Can that mod hat be worn jauntily off to the side?

[skdadl]

I wonder whether people have bothered to click through on the link deBO provides above to what she calls a delightful thread -- and indeed, it is. In a sense, it is the sunnier mirror-image of this thread.

Debra's OP expresses anxiety about the perhaps-changing nature of BnR, but after that, almost no one else does. A succession of members, each of whom has contributed a lot to this site and, Lord knows, to the real world, explain why they value BnR -- and their reasons are fairly varied -- and then how they fit their visits here into their real lives -- again, pretty varied. Debra hadn't actually asked people to do that, but they stepped forward to do it anyway. It's a good discussion, and I'd say that's quite a line-up of creative people -- all very different from one another, but all happy to be here.

BnR is different from places like babble and EM not only because they have more members. The people who are here are different, and they work differently, so the board is different.

I can't see anything wrong with a membership drive, although I also don't know how it would be done. Looking at the base membership list doesn't seem to me a very practical place to start. Try looking at EM's base membership list, and then compare that with regular posters, and you'll see the problem -- huge disparity in numbers. I presume the same is true of babble, although I'm not sure I remember a master list of members there -- again, it must be many many times the number of regular commenters.

This exchange from deBO's link seems to me telling:

Mandos: We don't seem to have a lot of prolific/logorrheic writers around willing to discuss on the board.

brebis noire: On the other hand, we have people with rich and interesting real-life lives, who drop in when they can to post and discuss.  

Exactly.

[RP.]

Have a judge solve the problem for you, after many painful months of back and forth, and paying me a lot of money.  

Srsly, the model of interest based negotiations, as outlined in the book, Getting to Yes, is probably the best model for solving problems where all parties have mutual interests in common.  The book itself has become a kind of standard for negotiators in different arena, especially in the alternative dispute resolution field in law.

[Caissa]

Ah, it's sitting on my shelf metres away.

This thread has sure boosted the traffic on this site. See what happens when you let people post.

I don't think BnR is significantly different from Babble and EM. They are of the same genre with slightly different cultures and emphases of topic(s).

[Debra]

Caissa I don't think you even realize how extraordinarily rude you are being.

you guys want point form hows this

1. moderation on this board is sporatic, but when it does occur is expected to be treated with the acknowledgement that without a precognition of mod authority we may as well just let the spammers lose.

2. this thread was started all because two members couldn't be bothered making the effort to take their conversation which may have resulted in a long topic to a dedicated thread and yet spent considerably much more time whinging about it.

3. the title of this thread is insulting and derogatory and a flame. It has been a long standing tradition that mods, who also like to post, insert mod hat on to designate that this is not an opinion but a ruling.

4. yes there is an ebb and flow in participation many of our members are women and as the two most vocal detractors here are men they are showing their complete lack of knowledge of women's lives. Sleeping Sun, Vmichel, Miss Vicky and others are currently very busy with children too bad they don't have wives to take up that work for them and leave them free to be verbose eh?

5. You do not have to personally like, agree with, or be friends with the mods on this board. You do not have to like being asked to do something so onerous as move a couple of posts to a new thread.  You DO however, have to respect the authority of the people who are GIVING of their time to help create a board that is reasonably easy to peruse and search.

6. Some in the community have allowed themselves to be drawn into the battle of personality of a few. This discord creates an uncomfortable atmosphere for some very cherished members of our community and repetitious, nonsense, thumbsucking, naval gazing ,temper tantrums such as this are unhelping in encouraging those members to return.

7. there is and has always been great leeway on this board. That was tightened up somewhat when the confrontations took a far too personal manner. Any attempt to return to that level of contemptible posting will result in suspension and/or banning.

If you don't like someone don't engage them.

[deBeauxOs]

... 4. yes there is an ebb and flow in participation many of our members are women and as the two most vocal detractors here are men they are showing their complete lack of knowledge of women's lives. Sleeping Sun, Vmichel, Miss Vicky and others are currently very busy with children too bad they don't have wives to take up that work for them and leave them free to be verbose eh?

I am stunned by the sheer sexism of the above.

[Debra]

how odd that you thrive on what you think are pithy barbs and yet don't recognize same in others writing.

of course there is lack of recognition and refusal of, wonder which is at play here

[skdadl]

I don't see that it's sexism at all, deBO.

I think this is sexism:

I don't think BnR is significantly different from Babble and EM.

The majority of BnR members are women. Denying that important fact, which has a variety of ramifications, is sexist to me. I sent people earlier this a.m. to your link, and especially to that exchange between Mandos and brebis noire, so that they might see the essence of the difference. I don't want to put words in their mouths, but I feel fairly sure that most of my old sparring partners at babble would agree that the gender balance here makes BnR significantly different, for all kinds of reasons.

[vmichel]

Well, if you're going to bring me into it...

Truth is, I could post more than I do, but when I think of something interesting to talk about I also think about the criticisms or dismissiveness that I might receive, and I evaluate whether I have a thick enough skin for it. There are a lot of subjects that I care passionately about, that I used to post about a lot, but that I've slowed down on because of exchanges like the one in this thread. So I mostly post to lighter topics. That's entirely my choice, and I don't blame the board for it or ask anyone to change their posting style to suit me -- I have just learned to know myself well enough to know when to detach.

And if you want my opinion of this whole business...

I don't know why anyone would have a problem with skdadl asking that the science posts be moved to another thread. But I also don't know why caissa would be suspended for saying "that's bullshit," but it's okay for Debra and skdadl to insult him.

And finally.... this past  year I have worked while my husband, a student, was the primary caregiver to our baby. I appreciate Debra's sentiment -- on the whole I do think that mothers of babies tend to have it harder than fathers do -- but in my particular case that's not so. I would feel very guilty to my husband if I let that comment stand.

[skdadl]

Hi, vee. In answer to one point you make: I don't know whether you read the original exchange, but pogge is quite wrong to say that I reacted to "bullshit."  "Bullshit" was just the opening salvo. There followed a long series of personal sneers at me, which I finally decided I had to put a lid on, because they were disrupting a community thread.

[Mandos]

So now Debra has spilled the beans on the toxic and transparent insinuations that skdadl was trying to make upthread.  Actually, skdadl was trying, rather neoconnishly, to construct a Grand Narrative of this situation completely at odds with its actual history via the sort of cheap and sophomoric psychoanalysis that once upon a time, I really imagined was beneath her.  I mean, she pretty much implied that this was all about Caissa and myself, and the size of our penises.  Please.  That's too easy a way to shut down the complaint.

The fact is that the list of female commenters who had children named by Debra were not our most prolific *female* writers, and considerably *more* prolific female (and male) writers either no longer participate or participate at a highly curtailed rate, and NOT because they had children.  You know, we all have our lurkers who support us in email, so let's not play the game of pretending to defend the weak.  Because, you know, you're *so* not.

You know, there really is no opposition between "logorrhea" and writing about "rich lives".  In fact, we had both simultaneously once upon a time.  The moderators appear to refuse to recognize that we have now quite a bit less of either, and it has been declining steadily for months.  Now, it could be that we *want* to become a blog aggregator and link library (which has little to do with our certainly rich and interesting lives)---but we never had this discussion.

In fact, it was pretty impossible to have this discussion.  Because the some of the present moderators were busy fishing for justifications of it.

[Mandos]

And are people actually trying to say that because Caissa swore that the moderators reacted they way they did?  *facepalm*

[skdadl]

"Defend the weak"? Huh?

Mandos, there are women on this board who can and do write circles around any man alive every day of their lives. There are also women on this board who shrink from contention.

None of that has anything to do with being "weak," and it takes a sexist to dismiss any of them that way.

You will have noticed that most of them have not appeared in this discussion, and that, I think, is because most of them just can't be bothered with a certain kind of needy ego any longer. Debra and I are here only because we have to be.

[Mandos]

I gather you too are challenged to see sarcasm.  *I* certainly was not myself implying that anyone was *weak*.  See "pretending".

[deBeauxOs]

Hi, vee. In answer to one point you make: I don't know whether you read the original exchange, but pogge is quite wrong to say that I reacted to "bullshit."  "Bullshit" was just the opening salvo. There followed a long series of personal sneers at me, which I finally decided I had to put a lid on, because they were disrupting a community thread.

skdadl, IMO your defensive response is symptomatic of the dismissiveness that vmichel just mentioned.

It seems you can't even listen to the mildest form of feedback from those you've implied have been silenced by the not-nice, not-lovely, not-good, not-creative, not-sunny other B'n'R members.

edited to add post to which I responded.

[vmichel]

After I posted above, I started getting nostalgic for the discussions we used to have. I have a suggestion, make of it what you will:

I think that lots of us had topics we used to write to. What if we listed some of those topics, and tried to revive some interest? I'd be willing to attempt a thicker skin  :D in return for some patience.  For example, I remember reading some great discussions about end-of-life issues from other posters that, while I didn't have anything to add to, I enjoyed reading. I'd love to throw out a link or a question in that category, if I thought that my ignorance on the topic wouldn't be met with curt dismissiveness. (Not to say that it always was.) There have been times that I've read something and thought "I wonder what the BnR'ers would think about that, and then thought "probably I'll get a snide comment from someone about how the source is lousy or I am showing my ignorance of the issue by posting that question."

I don't know, it's just a thought. If I knew that there was a lot of interest here in architecture, to pick a random example of something I know little about, I'd love to post a link to a building I saw or an article I read. I think of it like throwing chum to the sharks -- give us a good, meaty topic and let us feel comfortable expressing ourselves! But I don't want to do that if the response is "your selection of that building shows that you know nothing about architecture," or something of that nature.

Any interest in reviving the discussion? Or is that hopelessly naive?