It helps to view it all as a satirical performance piece.

I think it's a bit ironic that you complain about the tone of the argument while saying that everyone here (other than &quot Will Pitt) ... and a select few others" essentially contribute nothing but "useless trash," but oh well. I also think it's significant that you mention bearingbearing the brunt of so much anger/hatred yesterday with no mention of your role in dishing it out. But that's not really uncommon, either.

I don't doubt that you're a nice and generous person IRL, Chisolm TrailDem, or even that you usually are in virtual life. Maybe yesterday wasn't your finest moment, I don't know. But I'm happy for you that you feel you have made some sort of point.

And I agree that it would be nice to talk about important stuff, though I don't think responding to concerns about bigoted language (even when we disagree with the analysis that finds a certain phrase problematic) the way we saw in the last few days is the best way to go about it.

And with that I say: Happy Solstice to you as well, fellow DU'er!

getting caught up in and my role in it. I did it last week and this week just to see what would happen and, frankly, it was way worse than I thought both times.

Have a great summer, fishwax. I'll see you around the board, hopefully discussing something important.

Bigotry, language, free expression, maintaining strong progressive alliances ... These things are important. I think this, for example, is important:

about the Rude Pundit hide.

Yep, here it is. http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=5126363

my other concurrent post located here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025131383

Sooooo.... duh?

No, I don't feel compelled to read the entirely of every Meta OP you make. I didn't realize entering a thread came with prerequisites. Though your point is clear enough. Your Meta threads were good, you were persecuted, and now it's time for everyone else to change subjects on command. The fact you couldn't bother to read any of the other ten threads already going before you posted yours is of course irrelevant. Then you post two more Meta threads, one declaring what is useful and what isn't, and yet another Meta thread telling people not to post more Meta threads. ( I should say I did not read your thread about the Rude Pundit at all, I don't think anyway. There are so many it's hard to keep track, and you've now deleted the OP so I can't say for sure. )


That really is the overriding theme of DU: the I is always just; the you or they isn't. That applies to meta threads, alerts, slurs, hides, subject matter, and everything else. Censorship is wrong and people who disagree with them need to keep their mouths shut. That people are able to go on endlessly with no awareness that they hold themselves to an entirely different standard from others truly is remarkable.

As for any sudden turns, I have noticed people to be exactly who they are. The people who have always resented women, and feminists in particular (defined in this case as having the audacity to disagree with a man) have enjoyed using every vulgar term they can think of to insult women on this site. They feel empowered to do so because juries have decided that women really must be c...ts and bi...s, or ugly old hags if they object to being called a c...t (because apparently only ugly old women don't love being demeaned for the pleasure of some loser online) and the various other insults that are now going unhidden.

Of course, I knew what these people were already. They have just been freed to show more of their true selves. They've been going full tilt on Discussionist, and they've taken it up here, though there they still have to remain civil. That has now gone out the door on DU. The fact that over 120 people recommend a thread that has turned into an all out hate fest against women says a lot. Naturally anyone who thinks one should respect all people regardless of race, gender, or sexual orientation is a RW authoritarian out to censor free speech. We all know how much respect RWers have for the
subaltern. The whole thing makes me ill.

Whatever subject people go on to next, they remain who they are. They will continue to insult those they see as inferior as long as juries and the administrators let them get away with it. Whereas it was once a tombstonable offense to call a woman a "c...t," it is now seen as a badge of liberalism and freedom. They have redefined liberalism as the unfettered rights of white men to insult anyone they choose without reproach. That is who they have always been. and it is who they will continue to be, regardless of the subject under discussion.

It gets so old. And this particular strain in which so many Straight Folks wanted to Straightsplain to LGBT people what we should be offended by. You know what offends me? Staightsplaining.

As a woman I'm entirely non-plussed by female slang. But there were certainly a boatload of people who were railing about it on my behalf.

I think that's what irked me about the RP's column being hidden. I hate the nannies deciding to be outraged for me. I reserve that privilege for myself thankyouverymuch.

If I don't like it, I'll either trash the thread or ignore it, like most adults.

expressed a preference not to see certain words here. (And by the way, from all accounts it seems like those people were NOT the ones who were blamed for it.)

It wasn't for you. They weren't being nannies. They were simply people who have a different opinion from yours.

and the d**k sucking- that is a denigration of everyone who ain't a straight guy, including women. Many missed that point.
I think every one should feel free to "take back' the words in RL and live with the consequences, but I really do not want to her complaints about the good old dys when n****r and c***t were okay in common usage. Not all slurs are okay here, and I am fine with it. It is what we signed up for.

"embarrassed or ashamed", sorry. I always reject the idea of "collective guilt", it's just a pet peeve of mine, as I'm an individualist.

Hope you have a wonderful summer.

The vitriol about this has exposed the strain of deep hatred here. Its pretty ugly.

In fairness to ucrdem, one of the hosts who asked me to self-delete my post, he was correct. I should have.

I too value the contributions of solid analysis, interesting news for Dems etc and feel bad seeing great posts get overtaken by the nannies trying to work out exactly what we can say or what we must be offended about.

It is so easy to use people's ethics and deeply-held beliefs against them.

Your morals = my advantage over you.

But I don't expect it to get better before November...the goal for some seems to be to piss off as many people as possible between now and then...and make true what the right wing accuses us of...intolerance and censorship, and nanny ism.

So *we* should NOT "all be embarrassed and ashamed."

I can see why many here would be though.

and this goes back to the meta days, and beyond... the "problems" will never be "solved" because they are the whole point of being here, for some folks. Showing up to DU to complain about DU and DU members to DU, then expressing indignation over the reactions to those complaints, inferring the implications of those reactions to further formulate "criticisms" of the "problems" with DU and DU members that the reactions represent, and so on, iterating out to infinity.... in case you haven't noticed, that's pretty much the main activity some folks here engage in.

It's not a question of the train somehow avoiding a wreck. The train isn't supposed to avoid the wreck.

The train IS the wreck.




And yes, this post is meta, too- as is any observation of the phenomenon. ...normally these days I wouldn't even bother.

And in its pithy elegance.

Some of us get it.

Maybe this is what we should really be upset about.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2150281/REVEALED-Hundreds-words-avoid-using-online-dont-want-government-spying-you.html

mexico, semtex, echelon... and fuck hoover for good measure.

Throwing caution to the wind!

Exhibit "A"

quite a bit, indeeeeeeed.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/discoblog/2010/04/09/ncbi-rofl-vacuum-cleaner-injury-to-penis-a-common-urologic-problem/#.U6a2C7GootU

And I will continue to use that joke until it no longer amuses me.

He's apparently a bit more fond of his.

I wonder why there is so much hate being thrown at you?

I think you and I have spoken about this via PM.

Really. Even though a long time Duer, I have no idea what that word means.

That's the best way I figure to define it as it applies to DU.

Yes, "WE"! I'm not in this by myself - not by a long shot!

My post isn't about meta, it's about how easy it is to push GD off the track with bickering about words and it was about how much we hate each other.

C'mon, don't disappoint me by turning on me, I enjoy your contribution too much to feel animosity when I see your name.

When I post anything other than meta threads, my contribution dies a lonely death. My whole point in all of this was to say that we have bigger fish to fry than to be doing this to each other.

And, by the way, you bumped my OP to say what you said not because it is useful, but because it keeps the drama going. You're not completely innocent in this whole paradigm that has overtaken GD.

I've admitted my part in it and I apologize. Now, how about let's try to discuss real issues and not bicker and hate on each other?

Now, please, go ahead and post some innocuous pic or vid of a red panda with a sausage patty on it's head, like you usually do. I LOVE those posts!

How about----

And no, it is not quite meta. The splinters and breaks and tensions are now open gaping wounds. It is really a deep division that parallels what is going on nationally. I do not think any of us expected this to remain forever united. 2016 is gonna be nasty, and yes, we can forget about 2014