New Forum Idea

Ok, for those of you who can't stand me or my politics, please just consider this before you rip me a new one.

The thing that I HATE about the courthouse is the personal insults that end up polluting any chance of a real debate....you already heard my rant on this before. I realize now that it really would be impossible to make any real progress toward being more civil to each other given the distict differences in opinions and overall lack of maturity. I am as guilty as anyone.

I started thinking about all the people on this site that don't want to wade through this swamp but still have an opinion. I thought it would be a cool idea to bring ALL the forums together with one section that would get more people interested in sections they would normally not consider.

Confused yet? Here's the idea, we call it something like "The Voting Booth". Nothing changes in any forum including the courthouse....no additional moderation. Let's say someone is really pissed off about something or someone in politics (as usual) and the debate goes into the normal direction of personal insults and childish broad brush accusations. The thread can continue to it's normal worthless conclusion OR, it can be taken to The Voting Booth where the issue can be voted on by EVERYONE on 285bound. So instead of just watching liberals back up liberals and conservatives backing conservatives, we could let the less partisan members pick who made the best points. We make it short and sweet by just giving the participants 24 hours to go back and forth and then lock it for voting (there would be no voting end date). My guess would be that it would be more often a one on one but if several people wanted to chime in, you could make the poll with as many choices as needed.

The great thing about this idea is that it can be used for any forum. For example, lets say a couple people in the The Sports Field are arguing about which quarterback should start for the Broncos. Both state their cases and then they get to see who gets the most votes. Voters can remain anonymous or can explain their vote as well. Anthing could be voted on from the best recipes to how to keep bears out of your yard. Ya, some silly votes too but who cares, its all for fun.
For courthouse addicts, it would be interesting to see who would participate in something that so many people would see. Would the nastiest insult slingers just stay away because they are incapable of civili debate or just don't want to reveal their immaturity to the entire community? My guess is that those who thrive on insults, would be the least likely to participate...fine with me. Or, some may want to change their ways a little and resort to logic and reason for a change. We would also see who has the guts to put their ideas out there and let the community votes call the debate and not the partsan cheerleaders. This could also draw in some new people to the courthouse....wouldn't that be refreshing?

What do you think?

While I understand the sentiment, I'd almost have to chalk it up to wishful thinking. Consider the population here, basically the idea only works providing there is a new influx of that population. For lack of a better explanation, what you have is a corral full of brown cows, you can offer all the new amendments to their environment as you wish, but you still have only brown cows. Sure you can leave a gate open, but cows from other areas know the reputation of those brown cows and aren't always savvy on mingling with them.

So in essence you're stuck with what you have here, and unfortunately that includes many of those individuals who are far more brave on a keyboard than they are in person. They don't dare spew insults in person but instead of rationalizing with civil sense they opt to sling insults and resort to name calling like a bunch of middle-schoolers in a Social Studies class, because they have the safety of a computer. They don't know how to be civil in person and you can't even ask them to participate in a live debate. Thus the only way to control them is through moderation.... A touchy subject here, but understandable.

PineCam's problem is that the governing forces are not willing to leave their own personal views out of any debate whether they are participating or not. Thus you can present the most civil, well thought tactic for debate but if a moderator disagrees with it, you're put on some BS suspension, time-out, or possibly banned even though you never broke any rules. I've been there. But same sort of thing, confront those people in person and they call Park County on you due to the fact they lack balls and brains.

I still haven't figured out why so many other forums I'm a member of, do not have the lack of civility that ParkCo,JeffCo community boards seem to have. Its almost looking like people in the mountain communities are unable or unwilling to use intelligence rather than insults.... but that's just my opinion.


Badger

BadgerKustoms wrote: I still haven't figured out why so many other forums I'm a member of, do not have the lack of civility that ParkCo,JeffCo community boards seem to have. Its almost looking like people in the mountain communities are unable or unwilling to use intelligence rather than insults.... but that's just my opinion.

Some people move to the mountains because of the beauty and closeness to nature.

Other people move to the mountains because they have "Rugged Individualist/Mountain Man" fantasies and/or simply can't get along with other people if they had to live in closer proximity.

The second group seems to be somewhat over-represented on this and other similar forums.

People steer clear of the Courthouse, the Ring and the Study for a reason. I don't see any reason to bring them into the fray to validate anyone's views around here.

Why do you want to have a winner of these little "debates"? Face it, everyone has an opinion and if the method of their communication bothers you, why not call everyone out on it when they do it? You HATE the insults, why not point them out whenever anyone for whatever side does it? We are not all going to agree on ANYTHING, no one is convincing anyone else that they are right and the other viewpoint is wrong. We are all just wasting time in here posting links or our thoughts and opinions on issues, there is no debate. Most of the posting is done with the intent to incite the posters with the other viewpoint to react and froth at the mouth. Many of the posts you see on here have no other purpose than to create a stir, to get someone to post something ugly back so they can jump all over them or to sit in front of their computer and delight in the anger and frustration that they have created while remaining faceless behind a computer screen. It has even moved into threats and schoolyard fight talk lately. The posters who do this LOVE to drag people down into the mud and watch them thrash about.

You want intelligent conversation/debate in the Courthouse? Start by calling out everyone on their BS in here and I do mean EVERYONE. When someone complains, it is always about the "other" side, never their own.

I think you guys are missing the point. It's just a section of polls that is for EVERYBODY in every section. If someone goes in and doesn't see anything they want to participate in (as in voting), they just move on. What is the downside here?

Don't be so locked into the norm, it might be fun to bring everyone together for once. And as I said, it doesn't have to be serious stuff, two people could be arguing about the best rock band ever or the best way to deal with a bitchy mother-in-law. It's just not as serious as you all are making it.

I like the idea of polls.

Oh, and MOO.