The SUSPENSION of illicit drugs/mind altering substance topics on ATS (The experiment failed)

I'd like to know if the members of the committee intend on discussing the matter with the membership they are supposed to represent before bringing a proposal to the staff. They're all great people, but can't possibly accurately represent the rest of us without spending a few weeks discussing it with us.

The only reason I even question this, is the very concept of the DISC forum, that they have access to to discuss the situation, while the rest of us don't.

Again, I'm not implying that the committee members are doing anything wrong, but are they in a position to do anything at all? The fact that their discussions are behind 'closed doors' so to speak, speaks volumes towards the end result of this fiasco.

I suppose we can have another 100 page mess to discuss how the committee should interact with the membership at large. Maybe we need to vote on a committee to the committee.

Seriously, is it not obvious where this goes (or stays)?

[edit on 2/27/2009 by Unit541]

The deadline has passed and member have been elected. Thank goodness.

But, don't take this for a victory yet. I don't think the Admins have yet made up their mind. As Springer made apparent, as I have tried to re-enforce throughout the thread - it's original intention was a ban announcement. This has not yet been lifted.

There's still a lot of work to do and frankly after all I've seen out of the members in this thread ... I'm glad I didn't make the committee.

I just hope that the committee is able to convince the owners to allow the discussion ... which was what the was all about to begin with.

Well, i think they should have a forum to discuss things in private.

I also think there should be a thread dedicated to suggestions, were they can talk with the members.

Originally posted by Unit541
I'd like to know if the members of the committee intend on discussing the matter with the membership they are supposed to represent before bringing a proposal to the staff.

Without a doubt YES!

Without wishing to speak for all of us, I am confident that it will be our first order of business to start a thread which includes all the ideas and suggestions expressed within this thread and to allow ALL ATS members to have input as to the final proposal to staff.

We are here to represent EVERYONE!

Originally posted by Unit541
"Threatened the very existence of ATS...". I have an extremely difficult time assigning any merit to that statement.
>>>snip

Originally posted by 27jd
reply to post by HunkaHunka

 

K. Good for you. I'm sure there's a warm place for you on their laps.

If it's against T & C to voice my opinion on this topic, please show me. Otherwise, I still have just as much right to be here and disagree with the admin, as you do to agree with them.

Not at all... I never said it was against T&C to voice your opinion on this topic.

And I'm not agreeing with the admin.

I'm saying that your sense of entitlement to some sort of truth or participation in a vote or really anything other than the right to voice your opinion, is critically flawed.

We should have NO sense of entitlement on this site... period. It's not ours....

reply to post by schrodingers dog


I'm with SDog on this.

We are here to represent everyone and will listen to everyone's point of view.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic


No one was locked out. I have missed things that I wish I could have participated in on this board. Games, contests, other fun in-thread activities, even votes. But I have never considered myself to have been "locked out" of a thread that wasn't locked.

That's a serious victim mindset. This thread went up Wednesday morning and the vote was Thursday afternoon. You missed the window. No one locked you out.

We didnt miss the window. You limited the window to those who were already on board. This thread has been running for an additional 50 odd pages and nearly 24 hours past the time you locked the voting.

Even if the list of self appointed nominees was the same, there is no reasonable justification for not allowing all interested members a VOTE during the last 24 hours for those nominees.

I dont have a victim mentality. Calling unfair unfair is not "having a victim mentality" it is calling a bunch of self serving unfair people self serving and unfair. You can spin it any way you want to. How do you even justify not letting us vote on the existing list of nominees? I can see some justification for rushing to the nominee phase, although members of that list like Budski who self reported initially didnt even care about the ban but when he saw a chance to be a part of a committee said "hey why not?" Thats a fine representative for the membership.

Originally posted by budski

I was all for the ban, but when it became apparent that there MIGHT be a way to explore the subject as it should be explored then I happily changed tack - some may call this hypocrisy, I call it trying to find a happy medium and compromise.

There was no reason not to allow other members to vote during the voting period. Other than pure self interested power mongering. It would not have delayed the process unduly, and it would have spared enormous amounts of bad sentiment. It was pure arrogant stubbornness of the part of "those who cared so much that they just happened to be on when SO sent out his U2U."

Justify it all you like. And you can steer your committee wherever you like. It doesnt take away from the fact that your little clique has gone out of its not to allow interested members a vote, during a period of time that the voting was still going on. So you would have had to count some extra votes. I suppose that is much harder than shattering good will between members.

reply to post by skeptic1


Agreed.

We've said the entire time that this would not be a closed doors thing.

This is for all members, not just us.

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
f all the members posting to ATS/BTS in the past three days, only 4% have contributed to this thread)

now thats what i call a vocal minority. man i hope the energy here is transfered into a productive conspiracy discussion.

reply to post by Illusionsaregrander


Regardless of what you think we got something done,

Now that we HAVE a committee they, can start to operate.

I don't even know why i am posting to you.

[edit on 27-2-2009 by darcon]

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


Your staff has chosen to preoccupy themselves with this area without merit. That is my point that has continually gone ignored, and your reaction to my sentiments support that "hair brained idea" fully.

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
Congratulations to:

Schrodingers Dog
Skeptic1
Maxmars
Americandingbat
ravenshadow13
nyk537

Very impressive names. Nice going.


(Not that I ever associated those names with drugs though...with the possible exception of S-Dog... )

Anyways, i am glad this worked out, i look forward to seeing what the committee has done.

Peace out.

Good afternoon all. Congrats to those elected. This step was only the beginning. I hope you are indeed ready for all that is to come. Represent well.

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
the other areas suffer... the other 99% of members that care not of drugs suffer (of all the members posting to ATS/BTS in the past three days, only 4% have contributed to this thread)...

So, you're counting replies to this thread as accurate polling?? I'd like to see a REAL poll of the all the members and there thoughts on this subject though, that'd be interesting.

reply to post by Unit541


I do agree that there should be a thread for members to voice their opinions and suggestions on this issue for us to take into account. Right now I am not saying anything that has not already been discussed in this thread, and I am making sure that all of the members' opinions that I am aware of have been taken note of.

Originally posted by Illusionsaregrander
There was no reason not to allow other members to vote during the voting period. Other than pure self interested power mongering. It would not have delayed the process unduly, and it would have spared enormous amounts of bad sentiment. It was pure arrogant stubbornness of the part of "those who cared so much that they just happened to be on when SO sent out his U2U."

Justify it all you like. And you can steer your committee wherever you like. It doesnt take away from the fact that your little clique has gone out of its not to allow interested members a vote, during a period of time that the voting was still going on. So you would have had to count some extra votes. I suppose that is much harder than shattering good will between members.

Nobody could put it any better than that, and if I could I would give you like 275 stars for that.

Originally posted by HunkaHunka
I'm saying that your sense of entitlement to some sort of truth or participation in a vote or really anything other than the right to voice your opinion, is critically flawed.

We should have NO sense of entitlement on this site... period. It's not ours....

K, well thanks for making your opinion on ATS entitlement known. I'll certainly sleep better at night having read it.

reply to post by matth


I thought you were going to form your own Committee, you said you would follow through.

Regardless, goodbye

Peace out