The way I see things:
Campaigns Wikia (campaigns.wikia.com <http://campaigns.wikia.com>) -
Summary of various issues/viewpoints and where the candidates stand.
Forums ( campaigns.formationos.net <http://campaigns.formationos.net>) -
Discussion of various issues, like what is happening on this list.
Seriously, sign up for an account. Ask myself or Chad to create any
categories.
Mailing list ( [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>) -
Discussion of the running of campaigns wikia.
Nicholas
On 10/25/06, *Chad Lupkes* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote:
Rev. King,
Truth is in the eye of the beholder. Even facts are debatable most of
the time. 99% of what people say is based on their perspective, their
point of view, and facts can be twisted without sacrificing truth by
the clever use of frames. I don't want to deny anyone their POV. I'm
not trying to reach "secular objectivity", because I understand it to
be a false concept and I reject it outright.
So, here's a scenario. Someone posts something on a page like a
category that is controversial. It gets removed by someone who
objects to it. It gets restored, removed, restored, etc. until people
get so frustrated that they resort to vandalism just as a means of
lashing out. How should we handle this?
I'll tell you how we handled it. I asked the staff for advice, and
was reminded of the Three revert rule on Wikipedia. So we applied it,
and had a discussion and a vote. I argued during the debate for the
vote that we should [[Allow Points of View]] and leave the category on
the page. I also suggested that a balancing category be placed on the
page, or at least [[Category:Controversial]]. The answer I got back
from the person who removed the category was basically this: under no
circumstances would he allow that category to be placed on that page,
even if it meant he would be banned from the site. One of his
counter-proposals was actually to add dozens of caustic categories to
yet another page, saying that we should Allow Points of View and that
such additions could not be removed. Is that person worth working
with to keep them engaged? We all say yes, but we also want
behavioral compromises from him as well.
So let me use a metaphor here. In the United States, yelling "FIRE!"
in a theatre is not protected free speech, and can be punished by a
court of law especially if someone is hurt in the stampede to get out
of the theatre. But whether or not the law is engaged, yelling
anything in a theatre is a bad idea, and the owners of the theatre
have the right to remove the person who is yelling from their place of
business, by physical means if necessary. Whether that person was
yelling in support of the Iraq War or in opposition to it makes no
difference. What view is being expressed means nothing to the fact
that he/she is annoying the heck out of everyone and nobody wants to
deal with the shouting.
To continue with the metaphor, who decides what movies will be made?
The people with an interest in making the movie and the people who
finance the filiming. Who decides what movies will be shown on the
screens? Who decides whether movies from Christian, Islamic or Jewish
movies will be shown? The owners of the movie theatre, depending on
how many screens they have and how many people they think might be
interested in paying to watch the movies. This is where the wiki
breaks from this metaphor. We don't live on movie screens. Movies,
commercial radio, commercial television, newspapers and all the other
types of broadcast media that we are dealing with in this country and
around the world limit us to seeing what the people who have money
want to allow us to see.
Campaigns.Wikia was established to be an alternative to that. The
Internet is an open system, where people are able to post their views
without any cost to themselves. And the Internet is open where it
costs very little if anything to view the pages. We are perfectly
positioned with the MediaWiki technology and the success of Wikipedia
to make Campaigns Wikia a primary pivot point for the expansion of the
information age and the transformation of politics in our world.
We want to have a thoughtful, meaningful dialoge among political
equals about the subjects that affect us all. We are all equals, and
the place that we have set up to have that debate is the Wiki. Again,
objectivity is not the goal, because it doesn't exist in reality, only
in academia. We're looking for well reasoned debate where we can see
what all the candidates really think about the issues and be able to
intelligently choose which one reflects our values and will be most
likely and capable of putting our ideas into law. Or if nobody is
worthy of our support, we need a way to get out our own views and
perhaps run for office ourselves.
The "Social Contract" that you're asking for was approved last month
by those people active and voting in the policy debates. Allow Points
of View (APOV) is a version of of Neutral Point of View (NPOV) that
says that points of view are welcome and shouldn't be deleted if we
disagree with them, but instead should be countered with alternative
viewpoints.
Specific policies about the format of pages would in my mind
discourage people from engaging in discussion. Pages on the wiki will
be built by those members of the community that decide to get
involved. We can certainly tag well-designed pages as potential
models, and we can create a category or other means for people to help
build the pages that need to be expanded and cleaned up, I don't think
we should limit contributions to a specific and limited article
design.
And thank you for speaking about the need for a non-caustic form of
debate. I agree that is a key point that we need to keep in mind when
posting in a public forum. We should avoid doing so, and we should
also be willing to forgive people who get out of control. Bring such
discussions off the list, onto the talk pages or into other forums so
we can work out our differences and come back to the table ready to
help build participatory politics in order to rebuild our world into
one that works for all of us.
Chad Lupkes
Seattle
On 10/24/06, CH Rob J King
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote:
>
> Secular French post-modern philosopher Michel Foucault, not a
religious
> believer and even a practicing homosexual, nonetheless questioned
rigorously
> the supposed "objectivity" upon which modern Western Liberal
societies are
> now built.
> In my brief foray into the Wikia campaigns, I was saddened at the
attempts
> by many to impose an apparent "objectivity" (by force if
necessary) over an
> over-lapping set of complex political viewpoints arising from an
equally
> complex set of underlying and over-arching worldviews.
> What constitutes "normativity"? As Foucault questioned regarding
sexuality,
> is heterosexuality normative, and if so why? Is homosexuality
normative,
> especially if the ancient Greek philosophers seemed to welcome
it? Whose
> reigning sets of institutions, social and more importantly
academic, will
> define what is normative? What happens with groups, like Muslems
and Jews
> living in France in 2006, who, for the sake of a secular
normativity, are
> denied of religious liberties such as not being allowed to wear
religious
> headware in public? Is the secular view normative? Is the
Jewish view? Is
> the Islamic view? Who decides?
> Here is the problem that Wikia Campaigns will now confront. Any
public
> forum wishing to remain credible will not seek to silence or
eliminate
> voices that the forum's moderators happen to be in disagreement with.
> Granted, Wikia Campaigns will seek to be objective, but in seeking
> objectivity, as Foucault would rightly question, whose sets of
knowledges,
> whose protocol, and by whose authority would one define such
objectivity?
> Simply claiming academic or professional standing, although a
move with
> obvious merit (i.e. it is more difficult to obtain entrance into
schools
> such as Harvard, Duke, etc.), nonetheless does not solve the issue.
> Pro-abortionists have ethicists teaching at
Princeton. Pro-lifers have
> ethicists also teaching at Princeton. Which Ivy League ethicist
are we
> supposed to view as authoritative?
> Because of the incommensurability (to use moral philosopher Alasdair
> MacIntyre's terminology) of current Western European, N. American
and the
> elite world moral debates (e.g. pro-life vs. pro-abortion), in
order that no
> perspective be silenced, a quick and easy antidote is for Wikia
Campaigns to
> adopt a type of "Social Contract" ( e.g. as described by
Rousseau) so that
> every participant in Wikia Campaigns will agree to a mutually
binding,
> mutually determined set of normative rules, policies and
procedures. One
> example could be rules and standards that would govern the giving of
> academic lectures--i.e. a formal statement followed by short,
pre-determined
> lengths of responses, without editting for content or even tone
(e.g. many
> academic debates can become quite heated, even in the elite academic
> institutions of the United States such as Duke or Notre Dame). The
> pre-determined length will allow short, well-written, non-caustic
responses,
> in short, similar to a televised political debate.
> Only through adopting a mutually-binding, mutually-determined social
> contractarian form of on-line communication can the attempts at
"knowledge
> control," as described by Foucault and others, be avoided.
> Sincerely,
> Rob J. King, M.Div., Th.M., Ph.D. (ABD*), Professor of Bible and
Christian
> Ministry, Grand Canyon University-Online
>
>
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