Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads

Subject: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Peter T.
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 04:36 PM

O.K., speaking as a marcher, a "let a thousand flowers bloom" kind of guy, free speech, etc., let no subject be too whatever for Mudcat, could we give this a rest for, oh, let us say a week, or until the next big news story comes along? Every angle of this has been flogged to pieces. It is not being ignored, we are all deeply sincere in our worries, whatever they may be. It is turning into the worst kind of intellectual Muzak.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 04:41 PM

A rest on new threads anyway. If we've got anything to say, surely there are extant threads galore where our post could find a home.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Wesley S
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 04:45 PM

I couldn't agree more - thanks for the idea.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST,Thumbelina
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 04:46 PM

Right. Just political threads though. No censorship necessary, as now the membership will shout down those who want to keep discussing the war.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Bill D
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 05:04 PM

*grin*......

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: RichM
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 05:04 PM

how about those of you who feel you have said all you can about the subject simply do not post further to such threads?

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Don Firth
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 05:06 PM

Amen!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Peter T.
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 05:07 PM

No shouting, simply a suggestion. Ignore it if you like. You probably will anyway. yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: curmudgeon
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 05:11 PM

Yes, please. I can't figure out which ones to post to now. more will be too confusing -- Tom

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Frankham
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 06:44 PM

Don't see the need. It's a good thing to talk about. People need an outlet to vent their frustrations and why not on Mudcat? It's one of the few places left on the internet that promote the free exchange of ideas. Again, no one has to read them if they don't want to. I personally have found useful information on all of them. My vote is to keep 'em coming.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 06:46 PM

Amen, Peter, to any more redundant new ones.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 06:50 PM

You may wish to read the chilling news on the "cut and paste" thread. The days of Mudcat being one of the few places left on the internet that promote the free exchange of ideas among the folk music community, look like they are behind us.

If people are bothered by political threads, they don't have to read them. They also have the option of using the BS filter. What really SHOULDN'T be an option, is some posters who don't want the political threads, telling the posters who DO want the political threads, to shut up and go away, which is what is happening in this thread.

As opposed to the "cut and paste" thread, where Joe Offer informs us he is now going to actually start censoring the political threads.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:04 PM

He's not censoring. He's just trying to maintain order, and make it possible for people to actually read the threads. Have you though about how much extra time it takes to load a three-screen-length post, as opposed to a blue clicky?

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:31 PM

I repeat--anyone who doesn't wish to be bothered by the political or the BS threads doesn't have to be bothered. They need to exhibit self-control. That means not reading the threads and posts which bother them. Skip over them, and read what you want to read.

To start deleting political threads and posts, and using the extremely lame excuse of "maintaining order" is ludicrous beyond belief.

How about people who don't want to read threads about Iraq, JUST DON'T READ THE FUCKING THREAD!!!

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:39 PM

How about you take a good BIG dose of your own meds need to exhibit self-control...

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:42 PM

AAAAaaaahhrrh!!!!!! I'm MELLTINGGG!!!!

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Forum Lurker
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:45 PM

There are people, including me, who like reading the political threads, but don't want to wade through long quotations that double the time it takes to load the page. And there is no long copy/paste filter.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:48 PM

Ding dong the witch is dead!! Yippee!!

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:50 PM

There is plenty of stuff in thread I don't read. I scroll past those posts. It is really a pretty simple procedure, easily accomplished with a standard mouse.

I choose to scroll past what I'm not interested in reading, rather than demanding that what I don't like, don't find interesting, think is badly written, or too long, be censored by the admin.

The reason why I don't ask the admin to censor what I don't like, is because I understand that other people will like it. I also understand that the cardinal rule of enjoying any internet forum, is skipping what you don't want to read, rather than demanding that those who are posting what one doesn't wish to read, shut up and go away and stop posting here.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Gareth
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 07:51 PM

Mmmm ! Perhaps this needs the intervention of a "Thread Inspector".

The question in my mind is will the be any cooperation by "anon Guest"??

Gareth

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 08:01 PM

Oh good idea Gareth. A Mudcat TIPS program. Gotta love that one.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 08:48 PM

wahts a moritorium?

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: JennyO
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 10:25 PM

I don't think there should be any restriction on what is put in the threads, although blue clickies make more sense to me than cut and paste.

I have been reading the political threads, but it is taking longer and longer to get through them. There are so many Iraq threads now that it is getting confusing, and I think some of them should be combined - not into one, or even two, but less than there are now. And any new ones started from now on would need to have a really new angle to survive as a new thread. Maybe it is the confusion that is actually causing some to start a new thread, because when one wants to say something, it is hard to work out which thread it belongs in.

If the thread starters are not sure where to put their posts, I suggest they take a punt and pick one of the existing threads, as they are only adding to the confusion. Otherwise, Joe or somebody will have have to step in eventually and start combining some of them. Just some commonsense, folks!

Jenny

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 10:42 PM

JennyO, I might agree with you if the person doing the "combining" had a clue as to the matters under discussion, and any political judgment whatsoever. However, in the case of Joe Offer, that won't ever happen. It would take someone with much greater political acumen and a much more astute sense of judgment than Joe has ever exhibited here. As Lepus Rex pointed out in the "cut and paste" thread, attempts to consolidate just butchers the subject being discussed, puts things together which are in no way relevant to one another, etc.

Why are so many people certain that, just because there are currently a lot of threads about the war against Iraq, that people creating new threads don't know what they are doing? And why are the people who aren't following political events surrounding the war closely, not to mention the political discussions here about it, the ones who are making these decisions for those of us contributing to the political threads?

Those who are complaining most loudly about our discussions, are people who rarely, if ever, participate in them. Does that seem fair?

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Amos
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 10:51 PM

I suggest, Oh Nameless Thing, that you have fouled your own bed by abusing the communication channels open to you, in three particular ways. First, youhave loaded them with the basest sort of invective and ad hominem slanders, thinly disguised as impassioned speech but actually just underhanded undermining of persons. Second you have abused the channels by overloading them with lengthy diatribes, consuming more bandwidth than reasonable discourse would require. Thirdly, and most important, you have spewed negativity of the most generalized, nounless, anti-communicative sort, over and over again, made broad assertions of catastrophe and then slandered those who did not agree with you.

If, as you claim, you have other forums on which you regularly pursue this kind of pseudo-communication, which is clearly not aimed at understanding but springs from some much more idiosyncratic and bent need altogether, then I can only urge you to take these concerns there. You have abused the hospitality of this site, and now that you have been told so, and chided for your ill-mannered and contemptuous conduct, you are choosing to abuse the site itself, and its administrators.

Why don't you learn something from all this?

A

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Peg
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 11:23 PM

ooh, Amos! well said.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 11:25 PM

Amos, you are a splendid wordsmith! As ever, I'll go with the flow here, 'cause it's my conviction that the 'cat is worth waiting for... This forum is an excellent and reasoning beast, and like any democracy, requires the thoughtful consideration of it's adherents. Nice suggestion, Peter!

Respectfully yours, ttr

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: JennyO
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 02:41 AM

GUEST, you actually strengthened my point with what you said about not wanting Joe or anybody else to combine some threads.

If you believe these people haven't any political judgment, all the more reason for YOU (contributors and thread starters) to make the decisions and regulate yourselves to keep the number of Iraq threads at a number that will not cause all this fuss. Otherwise it will get to a point where someone steps in, and you will be crying "censorship".

BTW, I did not say that people who start threads don't know what they are doing, I merely suggested that before doing that they look - maybe a bit harder than they are doing now - at the other threads to see if their idea could be accommodated in an existing thread. I believe in some cases they could be, particularly as some of these threads are drifting anyway, and starting to look not much different from each other.

I'm sure I'm not the only one getting confused by the proliferation of these threads, and it is a shame, because I am interested in the issues, but it is getting to a stage where there is too much to read, not enough hours in the day to do it justice, and I am probably missing a lot of good information.

Jenny

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: leprechaun
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 07:49 PM

John from Hull - a moritorium is a place where they put dead people.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: GUEST,herc
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 08:41 PM

Dunno if it was this thread or another, but someone recently asked if people come for the lyrics, then stay for the flames. Some said yes. In a modified version, that's true for me. I came for the lyrics just before 9/11. At that point, I became fascinated (and helped) by the opinions all over the place in a period of great confusion. Intellectual muzak, maybe, but I wouldn't dispute that label for the music threads either. But I digress.

I've noticed that in the build up to war, I get opinions to chew on either in newspapers or here, and they each have glaring deficiencies. But it's interesting to me, as I've suspected and now firmly believe, that in my locale and circumstances, this subject is simply not viewed as polite subject matter. I live amongst many naval officers and enlisted marines and their families, and work with the downtown civilian crowd. In neither environment do we express our opinions (I have some old birkenstock-ed buddies from college days who will go on about it, of course, but I don't see them a lot.)

We had an unfortunate event on February 15, when so many protests took place, in which a small crowd protested at a naval shipyard. The resulting letters to the editor from military spouses were very interesting. They were calm, polite, and respectful of the anti-war message, yet still refrained from stating a position, and merely asked that people consider directing their protests to government officials, and not create further hardship for military personnel with jobs to do.

The point is, I think, that the noise level has ratcheted WAY up in here, because this is a tough one, and people need to vent, or question, or learn and decide. It comes out a bit crudely, sure. But there's a lot of pent up frustration. I don't think its the death of all civility on mudcat.

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: Cluin
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 09:07 PM

Here's some lyrics for a segue:

Why Don't You Just Grow Up
(James Keelaghan, 1996)

Why don't you just grow up and stop the little tantrums?
Why can't you just chill out? Why don't you take a pill?
There's something more to life than what's contained in your agenda
Your voice, mein fuhrer, is just a little shrill
Always with the talk; always with the lectures
There's nothing that is good enough; there's nothing that will do
So stop with the sarcasm, the scorn and the invective
School is out, yeah, class is through

If they give you the chance, plead insanity
It's almost like the truth and that'll do for some
And when they ask you what it was that drove you to distraction
Say the world just wasn't ready for the Son of God to come
Get off of that high horse; cut the condescension
Don't do me any favours; stop looking down your nose
I'm not overwhelmed by the glory of your presence
Why don't you take a number? I'll let you know when you are close

Why don't you just speak plain and drop the innuendo?
My eyes are going bad trying to read between the lines
It's very hard to understand just what it is you're saying
When your ideas are only threes and you dress them up as nines
And when it comes to that, there's one thing that I've wondered
Who does your thinking for you? Who puts you in the know?
Whoever that guy is, he's getting way too much
When you're handing out the pink slips, he's the guy that ought to go

oh yeah...

(Why'n't you grow up?...)

How `bout those songwriters, huh? Dontcha luv music and song and songwriting?
I vote we talk about that some more....

Subject: RE: Moratorium: Pro/Anti Iraq Threads
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 09:08 PM

A wee while back (week or two) there was an amazing demonstration of the effectiveness of the "don't post" tactic for killing threads you aren't enjoying. I believe it had something to do with 40 year old DoD or CIA contingency plans. GUEST made more of a babbling fool of itself than usual posting to itself, and the thread died. I know, I know, it's the "train wreck" phenomenon, you hate it but you gotta watch. But damn if ignoring morons doesn't make them go away. Yeah, it's hard not to open new threads (especially sans "BS" designations) but once you know the content and players, it shouldn't be all that hard to ignore the thread. Believe me, it'll go away once it knows it's being ignored. And even if it doesn't, so what, if you're ignoring it, it ain't bothering you.