The Forge needs more balance

Nope. Even TK isn't as cliquey and paranoid as some of the people around here.

It IS an awesome word.

This doesn't change the fact that the Three Lions fucked up today.

Gottverdammt...!

Did I say that one side was better than the other?

Here's a little food for thought: The members here who most vocally decry shit-flinging, bullying, putting the screws to n00bs and being disingenuous in regard to debate are themselves at least as likely, if not moreso, to engage in any or all of those behaviors. This is well within their right, and hey, it's the nature of the interwebz.

That said, it makes their not infrequent complaints about said behaviors and the overall lack-of-character of WF in general ring pretty hollow.

Speaking for myself, I would like a greater quantity of Hayek logic as demonstrated by Uncle Albert. I have been examining it for quite some time now and am still unable to locate any flaws.

Wordforge needs the more of the same thing that every other place in the world needs more of (with the possible exception of Arizona State University):

Young, attractive women with loose morals.

Good call. Shame that most of us seem to hate California.

No, you didn't say that, of course.

Both sides are to blame.

However, the lefties here are a clear minority. It's only natural that they try to fight back by even more bullying, shit-flighing and attacking the noobs. It's their own fault, of course. No doubt about that.

Yeah, this is the red room. Flaming and trolling is part of it, and the biggest flamer is even considered a "star" and a hero. You call it the nature of the interwebz, I call it the degenerated state of of the interwebz of today. I know it can be fun to be an asshole, but in the end, people like Paladin, with whom I disagree almost everytime, get far more respect from me then people like Sokar. Just like people as Packard get more respect from me then people like Liet. Because they try to stay reasonable in an environment where the most vile person is the "king".

The only way to bring balance to the forge is to kill everyone and start all over again, preferably with a founder less whiny than a Skywalker . . .

(Admittedly, I had to look up "jämmerlich" and "Vertreter.")

Yeah, sure...

The best way to bring balance to the force would be by rebooting your brain.

Extremists suck. On both sides.

Well a lot of the more left leaning members left when it became apparent that black jesus wasn't the second coming after all. They were crowing after the election in 2008, but after reality kicked in, they slunk out to safer grounds.

I wouldn't say that.

Extreme left and Extreme right are about the same. There are shades up and down the spectrum. There are quite a few liberal libertarians and conservative libertarians, some hardcore libertarians, moderates.

The clearest minority on the board is RickDeckard...who even knows what he is if you go by his posts.

Usually when a leftist says WF needs more balance, it's because it's not enough of an echo chamber for them to be comfortable here. really, WF just needs more people posting, period.

Very witty

Wordforge is not, and never has been, about balance, discussion, argument, or consensus. Saying it needs more balance implies a serious misreading of the nature of the place. To a certain extent wordforge is about cliquey but real discussion of narrow topics of interest to the membership, but when you get beyond guns, sci-fi, and, to a lesser extent, sports, wordforge is not really about discussion at all. To whatever extent it's not about people watching, flaming, trolling, or circle-jerking , wordforge is about airing your views and not having to watch how you say things when you do so. It's true that some people view that as a means to the ends of discussion and argument rather than an end in-and-of itself, but evidence of how wordforge actually functions is overwhelmingly to the contrary. Attempts at honest argument never end well here.

The airing of views, the observation thereof, and the observation of the reaction thereto don't need to be tied to any kind of balance to be of interest. If there's groupthink involved here, observing and understanding that is part of what makes this place worthwhile.

Jan has a point. I don't think it's so much the lack of liberal posters so much as the lack of ones worth respecting. Linda R. Was one of those, as was Gul...and I couldn't stand the latter for a good long while. Hell, I respect Raoul for actually debating, even though I disagree with 99 percent of what he says.

Unfortunately, the most vocal leftists here give all leftists a bad name. And as a former liberal myself, I'd like to believe that not everyone who support a bit more social equality is of Liet's narrow mindset who thinks that all minorities shold think one way (to give one example ).

And yet the methods for "attracting" them remain unchanged.

Bullshit. You've got essentially three groups at TK:
MineFielders, Badlanders (which have largely managed to self-implode and ride on the burning embers) and JackDancers. I'm one of the few members there that can't be lumped in any group, as I rarely post in the MineField (ironically enough, as it's mostly comprised of Lonafites, and Lonaf's my home board).

Tell me that's less cliquey.

To be fair, I'm not a member - I just skim through there once in a while, so I guess I'm not up on the nuances. It's not as obvious as it is here.

Rethinking, I'd say certain elements of WF tend more toward a swarm mentality.

I'd say we're more likely to jump on a rollickin' bandwagon, but there you are.

We Europeans dont' give a flying fuck about your "Black Jesus". We always knew him as a typical US career politician. Do not misunderstand us as Obama fans. We are stupid, but not THAT stupid...

As Tamar Garish said: This forum needs more posters. I say: It needs more European posters. Not only British ones, but Germans, Swiss, Belgiums, Dutch and French people, etc... THIS would help to balance the Forge and would make things more interesting. As long as you Americans are just discussing among yourselves, there will be no real dispute. Because you are so bipartisan. I may be wrong here, but it's worth a try.

Then go forth and spread the word. Or Wordforge. I task you with this, my loyal minion.

Don't you even go there. At all.

We have two forums where things are rowdy...if that is too much for someone to handle, if they are too stupid to keep to the moderated forums, then frankly, they are probably not worth much in the discussion department anyway.

We have every tool a person needs to eliminate annoyances from their own experience. If they won't do it....

One man's bandwagon is another man's tumbril.

I've tried to attract some posters from the msn money boards but msn is so pissy they won't let you promote another board on there.

They'll say my mission will save the world
And I will stand proud
My mission will change the world
The underground will rise... and
Save this world as we'll all stand proud
Our mission will change the world, we'll change the world
We'll all stand proud





Obama is not our saviour. Don't think that we believe in this shit over here.

The only ones shouting that here were the righties. Anyone with any smarts recognized him as a moderate.

Obama is moderate.

He's a leftist...he's just also a massive opportunist who can't give up power once he's got it and someone with a misguided self-protective streak who swings around where he believes the populist winds are blowing and has a desire to be a World Leader, but makes bad decisions there, too (whale ban, anyone?).

Obama is a fucking socialist. And an incompetent one at that.

Oh. Yeah. Good call. I was going to say "cowbell."

Bring balance to the Forge?

Yes, these days it seems like there are more conservatives than liberals, but that is because some of the liberals who showed up here were utter pussies (like bryce or Harmon Bokai).

Love her or hate her, Cass was a liberal who stood her ground and gave as good as she got.

And that is coming from someone who is moderate, independent, and mostly apolitical.

We need more Cassandras and less bitch ass muthafuckas like bryce.