It's lonely on the high road.Throughout the recent turmoil I have tried my best to stick to the facts, to what can be documented, and to play by the ground rules, even if those ground rules occasionally favor the other team.
The Illuminator, once [and to be again, Lord willing & the creek don't rise. --Editorial Junta] the public communications vehicle of the Edison State Education Association, has drifted into meanness and uncivility, and this is NOT helping the cause.
While I am neither a regular reader of nor contributor to the blog, I do - at least for now - have certain rights and privileges on it. With those rights and privileges comes responsibility - a responsibility I have been slow in exercising.
In reviewing the comments to some recent posts, I find unfair, cheap, insulting and ultimately damaging comments being made about members of our community - staff, administrators, and board members. These comments are always by either anonymous or pseudonymous users, and hiding behind a cloak of invisibility, they feel free to spout whatever invective pops into their minds.
Granted, some of the official entries on the Illuminator are sarcastic, biting, scathing - but there is a difference between calculated sarcasm as social commentary - a right and privilege protected by the laws of the land - and being mean and small-minded. Sure, it's fun to toss around insults among friends, and we do so even when we mean no real harm.
But this blog has come to be something more than that - kind of a dispatch from the front - and these petty personal jibes clutter up, cheapen and ultimately turn an otherwise valuable site into just another flame war.
Therefore, exercising what rights I still have (and understanding that they can as easily be taken away) I have changed the settings. No longer can anyone post comments anonymously - only registered users may post comments. And those comments are going to be moderated, at least until we at the "editorial board" (such as it is) have a chance to get our heads around this.
I have not put forth the effort I have, stood in the line of fire to be the voice of the loyal employees of Edison Community College, and suffered the personal attacks that I have suffered only to be dragged down at the last by people who post before they think.
You don't like it? Tough. Start your own damn blog.
Everyone else, if you have something important to say, consider it OK.
1 comment:
1. The Editorial Junta has been concerned about some of our blog's comments, and took a decision, given the Administration's penchant for retribution, and our readership's general level of sophistication and education, to allow anonymous posting.
2. We agree with Reed that conversations have been trending toward the unduly personal, and in some cases the unsupportable.
3. We will not become our enemy in order to defeat him. Nor should our fellow travelers.
4. Brad Reed is an Illuminator "peer", fully qualified and encouraged to make executive decisions of this sort, as are necessary.
5. Reed's decision is well put and well taken. Sign in, folks. It's near that time anyway, and you're already being counted for or against by the powers that be. Let's continue to get it on.
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