hippiechick wrote: 

Would you all please stop fucking talking about me. I am not 10 years old.

I made the mistake of thinking that I could have a conversation about the subject.

You know, you all suck. 

 MsJudi wrote: 
Naww, I'm cool J. I can't respond at the moment (stove is boiling over and all), but thanks for your words. Will come back at ya later. 
 

 aflanigan wrote: 

Weeeellll..... shoulda, coulda, woulda. I think the topic name was chosen deliberately, and I don't have a problem with it... it's more specific than a more bland, "Women's Issues". I also don't have a problem with someone creating topics that are wholly and obviously partisan, as long as they don't get downright mean, racist, misogynistic, etc., in the title because it takes no effort whatsoever for me to avoid entering a thread I feel might be one-sided and sporting a particular bent.

I'm a live and let live kind of lady.

 Zep wrote: 
I guess that was, in part, my point. Why come to this particular thread to carry out a complaint against a particular poster? Just because she created it?

Here's where I'm coming from: I know very well the shit storm Deni can stir up and I've seen the anger and hurt feelings she has generated. When she makes a mess all on her own I don't come rushing to her defense- I let her take a bloody nose, as any good friend should. On occasion, I even point out to her when it feels to me like she's crossed a line. (For what it's worth, I treat everyone here this way, not just Deni, but she was the target this time, so I hope she forgives me if I use her just as an example.) I don't ride her mercilessly, I don't insult her, I don't assume that she's a terrible person because she's said something crass, crazy, or insensitive. Negative reinforcement only produces negative results. I call her out, politely, firmly, and yes, with respect. And then I let it go.

But when she (or anyone) here on RP is required to take shit for doing nothing more than existing, then it's her detractors I'm likely to take to task.

I raised a bi-polar daughter to a successful adulthood without either of us landing in jail for murder because I learned very early that people are complex. Sometimes we're good, sometimes we're awful. Sometimes we're a joy to be around, other times, we stink the place up. Sometimes we're warm and generous and sometimes we're so ugly and hateful that the people around us would like to stuff us in a hole and cover it over with dirt. If there's a perfect way to encourage ugly, hateful, awful behavior, it's to punish someone continuously, without surcease, no matter how they're behaving. Are they being a shit? Punish them. Are they being polite? Punish them for the last time they were being a shit. When you do that, what you get on balance is shitty behavior more often than not.

I try very hard to take people as I find them, particularly online, where it's almost a given that I don't know them personally and can't possibly understand all the nuances of their moods, meanings, and motivations. Today you're behaving like a reasonable, rational person? That's what you'll get from me in kind. Tomorrow you behave like a raving wackaloon? I'm bound to ignore you. The next day you insult someone out of hand just because you're in a crappy mood? I'll call you out, gently, and suggest you pull yourself together. Get loose on a Friday night and have some fun? I'm bringing the wine. I try to adapt to people's quirks and oddness because I have plenty of my own and I know that my bad days don't define me.

Now certainly, everyone here is an adult and has the right to feel about everyone else any damned way they please. If you've been insulted and hurt by someone here, there's no good reason that I can think of that you should automatically forgive and forget. But is it so difficult to just ignore those people who've hurt you? Is it necessary to follow them around the forums reminding them that you hate them and their living guts? How does that elevate the level of debate? How does that strengthen the community? How does that add content to the forums?

Zep, you probably feel pretty beaten up at the moment, and for that, I'm genuinely sorry. Like the example of Deni, I am using your post as a launching pad for my own essay about the occasional level of discourse I find in the forums... you just happened to be the one at that moment to wander into a thread and launch a missile at someone who was only looking for a discussion on a topic she feels passionate about; it could have been anyone else.

We're all free to behave in any way we want, and we should all be prepared for the consequences of that behavior. For myself, I'll try to aim a little higher every day. That is the way in which I hope to contribute to this community that I love so well. 

Peace.

 MsJudi wrote: 

Zep can speak for himself very capably.  I think the point is, topics that are started with provocative titles and rhetorical questions like "how can anyone (i.e. anyone in their right mind) vote for candidate X" seem designed to generate much heat and little light. 

HC doesn't seem willing to accept or understand that there are members of her gender who believe just as passionately in their core principles as she does, who plan on voting for Mitt Romney.  Rhetorical questions like "how can anyone vote for Mitt Romney" are really thinly veiled ad hominem attacks that imply that you have to be ignorant to want to vote for Romney.  Either that, or they reflect the cognitive dissonance that occurs when one encounters facts that conflict with your views (i.e. that actual women are planning on voting for Romney).

If we really are sincerely concerned that Romney supporters of either gender are misguided and simply need to hear the facts and be persuaded by passionate argument, this presentational approach of generating friction via forum flame wars is not going to help convince them that HC's truth should be adopted as their truth.  Engaging people who think differently from you in a civil discourse requires a nonbelligerent approach, IMO.  The topic here could have been called "Women's Issues".  She could have posted a neutral and sincere query such as "which candidate do you think has women's best interests at heart, and why?", or "which candidate do you think will provide better outcomes for American women if elected, and why?" and decided to consider people's replies considerately and respectfully, even if she thinks they are wrong. 

I think it's also appropriate to post links to articles that you think tend to reflect on a candidates thinking.  But you need to accept that other people may not interpret these links in the way you or I might interpret them.  They might also not place the same emphasis one certain issues (like contraceptives being covered by insurance or retaining access to abortion as legalized in Roe v. Wade) that you or I might.  We need to respect other people's right to think differently from us and resist the temptation to belittle and insult those who don't agree with us 100 percent.
We can have ardent disagreements with other people but they don't need to deteriorate into baiting and name-calling.  Starting off a topic in that vein, as Zep points out, raises the question of just what HippieChick is really hoping to accomplish by such behavior.

As an example, one of the websites you linked to, Planned Parenthood's War on Women site, cites funding cuts to Head Start as an example of the Republican War on Women.  Really?  Isn't this more an example of a war on children?  A conservative website like CWA seems to consider that the Obama administration is waging war on women because of the controversy over health care coverage of contraceptives.  They consider this an attack on women's religious liberty.  Again, this is a rather thinly-veiled partisan talking point that really does not seem to constitute genuine evidence of a concerted attack on women.  We can toss these kinds of talking points about all day long, but it does little to genuinely address how the outcome of local, state, and national elections may affect issues of concern to women.

 MsJudi wrote: 
Ouch! 

Ms J, the discussion I was starting was not along political lines. I am NOT trying to make anyone go away. I'm trying to encourage greater responsibility in posting in the forums.

"War on Women" was where the action was Saturday morning. It could just as easily have been "Things I Thought Today." 

 

 Coaxial wrote: 
That's pretty much what I do.

 Zep wrote: 

Hear, hear.

 Zep wrote: 
1. Then why are you drawn to this thread? I get the impression that you don't agree that there's a "war on women", so the subject itself should hold zero appeal for you. But yet, here you are, and in all truth the way it appears to me is that you're here merely to have at it with someone you don't care for.

2. I also believe that there is a true threat to women's rights and that those rights are very much on the line in this election, in particular. I'm not alone in believing that ... check out the War On Women site, The ACLU's blog site dedicated to the war on women, People For The American Way, The Daily KOS... and those are just the first few hits I got when I googled, "war on woman". Maybe we're all just HP, and therefore suspect? Or is there just possibly something to the claim that deserves to be heard and discussed without personal invective?

So now that you've contentiously browsed through several sites to help you confirm or deny the position, and heard from not one female voice on RP, but two, and since one of us is known for controversy and one of us isn't, where exactly does that place me on your continuum? Am I saying that I believe that my rights are in jeopardy because I'm also just expressing fear and anger and that I won't make any friends by doing so? Do you suppose that the ACLU is concerned about making friends? The Daily KOS? Planned Parenthood? Are we all just venting our spleen in a little-known online forum?

"If you want to be a member of this group, you must be honest with yourself why you are here." If your presence in this thread is to prove once and for all that there's no war on women, then join the discussion - and it would be awesome if you could do so without trying to make others feel that they should keep quiet and go away. If your presence, instead, is to express your dislike of one person, then I would ask that you take it to a PM where it belongs, and not pollute the RAFT with it.

(I'm all for calling out people when they've been boneheaded. I'm NOT in favor of wandering around the RAFT smacking down the people you don't like just for BEING someone you don't like + having the audacity to start a thread.)

 hippiechick wrote: 
We'd all like to know why you are so full of it. Can you explain where your hatred towards all of the human race comes from?

 Umberdog wrote: 
Sit...Stay.

 Zep wrote: 


Geez Zep, that may be the most lucid thing I've ever seen posted here. Mark me down for "to have fun" and "blowing off steam."

Thank you.

So... if you think like everyone else... and don't make any waves... you will have friends here?

What a pathetic ideology.

I could say more, but I've said enough.

 hippiechick wrote: 
Ok I understand a little better. It's not that you hate Romney, it's that you fear what might happen to your interests, which in this case are women's issues. Romney just so happens to embody the latest threat; in 2016, it will be someone else, and in 2020, another someone else, or other issues, and so on. It's the fear which leads to hate, which in turn leads you to clouded judgment. 

As I said before, this is not a political thread I want to pursue. Rather, it's how we conduct ourselves in this community. The effects of frequent postings along political lines leads to divisiveness and alienation, and it makes people edgy. That's why you see some of the reactions you do.  

I would ask you to ask yourself two things: what are your goals (say, in relation to supporting your political goals), and what do you want out of RP? And by extension, the follow-up question, can RP help me reach those goals? 

Are you, for example, attempting to build an action group or coalition? Do you see yourself leading a group of activists to influence lawmakers on issues? Do you come here to blow off steam? Or to waste time? Don't get me wrong - these are all legitimate reasons, and they are reasons, among others, why I find myself here. 

But if you want to be a member of this group, you must be honest with yourself why you are here. If it's to express fear and anger, you're not going to make many friends. If it's to be a leader for a line of thinking, you might find yourself with power on your hands. If you are honest with yourself, it will show through your contributions.  
 

I think there are good reasons to fear the Greedy Old Party. If people actually looked into what it's done to us, I think the ditto-heads that vote Republican, just because it's a family tradition, would change their minds and hearts. it would be like "Fiddler on the Roof" and people with minds of their own would reevaluate their responsibilities to their world. At least the optimist in me hopes so. I think most people want to do what's right; but they've been brainwashed. To me, the GOP are like all the villains in all the stories and movies made.
 

 Zep wrote: 
Are you aware that if Romney gets elected, he will be able to appoint a Supreme Court justice and turn over Roe v Wade? Are aware that he doesn't support equal pay for women? Are you aware that he is planning to eliminate birth control insurance coverage for women?

 

 bokey wrote: 
Why the hating Bokey?

 bokey wrote: 
*sigh* Bokey, this is what happens when the RPFBBL ends ... 

 Zep wrote: 
Zep, she is so far past insane all we can do is hope that BillG will punt her and maybe some of the hundreds of intelligent people she has driven from this site will return and her evil hatred will be no more.