I understand, I first discovered Cecil in the pages of the now-defunct Baltimore City Papers back in the mid-80’s, rediscovered the SDMB in early 2000’s where I occasionally lurked around…didn’t join until 2012, and really only started participating in the last year or so…I could spend hours lost in certain threads as the discussions were very interesting, generally well reasoned, and informative…
Lately, since the 2016 election, it just seems to be a lot of groupthink, yes, I know, being a product of the Chicago Tribune means it has always leaned left, but one of things I’ve always lamented in life is, we are losing the ability to engage in intelligent discourse…and I see it infecting the SDMB which is very discouraging…when we have to demean and shout down opinions we disagree with, we’ve lost the art of communication, we’ve given up trying to understand a different viewpoint, and we’ve shut down our minds…and, yes, I know, I’ll get the, “But, Trump started it!” response, whatever, two wrongs don’t make a right, please, try to express a view that is constructive, not reactive…
Being a libertarian such as yourself, I find myself cringing at so many posts, I don’t know what to think anymore here, if you dare try to counter the groupthink, it’s pitchforks and torches, the SDMB was founded on the minds of many creative, intelligent and constructively critical people, so I hope it will survive and prosper…
We are all entitled to our opinions, and if we can intelligently elucidate them, then we should be given the courtesy of a respectful response…we don’t have to agree, quite the contrary, but we should be able to indulge in intelligent discourse with the intention of understanding each others’ point of view…
With all the talk recently if the SDMB financial issues, I actually thought about buying a membership, it’s no big deal, a fraction of my monthly wine budget, then I got sucked into a bad side discussion where it was obvious Ignorance was not being fought, it was being tickled with a feather duster, and I realized, why would I spend money on something where I have to think twice before I post as I don’t trust the respondents to have the same approach as I do, i.e., intelligent discourse, respect and a chance to understand one another…