I Will Be Restricting Access To Vocation Station

[Anselm]

The Octagon is an American kickboxing sport, where two fighters get in an octagon-shaped arena and beat each other senseless.

 

In that case I can't think how VS has ever been like that.

[brandelynmarie]

Thank you dUSt.:blush:

[ChristinaTherese]

The Octagon is an American kickboxing sport, where two fighters get in an octagon-shaped arena and beat each other senseless.

Okay.... Maybe it's the fact that I'm a woman, but I can't see why anyone would want to do that. :crazy:

 

In that case I can't think how VS has ever been like that.

Well... there's been a bit of a mess lately, I think. I've been offline for the last week or so, but I did start looking at one thread and think it was turning into a bit of a flame war. I'm pretty sure the same thing has been happening in other threads, hence dUSt wanting to do some cleanup around here. (One thread seems to have been resurrected only for the sake of a personal attack that has since been edited out by a mod, leaving absolutely no content behind.)

[Anselm]

 Disagreements will always happen, even when discussing subjects such as this. If problems are a recent phenomenon then isn't a cull of members and/or a tightening of membership criteria something of a knee-jerk reaction?

[brandelynmarie]

Not necessarily...charity & humility is needed when dialoging. There are certain patterns popping up in threads where this is not happening recently...

[PhuturePriest]

 Disagreements will always happen, even when discussing subjects such as this. If problems are a recent phenomenon then isn't a cull of members and/or a tightening of membership criteria something of a knee-jerk reaction?

 

This isn't new, it's been going on for far too long.

[Anselm]

Surely deleting members isn't an example of charity and humility?

[PhuturePriest]

Okay.... Maybe it's the fact that I'm a woman, but I can't see why anyone would want to do that. :crazy:

 

Well... there's been a bit of a mess lately, I think. I've been offline for the last week or so, but I did start looking at one thread and think it was turning into a bit of a flame war. I'm pretty sure the same thing has been happening in other threads, hence dUSt wanting to do some cleanup around here. (One thread seems to have been resurrected only for the sake of a personal attack that has since been edited out by a mod, leaving absolutely no content behind.)

 

I'm a black belt and have been doing martial arts since I was four. We get pretty physical and inflicting pain to toughen each other up isn't a weird concept to us, but we never get carried away with it. I don't see why you would want to beat someone up and get beaten up yourself. Fights are fun, but those aren't fights, those are bloodbaths.

 

And yeah, it's been going on for quite a while now. It's been pretty messy, and there have been arguments ranging quite a wide variety of things, including things that have nothing to do with discernment and Vocation Station.

[PhuturePriest]

Surely deleting members isn't an example of charity and humility?

 

No one said anything about deleting members. Dust simply said he would bar people from getting into Vocation Station because they are turning it into the Debate Table, when we already have one of those. This is about discernment, not debating. Debate about communities in the Debate Table.

 

However, it can be an example of charity and humility if we did delete members. If someone is harassing someone else and is being incredibly rude to everyone, it is not charitable to leave that lunatic running around harassing people. It is charitable to delete that member and stop him from harassing the community.

[AccountDeleted]

Surely deleting members isn't an example of charity and humility?

 

 

Anselm, dUSt isn't talking about deleting members. He is talking about restricting access to VS for those who can't discuss topics in a way that shows respect and courtesy for others, especially those who might have a differing opinion. If a person can't discuss things without becoming hot under the collar, then it is probably better if they spend more time in the rest of phatmass - Debate Table, Open Mic, Lame Board, etc. and leave VS - at least for awhile.

 

VS is a special place and it's important that the atmosphere reflect this. It would be uncomfortable to walk into a monastery or church and be faced with people screaming abuse at each other - simply because one expects something different in that environment. Here, we hope to be a loving and supportive environment for those discerning religious life or the priesthood. But instead, VS has become a place of contention that has made some people so uncomfortable that they have stopped coming to VS.

 

If you have other suggestions to help the situation, I am sure dUSt would be happy to hear them - send him a PM.

[Anselm]

Well I don't believe that that has happened. Besides, I've always thought that the very existence of the 'Debate Table' is silly since every topic on phatmass demands debate.

[Anselm]

'screaming abuse at each other'? Really?

[AccountDeleted]

Well I don't believe that that has happened. Besides, I've always thought that the very existence of the 'Debate Table' is silly since every topic on phatmass demands debate.

 

 

dUSt did ask those who had suggestions to PM him. Obviously if you don't think there is any problem, you probably don't want anything to change, but many people on VS have been upset and some have actually posted that they are not coming back because of it. And I have been personally attacked recently, on a thread that was old and out of date, for no reason at all. I attribute the attack to the atmosphere here that has made it seem ok to be aggressive and abusive to others. Honestly, something needs to be done, and dUSt is looking into ways to solve the problem. He should be supported in trying to do this.

[Anselm]

I think it woild be very sad if this became an area for those only well-known to Phatmass - was the abuse from new members? Also,how would new members join the newly restricted group?

[abrideofChrist]

FP,

I am not sure that dUSt is saying that he's going to ban people because they are turning Vocation Station into a debate.  What he said was that he is concerned about hostility.  Hostility happens when people start personal attacks on others because they don't like that person or that person's position.  We have seen many instances of hostility recently when people are implicitly or explicitly judged to be proud because they believe in Church doctrine, or too romantic, or too-fill-in-the-blank.  

If it were merely a matter of debate, I would think that the mods would have the authority to move a thread over to the Debate Table.  The fact that none of the threads displaying signs of hostility have been moved is rather telling.  

Personally, I think that instead online lynching posts made by clusters of hostile people who constitute themselves tone police, we should have a rule that says that any judgement on tone should be confined to PMs and the mods.  If a PM to the person who is making us react with the idea they are romantic or proud or whatever else doesn't work, we could turn to the mods, who can add tone policing to their responsibilities.