On Apr 17, 3:40 pm, David <pchristain...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Wiktionaryhttp://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/polemic
>
> "The art or practice of aggressive debate, attack on
> or refutation of the opinions or principles of another"
>
> KEYWORD - "aggressive"
>
> -----
>
> Over the years SRQ has degenerated and many
> regulars bailed out. The reason is unquakerly
> polemics.
>
A little history here, having monitored SRQ for
a number of years now: it'll periodically become
a target for vast quantities of material that have
nothing obvious to do with Quakers, nor is it
directed against Quakers, except in taking up
lots of space in the shared file cabinet.
With modern filtering technologies, it's still
possible to carry on as if SRQ were just used
for its intended purposes, but in reality it gets
used as a convenient dumping ground for some
netizens -- like a landfill, garbage trucks backing
up to it, almost 24/7 sometimes (beep beep --
like near the start of 'Idiocracy', a favorite movie).
> To reform it, my policy is to answer it back
> whenever it rears its ugly head.
You can try this, though if the past is any
guide you'll get a lecture from Engineer for
doing so (about not feeding the trolls).
My view is it won't matter either way. A lot
of this stuff is cross-posted, might as well be
machine generated. Your replies may attract
little if any attention.
Best to treat it as a fact of nature, talking back
as like talking to the wind (which you're free to
do by the way -- no rule against it).
All that being said, nothing stops me from
posting here, as a Q, writing to other Qs, so
I can't say I'm really a victim or anything. Just
another guy with a mouse and keyboard.
>
> Further, I advocate that SRQers try to get on
> the other person's wavelength for mutual
> conversation.and learning from each other.
That sounds very Quakerly and in some
individual cases may work.
Keep in mind that Usenet was never designed
as an apparatus for M4W or M4B (meetings
for wor****p or business). Quakers can try to
conduct some of their business here, but
there's no guarantee that every technology or
tool is suitable.
I use the Internet a lot to do Quaker business,
unhampered, no interference, but for me (not
speaking for others) this particular newsgroup
is more just an archive for what I call my Qv2
writings (playing off the practice of labeling
something two point oh when it's revamped
or rethought in some way -- in truth we're
probably up to Qv543 or something **, with
many versions running in parallel, many forks
in the road ahead (doesn't mean we all broken
and inimical -- learned *something* from
evolution, we did).
Kirby
** when waiting to see Nancy at Friends House
that time, she let me stare at what we call
"Quaker guts" in the ante-room, that poster
you may have seen, showing the convoluted,
well-nigh intestinal internals of our Religious
Society to date. Let's see if I can Google it...
Didn't find yet, but looks kinda like this one:
http://www.dsausa.org/GIF/History.GIF
(maybe someone else will supply a link).
>
> -----
>
> David Christainsen
|
