[OutsiderFan]

The notion every corner of the Internet is full of political discussion may in fact mean political discussion is important. The problem is most of those corners don’t have moderators, or moderators have been unwilling to moderate as much as simply throw the baby out with the bath water, by banning discussion entirely.

I know based on what I have seen on the Covid board that the people who populate the Cardboard have demonstrated the ability to have passionate discussions while being civil to each other. It’s like anything else. If people know there will be consequences for behavior, it will conform to what is socially acceptable and allowed from the highest community authority. So prohibitions of political discussion by board moderators unwilling to moderate, actually makes things worse in the places that don’t have moderation. We either experience a total shutdown of political discussion, or it is allowed to take place in a harmful, no holds barred (oh the irony of that at this moment) and totally unmoderated manner.

It’s akin to the NIMBY attitude I loathe with such great passion. By not dealing with our own angst locally, we ship it off to where it accumulates en masse other places it overwhelms. By way of analogy, it’s like if people don’t want refuse where they live, so they all go to dump it somewhere else, thinking they are getting rid of it, when the reality is the accumulating refuse ultimately contaminates the air and water they breathe and drink. Our failure as a society to have hard discussion and face difficult topics head-on by putting in the effort to create a culture of being civil to each other, hurts us in a similar manner.

The fact we didn’t establish social norms of respect for each other in online discussions since the internet started, has led to the U.S. being run by the biggest troll in the history of the Internet. I’m not blaming anyone here for this reality. It’s more of a challenge to people to really think about how we are all responsible for how things are in the world, and how our desire to be comfortable and not face difficult challenges, doesn’t solve them and only makes them worse.

It’s just a real shame we don’t have any effectively moderated political discussions in any corner of the internet, because we absolutely need them. What a failure of our society to not teach people acceptable standards of online conduct to discuss political ideas based on respect for others. The irony is if we had, we wouldn’t have as many topics being politicized and nobody would want to avoid political discussion because there would be no reason to hide from it. Anyone who runs or ever has run any Internet forum owns this.

[OutsiderFan]

The notion every corner of the Internet is full of political discussion may in fact mean political discussion is important. The problem is most of those corners don’t have moderators, or moderators have been unwilling to moderate as much as simply throw the baby out with the bath water, by banning discussion entirely.

I know based on what I have seen on the Covid board that the people who populate the Cardboard have demonstrated the ability to have passionate discussions while being civil to each other. It’s like anything else. If people know there will be consequences for behavior, it will conform to what is socially acceptable and allowed from the highest community authority. So prohibitions of political discussion by board moderators unwilling to moderate, actually makes things worse in the places that don’t have moderation. We either experience a total shutdown of political discussion, or it is allowed to take place in a harmful, no holds barred (oh the irony of that at this moment) and totally unmoderated manner.

It’s akin to the NIMBY attitude I loathe with such great passion. By not dealing with our own angst locally, we ship it off to where it accumulates en masse other places it overwhelms. By way of analogy, it’s like if people don’t want refuse where they live, so they all go to dump it somewhere else, thinking they are getting rid of it, when the reality is the accumulating refuse ultimately contaminates the air and water they breathe and drink. Our failure as a society to have hard discussion and face difficult topics head-on by putting in the effort to create a culture of being civil to each other, hurts us in a similar manner.

The fact we didn’t establish social norms of respect for each other in online discussions since the internet started, has led to the U.S. being run by the biggest troll in the history of the Internet. I’m not blaming anyone here for this reality. It’s more of a challenge to people to really think about how we are all responsible for how things are in the world, and how our desire to be comfortable and not face difficult challenges, doesn’t solve them and only makes them worse.

It’s just a real shame we don’t have any effectively moderated political discussions in any corner of the internet, because we absolutely need them. What a failure of our society to not teach people acceptable standards of online conduct to discuss political ideas based on respect for others. The irony is if we had, we wouldn’t have as many topics being politicized and nobody would want to avoid political discussion because there would be no reason to hide from it. Anyone who runs or ever has run any Internet forum owns this.