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I think what Flux might have been trying to say was something about how on ILM you can call some a 'fat bitch', and nobody will pull you up on it.
I think it's more the idea that someone may pull you up on it, but they will have little if any recorse to appeal to moderators or even a broadly agreed aspiration for the forum as a safe space or a progressive one. Not that there isn't any moderation done on the basis of offensive content on ILM, but you have to go pretty far to get a thread locked (for example, starting a thread purely to insult a long-standing member of the board, with their name and an insult in the title, will do it).
More generally, as I understand it, the argument in favour of a "socially Darwinist" approach to an online forum goes something like: all points made or positions taken can then stand or fall on their own merits. Abusive remarks, bigotry etc, will be ignored because if/because they are self-evidently stupid. Intelligent people will ignore or dismiss and generally rise above such remarks. Nobody will worry about treading on eggshells yada yada yada.
Problems with this approach:
1) It tends to ignore existing power relations outside of but thus also always the context of interactions on the board. In other words, it creates the illusion of a level playing field, when in fact said field is already siuated on, for want of a better term, a great big fucking slope.
2) It puts the onus on the person being called (to stick with our example) a 'fat bitch', or anyone who wants to take issue with that on their behalf, to respond, and take their chances in the arena without any back-up.
3) It valorises being 'thick-skinned' - which is arguably dubious in any context, but is especially problematic here given 1) - there may be any number of good reasons why someone who is being called a 'fat bitch' may not be able to shrug it off, move on, and draft a response.
4) Probably as a result of 1-3, it doesn't acknowledge that creating an online space which is 'safe' from certain kinds of politicised abuse is a valid endeavour.
5) Finally, there's the fact that it validates various forms of abuse as viable forms of interaction. Okay, so maybe the 'best' people won't respect you, but you're bound to find some people who snicker at your jokes about 'fat bitches'. And if there's nobody to stop you from making them, you and your new asshole buddies can form a little cockroach gang.
Those are, I think, the pros and cons for the principle of a social Darwinist online forum - whether any given forum fits that description is something which people will have to decide for themselves.
As I said in the Policy, there are those who take the position that the rough and tumble of a socially Darwinistic forum lends itself to a higher turnover of discussion, and more 'freedom' of discussion. I'm not convinced by that though. Since all the best music writers I know of tend to be feminists or stinkin' lefties anyway, I'm not sure I'll ever be convinced of that. |
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