Revised Group Guidelines

[Brian Howell]

I've revised the group’s welcome message. The particulars are...

Please refrain from ad hominem attacks and avoid stereotyping.

Claims made should be evidence-based and include supporting references.

[Brian Howell]

Jack wrote me earlier:

[N]o ad hominems toward ANYBODY?  Or do we just spare group members?  

How are we to discuss Kardashian news without a flag being thrown? 

My major concern is that I want to keep discourse civil, and everybody's got their hot buttons. Then again, if one's hot button is the Kardashians, or someone of similar ilk, then he or she deserves whatever comes.

Open season on the Kardashians. 

[Craig Good]

I often use hyperbole as a humor device. That probably gets me in trouble a lot, and I can tone it down or turn it off. I’ll defer to the moderator on that.

(Brian: I *told* you I’d get in trouble.)

On Apr 26, 2015, at 13:22 PM, Brian Howell <bdho...@gmail.com> wrote:

> My major concern is that I want to keep discourse civil, and everybody's got their hot buttons. Then again, if one's hot button is the Kardashians, or someone of similar ilk, then he or she deserves whatever comes.
>

--
--Craig WWSJD?
clg...@me.com http://www.craig-good.com

"People cited violation of the First Amendment when a New Jersey
schoolteacher asserted that evolution and the Big Bang are not
scientific and that Noah's ark carried dinosaurs. This case is not
about the need to separate church and state; it's about the need
to separate ignorant, scientifically illiterate people from the
ranks of teachers."
--Neil deGrasse Tyson

[jack saunders]

This strikes me as perfectly fair and insightful commentary.

I understand ad hominem to be something like, "school teacher Mary Jane Schultz is stupid."

Less informative.

 

---

From: Craig Good <clg...@me.com>
To: Brian Howell <bdho...@gmail.com>
Cc: Ipse-...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, April 26, 2015 2:38 PM
Subject: Re: [Ipse Dixit] Re: Revised Group Guidelines

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[Larry Rosenthal]

No trouble, Craig, truly.
Your main point, on my use of loaded terminology, was well taken indeed. I value the feedback and offer mine constructively.
My observation is that ad hominem is lowbrow and off-putting. I pray not for prohibition, only conscience. Of that I'm already convinced you and others on this list are bountiful owners.
Jack's correct that disparagement can be earned. I'm all for warranted dosages of mordancy. Barbs bark at the barbarous; affronts confront effrontery.

"INCONSIDERATE, adj.
Imperfectly attentive to the welfare, happiness, comfort or desires of others; as cholera, small-pox, the rattlesnake and the satirical newspaper."
A.Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Group guidelines should be crafted collectively. At least the written ones. Others are set in the setting.
.....
Happy to be pushed back upon when I challenge stereotypes.
Were a majority of observers to deem my attitudes "Bay Area" in nature, so be it.
Hope we can agree that characterization asserts little and proves less.
Perhaps I'm oversensitive.
I've heard my share of unjust jibes.
I'm a lawyer.
From New Jersey.
LR

[Jack Saunders]

And New Jersey lawyers, as everyone knows, are...lawyers.  From New Jersey.

( a dear, respected friend finds smiley faces at this intersection insufferable...a patronizing microaggression.  I feel no such thing, and we get along, in spite of all.  :(

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[jack saunders]

 

I'll pass on the counsel of H.G. Wells, who scorned political discussions that he felt were "needlessly unfriendly."

 

---

From: Larry Rosenthal <l...@berkeley.edu>
To: Ipse-...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Sunday, April 26, 2015 4:02 PM

Subject: Re: [Ipse Dixit] Re: Revised Group Guidelines

[Brian Howell]

To all and sundry,

I have been a senior member of another on-line community for many years. Early on, it had no limits to expression beyond an ad hominem prohibition. That led to some wonderful, free-wheeling discussions. It also resulted in a number of clashes over seemingly inconsequential slights that saw several otherwise popular members ejected and the community nearly fail altogether. I want to forestall these types of occurrences, especially during the storming phase of our community. (And we'll be there for a while, I think, as I hope to add several people over the next few weeks.)

I welcome group input on guidelines, with the caveat that such will be subject to my dictatorial benevolence, at least until we're into the norming phase. 

On Saturday, April 25, 2015 at 6:54:24 PM UTC-7, Brian Howell wrote:

[Craig Good]

Much appreciated.

I’m sure to get along famously with anybody who quotes Bierce.

On Apr 26, 2015, at 16:02 PM, Larry Rosenthal <l...@berkeley.edu> wrote:

> No trouble, Craig, truly.

--
--Craig WWSJD?
clg...@me.com http://www.craig-good.com

V. No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise
infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand
Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in
the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger;
nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice
put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any
criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall
private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

[Craig Good]

Just tossing into the mix:


Quora has what they call the BNBR policy: Be nice, be respectful.

On Apr 26, 2015, at 17:58 PM, Brian Howell <bdho...@gmail.com> wrote:

> I welcome group input on guidelines, with the caveat that such will be subject to my dictatorial benevolence, at least until we're into the norming phase.
>

--
--Craig WWJGD?
clg...@me.com http://www.craig-good.com

"The screenplay is the single most uncommunicative form of writing
ever devised."
--Stanley Kubrick