I tend not to write meta, but I recently felt frustrated to be part of the Docudharma community and wanted to share why. I’ve debated against sharing my opinions, but I decided against self-censorship in this situation.
So the following essay is my opinion only and does not represent the Docudharma admins of which I am not a part.
From a WTC essay, I learned of the talking point many of in our community apparently share. The view seems to be that there was a non-al-Qaeda-led conspiracy that contributed to the WTC towers collapse and anyone who disagrees with that assessment has their eyes closed or has been brainwashed or something. I feel such ‘group think’ discourages a reasoned, thoughtful, perhaps even skeptical discourse.
The essay was cross-posted to Daily Kos in, what I feel was, a childish mocking of their site’s guidelines. I feel it was as if the writer was deliberately trying to annoy that community and the comments in the essay seem more to be about the Daily Kos connection than about the validity of the subject matter of the essay.
Another essay lambasted what the Daily Kos community failed to cover. While it is mildly interesting that, for the most part, that blog’s community had largely turned a blind eye to Larry Summers part-time Wall Street gig that landed him $5.2 million, I think it misses the mark. Instead of focusing on some other blog’s omission, why not write essays damning the corrupt Larry Summers? The void creates an essaying opportunity on an important topic for the Docudharma community.
I’m disappointed that the Docudharma community seems more upset about the lack of coverage on another blog than the actual subject itself. Why should someone else cover it when we here at Docudharma only seem to care about the lack of the Larry Summers coverage on another blog?
I’m confident there is a wealth of opinions about Daily Kos, but I feel wallowing in them here is counterproductive to Docudharma’s own identity and energy.
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or not that’s what I feel.
Larry Summers got a vote of no confidence from the professors…and he gets a vote of no confidence from me, as well. He is a shill for Big Money, and I can only wish Obama would fire him & replace him with a contrarian.
But I lived in NYC when the towers fell, and through the aftermath. Indeed, it was a pleasure when we were finally able to return to lower Manhattan. The conspiracy theorists fail to convince…they are drinking the same Kool-Aid as Glenn Beck, imho.
Did the GOP use the attacks to further their own ends? Of course they did…Cheney in particular remains a criminal who will probably never be prosecuted.
But as horrible as Cheney is (and he is indeed a horrible excuse for a human being, who never should have been allowed near power: think Nero with no musical talent) — even he, in his greatest fantasies, I think, would not have ordered the devastation of lower Manhattan, not even to further his own ambition of national domination.
There are easier ways to take over. We’ve seen them in the past 8 years: get your trained lawyers to rewrite the laws to suit your ambitions. No bombs & no rocket science required.
If y’know what I mean.
are ok to publish here.
Whether or not they meet dK standards is not something we can or wish to enforce. That would be up to dK Admins.
While we have a strict no kos bashing policy, complaining about lack of coverage of this or that issue happens all the time on dK itself.
You’ll note that neither one of them were promoted. In my case that is because I didn’t think they were reflective of the image of the site.
Our policies are designed to give our members maximum freedom of expression while at the same time not reinforcing disruptive behavior.
If you disagree with an author you are free to do so in the strongest terms, but in fact the most potent disciplinary action of this community is shunning. Most disruptive authors have left simply because their work didn’t attract any interest at all.
that in my personal opinion the Thermite story is beyond ridiculous.
It would be odd indeed not to find a mixture of powdered aluminium and iron in the ruins of the Trade Center, and that’s all that Thermite is.
Well. I have been here just over a month now, and I will mention also that I’ve only been at dKos since about Sept 2008 (about 6 months?) so…
Since Im one of the “guilty” parties who nearly hijacked the WTC Essay in question, I will say that …well… I do have a few ideas as to why, but I was kind of surprised at myself at how hysterically funny I found that Essay Session to be. I felt a little guilty too, I admit, (for mocking The Other Place) but I think it has a lot to do with the fact that I myself am in sort of a transition… hard to “explain” why something strikes your funny bone.
So, I offer my apologies to not only the community here, but also to the writer, if I was out of line. I barely commented on the stated “Topic” of the essay at all really. However, I did thank edger (the writer) for the most welcome comic relief, something I was needing, more than I realized. Not that that was his intention with the essay of course.
Speaking of policies here… I have reviewed the DharmaDocs, the Mission and the FAQ’s… I am still learning How To’s, tech-wise, in addition to general blog-netiquette. Ive’ been playing on the intertoobs since 1996 but oddly, am still new-ish to blogs. So Im still learning. Always learning. I appreciate that you’all have been so patient with my ineptitudes thus far. 🙂
I’ll quote The Man Himself, FAQ’s:
P.S. who the fuck is Armando?
My kos-bashing radar went off, but I didn’t feel it rose to the level of actual bashing.
As for the thermite story, all Edge did was post an article from Raw Story, lol. The reaction, on both sites, was more telling than the story!
And as ek points out, neither was promoted….by the independent judgment of everyone here with the power to do so.
I like the way you approached this!
that dkos proclaims itself the internet “voice” of the democratic party. For that to be the case, it should be held accountable.
If I wanted to be told what to think by the lamestream what to think network there are mind numbingly numerous avenues to get varied biased, filtered,censored, obfuscated, neuro-linguistically programmed and intentionally dumbed down politically correct talking head TeeVee garbage that the internet is increasingly mimicing.
Blogs are just a mirror of this. Little more than mutual back patting societies centered around the particular board’s orientation. I have been banned from both sides but prefer the “left” oriented places based mostly upon the “higher” levels of discussion.
Common to all though is this increasing trend of unmitigated intolerance. Hmm…difficult is this for me to even put into words describing what I really mean. I had an expat experience. I was removed from “my” culture, shown another one, and then upon returning rejected most of “my” culture. Since then the trip down the rabbit hole has never ended.
My 2 cents?
YOU, ALL of you, as much as you might profess to being open, free, plugged into “reality” and solid members of an egalitarian community, all of you wear a brownshirt to some extend without even knowing it. Society forces it upon you gradually, progressively and save for the removal from it you would never even know it. Even me too.
“They” don’t have to censor the internet. We do it for “them” by burying ideas, people and concepts in confined little database boxes of blogs well beneath the daily useless din of commercial one-way “news”.
Really you didn’t think “they” would give you a world wide soapbox to present your particular take on life did you?
Even if you were to tell the truth.
If a tree falls in the forest does anybody hear.
Vicious, destructive, lethal bashing of the Constitution, the rule of law, and the Geneva Conventions, not to mention our economy.
Considering that, I think it’s ridiculous for anyone here to be concerned about criticism of Daily Kos. When it happens, it’s not gratuitous, there are reasons for it.
Valid reasons.
I’ve bashed Daily Kos here now and then. I’m going to bash them again.
Daily Kos, you are hereby bashed.
Please resume your useful discussion of this vital issue.
I’m an occasional Dkos basher, and I approved this message.
Have missed you!
I just attempted to post a rather long post to you, but lost it! Makes me so sick — I really, really, need to discipline myself to do everything first in MS Word, before even attempting to post.
In the meantime, I want you to know that you and another “comradre” are missed by me!
Anyway, please know that my thoughts (and I know, my friend, Alma, are with you guys!). 🙂
But it sure is comfy when I get bored of all them know-it-alls!
I was feeling the same way but thought it was just me.
Be trusting of your government and media.
Ignore those voices who scream softly a different story.
You must really like the Wsrren Report.
And sleep well at night knowing your government protects you.