to allow me to repost a wonderful essay from DailyKos comments here at corrente.
(Hat tip to DKos poster BeninSC.)
Of COURSE we can lift the discourse!
We do it every NIGHT here in Top Comments. Every night.
(Spoiler alert: this is a LONG comment. ;x )
The idea that we are too ’small’ or too ’few’ to make a change is the greatest challenge to democracy that we face in this country (I am certain it is not a feeling exclusive to here). It is a thought which builds depression consequences. Democrats, particularly in red states, ask themselves the same question, come voting time, and all too often the answer is, my vote isn’t going to matter, my vote is too small, too insignificant, too inconsequential … those voting like me are too few …
If you regard conservatives as a terrible political adversary, that is nothing compared to the inner adversary of the idea that there isn’t much we can do.
Please take time to read it all in its original glory here:
BeninSC.
I have taken the liberty of reproducing it just below.
I have been involved in a really nice thread, below, with Patriot Daily news Clearinghouse about mining for Top Comments, as TC diarists do it. That is only a portion of the picture of what goes into Top Comments each night. All of the diarists for Top Comments are also HOSTS. We try very hard to make TC a welcoming place for each night’s guests, a fun an interesting place to be, an online version of Cheers, where, if everyone doesn’t know your name, exactly, they at least know and regard your dKos nick, and try hard to recognize and validate your arrival when you come.
I know my time is limited each night since I get up around 5 am Eastern every morning, so I cannot rec and comment late into the night as I once did. Others do that, however. We take being fun and playful very seriously. ;)
Obviously, recs are a part of the dKos commenting system. They don’t mean much, neither does ‘TU status.’ But at least they are a tangible way of letting the commenter know ‘Kilroy was here.’ It is, for me, like a smile or a handshake of acknowledgement and approval. You cannot build a diary series on recs alone, however, it is built on comment threads.
When one works as a TC host, one has the opportunity to see very clearly how ‘energy’ works in the dKos community. Someone makes a comment within the diary, someone replies with a comment that adds energy to the thread. Not all comments add energy. Some comments - this kind is ultra rare in TC - drain energy, sap energy, work to kill the thread. Others bring energy, provoke thought, provoke further conversation and engagement. It can be a bit tricky following multiple threads in a given night’s TC diary, but TC hosts are very adept in that kind of virtual gymnastics. So we see many ways in which positive and dynamic comment energy works under the dKos comment structure.
People who comment more rarely have a harder time acquiring that insight into how energy moves comment threads. There are some other dynamics at play in a virtual comment field which don’t work well for building positive energy momentum. When there are conflicts, it can acquire a coliseum-like atmosphere, in which some come to cheer for the Christians (and add conflict-bolstering energy to one side), others come to cheer for the lions, and add conflict-bolstering energy to the other side. Egos become involved, no one wants to lose face, and before you know it, all the highly toxic energy all those individuals have ever stored up for ANY slight or injustice is brought full force into the fray. No, such threads are runaway energy, and it is all but impossible to jump in and arrest their momentum. The attempt to do so there is not very wise, really. It’s more likely that both sides will dump on the one who attempts it.
Most people know there are better times than others to discuss ‘difficult’ topics with loved ones, so they try to pick those times. The Dog Whisperer, Cesar Millan, discusses this very topic with a high percentage of his clients. They cannot get their dogs to do what they want when the dog gets excited. Cesar has an incredibly fine sense of recognizing the escalating stages of canine excitement. Many dogs can go from level one (calm) to level ten in a second or so. But they give off ‘signals’ that the escalation is about to happen, so he bumps or touches the dog in an alerting way before that escalation occurs, REQUIRING the dog’s attention, no discussion. The dog is like, what?! But they can’t sustain that escalation at the same time they are trying to decipher what he wants.
Obviously, human beings are a great deal more complex than dogs, but many do go through similar escalations when it comes to excitement. When their ‘blood is up,’ reasoning with them is all but impossible. My candidate diary last week (which in my defense wasn’t a candidate diary at ALL) talked a bit about Mahatma Gandhi (HE was the candidate I offered for consideration) and his brilliant peace movement. All of the most effective work Gandhi did was in the calm times, when his audience wasn’t escalated out of control. He taught when they could think, he prepared them for controlling their energy and their power when the challenges and provocations would inevitably come. He was probably the most effective teacher our species has yet had at reading human energy and in helping humans control their own energy from within, which is how it works best.
So, if you cannot help interrupt toxic threads, what can you do? First, remove your energy from those threads. Decline to read them, decline to rec them, not even individual comments within them, and certainly, refuse to add your energy to that toxic swirl. Energy has the unique property in our species of being magnetic, of being contagious. It can be very difficult to not be ‘infected’ in that atmosphere.
But the thing about life is, it’s short. And, moreover, there are infinite possibilities, infinite possible things we can do with out energy. What I like to see is Democrats using their energy in positive ways to elect Democrats, to promote a powerful progressive agenda. There are infinite ways to do even that!
So while it may seem at the time that we HAVE to say something in response to this or that, we really don’t, because a much better time will come for the communication, and better ways for it, too.
Put your energy and your attention in threads you want to encourage and reinforce. Watch how the infusion of your positive energy impacts the thread. Of course, it won’t always. This comment, for example, comes when very few will venture again into va dare’s fine diary. So it won’t get read by many, it won’t have much opportunity to animate. Many comments, however, DO get that chance, particularly in a fresh diary, with dynamic commenting happening. Or look at comment threads in last night’s diary which ‘took’ off. Look at the little bits of energy commenters fed into them to help them reach that ‘excape velocity.
The other thing Gandhi might highlight is, there is great power in being the change we wish to see. It ‘touches’ all those around us. It may not touch them with enormous influence all at once - what was the line in the old Moody Blues song Higher and Higher …
Blasting, billowing, bursting forth
With the power of ten billion butterfly sneezes- perhaps our energy will only have the power of a butterfly sneeze. But add a dozen, add a thousand, add a million, and before long its impact will be felt.
It does not seem like much when it is happening. But mistake it not, it will move mountains, and it does. Every candidate who ever won elective office won on individual votes which counted, every societal initiative which ever won the day did the same.
The power is greater if you believe in it. ;)
And, Gandhi might say that the deteriorating standards of behavior others adopt when they let their energy be carried away has nothing to do with you, if you don’t let it. Try to never sacrifice your standards in moments of passion. Think about what you are trying to accomplish. Which is to make this world a better place, unless I am very much mistaken. And ask yourself about the best ways to do that. Ways. Because there are infinitely many. There are ways with every person you ever meet. Use your passion and your power there.
“The opposite of war isn’t peace, it’s CREATION.” _ Jonathan Larson, RENT
by BeninSC on Sat Feb 09, 2008 at 03:54:32 PM GMT
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Front page
Pie in the Sky
Not following Dkos because it’s crowded and commenting is throwing a stone into the ocean. Furthermore, lately DKos has become Jonestown, the colony of the cult of Obama and I am scared to death of cults. Just look back at recent history: Nasser in Egypt, Hitler in Germany, Stalin in the Soviet Union. Cults always are associated with death in large numbers.
My perspective on comments to Netroots posts is as a commenter. Most of the comments I see are pure garbage, many are insulting, there are many food fights and there is a small percentage of constructive, thoughtful and honest posts.
I find that the piece from DKos in this post to describe unbelievable and at the very least a wide deviation from the average I see.
facebook, GOS
it hardly matters. the Kidz are taking over; and boring, spelling-focused, puctuating mofos who also have grey hair and don’t read manga don’t have a chance. the OFB
is another good example of the youth rabble ruining our nice, clean, Serious
intertubes.
the direction of political discourse is going to continue to be toward the more lazy, sloppy, insulting, vulgar, and shallow. until those things stop being in fashion, and unless some people learn that there is value in things like “books” and information sources that don’t sing and sparkle and have images of horny naked girlz.
so i’m not holding my breath.
All part of the training, koshembos
SacBee:
So now I know why that was the standard tactic on DK. And now I know why the Obama Fan Base there ran out of talking points so fast. They were not trained for that. So the reversion to abuse was the only remedy, once the conversion narrative was challenged.
Fair enough on Ganz (though I don’t think this Democrat ever lost his values). But then there’s this:
It seems obvious to this writer, that if one were to reason from evidence, it would be extremely easy for Obama campaign tactics to be confused with those of a cult—or even to morph into them—and therefore for some Obama supporters to be confused with cultists by some targets of the conversion efforts.
Although, since this particular putative reasoner is a “liar,” “dishonest,” a “racist,” a “shill,” “ignorant,” has reading comprehension problems, wants the Democrats to lose, and is paid by the Hillary campaign, and has been told that many, many, many times in so many words by Obama supporters, it’s equally obvious that what he dishonestly and disingenously claims to be seeing isn’t there, and that therefore what he writes is not merely deeply offensive, but dangerous. I guess I just don’t learn. Mission accomplished. The values of some have been communicated with complete fidelity, despite all the efforts of the planet Mercury to prevent this.
Sigh. So much for five years of free work and a few thousands of dollars in server costs. Politics ain’t beanbag. Not that I’m bitter.
Happy Valentine’s Day.
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
it's 1991/2 all over again, or: who paid attention the 1st time
around?
irony is so dead.
anyone else remember the silliness about bill when he was still the Darling Underdog Boy flavor of the month with the SCLM
? i guess that was too long ago for the OFB
. but here’s the thing- i have read scores of pieces that dwell on the Clenis’ magic powers of making anyone near it Fall in Love. behold, it is Mighty, and it woos the weak and the soft. sorry, i’m getting ahead of myself: there was a time when clinton was the exciting, darkhorse, come from behind in an overwhelming wave of love, built upon the Hope of progressives candidate, and he was going to save us all…and the media went along with that. they ate up his narrative: he beat the Inevitable of his day, and assumed that mantle, shining. hope was all over the place, as well as some small town…
anyway, we all know what happened to poor bill. he was made to sign DOMA and NAFTA and welfare “reform” and DCMA and a bunch of horrid, anti-progressive crap that forced us closer to where we’re headed today. he didn’t totally suck, but he “shore t’warnt” progressive. enough progressives hated him enough to vote for naydar in 2000, and gosh looked how that turned out.
did i mention the same media who loved him, when Poppy was ’weak’ and smeared his lips with the cum of ’yes new taxes,’ who elevated and lauded Bill (no one calls him “Bill” lovingly anymore, have you noticed that?) and made him look sexy in the debates (oh, ross! those ears!)…what, you’ve forgotten? once, bill was a media darling like once, fox news told democrats that hillary was inevitable.*
they love Barry now. and he’s not just dashingly handsome and able to make supporters lose all will with the bat of an eyelash, he’s a black man. a real one, not “the First Blaque Prezident.” an Alabama Blacksnake, to quote a fav movie of mine. you don’t think the media isn’t going to utterly destroy his “brand” right now, in favor of one that is the polar opposite of how they love him today? they will join with their monied masters to force him to sell out progressives, every time, in order to pass anything, any legislation he proposes. look at his econ advisors, his religious advisors, his plan to expand the military.
where do you think the money for those programs is going to come from, now that bush has ruined the economy and the dems failed to end the war? china? sure, so long as we’re willing to sell off our banks and resources to them and the saudis. what progressive regimes those are, i look forward to them calling the shots here, don’t you?
obama may indeed be a progressive, but he won’t be allowed to be one as prez. or have you forgotten the 90s so soon? that is the price you pay for “unity” or as we called it Back in the Day, the “Third Way” and “triangulation.”
* ironing knees
* i wanted to apologize for overvaluing that in some of my posts, i sort of bought into that too.
and, “irony is dead” because the same thing that elevated and martyred and sustained hillary, the same DLC, middle course, media gaming BS that she and her husband rode to power on, is going to be her political downfall today. by a guy who repackages it and makes her look tired and old, when in fact it is as least as much of a “change” to have a wombman preznit as what he’s offering. again, look at me kicking irony in the face. i wish i knew some funkadelic poetry or lyrics about mirrors, wheels, and illusions. he is/she is/is not/are not/will be = (hidden) so similar.
I played that song for you already, CD
“The same as it ever was.” The white guy dances:
And the live version:
Well, how did I get here?
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.I forget how good Talking Heads was
I didn’t get them then.
I’m just slow I guess.
Jake
Twenty five years ahead of their time, jake
Try this one, and think FISA:
Why stay in college? Why go to night school?
Or this one, which I can’t embed.
But why re-listen to the tired songs of the 80s?
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.Meta, meta ...
I see I have thrown this thread, which was originally about threads, off topic.
Sorry….
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Even so,
thank for pointing to Talking Heads.
David Bryne may be aspergers - according to David. Interesting. I read that after watching him today, but the first thing I thought, watching him, was that his intensity and focus is aspergers in action.
Jake