Anna, thank you for the thoughtful summary of some of the discussions taking place here.
In communities that are gathered around one topic or for one reason, it is a rare one that is able and willing to both sustain and support discussion in which one part of the community finds and wants to continue discovering each other in a new topic. My experience is that the clash usually does come from the raising of larger political issues, and my experience is that censorship in the name of "inappropriate subject" usually "wins". And usually that line is expressed by people feeling uncomfortable about the subject or having different views than those being expressed. Rather than express their own view or decide to simply sit out that particular discussion (in our case its the simple act of deleting), the call is to isolate that subject - either to cut it out or "keep it away from me." This has been so common in my life as a political person that its depressing. I am quite sure that no one in this community garden chat desires to turn it into a whole other subject - nor was it turned into the whole other subject of war. It is valuable and exciting to me to discover other aspects about people I have one kind of relationship with and I have been thrilled to have the conversation about the war with Iraq surface and happen. It was valuable to my sense of surviving this horrifying period to have people, even in my community garden list serve, express their views and activities around this war and the mass protest against it. I think we did, and I will continue to use the "subject" area when I want to address war or anothe subject. Laurie T, Chicago
