Nuxx:568c85ee-cd92-46af-9043-39e21623e8bc@v16g2000vbq.googlegroups.com

Path: num2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!num1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!number.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border3.nntp.dca.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!postnews.google.com!v16g2000vbq.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail Message-ID: <568c85ee-cd92-46af-9043-39e21623e8bc@v16g2000vbq.googlegroups.com> From: Nuxx Bar  Newsgroups: uk.net.news.moderation Subject: Re: URCM - controll freakery strikes again. Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2011 08:44:08 -0800 (PST) References:  Lines: 77 Organization: http://groups.google.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 82.71.49.124 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Trace: posting.google.com 1299516248 7909 127.0.0.1 (7 Mar 2011 16:44:08 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2011 16:44:08 +0000 (UTC) Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: v16g2000vbq.googlegroups.com; posting-host=82.71.49.124; posting-account=7_6kYAkAAABD6HrjM0VxehwvZOKMxm4g User-Agent: G2/1.0 X-HTTP-UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.5; en-US; rv:1.9.2.15) Gecko/20110303 Firefox/3.6.15,gzip(gfe) Bytes: 5008 Xref: perfectly-safe.chapmancentral.co.uk uk.net.news.moderation:38557

On Mar 7, 4:15=A0pm, Toom  wrote: > On Sunday, March 6, 2011 6:56:39 PM UTC, Rob Morley wrote: > > On Sun, 6 Mar 2011 09:52:57 -0800 (PST) > > Toom  wrote: > > > > In the currently very active 'ASA/BeHit thread. > > > -= -- > > > On Sunday, March 6, 2011 3:26:08 PM UTC, Ian Jackson wrote: > > > > > fx: dons moderator hat. > > > > > The discussion on this "experiment" of Tony's has been going round > > > > in ever-decreasing circles for some time now. =A0Please could peopl= e > > > > try to think whether what they are posting really adds anything new= . > > > > It is by far the most active thread recently and has had 30 > > > contributors so far. > > > > One of the purposes of discussion groups is to allow participants to > > > discuss issues of acvive interest to them. > > > > What exactly is the problem with allowing this? > > > That particular sub-thread has become a circular argument: "We need mor= e > > information" versus "I've given all the information you need", with som= e > > embellishments. There's no point going around in circles. Either Tony > > doesn't understand or wants to ignore what people have been saying in > > criticism of his picture. =A0Assuming the former then nobody has yet co= me > > up with an effective way of explaining it to him, until they do > > there's no point rehashing what has already been said. I think this is = a > > reasonable example of a case where the "no repetition" clause might be > > usefully applied. > > What you do not understand, and what they do not understand, is that the > charter and guidelines give the OPTION of intervenibg if arguments become > circular,repetitive or non-productive. > > There is no need for someone to obsessively hover over some subthread: ob= sessively reading and intervening if others are having a good and (to them)= intersting discoure. That's what discussion groups are for; sometimes, for > emphasis and argument, the same points need to be made in different ways. > If it is a tree-structured subthread, then those without interest can > bypass that or the whole thread. What we do not need, and what we seem to= have, is some demonstrably obsessive inadequate hovering over the thread r= eady to suppress discussion. > > Such obsession and micro-management would be hilarious were it not so > pathetic and sad.

Yes, I quite agree. If all supposedly circular discussion is confined to a single subthread then why not just leave the participants to it? It's trivially easy for anyone who wants to avoid reading such a discussion to do so. The eagerness with which such exchanges are pounced upon the moment they supposedly become circular (and often way before) smacks, as Toom says, of obsessive "because I can" control freakery, and often I think there's also an element of not wanting the "wrong" side to win.

Apart from anything else, it may sometimes be necessary to repeat or rephrase a point if an opponent is either having trouble understanding it, or pretending to have trouble understanding it because they can't counter it. Indeed, the latter disingenuous tactic (often practised by the likes of Chapman and other Jackson supporters) is only going to become more common if people know that they can conveniently bring an argument they're about to lose to a close, simply by getting their opponent to repeat something, or just repeating something themselves. Remember, for some people, it's not actually being right that counts, it's simply being *seen* to win (or at least not lose) the debate, and any and all dirty tricks to achieve that are fair game as far as they're concerned.