we have media consolidation, govt approved press releases blah blah now more than ever we rely on the internet for independence of opinion and unfettered voices. blogs and forums currently meet this need there have been posts by several of our members on par with the output of the more prominent journals and newspapers. dumbfucksci however prefers the national inquirer you will find that in an era of increasing censorship, it is this medium that has a chance of prevailing. you fuckers dont see that. you see only the trolls and one liners cos it makes you feel good. you justify your modships by the crap on sci. it characterizes your fucking existence you ignore value and emphasize crap your duties are approached with negative attitudes and punitive measures you then allow the results to define the whole of the experience why? dumbfucksci!
i just made a post in world events, history and posed a question in astronomy. See? i am a learner. i dunno nothing much. is that good enough for ya? geez, can i please have my boytoy thread now? it's cultural enrichment and enlightening current events from the far east. thank you Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I act as a mod on another (somewhat busy) forum - no prizes for guessing what it deals with - I guess you could call it a more tightly knit one. what it has that this site doesn't - the parameters for discussion (not just in terms of topics, but also etiquette eg -bad language) come from briefing the mods, not the guests (there are no posted "forum rules" ("section C 3.15: swear words and ad homs will not be tolerated and furthermore .....") - rather the standard of the material submitted clearly suggests what is acceptable chat link available for guests to mods to enable clear communications in case of misunderstandings/further queries understanding that mods are representing something greater than themselves (ie the mods are representing the site) and that guests must fit in with guidelines of behavior or face temporary or permanent bans (it is considered unprofessional for one mod to argue with another mod - at least publicly) all mods are given a questionnaire to test their knowledge base and also how they handle difficult/controversial/obnoxious issues (don't know if they do that here, but it doesn't seem like it) The tight focus is definitely restrictive (particularly for mods) , but thats the price you pay for focused discussion. If sciforums wants to take a similar path towards focused discussions, I think what it first requires is a consensus amongst the mods because they are ultimately the persons who form the "image" of a site. Simply axing a few sub forums or "problem case posters" is only a short term solution unless there is a framework of policy/vision to properly guide things. Personally I hope sciforums doesn't take such a path - the focus of sciforums is loose, but that is because what ever it has in the form of cohesiveness is powered by its informality. In short (despite the best hopes of liberals), informality doesn't foster focus of discussion (at least amongst opposing parties) - and tampering with that informality will radically change the persona of sciforums Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! I don't know how a balance can be struck between these two extremes Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Leadership (the modern, Western ideal), is the idea of imposing: control, censorship, punitive and proscriptive "powers". It's a crock. Eastern leadership is quite a different notion; but East/West notions collided thousands of years ago, and we're still watching the mushroom cloud. Or the mushrooms growing in all the shit, that's about the only useful thing been produced.
what is an example of eastern leadership? I find the notion of a force implementing control that doesn't have recourse to punishment/punitive measures difficult to reference.
Eastern culture has a far more rigorous class system. Thus, much order is imposed from the bottom up rather than the top down. There's far more flexibility in western culture than east.
Depends on how you view it. Westerners have always treated Asian, Arabian and African countries as subhuman. Just look at the genocidal population replacement as an example.
Also to consider is that English society did have a pretty rigid class structure at one point and likely still has one to some extent. That's part of the reason why India and England got along so well together.
They did steal snakes and ladders from us. *grumble grumble* We had a much cooler name for it. Vaikuntapaali Besides didn't all European society have the same class system, albeit of a more tribal fashion? I suppose the Nordics being more racially homogenous missed out on the differences due to physical characteristics stuff, though they appear to be catching up now with multicultural adoptees.
"A force implementing control", is indeed a notion that has a quite different meaning in Eastern philosophy. Your difficulty might be due to your being steeped in Western philosophical notions, which see punishment and control as the same. There's a definite clash of cultures, or ideas. Maybe someone from the East can explain the ideas of Eastern "leadership", or influence? (I'm unfortunately very much a Western kind of thinker, darn it) P.S. should have mentioned that Eastern leaders have been (and still are) just as dogmatic, proscriptive and punitive, of those who didn't bow down, as Westerners are. The Persians e.g. (Cyrus, Xerxes), were pretty merciless in that regard. What I'm talking about is the different approach taken by the likes of "gurus", and so on -religious teachers often ended up (still do) in positions of influence. I think the difference is that Eastern ideas don't see leadership as some station above, or more privileged, necessarily, than the ordinary people they are leading. Rather there's an emphasis on the relationship, and understanding the idea of surrendering--not one's freedom or fealty--but attachment to such things. Maybe.