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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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I make this post with some trepidation, but with absolute conviction. I think it is the first time I have ever instituted a new thread, which may indicate the strength of my feelings!
I am sorry, Tim, but I think that you have seriously over-reacted. I know that it's your board, but you do encourage debate. The mix of characters which the board attracts gives it its unique and supportive character, but strong views on moral issues are pretty well inevitable among such an eclectic bunch.
I think I might reasonably claim to have played a significant part in re-establishing the board as a venue for civilised debate when I challenged the validity of your view on including stories involving sado-masochism. It mattered not who won, or lost, but how we played the game!
You have a huge network of very personal contacts, as is a logical consequence of hosting a site of this kind and quality. The contributors to this messageboard are not privy to those contacts. They merely express their sincerely-held beliefs in the general context of life. There were passions here, but no flames. You have seen real flames, at The Shack and at The Glass Onion. Your board (with due deference to Comsie and Eggy) is on a rather higher plane.
I seem to recollect that I have only once sought to criticise you in the past, and it was for the same reason. You cannot pontificate about the manner in which views expressed on the board relate to your personal acquaintances - they are YOUR acquaintances, not ours.
Taking an objective view, I simply cannot see that anything said on the board justifies your reaction. You host one of the greatest and most useful gay sites on the net. PLEASE don't damage it by applying standards which are at variance with the very principles we all claim to support. 'If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen' may be a crude expression of what I am trying to say, but you can't have valid debate if you unreasonably limit the views which can be expressed.
I'd be happy to exchange posts with Tim on this thread, but I am not otherwise seeking support (although you should feel free to disagree with me if you so wish!) Tim and I have never met, although I hope that we may do so soon, but I owe him a great deal. Nevertheless, I claim the right to disagree with him where appropriate, and I think this disagreement IS appropriate!
L'Ecossais Pensif.
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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mihangel
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Likes it here |
Location: UK
Registered: July 2002
Messages: 192
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I have to agree with everything said by Cossie and by Trevor (in his post of 03.32 today under Victim support), because this rumpus affects the whole nature and ethos of the board. Like Trevor, when the bombshell burst I had no idea what it was about. I'd read nothing that seemed offensive, and had to plough back through the posts to work it out. And I'm still puzzled by your reaction. Had it not been for the unfortunate chance of a few posts offending an unseen reader, I very much doubt you'd have slapped down on the supposed malefactors.
Of course it's sad that someone has been hurt on a board that sets out to help. But it has to be seen in context. OK, the context may be more obvious to regulars than to casual visitors, but it seems pretty clear for all that. It started with your query about that anonymous and unidentifiable relationship: "Is it wrong?" From past experience, surely strong views were to be expected. And a blunt unqualified question like that only invites blunt unqualified answers. If the answers had given a unanimous "Yes, it's always wrong", I could understand a casual reader being upset. But they weren't. There was a spectrum ranging, when shorn of their wrappings, from "No, it's OK" via "It all depends" to "Yes, it's wrong." Had I (or, I suspect, most of us) been in that reader's shoes, I'd have been depressed by the negative replies, encouraged by the intermediate and positive ones, and aware that opinions inevitably vary.
"Judge not", you tell us. But some things we HAVE to judge. You seem to be using the word in the sense of "condemn" rather than "give an opinion on." But in hard practice both senses come to the same thing. Because we're not a court of law, our judgements have no force. They are only the expression of honest opinions. And all of us hold our own opinions on what one might divide into three areas of activity. There are black areas, totally beyond our pale, like rape, where we all judge and condemn without fear of reprimand. There are white areas where we would not dream of condemning, like sex between consenting adults. In the middle there are grey areas, areas where "it all depends," areas where we do not judge, do not condemn, nor yet give an unqualified thumbs-up.
The point is that we all define those grey areas differently: some wider, some narrower. To me, though others may disagree, exploitation of 11-year-olds (like Charlie) is black, not justifiable in any circumstances. I said so recently on the board. Following my conscience, I was blatantly and deliberately judgemental, but you did not reprove me. To somebody else, a relationship between an adult and a 16-year-old may also be black. If he's true to his conscience, he has to condemn it, just as I condemn what's anathema to me and you condemn what's anathema to you. Whether or not his post is wrapped in tactful wording or buttressed with arguments, it remains a judgement, a condemnation. But at the same time it is no more than his own individual opinion. Some posts include the phrase IMHO, many don't. But even if they don't (except where the subject is indisputable fact), that phrase is always implicit. Surely that is understood by any reader with an ounce of intelligence. There are no eternal truths here, only individual perceptions of what is black, or white, or grey. What you're in dangerr of saying, Tim, is "Your black areas are not the same as mine. Shut up!"
It boils down to this. Nobody gets rapped over the knuckles for saying "It's OK" or "Judgement reserved." But if, in response to the question "Is it wrong to exploit an 11-year-old?", I were forbidden to say flatly "IMHO, it's wrong," then I would consider leaving the board. By the same token, though a 16-32 relationship is not on my black list, it may be on others': why should they be forbidden to say so? An embargo on condemning rape would differ only in degree, not in principle. Ron draws attention to the notice by smith's computer: "If you judge people, you have no time to love them." I couldn't agree more, EXCEPT in MY own black areas, where I reserve the right to judge. I imagine everyone here agrees with the notice too, EXCEPT in THEIR own black areas. Which aren't necessarily the same as mine. Or yours.
You may well feel I'm taking this too far, that it's a matter not of what one says but how one says it. But is it? OK, there are ways and ways. But smooth words cannot disguise the basic message. At root, there are only three ways of answering a simple question like "Is it wrong?", namely "Yes," "No," and "It all depends." You got all three of these answers to your query, all of them honestly given according to the posters' consciences. That some of them hurt a reader is very sad. But you can't have it all ways. I hope that this board remains the great place it is, where opinions can be stated honestly and welcomed honestly. The alternatives are to submit to a sanitising censorship - which is what in effect you're proposing, with freedom of expression subordinated to protectiveness; or to close it completely. In both these cases everybody loses. Not only you. Not only us. But, yes, just as important, those unseen lurkers too, who surely draw far more inspiration from here than they find hurt.
Sorry to be long-winded, but to me it seems fundamental.
Hugs,
Mihangel
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I did not read your long post. It's undoubtedly well-written, reasoning etc.
BUT!
We know Tim's position on this matter. There's no point ARGUING ABOUT IT ANY MORE. So please just STOP, okay?
This debate has already offended at least one board participant badly, and it is making me VERY uncomfortable, not only because of the threat of closing down the board and all that.
This is almost all I got as far as moral support goes, and the dissent and emotions shown across MULTIPLE threads recently upsets me greatly, because this is not how I'm used to see this place.
I really don't CARE if you feel you are being censored by Tim's position or whatever. Can't we all just shut the hell up on this subject and let these threads get buried deep down in the back pages where they belong? (I'd rather have them wiped from existence, but that's not for me to decide.) I feel extremely uncomfortable by this whole situation.
Everybody knows the position of everyone else by now. Nobody's going to change their mind. Let enough be enough, and let us all get back to supporting each other in a kind and loving way like I am used to around here.
I haven't recognized the atmosphere here for several days now, and I don't like it at all. So PLEASE, STOP POSTING in these threads... You are all scaring me very very badly with what you're doing!
Do it via email if you have to debate the topic any further!
-Lenny
"But he that hath the steerage of my course,
direct my sail."
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act One, Scene IV
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cossie
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On fire! |
Location: Exiled in North East Engl...
Registered: July 2003
Messages: 1699
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I want what you want. I want this board to go on doing what is has been doing especially well for the last three or four months - bringing people together, to their mutual enjoyment, advantage and - occasionally! - education. Flames have found no favour here in the past, nor do they find favour now. But the attraction for me has been always been the free, rational and reasonable way in which the issues have been tackled. If I walk away I am abandoning the principles I found and admired here. I'm not conspiring against Tim - I'm simply trying to talk to him about a topic so important to me that I believe I must communicate openly on the board, not secretively by e-mail. It is, for me, a issue of integrity. Without integrity I see little point in coming here - but I have gained so much from doing so that I can't leave without fighting - albeit in a civilised manner - for what I believe in. Brushing the matter under the carpet is a recipe for an even greater disaster.
If we can't resolve this by talking, we will all be diminished.
For a' that an' a' that,
It's comin' yet for a' that,
That man tae man, the worrld o'er
Shall brithers be, for a' that.
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Is a treatment for a disease desireable if it's killing the patient? Because that's what this is doing.
It's causing more dissent than it's dissolving! That's why I have to speak up myself.
Tim knows your position. You know Tim's position. Trevor, Marc, Darren and whomever else has participated at one point or another in the discussion(s) in question know everybody else's position.
There's nothing left to debate. Anything further is just regurgitation, bordering on pointless bickering (no matter how civilly it is being conducted), since everybody already have their own opinion and has stated it.
Continuing this is totally contrary to what this board is all about. I don't want to brush anything under the carpet, because I believe putting an end to this is not brushing anything under a carpet. It's simply putting an end to something that really should be dead. We've exhausted the subject already.
Anyway, the closest I will get to stating my position on the thing that set off this ruckus to begin with is that I tend to lean towards Tim's position that nobody should be judged here for whatever reason, and this discussion you seem so eager to continue has leaned FAR to close to actually debating the right to judge, at least on this one particular issue. (And I don't think calling it a right to express one's opinion changes that.)
That's why it upsets me so much; the discussion(s) has created a harsh and cold climate that simply does not belong here. It has hurt feelings, hopefully only mildly, but that's bad enough.
I've said all I'm going to say on this. You can reply and get the last word if you want. No, I'm not getting off in a huff to sulk!  Reply if you want to, it really is fine by me. But I've said my piece now, and continuing to post again and again would be hypocritical of me. I want this to END after all.
If anyone wants me to clear something up for them or ask a question, my inbox is always ready and waiting. I'll reply to you from there on this or indeed any other issue.
"But he that hath the steerage of my course,
direct my sail."
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act One, Scene IV
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I will not go to deeply into this. But this discussion, even if somewhat tumultuous brings out real debate on a tough subject. I do not agree that Tim should censor somthing for the views of one or even a few if he chooses not to. But to me, the path is what is as important as the destination.
Let us continue to debate. Be civil and respectful. Maybe we will all learn and grow together.
GOD! I am so corny sometime .... ick.
Kevin
"Be excellent to each other, and, party on dudes"!
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A plea for tolerance. 
Cossie, Mihangel, Trevor, others whom it may concern: please read this 
