Making it Better: The future of WP

Post Reply New Topic

It's funny how fragile human egos are (mine included).

Well, when the site owner makes statements such as:

Source: https://wrongplanet.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=389127&p=8589208#p8589208

It certainly sets the standard for what sort of moderation to expect, and how "welcoming" the site is designed to be for those with differing political views...

Disappointing, really.

Roughly half of American voters support Trump. I wonder how many moderators on WP do? That alone could explain the often ludicrous state of the boards. I prefer to talk about other subjects and to make friends, but the health of the political discourse is awful. Slandering, vilifying and insulting Trump voters is actually encouraged practically, no matter what people claim elsewhere. Are we being prepared for a one party system?

To my mind American politics is representative of a small segment of members on this site.
The rest of us are here, generally, for Autistic reasons.

What's disappointing, that the site won't ignore reality?

Besides, US politics is a common aspie special interest for those aspies who would like to enjoy pro wrestling but also need to pretend to be more intellectual than pro wrestling fans (yes, I mean us, unless you'd rather just put on a speedo and throwdown in the ring, cuz I'd be down for that as well).

The sad part is, by being unwilling to have a civil discussion with those who hold differing views, you end up with the sort of shock that the Democrats and their supporters suffered in 2016: If you only talk to those on "your side", you lose touch with what the "other side" think\want\believe, and this impacts on how they will view you, and how much they are willing to support you.

Breaking down support to "If you support XYZ, then you endorse ABC happening" also helps alienate people: Each party will have many policies\things they push for. If party 1 will take care of 40% of the things you want, party 2 will do 60% (assuming no cross-over), then maybe people would be willing to overlook some things on party 2's side, as the positive things they are looking for may outweigh the negative things. Similarly, some of the "negative things" may in fact not be the same as they are portrayed in the media, as different news (opinion?) sources will adjust the items being presented to suit their audience rather than just providing unedited details to allow the viewer to make their own minds up.

A lot of conflict here and IRL seems to be weaved around what you just stated, from all the sides possible.

Everywhere else too.

Also, I'm proud of our literal metaphorical baby. I believe your contributions are what made it so lovely.

The answer is simple and obvious as when this thread started back when my great grandfather owned the Inn in Belchertown.

"Do onto others"
Treat WP members how you want to be treated.
Not complicated at all

It's simple but it ain't easy it seems

And who will account for all the masochists here?

Your sig doesn't make sense because you said in another thread that you planned on voting for a third party.

I think it's a great pity that toxic American Politics is causing the ambience here to go belly up.

Some of us just want our popcorn and only say something when necessary.

Yeah, like I just spent hours catching up here when I could have been watching new episodes of Lucifer.

Hours of my life taken away, lost forever.

It took me a little over an hour to catch up. IMHO, I see change and improvement in the tone of the discourse here. I see more people coming to the conversation and there seems to be more listening going on and at least some are entertaining the idea of community, mutual care and support.

There are still positions of conflict, but IMHO, conflict is a constant. Humans are too different from one another to agree on everything. It would also be a pretty boring world.

The question is, can we live with the conflict and still support each other as fellow autists?

That does seem to be the root of the problem, the question is should WP be an American political platform? There are so many platforms specifically for this, or is its purpose to unite autistics from around the globe under one protected umbrella and focus on mutual assistance, combating isolation, healing and strengthening the sense of well- being.
Political combat does none of these.
Non-Americans will leave otherwise, and also those on the bad end of the most popular political trend. It would be a tragedy for WP to go belly-up just because people can't live with each others' diversity of thought. That doesn't bode well for America or the rest of the world either.

It sounds to me like this:
" I am going to kill you, I hate you because you don't like pretzels and don't agree with me that pretzels are better than Pringles, you are bigoted because you don't agree with me and I will shame you because I can't tolerate anyone who prefers Pringles when I know pretzels will be better for you and the whole world. I will control how you think according to my values and life experience, what do you know about snacks? and I don't care if you have Celiac's disease I know what you should prefer and I will dictate to you what you should think."

I hate politics, they divide and destroy. All we need is mutual respect.

Last edited by Teach51 on 22 Aug 2020, 11:17 am, edited 1 time in total.