locked threads
gimmesometruth27
St. Fuckin Louis Posts: 23,303
it is probably not my place to say anything, but in light of all of the locked threads the last few days i just feel the need to say this.
come on people. we are better and more mature than what we have demonstrated to the mods the last few days. this is beginning to be ridiculous. a few years ago the train was completely shut down for an extended period of time for similar reasons and i am afraid if we keep pushing it the same thing might happen again. i and many others enjoy the debate and discourse here and have learned a lot on this train. i think it is important that the train stay open and that the exchange of news and opinion on this forum is vital. even though we disagree on a lot of topics a majority of the time, i do believe that all of us are good people who deep down at the core care about the issues and our positions on those issues. if we didn't, we would not bother posting here.
most of the time this place can police itself and take care of things on it's own without having to get the mods involved. can we just debate within the spirit of the train in line with the posting guidelines? let's try to keep from stereotyping entire groups of people based on a few, based on religion, based on skin color, based on socioeconomic status, etc...and can we try to stay on topic? i have been guilty of some of that in the past, but lately it just seems that people would rather argue and hurl insults than engage in actual debate. some people are not even reading what others post, and that does nothing to further debate. what good is information presented that goes unread by people participating in the discourse?
we here as a group are better than that. and that is all i have to say about that....
steps down from soapbox....
come on people. we are better and more mature than what we have demonstrated to the mods the last few days. this is beginning to be ridiculous. a few years ago the train was completely shut down for an extended period of time for similar reasons and i am afraid if we keep pushing it the same thing might happen again. i and many others enjoy the debate and discourse here and have learned a lot on this train. i think it is important that the train stay open and that the exchange of news and opinion on this forum is vital. even though we disagree on a lot of topics a majority of the time, i do believe that all of us are good people who deep down at the core care about the issues and our positions on those issues. if we didn't, we would not bother posting here.
most of the time this place can police itself and take care of things on it's own without having to get the mods involved. can we just debate within the spirit of the train in line with the posting guidelines? let's try to keep from stereotyping entire groups of people based on a few, based on religion, based on skin color, based on socioeconomic status, etc...and can we try to stay on topic? i have been guilty of some of that in the past, but lately it just seems that people would rather argue and hurl insults than engage in actual debate. some people are not even reading what others post, and that does nothing to further debate. what good is information presented that goes unread by people participating in the discourse?
we here as a group are better than that. and that is all i have to say about that....
steps down from soapbox....
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Post edited by Unknown User on
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This discussion has been closed.
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Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Thanks again for this excellent post!
Peace.
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVTK_XffAvk
A common misconception is that a right to free speech means that you should say anything you like just because you can. This is wrong.
Rights don't exist in isolation from each other, they intersect. And by intersecting, they balance and limit each other.
We have a right to free speech, but we don't have the right to violate other people's rights in exercising it - their right to freedom of opinion and expression, their right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, freedom from discrimination. That is not acceptable, it's an abuse of the right to free speech, and it is perfectly reasonable for mods to ask us (as they do in the Posting Guidelines) to respect the rights of others while exercising our own - and perfectly acceptable for them to lock threads when people don't abide by that. And, like it or not, you, me and we all agreed to those Guidelines when we signed up to post on this board.
In short, free speech, so long as it's respectful.
Thanks for posting this, gimme. Well said - it needed to be said.
96: Cork, Dublin
00: Dublin
06: London, Dublin
07: London, Copenhagen, Nijmegen
09: Manchester, London
10: Dublin, Belfast, London & Berlin
11: San José
12: Isle of Wight, Copenhagen, Ed in Manchester & London x2
No, free speech as long as it doesn't descend into bigotry and/or racism.
Lol
It was also said that rights intersect and balance one another. That is true, but I think that principle is misapplied here. People have a right to freedome of speech and people have a right to free expression of their religion, beliefs, etc. There is no right, however, to not be offended. If someone uses their freedom of speech to insult your religion they are within their rights to do so. If you are offended that is really just tough, and entirely your problem. Discrimination relates to actions; it does not relate to being nice to one another. To choose one real life example, the creators of the Danish Mohamad cartoons, while they could have (and perhaps should have) chosen to be nicer and less provocative, were entirely within their rights to freely express their opinion of Islam. Muslims the world over were likewise within their rights to freely express their disagreement and displeasure at the depiction, but they were not justified in claiming discrimination or some other sort of a violation of their rights simply because they were offended.
I pretty much agree with this, although targeting an entire group of people - which borders on bigotry, or racism, isn't acceptable.
The Jewish holocaust didn't begin with the gas chambers; it began with discrimination and bigotry. These things need to be guarded against.
In my opinion, targeting a religion (criticising the nuts and bolts of a religion) is acceptable, though insulting the followers of a religion may be treading on dangerous ground.
Though of course someone will always take offense if their religion is criticized or challenged. Just ask Charles Darwin about that, or the creator of the artwork entitled 'Piss Christ'.
gotta like the "broad brush" we infidels are painted with.
Though I wouldn't mind being labeled a pagan. Being of and for the Earth isn't something to be ashamed of.
sura 8:12-13 smite ye above their necks and smite all their fingertips off them. this because they contended against allah and his messenger. if any contend against allah and his messenger, allah is strict in punishment.
holy crap....cutting off their fingertips....that is some serious law.
i do think that board members are basically ASKING for threads to be locked simply by the way they subject the headings ... see Yosi's thread ...
the level of discourse on this board is pretty good i think and we've lost a lot of the inflammatory board members ... we just need to be smarter about naming threads that we know are gonna raise flags and be put on short leashes ...
we should be open enough to discuss things like religious extremists and here everyone's opinion without it getting to be problematic ...
the mods have shown they are not going to tolerate certain things ... for the baseball peeps ... it may not be in the strikezone technically but if the ump keeps calling it a strike ... it's a strike ...
Did you understand what Byrnzie explained? He explained it very well. Do you understand now why it isn't ok to paint an entire group with a single hateful brush? The example of cause and effect pertaining to the Holocaust was a good example of what can happen if we're not all careful.
Absolutely the extremists in that religious group are bad...very bad and they hurt us and members of their own group too. The extremists take the bad from the Quran...the parts about non-believers and I don't know what else. There are also Muslims who ignore those bad parts and focus on good parts...they are in there...just like the Bible. There have been many interviews on TV lately examining these very things because everyone is concerned and trying to understand and trying to figure out how to change it and make it better.
It's still not ALL members who think one way. If you can display that sensibility in your posts by carefully choosing your words, then a new thread is fine. If it turns into a hate thread, it will likely be closed.
Kat
Admin
That's all. There are boundaries for a reason. There are serious problems to be solved and if they can be discussed in an appropriate way, there is no problem at all on AMT. Everyone, please be thoughtful and careful with your wording.
And thank you for the thank you thread. I'm going to lock it and this one because I so love locking threads, not. Take care all and have a great week with what's left of it.
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