Welcome home! Please contact lincoln@icrontic.com if you have any difficulty logging in or using the site. New registrations must be manually approved which may take several days. Can't log in? Try clearing your browser's cookies.
Why then contribute to those sites at all?
It's a serious question.
I have contributed there on and off because some threads looked interesting enough for discussion and some of the members are very nice.
It has been only a couple of weeks ago that it has really become plain obvious to me that this administrator is plain hostile and I stopped.
But then, something in me rebels, because: how can you have an open forum, advertise it as a friendly place, and then run it like Hitler?
I feel it is unfair not to question her methods or let her have her way.
Good on you. It is sometimes hard to know whether written communication to someone who is obviously ego tied to a site's content, is as effective a teaching as folks just going elsewhere. I think that on a graduated path, one should first try communicating for compassion's sake because everyone does eventually change sometime but not do so to the point that the communication is mistaken for support of the site as it is.
Why then contribute to those sites at all?
It's a serious question.
In my case, I had only been on the site in question a couple of weeks, and had only noticed how few postings there were. The mod/owner sent me a question via email (outside the forum), and it was an okay question. And then another question. And another. And finally asked if I had been corresponding with a particular person. Red flag! Who I correspond with in none of her business.
So, then I dropped out. It takes time to measure the tenor of any forum.
Anyway, the fact that I mentioned this site without naming it and a couple of members identified it on the spot is a sure sign that fortunately it is an exception in the online Buddhist forum world.
Micro-managers. It's impossible to successfully moderate any forum and be a micro-manager without either A: losing your mind or B: offending your users and scaring them off.
We are very lucky here. We have bumps once in a while, but I've been in online groups since before the internet had graphics or web addresses and this is by far the best moderated and most civil place I've ever been. I've moderated children and family forums in the past, and currently admin 3 community pages on Facebook. It's exhausting, time consuming, and can be very difficult (largely because we are a small community so despite the teeth gnashing on FB, we all have to see each other in person on a regular basis). They really do a good job here.
@federica said:
Care to share? surely you don't mean here..?
Of course not here. NB seems to be one of the most active Buddhist forums out there, possibly the most active. And for the most part, barring the occasional but fairly rare rough patch, it's pretty warm and fuzzy, pretty friendly.
@DhammaDragon said:
After I made a comment once, she answered by referring to something I had said here, as if she wanted me to be aware that she keeps a vigilante eye on what I write on other forums.
o.0
Pretty creepy! OK, I'm outa here! Been nice chatting with you folks!
In regards to the fellow "Buddhist" sister and her site (And no I'm not a member nor have I spent time on the site)...
I can understand the frustration some might feel when dealing with a person who seems to have been conditioned (in an unpleasant way) by her circumstances...
I doubt it was her original intention to inherit a "nasty" reputation After all who in their right mind would set up a Buddhist site then deliberately seek out unwholesome feedback for themselves...
Let's not write her off completely....Lest we forget...We are all in Samsara together and experiencing Dukkha in our own way...
This is the only Buddhist forum, other than my Sangha's page, that I am a member of. I have tried to read on a few others, but cannot get into the format as much as here. So I don't bother. Sounds like I'm not missing much, lol.
It depends on why she reads the forum, and what she does with the info gleaned from that. If she does that in order to intimidate her members by referencing things they've said on other forums, that's really inappropriate. One might say it's a bullying tactic. On the other hand, if she reads the forum to get topic ideas, there's nothing wrong with that.
@Dakini said:
It depends on why she reads the forum, and what she does with the info gleaned from that. If she does that in order to intimidate her members by referencing things they've said on other forums, that's really inappropriate. One might say it's a bullying tactic. On the other hand, if she reads the forum to get topic ideas, there's nothing wrong with that
One would think that if such blatant bullying was going on, the bullied members would just pack their bags and leave...I've had no firsthand experience with her forum so I can only give her the benefit of the doubt (as human beings we have flaws) and think that her original intention to start up a Buddhist forum was in good faith and to benefit others, and if it was just for the rush that comes from craving power , I'm sure others would have eventually seen through it all...
And in the news right now, we have a report that 5 high school kids, ages 14 and 15, all on the football team, were charged with an attempted rape and expelled because they got a special ed student in the shower, held him down, removed his pants, and threatened to sodomize him with a broomstick.
Normal people would ask, what were these idiots thinking? Well, anyone who has seen a bully gang in school knows that of those five kids, one or two are ringleaders and come up with the ideas and the rest enjoy the power of being in the gang and won't disagree.
Bullies only respond to power. It's a shame that people are like that.
Bullying is about power and control, often bullies have a domineering figure in their life that bullies them and they in turn dish it out to make their selves feel in control.
I was bullied once beaten and abused by another, It all ended when I broke the victim cycle and defended my self...Bullies pick on the weak because they are weak people themselves.
The lesson I learnt from my experience is stand up and defend yourself, if that means knocking a bully on his arse and giving them a taste of their own medicine then so be it.
This was a long time ago before I was seriously practicing Dharma. But the lesson is still the same, don't be a doormat, defend your mind with patience and defend yourself physically in whatever way you need to in order to solve the problem.
It's much harder today to fight back and have that be the end, though. Many schools have zero tolerance policies, where if you fight back, you are just as in trouble as the bully and you are both expelled. When my son was 8, another boy was hitting and kicking him on the bus. When my son stood up to change seats, the bus driver wrote him up and kicked him off the bus for a month (even though several other kids told him what happened). Also, a lot of bullying is not physical anymore. It's much more insidious, and fighting back can be very tricky, if possible at all. It's pretty hard to fight back against a boyfriend who just posted private photos of you all over the internet. Pretty hard to fight back when gangs of people you've never met are telling you on Twitter to kill yourself.
2
federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
Yes, tragically, with the countless innovative technical advances we've made in the last 50 years, has come the increased and sinister social problem (to put it mildly) of picking a victim and driving them to suicide, without ever actually laying eyes on them.
hell, you don't even have to live in the same country to make someone's life a misery.
Ayone else notice the message under the 'google' logo, today?
"Safer Internet Day: Read tips to help you stay safe and secure online"
Comments
I have contributed there on and off because some threads looked interesting enough for discussion and some of the members are very nice.
It has been only a couple of weeks ago that it has really become plain obvious to me that this administrator is plain hostile and I stopped.
But then, something in me rebels, because: how can you have an open forum, advertise it as a friendly place, and then run it like Hitler?
I feel it is unfair not to question her methods or let her have her way.
@DhammaDragon
Good on you. It is sometimes hard to know whether written communication to someone who is obviously ego tied to a site's content, is as effective a teaching as folks just going elsewhere. I think that on a graduated path, one should first try communicating for compassion's sake because everyone does eventually change sometime but not do so to the point that the communication is mistaken for support of the site as it is.
In my case, I had only been on the site in question a couple of weeks, and had only noticed how few postings there were. The mod/owner sent me a question via email (outside the forum), and it was an okay question. And then another question. And another. And finally asked if I had been corresponding with a particular person. Red flag! Who I correspond with in none of her business.
So, then I dropped out. It takes time to measure the tenor of any forum.
Anyway, the fact that I mentioned this site without naming it and a couple of members identified it on the spot is a sure sign that fortunately it is an exception in the online Buddhist forum world.
Micro-managers. It's impossible to successfully moderate any forum and be a micro-manager without either A: losing your mind or B: offending your users and scaring them off.
We are very lucky here. We have bumps once in a while, but I've been in online groups since before the internet had graphics or web addresses and this is by far the best moderated and most civil place I've ever been. I've moderated children and family forums in the past, and currently admin 3 community pages on Facebook. It's exhausting, time consuming, and can be very difficult (largely because we are a small community so despite the teeth gnashing on FB, we all have to see each other in person on a regular basis). They really do a good job here.
Of course not here. NB seems to be one of the most active Buddhist forums out there, possibly the most active. And for the most part, barring the occasional but fairly rare rough patch, it's pretty warm and fuzzy, pretty friendly.
o.0
Pretty creepy! OK, I'm outa here! Been nice chatting with you folks!
In regards to the fellow "Buddhist" sister and her site (And no I'm not a member nor have I spent time on the site)...
I can understand the frustration some might feel when dealing with a person who seems to have been conditioned (in an unpleasant way) by her circumstances...
I doubt it was her original intention to inherit a "nasty" reputation After all who in their right mind would set up a Buddhist site then deliberately seek out unwholesome feedback for themselves...
Let's not write her off completely....Lest we forget...We are all in Samsara together and experiencing Dukkha in our own way...
She reads this forum.
Is that a bad thing?
This is the only Buddhist forum, other than my Sangha's page, that I am a member of. I have tried to read on a few others, but cannot get into the format as much as here. So I don't bother. Sounds like I'm not missing much, lol.
It depends on why she reads the forum, and what she does with the info gleaned from that. If she does that in order to intimidate her members by referencing things they've said on other forums, that's really inappropriate. One might say it's a bullying tactic. On the other hand, if she reads the forum to get topic ideas, there's nothing wrong with that.
@Dakini,
One would think that if such blatant bullying was going on, the bullied members would just pack their bags and leave...I've had no firsthand experience with her forum so I can only give her the benefit of the doubt (as human beings we have flaws) and think that her original intention to start up a Buddhist forum was in good faith and to benefit others, and if it was just for the rush that comes from craving power , I'm sure others would have eventually seen through it all...
@Shoshin Yup. That's exactly what happens. Sooner or later, people leave. Including all the mods.
Exactly...which is why on some days there are no posts at all.
Let's steer back towards general bullying and less discussion of other sites' practices. I think we've run that one aground.
No, not here.
Mr Cushion is a bully! He makes me sit on him. The Buddha just looks on. Just needed to share . . .
And in the news right now, we have a report that 5 high school kids, ages 14 and 15, all on the football team, were charged with an attempted rape and expelled because they got a special ed student in the shower, held him down, removed his pants, and threatened to sodomize him with a broomstick.
Normal people would ask, what were these idiots thinking? Well, anyone who has seen a bully gang in school knows that of those five kids, one or two are ringleaders and come up with the ideas and the rest enjoy the power of being in the gang and won't disagree.
Bullies only respond to power. It's a shame that people are like that.
Bullying is about power and control, often bullies have a domineering figure in their life that bullies them and they in turn dish it out to make their selves feel in control.
I was bullied once beaten and abused by another, It all ended when I broke the victim cycle and defended my self...Bullies pick on the weak because they are weak people themselves.
The lesson I learnt from my experience is stand up and defend yourself, if that means knocking a bully on his arse and giving them a taste of their own medicine then so be it.
This was a long time ago before I was seriously practicing Dharma. But the lesson is still the same, don't be a doormat, defend your mind with patience and defend yourself physically in whatever way you need to in order to solve the problem.
It's much harder today to fight back and have that be the end, though. Many schools have zero tolerance policies, where if you fight back, you are just as in trouble as the bully and you are both expelled. When my son was 8, another boy was hitting and kicking him on the bus. When my son stood up to change seats, the bus driver wrote him up and kicked him off the bus for a month (even though several other kids told him what happened). Also, a lot of bullying is not physical anymore. It's much more insidious, and fighting back can be very tricky, if possible at all. It's pretty hard to fight back against a boyfriend who just posted private photos of you all over the internet. Pretty hard to fight back when gangs of people you've never met are telling you on Twitter to kill yourself.
Yes, tragically, with the countless innovative technical advances we've made in the last 50 years, has come the increased and sinister social problem (to put it mildly) of picking a victim and driving them to suicide, without ever actually laying eyes on them.
hell, you don't even have to live in the same country to make someone's life a misery.
Ayone else notice the message under the 'google' logo, today?
"Safer Internet Day: Read tips to help you stay safe and secure online"