Religous intolerance?

As a Christian I have to admit I can't see what the big fuss is about with Talen's removed post. What exactly is wrong with Jesus singing YMCA? You don't think God has a sense of humor? Then explain the hippopotamus.

That's it! The hippopotomus is a beautiful and dignified creature which has been persecuted ever since someone gave it that ridiculous name. Jeska, this post is a violation of the TOS, please edit it. I am tired of this unrelentingly mockery of and discrimination against hppopotamuses or hippopotami or whatever.

Not to start a fight with anyone about all this (and certainly not you, Talen), but I did want to jump in here and remind everyone that these forums are being run by humans. And they seem to have a real desire to let us have as much room to speak as possible - without pushing people away with behaviors that are really unnecessary. On one hand, we want a forum where we can move, where we can throw our weight around - physical or philosophical - as much as we think we must to get the work of world-building done. On the other hand, we want our particular moral and ethical standards considered, understood, and met.

I’ve done this job before, for several years, and I can tell you that this balance is practically impossible. By that I mean it is impossible as a practical matter. The enforcement of some sort of universally acceptable standard will never be perfect, or even reliably uniform.

I’m not trying to convince people to grab the nearest Linden and lay on a big bear hug. I am trying to point out that it is reasonable - and humane - to assume that anyone who has even tried to be ethical about this process has earned an extremely tolerant respect. Especially from those of us who challenge the process on such a frequent basis.

When you add the fact that we all assume a degree of confidentiality rivaling that of a medical relationship, then you make it hard for the moderator to give you the explanation that you ALSO feel is due you.

So, while I can certainly understand why you might rail against some of the CRAP I’ve seen on these boards, I’d like to encourage you all to point your weapons at the real culprits. And don’t be so cross with the poor cops who - time after time - have to thrust themselves into our domestic conflicts where nothing is sure except the total dissatisfaction of SOMEBODY.

If I was running a forum where all I needed was to enforce a uniform, clear, liberal ethical standard, it would be a piece of cake. But we insist that the Lindens don’t do that. We expect them to allow everyone room to throw down. Well, they’re doing a fairly fine job of that. At least as fine as anyone possibly can.

There is only one outcome possible if we push our myriad indignities at the Lindens without allowing them to do this as an art. Sooner or later, it will become pure administration. There will be a list of bad words. Or maybe off-topic postings will be completely disallowed. Or - most likely - the Lindens will begin to remove every single post that has any fire in it at all.

If you don’t give people permission to simply do their best, and trust that they mean to do their best, you’ll end up with people who just don’t care at all. And we all know where that leads.

Dirk - Simply asking a group of forum participants to start parallel threads doesn't guarantee that it will happen. The ensuing Thought for the Day debate/discussion was, for the most part, contained within your original thread. And if you page back through that thread, your presence was, for the most part, mysteriously scarce. Come on man, don't play that diversionary game. You say you are a forum vet. Why, then, are you surprised that your devotional post, which totally lacked context, generated the response it did? That it vectored off into unanticipated topical areas is the nature of the forum beast.

I stand by my earlier post, Dirk. If you are not willing to invest in the lives of those you wish to "reach," don't open pandora's box, leaving the mess behind for the rest of us to clean up.

That’s alright Ulrika. I understand your problem, and I’m not out for fisticuffs on this topic. I’m a lot more likely to roll my sleeves up over your irrational use of double spaces after your sentences than to try to force you to accept religion.

However, I would like to suggest that there are more than irrational paths to religion. My own religious travels took me through most mainstream Protestant sects, a brief stop at Catholicism, a few Eastern and New Age tourist traps, and more philosophers than can fit in my bookcase. In the end, the path that led me to certainty was a path through the overlap between science and poetry. Bizarre, I’ll admit, but it was the only way I could resolve all the questions I had that usually waylay seekers. I, too, needed rationality - and a poetic mysticism. I found that it was useless to pick a religion and then try to convince myself of it. Instead, I worked out all my own issues with a bleak universe as far as I was capable of understanding it, and then looking for the best way to add hope to it.

So, no, I’m not apt to challenge another seeker with bits of dogma, platitudes, or other irrational sops. I may not always succeed in making myself understood, but I always try to work with understandable tools and precepts. My education was peculiar in that I was trained in a environment based almost completely on Socratic/scientific methods and which avoided derivative work in favor of original writings at every opportunity. While this makes me a bit rough on the civilians sometimes, it did force me to never accept worthless, pacifying pabulum as a resolution to a query. The truth is so much more bracing.







hehe Well, if yours is an accurate description of not only your own perspective, but the effects these various ideas have on all the other readers of these forums, then i suppose you’re right. But I think you may have left a bit of color out of your painting in order to improve the contrast. Having seen neither picture, I can’t tell you how I would have reacted. However, I am willing to assume that the picture wouldn’t have been deleted if someone hadn’t been offended enough to cause them to report it. Now, if I was the person with the badge at that point, it’s fairly likely that I’d have had to considered both the complaint AND the value of the posting to the purpose of the forums, to the progress of the discussion, and to the cause of truth. Frankly, a gif of Christ singing YMCA might have failed to impress me in most of those categories. If it was clear that the distress of the complainant was sincere and heartfelt, I suppose I’d have axed it too. And, given the restrictions on discussing players with players, I wouldn’t have been able to offer up a pleasing description of my deep contemplations. Instead, I’d just plain look like I did it wrong - at least to someone.

Again, if you keep asking for complete uniformity in enforcement, without personal discernment, you’re apt to get it. Once we insist that people stop trying to be humane to our enemies, we start down a path leading to the end of our own liberties.

[As for why Alby baits Liberals, I suspect he’s simply found a group that he could identify with, and part of his acculturation required that he disrespect and lampoon any ideas different from those his group shares. It isn’t very conducive to developmental thought, but it makes him feel all cozy inside We should keep that in mind: he - and his - are like this because it keeps them from being lonely and frightened. This is why I seldom actually try to dissuade or educate neo-cons. I may lambast them for the intellectual benefit of other readers, but I gave up thinking I’d change the Right a long time ago. By their nature, they cannot change. Not without much pain and courage.]







How does warning someone that you’ve got something offensive to them hidden in a file any different than whispering something nasty in a friends ear and then the both of you laughing and pointing fingers and the dope? I won’t go into all the ways I think “warning” someone is just another brand of abuse, but I will offer a better solution to your apparent need to post silly (to some of us) pictures. Let’s understand that all of these forums, including the Off-Topic forum, are moderated. They aren’t like usenet newsgroups, where everyone is equally vulnerable, and more or less equally armed. There is some poor slob who has to edit this forum to please all readers, or at least piss off as few as possible.

On the other hand, there are a lovely set of Group Forums that are moderated by people who do NOT have to please everyone. My own, for instance, was set up explicitly to be a place where my only masters are the members of my Group, and the driest interpretation of the Community Standards I can manage. What would be more appropriate to a Group gathered to discuss political comedy than a picture of Jesus on a pogo stick? How could anyone have credibility complaining that they were simply walking by, minding their own business, when your offensive animation reached out and dragged them - screaming and struggling - into the Politics and Comedy Forum? Especially if the description of the forum is accurate.

Sure, you’d have to gather a large enough contingent to convince the Lindens to give you a forum, but I’ve seen you work. I’m sure you’d pack them in. Hell, I suspect I’d even join, myself.

Paolo,
I'm sorry you feel that way, or more truthfully, that I"ve made you feel that way... I will try to live to a better standard. I don't expect anyone to clean up my "messes", so please don't try in the future. I'll do better to handle it myself...

Your servant

Nice post Kathy. I know that we disagree at times, as do we in parts of the above, but for the most part I agree with you. This was well thought out and well written.

Amazing! No one has ever commented on the fact that I place two spaces after a full stop before. I'm very impressed by your observational skills.

For casual users of computers (word-processor users), there exists a debate on whether or not one should use one or two spaces after a full stop (period marking the end of a sentence). The Wikipedia page discussing full stops states:


The reason I use two spaces is that I'm not a casual computer user. I rarely use word processors, working instead with either professional typesetting programs or simple monospace 7-bit ASCII text. I understand the difference between ex, en, and em spaces and dashes and use them appropriately. For instance, in the professional typesetting environment, typographically proportional text always has 1.5 spaces and monospace text always has 2 spaces. If the environment I'm working in supports typographically proportional fonts but cannot represent 1.5 spaces, I always err on the side of two spaces rather than one.

(By the way nothing I do is irrational and almost always has a two-page explanation which accompanies it.)

~Ulrika~

EEEEK... I use a 2-space stop too. Someone please wake me up, this is a horrible nightmare. Please, please, please say it isn't true. How can I go on? I need a Valium.

(This is in jest in case you didn't know Ulrika. However, yes, I do use the 2-space stop too)

Well, I confess that I tend to use it as a quick-first-glance rough indicator of someone’s tendency toward blind obedience Of course, it is only an indicator if the person is simply echoing the do-it-cause-we-told-you-to training of typing class, but it usually tells me what I need to know.






Actually, I disagree with many of the premises used in the wiki article - and a few of yours as well. What can you expect when the practice is so deeply ingrained in those most likely to have an opinion about it?

I’m a bit confused by “casual” and amazed by your classification of word-processor users as necessarily casual. However, I take your point that YOUR use of computers does not normally include word-processing, and that you have a special need for double-spaces.

I would like to point out that simply saying that extra space is the rule in typesetting doesn’t speak to the possibility that it’s equally unnecessary there as well. All of these habits came about in an effort to make machines with a high variability in spacing and placement produce more readable print. I would argue that it’s unnecessary now, and certainly not so important as to plague many thousands of typists with the habit of twice as much work at the end of every thought. It just plain a waste of energy and time. If it were just a tiny bit more effort, we’d have stopped it long ago. Or at least invented a machine that would....wait a minute, we did! We invented a machine that would relieve us of all those ancient rituals. I’m typing on one right now. And, I would wager, so are you. And most of the people who got this far in this blatant thread hijacking, are reading this on one of those new-fangled machines.

Here is a bit from the Chicago Manual of Style web site. It is gospel, true, but I did want to show that I’m not alone in my madness.:




As one who has spent many years cleaning double-spaces from countless files in order to lay them out properly in one of those trivial word-processing programs, I would dearly love to find a way to get the traditionalists to stop corrupting the future typists of America with a habit they will only need if they happen to find a particular job that requires it.

They’re still teaching it. And on computer keyboards running word processing programs, no less!

Well, this wasn’t quite two pages. But I really think we need to stop hijacking this topic and leave them to their donnybrook.

Only in the Second Life forums can a heated debate on religion turn into a discussion on the use of spacing after a full stop

actually, it happens all the time *sigh* for example I was participating in a forum about String Theory and Quantum Mechanics and it devolved into something trivial for page after page until the point was lost...

Yep. It's a fairly common practice in some of the more volatile newsgroups on usenet. It was one of the ways of cooling down the conflict that the alt.sytax.tactical trolls would create in order to drive the regulars out so they could take over and occupy a newsgroup. The first place I saw this type of cooling used well was in rec.arts.bodyart about 10 years ago. In fact, now that I think about it, I think the hot topic was something about Religious suppression of body art

I can’t account for why someone would use it in the middle of a civil discussion, though. That just sounds rude. Or someone got distracted - though a really gripping exchange would obviously preclude that.

Nobody minds an explanation, explication or discussion of personal faith, but by witnessing and actively proselytizing, a person makes a public argument and judgement that their personal creed is superior to and preferential to that of another person. That is just wrong. Whether we choose to venerate Christ or Oak Trees or Allah or Hanuman, nobody needs to be told that they are worshipping the wrong god or the wrong way. That is a personal choice that they make themselves.

Perhaps "casual" is incorrect. I'm referring to those who use the simplest available technology as opposed to those who use advanced technology (with no stigma implied). Examples of simple technology are word processors and web browsers. Examples of advanced technology are professional typesetting programs (desktop publishing suites). With a professional typesetting program, one can control kerning, generate ligatures, and choose where and when to use ex, en, and em spaces and dashes. These are advanced typographic features that are either difficult or impossible to control with the simple typesetting provided by a word processor or a web browser. The difference between a document that has been created on a word processor and a professional typesetting program is dramatic to the trained eye. I can spot the printed work of a word processor from ten feet away (I just did this last week).

Well, I do agree with you. It is unnecessary for the vast majority of people to use a double space for a full stop for many reasons. First, personal communications simply do not require the professional touch and extra overhead that a professional typesetting program provides. Second, with typographically proportional text, the standard full stop is a 1.5 space, which cannot be done in a word processor or rendered HTML (without some trickery). I'm of the mind that if one is using a word processor for casual use, that they choose based on their own preference how to represent the 1.5-space full stop (either 1 or 2 spaces). I prefer the longer 2-space full stop to clearly delineate between sentences and as a nod to the advanced typesetting I perform in my profession.

Yes! It is a waste of time for users of word processors but not for those who use professional typesetting programs. You see, a good professional typesetting program will automatically add in whatever full-stop space is required for a given book, journal, or magazine. No extra typing is required. The need to manually add two spaces to mimic the effect of a 1.5-space full stop is a personal choice for many to overcome limitations in manual typewriters, word processors, and web browsers (although I recognize that there are those out there who dogmatically adhere to what they were taught without such a deep analysis).

So the choice of whether or not to use one or two spaces is a not an issue to those using typesetting software. It's a choice made by the publisher and handled automatically by the software. Which is great that you brought up the following quote:


The final piece in the puzzle is that different publishers have different guidelines. For instance, the Royal Philatelic Society (RPS), has detailed instructions on exactly when and where a full stop is used, that differ from those used by the American Physical Society (APS), that differ from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). A professional typesetting program will automatically change its formatting to accommodate those different styles with no work to the user.

Again, removing double spaces is a problem faced by only those who use a typewriter or word processor -- (note that em dash) even the lowly web browser will automatically convert two (or more) spaces after a period into a single space. The fact that you are even aware of it is evidence of the limitations of the software. If we all used advanced typesetting programs, we'd simply have our style file of choice and the document would take on our own personal styles as soon as we viewed it (similar to cascading style sheets (CSS) in the browser world but more advanced).

But wait! There's much much more than the 1.5-space full stop that word processors and web browsers cannot handle. Below is just a small sample.

1. Note above that I put a space on either side of my em dash (follow this link to learn when to use a hyphen, en, and em dash). This is something which shouldn't be done yet I choose to do to improve readability because I don't have easy access to a real em dash.
   
2. According to IEEE, units should be set off from their numbers by a nonbreaking half-space, however a nonbreaking half space does not exist in HTML or MS Word, leaving users to choose either no space (against NIST formatting rules) or a breaking space which could split the number and unit at the end of a line. (I use a nonbreaking single space in both HTML and MS Word.)
   
3. In a word processor or web browser the rendering engine will not form ligatures from pairs of letters like "fi" or "fl". There is no workaround.
   

I could go on and on.

So that's why I use a 2-space full stop in HTML. It's not because I'm an automaton who unthinkingly adheres to prior teaching. It's because I have a deep understanding of the nuances of professional typesetting and I've made personal choices on how to compensate for the limitations of "common" software.


Oh yeah. We're off topic. Um. Jesus saves! (There, that'll cover this post.)

~Ulrika~

Good lord, that was boring.

Ha ha! It's like anything in life. It's boring until you're good at it.

I almost committed hari kiri at a dinner last week when I was trapped at a table with a man and woman who talked about deep-sea fishing throughout the whole meal. What made it especially torturous is that they both had unusual sinus problems which made it seem like they were snorting at each other across the dinner table like little piggies. I mean, get a kleenex and say hello to the other folks at the table for Christ's sake (obligatory religious statement to keep us on topic).

~Ulrika~

Um....WTH?

Um, why does that quote say it's by Prokofy when the post is by Ulrika?

It's a whopper isn't it?

I was thinking it was more along the lines of Gwyneth Llewelyn's or Kathy Yamamoto's detailed posts. In order to be a true Prokofy post it would have to be filled with irrational arguments, personal attacks, and unremitting paranoia.

~Ulrika~

My work here is done

Yawns

You're not going to reply? I've never seen you dismiss a good post written just for you before.

~Ulrika~

Aw, don't single one group out....there are many asshats out there from a broad spectrum of beliefs:
Christians, Muslims, Jews, Voodoo Witchdoctors, Republicans, Democrats, Liberals, Conservatives, Communists, Hippies, Nazis, Armenians, Gypsies, Robots, Hamsters, Shellfish farmers, Bavarian Brewmasters, Advertising Executives, Telemarketers, Chupacabras, Klu Klux Klansmen, Vampires, Superbowl Fans, Atkins Diet Fanatics, Anal probe-loving Aliens, People from Malta, Yetis, Armed Postalworkers, People who ask you to smell something when they already know it stinks, Policemen, Wal-mart stockworkers, Werewolves, Mascots, Insurance Salesmen, Computer Technicians, Wall Street Stock Traders, Subway Sammich Artists, Newspaper Editors, & Dental Hygenists....