Why "me too" doesn't include me.

You have the data. I suggest you do some research on this. Search for direct personal attacks; you can use key words like "**** you", "moron", "asshole", "idiot"... etc. I will bet that 80% of them come from the core group of liberals here. Yes, there are a couple of pretty hateful people here (holocaust deniers I will give you pose a problem).

From my experience, expressing the "wrong" opinion on any topic will lead to personal attacks by a core group of the same members. It seems to me to be clearly ideologically based.

I started a thread that included everybody, but it wasn't good enough for Max.

I am curious Edgar. Are you in favor of restricted posts where only people invited can participate? Do you see the downside of this? Have you tried Facebook?

If the post is restricted as to who can participate, should it also be participated as far as who can view? If not, is there a danger of competing posts... one liberal, one conservative responding to each other cross-topic? That wouldn't seem to change anything.

Not only invited people, anyone but specific blocked people they can’t stand anymore. Not letting users control this part of their experience leads to users just leaving the whole community. Thought bubbles exist too when people choose to leave. Nobody just accepts dealing with someone they can’t stand anymore.

Letting users block others will just fix the broken parts of the ignore user feature (that allow the obnoxious behavior being blocked to continue) and allow for the community not to have to get involved as much in individual disputes. This will make the marketplace of ideas more robust because the alternative is really just that people leave. They don’t force themselves to endure what you think they should, they do this for fun and when it’s not fun they stop doing it.

So the idea is that each of us gets a blacklist, and someone on my blacklist can neither see, or respond to my threads? What about my posts on other people's threads?

That is an interesting idea..I would love.to see the graph of who blocks whom. Would there be clusters? Would it be reciprocal?

I don't think I like it. But it is interesting enough that I am open to see how it works.

They become invisible to each other (can’t see each other’s topics replies or profiles) while everyone else is left alone as much as is possible.

Curious about the invisibility. Will this apply only when signed on or will there be no viewing of any thread where the OP has placed members in the restriction box?

The privacy models won’t change wholesale on a2k and that scenario would be handled like nearly any community with that tool does (am on a treadmill so won't torture my thumbs by going into greater detail).

Understood, thanks.

Back at the office and can expound a bit (before I need to get back to the work that pays the bills). Basically a2k itself will become one community on a platform (called hurdd) of communities in roughly 6 months or so. It will be finishing the unfinished groups plan that is half-baked here. Like that plan there will be the ability to create closed communities (just like there are closed groups in the groups area) but able2know (and I suspect 90+% of communities created) will remain open.

Obviously if it is open to guests content can't be hidden from specific users when they log out but the goal isn't so much to create secret content so much as to prevent beating of dead horses and fighting ruining things for non-participants. One could always log out and still read it and that is fine, because if they reply (using another account, for e.g.) that can be acted on then and there's no problem with the post not being kept a secret, that feature isn't meant to support that.

There are a lot of different models of community, from their distribution models (one to one, one to many, many to many) to their relationship basis (people you know vs topics you are interested in) to their identity and reputation models (anonymous, pseudonymous, eponymous). While we will try to give communities the tools we can to make the experiences they desire we can't be all things to all people so will focus on being the best pseudonymous, many-to-many platform we can be.

As such there will be an emphasis on the open privacy model. For example, one of the things I was pondering on my run was that Facebook's model allowing you to set privacy on a per-post basis is far along the privacy/secrecy spectrum of models and is a powerful tool for that purpose, some of my ideas were to give similarly granular control to individuals. But that is one reason (of many) that they are not cited as much in public discussions as other much less popular mediums like Twitter where the account is either entirely private or not so you don't usually have to think about sharing a post and if you can etc. Even public posts on FB are carrying a lot of the baggage of their privacy model, which is based much more on close personal relationships than being a marketplace of ideas and much less well suited for the openness that makes for a better marketplace of ideas.

As such we'll not compromise the openness to try to optimize for this kind of thing, that is a fundamental, non-negotiable part of this platform's raison de'être.

Max is high on the word ideology, like a member with a new puppy. He vivifies segmentation, not getting that people often or at least sometimes vary in their own minds. It gets highly annoying to repeatedly be accused as a non-thinker.

There once was a good song, Love for Sale. I'm reminded of it because of Max's Ideology for Sale, without the actual music... he is usually, if not always, pushing that as an accusation to others.

In case you are wondering why I ignore this kind of post each time anyone makes it it in reply to me it is because I have no interest in a thoughtless pile-on. Just because I criticize max about something doesn't mean I'm interested in hearing everyone else's own criticisms about him and making a dog pile on top of him.

Thank you Robert. I appreciate the thought you are putting into this and your ideal of creating a marketplace of ideas is something I wholeheartedly support (whether I gripe about details or not).

I feel better about your plans now. I am hoping we can foster a stronger community of people with diverse viewpoints that can discuss ideas respectfully. The platform has a role to play in this, but so do we the long-standing members.

Good luck.

Osso. I am glad you are part of this community.

Another problem is gossip. There are several people, part of the core group, that have posted in multiple threads that I admitted to raping someone in college. It is a lie, and a rather nasty personal attack to discredit the opinions I am expressing.

I would like to know that the private threads don't exacerbate that behavior. I would hope to not be blocked from a thread that was publically accusing me of being a rapist.

OK, I'll listen. I should shut up about him anyway, and, actually, often have, though not always, over years.

We have often agreed, and sometimes not. My gripe is not about agreement, but tone. Which I get is a defect, that tone can get my goat.

Well, maxdancona, today I was reading stuff and an item popped up which made me remember your issue with the #metoo movement and how you felt it to be noninclusive of several people, including yourself.

Actor/Activist/Author Amber Tamblyn has in her own way addressed this matter in the form of her new book, Any Man.

The book apparently centers on a female serial rapist and what it does to six different men, including a comedian and a gay right wing conservative man.

Thank you Sturgis. I read the synopsis and review of this novel. I am not sure it fits the bill as a story that is sympathetic with real male victims. I haven't read the actual book, but from the summaries I fear it takes a stereotypical view of rape that doesn't match the reality of most victims.

Most rapes (of either men or women) are perpetrated by someone the victim knows and often trusts.... a family member or caregiver or intimate partner.

The plot of this story seems far to contrived to present a real exploration of what most rape victims experience.

There are groups working with male survivors of rape. I wonder if the author spent any time talking to them.

It tends to be an unfortunate part of fiction that physical happenings aren't fully or often properly conveyed. In a first novel from a woman, it will likely be very even further distanced from reality. Even if she talked/interviewed with hundreds of men, she'd be hard pressed to truly know the feelings. It is however a step in the right direction.

The intent of the author matters. If she was trying to make a political statement, as in "if only men experienced what women experience", then in my mind she is missing the boat.

There are real men who are victims of rape. I am a little curious to see how her male characters heal... and whether is is a realistic portrayal of what male survivors experience. I suspect that I might find this book insulting if I take the time to read it.