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Originally Posted by Halx
This forum had a sweet spot as far as "meaningfulness" goes a long time ago. It was the type of environment that had a little magic in it. Everyone was open to new ideas. Everyone was open to sharing. Everyone interacted with a lot more flirting. Its changed a lot, obviously. I blame the general internet environment. Recent events have polarized and scared people. Instead of floating in the space between, people have been forced to choose a side and now approach arguments from that perspective instead of entering them open to all ideas.
So when people say they don't feel like they're evolving here, I attribute it to the way people handle themselves. No longer can you share your personal life with the internet because you think/know it will come back to haunt you. No longer can you listen to someone else's opinion because you were knee-jerked into your current opinion by recent events. Everyone has their guard up.
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Not sure exactly what you mean by "having their guards up"? There are parts of my life I'm very open about (here) and parts you'll never hear me talk about (my choices). But as far as opinions, if I feel strongly or passionately about something, I'll chime in my two cents. Maybe some of it has to do with age; years ago if I posted on a forum and my post wasn't acknowledged, I would take it personally. For some, that translates to resentment.
As to the friendships here that have been going on for years, you "guys" have become a closeknit group. Any newbie here can see that. I was part of that tight group at the site I frequented for several years, and there were many who disagreed with a mindset we shared. We understood one another and those coming along were just beginning to learn what we knew.
TFP was flirty, friendly, and those web-inception bonds can't be broken. It was easy, effortless and the segue into politics followed naturally. If you disagreed, you knew one another well enough to argue creatively and listen to one another.
Couldn't it be that TFP is evolving as it's own membership evolves? The founding members are aging
, they get married, have kids, change relationships and jobs, travel and move around. The world has changed, we've changed our priorities and maybe our politics might even change just a bit.
The only guardedness I see is a defensiveness, maybe more of a denial. Not wanting to get change, not wanting to believe that what we once were so cocksure of, ain't necessarily so. Some of us are afraid to look within or afraid we might seem weak if our thought process isn't the same as it used to be.