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[email protected] · February 2nd 07, 04:31 AM posted to rec.radio.amateur.policy

From: (Michael Black) on Thurs, Feb 1 2007
7:24 pm

Michael Coslo ) writes:

The point is as I see it, that when we place what we see and read into
the hands of others, we might not see what we want to see. I am
perfectly happy to use Xnews to get rid of the fringe elements.

And at what level do we censor. And let us mince no words, a post that
does not get past the moderator is censored.

No, I wouldn't call it censorship. After all, they have other outlets
to spout off. If some outside force put a clamp on their speaking, that
would be censorship.

I would agree with M. Coslo on that, not M. Black. shrug

Censorship is still censorship, whether one uses the euphemism
of "moderating." "Censorship" doesn't automatically carry a
negative, "bad" tag. Sometimes it IS good and for our own
security. Case in point in the USA during WW II: Overseas
mail was examined by censors and, if it fell under some
criterion of suspicion, or even the contents of same
service personnel's mail, it was blacked out. Literally.
That is past history and few in here were alive when that
happened, but it was on a large scale.

"Censorship" should not mean all "offensive" posts are
deleted. The biggest problem is Judgement of what is
Offensive. That approaches the USA's constant arguments
of "sexually offensive" content when there is no real,
decisive definition of what IS offensive in that area.

What exists below your southern border in amateur radio is a
great deal of in-grained attitudes of What [USA] Amateur
Radio Should Be. That has been a sort of mental conditioning
by the surviving national amateur radio membership
organization. Since this organization has a VIRTUAL (through
numbers, not in the legal sense) monopoly on special amateur-
interest publications, it has the capability to set patterns
of behavior, influence desires (very subtly) of what activity
should be engaged in, and generally be looked at as some kind
of "boss" of all, complete with Titles and so-called
democratic-process lower-level "voting" which is far from
what the US government voting entails with its attendant
checks-and-balances. Those aren't the "same" democratic
ways, just some inferences. It is difficult to find out what
is exactly going on in that organization since they have this
virtual monopoly on amateur radio information in the USA.

I really hate to admit this, but I have been paying attention since this
issue of a moderated newsgroup came up. And while there are some obvious
spewers here, I now see it's not just their fault.

There really is too much animosity between some posters, so everything
turns into that animosity, rather than discussing the specific issue
at hand.

Of course there is. There has been for a decade in here.
Longer. The "morse code test" issue arguments had gotten
such that a separate "policy" newsgroup begun to steer the
morse code test issue into a separate venue, RRAP.

Whether or not to eliminate the morse code test was a
HIGHLY contentious subject, especially down here.. The
alignment of opinions was, by simple observation,
polarized about as far as such could be. In such a highly-
charged environment of polarized opinions, it was easy to
"cross the line" into personal attack regardless of the
logic, real logic not euphemisms of what posed for logic.

The big problem came about when the "established" saw
perceived personal attack for some of their arrogant
power-play activities. They bristled and then attacked
their "opponents" in much less than FB terms. Those
had achieved self-righteous "control" (they thought) and
wanted to keep what they thought was Theirs.

Also quite present has been the "credentialism" aspect of those
that had achieved Titles, Rank, Status under the old rules and
their territorial imperative claims for that. I have nothing
against Titles, Rank, or Status in any hobby activity but do
bridle at such things used to infer that some are "stupid" or
"inferior" in radio (or electronics) JUST BECAUSE some
individuals had "earned" such Titles, Rank, and Status some
while ago in a specialized genre of hobby radio activity. That
spoke of an extreme self-righteousness on their part. Given
a highly optionalized hobby activity (from governmental law)
they needed (?) all to conform to Their idea of What Should
Be. They never had that power in the first place but once
they had it, their addiction did not let them stop.

The people behind the proposed moderated newsgroup might start with
talking to some of the sensible ones, convincing them to stop dredging
up the past of regular posters here. Or convince them that making a single
statement, and walking away from that thread says a lot more than keeping
the thread going for weeks and arguing over small points (especially when it's
often a rehash of the last long thread).

The "people behind the proposed moderated group" ought to look
at some of the things ALREADY allowed: Deliberate cross-posting
to several newsgroups at the same time; degeneration into many,
many posts which are quite obviously insulting and sexually-
oriented by any "community standards," not the least of which
is the NON-subject-to-a-newsgroup's general subjects. Part of
that is obvious pseudonyms including the attempts at copying
others' pseudonyms. I've posted to Google, my own (and only)
avenue of posting and got NO response on those obvious ones.
The pseudonyms are obvious by their content and, in many cases,
length of text content consisting (seemingly) of endless
"quoting" of old material plus "signatures" of old-style ASCII
character graphics.

I agree with you that old, old subjects are NOT good for
delving into. Those that lost old arguments in the past will
not "win" anything by trying to repeat it all. Neither is
this some formal court where self-appointed barristers can
demand absolute, unequivocal "proof" of their perceived
slights. Let them spend some time powdering their wigs and
cleaning their own robes before hitting their Queens Bench.

I talk about "sensible posters" because while it may reflect my bias,
I do think some are more likely to see the damage they are doing to the
newsgroup than others. And if "one side" can stop it, then that doesn't
leave much fuel for "the other side".

The biases can exist on the proposed moderator's side as well.
There has been the undertone of "only we know how to moderate."
Moderation or censorship or controlling content has been done
well before the Internet became public in 1991, even on an
international networked system of BBSs. I've been there and
done that, know how it feels to BE a moderator. The main
thing a moderator MUST refrain from is to get engaged or "side"
on a contentious subject IN PUBLIC. Their credibility can
disappear almost immediately doing that. Simple rule and
cannot be countermanded by "credentialism" or self-righteousness
about being a moderator. Those who do moderation MUST give up
doing anything in public other than advising or the behind-the-
scenes warnings and actual deletions.

There is a sizeable difference between posting a formal RFD, and actually
being a real person and saying something like "we do have a problem here,
how can we fix it", because then it's some guy like a neighbor. Instead
the proponent has come with an answer that hasn't necessarily been seen
as the answer. I'm not arguing that there is a problem in .misc and .policy
(and the rest of the hierarchy when it spills over), and even not arguing
that something shouldn't be done about it, I'm not convinced enough
preliminary work has been done to show that a moderated newsgroup is
the only solution.

Based on my experiences as a user and as moderator on BBSs,
ones where in-person meetings were the norm, not just on-line,
there comes a time to DO something. That was reached a couple
years ago in RRAP. Nothing was done then. I don't expect
anything will ever be done now or in the future. Draconian
measures are required to get things to some semblance of
normalcy. All the "requests for discussion" won't help.
All those RFDs (plural) are, to me, boondoggle business of
endless jabbering in place of taking action. It may make
the jabberer feel good inside but it's all busy work, what
some say is equivalent to "teaching a pig to sing."

The powers-that-be will probably issue a 4th RFD, a 5th,
etc., until everyone gets sick and tired of it all and
bail. What's the point of an "endless summer" of jabbering
when NOTHING happens? "Fish or cut bait." So far as I see
the bait hasn't even been collected. :-(

Then there's the issue of there being moderated "newsgroups" already.
All that web-based stuff. Lots of people have moved there, we see it
as the number of posts drop. Though I'm not completely convinced it's
an issue of moderation, they may have found they prefer the web based
areas, and so they left as soon as they were developed.

I see that "web-based stuff," (non-"Usenet" discussion
and argument sites), to be nothing more than COMPETITION.
Bulletin Board Systems of old got out-classed by the
Internet going public. TS. Consider that as normal
"market-driven" cause-effect. The core issue of moderation-
censorship-control-of-content is the SAME in all of them.
One very small group in each governs each group's actions.
The "governing bodies" will be subject to all kinds of
bouquets and brickbats depending on what they do,
despite whatever real or imagined altruism they feel.
All too often the slightest brickbat will set them off
on the "fault" of their users. Not so. It is THEIRS.
It is up to them to correct it. If not the users simply
go away. Simple competition at work. The Internet is
too large and there will always be alternatives. A wry
saying is "mankind invented language to satisfy his
need to complain." That need seems to be ever-present. :-)

I personally have no need to go to any new group. My intent
was always to advocate the elimination of the code test in
US amateur radio. The US government has ruled. Yet, the
old animosities of the self-righteous must continue. Those
are too allied with the old paradigms of What Should Be to
change with the times.

I think that there should be areas where people can express
themselves. The hide-bound do not. They desire the
familiarity of the known, the "safe," Theirs (in effect).
If they cannot take criticsm, then They can go away, not
their perceived enemies. The world was not meant for
them and them alone to rule.

Okay, "lock and load..." :-)

LA