Moonlit_Angel
Blue Crack Addict
Gzusfrk, there is no point in engaging people who obviously want an echo chamber and shout down anyone with an alternative viewpoint with personal insults.
Alternative viewpoints are one thing. But many of the right-leaning posters who've been posting here in recent times have not seemed at all interested in actually engaging in any sort of debate. I tried to have civil debates with Oregoropa when he was here. Know what that got me? The realization that, after he'd been kicked out of the forum, I'd been debating with somebody who turned out to be a white supremacist troll who had creepy pervy attitudes.
I tried to have civil debates with INDY back in the day. Again, he ended up doing nothing but posting lame memes and considered that an actual debating tactic, and he eventually flamed out because he had nothing of substance to contribute to the conversations anymore. If he ever did.
And now this Gzusfrk* guy-he doesn't even stick around to actually debate his points. He pops in every few pages, makes some comment, and then leaves without even addressing much of what was said to him. How exactly am I supposed to have a debate with somebody who doesn't even stick around to try and defend their side?
*Totally didn't catch the actual meaning of his name, by the way. Duh, me.
I fully agree the personal attacks here, on either side, are completely unnecessary and do not help the situation. And I am all for people of different political stripes debating here where possible, as there were conservative posters back in the day I did have good conversations with, both political and otherwise. I'd also point out that we have Headache here, who is not a liberal, and yet somehow he manages to do just fine.
But lately, a lot of the conservatives who've posted here don't want to do that. They deal in memes, they talk about "racism scales" and say things they know full well are inflammatory in an attempt to rile people up, and they say things that are blatantly untrue. If somebody can't deal with being called out for believing or saying something that is flat out wrong, and runs away instead of learning from or trying to defend their ignorance, then that's their problem to deal with, not ours. Maybe that makes us an echo chamber, but at least with the people who stick around, it means we're having conversations with people who are smart and thoughtful enough to actually debate.
(Also, just because this forum is very liberal-leaning doesn't mean we're all in lockstep even on issues within our side of the party. Some of the fiercest debates in recent times were among us liberal posters Just look at the Clinton versus Sanders debates for an example of that in action.)
Anywho, so getting back to the actual topic of this thread at hand, apparently there was yet another shooting today, this time at a middle school in Indiana. A mere week after the one in Texas, I may add.
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/active-sh...ol-police-140103553--abc-news-topstories.html
I'm just going to quote Irvine's response here, 'cause this is honestly the point I'm at now with this bullshit, too:
I really do think we need to start taking people’s guns.
Last edited: