Vibr8gKiwi

Final comment over this slam against me as you apparently don't read the threads before you comment. I swore AFTER the hijackers started with the large font "bullshit" comment. Of course the guy that actually starts the flaming and swearing is ignored and I'm attacked. This board is messed up and the moderation is an unfair joke. Anyone reading the thread can see that.

livius drusus

The word "bullshit" is not a flame, Vibr8gKiwi. Rule 2 does not prohibit calling someone's argument utter crap. It prohibits calling people names. You should know this from the last time you railed against the moderation.

Anyway, whether you ride off into the sunset or not, I am interested to see the conversation proceed along the lines ex-xian and tribalbeeyatch were discussing. Tracking the actual meme instead of the generic word "bright" is of particular interest to me.

Celsus

Dammit Kiwi come back here. Since when has holding unpopular views ever been a good reason to stop someone? I'll tell you that I don't like the Bright idea, but on the other hand, the jumping on your back was unwarranted and unnecessarily hostile. I'll also tell you that what you're doing is exactly the sort of thing that Ruy Lopez (ole Demonsword if you remember) gets up to in Politics with his cycles. He's tolerated because he holds to fairly majoritarian views on the Politics forum (and to be more blunt, I think "memes" aren't as great a theory even though I once was extremely keen on the idea).

So it's not that your thread is "bullshit" or somesuch, and I have no idea where Secular Pinoy's snide remark came from, but you need not have stooped to that sort of level. FWIW, I did not interpret your thread as evangelism, but only that you had no idea exactly how unpopular the idea was here till now. If the idea were more popular, I'm sure plenty of people would have looked on it more keenly. I'm curious myself about publicity, but you do need to shake up that methodology, is all. Chill, and think about it some more. You're still welcome here regardless of your opinions. Now if the Brights is going to be such a bloody divisive issue, then the only lesson we need is tolerance and not some infantile yapping at each others' heels.

And I always liked your nick.

Joel

P.S. Moderators, Admins, isn't the "Brights" a lifestyle (if not the lifestyle) issue of the moment or did I miss some big announcement?

livius drusus

It is an activism issue, as the creators of the term never cease to repeat, and given the wide ranging nature and importance of the debate, it is far better suited to the Secular Activism forum than the Lifestyle one. No big announcement, but you can find the fulcrum of the appropriate location issue here.

Vibr8gKiwi

Final comment for the thread:

To any rational people that read this. Look at the big picture on this thread for a moment. Look at the initial posts, and what the idea was. Then look where the thread ended up. Read the posts inbetween and see how one or two people are allowed to destroy a constructive thread.

I make an attempt to merely track how many times an atheistic term appeared in a web search over time (a cool idea, I thought). Some methodology is questioned, but really it's just a tracking of a term and there isn't much methodology--that was admitted early. Yet the redundant harassment continues, I get slammed by the moderators, and chased off--the experiment is abandoned as soon as it started.

Big picture: if this thread is a typical example, then this board has some big problems. You guys that are here all the time perhaps don't notice it, but as an atheist looking with fresh eyes I can report that this place is unfriendly, arguably unreasonable, and just not somewhere it's worthwhile to participate.

Vibr8gKiwi

As I clarified early on, I had no argument. I was merely tracking the number of times a term appeared in a google search. That was apparently too difficult an experiment for this argumentative board.

Thanks for the link. I had forgotten why I had left before. It's especially interesting as I'm walking away this time not due to the moderation, but due to the environment. When I'd left previously it was due to some new moderation rules that wouldn't allow comments about people (even when they were accurate and deserved). I called a racist, homophobic, bigot a "twig" (yes, I called him a small branch) and I got moderated for it. That's how bad the moderation had become at that time.

At the time those new moderation rules were supposed to improve the environment around the board. It's ironic that I'm leaving now due to the environment. Even with the moderation (that apparently still won't allow jerks to be called what they really are), the environment isn't conductive to carrying on any particular topic. The argue-bots can take down any topic with an onslaught of annoyance (as long as they don't call anyone a twig). Nobody will be called a twig, but I don't see how anything of interest will ever be successfully talked about by those who aren't interested in fighting endless interruption and harassment.

viscousmemories

Correction: My jumping on his back yesterday was "unwarranted and hostile", because I assumed that he was merely using an experiment with fudged data to promote an ideological viewpoint. When he assured me that he was "just having fun", I took him at his word and offered to back off and let him have his fun. I now have very good reason, based on the content of his posts over the last two weeks, to believe that he outright lied to me about his intentions in starting this thread.

Well obviously that is a matter of opinion. In my opinion it is bullshit, and I don't mind saying as much.

Then you obviously haven't read every single other post Kiwi has made in the last two weeks. I have. He came here with the express intention of promoting the Brights movement, he knows exactly how unpopular the idea is here, and he thinks that anyone who disagrees is just a whiner who is out to spoil his fun. This thread is clearly designed to promote the idea that the Brights 'meme' is roaringly successful, and his refusal to alter his data model (in accordance with some suggested parameters) to more accurately reflect the truth is clear evidence of that.

You're not getting the point. He's not going to "shake up the methodology" if it doesn't serve his purpose. Read his posts since he came back here. He has one goal: promotion of the Brights 'meme'. I made the mistake of taking him at his word yesterday. I won't make that mistake again.

What is going on here is not intolerance and infantile yapping. Kiwi is here to promote his ideological viewpoint, and since he failed to win support for his views in this thread, he decided to try a little "game" wherein his point is proven through the use of bogus data. It's a pathetic maneuver for which he has been exposed, and now he is trying to cover by falling back under the old, "why is everybody picking on me?" routine. It's a joke.

Look, if I came into the Secular Lifestyle forum and started a thread "just for fun" that showed statistical evidence for the superiority of white people, and challenged every antagonist with, "stop hijacking my FUN thread! I'm just playing here!" I would be laughed off of IIDB. For the record I am not suggesting that the Brights 'meme' is as bad as racism, I am just pointing out that "I'm just having fun" is a bullshit excuse for trying to publicize a point based on faulty data.

vm

Celsus

viscousmemories,

You need to relax.

Joel

viscousmemories

Is that supposed to be some kind of argument? 'Cause I'm not getting it. Exactly how does my level of personal stress affect the validity of my points? I'd prefer it if you'd restrict your comments on this thread to the matter at hand.

Thanks,

vm

livius drusus

Vibr8gKiwi, if you really feel compelled to make sweeping generalizations of the board and its users based solely on this thread, then Bugs and the ICR are more than available to you.

So, how do we go about determining a reasonable methodology for tracking the frequency of use of the term "Bright"? So far I'm partial to Gurdur's suggestion of adding "nonreligious" to the search parameters, only he used just "brights AND nonreligious" and I'd like to see the article "the" retained, so " 'the brights' AND nonreligious."