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By "outsiders", I'm referring to those outside the argument, not outside the thread.



If you saw myself and Kyraa honestly arguing about something in the thread, would you be comfortable to stay there and watch? Not just disagreeing, or debating, or playfully bickering; a full-out argument.

Or would you want us to take it elsewhere?

Eh, fair enough.

As a newcomer, I'm going to warily toss in my opinion that the church is fairly elitist. I'll throw a disclaier up that I don't think it's neccessarily bad- you're comfortable with those you've been around for awhile, which is why children have trouble adjusting to new supervisory figures in their lives. It's a basic human instinct. I don't feel insulted by it or anything.

I am more curious as to whether my presence fouls me from being able to observe things clearly. I know that I often accidentally (or even intentionally) end up moving with the flow of the conversation (in my own clumbsy and socially misanthropic sort of way.)... put succinctly, I try to at least follow Roman law while in Rome. I try not to be disruptive to the current pace and nature of the thread unless I am confused beyound all reconciliation (more often than I care to admit), or I actually find the current banter to leave the realm of personal taste, and enter ToS violations, or personal grievances.

But then again, I'm a moody and blatant person... so I might just be projecting. neutral

Edit:Now, on to the more recent parts of this...

I personally come from a region where one is discouraged from airing their dirty laundry in the front yard so to speak...
Doesn't stop me, on a personal level, from being one of the more proficient whiners in all creation, but on a societal level, I tend to prefer this method... mostly so it doesn't interfere with those who don't want to deal with the matter at hand, and because it lowers the chance of scarying off new or established persons who drop by the thread to meet and interact with civil humans.

I am very proud of how decent this issue has been in discussion thus far...
It's so easy to get all riled up about these matters... sweatdrop

Edit2:No offense my dears... but Ellie, honestly, who amongst us isn't at least a little quirky?
I mean, as humans we all have some levels of deviance, but one of the reasons I feel so good here is because... just maybe... I'm not the only person who is a dodecahedron trying to fit into the triangular whole of the world... wink

Well, of course we're elitist. After all, we do tend to exclude people who present themselves as semi-literate monkeys pounding on their keyboards in a frustrated attempt at communication. But that sort of elitism is so blatantly obvious that it's probably not the sort that we're talking about, is it?

So, despite my increasingly peripheral role in the CoM and DYBiM thread, I suppose I'll throw in my two cents. The thread does have a certain elitist bent, but it's not entirely responsible for some of the seemingly cool treatment that new posters may encounter. When I first started posting in the thread, back when it was still in M&R, the regulars weren't exactly falling all over themselves to respond to me, but that was, I thought, to be expected. After all, I was new, nobody knew who the hell I was, and I certainly didn't think that I was going to immediately become friends with everyone there. Now, after two years, there are several people that I'm friends with, more than a few with whom I'm amicably acquainted, and, increasingly since we moved into the Chatterbox, a large group whom I don't know all that well. That's just to be expected in an extended social group. I don't go out of my way to make new-comers feel 'welcome', but that's just my nature: I tend to stay in my comfort zone, and I don't think I'm alone in that.

That said, elitism does deserve its due, so to speak. As Alliance pointed out, we've gotten warier of newcomers (i.e. it takes longer for them to be fully accepted as 'regulars') since we got moved to the Chatterbox, and that is elitism. In M&R, we were drawing from a smaller pool of potential posters, one that we saw as being a fairly reliable source of quality people. Now that our forum demographics have changed, there seems to be some feeling that new posters need more extensive vetting, lest DYBiM become just another 'Box thread. This is not entirely unjustified in my opinion. But then again I'm stodgy, self-important, and hate change. So there you have it.

I think the intimidating and cold people DO carry a lot of weight (you and Gendou and Meghan spring to mind, for instance) and also being around and also who you speak to and who responds to you. And, to a certain extent, knowing how to step into a discussion is key; I don't know if people will believe this or not (or if they'll think me an egoist for thinking it deserves notice), but I get ignored when what I say isn't interesting to anyone else who happens to be around.


Well, for one thing I didn't realize until Ally did his drama-diving that people sucked up to me in 2005. That's pretty damn hidden! And baffling!

And let me say, from the top, that I find the idea of me being someone suck-upable-to to be deeply disturbing, which is why I try to make light of my Moderator status - which is a very visible symbol of power in a very tangible sense - in sometimes a more-than-awkward way. This probably informs my discomfort with elitism charges because, quite honestly, I keep thinking I may be on the short list for that and I don't like the idea of someone as flaky as me having her thoughtless posts and actions taken as some endightment against one person and an endorsement for another; nicer to pretend there's no elitism and then I don't have to second guess my actions.

But I do think there are people who can and do shape the thread as a whole and people who, for better or worse, get run over and more frequently ignored. It's difficult to say how much of this is the actions of the people and how much is their untangible "authority" in the thread. And that's where the hidden comes in; I don't think most of us even think about it. When Meghan or Gendou show up and I'm there, I pound a path to their door because I hardly ever see any of them (I posted on the same page as Meghan! *tear*); I'm far less likely to do that for other people who I see more often. Does this mean they have more authority or power? I'm not sure.

And some of it is hidden because people don't like to shout their insecurities and jealousies to the world, and rightly so.


Heh, ironically, I think the reverse. In M&R Rommy made it a point to not ignore anyone and to forbid discussion of M&R in the thread in order to keep it open to all people. I know in M&R I greeted EVERYONE who posted while I was on, no matter how briefly. In the CB I regularly ignore people who post just a greeting, and I've seen several on a page that no one responded to, because so often in the CB that person is posting for money and won't be back.

Not saying either is a bad thing - both are, I think, appropriate responses to the change in venue - but the former was actively trying to be the only chat thread for the forum wheras now we're a little chat thread in a big forum.

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My experience has, and I'll be dead honest here, that while I'm sometimes ignored, I have never felt deliberately excluded. Some of this may be how I presented myself, though. I went from "n00b" to "regular" in Morality and Religion in about two weeks because I type and communicate skillfully and people noticed and remembered me. I also really don't discuss my personal problems and failings, even with people I do communicate with privately (and largely at their instigation, I'll add; I am a bad friend). Some of this is, at this point, how long I've been around. Some of this is that I have several people who go out of their way to have cute interactions with me ('dextra and Kejou most notably of late), which makes me feel noticed and important and valued.

I am sure there are people who have a very different experience in the same place and I'm honestly not sure what to do about it. I am very uncomfortable with the idea that some moral standard of "having" to interact with everyone is assumed, though. There is the odd person in DYBIM that I don't like, and while I don't want to name names and make it overt, I also don't want to have to extend myself beyond basic politeness because of any actual or perceived power I have. I don't want to avoid critique if someone thinks I am behaving badly (and I thank those people who have contacted me privately when they think I am) but I also don't want to have to second guess everything I do in DYBIM even more than I already do.

There, Rommy, I took it personally for you. wink heart

I... I do?

I'm not sure I want to know. sweatdrop


There's a story about a group of monkeys in a cage and a thing of bananas hung in the corner. Every time one of the monkeys would go for the bananas, cold water would soke the whole group. When a new monkey was introduced and (logically) went for the bananas, the group as a whole would stop them. As the group dymanic changed and monkeys part of the original event were removed, the violent response to new monkeys became more and more extreme because the reason for the response was gone.

I'm not saying we're beating up new monkeys, but I am saying acting for no reason, or the reason of "fitting in", is likely to have more violence and negativity in it that reacting because of a circumstance or reason.


Heh, I've hung out with groups where I didn't like one member, but that's neither here nor there. I think expecting people to like everyone is unreasonable; be polite to them is another matter altogether.