It's been nice knowing you, Eden.
I hope you go on to live a happy, fulfilling life.
Don't hesitate to return to this forum if you need it.
P.S. and don't call Simon a "great tool" (joke)
Farewell
by EdenOne 104 Replies latest jw experiences
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freemindfade
I hope you stick around my friend, I recommend just taking a break from the forum and maybe some debates altogether. No always easy, but maybe keep the forum and just change how and what you use it for. You can still assist others waking up and moving on.
FMF
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truthseeker100
Thttp://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htmhink people!!
There is a reason Canada is the true North Strong and free!! Think people!!
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LoveUniHateExams
P.P.S. - great last post, Simon (page 7 of this thread).
Anyone who feels hard done by because of someone else on this forum should take 2 mins to read that post.
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Apognophos
Things would not have gotten to this point if you had been enforcing civility on this forum, Simon. There's no way you haven't noticed Viviane's thousands of argument-baiting posts. S/he has been injecting toxin into this community for quite some time, and it has been building up. I know that you are only one man, but that's where a moderation team is supposed to come in handy. Someone saw fit to ban Viviane once before under his/her previous user name (an erstwhile moderator?), but apparently the same behavior is now tolerated that was once considered unacceptable.
I don't believe EdenOne should quit the forum over this. But I do believe the problem goes beyond Viviane, and extends to anyone who drops into faith-based threads to deposit mocking remarks which are designed to poke at other people. This is a pattern of behavior which has been allowed to proliferate here, and it's 50% of the reason I no longer post here (the other 50% being free time). For anyone to hide behind the idea of "only attacking beliefs, not the person" is to pretend that people do not hold certain beliefs dear, that they do not have sacred cows. Some of the people here once became violently ill when they started to realize that they were not in "the truth"; are you really telling them that beliefs are just a superficial thing like a piece of clothing that one can take off and exchange for another; that attacking their beliefs is a considerate way of speaking to them?
We have had numerous threads on this subject of rude posters, and they have often been started by agnostic/atheist posters who were not personally offended by other posters directly, but took issue with what was happening. I participated enthusiastically in one of these threads, arguing for the kind of moderation that is commonly employed on other forums (i.e., a rule about being civil to each other). Finally you, Simon, made a post where you clearly stated that you were in favor of mocking foolish beliefs, and I realized that I was wasting my breath, and lost a lot of my attachment to this forum. Since the personality of any organization comes from the leadership, there's no way that civility can be enforced when the leader(s) do not will it.
Your personal journey away from religion, which started over a decade ago, has been given precedence over the concept of running a tolerant forum for people who are just now learning the truth about their religion and figuring out how to cope. Any discussions over science and philosophy should naturally take a back seat to the needs of people who are in such a vulnerable place and can use the help of others who have been there. And yet the message this forum sends on a daily basis is that it is inappropriate to even consider passing through "Christianity" or "spirituality" as a phase on one's way out of the cult. That is not a sympathetic way to run a forum.
I know it's not pleasant to have random posters popping up telling you how to do your job. And you only have so much free time to manage disputes between people. And I don't think it's necessary or fruitful to require posters to apologize formally. And I see that you have asked Viviane to be less argumentative in the future. But please don't act blind-sided, as if this all came out of nowhere, when Viviane and other posters have been antagonizing people for years and multiple threads have been started over this issue. The community is trying to tell you something here. Please listen to it.
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slimboyfat
Viviane I don't think I've read anything from you. From what I gather you accused Eden of something that was factually incorrect but won't take it back. What are you about? Your avatar suggests you're a woman but your argumentativeness suggests you're a man. Cofty reckons you're clever but maybe it's because you agree on various materialist assumptions. You remind me a bit of Las Malvinas but Cofty didn't get on with her because of the Falklands and he supports Britain. I think you started posting while I was not visiting here very often. I used to post here more regularly and then I stopped for reasons I explained at the time. It's nice to meet you anyway. Eden is an interesting poster. -
truthseeker100
Just wait for the next cycle of time. -
truthseeker100
Hhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_Hill_(Moncton)
Have you guys ever seen a magnetic hill? If not you should check it out.
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Simon
Please for god's sake don't continue the same god damn argument on this topic !! (posts removed)
Things would not have gotten to this point if you had been enforcing civility on this forum, Simon.
OMG, it's so simple, why don't you tell the internet that the problem has been solved !
If only it were that simple - if I could just say "be civil" and people were ...
You would not believe the abuse I get when I step in to some situations. Seriously, some people carry things on for YEARS just because they have been curtailed from posting some insult to someone else once.
When I do (rarely) delete something then I get the usual chorus of demands to "explain it to me, which rule did I break, why don't you have a specific rule saying I can't say those exact combination of words, you are like a nazi elder ... wah, wah"
Finally you, Simon, made a post where you clearly stated that you were in favor of mocking foolish beliefs
Because saying dumb ideas are dumb is different to mocking a person and insulting them. If you can't separate people and belief then you are the one with the problem.
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Apognophos
Simon, please calm down. I can tell you're worked up from the fact that you clearly didn't read my post carefully. I acknowledged that you cannot personally enforce civility; that's why I mentioned a moderation team. You used to have several helpers. I would never suggest that an administrator should be doing most of the moderation work (in fact I have been on many forums, and have never seen an admin as active as you are in both moderation and discussion over such a long period, and I wouldn't be surprised if it's burning you out).
I explained pretty clearly why people and beliefs are not separate; please read that part of my post again if you are going to reply to it. But just to clarify, I'm not advocating some opposite extreme from how the forum currently works, where nobody is allowed to disagree with faith-based or bad-science posts. It's all a matter of how we correct somebody. The concept of etiquette went out the window a long time ago on this forum and I think it happened gradually so that you haven't fully realized how vicious the tone has become here.
That's why, when people call Viviane names, I see it as an unavoidable consequence of the forum's management style. Without a moderation team requiring people to behave better, the forum is naturally going to degenerate into personal attacks, because people are angry at how they are treated, and they feel like they have no other recourse since no one is putting a stop to it. I'm not saying it's justified -- just describing a natural law of human behavior and how to prevent it.
And Simon, I'm sorry if anyone is being abusive towards you, but you don't need to tolerate that. I'm sure I don't need to tell you how to run a forum, but "warning -> temp ban -> perm ban" is the standard process of escalating a response to a misbehaving poster, whether they're being aggressive with a regular member or with you personally. Why is that process not being used here?
(I won't be able to respond further until much later today, as I have to head out on a day trip for work now.)