On Sat, 4 May 2002, J. van Baardwijk wrote: > I do not believe it would make any difference. If someone, say the employer > of listmember X, would find that site and see that X often ressorts to > personal attacks to try and win an argument, do you really believe it will > make any difference for said employer whether he finds it on www.Brin-L.com > or on, say, www.vanbaardwijk.com?
I'll try to put myself in that employer's shoes and imagine my reactions to the two versions of the site. 1: If I go to Brin-L.com and find the site listing listmember X's personal attacks, then I have the feeling that I'm on the official site of the Brin List. I'll assume that the Brin-L "web of shame" is a catalogue of misdeeds produced by a consensus of listmembers for the purpose of governing Brin-L. I'll assume that listmember X is on the web of shame because it was the consensus of Brin-L to put him there. 2: But if I go to vanbaardwijk.com and find a similar list, then I know that I am reading summaries of Jeroen's personal judgments about listmember X. Knowing that the web of shame is an individual's project and not a community project should make me much more skeptical of the picture it presents. If I think all of Brin-L condemns listmember X, then I'm strongly pushed to conclude that listmember X is someone who can't get along with people in general. But if I think that only Jeroen condemns listmember X, then I'm more inclined to conclude that listmember X has a problem getting along with Jeroen, and vice versa. Scenario #1 is vastly different from scenario #2. Moreover, if the "web of shame" backfires and makes the accuser look worse than the accused, then putting it on Brin-L.com casts all of Brin-L into a bad light. If the "web of shame" is on vanbaardwijk.com, it only puts Jeroen in a bad light. Unless the majority of Brin-L endorse your idea, I think you should air your grievances as belonging to you alone and not to Brin-L in general. > How can you rebut statements that were clearly intended to hurt the victim? > How, for example, would you rebut a statement like "you live in a paranoid > fantasy world"? The only way to rebut *that* statement is by explaining > that we were discussing the setup for a role-playing game we are designing > -- but in that case the comment would not and could not be seen as an > insult and thus would never make it to any Wall of Shame (or whatever you > want to call it). The second way to rebut it is for listmember X to explain the things that prompted him to make the statement, trusting that most readers (at least, the readers most likely to matter to him) will agree with the writer's overall POV and assessment of the situation, thus excusing the inflammatory remark. Listmember X's argument will not be, "I didn't make the remark" or "That remark isn't a personal attack;" rather, it will be, "Under the circumstances, the remark made sense, and besides it's only a mailing list and the creator of this 'web of shame' is way too touchy for his own good." > We clearly disagree on the definition of "threat". I do not see such a site > a a threat, but more like the penalty the state imposes for breaking a law. > Pointing a gun at someone and saying "do this-or-that or I will shoot" is a > threat. The state's penalties for lawbreaking *are* enforced at gunpoint, Jeroen. (In the US, anyway.) Even if your local police don't carry firearms, the *threat of force* is what the state uses to enforce the law. Hence "enFORCE." But Jeroen, you are not the state. No one here to my knowledge has granted you special authority of enforcement. There are really two definitions of "threat" at stake. The first definition of threat might be "a palpable danger, a genuine risk of harm." For this definition of threat, your "web of shame" idea might actually pose very little threat to listmember X because few people will likely read it and fewer people will care. Still, it presents a tool that someone with a grudge against listmember X might find with a quick Web search, so the threat is not zero. The second definition of threat has to do with intent and might be defined as, "the promise of retribution in order to deter or prevent a given behavior." You have said that you want to use your "web of shame" to deter personal attacks on Brin-L. The ONLY way a web of shame could accomplish that goal is by increasing the likelihood that making a personal attack on Brin-L will bring real-world consequences down on listmember X's head. By offering your "web of shame" idea as a possibility, you have basically issued a threat to all listmembers which says, "If you engage in personal attacks, I will put your name on a website that solicits real-world harm to you in retribution for your actions." It is this second definition of threat that I find most disturbing, and it is this definition of threat that perfectly matches your proposed plan. > But then, if I say "if you do not maintain your car properly it will break > down", there will probably be *some* people (especially Americans) who will > see it not as good advice but as a threat that I will sabotage their car... No, you'd have to word it thus: "If you do not maintain your car properly, I will repossess it to penalize you for your negligence." <g> > In the past I have tried the approach of telling people personal attacks > are not nice and therefore they should refrain from that. I have tried > telling people that if they want to accuse someone of something they should > also provide ample proof for it. Unfortunately, that approach seemed to > have failed miserably. There are a couple of reasons why, in my opinion. 1) We (those who criticize you the most) have become somewhat complacent and have allowed the conclusions we've drawn to overshadow our manners. Bad us. We should do better. 2) Nobody likes to be told how to act. Your approach to interpersonal relations seems to rest on telling people what they should do, insinuating that perhaps offenders should be booted from Brin-L (see the last dust-up over JDG), and offering authoritarian solutions like webs of shame calculated to deter behavior you don't like with the threat of real-world repercussions. I think you'd have more success if you were to approach the people with whom you have difficulties, apologize for your part in past unpleasant exchanges, and offer to wipe the slate clean if they'll do the same. I'm willing to go that route. How about you? Marvin Long Austin, Texas "Never flay a live Episiarch." -- Galactic Proverbs 7563:34(j)
