After being given a week vacation for an OT post I was able to view P&N from the outskirts. To really see how conversation flowed and was often derailed by both sides.
Combine that with an article I read in the NYT a few days ago
Text
The rest of the article was on another topic which is unrelated to this post, but that was the important part.
As someone who is also a participator in what I am about to say, I understand that I myself have shown these traits and probably will again in the future, but again, that is truly unrelated to the topic at hand.
As some of you have guessed I am sure, AT overall is a interesting board on the internet. We have people from all walks of life, high school drop outs, CEO's, doctors, mechanics, people from every industry, class, education level, religion, way and walk of life and most continents. This is in part due to a love of technology that usually brings us here, someone that obviously goes above the typical lines that define our life.
The reason this is important is for this. Whether you like to admit it or not, political parties do have people on pay roll whose entire job is to surf the internet forums, blogs, ect to find out how people "feel" about political subjects. Here on P&N we have had posts from political party representatives a few times I can remember in response to threads that either dealt with large Federal Issues, or relatively local issues.
Why is this important?
The reason, is because if we look at any P&N thread we can see that P&N has degraded substantially over the years. It has gone from what some moderators enjoy calling a "pristine political forum" to a forum that resembles more the comment section at CNN. We have intelligent, very intelligent people on these forums who in some posts will type out intelligent well thought out replies that bring discussion on the subject, but at the same time will go into another thread and do one or two line sound bites against Obama, Bush, republicans, democrats.
The problem with this, is that as a forum of people from all walks of life, active partipants can have there opinions changed by the subjects they read about on forums, especially regarding subjects they never thought of. The internet, or specifically, a forum as diverse and as active as AT is not simply a extended version of 4chan or ebaums, the forum is a discussion area for people who otherwise live there lifes, make decisions ect.
So the real reason for this post, is as a right winger, who supported the idea of Obama I have to truly question whether people have begun to become so ideologically blind on both left and right that they would rather there reasons and there beliefs be correct than to admit they might harm the country overall. The idea of political freedom is to base your ideologies around your opinions, not your opinions around an ideology. One liners such as "but buush buush buush" or "Change we can believe in" or "neocon again!" or any of the other useless attacks both sides use to attack the other seize discussion and result in the thread degradding into nothing more than childish slanders aimed at one another.
It is possible to like a republican idea without being a republican. It is possible to like a democrat idea without being a democrat. You can question the bailout and still vote Dem, you can accept the bailout and still vote R.
I guess what this comes down too, is simply as a forum we have more influence than most people will admit too, or even think. Our posts here affect peoples opinions in day to day lives, we have members that post on multiple forums, that post on blogs, and the beauty of the internet is an idea born here can spread everywhere until Mr. Congressman/Woman reads about it on his Google homepage. The mods have decided to allow the forum to really run its course, choosing to not really touch anything for fear of seeying slanted. I understand there reasoning, I ask that as members though, if we disagree with something explain why, give some reason. Don't destroy every thread because you are angry your guy lost, or because you are happy your guy won and someone is questioning his actions. We have many smart people on this forum, there is no reason it should be a forum of degenerate name calling useless discussion.
Combine that with an article I read in the NYT a few days ago
Text
The rest of the article was on another topic which is unrelated to this post, but that was the important part.
As someone who is also a participator in what I am about to say, I understand that I myself have shown these traits and probably will again in the future, but again, that is truly unrelated to the topic at hand.
As some of you have guessed I am sure, AT overall is a interesting board on the internet. We have people from all walks of life, high school drop outs, CEO's, doctors, mechanics, people from every industry, class, education level, religion, way and walk of life and most continents. This is in part due to a love of technology that usually brings us here, someone that obviously goes above the typical lines that define our life.
The reason this is important is for this. Whether you like to admit it or not, political parties do have people on pay roll whose entire job is to surf the internet forums, blogs, ect to find out how people "feel" about political subjects. Here on P&N we have had posts from political party representatives a few times I can remember in response to threads that either dealt with large Federal Issues, or relatively local issues.
Why is this important?
The reason, is because if we look at any P&N thread we can see that P&N has degraded substantially over the years. It has gone from what some moderators enjoy calling a "pristine political forum" to a forum that resembles more the comment section at CNN. We have intelligent, very intelligent people on these forums who in some posts will type out intelligent well thought out replies that bring discussion on the subject, but at the same time will go into another thread and do one or two line sound bites against Obama, Bush, republicans, democrats.
The problem with this, is that as a forum of people from all walks of life, active partipants can have there opinions changed by the subjects they read about on forums, especially regarding subjects they never thought of. The internet, or specifically, a forum as diverse and as active as AT is not simply a extended version of 4chan or ebaums, the forum is a discussion area for people who otherwise live there lifes, make decisions ect.
So the real reason for this post, is as a right winger, who supported the idea of Obama I have to truly question whether people have begun to become so ideologically blind on both left and right that they would rather there reasons and there beliefs be correct than to admit they might harm the country overall. The idea of political freedom is to base your ideologies around your opinions, not your opinions around an ideology. One liners such as "but buush buush buush" or "Change we can believe in" or "neocon again!" or any of the other useless attacks both sides use to attack the other seize discussion and result in the thread degradding into nothing more than childish slanders aimed at one another.
It is possible to like a republican idea without being a republican. It is possible to like a democrat idea without being a democrat. You can question the bailout and still vote Dem, you can accept the bailout and still vote R.
I guess what this comes down too, is simply as a forum we have more influence than most people will admit too, or even think. Our posts here affect peoples opinions in day to day lives, we have members that post on multiple forums, that post on blogs, and the beauty of the internet is an idea born here can spread everywhere until Mr. Congressman/Woman reads about it on his Google homepage. The mods have decided to allow the forum to really run its course, choosing to not really touch anything for fear of seeying slanted. I understand there reasoning, I ask that as members though, if we disagree with something explain why, give some reason. Don't destroy every thread because you are angry your guy lost, or because you are happy your guy won and someone is questioning his actions. We have many smart people on this forum, there is no reason it should be a forum of degenerate name calling useless discussion.
Facebook
Twitter