This is being posted in "Anything Goes," so it should be okay here.
I must say that I joined this forum for a few reasons. One, the wealth of information to be found here about our cute little babies, and two, the overall environment of camaraderie and goodwill that pervades this forum, as opposed to that "other" forum about Maltese.
However, lately, I have noticed that this board has become divided into little cliques, almost like in high school, where if one does not conform to that group's beliefs, attitudes, or style, then the group shuns her, or even picks on her. Now I admit that I have been involved in some of these little spats in the past, but even after I have been laying low, I still see it going on. This means that the problem is still out there.
While I am not naive enough as to believe that we will all get along on here like we were the animatronic robots in Disney's It's A Small World, I still think that we can operate with as much of a sense of harmony as possible if a few things changed:
1. If someone in your clique posts something and someone from another clique disagrees with it, just let it be. Too often I see this happen, and then Clique A calls Clique B's post a "personal attack." However, if Clique A replies with an equally snide post, that is characterized as Clique A "defending herself." HA! The hypocrisy here is almost unbearable.
2. As has been stated before, we should all use the PM feature a lot more.
At the risk of starting something seen on Judge Judy, I was totally blown away by how the whole Spottypoo vs. DoctorCathy war played out. Granted, things were said by both sides that were in poor taste (whether they were edited out by the poster herself or by Joe), but I think that this is an example of one clique ganging up on another. Both parties were equally wrong here, yet only one was publicly chastised for it. No, I did not read the "evil" post by DoctorCathy that was edited by Joe, but from what I heard it said something that was no more scandalous than Spottypoo telling Mee (an innocent bystander) to "bite me!"
Joe, this is your forum and you certainly have the right to run it any way that you want, but in my humble opinion, if you start taking sides like that, then you run the risk of turning what was once a great forum into something exactly like "that other guy's forum." Just look at how bold Spottypoo got in her subsequent posts after she saw she had an endorsement from the Administrator! This damages the "safe" feeling that refugees from the other site came here seeking. Soon enough, this forum will be exactly like the other one, where a certain group of "regulars" start snapping at any newbies who post contrary to their beliefs.
I understand that many feelings were hurt here, and that some things were said that may not be forgivable, but if we just move on without addressing what went wrong here, then these kinds of episodes will keep happening, and I know that Joe does not want that. We should all just leave the bad things from our days at the door, and when we log on to this great forum, we should just be allowed to post our beliefs and agree to disagree at the end of the day.
Let's not forget the reason why we are all gathered here in the first place:
I must say that I joined this forum for a few reasons. One, the wealth of information to be found here about our cute little babies, and two, the overall environment of camaraderie and goodwill that pervades this forum, as opposed to that "other" forum about Maltese.
However, lately, I have noticed that this board has become divided into little cliques, almost like in high school, where if one does not conform to that group's beliefs, attitudes, or style, then the group shuns her, or even picks on her. Now I admit that I have been involved in some of these little spats in the past, but even after I have been laying low, I still see it going on. This means that the problem is still out there.
While I am not naive enough as to believe that we will all get along on here like we were the animatronic robots in Disney's It's A Small World, I still think that we can operate with as much of a sense of harmony as possible if a few things changed:
1. If someone in your clique posts something and someone from another clique disagrees with it, just let it be. Too often I see this happen, and then Clique A calls Clique B's post a "personal attack." However, if Clique A replies with an equally snide post, that is characterized as Clique A "defending herself." HA! The hypocrisy here is almost unbearable.
2. As has been stated before, we should all use the PM feature a lot more.
At the risk of starting something seen on Judge Judy, I was totally blown away by how the whole Spottypoo vs. DoctorCathy war played out. Granted, things were said by both sides that were in poor taste (whether they were edited out by the poster herself or by Joe), but I think that this is an example of one clique ganging up on another. Both parties were equally wrong here, yet only one was publicly chastised for it. No, I did not read the "evil" post by DoctorCathy that was edited by Joe, but from what I heard it said something that was no more scandalous than Spottypoo telling Mee (an innocent bystander) to "bite me!"
Joe, this is your forum and you certainly have the right to run it any way that you want, but in my humble opinion, if you start taking sides like that, then you run the risk of turning what was once a great forum into something exactly like "that other guy's forum." Just look at how bold Spottypoo got in her subsequent posts after she saw she had an endorsement from the Administrator! This damages the "safe" feeling that refugees from the other site came here seeking. Soon enough, this forum will be exactly like the other one, where a certain group of "regulars" start snapping at any newbies who post contrary to their beliefs.
I understand that many feelings were hurt here, and that some things were said that may not be forgivable, but if we just move on without addressing what went wrong here, then these kinds of episodes will keep happening, and I know that Joe does not want that. We should all just leave the bad things from our days at the door, and when we log on to this great forum, we should just be allowed to post our beliefs and agree to disagree at the end of the day.
Let's not forget the reason why we are all gathered here in the first place: