Are you suggesting doing away with the SDMB??
In “A special note to Punditlisa,” TROLLPUPPET says:
And in “DavidB should resign or be replaced,”:
The message board isn’t forcing anyone to do anything. People are free to do and feel whatever they want, and how they feel as a result of the message board is their own responsibility.
I admit, I have felt bad after reading some messages on the board. When I got into my first debate as a newbie, I’d sit and weep after reading the responses to my posts. When posters dissected my post line by line, disputing or mocking my assertions, I took it personally. If you don’t like my ideas or thoughts, then you must not like me. If you think my posts are stupid, you must think I’m stupid. But I didn’t have to react like that. I didn’t have to hand that kind of power over my emotions over to nameless, faceless strangers. It is just a message board. I like to think I’ve gotten passed that, but if I haven’t, it’s my own problem.
Even if posts on the MB were the catalyst to Opal’s latest episode, her problems go back a lot further than the MB’s existence. Doing away with the MB wouldn’t make her or anyone else feel better (except maybe trolls and sock puppets who seems to delight in disruption and destruction). If she hadn’t been on the MB, something else may have triggered this outburst. She’s already stated that she’s been under the weather a lot lately, and her doctor recently switched her meds. Having had a little bit of experience with depression myself (though no where near as extreme as Opal’s), I know either one of those factors can be jarring or unbalancing and leave a person upset and hypersensitive.
A lot of people enjoy the MB and find it a good way to kill a little time, get a little education, and blow off a little steam. Opal’s illness and the cretinous actions of a few like N/A, FORMERAGENT, Phaedrus, et al, don’t warrent doing away with the whole thing. So what’s your problem? Why do you want it to go away? And if you dislike it so much, why don’t you go away?
“I hope life isn’t a big joke, because I don’t get it,” Jack Handy