Let's talk about The Cool Zone

[vampirate]

Hating someone for their professed political beliefs is not the same thing as hating someone because they are gay. I suggest you drop that hand-grenade of a comparison and back away from it before it explodes in your hand.

I don't agree with calls to violence, but I also haven't seen much evidence of such in my brief forays into the channel. In the times I *have* seen it, it's been addressed rather quickly and judiciously by other admins.

I used the gay comparison because I date men, and it's the only one I felt qualified to make. But you're right, it's a poor comparison. I don't have a better one (I wish I did because you are absolutely right), but the point is the handwave of the breaking rules for one location in broad strokes is not a good precedent.

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Every time I've seen statements that passed the 'a reasonable person would consider this incitement' test, it's been shit on by regular folks pretty much immediately, and Dealt With by an admin as soon as one saw it. I mean hell, even carbodox's screenshot that he intended to be an example of the system not working, was - actually a screenshot of the system working, because an admin Dealt With It in moments.

As for differing opinions - frankly, it's not our job to make people like you or agree with you. Yes, the cool zone has a 'feel' to it, there are ideas that are accepted and ideas that are not accepted. The same is true of any space where conversation more complicated than small talk is allowed. If you have ideas that the space generally doesn't accept, the simple solution is either to not go into that space, or to keep those ideas to yourself if you do choose to go into that space. I, for one, hate lobster. Hate it. Seafood in general is wasted on me, but lobster specifically I have absolutely no use for. I do, however, love to cook, and hang out in a few spaces where talking about cooking is the stated goal. If I say 'lobster is trash garbage and i hate it' in those spaces, I would probably get Yelled At - not for saying I hate it, but for saying it's trash garbage. Is that unfair? Not in the slightest. It's not *my* space, it's a communal space of which I am simply one member. The unfair thing would be for me to insist that my personal standards are more important than the standards of the space I choose to hang out in.

The same is true here - it's up to each individual person to decide whether or not they want to look at or chat in the cool zone. It is up to each individual person to decide which opinions or ideas they choose to share in the cool zone. If you share an idea in the cool zone that is rejected, even if it is done so impolitely, *it is not our job to make people agree with you*. Just because multiple people are disagreeing with you don't mean you're being dogpiled. Most of the time, it just means you probably should have kept it in your pants.

It is the way they do it as well as the mass rushing of people. If it's not a place for debate and all that, then getting dogpiled shouldn't be a thing... but setting that aside, the toxic nature of the dogpiling... rather than reasonable disagreeing escalating to personal insults and such is where it gets bad. Lemme call myself out here, I reacted with returned insults myself a couple times. I had to walk back some shit, but... it just seems to be an environment that fosters it. Not always, but enough that it's noticeable. If it's a place to debate? Then yeah I suppose the reasonable expectation is I might get dogpiled, but if it's for catharsis and people just to sad or facebook post... that feels like a place no one should get dogpiled unless their opinion is just hideously egregious like on some neo-nazi shit. That is my opinion