The Yell Softer Thesis

(10 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Karmafish at MLW says in the Question of the Day: “Yell Louder!”

Well, no, its not a question.

There are certain people who seem to think that we need to yell louder.  It’s as if they believe that if we wish to bring about positive fundamental change to the American system of governance than what is needed is… well… more yelling.   We need to yell and scream and rant and rage.  We need to jump up and down and shake our fists and howl at the mooon.

But, ya know what?  I’m tired of yelling.  I’m tired of listening to people yelling.  I’m tired of pretending that yelling somehow gets us anywhere.  I’m tired of self-righteous assholes, who barely know what the hell that they’re yammering about, insisting to the rest of us that their every syllable is right and true and good… while any who may oppose them, or merely even question them, are wrong and false and bad.

This is one reading of the “Yell Louder” text. I had a different one.

I agree. Suffering in silence is far superior to …

… screaming in agony.

Well, actually I completely disagree at the equation of “yell louder” and “be more strident”.

When you reach the limit of volume that one voice can reach, the only way to yell louder at that point is to engage in effective organization to get more voices yelling together.

And when a small group united around a single cause reaches the limit of volume that one small group can reach, the way to yell louder at that point is to help other groups to organize and then join together the voices of multiple groups yelling together.

Recursively organizing and yelling in unison all the way up.

As far as:

I’m tired of self-righteous assholes, who barely know what the hell that they’re yammering about, insisting to the rest of us that their every syllable is right and true and good… while any who may oppose them, or merely even question them, are wrong and false and bad.

… there are those to whom the description is fairly applied, yet the dictum to yell louder in the face of oppression is evidently not directed at them, since they are always and all the time yelling at the top of their voice. …

… and there are those to whom the description is just a way of saying that you do not agree with them …

… and the description itself offers no hint whether its directed to the first or the second or to both indiscriminately.

But the question is, how can the second reading of “Yell Louder” be put into effect.

I’ve made this suggestion before, so I’ll repeat myself.

A group of community blogs could form an alliance. Five to seven of different forms would each have a common tab bar at the top to jump to the front pages of each blog. The main upgrade required of each would be the ability to act as identity server so that any member of any of the blogs could sign in once and then post comments in each of the blogs. So, for instance, if I am signed into Docudharma, and I am commenting at one of the other blogs, I can comment there and will show up as eg, “DD:BruceMcF”.

Each blog would retain its own governance on ban-able offences, etc. – when the identify “DD:BruceMcF” becomes persona non grata at the Automobiles, Road Building and Progressive Politics blog, that would not change BruceMcF signing in at Docudharma.

This could be extended further to open up to the new media, such as allowing FaceBook:name and Twitter:name guest sign-ins.

What would be the point?

The point of this – and why I added the last – is the recursive relationship behind power law distributions.

Programmers write for Windows 3.1 because more people own computers running Windows 3.1, so more programs are available for Windows 3.1, so more people want to buy computers running Windows 3.1, so more programmers write for Windows 3.1 … which was preceded by MS-DOS and followed by Windows 95 and Windows NT and ME and XP and Vista and now Windows 7.

People post at the Great Orange Stain because more people look at it so posting there attracts more comments, and because more people post there more people look at it and comment, and therefore more people post there.

Increasing the Commentariat will draw more posts to the collective, which will draw more traffic, which will draw more commentary, which will draw more posts.

The point is to climb some notches higher in profile, while attempting not to lose ourselves in the process.

And the second half of that is why its proposed as a coalition rather than as Yet Another Plot to Become The Next Great Orange Stain.

Doing it as a coalition means that each member of the cooperative retains its identity. If there are three or four Soapblox style community blogs in the cooperative, there are three or four independent reclists. Any guest can chat, but each blog can have its own system regarding what history on the blog is required to be allowed to rate, or recommend, and so the reclists represent the diverse make-up of the coalition.

And being open to the new social networking media is important if the vision of the cooperative is not just to act as a mindless ATM for the candidates of one or more factions of one political party, but rather to act as a community of discourse in support of those fighting to achieve an ecologically sustainable and just society.

So that existing idea was probably lurking in my head as I re-imagined the text “Yell Louder” to mean something different than “Scream At the Top of Your Lungs”.