As you state in the FAQ:
All of the 'rules' are subject to .....MY subjectivity. All of these rules are changeable. And challengable! But....I am The Decider. The Zen Dictator of Docudharma...meaning, I will have a hands off policy and position as much as is possible, but if it comes to me having to make a decision, I will do so as quickly as possible and take full responsibility for it. If the site is successful and we get too big for me to pay attention to every case, the rules will be changed. Which should lead to some interesting discussions!
First of all, I just re-read the FAQ. All that it says on I/P is:
Inflammatory discussion of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is not allowed. What constitutes inflammatory is my subjective call. If you wish to publish on this issue please e-mail me for more details.
My strict reading of the policy is that:
(1) Inflammatory discussion is not allowed. I would gather that applies to BOTH essays and comments.
(2) If you wish to publish, contact you for (implicitly) guidelines. It does not mention pre-approval and is posed as a [firm] request, not a demand.
Per the wording in the FAQ, I have no objection to the policy whatsoever. Your request that people contact you for details is perfectly reasonable. There is no mention of "I will ban you if you don't," though I assume that if -- per the above wording -- someone didn't contact you and was inflammatory, their ass would be banned right pronto. (And I note that you have been readily approving essays.)
However, in ek hornbeck's Ex Cathedra post, he states:
If you wish to discuss Israeli/Palestinian issues you are expected to submit your content in advance to buhdy who will discuss it with other site Administrators and Contributing Editors and decide whether your content is inflammatory or not.
There is quite a discrepancy between the FAQ stated policy and the ek stated policy. Has the FAQ changed in the past week? Is there a shadow policy, the "real deal" behind the curtain?
ek hornbeck goes on to state:
Discussions of I/P almost always instantly degenerate into knee jerk apologies for unconscionable actions on the one hand and anti semitic hate speech on the other.
He puts this in quotes, with perhaps an implication that this too is from the FAQ. In the ensuing discussion on that post, MomCat cites this quote twice.
If this is indeed the rationale for a pre-approval policy, I must say that -- in the responses to my Eyeless in Gaza essay and in the others that you have approved, flame wars have not been the case on Docudharma. I noticed that while, Kos used to have flame wars over this, there have been many side diaries on Kos in the past week, and while there has been some smoke, there has been no fire. Is this because the Kos community has suddenly had an affliction of good manners? Perhaps, but I suspect that it results from a political shift in the past year, capped by the fallout from the flotilla massacre. There is no basis for serious flame war on a PROGRESSIVE site because there is no humane foundation for the old kind of blind defense of Israel in the current climate. That has certainly been the case on Docudharma.
The only "flame war" Docudharma has seen on this has been on ek's post. Both Kitty ("the contents of this thread confirms that the rule is a good one" and MomCat ("Most of the comments have confirmed our resolve to enforce it") apparently consider the discussion on ek's post as justification for the ban. Indeed, Ed Encino said some bad shit and rightly got his head handed to him, and there was Diane's "brownshirt" remark which she herself regrets. A few other of the 211 comments were unnecessarily nasty. But a major part of the heat on the thread was generated in reaction to the moderators or directly BY the moderators.
ek's:
Now you can feel free to hate me just as hard and long as you want, my ego is quite robust and I assure you it can withstand your assault. I don't give a rat's ass what you think anyway.
... certainly takes the "moderate" out of "moderator." And when people wanted to discuss the policy, they were confronted down the line with "this is the policy, we will enforce it, you must not have read the FAQ." I got variations of this response 5 times from MomCat, and you and she both know I have read the FAQ. The belligerence does not reflect well on Docudharma.
But my bottom-line argument -- apart from I/P posts on Docudharma NOT "almost always instantly degenerat[ing] into knee jerk apologies for unconscionable actions on the one hand and anti semitic hate speech on the other" is as I stated on the thread:
it is simply that when there is murder and oppression going on, we have not only a right but an obligation to speak out. Anywhere. Even if some are made uncomfortable. To do otherwise is to commit the crime of silence.
To single out I/P sends a chilling message, whether intended or not, and fears of constant flame wars are highly exaggerated.
Night Owl has requested: "It would also be nice... to know the criteria for approval. 'Inflammatory' is way too vague a term to be of much guidance. Apart from the pre-approval issue, I think that would be helpful."
In any event, I know you are navigating difficult waters, and thank you for considering this.
jeffroby
We'll see.
