You know, there was a time...

[Robb]

...on DU when posters didn't just run around looking for articles that supported their own world-view, and posting them every chance they got. It was a place to be informed, have your ideas challenged, etc.

Blasting DU with repeated stories that support a particular slant on events only turns people off to your posts if they don't agree with your slant. No one learns shit that way. Instead it's "Oh, look, another BS post from XXXX."

That the stories are largely true is immaterial; "But it happened!!!11! I'm not offering opinion!" is a nonsense defense. If a reporter did nothing but stories on Hispanic crime across the country every week, one would naturally impugn their motive. Same with posters lately who repeat a single theme, over and over: taken as a whole, the posts amount to propaganda.

Possibly well-intentioned propaganda, but propaganda nonetheless. And not conducive to the marketplace of ideas. My $0.02.

Edited to add: please feel more than free to unrec this, it's internal laundry, IMO.

[dionysus]

1. you cruise missle loving warmonger you ;)

:hi:

[Robb]

2. My point, actually.

As much as I post news on Taliban atrocities, I also brought Jerome Starkey's UN coverup story's confirmation when it appeared. After pooh-poohing it when it first appeared.

[dionysus]

6. i was joking.

[Robb]

7. Oh, I know you were.

But "physician, heal thyself" and all might not be an unreasonable argument.

[TorchTheWitch]

3. I'm actually happy to see any OP that has an article

and not just some one liner gripe about something the poster didn't see fit to bother mentioning.

[HopeHoops]

4. Reminds me of an old Far Side cartoon - the "little bang theory".

If you're not familiar with it, there's a group of scientists and one is significantly shorter than the others. The short one is gesturing with his hands while talking to another and in the foreground one scientist remarks, "There goes (whatever his name was) pushing his 'little bang' theory again."

[mrcheerful]

5. Remember DU has been a magnet to the wing nuts who infiltrate DU to spread their non sense

so they can go back to freep land to brag about how they "fooled liberals" over here. Anyone that posts "prove its" when a fellow DU poster voices opinion on something is a dead give away, one of the things I liked about DU was the lack of posts with Prove It attached to an opinion. But since the 2008 election I have noticed that has changed, excuse me but DU was about someone voicing a belief and other posters would then help said person see where they were off on their thinking by providing the poster with links that showed where the poster was off instead of yelling PROVE IT.

Sorry a pet peeve of mine and I know for a fact that their are conservative freepers posting in DU, I was called out a few times for using DU to get ideals on how to debunk nit wit talking points at their supposedly non party sites.

[blueworld]

23. I used to doubt this premise but am now 100% convinced you are correct. n/t

[laststeamtrain]

8. You know, you have a very nice way of telling people to STFU. But alas, no. n/t.

[Robb]

9. Are you saying this is what you're up to?

To be honest I haven't felt that about your posts. If I'm wrong, I'm disappointed.

[laststeamtrain]

12. My 'copy/paste' jobs tend to hit the same points again & again.

Anti-interventionism is the POV that's little heard in the media.

An 'empire of bases' seems to be the given of most foriegn policy discussions.

Mostly I'm just trying to corrupt youth with the dangerous anti-imperialist POV. :sarcasm:

[Robb]

15. True enough on anti-interventionism. nt

[CreekDog]

11. before you complain about him, how about reading what he posted

because apparently you didn't.

[laststeamtrain]

14. Huh? n/t.

[CreekDog]

10. DU used to be a better source of all kinds of info

when people use it to simply spam us with 10 examples, sometimes repeats of their easy to find opinion...it makes visiting here not all that useful.

this place is much less useful in 2010 than it was before 2008.

[tjwash]

13. Meh...GD has gone completely to hell

I pop my head in from time to time, and all I ever see is grave-dancing, arguments over semantics and punctuation, and "oh-please-please PLEEEASE let this be the day the whole world devolves into chaos and anarchy so I can say I was right" posts.

Its sort of became the message board equivalent of late-night public access cable.

[bigtree]

16. you can't win. Post an opinion

. . . folks demand links to support your assertions.

I really don't understand your complaint. Most of these articles posted in GD wouldn't do for LBN. That's the point of posting them here for a response. Not to mention the importance of many of them to the debate; with points which would otherwise go unremarked on and ignored from posters here with the same posted pov.

I'm not agreeing with your query.

[SidDithers]

17. I think that's the biggest change I've seen at DU over the years...

The marketplace of ideas has become a series of soapboxes, where life is lived in black and white.

Good post.

Sid

[CreekDog]

18. I see that too

While people have always had their causes, the number of prolific posters whose position on any news or policy can be predicted by their screen name --even if it is inconsistent with other positions, the number of those posters has grown and begun to dominate.

I used to find this place more informative because there was less of this.

Now I find I post that I think I can like Obama but still not be willing to support expanded offshore oil drilling (a position you would think a lot of DUers can appreciate) but instead I get flamed over it by over half the posters to my thread.

On DU?!

[Bobbie Jo]

19. Recommended.

....and agreed.

[pscot]

20. The endless copycat posts of some overworked "news" event

are far less interesting than posts like this one, where the writer lays out his own view of something in a sane, reasonable manner. I use this site partly as a news source and partly for the coversations about subjects of interest. The me-tooers and ideologues are a definite turnoff. It's impossible to have a conversation with someone who never climbs down off his/her hobby horse.

[bvar22]

21. YES!!!

Reality has a Liberal bias,
and supplying links with facts and educated opinions to support Liberal positions really annoys the Centrists.

[Individualist]

22. Hear, hear!

:thumbsup:

[Robb]

25. I guess you lost me.

What you said is true, but has little to do with the drumbeat of repetition. :shrug:

[Soylent Brice]

24. this is an awesome OP, because it applies to crazytown and the echo chamber.

[Robb]

26. OK, am I meant to guess where those places are?

:D

[Soylent Brice]

27. i'm sorry, i thought it would be obvious:

Crazytown = GD
Echo Chamber = GDP

:evilgrin: