let me clarify:

i haven't given my opinion anywhere yet, i just stated facts. i haven't said a word about this phenomenon being acceptable yes or no, just that it is a very common thing in behavioral psychology and that it comes up in nearly every group such as sports teams, workplaces, school classrooms and, in this case, internet message boards.

dinz stated that these problems are caused because this board has too many members, i'm questioning that and i'd like to know how these things go in smaller communities where people know each other, because i have no experience with smaller communities.

i'm trying to rule out whether it's the personalities or the amount of people that's causing trouble, with the "other" messageboards as testcase!

No, I asked if it was because of the large numbers.

I think that with any small number of say, your friends, there are maybe 20 or so you see regularly, and only one or two will piss you off occaisionally.
Now, take a workplace with about 100 or 200 people, there are dicks, and some you have to work directly with or even for. That's a dynamic because of size, and the forced interaction with people you dont necessarily like or would have anything to do with.
So in effect, the number of members here has, I think, changed from a bunch of friends to a large group, some of which are the office dicks.
That you would still drink and go party with "some" work colleagues doesnt mean you enjoy your normal work day. And that could be becuase of the forced interaction with people you dont get along with.

Perhaps.

good thread dinz
:)

i'm just trying to be positive and have a good time.
i've learned you just have to ignore the negative stuff.

:) ^ ^ what he said.

It is a good thread. :)

This last little upheaval made me think again about how people who treat others badly often habitually never take responsibility for their actions... they always blame it on the person or group they're bullying and/or abusing: "Well, you shouldn't have pushed me" and "There's no other way to get it across to you" and "When you act like that, it makes me hit you/yell at you/treat you badly" etc. Sometimes it's even more passive than that. It's a little frightening how good they are at rationalizing their actions.

For some reason (probably growing up in a dysfunctional family :rolleyes: ), I end up feeling like it's my responsibility to try to educate people like that... try to appeal their conscience or sense of fairness... I need to stop doing that. It's a waste of time. I think the only way they're going to learn is by losing all their friends (and sometimes that's not enough because then they rationalize that their friends are somehow at fault) or by having someone kick their teeth in (or some other reaction by the recipent of poor treatment rebelling against it ) and I can't do either of those things for them. Especially not the teeth-kicking part.

A message board is a great place for people like this, because they can behave as badly as they like, and there's no recourse but to let them do their thing, or ban them, and since Ze has very little criteria for bannage, they get to just blithely poke holes in others' fun or make fun of others' pain at their whim. It's an ugly thing, shameful, but I guess that's the cost of freedom.

Rule of 150
 

So I'm reading The Tipping Point right now. for those who don't know, the basic premise of the book is to examine how individual actions can become movements throughout a population.

one of the many ideas in this book is "The Rule of 150"- psychologists have figured out what the optimal number of people is in a given group to keep together the level of cohesion in an informal, yet highly-effective manner (this means a more organic, self-regulating group rather than a more formal hierarchy) And you guessed it- the optimal number is about 150 individuals.

why is this? well, there's an idea that we all have a very specific level of channel capacity- meaning we can only fit so much diverse raw information into different channels in our brain before everything goes ooky. The number of channels is about seven (the book proposes this is why telephone numbers are seven digits. look up psychologist george miller and "the magical number seven" for more on this.)

The book extrapolates this theory from raw information channel capacity to social channel capacity- we can only keep up on so many social relationships. For instance in a group of five people, you have to know about ten separate relationships: you with the four others and six two-way relationships between others- understanding what the dynamics are, individual personalities, needs, wants, your own time and attention, etc.

Beyond a group of 150 individuals, our brains go all ooky. Imagine that.

Bill Gross, a Hutterite leader in Washington State is quoted in the book; "Keeping things under a 150 just seems to be the best and most efficient way to manage a group of people. When things get larger than that, people become strangers to one another. In smaller groups people are a lot closer. They're knit together, which is very important if you want to be effective and successful at community life. If you get too large, you don't have enough work in common , and then you start to become strangers and that close-knit fellowship starts to get lost. What happens when you get that big is that the group starts, just on its own, to form a clan. You get two or three big groups within the larger group. That is something you really try to prevent, and when it happens, it is a good time to branch out."

do unto others...

with my conservative views (morally and politically) i am a minority on the board and yet you can still see me lurking around. my opinions and thoughts are not the norm for this place...and yet i feel like i can post them...hey if someone doesnt like it...thats ok. its the same as the real world...sometimes we are a bit too sensitive about things. i know i can be that way. but you know...everyone doesnt have to agree with me---and im ok with that.

im not tryin to be a love hippie--im just saying...remember we all are entitled to our own opinions and even if you dont agree you can be civil and nice :)

i hope i have lived up to my own high standards :)

*cartwheels and sunshine*
Clytie

yeah it's appreciated clytie.
sometimes it's just too tempting to pull your leg.
it's always without malice though.
:)

Some great points in this thread, made by all
 

I'm not picking on you, Coffee. I have too much personal respect and admiration for you to do that.

But this same sentence has been said more than once here & I don't necessarily think it's true.

Sometimes it's not worth it to get into it w/someone, if they post something you don't like or do not agree with. You're not sure if a thread is just a game between the posters that you were not invited to, or what.

I'd like to remind everyone of a night a certain shadow puppet pulled up & had an argument w/me in a thread. The only one who came to my defense was NYC. She did not know the thread had turned into a game for the puppet & I, but then, neither did the rest of you. *shrugs* Just sayin'.

In the Debate Hall, that's different. I would like to think everyone knows that we say what WE feel, at the time, and we mean what WE say, at that time & not everyone has to agree on everything & that's the end of it. What a boring world this would be w/o a little diversity.

It would be nice if we could respect each other's differing opinions, but when it comes to something I'm not comfortable with, well then I just can't. Akin to someone thinking it's ok to abuse animals & me thinking that it's not: I don't think I should have to respect the differing opinion in this case, b/c it's cruel & inhumane. I can see how some people could feel that way about ALL differing opinions & I guess that's their right. But what a bleak world they must live in. I personally enjoy when someone has succeeded in getting me to see their point of view, but that doesn't mean I will then agree w/that person.

I generally only speak up when I have a visceral, "I do not agree, and feel the need now to say something about it." reaction. It takes quite a bit to piss me off, but once you're there, look. Out.

As for things that have happened here this week, or every 6 months, really: remember, there are 2 sides to every story. Carrying the wreckage through several threads for several days does nothing but prolong the drama, and irritate those who winced at it the first time it was posted, and sort of tells the other person's side w/o them having to post a single word.

I've not really said much about my opinions on this matter because it will probably start another party for the people on here that get a kick out of bashing people. What I said has spoken for itself and a few good people on here have gone out of their way to justify it, I did this to warn other people on here, not to improve my popularity points or high opinions of people that go around this board calling newcomers c*nt, d*ck, etc. Getting threatening mail and having shadow puppets send me cruel comments on MYSPace (that started a while ago actually) only goes to show that I must be doing something that is bringing out the worst in these freaks, yes Freaks; only a freak goes around threatening people like that. This is a public board and like a few people have said on here there are alot of members and ofcource we're not going to like everyone, that's life deal with it.

P.S. the shadow puppets that try to PM me on here or e-mail me at my hotmail get a step by step instruction on how to program in PHP, if you're this bored I might be able to interest you in learning something new. I even have instructions on how to learn color theory through Photoshop, anything to help you get some healthy interests going :D

I'm with Pricey on this one. On this board, silence isn't always tacit approval.

On this board, when things start to go wrong, they get ugly very, very fast. Things get nasty and personal and all in public.

I think the root of this is that it's a public board with relatively relaxed moderators, so everyone feels "entitled" to be here, and "entitled" to post whatever they'd like. When someone's feeling of entitlement is undermined, people take it personally. And they strike back in nasty, inappropriate, over the top ways.

It often takes serious restraint on my part to not tell people exactly what I think of their shenanigans. Often, in my own opinion, I have some worthwhile things to add to the fray (my own sense of entitlement). However, I rarely get involved, because I know it will, almost without fail, result in a personal attack on ME, and an assumption that I've joined one-side-or-another.

This, of course, is never true - I try hard not to join sides in a personal argument. I restrict my proselytizing to politics and the Debate Hall. Because pointing out someone else's asinine behavior, no matter how egregious it is, will automatically make you a "drama queen" on this board, one of the ones who're labeled "the first to show up in a controversy." F**k that.

Jezis gawd, if there were two things I wish people on this board would learn, it would be (1) how to give constructive criticism that isn't an attack; and (2) the value of ACCEPTING constructive criticism, and REALIZING that it isn't an attack. Oh, and let me add a third: KEEPING IT OFF BOARD.

This board is a COMMUNITY, and public frays between members affects us all. We're all entitled to be here, and, as a corollary we're NOT entitled to run everyone (or anyone) else off, either directly or through passive-agressive posting. Keep it to your PMs, please, because the rest of us don't want our nice friendly threads soiled with it.

The End.

Oh, yes Venus, true true, we are totally at a loss when it comes to your opinions on this matter; you've been so terribly circumspect and self-effacing.

Speaking for myself in terms of the "silence = tacit approval:" BULLSHIT. If I am silent, in face to face interactions as well as message board ones, it might mean any and all of the following:

- I am too horrified to say anything
- I am falling off my chair laughing, and unable to communicate
- I strongly disagree, but don't feel like devoting hours of my free time to a fruitless argument
- I strongly agree... see above
- My brain chemistry has been altered such that I cannot form a coherent thought
- I assume people are adults for just this one rash moment, and decide they can fight for themselves
- I don't give a flying ****
- My GI is giving me trouble, and there just won't be time for a long discussion
- I am trying to remember where I left the weapons keys, and not paying much attention
- There is an elk outside the window

You get the idea. I think.

You can chose to not receive emails from members of the site . . and uhm. . hello, the ignore list. Your just chosing to allow people in your space. If you find it all so intrusive then stop handing the key to your house out to everyone because it sounds like you view every single word said to you as a personal attack.

It comes in handy.

Zaftig I do block people on here I'm talking about my personal e-mails I was dumb enough like you said to leave that information on here when I joined this place. I really didn't think grown people would resort to sending me nasty comments on my personal e-mail, that started a while ago actually. I've learned my lesson though and kind of see what this place can be about. There are alot of good people on here though which makes it worth sticking around :)

eeerm, just wondering, but has anyone else had this experience?
cos i've had a few run ins with folks here (unbelievable, i know)
but no one has ever sent me a nasty email or pm.
am i the odd one out here or.....

:confused:

just filter them right to trash. add a couple known domains / addresses to a whitelist, grey list everything else, and blacklist people you know you don't want to talk to. communication requires two willing parties... one to send the information and one to recieve. if you don't fulfill your role in that procesas communication doesn't happen. you don't want to talk to someone ... don't, I don't know how many peoples posts I just skip over, not so much here, but on a couple other boars where we've had problems. you see a post from someone... you scroll it off the screen, don't even bother reading it.. posting a public email address is not a bad thing, mine exists out there a lot more than I would have thought, thats what happens when you become fairly active online, I google my email address and I get 121 hits right off the bat (suprised its that few) on my primary accountit doesn't take much for anyone here to to tie me to an address, quite possibly even a physical address (haven't checked lately , know I used to be able to before we moved). its no different than having your phone number in the phone book, or giving the bank or power company a mailing address. it can leak, very easily. mastercard alone just had 40 million accounts breached, if I understood correctly , names, addresses, SSN/SIN's, phone numbers, and in some cases bank account numbers were lost and are now out there floating around. no one can expect complete privacy in this life anymore (unless you become a tibetan monk) all we can do is try to maintain as much of it as possible, and learn to deal with the intrusions that will occur.

It does seem strange Craig and that is why I mentioned it. In a way it's funny that someone is doing this but also sad. And I did not say I received a nasty PM on here??? Where did I say that? I was talking about my e-mail and My Space profile.

It's true Simage it's scary what comes up when you type in your e-mail or full name, stuff you wouldn't even have thought was connected to you.

What I did is not the worst thing that has ever happened on here and won't be the last mistake someone makes. The name I posted is not his real name so I'm sure he's safe out there in the World. It does hurt to know that people are going out of their way to post negative comments after I post something on here and to have gone through old threads and seeing how many people have been driven out of here by this mental abuse that is acceptable on this board. Also the fact that a large majority of these Moderators are the ones leading this on, kind of like a mental lynching. And you can't block the moderators, what's up with that? Anyway this has been an experience