Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Where do we draw the line between political discussion and ideological spam?

Baraka_Guru · 12-26-2007, 06:54 PM

The only interpretation of the problem issued by the OP I can come up with is this: The creation of discussions in Politics is done with a distinct bias. There is no debate structured without bias--it is always leaning in one direction; it is framed in such a way that disagreeing with the OP is inherently divergent of what is "acceptable."

In a way, it reminds me of Foucault's concept of Gouvernementalité in that the threads created in Politics act as a form of overreaching governance in which the OP (and its adherents, no matter how loose) seeks to control the detractors through means of restricted and exclusive "knowledge" (savoir). Anything that disagrees with this knowledge is not only automatically wrong, it is already accounted for with a complex system of watchers who refer to the OP as the single source of power.

Basically, to disagree with the OP is to be wrong....because the OPer is not only entitled to their ideas, they hold the power over the ideas and how they govern the thread. This causes the thread to go nowhere (logically) and no real debate can arise.

If we want debates in Politics, we need them to be formally set up through a panel of moderators, and the posting needs to be done formally and with a sense of order.

So, the question is: Do we want to go that far? Or, we could ask: How can we move closer to the formal model without losing the accessibility of the medium of Internet forums?

EDIT: This does not refer to all Politics threads, merely threads that the OP would consider "ideological spam."

12-26-2007, 06:54 PM	#15 (permalink)
Baraka_Guru warrior bodhisattva Super Moderator Location: East-central Canada	The only interpretation of the problem issued by the OP I can come up with is this: The creation of discussions in Politics is done with a distinct bias. There is no debate structured without bias--it is always leaning in one direction; it is framed in such a way that disagreeing with the OP is inherently divergent of what is "acceptable." In a way, it reminds me of Foucault's concept of Gouvernementalité in that the threads created in Politics act as a form of overreaching governance in which the OP (and its adherents, no matter how loose) seeks to control the detractors through means of restricted and exclusive "knowledge" (savoir). Anything that disagrees with this knowledge is not only automatically wrong, it is already accounted for with a complex system of watchers who refer to the OP as the single source of power. Basically, to disagree with the OP is to be wrong....because the OPer is not only entitled to their ideas, they hold the power over the ideas and how they govern the thread. This causes the thread to go nowhere (logically) and no real debate can arise. If we want debates in Politics, we need them to be formally set up through a panel of moderators, and the posting needs to be done formally and with a sense of order. So, the question is: Do we want to go that far? Or, we could ask: How can we move closer to the formal model without losing the accessibility of the medium of Internet forums? EDIT: This does not refer to all Politics threads, merely threads that the OP would consider "ideological spam." __________________ Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing? —Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön Humankind cannot bear very much reality. —From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot Last edited by Baraka_Guru; 12-26-2007 at 07:23 PM..