The Discordian Norm vs. The PD.COM Norm

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

AND I do think she got some extra leeway out of it early on, which I said outright, but what you are Lo5ing my posts for seems to be a direct accusation that YOU are in her pocket because of her tits, and that is not what I'm saying.

Also, I think that is nothing more than a diversion from the fact that I have perfectly valid reasons for not liking her, and it's not your problem. Ratatosk mentioned honesty, earlier; I have been practicing it in this thread, your accusations to the contrary.

You always have perfectly valid reasons when you get into a pissing match with someone. 

Who pissed in your Wheaties? It seems evident that you are looking for a fight. Sorry; I'm not your man.

[Jasper]

OP:  If you want to talk about the PDCOM norm, it's blowups like this. 

[Golden Applesauce]

This thread is a great argument for a separate 10k+ post only subforum... this shit is embarrassing.  At least in the flamefests between newbs and more established members I can't hear relationships cracking apart.

FFS, people, you are conducting a conversation on the internet.  You are in control of the stressers around you; you can go read a relaxing book, get some exercise, watch a favorite TV show, take a nap, and then if you still think it's important enough, come back to this thread later.

[Faust]

Another thread dissecting the forum instead of just experiencing it?

[NotPublished]

maybe your sig best describes it

and I don't know what it is

[AFK]

Okay.  So let's forget it then.  No problems. 

[Faust]

Okay.  So let's forget it then.  No problems. 

Sorry there was no offence intended, Its just we do seem to spend a good week of every month analysing some component of the forum dynamic.
Its not necessarily a bad thing, I'm just not up for it.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

cross post!

For what it's worth...

Yes there is a "norm" here at pdcom. It's inescapable that any community frequented by the same group of people for a lot of years develops its own culture. Like anywhere else, this community has a set of moral, intellectual, comedic, and other standards. That's not to say that our standards are inherently superior or inferior to any other set of standards, it's just one of the things that distinguish this group from any other group. These standards are what attracts certain people to pdcom, they are what we expect to see when we get here, and they are the reason we keep coming back. To think that just because this is a "Discordian" site, we should be somehow immune to the natural laws of community that have existed ever since the first time two cavemen ganged up on a woolly mammoth is kinda ridiculous, in my opinion.

People here are protective of this community. In the first place, it's rare to find a group of people online or off that is as high-quality, productive, helpful, and insightful as the pdcom membership. Even when it sucks around here, it's still more entertaining and enlightening in my opinion than any other place I've found. Maybe that's just because we have a unique brand of BS that appeals to me, but I don't care. I like it here, and I don't want to see this place devolve into just another interwebs forum. I'd feel an actual loss, not just because I'd have to go look for somewhere else to waste my time, but because the kind of things we produce here are worth wasting time on.

Sometimes the flaming gets a little hot. But there are plenty of people who survive it, and I'd rather have a little potential value scared off than just open the floodgates and have pdcom drown in the inevitable shitstorm of fluff and bullshit that would surely follow. Part of what makes Discordia Discordia is that it expects something of a person. It isn't enough just to spout Dadaist crap all day long and pass yourself off as Outlandish. And I want to keep it that way.

[AFK]

It is what it is.  I guess I'm a proponent of a more "big-tent" community, and perhaps that is what puts me out of this norm.  And I am biased by my work which is all about building community.  I just think we've talked for years about branching out.  The whole point of Intermittens, POEEcasts, the BIP pamphlets, GASMs, etc., was about spreading what we are doing to other Discordians and other individuals ready to think and talk about this stuff.  The implication, of course, is that we are open to these individuals coming here to further discussions and conversations.

So where I am coming from, is that it is hard for this site to have that kind of goal and then engage in extreme combativeness when people do come, when they don't live up to some collective ideal.  So if the above are no longer goals of this community, fine, then case closed.  However, if we do still hold to some of these values, I think we, as a community, should think about how we treat others when they do arrive.  I am not suggesting when someone comes in with questions that are making generalizations that we don't engage them in a debate, and that we do not question their generalizations.  We've done that before (Laz).  But I think it is quite a step beyond when that debate gets driven into an ugliness like we saw in the PED thread where someone is being labled a Nazi and racist.  Speaking as someone who has been a part of the community for 5 years, I don't feel it speaks well for our community and does not promote the openness to our community we have espoused.  But, again, if that is no longer a value of our community, the questions are moot and we can just forget it and move on.  

[tyrannosaurus vex]

On the other hand, I don't think the goal of Intermittens or the BIP or GASMs was to invite people in here so they can be welcome and contribute to whatever conversations we have going on, regardless of how productive they are to those conversations. Sure we want people to check out the community, and they do. And many of them stay. It's really up to them. Even somebody like PED isn't completely written off. Fuck, if AKK showed up again one day and started being constructive in a genuine sense, even he would eventually become accepted.

This is just the same old "elitism" argument that pops up in every Interwebs community. And yeah, there's a fair amount of elitism at pdcom. Some of it is the wrong kind, most of it is the right kind, where a person is valued for what the contribute, not who they are. In PED's case it became clear fairly early on she wasn't going to be very constructive around here so she passed from 'member' to 'toy' and things degenerated from there. People would pop in here, eventually, just to abuse her because she would reply. That's what she made herself. She made that choice.

PDcom is pretty harsh toward new people, but I don't think we cross the line into "unfair" until a person has made it abundantly clear that they're not interested in ever becoming a part of this community in the first place.

[AFK]

Personally, I think the labelling of PED as a Nazi/racist crossed into unfair territory.  Honestly, if that hadn't happened, I probably would not have invested as much time into this as I have.  It's one thing to call someone stupid, idiotic, unintelligible, etc., etc.,  sticks and stones.

But when you get into Nazi/racist territory you are getting into terms that are very loaded.  I mean, look at how defensive (justifiably btw) we got when Lamanite went there all because we used the Latin word for black on our BIP materials. 

[East Coast Hustle]

If calling someone a Nazi on the internet is suddenly a problem, well, I guess the ENTIRE FUCKING INTERNET is pretty well fucked.

[East Coast Hustle]

On a more positive note, I'd like to point out that having people here who take the attitude toward this sort of thing that RWHN takes is a good thing. Even if 99% of us decide that we disagree with what he's saying ITT, it is at least forcing us to think about what we're thinking and saying and evaluate whether or not it's what we REALLY think (in this case, I really do think that PED is a puerile and uninteresting twat who has displayed some behaviors that cause me to think that, whether she's aware of it herself or not, she has some race-based issues) or whether we're just repeating the party line by rote, as it were.

So RWHN, I may totally disagree with you and argue the shit out of the point with you, but I'm glad you're here to make that happen.

As for the whole "norm" thing? I think that's a really relative term, and a loaded one that obviously is going to push buttons. I also think that regardless of where most of us fall in terms of the "norm" here (a term that I am using VERY loosely), we still have way more in common with each other than we do with the people who aren't part of this community, and it behooves us to remember that once in a while. We may be a team full of bickering assholes who will stab someone over the most pedantic point imaginable, but we're still all on the team.

[P3nT4gR4m]

As for the whole "norm" thing? I think that's a really relative term, and a loaded one that obviously is going to push buttons. I also think that regardless of where most of us fall in terms of the "norm" here (a term that I am using VERY loosely), we still have way more in common with each other than we do with the people who aren't part of this community, and it behooves us to remember that once in a while. We may be a team full of bickering assholes who will stab someone over the most pedantic point imaginable, but we're still all on the team.

QFT! It's a tired old cliché but most of you fucking weirdos are "on my wavelength" in a way that only a handful of IRL people are. After years of being an outsider, pissing in the mainstream and bucking the norm to the point where I do it automatically on instinct now, I guess finding this place and the whole "fitting in" thing sets off alarm bells even if it seems to be true.

[LMNO]

I think both ECH and RWHN are saying good things.

It's also good to see that even if there's disagreement, there's some modicum of respect as well.