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Originally Posted by ubertuber
Pan:
You've definitely got my respect and admiration for having the heart to fight the good fight, however small and hard-fought the gains are.
While I don't disagree with the thrust of your feelings on negativity, I think there's also a trap in single-minded focus on "solutions". When I was still in school, this mindset was frequently employed by the administration as the ultimate criticism killer. Don't like the way housing is allocated? Come up with a better method. Don't think our vendor contracts are negotiated to students' advantage? Figure out a better system. Disagree with the way teacher evaluations are handled? YOU fix it. This was so effective at shutting down unwanted feedback because the people with the ground-level view were not the ones with the resources and knowledge, to say nothing of responsibility, to solve the problems. In my year working in that administration, I got a lot of attention for telling students to come to me with problems because it was my job to fix them.
I think a certain level of this translates to what goes on at tfp - and it's a question central to who we think we are and what our space will become. So far as I know, none of us are politicians. None of us have the whole picture, the knowledge, the resources, or the responsibility to fix these problems. To insist that every post or thread without a solution packaged is nothing more than negativity is to lock us into choosing between silence and pie-in-the-sky posts.
I'm perfectly happy to learn about and discuss problems here. I know that none of us is likely to come up with anything as grand as a solution. For me, the reward is in learning to use some insight that one of you posts and think about the world around me in a clearer fashion...
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Thanks Uber............. I truly am thankful for the kind words.... and I agree, it is a double edged sword saying "find the solution." In politics it is the politician's job to fix things and keep them running smoothly, however, it is up to us the people to find the politicians who have good ideas and are willing to take chances, are willing to listen to all sides and find solutions that people may not like but can live with.
Again, if we discuss problems here and we find something that may work, we have some idea what to ask from our politicians and what to look for in them.
But if all we do is hate and ignore..... our politicians will be as negative as we are..... hence corruption, hence greed, partisan politics, etc. etc.
What have we got to lose by trying to be positive and focus positively on issues and try to find positive ways to handle them?
Nothing more than we already have lost and are losing.
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And so it goes and Host and RB's posts are perfect examples of what I started in this thread with..... instead of debating .... RB and Host all of a sudden turn the thread into "let's blame the Right and show economic injustice".
Great, but that wasn't the point I was trying to get across in saying I am trying to stay positive and I don't post because people here seem to want to stay negative and not work on finding middle ground.
On the other hand these 2 proved my point as to why it is utterly useless to try to post anything here............ They don't like the flow they change the subject to what they want and totally disregard what was being said.
(Not just Host and RB do this.)
Hence, the elitism on this board.... you play by THEIR rules and when THEY decide the topic isn't worthy instead of starting a new thread or just saying they have nothing more to say they bog the thread down, change topic and fuck anyone who might have been interested in what was being said.
Thanks for demonstrating the answer guys, I am not trying to attack you anymore than you tried to change the subject on me. And decided what I had to say and others who may have had something to say on a topic you obviously were bored of..... wasn't worthy of your respect.