What to do here?

The Coffee Shop
1

folks, i need to ask you your views on the lavender room, and what direction you’d like it to go, moving forward.

this was originally intended to be a forum to keep off-topic questions/discussions off the main forum.

but, as we all know, half the traffic here is political, where the hard lefties fight the hard righties, or the hard righties congratulate each other.

i’m going to make some changes here, or not, based on what you all say. but i’m going to ask that those of you who are the chief lieutenants of your movements - those who come to the forum every morning with swords drawn - not participate in this discussion. this includes but is not limited to those who instigate the daily threads: big kahuna, yahey, mjuric, chainpin, dave_w.

and, look, i’m not saying that what you do is bad, unfair, unrighteous, or unwanted. i’m just asking whether THIS forum is the right place for it, rather than other forums given over to precisely these sorts of discussions.

so, to those of you who are either OCCASIONAL or NOT AT ALL the regular participants in the lavender room is, would you post more if this forum didn’t have the hard core responders? does none of the political discussion matter to you? is it a distraction? does it make you angry? does it attract you to this forum or drive you away?

i’ll probably poll this question formally, but before i do so i’d like to get my arms around the zeitgeist here and see whether i’m worrying about nothing or whether this is a necessary discussion.

2

Are the other forums you speak of tri related? I like to do all my shopping in one place!

3

I’m pretty good at uzing teh interwebz. I don’t open the threads I have no interest in.

In general, I find the political threads tiresome, but if they want to hang out in there and shake their metaphorical whanguses at each other, I don’t care.

4

I think you’re “worrying about nothing.”

I enjoy coming over here and even have some appointment viewing with a few posters (I’d love a religious thread where Rob C and TriFloyd are the only ones allowed to post) and if there’s something I’m not interested in, I just turn the page, so to speak.

The reason I never post isn’t because I’m intimidated, and I can’t envision a change you’d make that would entice me to post more-the reason is I just can’t get myself worked up enough to care about posting-but I enjoy reading the view-points of those who do.

One minor issue I have is when the LR denizens haven’t put their armor on yet so they wander over to the Tri forum to sling the shit-I call this “pulling a Yahey.”

5

I’m curious about what kind of changes you would forsee. Unless you would ban and delete any “political” thread or discussion, you will always have those threads running. Almost any tpic can easily be turned towards politics, religion, etc. And so long as those subjects are discussed, you will find hard core “true believers” on either side to argue over them. Even if you conducted a mass purge of whoever you see as the worst offenders, typically someone will move in to take their places.

Personally, I don’t open most of the obviously partisan political threads directed at bashing this politician or that one. I’m not as god at ignoring the threads that go to broad political or social ideas, because those discussions have potential to interest me.

6

Honestly, the Lavender is the first forum I go to everyday (Bleh, that’s sad!) and while some of the regular responder’s bullshit pisses me off, I’m ok with the current setup.

Where else can I go to watch the left circle-jerk each other?

7

I’m curious about what kind of changes you would forsee. Unless you would ban and delete any “political” thread or discussion, you will always have those threads running. Almost any tpic can easily be turned towards politics, religion, etc. And so long as those subjects are discussed, you will find hard core “true believers” on either side to argue over them. Even if you conducted a mass purge of whoever you see as the worst offenders, typically someone will move in to take their places.

Personally, I don’t open most of the obviously partisan political threads directed at bashing this politician or that one. I’m not as god at ignoring the threads that go to broad political or social ideas, because those discussions have potential to interest me.j

You know, it’s just like you to bring religion and politics into a thread like this. It’s this kind of behavior that really turns me off to the Lavender Room.

:slight_smile:

8

In the 4 years I have been on Slowtwitch, I have never been to the Lavender Room until today, to answer this question. I avoid it because I come to ST for tri chatter, not politics. For politics I will go somewhere else. Plus, given what appears on the tri forum, I imagine this place is full of extreme opinions and I have no interest in reading them.

9

I sometimes particate in the political threads but it would certainly help my work productivity if they were shut down :wink:

However, one of things that makes the lavender room a regular daily stop for me is the traffic here and the “known quantity” posters that chime in on a wide range of subjects. We probably could all live fulfilling lives without another God vs science thread but my only personal concern would be that banning those types of threads would lessen the breath of responses one sees in the “Does a 5/16” screw for wall mounting a tv require a 3/8" masonry bit?" or “kitchen appliances” type threads, just to name a couple from this morning. There is alot of wheat here among the chaff. I would not want to miss out on some good advice on a home improvement project or a tech purchase, even if it does come from a godless heathen.

10

I don’t go to the Lavender room precisely because it’s full of political and religious hyperbole. I’m on ST for tri-specific items, and am not watching “the telly” for exactly the same reasons: I’m sick of listening to the forced messaging.

That said, were it not for a Lavender room, there might otherwise be a triathlon forum full of the stuff that goes on in Lavender. It’s probably best left as is, in order to give it a place to go - that way those not interested can avoid it without it being thrown in our faces in the tri forum.

11

You can’t stop it, Dan. You can only hope to contain it. The obvious “Look at what Obama the Anti-Christ did today” or “Sarah Palin kills babies in her spare time” threads are easy to avoid. But, invariably, you get these types of posts in legitimate threads, too, so it’s never going to go away. My take is that this is much ado about nothing. People will invariably be assholes on Internet forums, and there ain’t thing one you can really do about it short of banning people.

As much as I dislike some of the useless threads here, I say leave it as is.

12

i probably fall into the ‘occasional poster’ camp, though as my health worsens and my interest in the kind of training and gear minutae that interested me as a youngster wanes, i’m probably posting more in the LR than in TRI. and frankly, i don’t race IM or train by power, and ride a 6-year-old bike, so the extent of my tech questions is relatively limited.

to me, the LR ain’t broke and don’t need fixin’.

-mike

13

One other thing to remember is that, sometimes the Tri forum isn’t exactly the nicest playground to play in either. No matter the subject matter, people will take extreme views on either side of the line. And some of those people will be dicks.

14

so, to those of you who are either OCCASIONAL or NOT AT ALL the regular participants in the lavender room is, would you post more if this forum didn’t have the hard core responders? does none of the political discussion matter to you? is it a distraction? does it make you angry? does it attract you to this forum or drive you away?

Slowman,

I came here to post due to the thread you posted on the main forum. The short answer to your question is I never come here. Don’t really plan on it. And don’t really care what the content of this forum is.

Would you post more if this forum didn’t have the hard core responders? Nope, I don’t have any interest in it.
Does none of the political discussion matter to you? Correct, it doesn’t matter to me.
Is it a distraction? Nope, I ignore it.
Does it make you angry? Nope, I ignore it.
Does it attract you to this forum or drive you away? I guess, indirectly, it drives me away but I don’t consider it a loss.

Essentially, I come to ST looking for triathlon-related stuff and tend to ignore the existence of the Lavender Room entirely. If I wanted to engage in an online debate on non-triathlon topics (which I don’t) I’d probably go to another website altogether.

(PS for the smarty-pants crowd: When I say, I “never come here” I mean “I don’t recall ever coming here and don’t make a point of it” so please don’t go search for that one post I might have made in 1963 and say “ah ha!”)

15

One other thing to remember is that, sometimes the Tri forum isn’t exactly the nicest playground to play in either. No matter the subject matter, people will take extreme views on either side of the line. And some of those people will be dicks.

Yes… “sometimes”. :slight_smile:

16

Not sure if I fall into the “swords drawn” category. I don’t start that many thread, although I participate in a lot. I think about 60% of the threads I start are sports related (NCAA football, NFL, etc). Anyway …

I have been a lurker on ST since 2004 and a poster since 2006. I resisted the LR for many, many years, and was pulled over here via the Specialized Girl thread. Since then, I have loved it.

I think there is a fantastic mix of people in the LR with great, great views. We spar a lot, but, I think it is great. I really do.

From a business standpoint, the LR has been great for me. I have made contacts with a number of people via exchange of posts here over time. Also, this forum enables me to see trends around the US in a variety of areas including views on politics, unions, labor laws, unemployment, etc. It has been invaluable to me, personally. Plus, it is simply fun.

I really like the LR and hope you do not plan on instituting sweeping changes.

17

Same Here!

18

I say you kick that asshole chainpin right the hell out of here.

19

“I really like the LR and hope you do not plan on instituting sweeping changes.”

these forums do not exist for me. they exist for you. so, the only changes i would make are those that a significant majority wants to have made. so far, it certainly seems that folks either don’t care, or prefer no change at all. if it remains trending this way, i’m fine, there will be no changes.

i personally fall into the category of, “i would post here more often but i don’t because of the toxicity here.” but i’m one of 43,000 registered users, and i weigh my own vote less than the votes of any of you all.

20

“I say you kick that asshole chainpin right the hell out of here.”

:wink:

.