On civility

[5DollarShake]

I guess that within this site (and others) there’s a contingent that demands the dominant discourse of the site be contentious, political, and coarse. They browbeat anyone who suggests (and I never saw any “demand”) that anything but a wild west format be implemented. Their opinion is that civility and consideration is a “ultra conservative religious” value.

I might go so far as to guess, and it’s supported by my particular case, that to a person of moderate sensibilities, who isn’t able to spend their entire day checking and posting on this site and who might like to occasionally post and often read about Ute related matters on a message board might feel that this site isn’t what it ideally could be. Engaging in senseless arguments about things that absolutely do not motivate visits by a great majority of the potential visitors of this site has been proven to be an unsustainable format.

I don’t want Utehub to become UF.N 2.0, where vicious partisanship is king and anyone who doesn’t like it gets bullied and leaves. Are a little maturity and understanding, and effective site design, just too much to ask? Mods will be responsible for the unenviable job of “reeling it back” when it does inevitably become a free-for-all because “some (people) just want to watch the world burn.” If anything has become obvious over the last three months, the next four years aren’t going to get any less politically stormy than the last two.

But anyway, it’s an odd site where FFU doesn’t feel comfortable because of people who have allegedly messaged him saying his NSFW posts aren’t welcome, but creating a place within the site that is less prominent where those contributions can exist is deemed too restrictive. To have something “buried” is somehow unreasonable even though Tony stated that only the home page could become sports-only, kind of like how UF.N had a home page with select posts highlighted, but instead of particularly popular posts in that position, it would have encouraged discussions and recent news that might rationally be the point of a sports message board.

Recommendations that people uncheck categories aren’t helpful. Any suggestions made yesterday were partially the result of Tony identifying the issue of unchecking a category being inadequate. BTW, @AZswayze I’ve ignored you, we don’t come to Utehub for the same reasons.  My motivations are entirely rooted in following Utah sports programs, and most of your posts are unrelated to that. Best wishes and good luck with your life.

Tony, I’ve made my opinion known, take it or leave it. I’d of course like you to do things that I think could make this site better, busier, and pleasanter, but that’s very obviously entirely up to you.

Tl;dr:
Civility has little to do with religion or ideology. I think it would make the site better for the home page to show only sports related topics and allow for other discussion to happen one click in to help prevent a UF.N incivility and intolerance situation by reducing the number of eyes that see the hateful garbage people are unfortunately capable of producing.

[SkinyUte]

I’m a little confused on what you’re asking for. It sounds like you want nothing but Utah sports. That’s fine, I suppose, but means that the site would be almost completely dead between March and August (those of us who don’t follow hoops much would even argue December through August). That doesn’t exactly sound like a sustainable model either.

I have never quite understood the aversion to unchecking categories so things that don’t interest or offend you (the general “you”, not you specifically) don’t even show up on the site. Can someone help me understand why that is such a bad solution?

[Utah]

He wants to bitch. Plain and simple. His safe space has been violated and he needs to tell everyone about it. 

Instead of unchecking the politics category, so when he comes here he only sees Utah related sports topics, he feels he needs to brow beat everyone else into acting how he wants people to act.

It’s comical how easy it is for everyone to be happy. 

1- When you log in, click the “remember” button. 

2- Then click the category button. Unclick politics, BYU and anything else. 

3- Then post away. 

OR

set your favorite link to the Utah Sports forum. 

Its really that simple. Yet, we have these posts over and over and over and over…

[Anonymous]

Pot meet Kettle. You are the king of bitching. 

[AZswayze]

It’s not a viable solution. Other sites have tried it and they didn’t exactly flourish. The people that complain about political talk are typically of the same cloth from what I’ve seen, so I think it has to do more with the fact that UFn leaned left than them actually being bothered by political discourse. We should do a simple experiment where we all parrot Rush Limbaugh for a week, and see if people still complain.

[Puget Ute]

UFN was really ‘left’, it just wasn’t über-Right enough for some people.

[Newbomb Turk]

^Nailed it^

[Utahute72]

All perspective is relative, but based on the stances I would say that more of the posters on UFN were left of center.

[Puget Ute]

Of course. This is based on our own perspective. Something that may seem ‘center’ in Alabama (or Tooele – just kidding!) would be super-freaky-right-wing in Utah, just as ‘center’ in California might seem to be left of center to most people in Utah (and would appear to be super-freaky-left-wing to some people).

But the bottom line is civility is very important. There is nothing wrong with expressing an opposing opinion to another person, so long as we don’t resort to name calling. “Uncontrolled rage”, “worst offenders”, “snowflake”, similar name calling, and generally degrading posters directly for sharing opinions rather than countering their argument is uncouth at a minimum.

And besides, the only real moron in the state held a town hall at Brighton High School last night.

[Tacoma Ute]

Absolutely they were. To suggest otherwise is just silly.

[Puget Ute]

There were a relatively small percentage of posters on the left pushing back on ideas. To suggest it was in any way a majority of posters, or that the entire tenor of the board that leaned much to the left is counterfactual.

When the discussion devolves into personal attacks, name calling, strawman arguments, etc, (and people on all sides were guilty of that), THAT is when things get ugly.

[Anonymous]

[Utah]

What we REALLY need is an OC we can all hate. Lol. 

[Anonymous]

Give it like two games. We will all eventually hate Taylor.

[AZswayze]

Rather than respond in the thread I started, you start a whole new thread, then ignore me so you don’t have to see my response? There’s a word for that kind of move, but for the sake of civility I will avoid using it here.

[Stradlater]

Why is unchecking a category inadequate? It seems like it works well.

[Daedalus]

I think Tony did a great job implementing that.  Haters gonna hate, and whiners gonna whine.

[RedRocks]

I think instead of an opt-out methodology for the site (unchecking), we need an opt-in methodology.  I am totally fine with a diverse array of conversations, but I know that, on occassion, some people (who shall not be named) come here for U of U stuff.

 

🙂

[Stradlater]

I think if people have a problem with something they should take it upon themselves to filter it out for themselves.

[Jumpmasterute]

Thanks FiveDollarShake. I was just thinking about this tonight. You put it better than I could have. It did catch some attention because 2 of the 3 worst offenders showed up with their uncontrolled rage to defend themselves.

AZswayse is not one of them and I won’t put him on ignore just cause I don’t agree with a lot of his political views. He can be hot headed at times but I’ve also noticed that when he cools down he is willing to discuss a topic rationally and I chalk that up to him being passionate about his beliefs.

I’ll now return to my lurking ways in hopes to gain info on Utah sports.

[5DollarShake]

Let’s not engage in further finger pointing, it just adds to the frenzy. I said my piece. Fanatics spoiling for a fight just feed on being identified and someone to hate on.

[Jumpmasterute]

I agree. Just hope I can live up to it.

[SkinyUte]

Now I’m really confused. I suppose Utah’s post could maybe be taken as a bit salty (although by the tone, I suspect there is some past history there with 5Dollar), but “uncontrolled rage”? “Spoiling for a fight”? “Hate” in this thread? Um…where?

Heck, my post (that I assumed was entirely civil) got downvoted multiple times, so maybe I just have a huge blind spot I’m not aware of.

[Jumpmasterute]

SkinyUte. Against my better judgement I’m going to reply. You may think that people forget and we do, but not as fast as  you may think. You’re referring to one thread, I’m referring to your posting history that goes back further than UteHub.

 I don’t know you from Adam. But the impression your posts suggest is that you have been indoctrinated into one idea and no others can exist. Have you noticed that all your political posts have tried to stifle or surpress others that don’t agree with you? You are coming from the tolerant party aren’t you?

[SkinyUte]

I find it unfortunate that expression and discussion of differing viewpoints is somehow equal to “hate” and “rage”. Although, I suppose that mindset would explain a lot about the state of our national dialog in general right now.

And I’d disagree that any of the posters here (from either side of the political aisle) is attempting to “stifle” anyone. Quite the opposite…we post in order to have a discussion and dialog about issues. One of the things I have found most beneficial about the conversations here is how I am able to gain an understanding of how others view the world. We will likely disagree (which is fine) and express opinions or data to back up that disagreement, but there is absolutely value in the discussion and no personal ill will. That’s having a conversation…not “hating” or “stifling” anyone.

(I would add that Moose is/was an exception to the above. You’re right, I was entirely intolerant of his racist slurs and misogynistic comments.)

[Tacoma Ute]

I feel bad for Tony. He has to referee this nonsense. Go Utes!

[leftyjace]

Interestingly enough, I feel that the format of this board lends itself to more civil discourse.

With the old digs, most people were limited to a small number of characters to get a point across. Mostly because any post that was quite long people didn’t pay much attention to… the “headline” element of the previous board lent itself to skimming. Subsequently, people tried to get the full gist of their intent in the header of their post. That lent itself to abruptness, zingers, and quite frankly digs and insults.

This board format is pretty neat. You can’t determine someone’s “lean” by simply looking at a headline (except for the OP’s headline). You have to actually dig into the body of what is said to ingest and understand their viewpoint.

Just an observation.

[SkinyUte]

I’d also add that I like the fact that up or down-votes are anonymous here.

I always suspected that being able to see who was stalking every post with blue stars was a good recipe for creating animosity towards specific posters. While none of that ever mattered to me personally, I saw some folks at UFN getting quite wrapped up in that aspect.

[Anonymous]

I agree, and if you blue starred the wrong person then they (with their posse) would blue star every post you write. This is much better.