Re: On Elian and the Public/Private Nature of the List

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

Eli Stephens:
> That certainly clarifies the thinking on the intended public nature of
> this list. However I must say I'm confused about the rest. The "latest 100
> messages," which is how I read Marxmail because I refuse to allow more
> email in my inbox even though I have a high-speed connection, is just a
> web page. No matter how long or short the messages are, they're each just
> one line on that page. And if a particular thread (e.g., the Laura thread)
> is going on too long for someone's taste, all they need to do is to not
> click on those posts. That's certainly what I do (or don't do).

Eli, do you have a job? Are you a student? Married? With children? Not
everybody has that much time at their disposal.

> As far as email, two short emails and one long email take up *about* the
> same amount of bandwidth (with headers, of course, the two short ones do
> take up some more space) and the same amount of download time and cost for
> someone on a dialup connection. So I really don't think that argument flies.

The problem is that you need to familiarize yourself with the threads and
the participants to know where to start. Not everybody wants to make that
commitment at the outset, especially those who are reading the archives in
an Internet cafe.

> The argument that one should think deep thoughts and write up long,
> detailed posts a la Lou or Jose has validity in some cases, for sure. But
> if that's all that's encouraged, the list would be quiet indeed, and, in
> fact, many of those long thoughtful responses come in response to the
> shorter posts.

I am not opposed to shorter posts, just not making 10 of them a day.
LBO-Talk was set up for that. In fact, quippery is encouraged by the
moderator who has made an art of that.

> Enough on that. Just to throw in my $0.02, I do believe Laura was
> "bashed," and I can't agree with Mark L. who dismisses that term as "a
> blanket dismissal of critical comments." Any impartial observer who read
> the thread of recent comments would see Laura being gang-bashed (by SOME
> of the responses, certainly not all) in a way that contributed nothing to
> the elucidation of key issues, but only to quickly driving her and her
> different point of view off the list. For myself and the value I get from
> reading the contributions to this list, I regret that.

It was almost inevitable. The SWP generated a great deal of ill-will from
the people who went through its ranks. Perhaps if they learned not to
regard everybody who is not a member or an active supporter as
petty-bourgeois obstacles to proletarian revolution, they would fare better
but who am I to give advice to a group that sees itself as having the same
relationship to Marx and Engels as Luke Skywalker had to the Jeddi Masters.


Louis Proyect, Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org