Deletion discussion

[narya]

Just for the record, it wasn't me that deleted the post about the link. But thanks for the rest of the post, which was very supportive.



Note to self: Must strive to sound more bitter, or people won't notice.

[JewelSong]

Just for the record, it wasn't me that deleted the post about the link.

It wasn't? That's what I get for relying on my imperfect memory...

Note to self: Must strive to sound more bitter, or people won't notice.

*snort* Perhaps there should be a "bitter" emoticon, so everyone knows.

[Frelga]

I want to say something about the Coping thread, the first of which I founded. While I realize that, soon after someone else has posted devastating and life-changing news, people might hesitate to post about any problem short of that, I don't think pain can or should be weighed and measured and compared, and I certainly don't believe it should be judged. Not in Coping. I would wish for everyone to feel welcome to post as they need to, and to be acknowledged.

I keep meaning to start a Kvetching thread. For all the stuff that is annoying but not Big. But then I realize that half the people here never complain, even about things that would make me whimper in the corner for days. So I suck it up and fire off that email that made me hyperventilate for two weeks.

[anthriel]

I think a Kvetching thread is a fetching idea.

Yes, I am aware that that is sort of alliterative. Yes, I am very happy about that.

narya, thank you so much for coming in here and saying what you said; I can so commiserate with that predicament. I, too, tend to share too much (or I used to, anyway) and TMI sums it up well; I would put something out there, sharing from the heart, lots of emotion, lots of... well, somewhere between dramatic overage and courage, really, and sometimes... nothing would happen.

I KNOW that many times it was because whatever I had said was so raw, so... maybe inappropriate, that people didn't know how to follow it. The last post I deleted, the last one I probably will ever delete, was about two weeks before this thread started. I came on here one night and posted a big "I love you guys" post and totally emotion dumped on the board, and no one answered me or posted in the thread for more than 24 hours.

So I deleted it, and the next post came in within minutes. Nothing to do with what I had written and expunged, btw. It just seemed like maybe my ridiculous words were damming up an otherwise sane discussion.

And then I learned in THIS thread that the infrequent habit I had of jumping in and then scrambling out if I were over my head was actually hurting people. Upsetting, frustrating, and HURTING people. This I will not tolerate, even from me.

So I've been posting the equivalent of kitten pictures, since then. Safer, really.

My problem with this whole discussion is that I have felt shamed for being ashamed.

Exactly. As if berating people for being insecure makes them more secure, somehow. Oy.

[narya]

Dang, if I'd been here, I'd have responded to your post, Anthy. But I missed it. All of your posts, even the over the top ones, are full of love. We are poorer without them.

Do we have a maudlin emoticon here...

But really, I do mean it, even if it is so uncomfortable for me to say it that I have to joke about it, I really do appreciate your posts. Especially the raw ones.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I think a Kvetching thread is a fetching idea.

Yes, I am aware that that is sort of alliterative. Yes, I am very happy about that.

narya, thank you so much for coming in here and saying what you said; I can so commiserate with that predicament. I, too, tend to share too much (or I used to, anyway) and TMI sums it up well; I would put something out there, sharing from the heart, lots of emotion, lots of... well, somewhere between dramatic overage and courage, really, and sometimes... nothing would happen.

I KNOW that many times it was because whatever I had said was so raw, so... maybe inappropriate, that people didn't know how to follow it. The last post I deleted, the last one I probably will ever delete, was about two weeks before this thread started. I came on here one night and posted a big "I love you guys" post and totally emotion dumped on the board, and no one answered me or posted in the thread for more than 24 hours.

So I deleted it, and the next post came in within minutes. Nothing to do with what I had written and expunged, btw. It just seemed like maybe my ridiculous words were damming up an otherwise sane discussion.

And then I learned in THIS thread that the infrequent habit I had of jumping in and then scrambling out if I were over my head was actually hurting people. Upsetting, frustrating, and HURTING people. This I will not tolerate, even from me.

So I've been posting the equivalent of kitten pictures, since then. Safer, really. .

I think this may well be the most upsetting post I have seen on this board.

[nerdanel]

Anthy, I can relate to some of the ideas you're expressing. If I'm on the fence about making a particular post (not just at HoF, but in general online), at times the lack of response or type of response I get to that post will influence whether I leave it up.

The reasons I might question a particular post of mine are different than yours. For instance, if I feel unclear whether a particular passionate post of mine came off too stridently, a lack of response might cause me to wonder whether others are silently thinking exactly that and in some cases might cause me to remove the post.

As to the broader discussion: I come down very much on the side of those who believe in a right to delete or edit one's own posts, at any time after their making, for any reason, and whether or not responses to that post have been made. A post is offered at a particular moment for reading by those who are then participating in the discussion, much like an offline discussion participant makes a statement only to those present within earshot. No online speaker should be compelled to continue to offer their post for others to read if they've changed their mind about sharing their comments publicly. No one who is not present when the post is initially posted has some sort of vested right to read the post simply by virtue of its having been made in the first place. And to register my explicit disagreement with a couple of the more strongly-worded comments made earlier in this thread: it is not necessarily either "dishonest" or "passive-aggressive" to choose to withdraw one's comments after the fact.

[Túrin Turambar]

I think we need to distinguish the difference between arguing that people don’t have the right to delete posts and suggesting that deleting posts is, in most cases, not helpful to achieving any constructive purpose.

In particular, I hate to think that people would delete posts simply because they receive no replies. I have made many such posts, from the final posts in three front-page Lasto threads to the first act of my parodic sci-fi film script featuring pirates in zeppelins. I have to say that it never occurred for me to delete them – the fact that nobody replied shouldn’t suggest to me that they were bad, only that people had nothing to say in response. I suppose I view messageboards as being far more of a written than a spoken medium of communication, more akin to publication than conversation, and a lot of my views flow from that.

[nerdanel]

Saying that deleting posts is "not helpful to achieving any constructive purpose" seems to ignore the strong benefit to the individual poster of removing from the public view words that they no longer wish to share. In turn, knowing that one can speak without having one's words indelibly tattooed on the board (to paraphrase something another poster wrote at the start of this conversation) is - I would argue - a benefit to the whole board, because many of us would speak far less, or not at all, if a messageboard post were deemed akin to a publication or indelible tattoo that could never be deleted or redacted. For me, posting on a messageboard is definitely conversation - not publication at all.

[Lhaewin]

For me, posting on a messageboard is definitely conversation - not publication at all.

For me it is both. While I am not able to take back my words in a face to face conversation, I can give my posts on a message-board some thought, edit them and even delete them, if I change my mind. Therefore some shy people are not able to open up in RL, but on the internet. To go back and delete a post which is months old, does not make lots of sense to me. It leaves a gap in a conversation and may even disrupt the meaning of it. Nevertheless I think it is a right of everyone to take back their words on a message board and I just assume that they have very good reasons for doing so.

The question is imho why do I sometimes feel awkward about posting? Why do I often wish to say something, but withdraw? Obviously, I can only speak for myself. First, at present I don't have so much time because I am about to finish my Master dissertation and this takes a lot of energy. Second, I am quite self-conscious regarding my language skills. I know my English is good and all that (this is really not an attempt to get praise about it!), but it is simply not the same to express deeper thoughts in English or my own language. I just don't think I can contribute appropriately which makes me feel a bit detached from some of the lovely people here. Third, I know the issue of unanswered posts, not necessarily from this, but from other boards, and I do feel insecure about it. Fourth, I keep thinking that for example in the Coping thread other people's issues are more important, worse or more serious. This might be owed to the fact that my issues are often not physical, but caused by exhaustion and stress.

In other words, posting kitten pictures might be the solution.

[anthriel]

Lhaewin: I will manfully refrain from pointing out how amazing your English is, then. I understand your hesitations, but please let me tell you that your success in expressing yourself in a language not native to you makes me very much wish I understood German.

narya, Thank you. I appreciate your posts as well, and have never noticed anything from you that I saw as bitter. FWIW.

SirV, I am so sorry. I can't help how I feel. But it really distresses me to know that I am distressing you. OY!

nel, I think, perhaps, we are relatively close to being on the same page. When you say:

The reasons I might question a particular post of mine are different than yours. For instance, if I feel unclear whether a particular passionate post of mine came off too stridently, a lack of response might cause me to wonder whether others are silently thinking exactly that and in some cases might cause me to remove the post.

... it rings in my ears as EXACTLY the same predicament that I find myself in. You are less maudlin, I am less confrontational, but both of us wonder, after the fact, if our passions have gone too far. Silence can be a good indication of just that.

In particular, I hate to think that people would delete posts simply because they receive no replies. I have made many such posts, from the final posts in three front-page Lasto threads to the first act of my parodic sci-fi film script featuring pirates in zeppelins. I have to say that it never occurred for me to delete them – the fact that nobody replied shouldn’t suggest to me that they were bad, only that people had nothing to say in response.

LordM, once again I am compelled to say that some of this disconnect in understanding comes from the fact that we are all different people, and react differently to the same situation. Even though I know I am risking another "tra-la-la" response (LOVE that stimulating dialog, boy howdy), I would say that perhaps your style of posting doesn't expose your pasty underbelly like mine does (not that you HAVE a pasty underbelly, of course, going with the literary license, here).

I recently posted somewhere that people really don't have blue eyes, that eyes are "blue" in the same way that the sky is blue; it has to do with scattered light and perception, not pigment. I thought that was kinda interesting, and I checked back several times to see what people's reactions were to that.

Reactions? None. But the fact that no one commented on THAT didn't upset me at all. That was just a fact that I was sharing, and people probably did read it and say "huh" to themselves and move on. I wasn't emotionally invested in that post, in other words.

You are a fairly factual poster, even when you are expressing your opinions. I am a hot mess. (tra-la-la ) We of the Hot Mess variety know that our words can be overwhelming, and we sometimes are, and darned well should be, aware that core dumping is not always welcome wherever we go.

Anyway, yeah.

[yovargas]

And then I learned in THIS thread that the infrequent habit I had of jumping in and then scrambling out if I were over my head was actually hurting people. Upsetting, frustrating, and HURTING people. This I will not tolerate, even from me.

Okay, how bout this - the only person who has expressed more than mild annoyance about this has been jewel.

So to JS I say - Get Over It. People are different and are gonna behave differently for different reasons. Some of those reasons and behaviors you might not like. Get Over It. Anthy and narya and most other people are very different from you so they will behave very different from you. Get Over It. Your repeated insistence that people should post and behave the way that you want them to is far more irritating to me than any deleted post I can recall on this board. I've told anthy more than once that, gee, I wish I'd gotten to read that deleted post cuz I almost always love her posts, but I never thought it was anything more than her total prerogative to post or remove whatever the hell she damn well pleased. Does that bother you? Too bad, Get Over It.

[Frelga]

I recently posted somewhere that people really don't have blue eyes, that eyes are "blue" in the same way that the sky is blue; it has to do with scattered light and perception, not pigment. I thought that was kinda interesting, and I checked back several times to see what people's reactions were to that.

Reactions? None. Confused But the fact that no one commented on THAT didn't upset me at all. That was just a fact that I was sharing, and people probably did read it and say "huh" to themselves and move on. I wasn't emotionally invested in that post, in other words.

Really? Wasn't that the post that started a discussion of genetics and evolution and survival of traits with no particular purpose? Also melanin.

[narya]

The blue eyes and blue sky explanation also applies to the apparently blue veins in your wrist.

And then I learned in THIS thread that the infrequent habit I had of jumping in and then scrambling out if I were over my head was actually hurting people. Upsetting, frustrating, and HURTING people. This I will not tolerate, even from me.

Really? I had no idea! I've always found your posts to be supportive and bonding. But then, I seldom go to Lasto or the Tolkien forums. Too many times I have tried, and I've been ignored or unpleasantly put in my place. Perhaps you have been, too. It's a rougher neighborhood. In fact, the only reason I'm in this thread in Lasto now is because I'm finally able to talk about something I'm an expert on - my own feelings and observations.

Lhaewin, I appreciate your posts because you bring a different perspective. I, too, wish I knew German and could hear you on a deeper level. But what you do say is certainly valuable.

Nel, I think part of the difference of how we view the boards has to do with which TORC tradition (if any) we came from. I seldom posted in Manwë, and was not welcomed when I did, but I did lurk. It appeared to me that the threads were current events driven and somewhat ephemeral. I don't know that anyone would pull up three year old threads to read and respond to. In fact, one of the reasons I didn't post is because the threads were often many pages long, with hours of reading, and I don't like to post if I haven't first read what comes before. I can see that if you were feeling uncomfortable with what you said in a heated moment, and did not want it out there for the world, you might have the desire to remove it. At some point, someone will, if they haven't already, cross connect your TORC or HOF name with your real life name, read through all your 5 or 10 year old posts, and develop a different opinion about you. I worry about that myself, and tend to, therefore, post mostly in the closed threads, which are marginally safer.

Likewise, the social threads were real time chatting, and not worth slogging through at a later date. But the Movies forum, my hang out, was rich in threads about what makes a good movie, what is the meaning of life, and how Tolkienism informs my choices, the sort of things that are timeless. I'm the one who started the Movie thread index, that TTBK eventually took over, because I read all those old threads and really enjoyed them. Those threads had value to future readers, and would have been damaged if some of the members took their marbles and went home. I can look back at those threads and see that I was a lightweight, and my voice was seldom responded to, but it was a part of the fabric that made for a richer experience. (And, it is always painfully obvious when I'm not responded to, but not as obvious when someone else is equally ignored.)

Yov, thanks for standing up for me, but I was not hurt by Jewel, just puzzled. Sometimes we need a facetious emoticon. (Love that word, facetious.)

Time for a grope hug.

[nerdanel]

Narya, that makes a lot of sense: most of the posts I may reconsider or remove are Lasto/Manwë-style posts. However, there have been times on this board when I've wanted to withdraw more personal posts that have dealt explicitly with my own life, family history, personal decisions, etc. In some cases, this was because I decided that I simply overshared; in at least one other case, I was so uncomfortable with the responses that I received that I concluded that this was the wrong forum to have shared the thoughts that I did altogether. In these types of cases, I feel especially strongly about posters' rights to withdraw their words.

Anthy, yes, I agree with what you said in response to me.

[Cerin]

If I'm on the fence about making a particular post (not just at HoF, but in general online), at times the lack of response or type of response I get to that post will influence whether I leave it up.

A post is offered at a particular moment for reading by those who are then participating in the discussion, much like an offline discussion participant makes a statement only to those present within earshot.

No online speaker should be compelled to continue to offer their post for others to read if they've changed their mind about sharing their comments publicly. No one who is not present when the post is initially posted has some sort of vested right to read the post simply by virtue of its having been made in the first place.

I see posting very differently, because it is written communication and not necessarily being seen in real time, as words are exchanged in a conversation. I think it is mistaken to consider that we are speaking privately to a particular set of people at a particular time when we choose to post on a public messageboard; we don't know who or how many people read our words. I think what we write on a public messageboard becomes public; it is no longer our private property. You can't unsay what you say to people in real time, and you can't really unsay what you write on a messageboard, either, if you consider that immediately upon a post appearing, other people have a right to quote your words and they would not be remiss in doing so, even if the post is subsequently deleted.

I'm kind of taken aback by the idea that people consider deleting their posts based on whether there's a response. Perhaps it's because of the way I view a messageboard as primarily an exchange of ideas, rather than as an opportunity for socializing. I strongly feel that the value of a post isn't defined by what sort of response it gets. It has its intrinsic value, as the representation of a person's thoughts.

Saying that deleting posts is "not helpful to achieving any constructive purpose" seems to ignore the strong benefit to the individual poster of removing from the public view words that they no longer wish to share.

But this is it. You say posting is like conversation, but you can't unshare words in a conversation.

Certainly I understand editing posts for ill-considered or personal content, but that would rarely necessitate removing the entire structure of a post. I have posted many things on our family of messageboards that would no doubt embarrass me if I re-read them, but I wouldn't think of removing them unless I were figuratively shaking the dust of a community off my feet, which is a sign of repudiation of that community. To me it would imply disrespect for the reality/value of the interactions that took place.

Your repeated insistence that people should post and behave the way that you want them to is far more irritating to me than any deleted post I can recall on this board.

I haven't seen Jewel doing this. As I see it, she has been expressing a concern that people were censoring themselves. I haven't seen her insisting that people behave a certain way. I don't think she should be blamed for the conclusions others have reached based on this conversation. We all have the right to feel as we feel, and post according to our comfort level, and I'm pretty sure we all understand that.

[nerdanel]

I think what we write on a public messageboard becomes public; it is no longer our private property.

I understand that some people may feel this way, but I will choose not to post (or post very sparingly and non-substantively) on any messageboard that enforces this view. You can certainly create a messageboard that takes this view and people can opt in or out of posting based on whether or not they agree.

You can't unsay what you say to people in real time, and you can't really unsay what you write on a messageboard, either, if you consider that immediately upon a post appearing, other people have a right to quote your words and they would not be remiss in doing so, even if the post is subsequently deleted.

You can't unsay what you say to people in real time, but you only say it to a limited number of people and (typically unless you know your words are being recorded and disseminated on the Internet), your words are not offered in fixed, provable form accessible to almost everyone in the entire world. Because the scope of the sharing is potentially much, much greater over the Internet, people should (and do) retain some degree of greater post hoc control over their words.

I'm kind of taken aback by the idea that people consider deleting their posts based on whether there's a response. Perhaps it's because of the way I view a messageboard as primarily an exchange of ideas, rather than as an opportunity for socializing.

I agree that a messageboard may exist for an exchange of ideas, but silence can indicate a critique of the form/tone in which those ideas were expressed. If I'm already on the fence about form/tone, silence may cause me to wonder if others agree with my self-critique. This happens very occasionally, not constantly.

But this is it. You say posting is like conversation, but you can't unshare words in a conversation.

See my point above re: the limited scope of sharing in an in-person conversation.

I have posted many things on our family of messageboards that would no doubt embarrass me if I re-read them, but I wouldn't think of removing them unless I were figuratively shaking the dust of a community off my feet, which is a sign of repudiation of that community. To me it would imply disrespect for the reality/value of the interactions that took place.

And it's fine if you choose not to edit your own posts for this reason, as long as you acknowledge that people who choose to edit may have other reasons for doing so than implying disrespect for the value of their online interactions.

[Cerin]

You can't unsay what you say to people in real time, but you only say it to a limited number of people and (typically unless you know your words are being recorded and disseminated on the Internet), your words are not offered in fixed, provable form accessible to almost everyone in the entire world.

I agree with all of this, which is why I think posting is not at all like conversation. Perhaps that's the crux of the issue. If you treat posting like conversation (which it is unlike in so many ways), I can see that you might have reason to do quite a bit of deleting.

I understand that some people may feel this way, but I will choose not to post (or post very sparingly and non-substantively) on any messageboard that enforces this view.

I don't mean that posts should be viewed as public; I mean that our words are, in fact, public once we post them. The comforting notion that edit/delete allows us to retrieve our words is somewhat illusory, since we don't know who might have quoted and saved them for reply, nor how they may have taken flight in the ether or cemented themselves in the minds of others.

And it's fine if you choose not to edit your own posts for this reason, as long as you acknowledge that people who choose to edit may have other reasons for doing so than implying disrespect for the value of their online interactions.

I acknowledge that there are many reasons people edit/delete, and that it most likely doesn't imply disrespect on their part, for the people or the conversation they were a part of. But I think deleting posts in their entirety after the fact is inherently disrespectful of the conversations and community in which they took place -- of the reality and value of those interactions at that time -- even if the deleter intends no disrespect.

[yovargas]

Your repeated insistence that people should post and behave the way that you want them to is far more irritating to me than any deleted post I can recall on this board.

I haven't seen Jewel doing this. As I see it, she has been expressing a concern that people were censoring themselves.

I'd say her calls of "dishonesty" and "passive aggressive" went well beyond "expressing a concern" about self-censoring. I'd say the same about your labeling this as "disrespectful". In both cases this is a problem with your perceptions, not with reality. Nobody else should be expected to change their behavior because your perceptions are flatly wrong.

[anthriel]

I recently posted somewhere that people really don't have blue eyes, that eyes are "blue" in the same way that the sky is blue; it has to do with scattered light and perception, not pigment. I thought that was kinda interesting, and I checked back several times to see what people's reactions were to that.

Reactions? None. Confused But the fact that no one commented on THAT didn't upset me at all. That was just a fact that I was sharing, and people probably did read it and say "huh" to themselves and move on. I wasn't emotionally invested in that post, in other words.

Really? Wasn't that the post that started a discussion of genetics and evolution and survival of traits with no particular purpose? Also melanin.

I don't remember, exactly; that discussion certainly plowed on, though, and I loved every minute of it. My point is that no one came in and said no WAY blue eyes are not really BLUE?, and I must have been expecting it on some level; I think I was watching for it. However, the fact no one did was not of concern to me at all. I noticed, but there was no emotional response on board, at all. (As, of course, there shouldn't be!)

My point was that THAT type of post doesn't feel like I'm wafting out in the wind. When I post about microbiology, I'm not sure I even notice if anyone responds. It's not that responses aren't interesting, because of course they are, it's just that I'm not so emotionally invested.

If I were more typically a directly factual poster, as Cerin and LordM are, I might have a hard time understanding why people would want to delete, too. As it is, I understand that tendency just fine.

The blue eyes and blue sky explanation also applies to the apparently blue veins in your wrist.

Your repeated insistence that people should post and behave the way that you want them to is far more irritating to me than any deleted post I can recall on this board.

I haven't seen Jewel doing this. As I see it, she has been expressing a concern that people were censoring themselves. I haven't seen her insisting that people behave a certain way. I don't think she should be blamed for the conclusions others have reached based on this conversation. We all have the right to feel as we feel, and post according to our comfort level, and I'm pretty sure we all understand that.

To my eyes, what yov describes is EXACTLY what Jewel has been implying all along. IMHO.

And if we really all do have the right to feel as we feel, and post according to our comfort level, and we are "pretty sure" we all understand that... well, then there needs to be room here for the retreaters. The ones who post and then worry. THAT IS WHO THEY ARE. That is their comfort level. That's it. If people don't like it, they need to skip over it and move on. It is not the ONLY bad habit on the board.