An open letter to all members
posted 18th Aug '12
An open letter to all members of baby-gaga.com no matter who you are:
Your forum is under siege, and right now it probably seems like there's no end in sight. This is because an area of the forum known as The Drama Corner or TDC has been allowed to become its own cultural phenomenon; a wasteland of vicious barbs, backbiting, and clawing and toadying for position and popularity. It had bred nothing but ill will and paranoia in people who instead of learning to work together have decided to band together in little groups for survival and prosperity at the cost of the enjoyment and happiness of other people.
It was never intended to be that. Ask anyone who was a member before it existed, and saw it implemented. It was meant to be a place for out of control threads to go to die, to keep the worst of the forum contained in one area. And for a while it worked, and you can argue it still works; but it doesn't. Not only has the section of the forum truly inspired the worst in so many of us, because we're never held accountable for our actions there, but it spills over into other areas of the forum. People attack en masse at the slightest provocation. People want to prove they're someone, and so they leverage who their friends are or how much muscle they have.
You have an admin that is arguably well intended, with a good heart, but one who is unwilling to make unilateral decisions that would benefit the entire community. You need to make yourself heard if you want any of it to change, if you want to be able to post again without worrying that the wrong word will make you the next target.
What TDC has bred is the root cause. So many of us become the worst that is in us to be, simply because we can, because there is no check on us, except our own consciences. Those have been in short supply lately, from a lot of people. Even if this current storm blows over, as long as TDC is allowed to remain a place where people can congregate and act in concert to achieve the worst, nothing will change.
So here is what I propose. Take an axe to TDC as it stands now. Delete every thread. They don't need to sit there festering. Originally TDC had rules, when there were supermods to enforce them. Now there are none, and there is no practical reason for TDC to exist as a place people can openly post and hang out in.
Want privacy and immunity? PTOT. It exists now, and we all use it. Want a chat group that's open to the public? Great, make one, but not in TDC. Abide by the same rules as everyone else, and don't hide behind the no holds barred nature to be cruel and vicious knowing you will never be taken to account for it. Chat groups in TDC simply enable us all to be our worst selves, and worse, to take glee in it and rile our friends up to do the same.
If you want to see a difference on your forum, know where the root of the problem is. TDC and the environment is allows to breed and fester. Call for it to be axed, and every thread that goes to TDC from now on to be automatically locked, so that TDC becomes once again what it was meant to be from the beginning - a place for the bad threads to go to die, and that is ALL. No more putting threads into TDC to avoid moderation, no more hiding behind the shield of "it's a cut throat place and you have to be cut throat to survive" mentality - it has done none of us any good. Look what it has done to our forum, and the division it's caused. Look at what TDC has been used for recently, and see if it has any merit in still existing as a place to allow this sort of thing to fester.
This proposal has already been brought to Mara:
"i'm going to mull over your proposal, right now it sounds like a good plan... this smurf is feckin' unreal. all of it."
Don't let her mull it over and then forget about it if this blows over, thinking that it won't happen again. It does, it cycles, and every time TDC and what it breeds in us is at the core. If you want your forum back, I think this is the only way to do it. Tell Mara you want TDC axed and you want the forum to be a place where everyone is once again accountable for their actions, everywhere, at all times.
If you don't agree with this proposal, ask yourself why. Do you want a place where you can be your worst with no repercussions, or do you care about the entire community and what this bullsmurf does to all of them? If you care, do what's right, stand up for accountability at last, because many of us have fallen far off track and this is the only way to fix it.
quotesmurfs?
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