Re: RE: [ga] Re: What list forwards to what list

[Karl Auerbach <karl@CaveBear.com>]

Thanks for confirmation that we are currently "censor" free.

As for the distinction between bad behavior and censorship.

There is indeed some awful, terrible garbage that nobody ought to be
expected to tolerate.

To me that intolerable garbage is e-mail that says "censorship is OK".  
To some that intolerable garbage is e-mail that makes references to bodily
functions.

But should the reaction be to gag the speaker or to individually block our
ears.

I chose the latter approach.

Indeed, I do have filters send e-mail with suspicious strings, into either
the bit bucket or a special mailbox that has a close proximation to a
garbage can.

And I do have filters that send e-mail from certain characters into a
similar mailbox (but I send no purported person automatically to the bit
bucket.)

I've discovered that it is occassionally worthwhile to read some of the
auto-filtered garbage.

What I've found is that people do go through phases.  Sometimes a great
insight arises from such an unusual place (indeed, one of the best
insights I've had about some research I'm doing at the company I work for
came from someone who is routinely blackballed from several lists.)  And
sometimes people reform.

Tolerances, or lack thereof, for this or that kind of thing are something
that varies from person to person.

My tolerance for sleazy language is pretty high and my tolerance for
censorship is extremely low.  Clearly others have different patterns of
acceptable and not-acceptable content.

It seems to me that given the fact that it is very likely that every one
of us has e-mail tools that can filter content, we ought to place the
burden of molding one's e-mail reception to one's own prejudices and
tolerances ought to be a personal matter.

Indeed, if it helps, we can share our filters.

There's no need to reduce the conversation to the lowest common
denominator, which is what censorship of a list does.

The GA has a tough job to do - the biggest is accumulating some actual
power to make decisions that stick - and that's going to take some solid
head bumping, with associated smoke, flame, angry words - the normal side
effects of tough issues.  We don't need to add to our burden the need to
constantly watch over our shoulders as we type to look for the falling axe
of the sargeant at arms.

		--karl--