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Yet again Chandos simply can't post without referring to some prehistoric US president. Face it. Chandos, you're not left or right, all you want is a choice between Washington, Lincoln, and Jefferson on the next ballot paper.

 

And...that would be a bad thing...? I'm anything but middle of the road though, HS. But, HB, I do that especially because we all know of how much you enjoy reading about the Revolutionary generation. :

 

Hang on, all this revolutionary talk is just a smokescreen leading up to Chandos's ultimate revelation. It's all there in his name. Chandos the "Red". He's really a communist!

 

But of course! Still, it fools all those American bourgeois business people...

 

I don't like it. I agree with joacqin. The more you split the so called serious issues into "religion", "politics", "ethics", "history", "art" or whatever, the more you loose important connections between those topics. Take birth control. A classical clash between religious claims and political needs. Where would I post it? How much time do you admins want to spend with moving around misposted threads? I don't see the point.

What exactly are the advantages of dividing the Alley? The next step would be to split the AoLS into one forum for pro-US postings and one for contra-US threads. And then you would split the contra-US forum into one for US citizens (who know what they are talking about/who are completely brainwashed) and one for non US citizens (who don't have a clue/who have a healthy distance) (underline the appropriate).

Did I say I don't like it? Forget that. Somehow it deeply satisfies my typical German need for bureaucracy...

 

I agree with Darkthrone. 'nuff said.

 

Certainly there will be places where all these topics intersect. But the dividing line would be up to whomever writes the topic. Say Chev wants to create a thread on abortion (we all know that could never happen) he would be able to approach the topic in whichever approach or format best suits his purpose. The approach would not be an attack on a country or politician who is either for or against it (like say Bush or Kerry). It would be the policy and perhaps its relgious implications. If he wanted to look at a policy stance by an individual then he would have to create a political thread to deal with a political figure. (Sorry Chev, I'm not picking on you in anyway - please don't take it that way). Thus, it would also serve to keep the threads more on topic, and more clearly defining the issue in a particular light. This would be way better than the approach we have now, which is from all the angles you just mentioned on one thread. I feel it's a great idea.

 

Aha. I, on the other hand, believe that the viewing of topics from different angles is exactly what is contributing to any discussion. Narrowing it down to one specific way of thinking would just result in pointless agreements. The important thing is someone going "Gosh! Never thought of it that way before!"

 

It's a bit more complex. There are religious people who believe it should be left up to individuals and there are irreligious people who believe it should be banned. To some extent, this is a political matter, although it tends to relate with religions. It's a bit similar to the problem of Christian Democratic Party or Anticlerical Party of Progress, whether it's a religious thing or a political thing, and I believe one can't be separated from the other. In many, many cases you can't achieve a clean cut separation. That's because religion is not so much a private thing as a social thing and all social things have bearing on politics. Political views can also affect someone's religious views, especially as regards affiliations with religions one doesn't actually profess himself and relations with the clergy and faithful of those religions.

When you have a thread where politics and religion intertwine, you can't really put it into one of two forums by the flip of a coin and forcing the posters to cut one half of the discussion out wouldn't be a good idea and may not be worth it for all the inconvenience it will cause.

No, he's a wig party member and a cryptofreemason.

@Chandos: Well, if I were to open a thread on abortion, it would most probably a court verdict. I would most probably comment on the legal grounds, find them faulty (law, AoDA), accuse the judges of playing their own politics (politics, AoLS) and usurping the legislative authority (constitutional law, middle ground) and someone would inevitably come up with my Catholicism and accuse me of undermining the separation of church and state (again, middle ground) pulling my religion on people (religion, problematic).

[ January 25, 2005, 17:59: Message edited by: chevalier ]

 

Fascinating. I'm glad to see that political discussion will be staying. I won't be participating, but those who do can still enjoy. I hope people try to be more respectful in the future. I understand and agree with what Laches said, but I chose a different way of dealing with it. I just don't read those threads anymore (or any threads from certain people). I like to debate ideas and opinions, there is often just too much nastiness heaped on top of real content. The actual debate gets lost in the noise. It's a shame, really. An opportunity lost.

Oh, well. I took a few months off over the summer and then came back when I was ready. I have been making a lot of changes in my life and now have a clearer mind and a less angry soul. It feels great to be able to come back here, participate in the topics that interest me, and ignore those that I might find upsetting. Maybe someday I'll be healthy enough to wade back into one of the Alleys, but for now, I'm staying out. I would recommend the same to those who frequently find themselves having difficulty with the opinions expressed there.

Thanks again Tal for providing this site and administering it the way that you do. It is an interesting place for a lot of reasons.

 

@Tal: That's actually not the problem. The problem is that people might feel pressured to have two different threads for two aspects of one discussion or to keep one aspect out of the discussion.

 

I tend to think the real problem was not politics but nationalism, and that separating the political stuff will not keep the nationalistic stuff out of the AODA. For example there was a thread awhile back on a crime in France that turned into, "so, you Europeans thought you had a better crime rate than the US, huh?" and in the thread about partial-birth abortion we got comments like, "that sort of thing would only happen in America!" I don't mind the political threads that are *intended* to contrast and compare aspects of different countries' political systems, but it seems to me that the annoying problem of nationalism bleeding into unrelated topics will not be solved by simply separating the political threads from other controversial ones. It's worth a try, though, I suppose.

 

Quite an excellent point, Sprite! Although, I'm hoping the splitting of the forums might cut down on it some.