OKAY, Possible SOLUTION Please VOTE HERE (about DP forums/bickering)
Posted May 14th, 2008 by sobrdup
output
Fellow Patriots, we are all aware now about arguments over what topics we should discuss here. I'm not going to give my opinion either way, but rather offer a possible solution. I think everyone can agree that our first priority is to promote Ron Paul. With that in mind I think there is a simple way to achieve that goal while still having all sorts of spinoff discussions.
The problem, as I see it is that there is currently just one Daily Paul General Forum. Click "Forums" above and take a look. This general forum has over 40K topics and almost a half million replies. That's awesome and lively! Props to Michael for creating this! However, the other forums titled "Ron Paul March", or "Books" pale by comparison.
My suggestion: We ask Michael to simply change the forums a tiny bit. Here is something which may work better:
Daily Paul Main Forum - For anything and everything about Dr. Ron Paul, his campaign and related current events. (ONLY topics directly related to Ron Paul)
Daily Paul Member Discussions - Discuss various topics with the Daily Paul crowd (talk about economics, conspiracies, religious aliens, or whatever you like with your fellow patriots!)
Ron Paul March - An area to discuss the upcoming March on Washington, that Ron Paul has encouraged us to undertake in his video of 2/12.
Books - Discuss books etc...
Ron Paul Videos - etc
etc.
Please vote below on whether or not you think this would serve ALL our interests better! Thanks!
Bookmark/Search this post with:
perhaps a digg/youtube style
perhaps a digg/youtube style voting system?
religious aliens lol
Vereh funneh! lol
Yeah, decent idea but it won't work. Why? because everyone will just continue to post in the general forum because that's where all the traffic is. I have seen this many times before.
"It is like a finger pointing away to the moon, don't concentrate on the finger or you will miss all the heavenly glory." - Bruce Lee
I agree! People want to post
I agree! People want to post where the most traffic is because everyone thinks their post is the most important. I kind of like the diversity in one or two forums.
The real problem is people taking responsibility for what they decide to read. Rather then do that they would rather bitch about what shouldn't be posted in the forum according to their opinion.
The solution is for the reader to decide not to read a post he/she doesn't like rather then expect people to post only things he/she wants to read. And they want to bring force to bear to have it their way also by moderation. It is a symptom of our selfish and forceful culture. I admit I have done the same thing myself but try to watch it.
Don't get me wrong I think some moderation is necessary if things get out of hand but it should be as minimal as possible. I have been pleasantly surprised with the minimal moderation on this forum. I like to error on the side of freedom despite the trolls.
-----
Please Visit New Freelanders
Self Reliance & Preparedness Forums
That its a decent idea. What
That its a decent idea. What about the ability to embed video?
www.ronpaulforum.info
I don't care what the category arrangement is.
If changing the category arrangement is going to make people happy, I don't have any opposition to it.
I think it is rather comical, but that's all.
Listen to What Dr. Paul Says...
He talks about free market with out interference from the Gov't. I think the same applies in this situation. If you simply don't "click" on the topic because its of no intrest to you, and others do the same, then it will move to the bottom. If it is of intrest to you and to others, then you "click" on it, and it will takes its place in the order of popularity.
Allow peoples intrest to be the deciding factor.
When I tune into the radio and I hear something I'm not intrested in I don't give them my business. I move on and find something I am intrested in.
Allow the market to work itself out on a supply and demand basis.
Anyways thats my 2 cents.
i do believe i agree.
it's privilege to be using this at all, especially when the people AT LARGE who would like to silence us do not like this site or anything else that proves them wrong........to say the least.
and like the lpviper said below, it's not a right.
and to keep anyone from being censored - there will always be a right place and right time for the right kind of talk'n.
i don't appreciate my fellow americans/human beings telling anyone that the truth movement has given ron a bad image. if you would just stop talking for a minute, put down your big mac and the remote to your TV - pay attention to things you never thought possible and ARE true.....maybe you'd be a little less likely to fault anyone particular for things that are mainly above and beyond our capabilities to control.
TV dwarfs us.
it takes anything and everything i say to anyone and mostly obliterates it.
like i could stop telling you the truth - like i have the choice.
like the short sighted vision of just having ron elected somehow removes all of our obligations to find out what happened on 9/11 as soon as possible while there is still some time to convict the people who did it.
i agree that there should be different forums.
i also agree that people should refrain from arriving at their conclusions so earnestly.
take time to look things up.
and for god's sake.....wake up!
As Long As Active Forum Topics Disregard Which Section
As long as the active forum topic disregards which section the thread resides, I'm ok with this. But if more active forum topics are censored from the "Active Forum Topic" list on the right of the main page, then this is just a sneeky way to not post these threads on the front page. So my vote is conditional based on whether or not the most active forum topics remain listed on the front page or not. It should not matter which subsection the most active topics are in, only that they are truly the most active topics.
I'm just curious... I love
I'm just curious... I love this site as much as the rest of you...
But what's wrong with posting the off topic discussions at RonPaulForums.com where they DO have the appropriate sub-forums already setup?
Most people here (and there) frequent both sites. So why exactly could we not take the off topic discussions to a more appropriate place?
Because it is not required of us
Because we are free to post here.
Because we are beholden to no one in our search for the truth and enlightened and sometimes silly discourse.
Why do you wish to push people away from here?
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
Furthermore
many of these 'off topic' discussions are not 'completely unrelated to the campaign or the presidential race', which is Michael's only content stipulation. A topic like, 'I enjoy Milk Duds, let's discuss' would fall under this criterion, while gardening for survival, FLDS, and Illuminati threads would not.
Stop misrepresenting what this website was created for, and stop pushing people away. That is not the way of freedom.
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
I agree. If we just make
I agree. If we just make different parts of the forums for different discusions we would be much better off. Thus all the offtopic threads can be moved to the offtopic area. Such an area would contain everything not directly supporting ron paul. This would include posts about other candidates and anything else not directly related to the support of ron paul himself.
I think it is a good idea...
to create a separate section or sections for other topics. This is not censorship, it is called rational organization and is the way many if not most forums are designed.
I think that some of the resistance comes from those who feel that their posts won't get as much attention if they are in a section not directly associated with Ron Paul, but be honest, shouldn't that be the reader's choice?
This is completely in harmony with freedom of speech. (You have a freedom to speak, and I have freedom to listen or not.)
People who are violently opposed to this idea must realize that their posts are not all that interesting to the majority of Ron Paul supporters or guests on this site. But that is precisely why they should be posting in a separate section.
The titles of the posts do that eloquently
Why must we segment and divide? I come here for the variety of discourse offered. It must be frustrating to people who would like an audience for their views to be turned away in such a fashion. It reminds me of a Congressman from Texas who has been pushed from the view of the general public. But then,
"People who are violently opposed to this idea must realize that (his views) are not all that interesting to the majority of (MSM viewers) or guests on (their programs). But that is precisely why (he) should be posting in a separate section (only on the internet, home of 'the kooks')."
Do you see how assertions like yours are used in other forums to narrow the spectrum of public discourse?
Think about it...
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
lpviper
No one here wants censorship but most people here do come for information regarding Ron Paul.
I respect that you come here for the "variety of discourse offered" but do you not also understand and respect the rules of the board? The rules of this board specifically state that discussion needs to be limited to Ron Paul and the 2008 election.
Do you accept the rules of this board as they have been laid out?
The 'rules' post also contains this statement
'I set this up to be an open forum for the honest discussion of ideas and the search for truth. In order for this to work, everyone must play by the rules and respect the community. While I don't want to get into the habit of banning people or deleting posts and / or comments, if you don't respect the community, then you are not welcome here.'
and:
'Any of the following will be sure to get you banned without warning:
Engaging in flame wars or personal attacks on other members, racist remarks, posting material completely unrelated to the campaign or the presidential race, bumping your own thread to keep it on the front page, posting the same non-related comment on multiple threads to promote your website or event, blatant advertising and EXCESSIVE USE OF CAPITALS. If you cannot consistently spell or check your grammar, you may also be banned. Sorry. Posting here is a privilege, not a right.'
Nowhere do the rules state what you say they do.
Why are you lying? What do you have to gain by this relentless pursuit of censorship?
Please stop this. You completely ignored the content of my comment above (again) and have resorted to rules-lawyering about rules that you have invented from nothing. Michael specifically says in the passage I quoted above that this is an open forum for the honest discussion of ideas and the search for the truth.
Why are you opposing this, the founding principle of this forum?
What do you gain by this behavior? I do not understand you, sir.
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
You are right.. It is an
You are right.. It is an open forum for the honest discussion of ideas and the search of truth..... regarding Ron Paul and the election of 2008. That stipulation is specifically stated.
Off topic posts are not permitted.
And don't ask me to "please stop". I had never even seen any of your posts until today so my original complaints weren't even really directed towards you. But you wanted to jump in and argue the point with me so if you want to stop then go ahead.
That stipulation is certainly NOT specifically stated!
Why are you lying? What are you afraid of?
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
I'm not lying... "Any of the
I'm not lying...
"Any of the following will be sure to get you banned without warning:
Engaging in flame wars or personal attacks on other members, racist remarks, posting material completely unrelated to the campaign or the presidential race, "
Now that we've cleared that up...
Do you accept the rules as they have been laid out?
refer to my response above
and stop appropriating this website to discuss only those things YOU wish to discuss. I feel like Ron Paul at a TV debate.
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
It's amusing that I post
It's amusing that I post Michael's rules regarding THIS board and you somehow equate those rules to "things I wish to discuss".
I don't have a problem with most posts. But gardens have absolutely NOTHING to do with the campaign or the election. You can rant and rave about self-reliance all you want but that has nothing to do with a United States presidential election.
My gripe has nothing to do with most posts on this forum but the truthers have created a horrible image for Ron Paul. The FLDS (while it's a horrible story) has nothing to do with Ron Paul. Does Ron Paul even have the support of the FLDS? Not that I'm aware....
Ridicule me all you want about me being a 'rules nazi' but if someone doesn't do something then this site will deteriorate into oblivion. So either follow the rules or don't.. but if you don't you risk being banned.
We need to keep everything on track and focused. The election is almost over and then there will be plenty of time for all these discussions. We should be focused on topics such as: How can we challenge McCain delegates at upcoming conventions?
Actually, Yes, Ron Paul does have the support of many FLDS
The only donations to any presidential candidate from zip codes dominated by FLDS members are donations to Ron Paul.
So there.
Then create a post with that as the topic
No one is stopping you. Now, fair's fair. I told you below what I am afraid of. What are YOU afraid of?
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
What are you afraid of,
What are you afraid of, LPViper?
I am afraid of the theft of my freedoms.
I am afraid to be censored by those who want to limit what information I can see by their whim or desire. I am afraid of world government. I am afraid of having my morality dictated to me by elites. I am afraid that my children will be enslaved by the theft of all our material values by corrupt governments. I am afraid that if I do not speak out against ANY censorship, that eventually ALL censorship shall triumph, and the spark of liberty will die, and my issue and their issue will know only misery, and wonder why no one spoke out against it.
OK??????
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
NO
Again we 'pigeon hole' and 'group'
This segmenting and categorizing of sovereigns and their thoughts is traitorous
Whoever posted below about conspiracists, explain the negative connotation of your assertions without resorting to groupthink, social conventions, or categorization of soveriegns who are free to express their theories and opinions without being dismissed out of hand as 'kooks' or other such collectivist phrasery.
I may not agree with their assertions but I try to absorb it all and digest it logically, and I do not let emotion or convention dictate which opinions I will agree or disagree with.
'Live for yourself, there's no one else more worth living for,
Begging hands and bleeding hearts
Will only cry out for more...'
I've an idea as well
just set up another instance of Drupal on another site. One that would have the forum topics to the right-hand side instead of the banners... a ~rabbithole~ area for people that are free-thinkers (members only section, without moderators) then a general section for the guests that is moderated. That way guests only see the general/moderated topics, the members will be able to browse the ~forbidden~ subjects. Same format as here so it's comfortable with the regular DP people... just a slightly different navigation.
I've been working on it since last week... it's a part of libertylove.org.
It comes online Friday night.
This is NOT to compete with Mike... it is to offer an alternative place to post topics so that we stop splitting the grassroots. I was asked if it was possible weeks ago, so am doing it, is all.
If it goes nowhere, I'm out some time.. no biggie. If it goes somewhere, well.. that will be up to the users. I'm not going to be the owner... it will be a community.
So we'll see as we go.. ;)
Sounds Great!
This may be the best solution for holding spinoff discussions. Please be sure to post a thread here when it comes online this weekend!
Here's the deal...
libertylove.org is a meetup site... people asked for it, I made it. However, the forum in the phpizabi script sucks, so I was putting a better forum in anyways. Some friends pointed out that a solution to the problems here would be to put up an alternate forum, is all.
So see you Friday.. It's up, I'm just doing the theme, so it's not linked yet. The nice part is that it's 6.2 ... so we have moderators.
Seemed to be the best solution for everyone... especially as I'm a bit of a free-thinker anyways.. ;)
I believe in free speech...
and this sounds too much like censorship to me.
But, this is only my opinion.
it is not cencsorship.
it is not cencsorship. merely better catagorization. It will help people who have no interest in the rest of the topics posted that are not directly related to ron paul and supporting him.
I understand that people
I understand that people don't like to be censored, however as one of the previous posters noted, some sort of organization and rule is required in order to protect the site for everyone.
People may wish to sit around and discuss whatever topics they please, however, this site does have forum posting guidelines and to skew from those guidelines DOES affect the site for everyone.
If you haven't read the forum guidelines, then you should.
http://www.dailypaul.com/...
Specifically, the very first clause as well as the "what will get you banned" area...
Read the very last statement. Posting here is a privilege not a right. So that blows censorship right out of the water. It's not censorship if posters are violating the rules.
Ron Paul has specifically stated he doesn't think that 9/11 was an inside job. That means that any truther posting 9/11 stories on this site is disrespecting the community. While I sympathize with the FLDS, their sad story has absolutely nothing to do with the presidential race. It's a State issue. Which means, that any FLDS story on this site is a disrespect to the community.
I like the OP's idea of multiple forums, however, if that happens (which Michael has already posted about several months ago and said he just didn't have the time) I feel as though this site would turn into RonPaulForums.com (which by the way already has the subforums that would allow for the discussion of Aliens, FLDS and gardens.
This site used to be about the promotion of Dr. Paul. Our race is NOT over. There are still conventions, delegate selections, challenges, marches and national conventions. There is plenty to discuss without getting side-tract by other types of ideas and/or discussions.
Instead of these off-topic discussions, we need to be figuring out what our next step and our next plan will be. RP delegates were challenged during a recent MO convention. We should be discussing methods by which to challenge McCain delegates in some upcoming conventions.
Remember, we are all here for the same purpose... to get Ron Paul elected and/or to continue our revolution into 2008 and 2012. Anything other than that is a distraction and a disrespect to the DailyPaul community.
When a State government blatantly violates the
civl rights of an entire minority group, it is no longer a State Issue. I believe fully in states' rights. But Texas's violation of an entire town's first, fourth, fifth, and fourteenth amendment rights is as big a violation as any in recent memory on U.S. soil. It is a very serious Constitutional issue and educating others on it goes a long way toward educating them on the actual rights we as sovereign citizens have. To let the issue die is to sacrifice an entire town of people--over 700 American citizens--to the false deity of the Almighty State.
It went way beyond a State issue, when the state proved they were incapable ot protecting the rights of this entire town of people.
If it were your town, or your extended family, am I right to suggest you would tell everyone not in your home state to butt out? I doubt it.
I agree it's a horrible
I agree it's a horrible issue. However, nothing can be done about it on this site nor with the election.
And regardless of how you feel... it IS a State issue. Therefore you need to take your issues up with the State of Texas and if you wish to take it to a federal level then contact the Texas congressmen, senators, governors and anyone else you can think of.
Until the layout of this site changes, this is a Ron Paul site and we should keep the discussion focused on the issues.
Many people from this site also frequent RonPaulForums. They have the sub-forums that these discussions would go into. If you so choose, go there and post the topics within the appropriate forums. More than likely most of the same people (as well as new people) will still read the topics.
I agree. "we should keep the discussion focused on the issues"
Issues such as.....oh, I don't know....CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS, PERSONAL LIBERTY, PARENTAL RIGHTS, MEDICAL RIGHTS, RIGHTS TO RAW FOODS, HABEUS CORPUS, EXPANSION OF THE POLICE STATE, EXCESSIVE FORCE AND GOVERNMENTAL TYRANNY....all issues that Ron Paul holds near and dear, and all issues that are being lived out by an entire community of people, right before our very eyes.
And again, once the State of Texas has proven itself unwilling to safeguard the rights of its people, then it has become a federal issue. That happened with the very first court hearing, when these people were treated like cattle.
Yes, let's keep discussion focused on the issues. A real world application of all of the above issues, and more, is happening right now. So, let's discuss it.
What are you afraid of?
i understand what you mean
however, this sounds a bit like regulating to me. ouch.
can't we all just get along? we either will or we won't.
~peace
Yes, I agree it is regulating a tad bit.
But think of it like traffic signals and streets. There must be some kind of rules and organization for the benefit of everyone acheiving a common goal - getting to their destination safely.
We are Ron Paul republicans
We are Ron Paul republicans which means ....We believe we have the right to do what ever we want as long as it doesn't do harm to others and I add that which is moral....
So, why do some ron paul people constantly argue about what someone else says or believes???
Do you guys need the FCC here to monitor the airwaves/??
What happened to...I may not agree with what you say...but I believe to the death your right to say it....
other than some neo con shills.....I don't mind reading anything...and if it will bother me...I just don't read it.......it's that easy.......
However
I agree but some of the posts I've read contain positions that Ron Paul would not agree with, (including bigoted comments)those posts hurt the Paul campaign. People need to remember that this site is about the Paul campaign.
I don't care what you believe or what you post on a Obama or Clinton blog but we should all try to remember not to post things here that would embarrass the Paul campaign or put RP in a bad light. In fact I encourage people to go to Clinton and Obama blogs and post all the 9/11 truthers posts, anti Catholic, anti Christian, anti Jewish and conspiracy posts they want.
I agree there should be no monitoring! No censorship!!!
That's why I suggest the forum change. This simply organizes our discussions which can be wild and all over the place, and may add to the "kook" stereotype, just because we tend to be more open minded. That's the purpose of having different forums of "themed" discussion.
Great Idea
Like a general chat area. I'm afraid some people wouldn't like that because the posts will show up in the sidebar. Can't please everyone.
I enjoy being able to freely read/discuss topics that get pulled on other forums. It's all about the Freedom!
sounds good
to me.
Not sure if I agree but ....
great suggestions.
The message is freedom.
I think it would be PERFECT!
I think it would be PERFECT! Also the expansion of the active forum topics
listing. Could shorten online user name block.
GREAT idea, and good thinking.
It would require a change in behavior, which is always dangerous
The site may see a short term dip in hits.