The discussion went better than I expected. Some people demanded responses to specific and alleged violations of comity by various bloggers and commentators, but for the most part, we moved beyond rehashing old debates and focused on how to specifically improve communication. We talked about bright lines for bloggers on topics and attacks, where they exist (if they exist), and whether they exist as a broad agreement.
One of the more interesting points came when talking about anonymity. Some panelists felt that anonymous postings degrade the level of discourse through a lack of responsibility, and some felt it should be restricted in some manner. I disagreed, noting that pseudonymous political essayists have a long, rich tradition in Western history, including Americans such as those who wrote the Federalist Papers, although that example came from Jeralyn. I expressed some discomfort at “prohibiting” anonymity, and wondered how it would be enforced in any case.
Frequent CapQ commenter KT Cat attended this session and has more notes on the topic. He has a fair amount of criticism for the panelists, all of which seems reasonable enough and at a high level of discourse, if you will. All in all, I found the panel and the discussion to exemplify the highest level of discourse between bloggers of varying stripes — an excellent prototype for all of us to recall as we continue the debate on line.
And yes, I denounced myself a priori.
I denounce your denunciation.
Did they discuss the use of strike-thru when discussing
Gleenwalds?You can’t foola me. There’s a no such thing as a comity clause.
Madonna mia!
Strategy is easy. Comity is hard.
Comity, I thought he meant comedy.
Said it before: You only need to know who people are if you want to hurt them.
We bodiless entities can be disbelieved, ignored, ostracized, even silenced without being identified, but we can’t be threatened, stalked, deprived of our livings, etc.
Anyone who demands to know who you are wants to destroy you.
Captain Ed doesn’t. Notice who does.
Ummm…
Truth is, anonymity works only so long as someone somewhere isn’t sufficiently motivated to dig for the bread crumbs that will lead them to you. Fortunately, it’s rare for the anonymous to attract that much negative attention, and in almost every case where they do, they’ve practically begged for it.
So, I would amend your assertion, psychologizer, to something more like, “we’re a lot less likely to be threatened, stalked, deprived of our livings, etc.”
Me, I’ve been using my real name and face on the internet for 12 years. I suppose I’ve been stalked, but most would-be stalkers have this funny tendency to not like discovering that they, anonymous or not, can be stalked in turn.
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Commaty.
Looks like a comma-unity to me.
Anonymousness is just an avatar. It’s not the same as people I don’t think. For people, you have to have special rules.
Blogs are media is what I mean. Depositions are different.