Now, I think we've probably exhausted our powder on this partners/friends/barbelite business, so I'm going to suggest that anyone who feels strongly should start a new thread about it. Personally, I think I'd find it quite interesting, if only to see who is assumed to live in London/go out drinking together/have sex with each other. Another thread, though.
As an aside (because I don't want to keep dwelling on this), I did a Policy search for threads devoted to the periodic claims of 'Barbelitism', but couldn't find any - which is weird, because I'm sure it's come up again and again. Possibly it's never had its own thread. It's an allegation which bedevils all message boards, I think, and I agree that there might be mileage tackling it in a specific thread - if only because we'd have somewhere to link to when the subject (inevitably) arises in other threads.
Back here, and addressing Our Lady's point - I think that's right. In fact, I think we can decide on a set format for title and abstract here and now, and moderate out any variance, but it would be unwise to demand that somebody act as if impartial when clearly making a partial case. Having said which, we could have a "standard opening", which we could draw from, as a start, id's post here.
That's kind of what I was groping towards too, the idea of having some sort of formal framing device for these threads, so that we could have a standard "all are welcome to post their opinion" spiel before the individual who wants Poster X banned starts to present their case. I think it's still worth trying to be low-snark in these threads, though, if at all possible; I agree that's sometimes very difficult.
I was hoping that this thread would also be able to look at ways we can try to reach people earlier and in a less heated environment. I don't think this would actually have helped with Shadowsax, personally, but there are people with whom it might.
I think we could/should develop the idea of threads in which we try to modify our posting styles in a particular way - for example, the aforementioned low-snark-zones, like Homo 101, where posters can expect to be able to ask 'unexamined' questions and have them answered without the same degree of scorn which might otherwise ensue. More patient threads, maybe, with an emphasis on giving ignorant-sounding or borderline-'ist' questions the benefit of the doubt, at least until they've been answered. Another example would be my original conception of the ShadowSax thread as somewhere as many of us as possible might state their opinions without a huge amount of challenge: more somewhere to register opinions than rub them up against other people's.
I dunno, maybe I'm being a little naive with this, but it seems to me that there might be worth in having some places where we consciously try to siphon off the snark element. |
