KERRY FORUM SUCKS!

[ksatriyakiller]

Was over at the Kerry forum and saw this one thread by a person who said he supported Dean and his views. The person went on to say that he's been banned three time from the Kerry forum. Didn't really say anything bad in the thread he had started. Just was complaining about being accused of being a troll and getting banned for voiceing concerns about Kerry. He didn't last long as he got zapped into cyber-space. Dean people don't fare well there unless they just cheer lead for Kerry.

[Snoggera]

1. Let's see

it's a Kerry forum. Right? I'm sure there are still Dean forums to post at. Maybe that poster should spend time at one of them instead of trying to raise questions about Kerry at a KERRY FORUM.

[Ignoramus]

3. Why criticism is good aka symptoms vs. problems

If you only entertain ideas that you thought were good to start with, you run the risk of being mistaken, and then you are stuck following an idea that doesn't match up with reality, and this can lead to catastrophic problems.

By comparing the ideas you have with changing events, and not being inhibited by a desire to back up a cherished belief, you can make decisions that are more beneficial because they match the reality of the given situation, and take advantage of the specifics of the situation.

A symptom of a problem, is not the problem itself. A symptom of having a broken arm is intense pain. The intense pain is not itself the broken arm. So, if you simply apply morphine, you are only treating the symptom and not the problem itself.

Worse, if you were to give someone morphine ahead of time to prevent broken arms, it would not have the desired effect, because while you may prevent the symptom, you do not prevent the actual problem itself.

For the most part, symptoms are actually good, because they are what make you aware of the problem. In fact it is a good idea to take whatever measures are necessary to make sure that symptoms are not obscured.

If you think of criticism of Kerry as a symptom of a problem with the candidate or the community around the candidate, it should be your desire to support and encourage an environment in which symptoms of problems are not masked over, pummeled, insulted, screamed at, etc. Instead, the problems that the symptoms represent should be the target of such reactions.

[mitchtv]

2. it was decided long ago

when the convention was over the criticism of our candidate must stop. While that is an ideal, yourfriend must've stepped on someones last nerve.

[unkachuck]

13. exactly....

.....no one has ever accused me of being an enthuiastic Kerry suppoter, but the Convention is over and we've got a fetid Bush to remove....

[MoonRiver]

4. Why should Kerry put up with anti-Kerry smears and lies on his forum?

I'm glad he got banned. There needs to be a lot more of that, imho.

[Ignoramus]

6. Why totalitarianism is bad and democracy is good

Totalitarianism is based on the idea that there are the "good people" and there are the "bad people". The theory, implied or specifically stated, generally goes that problems will be solved by giving absolute power to the good people over the bad people.

In a group, it works out that there are the common people among whom it is not clear which are the bad people. The idea is promoted that some people are chosen or assert themselves as the authorized good people, and that the common people should trust the intentions of the people in power to decide who is good and who is bad and to dictate policy.

The problem with this is that good and bad are usually judged in terms of specific practices, and it is these practices which the totalitarians cite to portray good and bad people. But, people are not their practices. An individual person might engage in some "good" practices and some "bad" practices. It is really the practices which are good or bad in some context. So, it does not make sense to trust that an individual person or group of people can be absolutely good.

An alternative to totalitarianism is democracy. The idea of democracy is based on the notion that no person should be held in a position of absolute authority, because no person can be trusted to engage in only those practices which are considered good.

In an absolute democracy, there would be no elite group of people acting as authorities. However, this environment typically can not exist given people's fallibility, and in fact due to one of the premises of democracy, that people should not be trusted to know what is good for all.

So, various schemes of approximating democracy exist, but it is generally useful to hold democracy as an ideal, because it acknowledges the fact that people can not be trusted to be absolutely good or absolutely bad.

Further, despite being ill-founded and harmful to those who become victims to decisions made by the authorities, totalitarianism is actually futile, because the fact that the authorities can not be absolutely good, yet they prohibit criticism of any ideas proposed by the authorities, and because reality tends to differ with people's preconceived ideas (see the other posting in this thread about why criticism is good), it is inevitable that such a system will eventually clash with reality and be forced to come to an end.

Within a forum, democracy has shown to be most useful as a model, as opposed to totalitarianism. Of course, authority must be given to those facilitating the forum, but the more that authority starts to approximate totalitarianism, the less useful the forum becomes because it begins to conflict with the basic idea of a forum. A forum is for discussing, not simply agreeing with an idea. If a forum does tend to only allow agreement, it might as well not be a forum but be web log instead.

[MoonRiver]

12. Message boards do not model perfect democracies. Nor should they.

It is a ludicrous concept, because boards are easily infiltrated by the opposition and only banning and deleting can get rid of these devisive elements.

It has been my observation that only posters who disagree with a particular board's ideology complain. Those folks should find boards more compatible with their views.

[Ignoramus]

15. perfect no. democracies, of course.

People who are just trying to make trouble should be dealt with appropriately, as they would be in a practical democracy.

I would disagree with a board's policies even if the person being a nazi expressed views similar to mine. Duh!

No, I'm not going to let you people bully progressives into leaving, as I keep seeing around here.

I will fight what I used to call republicans but now have to come up with a new term for, whether they support Bush or vote with me for Kerry. You are not going to take over my country or this community.

[MoonRiver]

28. LOL! You have obviously seen the "enemy".

:crazy:

[sandnsea]

5. Nonsense

There's lots of former Dean supporters and most of them don't just cheerlead. But there's a few who do nothing but post garbage. The moderators know who they are and after a time or two, they do get zapped. Candidate infighting has caused more problems on that forum than you can remotely imagine. If I'd been in charge, there would have been NO posts about other primary candidates at all. You just can't imagine the hard feelings it caused.

[canuckybee]

7. I went to the forum

and started reading the thread on Republicans for Kerry....very interesting reading for anyone who has the time. That thread led me to an article which I had never heard of.

“Free-Speech Zone
The administration quarantines dissent" from 12/03

http://www.amconmag.com/12_15_03/feature.html

definitely worth a read.

[LibertyorDeath]

8. *

N/T

[Skip Intro]

9. Details are our friends

What was in that thread that prompted you to post here?

What did that "Dean supporter" say that recieved such a respoonse?

Why was that "Dean supporter" banned previously?

Let's hear the details...

[shawmut]

10. Can someone post a link to the Kerry forum?

I don't see it on the site. :shrug:

[oasis]

11. Why should moderators have to sort through negative posts in an attempt

to keep a few people happy who are slow to get with the program? :shrug:

The Mods have their hands full and likely haven't the time to fully comprehend the intentions of well meaning posters before giving them the boot.

[flaminbats]

14. What is a Dean troll anyway?

I was once a Dean supporter, then I voted for Kucinich in the primaries because Dean dropped out...

Is this Dean supporter still undecided? Please remember, in the real world nearly all of the Dean supporters are now behind Kerry!

The only other reason a former Dean supporter might be banned would be if he or she just wasn't civil, or simply decided to switch parties. But as long as Kerry bashing is avoided, questions and civil discussions about Kerry are encouraged!

[yardwork]

16. Let me get this straight. At this time you have 17 messages here at DU

It sounds like you are also new to the Kerry forum. On the basis of this extremely limited experience with both boards you start a thread here entitled "Kerry Board Sucks!"

Um, I don't want to be rude, but perhaps you should spend a little more time posting here before making sweepingly negative generalizations. Just my opinion.

[SoCalDem]

17. If you are invited to Bob & Carol's house for dinner,

it's poor form to continually comment on how lovely Ted & Alice's house is, and what a marvelous cook SHE is :)

Manners matter :)

[oasis]

18. I only visit Bob, Carol, Ted and Alice's house when it's time for dessert.

:spank:

[SoCalDem]

20. Don't you REALLY mean when it's a slumber party??

It cracks me up to think that when that movie came out it was SCANDALOUS... It was banned in my hometown.. but then so was "The Devil With the Blue Dress On".. (the record)..

[oasis]

21. Banned in The People's Republic Of California?

:wow:

[SoCalDem]

24. Kansas...

:)

[depakid]

19. deleted- looked again at the thread title

[flaminbats]

22. What do you wish to debate about Kerry?

What do you do find soooo lovable about Bush? I'm truly interested!

[Julien Sorel]

23. Waaaaaaaaaaaa!

The Kerry people aren't interested in being told how worthless their campaign is by supporters of a candidate they defeated! How unjust! How outrageous! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

[bloodyjack]

25. totally off-topic (am unable to PM you): WTF is your username about?

some of us might happen to belong to ksatriya lineages here, you know.

well I sort of do, anyway :shrug:

[Warren DeMontague]

26. Why Don't You Ask Dean who HE'S supporting. n/t

[Julien Sorel]

27. And on a different note,

it sure seems to me there are a lot of people here who make posts with the potential to start up Dean - Kerry discord. Probably a coincidence, I'm sure, but I recall the Republicans were counting on unhappy Dean people as a problem for Kerry.

[Warren DeMontague]

30. Yeah. I feel stirred up. Like many others,

this sort of thing makes me completely forget what an unmitigated disaster the Bush misadministration has been... NOT.

[LTR]

29. From someone who runs a few message boards...

People can do whatever they want with their forums. Message boards are not democracies, they're dictatorships. Or, to be more exact, they are whatever the person running it wants to be. Some are pretty tight (as I imagine an official Kerry board would be) and some are total anarchy (and read like a bathroom wall).

I've posted on Kerry's official board (think Dumbya has one? HELL NO!). They are strict. But they are also very fair. If you don't like the official Kerry board, or if you find DU to not be your thing, just Google "Howard Dean Message Board". I'll get you started:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&c2coff=1&q=%22Howard+Dean%22+Message+Board

[cindyw]

31. What makes you think this person is telling you the truth?

My experience, and it is qualified, is that people who complain to others about being banned for "nothing" or say that they did not post anything bad, are usually lying.

Keep that in mind.

Also, Dean people are welcome on the Kerry Forum. There are many there. Please stop trying to divide people.