A bi-partisan idea

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by Surfer Joe, Jul 27, 2019.

  1. Surfer Joe

    Surfer Joe Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I think that one of the main problems with the "news" media today is that there is way too much of it and the competition for ad dollars encourages people to turn journalism into an endless diarrhea of nonsense that corrodes the brain and enables manipulation of weaker-minded individuals by special interests.
    Just like watching mindless violence can desensitize a brain to violence, the endless barrage of tripe posing as news or punditry can desensitize a brain to what's really important and allow special interests to implement agendas that are harmful without drawing quick attention.
    People become useful idiots, prattling on mindlessly about things they don't really understand, and become unable to discriminate between the banal and the serious challenges facing us all.

    I think that the same excess spills over into social media platforms such as this forum.
    Does anyone really need to write 25 or more posts per day to a single forum?
    Think about it.
    Assuming that a person sleeps and works for 16 hours/day, that means that they are having to write posts at a rate of three/hour during all of their free time to reach that target.
    And there are many posters who have even higher daily post averages.
    How thoughtful can any of this really be?
    It's more like spamming than thoughtful discussion.
    And how sad that someone doesn't have something better to do with their free time.

    I would like to suggest a policy that limits posters to a maximum of 5 posts per day total.
    You can write the most white nationalist or far left stuff that appeals to you, but you can't post more than 5 messages a day. Use it or lose it. Across all forums on the site.
    It might encourage people to actually think before wasting their verbal ammo and it would certainly improve the tenor of the forum not having to wade through tons of mindless verbal diarrhea by the same person.
    It would also help to control the paid agents or robots or those who just want to push an agenda instead of discuss ideas and policies, as is the stated goal of the forum.
    If some people have a pathological need to post incessantly, they can join multiple forums and spread their pearls of wisdom far and wide.
    Your opinions are welcome. (Mods, if you feel that this is in the wrong forum, please move it.)
     
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  2. Derideo_Te

    Derideo_Te Well-Known Member

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    The OP makes a good point about the quality of the posts and as someone who does have the time to write many posts per day the proposal to limit them would have an impact on my participation.

    So let's examine this proposal from all sides so as to determine the pros and cons from all perspectives.

    The OP is correct that wading through a great deal of dross is tedious and time consuming.

    There certainly is room for improvement in the quality of the content of the posts, my own included.

    Thinking before responding would be a good idea albeit unenforceable.

    Establishing ways and means to control the bots and other malicious content is a good idea.

    There are already some who post on multiple forums but unless ALL forums implemented a posting limit that would merely drive members away from this forum IMO.

    Driving members away, for whatever reason, is a bad business policy for the owners who rely upon content to obtain revenue to run the forum. I know from personal experience what happened at another forum where this occurred and the negative results that ensued.

    Each member does have the ability to filter the content that they want to see via the Ignore function. Speaking personally I can say that it saves me a great deal of time.

    Raising the quality of the posts can be achieved via other means given that limits are counterproductive. For example highlighting and rewarding posts that are well written and make relevant points would allow members to browse those as a category like New and Watched. This category could be used to attract new members to the forum who appreciate such content.

    One last point is that perhaps this OP should be under Member Casual Chat or Announcements & Community Discussions.
     
  3. nra37922

    nra37922 Well-Known Member

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    I DO AGREE with your post 100%

    But if one is unemployed and/or sleeping in their parents basement what else can they do?
     
  4. RodB

    RodB Well-Known Member Donor

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    Very true. The media "problem" began when Ted Turner started CNN with 24-hour telecast of news. There wasn't enough real news to fill the time so they found other stuff to broadcast disguised as news. However, this doesn't explain why most went to hate and bash Trump as all the other stuff and most of the news.

    I don't buy your limit of 5 posts per day on this forum however.
     
  5. perotista

    perotista Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Most of the posts on this site I tend to ignore as they're for the most part either virulent pro or anti Trump. In my opinion most aren't based in reality, but are poisonous very partisan views and rants. I'm not sure limiting a poster to five posts per day would accomplish anything as to making their posts more meaningful and thoughtful. I'm sure that these posters are posting their heart filled beliefs. They're the ultra ultimate partisans.

    As for the news media, we know they have taken sides in our political battles and no long just report on those battles. Trust in our news media to report the news fully, fairly and accurately has taken a dive. Only 32% of all Americans have a great deal or a fair amount of trust in our news media to report the news fairly, fully and accurately. This trust is down from 72% in 1976, dropping down into the 50 percentage range during Clinton and G.W. Bush, then falling all through Obama to 32% today. In other words, most of us know we're being fed propaganda when it comes to political news.

    https://news.gallup.com/poll/195542/americans-trust-mass-media-sinks-new-low.aspx

    If you are an anti-Trumper you tune into CNN and MSNBC, you know your going to get the news in that manner you want it. Very anti-Trump. Pro-Trump, you tune into Fox. It seems to me that the cable news networks have become nothing less than propaganda wings of our two major parties. This feeds the partisanship and helps polarize us more and more. This leads to more and more posts virulent pro or anti Trump. Feeds the distrust between our two major parties and their political philosophies.

    It used to be that both parties, ideologies, philosophies recognized that the goal of each was to attain a prosperous and secure America. Only the paths taken was different. Today, each view the other as out to destroy America, each accuses the other of hating America, calling each other all sorts of nasty names. I don't thing limiting those who do this to five posts would change much if anything. It probably would cut back the number of posts by two-thirds though. These folks don't think, they just spew their hatred of anything that differs from their point of view. My take anyway.
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2019
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  6. nra37922

    nra37922 Well-Known Member

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    Simple solution to the "problem"

    Look at the Topic and then the Poster. After awhile one can figure out if its worth opening or not.
     

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