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All - Anonymity - mcb100
I do wonder whether some of the occasional fractiousness on here (and I’m sure it also occurs on other fora (plural of forum?)) is because comments are made from behind a cloak of anonymity?
If people had an open identity, would it descend to the occasional bit of name calling?
All - Anonymity - _

I don't know of another forum where people show their true id, but on some of the tech forums, facebook etc they do.

Edited by _ORB_ on 28/02/2023 at 13:37

All - Anonymity - FP

Much of the commenting on various types of forums ("fora" is the Latin plural) - on social media and elsewhere is abrasive, even when people use their real (and traceable) identity. It's a well-known phenomenon. But there is also a counterpart, which is people's hypersensitivity and capacity for misunderstanding.

A lot of it comes from the crudeness of typed messages, which, compared with face-to-face interaction, have no accompanying nuance of vocal intonation, gesture or facial expression. This, together with many people's reliance on text messages, has subtly altered many people's mindsets when it come to the use of the internet.

I don't think changing this forum to one where everyone had a "real" identity (how do you check that, anyway?) would make much difference. It's really a question of people needing to be careful what they say and never to post in haste or in anger.

All - Anonymity - sammy1

I recently mentioned this subject in another thread commenting would people behave like this if talking face to face.

From my prospective the ganging up on some from a minority on here is tantamount to bullying just because they put over a different viewpoint. Who is to say who is right or wrong or indeed where their views originated.

My amaryllis is in full flower!

All - Anonymity - alan1302

I recently mentioned this subject in another thread commenting would people behave like this if talking face to face.

From my prospective the ganging up on some from a minority on here is tantamount to bullying just because they put over a different viewpoint. Who is to say who is right or wrong or indeed where their views originated.

My amaryllis is in full flower!

There also seems to be a view that if the majority of people disagree with a poster then they are being bullied - when all it means is that the majority disagree with them.

All - Anonymity - _
There also seems to be a view that if the majority of people disagree with a poster then they are being bullied - when all it means is that the majority disagree with them.

Correct.

All - Anonymity - Engineer Andy

I recently mentioned this subject in another thread commenting would people behave like this if talking face to face.

From my prospective the ganging up on some from a minority on here is tantamount to bullying just because they put over a different viewpoint. Who is to say who is right or wrong or indeed where their views originated.

My amaryllis is in full flower!

There also seems to be a view that if the majority of people disagree with a poster then they are being bullied - when all it means is that the majority disagree with them.

Actually that's incorrect as well - all it means is that a majority of those commenting on a thread are on one side of an argument or who want to get involved in the more vociferous arguments, not of all members or even regulars.

I know of a good number of Backroomers and ordinary people outside of this site who privately (on a one-to-one basis) will have 'stong opinions' on a wide range of subjects but are scared of the consequences of voicing them 'publicly', even on an supposeddly anonymnous basis on a forum like this.

As has been shown on social media many times, people with 'anonymous accounts' often get 'doxxed' either because someone who works in the admin / IT dept of that social media firm is very sympathetic to the other side and leaks their personal information, or a very determined person trawls the interwebs for clues as to that 'anonymous' person's real name/details.

For example, many of us here have usernames that have part of our name in it, or something that could, with other information on other forums and what we say on them give clues for the very determined person who has a grudge and who doesn't care about the consequences of their actions.

I do agree that face-to-face discussions are often far more open and respectful, but only if the setting is reasonable. Having one person on 'one side' and 5 on the other isn't exactly a fair contest. I've seen people who are very pleasant people when interracting on a one-to-one basis become a completely different person when in a group setting - like the 'roudy blokes' showing off on a night out drinking on the town, including getting agressive.

In that scenario, it's not much different to a web forum where debates can rapidly become inflamed, whether of their own accord or deliberately fanned by indivudals keen on manipulating things in their favour - even when the other participants on both sides don't see what they're doing.

All - Anonymity - FP

"... the ganging up on some from a minority on here is tantamount to bullying..."

"Ganging up" would imply that some posters are acting together in some way to single out someone and attack them. I don't think there's any evidence of that.

Enjoy your amaryllis. I have grown them a few times and my late mother was particularly fond of them. Have you ever tried the challenge of keeping a poinsettia from season to season and ensuring it produces red leaves (or whatever colour has been bred into it) in time for Christmas?

All - Anonymity - sammy1

This is going well discord already on this thread. There are hardly enough commenting to form a football team so hard to get a cross section majority

Re the poinsettia, the red leaves are called bracts. we always have one for X mass but the central heating does them no favours so it struggles and usually get a new one

All - Anonymity - Engineer Andy

"... the ganging up on some from a minority on here is tantamount to bullying..."

"Ganging up" would imply that some posters are acting together in some way to single out someone and attack them. I don't think there's any evidence of that.

That doesn't mean it doesn't or hasn't happened. It could just as easily mean that those involved are covering their tracks well.

Not exactly difficult, given the anonymous nature of most forums and where many members have been around for a long time, giving them ample opportunity to innocently swap contact details or discuss things via private chats (which some sites [not this one] provide the facility for).

Ganging up doesn't have to require much, if any, co-ordination offline either. Whether a person thinks another deserves 'some stick' (for whatever reason) or not is not grounds for such behaviour - anywhere. If something is really bad, then the moderators or (if illegal) authorities are there to deal with it.

All - Anonymity - sammy1

I happen to know that from previous correspondence after a previous spat that some members on here are known personally to one another. Also that many years ago the forum had an acrimoniously split a a lot left together forming their own group.

All - Anonymity - FP

"I happen to know that from previous correspondence after a previous spat that some members on here are known personally to one another."

- I've no idea if that's true or not. Maybe it is. In any case, it doesn't prove anything about "ganging up" or anything else. I can categorically state that I don't know anyone on this forum - certainly not personally, and I don't know anyone else's real name. Nor do I wish to.

"Also that many years ago the forum had an acrimoniously split a a lot left together forming their own group."

- "Acrimonious split" is not accurate. There was a time when the HJ forum lost function and some members (myself included) joined an alternative forum. The formation of the new forum was not the result of rows between posters, though those did take place before and after. It's what happens when controversial stuff is discussed.

All - Anonymity - Bromptonaut

I happen to know that from previous correspondence after a previous spat that some members on here are known personally to one another. Also that many years ago the forum had an acrimoniously split a a lot left together forming their own group.

I can only speak for myself. There's only, I think, one person who was on here but is not any longer with whom I've had significant off line contact. That was because we were both members of a cycling forum where I used the same 'handle' as here. In that place there is a Private Message facility which we used occasionally.

I'm not sure what you mean about an acrimonious split. The main alternative was set up buy the person who owned the original software used on this site and one or two of the Mods. The driver for that was this place being off air for an extended period of time. Unsurprisingly, another virtual pub with the same look/feel we were all used to caught on.

Aside from chatting about cars etc my attention has often been caught by views about politics and the world outside. As an unashamed member of the moderate end of 'Old Labour' in the mould of Tony Crosland and Denis Healey I'm going to stand up for moderate Socialism and argue against those to the right of the aisle.

All - Anonymity - nick62
Aside from chatting about cars etc my attention has often been caught by views about politics and the world outside. As an unashamed member of the moderate end of 'Old Labour' in the mould of Tony Crosland and Denis Healey I'm going to stand up for moderate Socialism and argue against those to the right of the aisle.

Hear, hear.

All - Anonymity - Andrew-T

The conspiracy theories seem to be getting tinged with paranoia .... :-)

All - Anonymity - Engineer Andy

The conspiracy theories seem to be getting tinged with paranoia .... :-)

It appears that those saying anything on the other side of a decate is now called a 'conspiracy theory' (read facts or opinion that mostly gets proven a few months or year or two away) by a certain group of individuals who cannot find any way of refuting those arguments and because it requires no work.

Stating what you did could also easily be called gaslighting, exactly to make people feel paranoid.

All this needs to stop.

All - Anonymity - Adampr

The conspiracy theories seem to be getting tinged with paranoia .... :-)

It appears that those saying anything on the other side of a decate is now called a 'conspiracy theory' (read facts or opinion that mostly gets proven a few months or year or two away) by a certain group of individuals who cannot find any way of refuting those arguments and because it requires no work.

Stating what you did could also easily be called gaslighting, exactly to make people feel paranoid.

All this needs to stop.

Surely, Andy, you understand that:

1. If you keep expressing opinions that are completely different to the general consensus

2. If you keep alluding to, but not naming groups or individuals who are secretly controlling everything

3. If you ignore all information sources that don't agree with your opinion

4. If you claim that the majority are don't understand reality because they have been misled by the media, which has somehow been infiltrated by people whose opinions you don't like

5. You keep talking about a global plan to force people into serfdom and make them eat insects.

6. You chuck around meaningless words like globalist and accuse anyone left of centre of Stalinism.

Firstly, the majority of people are going to disagree and some will get quite vocal. Secondly, you will be labelled a conspiracy theorist because, frankly, you are theorising that there is a conspiracy.

All - Anonymity - Engineer Andy

The conspiracy theories seem to be getting tinged with paranoia .... :-)

It appears that those saying anything on the other side of a decate is now called a 'conspiracy theory' (read facts or opinion that mostly gets proven a few months or year or two away) by a certain group of individuals who cannot find any way of refuting those arguments and because it requires no work.

Stating what you did could also easily be called gaslighting, exactly to make people feel paranoid.

All this needs to stop.

Surely, Andy, you understand that:

1. If you keep expressing opinions that are completely different to the general consensus

The 'general consensus' isn't the majority of people commenting on a thread. As I've said before, many people have views that agree with this supposed 'minority' but don't air them precisely because they fear what you and others do to me just because I have a different viewpoint to you.

Besides, a minority viewpoint doesn't necessarily equal a 'comspiracy theory'.

2. If you keep alluding to, but not naming groups or individuals who are secretly controlling everything

I have named people and organisations who I think are pulling strings to various degrees.

3. If you ignore all information sources that don't agree with your opinion

You rarely name any actual documents. On the rare occasion someone does, they do not stand up to scruitny.

4. If you claim that the majority are don't understand reality because they have been misled by the media, which has somehow been infiltrated by people whose opinions you don't like

They don't need to b e'infiltrated - just either scare and/or bribed - even without being explicitly told. You don't think that, for example, The Gates Foundation's millions that went to the Gauradian and telegraph didn't come with strings attached, do you?

Or similarly to most MSM outlets with government ad cash during the pandemic? For that matter, do you think that ANY organisation or firm would continue to give ad reveneue to papers that reported on their many misdeeds and/or bad products over the decades?

That's the reason why many of us flocked to this website, because it didn't mince its words on reviews.

5. You keep talking about a global plan to force people into serfdom and make them eat insects.

Funny - I thought that's exactly what governments worldwide are current doing, via spending - > inflation, green policies, etc. The EU has just allowed bugz to be used in food production, after decades of supposedly trying to ensure they aren't in food.

Besides, its all on the WEF's website (remeber the video about owning nothing, living in the pod, eating ze bigz [no meat] and will be happy by 2030?) and in the UN's Agenda 30 documentation, which has been signed up to by all major politicians of all mainstream hues.

6. You chuck around meaningless words like globalist and accuse anyone left of centre of Stalinism.

Nope - please show me when I've used that word, with links. I'd call a good few 'socialists' (something that Brompt just admitted further up - though he says he's 'more moderate' than I think he either is or believes, but that's just opinion) on here, or maybe globalist apologists is a more apt term.

Firstly, the majority of people are going to disagree and some will get quite vocal. Secondly, you will be labelled a conspiracy theorist because, frankly, you are theorising that there is a conspiracy.

More gaslighting. I wish you would be frank, rather than going in for that Blairite gaslighting stuff all the time. What do YOU really want? What are your political alleigances? Do you believe in those policies I spoke of, or don't you care because you'll not be around by then?