Posted by MisterB on July 9, 2000, at 20:04:52
In reply to Re: possible 2nd board and links experiment, posted by Dr. Bob on July 9, 2000, at 14:10:26
It's Dr. Bob's time to do with as he chooses, but I would think it better spent clearly defining rules for participation on this board than spent creating more exclusive boards.
In the other hand, the internet first was created primarily as a research tool to facilite interaction among scientists. In the evolving environment of personal use, it seems totally appropriate that anyone can develop their own mailing list and conduct an ongoing exclusive dialogue. From my perspective, problems would develop when this private converstation is published for public consumption. As a reporter and journalist, my effort has been to insure that the breadth and depth of perspectives in the community are fairly represented in public forums. An exclusive second board would not be unlike the many round-table conversations available on cable TV, but those conversations benefit from a production staff that is concerned with the fairness of the content.
My concerns about an elite, exclusive, second tier are not that such a tier is per se unfair, but that it might be used unfairly, as a badge of prestige, to exclude unpopular perspectives and to publically criticize participants on a lower tier. If those were to be the functions, I would suggest members of an exclusive dialogue keep their conversation private. If the only measure for participation was that old-timers on this board can participate in a new board, I would rather it also only be read by old-time members of this board. Otherwise, anyone wanting to respond might feel obliged to post responses to the exclusive board on the main board, or to create some alternate board, and invite an open-season of un-regulated criticism. My point is that excluding segments of the public from public discourse can promote extreme reactions.
The e-groups site idea is interesting, but my experience with e-groups is that their registration processes are a bit cumbersome. It took me several tries to get a handle registered to allow me to continue posting here - I don't know if my earlier handle was blocked, my ISP was blocked, my e-mail address was blocked, if there was just a glitch in the software, or if I was persistenly making typographical errors. With e-groups, a user has to navigate several pages to log on to the site - as I recall, one can't simply direct their browser to a URL to read the contents of a discussion.
The requirement that users have a credit card is particularly offensive to me. Many, especially those in lower income groups, cannot obtain credit cards. I refuse to hold credit cards for several reasons. A general argument against numeric identifiers is that they further erode our biological identity. Anonymous participation in electronic forums seems more natural to me ... as in nature, what you see is what you get.
The idea of grad students participating as moderators here seems like a good idea, though the countersuggestion that psychobabblers perform that function is also a credible idea. Telephone crisis lines are seldom any better than the training offered to the volunteer staff, whose skills are usually limited to empathetic listening and to directing callers to other resources. Volunteers on this site would presumably serve as moderators. To go further, and offer live assistance in directing users to other resources might be very helpful in some cases, but it might also encourage dependancy at a site that otherwise helps develop initiative.
Another problem is to determine what guidelines moderators would follow. Many users of this site might agree on a common definition of the term "civil" but participation in this board so far might be self selective in favor of people who can afford psychiatric care, who have sufficient educational development to participate in their own care and who have internet access. As participation in the site grows, even if we presume that the accepted idea of civility here is to be imposed on new participants, those who do not share the predominant background might need some clues as to the definition of civility used here.
I don't mean to suggest that a moderator would limit content. My suggestion for moderators would be that they respond to the way information was conveyed rather than to the information itself. I am thinking a moderator could be like an editor.
The post about humorous verbal terrorism contains a valuable inventory of rhetorical devices used to misdirect conversation. In a discussion such as this, identification of rhetorical devices can serve to preempt escalation of interpersonal conflict. A simple, timely identification of a rhetorical device, with perhaps a brief explanation of the hazards associated with that device, might help get a discussion back on track. For a person who suspects, as I do, that many biologically identifiable mental disorders are caused by social stresses and that those social stresses are often a result of deficits in interpersonal communication skills, an informed moderator can serve not only to help keep the board on track but also to provide therapuetic education for participants.
poster:MisterB
thread:39451
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20000708/msgs/39919.html