Gay intolerance in threads?

February 10, 2003 4:54 AM

I wonder where this is going?
posted by hama7 to Etiquette/Policy at 4:54 AM (37 comments total)

Is this something that really needs to be wondered outloud?
posted by adampsyche at 5:20 AM on February 10, 2003

I posted a thread about students using blogs as a weapon of homophobia towards other students at their school.

Your response was to post a picture of Kiefer Sutherland. Could you elaborate on the connection? It's not immediately obvious to me. Thanks ham.
posted by djacobs at 5:21 AM on February 10, 2003

i wonder why hama7 wonders.
posted by zerofoks at 5:21 AM on February 10, 2003

I wish I hadn't mentioned Bill O' Reilly in the post. We all know he is insane, and it took the focus off of the students.
posted by djacobs at 5:24 AM on February 10, 2003

at night hama7 dreams of being gutted like a deer. by day hama7 gazes lovingly at this image between posting it in various forums. hama7 obviously has a secret crush on keifer. he should start a blog.
posted by quonsar at 5:42 AM on February 10, 2003

i wonder why hama7 wonders.

of the 7 meta posts hama7 has made, three have questioned appropriate content. all three have been on political issues (race and sexuality) that hama7 disagrees with (note - i've been told i'm wrong to draw this connection before).

on the one hand, it doesn't matter one jot the political views of the messenger if the thread is truly awful. on the other, i wouldn't get too worried until others also wonder.

i feel happier complaining about threads that i do support, politics-wise. there's a danger that you (i) get carried away by emotion and end up abusing meta for your own nefarious political ends...
posted by andrew cooke at 5:48 AM on February 10, 2003

You made your opinion of the thread clear with your comment within the thread:

Good luck, thread...

I guess one could say the same for this unnecessary MeTa post.
posted by thatweirdguy2 at 5:54 AM on February 10, 2003

I wonder where this is going?
posted by crunchland at 7:09 AM on February 10, 2003

Hama7:I wonder where this is going?

Pretty civil so far. Disappointed?
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 7:26 AM on February 10, 2003

Where do you want to go today?
posted by soundofsuburbia at 8:34 AM on February 10, 2003

I wish I hadn't mentioned Bill O' Reilly in the post.

This may have been why hama7 began to wonder.

So Kiefer is connected to these kid's situation, is what I'm wondering now hama7.

hama7, I once wondered if you were (7ama)ricans abroad somewhere...then concluded that I had the wrong member ;)
posted by thomcatspike at 12:27 PM on February 10, 2003

Given hama's objections to some posts out there, I'm wondering not if it's (7ama)ricans a-broad, but (7ama)ricans a-closeted-homosexual ;-)

Just kidding hama7, you know I love you. In a good Christian way. :-D
posted by WolfDaddy at 12:38 PM on February 10, 2003

You mean in a "biblical" way?
posted by Pollomacho at 1:08 PM on February 10, 2003

Can we please stop talking about civil rights? Let the free market decide when a normal amount of harassment turns into too much.
posted by Mayor Curley at 1:29 PM on February 10, 2003

*whistles tunelessly, examines chipped paint and cracks in wall*
posted by y2karl at 3:11 PM on February 10, 2003

Could you elaborate on the connection?

Did you look at the first link that you posted?

I thought the Bill O'Reilly and the ACLU inclusion was like a cage match between Strom Thurmond and Jane Fonda: no winners, but a lot of off-topic hair pulling and tattered garments. And it was.

It could have possibly (maybe) been an interesting post, but it's still a stretch to see it as the "best of the web".

I thought the policy here at MetaFilter was: " it's all about the link", right? Is it now: "not about the link"?

I heard once that "Metafilter doesn't do politics very well", and that posts which instigate debate or "further an agenda" don't belong on MetaFilter because "MetaFilter is not Usenet". Did anybody else hear similar information? Yes, I've heard a lot of things like that, so I try to observe them especially when I post, and I hope that others do too, but posts like this really surprise me.

I really couldn't give a damn whether the post is about Rupaul, Cracker Jacks, or the River Kwai, if it's a good link that is novel and interesting and "might warrant discussion from other members", then it's a good post as far as MetaFilter and I am concerned, capiche?

I hope this is registering, or awakening distant memories, or something, because if "were all in this together", then I think we should all be observing similar guidelines, don't you?
posted by hama7 at 3:45 PM on February 10, 2003

The o'reilly thing was an unfortunate tangent that didn't die, but most of the postings were about the GSA, which is the point of the post and original links (which seemed interesting enough to me).

I'll agree that all the O'Reily said this/O'Reily said that turned into nonsense barely related to the original thing, but other than that, what do you find so horrible about it hama7?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 4:03 PM on February 10, 2003

As usual, hama7 has a point.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 6:07 PM on February 10, 2003

I'm still waiting to hear what the point was. The mentioned first link (and the second) were to what appear to be hate sites built around students, by other students, that are directly related to a story. The last bit about O'Reilly could be dropped yes, but the rest seem fine to me. So again, I fail to see the reason for the outrage.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:17 PM on February 10, 2003

How can one forget the words of someone who praises the active denial of someone else's civil rights (sadly, that thread turns up a big CF error, perhaps you can fix it, Matt)? The mere idea of my existence frightens and outrages him, so naturally the mention of homosexuals (Gawd, such an ugly Frankenstein monster of a word, a senseless amalgam of Greek and Latin, signifying nothing) drives him batty.

Oh, I see the reason for hama7's outrage, mathowie. It's quite obvious if one remembers hama7's history here. Some people may not remember, since some of it has been deleted.

But I remember. I most certainly remember.
posted by sir walsingham at 6:56 PM on February 10, 2003

There isn't any outrage at at. None whatever. I saw the post as a highly politicized, emotional platform for debate, and the links frankly not novel or interesting, and if it had been another I/P/Iraq thread I'd be saying the same thing, and I have requested an end to the I/P circular discussion before here in MeTa.

I'm only taking the time to write this because I'd like to see amazingly great posts, that are discussion-worthy and that I will continue to access in the future, much the way one would re-read a good book. I think that's what MetaFilter is, although I've made my share of mistakes too.

And sir walsingham, that's not going to work either. I don't believe reparations of "hate crime" legislation, so I must be a *racist*, right? And I disagree that marriage for gay people should be a right, so I must be a homophobe? Ridiculously illogical, but it does prove my point that highly politicized debated of such an emotional nature might be better off elsewhere.

I'm not so keen on newsy stuff either, and this post was chock full of it.
posted by hama7 at 7:13 PM on February 10, 2003

Sorry: 'debates' and 'at all'
posted by hama7 at 7:40 PM on February 10, 2003

It could have possibly (maybe) been an interesting post

I think that anytime anybody feels this way about any given post, they should resist the temptation to post a snarky comment about said post and see if maybe, just maybe, it does in fact turn into an interesting discussion. If it doesn't you can always rip it eight comments later.

If you don't want to be part of the solution, resist the urge to exacerbate the problem
posted by vito90 at 7:41 PM on February 10, 2003

If you don't want to be part of the solution, resist the urge to exacerbate the problem

I think I've outlined the reasons why I thought the post wasn't all that hot, and it's precisely a solution that I seek by bringing the topic to MetaTalk, and I've also embarassedly noticed that my hastily typed post above is practically unintelligible. Apologies, I hope you can decipher it. Work, you know..

You mean that wasn't Kiefer Sutherland?
posted by hama7 at 7:51 PM on February 10, 2003

Here, see the similarity? (first link)
posted by hama7 at 8:04 PM on February 10, 2003

I heard once that "Metafilter doesn't do politics very well", and that posts which instigate debate or "further an agenda" don't belong on MetaFilter because "MetaFilter is not Usenet".

Despite what you'd like to believe most educated people are past the point where a conversation that includes the idea "homosexuality" will necessarily be a debate. This post actually isn't about politics, or an agenda, sorry.

I saw the post as a highly politicized, emotional platform for debate

Could you be bothered to take another look?
posted by rhyax at 8:40 PM on February 10, 2003

hama7, I still think you're overreacting. It's an ok-but-not-great news story with a couple interesting links to companion sites. It suffers from a tangent that manifested in the thread, but otherwise a fine discussion was had around the off-on-a-tangent comments.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:11 PM on February 10, 2003

Could you be bothered to take another look?

But of course. Now it's a ridiculous "hate crime" legislation discussion about the term "wetbacks". It's not only not on topic (although frankly, I'm not sure if the topic was the first two links, the ACLU actually suing a public school over club rights, what Bill O'Reilly thinks, the principal's hypocrisy, or other newsy items about the court case), but if anything it's even more politicized.

Is that the "best" the web can do? Now I'm even more surprised that I'm alone on this.

mathowie: It suffers from a tangent that manifested in the thread, but otherwise a fine discussion was had around the off-on-a-tangent comments.

And that, as they say, is that.
posted by hama7 at 9:20 PM on February 10, 2003

I prefer to call it homosinsuality.

/Mr. Show
posted by UKnowForKids at 10:31 PM on February 10, 2003

I don't presume to know to to make a perfect post, or if there is one, but since I started this thread, here's how I might have handled the same topic in a post:


"In 1984, President Ronald Reagan signed the Equal Access Act [pdf file], providing that a public school must treat all noncurricular student clubs equally; if a school has one such club, it must welcome all responsible clubs." [more inside]

[inside] Fellow public school students opposed to the formation of the gay-straight student alliance club have responded by creating these two weblogs.



What do you think? (I might also drop the weblogs, as they provide nothing relating them to the GSA info.)
posted by hama7 at 10:37 PM on February 10, 2003

Yes, yes. It's clear that you're very good at sublimating homosexual references.
posted by crunchland at 10:58 PM on February 10, 2003

Hamagenized.
posted by Opus Dark at 11:25 PM on February 10, 2003

'Fraid not, hama7; I preferred the original. It was interesting to see upfront that there are "1,200 such clubs nationally" for one thing, and the links to the blogs provided local context, making the story more "real". They were the reason (for me) that this was a good Metafilter post. The "newsy" part of the post alone would have held my attention for about three minutes, but it was the links to the blogs that made me really try to picture the situation and imagine what these particular kids, on both sides of the issue, are experiencing and thinking.

This story managed to break through my news-numb buffer zone, and that's not so easy to do...
posted by taz at 4:04 AM on February 11, 2003

The original was a good post, in my opinion; hama7's version of the same post would not have been, since the link titles provide no information on what they're about, and I'm not a fan of having to click links to find out what they are. Also, what taz said.
posted by UKnowForKids at 6:09 AM on February 11, 2003

in my opinion; hama7's version of the same post would not have been, since the link titles provide no information on what they're about

But, hama7's edit ensured that no one would catch the gay from a post on MetaFilter.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:44 AM on February 11, 2003

That's disappointing. Well I tried.
posted by hama7 at 6:52 PM on February 11, 2003

no one would catch the gay from a post on MetaFilter.

Always a worry. ~It happened to me.~
posted by bradlands at 7:46 PM on February 11, 2003