Tridimity

Thanks

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The title indirectly references the previous thread, has a distinct smell of resentment about it and, most importantly, says absolutely nothing about the content. You wish to talk about a very delicate topic - think matches near petrol. You need to use all your skills to present and navigate such a discussion in an objective and calm manner.

Obviously but there has been zero opportunity to make those changes - instead any who introduce a controversial topic are silenced outright.

 

 

There are many threads that get closed where he poster is admonished not to re-introduce the subject — usually when the discussion has dragged on and the poster refuses to engage in some critical way such as only repeating previous arguments. I don't recall there being any such restriction put in place with regard to your post. Just a modnote saying it was closed pending staff review. So claiming you've been denied anything is false, or at least premature.

I restarted the topic under the thread title 'Neutral Comment' and that too was locked - with 2 Mod notes for good measure!

Absolutely, I would also add that the way one treats criticism is usually much more telling than the criticism itself.

 

I would have been receptive to criticism if it had been justified but instead it was handed from on high with zero opportunity for discussion. If the Mods had suggested the necessary modifications e.g. change to thread title, more commentary, I would have implemented those changes - that would have been constructive criticism. I haven't seen a single Mod take into consideration any of the reasons as to why I posted in that manner, and frankly I don't look forward to coming here again, and clearly my contributions here will not be missed. Surprising that Despedida

Ophi,

The religious leaders whom you have encountered certainly sound worthy only of admiration. Please could you clarify, what would be the advice of your local minister to a child or young person who is attempting to make some difficult decision in life?

Some people find that it's better to live by oneself than to live with the wrong person; some people would feel lonelier by sharing their life with a partner who does not understand their true nature, than they would by living with their self.

"Flame war" usually connotes something closer to mudslinging, or at the very least, hostile back-and-forth with neither side really considering the other's position. "Soapboxing" refers to a certain level of preachiness that doesn't admit much in the way of debate.

 

"Mudslinging" and "preachiness" - not very helpful in trying to understand the meanings - replacing one verb or noun with a synonym. The Mod actions certainly prevented any 'flame wars' or 'soapboxing' but also prevented any productive discussion of what I think is an important topic. New method for cancer prophylaxis: kill every cell in your body before it has a chance to go awry

Whether your thread constituted the latter or would have led to the former, I don't know. It's the moderators' responsibility to make these decisions, and they do a pretty good job at it. A mod decision (especially one that includes closing a thread entirely) isn't made on a whim, and if you find yourself on the receiving end of a mod note, it's fair to say you made a mistake somewhere. It's not the end of the world, but moderator actions do warrant consideration if you intend to continue posting here.

 

"If you find yourself on the end of a mod note, it's fair to say you made a mistake somewhere." In order for that statement to have any validity, you must have first given some independent thought as to the rationale of Mod actions following members' posts. In order to extrapolate to my particular situation, you would need to extend the same thought processes to this particular case, and make a judgment. You have already said that you "don't know" so the extrapolation is invalid. I think you actually agree with the Mod action but are too politically correct to say so. Say so! I really don't care

The public nature of mod notes serves the apparent purpose of reminding readers and thread participants (not just the targets of the notes) of the rules and providing examples of infractions, which helps to clarify the standards of the forums. Public responses to mod notes, on the other hand, lead either to thread derailment or (in the case of new mod response threads being created) ultimately to superfluous repetition of what the mod notes said in the first place.

 

Mod notes make the poster, who may have contributed a substantial number of quality posts, look like an idiot by immediately cutting them off and censoring their opinions not only on the topic at hand but also on their treatment at the hands of Mods who are, let's face it, probably younger and less qualified who nevertheless feel it is their noble duty to silence anything that might rock the boat. So the poster is disrespected and shamed, the Mod leaves on high horse, and there is no opportunity for the poster to justify their actions.

I think one of the problems, Tridimity - perhaps the problem - is that your thread title was obviously and seriously inflammatory. The problem you highlighted was disturbing and could, potentially, have generated productive discussion. However, your thread title doomed it to become a religion versus atheist discussion, then debate, then argument, then flame war, then closure, possibly accompanied by bans. The mods made an educated guess that was where it was heading and cut it off before things got out of hand.

 

The title was strong - I have already mentioned that the argument against the generalisation of the thread title would have been well received within the thread itself, but alas any communication was prevented before any such discussion could take place. Not all religions recommend physical violence as a means of modifying children's behaviour, but in this particular case the suggestions were inextricably linked to Christianity, and symptomatic of a trend that pervades some religions especially Christianity and Islam - to promote the absolute submission of women and children to authority figures: the family patriarch, religious authorities and God.

Let's be clear, the majority of religious would be as appalled by this story as you were and as I was. What you did was equivalent to me posting information about the Piltdown hoax with the title "Here is why I don't trust Science". And it would have had as much justification.

 

The trend of promoting absolute submission of subjects - especially women and children - to the will of male family members, religious authorities and God stands. This does not occur with all religions (e.g. it does not feature in Buddhism or Humanism, both religions I adore) but does pervade some of the major world religions, especially Christianity and Islam. If you can prove this not to be the case I will be receptive to withdrawing my entire argument.

There are certain interesting linguistic terms here, 'flame wars' is presumably any heated discussion, silly me I thought that was the point of a discussion Forum. Any unwanted emotional response is labelled 'soapboxing'. So what if the children involved in these abuse cases were to come out and emotionally appeal against their abusers, would that also be soapboxing? Perhaps if they set their case in context with a few lines of text it will be worthy of an audience? I appreciate that not all religious people use physical violence as a means of punishing their children, and it would have been quite an effective argument against my thread title, if posed within the thread. However, the source of the advised punishment methods in this particular case was inextricably linked to the religious affiliations of the parents and is, I think, reflected more broadly in the nature of religions which demand that believers become subservient to the will of God and religious authority figures. My hope was that a member would comment further on what I had posted and I would subsequently follow up - I never planned to spawn a 'hit-and-run' thread.

Moderator Note

Tridimity, if you have problems with a moderator decision or you wish to clarify something, there are appropriate channels to make your case. I'm closing this thread pending staff review as well.

 

Anybody know what these 'appropriate' channels are? Why is it okay to publically criticise a member's contribution but not for a member to publically criticise a Mod's contribution? They should either both be public or both be private.

TAR,

While I agree with most of your points above, I would add that, even if every other single human being on the planet with whom one could make a reference to morality, were to deem it morally acceptable to harm oneself or others - this does not mean to say that to do so is justified. The world and its inhabitants may go a long way in shaping our conception of right and wrong, but ultimately as free-thinking individuals we must choose where to draw the line and make our moral distinction from the crowd. This, perhaps, is why I venerate Socrates and his courage in questioning received wisdom.

Tri

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25268343

I found this article interesting and thought that others might. It features religious practices which include physical punishment so as to subjugate children completely to the will of parents. The purpose of the thread is of course for discussion so please comment if you wish to. It may be impossible for members outside the UK to access the website but I have been reliably informed that to include the text is not acceptable - so you will just have to guess what is in the article. Good luck! I have feelings about this, being human, but I will not mention them because to do so would be SOAPBOXING.

A child-raising book that advocates whipping with branches and belts has sold hundreds of thousands of copies to evangelical Christians. But the deaths of three children whose parents appear to have been influenced by the authors' teachings have provoked a growing backlash.

The implements can vary. For a child under one year old, a willowy branch or a 1ft (30cm) ruler is recommended. For older children, a larger branch or a belt.

But the objective of the "spanking" described in Michael and Debi Pearl's To Train Up a Child is the same - making children surrender completely to their parents' will.

"Training is the conditioning of the child's mind before the crisis arises; it is preparation for future, instant, unquestioning obedience," reads a passage from the book's first chapter.

The "training" is meant to start early and pre-empt the need for punishment. But if the child is already rebellious, parents are told to "use whatever force is necessary to bring him to bay".

"If you have to sit on him to spank him then do not hesitate. And hold him there until he is surrendered... Defeat him totally."

Hannah (not her real name) grew up in a community of Independent Fundamental Baptists in north-western Florida. Her parents obtained copies of books by the Pearls when she was about nine and her sister seven.

The spanking began shortly afterwards and continued for at least eight years. In the first five years, it usually happened several times daily.

One day, when she was 14 or 15, her father heard a story about Hannah getting into a fight with a boy at church.

"I'm still not sure honestly what I was being accused of, but my dad just completely flipped out because whatever he heard was just atrocious," she says.

Continue reading the main story “Start Quote

There's no way that a person who reads the book could be led to violence”

Michael Pearl

He used wooden rulers, or yardsticks, to spank her, snapping about five in the course of the beating - her mother kept a dozen in the house because they broke so often.

"When I couldn't sit down a couple of days later he was like: 'Stop being so melodramatic, what's wrong with you?' Then he had mother look and [my coccyx] was incredibly bruised and swollen."

Hannah, now in her mid-20s, says her father was "horrified" and never spanked her again. But her mother continued, using a plastic blind handle that she thought was less likely to leave marks on her children's skin.

Like other people who have witnessed Michael Pearl's advice being put into practice, Hannah says her parents were seduced by the idea of a simple formula that would make their children compliant.

"The problem is that [Pearl] tells you you have to break your children," she says. "And to get there you have to be completely ruthless."

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25268343

TAR,

People are capable of change, so even those who display the negative characteristics aforementioned, may transform into tolerant, considerate, thinking individuals. However, the fact that a person displaying those negative characteristics, deems me to be negative in some way, e.g. if they say 'you're not a nice person', then I'm going to take that with a pinch of salt and interpret it in the context of the source origin (a closed-minded, bigoted, sexist, racist, homophobic, conceited bully). Their comment is then contrary to reason because, if my espoused values are opposite to theirs, I can be assured that I am infact a nice person.

In some cases, I go by the general "feel" I get from the people around me, who bolster or disuade various considerations I might have. And as we as doing on this thread, I think people are influenced by the attitudes of those around. Sometimes this is assisted by laws and rules with punishment and such to influence behavior.

 

This attitude can be dangerous though: if you do not accept that morality consists of not harming others or oneself, then the pack may lead you (well, not you personally, because you are better than all of this) but may lead a person astray to commit atrocities. This is why independent thinking and freedom of conscience is essential. I believe that people are fundamentally good and that it is circumstances that lead them to commit immoral acts - if a person were left on their own, to listen to their inner voice or conscience, without influence from circumstances or events (e.g. poverty and lack of social mobility; withholding of love by parents and others; physical, sexual, emotional or psychological abuse by others) then they would immediately recognise the correctness of harming neither oneself or others.

Tri

Drat. It's an EE network ad that features Kevin Bacon and others doing the conga. You'll just have to take my word for it

But, there is, I think, in everyone's mind, people that are real, and people that are hypothetical.

 

People whose existence is contingent on some other variable?

Such is the problem with "thinking" globally. You do not know near enough people, to make a proper judgement at that level. And "acting" globally is something that very few individuals, but kings and presidents, billionaires, movie stars, famous writers, and leaders in their fields of endeavor in science and industry and the arts, medicine and fashion and such, even have the power to do. Thus the only actual power that most everybody has, is to act locally. If this is done with a certain consideration of global issues, such as the environment, and political and religious and resource realities, then one can think globally and act locally. It seems very unrealistic to me to think locally, as in just considering your own judgement as complete and proper, and then act in a global fashion, as if it is your will that should be done.

 

 

Well, if one is not going to think globally, what is the point in engaging in 21^st century society? It seems like an awful waste to me, to have at one’s disposal the technology and financial and time resources that even greater men and women of previous centuries lacked, and to fail to investigate beyond one’s locality. Taking on an investigation of the whole world’s human populations is an enormous undertaking but vastness is no excuse for ignorance. The study of life itself is a vast undertaking but that does not mean that individual Biologists give up in despair – for one, because they are each contributing and can rely on their mates in a different field to worry about the rest - so too it can be with Anthropology. Even as an individual layman (or laywoman, that sounds wrong, like an instruction, anyhow) there will be benefits to amateur investigation of the nature of the world’s peoples. Some degree of stereotyping, or at least generalisation, will necessarily occur – the same is true with any scientific finding and one expects to meet a statistically small number of anomalies that buck the trend. In fact, I am not sure that locality means very much – currently I am living in certain geographical dimensions, but if I were to travel to different geographical dimensions, then that would become my new locality. My sense of self would be unaltered, except that I would have different experiences. Any action that is performed in locality A or B is going to affect the globe in some way – releasing a greenhouse gas at either locality will impact on the globe. I’m not sure what locality even is – we are citizens of the world, some are unfortunately unable to traverse the globe because of lack of resources, but they are nevertheless citizens of the world.

You have already grouped the world into those that are worthwhile and those who are not worth any consideration. There is a certain problem with this, in that you have no way of identifying, those that belong in the one basket or the other, from a 10,000 ft. in the air, vantage point.

 

 

This decision is made on the basis of case-by-case analysis of individuals: if a person is closed-minded, bigoted, sexist, racist, homophobic, conceited or bullying – then I will not care for their opinion of myself.

This is my favourite advertisement: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALcJXQxdQ48

This is how society should be - everybody involved, everybody moving in the same direction together, everybody connected, everybody happy...

TAR,

I think you overestimate the advantages of face-to-face interaction: people are capable of manipulating their own body language, voice intonation and facial expressions so as to convey to their viewer whatever message they wish to send, which may not be the message that it is in their mind. Close proximity interaction is no guarantee of mutual honesty. Conversely, even if a person uses an avatar and alias on the web, so long as that avatar or alias remains constant, it really does not matter what the label is. I have become accustomed to your alias TAR, which for me represents a sweet yet worldly family man who errs more towards conservatism than I but who is nonetheless friendly and whom I enjoy talking with. Finding out that your real name is Jeff would not change anything. Even if the above identity is not your true identity, at least I know that whomever is communicating under the alias 'TAR' seeks to represent the above identity. And, in fact, this is as close to the truth as we get in any close proximity relationship. You could be married to a person for 40 years and, at the end, the extrapolation that 'my wife has characteristics X, Y, Z' is still only a hypothesis. You are presented with a portrayal of characteristics and will never know 100% if they are bona fide or mere shadows.

As for your global/local thought/action, what of the following:

Think globally, act globally?

Think locally, act locally?

I think it instead true, that ALL humans have human judgement, and are fully capable of judging me, and my behavior, and I therefore am responsible to them, for my behavior, and likewise, they should care about how I feel toward their behavior.

 

It depends what you mean by 'responsible to them for my behaviour.' You have a duty to refrain from harming others but you have no duty to be judged positively by others! (Some people's judgments are not worth caring about and, indeed, endorsement from these people would amount to great insult). As for the last part, this is the most difficult part with regards assertiveness: it is not possible to interact assertively with somebody who does not care about what you think or how you feel.

Tri

"The victims are always the ones who trust"

That's patently not true.

 

Okay, in the majority of cases the victims are the ones who trust the criminal - people who are distrustful of potential criminals will generally be more difficult to exploit precisely because they will be avoiding exploitation.

"Trusting in a criminal isn't going to make him/her more trustworthy"

Why not?

 

Because, for example, if a man has determined to burgle your house having gained your trust and taken a spare key, he is unlikely to back out because you trust in him. His objective was always to steal your belongings and your trust in him is not going to change that.

"So, it is safer not to trust"

It's safer to build a prison and never leave but what sort of life would that be?

Edit/ For prison read fortress.

 

A safe one

"That's BS" is rather strong, considering "If you do not update your personal belief system according to available evidence ( e.g. being cheated on in a relationship; being mugged in the street" is just another way of saying "without external influences, such as a known lie or deceit". Then vector in the abundance of negative sensational news, that merely inspire a sense that the outside world should be feared; when, for instance, were you newsworthy? Everybody I know haven't been, so why shouldn't I trust?

The victims are always the ones who trust

It reminds me of that saying, 'Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean that they're not out to get me'. It's true - the trustworthiness of others is independent of our capacity to trust. Trusting in a criminal isn't going to make him/her more trustworthy and choosing not to trust in a benign person isn't going to make them any less trustworthy. So, it is safer not to trust.

That's BS. If you do not update your personal belief system according to available evidence (e.g. being cheated on in a relationship; being mugged in the street) then you are putting yourself in danger by trusting others - even if you are yourself trustworthy. For the same reason, TAR chooses to lock his front door when he leaves his house - sure, he would not burgle others and so is trustworthy, but that does not mean to say that it would be sensible for him to assume that others think in the same way that he does.

You seem to be arguing in favor of contributing to the welfare system, as if I am against contributing to the welfare system... It is the forced altruism that is counter my sense of fairness and personal integrity and self worth, and the intrinsic value of compassion and sharing.

 

But the welfare system is forced altruism, so aren't you really arguing against the welfare system?

It is the impersonal nature of the "system" that creates rules to which no one is accountable.

 

The populace is collectively responsible for the rules of the welfare system, and their will is (more or less) represented by elected representatives. I would agree that their is a need to more directly gauge consent from individuals before forcing them to contribute to the welfare system, but then such a design would need to ensure that the private individuals, as it were, were unable to benefit from the system to which they have contributed nothing. In principle I think that this would be a great liberal idea but in practice it would be messy and may have unforeseen consequences.

We had a discussion about locking doors, and trust last night at the event of my 60th birthday dinner, hosted by my wife, and attended by my eldest daughter, who lives at home, my father, my stepmom, my wife's cousin, and her husband. All in attendance would have no reason to lock anything up to protect it from being taken or abused by anybody else in attendance.

 

All in attendance believe they have no reason to lock anything up to protect it from being taken or abused by anybody else in attendance. An important distinction, but one coming from a mind turning more and more like that of Godel who, out of paranoia at being poisoned, trusted nobody but his wife to prepare his meals, and subsequently died of starvation when his wife was hospitalised for 6 months and therefore unable to prepare his meals. So, you know, pinches of salt.

It does depend on how you define happiness, as iNow has highlighted. I imagine that happiness can buy minimisation of suffering but that, at some point, the overall benefit to the happiness/unhappiness scale plateaus since it is impossible to buy self-esteem or the love of a good person.

I was watching this TED talk earlier tonight http://www.ted.com/talks/enrique_penalosa_why_buses_represent_democracy_in_action.html on the importance of prioritising sustainable, safe and spacious transport infrastructure for the financially underpriveleged (i.e. those whom rely on public transport), although the speaker, Enrique Penalosa, also suggests that:

An advanced city is not one where even the poor use cars, but rather one where even the rich use public transport

 

His overall message and his propositions are admirable imo e.g. designs for new cities in developing countries that involve equal road space granted per person rather than per vehicle so democratising resource allocation and granting individuals equal respect and importance, regardless of financial status.

It comes back to prioritising social wellbeing over wealth accumulation and finding ways to make the markets work in the interest of social outputs not just profit creation.

Henry James The Birthplace and Stephen Law Philosophy