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Ganesh: Nope - raelianautopsy was somebody else entirely. The Fetch started a bunch of threads in the Temple, and was eventually bounced for anti-Semitism, failure to engage with the Board and generally having a profoundly dubious agenda - in fact, he was partly banned on the strength of anti-Semitic and homophobic posts he made elsewhere on the Internet, which suggested that he was inserting the thin end of a wedge - see here. The subsequent "do the Jews rule the World?" thread was a spin-off, which revealed that some of our more enthusiastic conspiracy theorists were happy to treat the Holocaust as just another conspiracy theory, which Tom felt crossed a line, but a thread-killing line rather than a suit-banning line. I was personally glad that the holocaust deniers were being mocked and challenged, but there certainly were a fair few of them and the thread was certainly pretty tooth-grinding. I don't see a problem with Holocaust denial being something that we simply do not allow on Barbelith, if only because the people who are likely to leave because of such a prohibition are unlikely to be missed. I do see your point, but I do think it is much easier to draw a line - if somebody says "hey, let's discuss whether the Holocaust actually happened", one can simply say "Let's not". A throwaway comment about syphillitic Indians, the xenophobic Japanese or the baby-killing Bengalis of old Whitechapel town in an ongoing thread is a trickier proposition.
Morque: who I feel is a garden-variety idiot and not the raving nazi you paint hir to be.
If you read the thread, you will find this to be a contemptible misrepresentation of my position. Other people's posts don't just help you to contribute meaningfully to the thread - they also contain useful and fascinating information.
I'm a bit concerned about the implication of Fridge's assertion that some posters, particularly newbies, would attempt to defend the indefensible statements in the face of any and all criticism and this is something that should be pandered to, allowing those posters to 'save face', go away and think again.
Honestly, I don't feel that it is any duty of Barbelith's to provide a safe space for prejudice, whether that prejudice is expressed through bad jokes or holocaust denial. However, there is clearly a material difference between the two, and it is useful to have a way of differentiating them. Also, there is no point in simply generating flamewars, which are not only no fun to watch or participate in, but also disruptive to the quality of Barbelith. Hence, among other things, my suggestion that a thread in the Policy would allow people to check whether the gag about stinky gypsies, say, was a one-off or part of a set of behaviours by that suit, just as a standard form of words asking a member to think more carefully about what they have just said and what it has achieved does not seem to me either an unrealistic request or a sure-fire invitation to people to become aggressive: it is providing that easy way out that Tom has mentioned - all you have to do to stop being identified as behaving like a racist is to stop behaving like a racist, in essence, which should actually not be very difficult. The presence of a statement below such a comment making it clear that board policy is not to allow language or statements that perform as acts of harassment to board members go unchallenged helps to avoid the problem both of the perception of tacit approval and the turd-in-the-living-room issue I raised waaaay back in the first post of this thread.
Incidentally, on TV shows:
There's more offensive stuff than that in pretty much any episode of Little Britain! The statement that carnies smell of cabbage is in Austin Powers. The Simpsons has gay and ethnic characters that are stereotyped no less heavily than this.
Well, maybe so. However, Barbelith is not a television programme, and functions differently. Let's say that Little Britain introduces a comic Indian/Gay/Whatever character. Let us say, further, that an Indian/Gay/Whatever viewer, seeing this, decides that, although they enjoy a lot of Little Britain's humour, this particular portrayal is upsetting to them, and they don't feel it is, on balance, enjoyable to watch anymore. So, they stop watching it. That doesn't actually change Little Britain at all - it's a broadcast medium, and if one audience member stops being an audience member it doesn't have any immediate effect on the show, just as turning off a single tap does not have any profound effect on water.
Now, let's look at the case of Barbelith. Let us assume for a moment that, as a result of unchallenged "jokes" - like that banging Indians makes your cock drop off, say, or that Gypsies smell of cabbage - any one of a number of posters who actively and reliably contribute value to Barbelith decide that, although they enjoy a lot of Barbelith, the prevalence of this kind of racially-motivated "humour" is making it something they no longer wish to be involved in - just like our Jewish member with the Fetch and the Holocaust conspiracy theorists. That immediately impacts negatively on the quality of Barbelith, because Barbelith is not a one-way broadcast but the ongoing creation of its members. This strikes me as contrary to the aim of Barbelith given in the wiki as:
to create an online space where the standard of conversation, discussion and debate is higher than anywhere else online
So, I think different considerations apply.
Annnyway - it seems that Tom thinks that tempers are running high. Personally, as I say, apart from a couple of people trolling the thread everyone seems to have gotten on pretty well despite not necessarily agreeing. However, is it worth locking this one and maybe starting new threads to address specific bits of it, like, as I suggested above, a form of words for asking people to consider their statements and funnee comments without inciting confrontation? Or just locking this one and them moving to reopen it in a day or two, as a colling-off period? |
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