Tia Leschke

>
> Thank you for your thoughtful response. I think you misunderstand me
though.
> As I said in my post, I wasn't particularly interested in much of Ned's
> political rhetoric, I just believe that censorship of different viewpoints
is
> hypocritical behavior from a forum that chooses to represent all
unschoolers
> by virtue of the name you chose to represent this forum. By choosing a
name
> such as unschooling-dotcom you are choosing to represent all discussion
that
> relates to unschooling in even the most remote or annoying sense. As
> evidenced by the fact that almost anything goes here---I've seen
discussions
> about baby care, personal family problems, neighbor issues, notes about
> vacations, and the ever present fundamentalist Christian rhetoric----the
list
> is endless. I've seen all kinds of things here that I have a hard time
> relating to unschooling, I may delete hundreds of posts that I find not
> relevant, but I would never presume to suggest banishing someone simply
> because their agenda does not fit my own definition of something as all
> encompassing as the concept of unschooling. Also, if someone's posts
generate
> tons of responses, that means that the posts are making people think! If I
> owned a list, my dearest wish would be to get people thinking. Often, when
we
> have been in a very complacent rut, we may need a very uncomfortable nudge
to
> jolt us into moving forward and growing as individuals.

From what I remember of the Ned debate, people weren't responding to his
opinions and thinking about them. Those tons of responses were mostly
telling him to go take his agenda elsewhere, where there would be a positive
reception. His posts felt like spam to me. So Yol, would you be happy if
the list were also opened to spammers?
We have lots of religious discussions, but as far as I know, people aren't
allowed to come on here and start trying to convert others to their
religion. That's what a lot of Ned's posts sounded like to me. Should we
open the list to religious proselytizing?
Tia

Betsy

**The quality was different. Ned appeared to neither
respond to the opposing ideas nor to the objections to his ideas. He
attacked people personally and basically just repeated what he'd said before
as though others just weren't listening to him.**



Yes, this is my perception as well.

If Ned came back to this list, I would just auto-delete him. Which I'm
sure is preferable to me getting really pissed and screaming at him.

If he didn't repeat himself so much, I would actually take the time to
read his posts.

Betsy

[email protected]

In a message dated 1/6/03 1:48:01 PM Eastern Standard Time, leschke@...
writes:

> So Yol, would you be happy if
> the list were also opened to spammers?
>

I may have missed something ( VERY likely) but the original post did not come
from Yol. As far as I know, she always uses the same ID and
email.(bluelotus). I could be wrong though, and Im sure Yol will answer up.


Teresa


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Karin

<fetteroll@...> wrote:

> on 1/6/03 12:31 PM, grlynbl@... at grlynbl@... wrote:
>
> > I don't even know this Ned person or what he had to say.
>
> And to make any meaningful judgements on a particular incident it's
> imperative that someone have been there and been trying to use the list.
>
> Other people's perception of that period will be entirely different than
> Foxglove's.

Yes, my perception of that period was different than Foxglove's.
I don't post much at all, but I read everything that comes through here.
When Ned first joined the list, his posts were so inspiring and I truly
respected his sage wisdom and advice about unschooling. His words come
through loud and clear with much confidence, especially since he has a
successful and grown son who has been unschooled all his life. I looked
forward to reading things he had to say about various subjects that came up.

However, after a while, Ned's posts were all about how school and moreso,
the government, are so evil and out to get us. People responded
point-by-point to his posts, but he rarely addressed the questions asked of
him and continued with more anti-government talk. I didn't know what I was
supposed to do with the information he was trying to get across to people on
the list. How was it helping me unschool my kids? And how was it helping me
feel good about anything? It came to the point that reading his posts were
actually depressing me and the sheer volume of responses to his posts were
extremely overwhelming. He was also criticizing people who asked him to tone
down - I basically lost a lot of respect I had gained in him previously.

Although it was very sad, in a way, when it came to the point that he had to
be silenced, in another way it was a huge relief.

I saw him and Luz speak in SC and I did regain my respect for him. He is a
wonderful speaker and seems like a knowledgable source for anything
unschooling. I often give out his website to friends or family members who
want to learn more about unschooling (and Sandra's, too!) because it's
written with such confidence and understanding about unschooling, and seems
to be geared towards beginner unschoolers.

>
> From my point of view as moderator whose task it is to keep the list
useful
> for unschooling discussion, it had ceased to be useful.

I agree completely.
Joyce, you do such a wonderful job of moderating.
I am in awe of your patient and tactful skills.
And your unschooling posts are gems, too.
Thank-you for being here. :-)

I'll stop talking about Ned now and go back to lurking - it's how I learn
best!

Karin

Betsy

**Would he just keep posting to "deaf ears"? Hmmm, well,
he might.. lol.. but if he was blocked, how would you know?**

Um... in my case I did eventually figure out how to block him, but
people replying to him would quote his most incendiary paragraphs and I
would think "Holy, Hannah! I can't BELIEVE he said that, and get all
fired up again."

Betsy

[email protected]

In a message dated 1/6/03 1:48:06 PM Eastern Standard Time, leschke@...
writes:

> From what I remember of the Ned debate, people weren't responding to his
> opinions and thinking about them. Those tons of responses were mostly
> telling him to go take his agenda elsewhere, where there would be a
> positive
> reception. His posts felt like spam to me. So Yol, would you be happy if
> the list were also opened to spammers?
> We have lots of religious discussions, but as far as I know, people aren't
> allowed to come on here and start trying to convert others to their
> religion. That's what a lot of Ned's posts sounded like to me. Should we
> open the list to religious proselytizing?
> Tia
>
>
>
>
>

Yes, I do believe that if individuals were to feel that religious
proselytizing related to their unschooling, then you should allow that too. I
would simply exercise my delete key option more frequently---or perhaps I'd
read their posts when the mood strikes me. Who knows? I might learn something
new!


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

marji

Karin, your post on this subject said it all for me, word for word. So,
the only thing I can add--in the interest of brevity--is, "Me too."

Thanks, Karin!

Love,

Marji

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Tia Leschke

> Once again, I was not defending Ned or anyone in particular. I was
defending
> the right of people to express unpopular opinions, and I was defending
other
> people's right to read or not read posts that do or do not interest them.

In the course of this debate it's been said several times that it was *not*
Ned's opinions that were the problem. I still wonder just why this is
coming up at this particular time.
Tia

Tia Leschke

>
> Ahh! But I believe the readers are primarily ADULTS and very precocious
> children, who don't need You Sandra to close doors for them!

Now I think I'm beginning to see where this is coming from. It wasn't
Sandra who closed any doors. It was the owner of this list, after trying
many other ways to solve the problem without success. I would do the same
if he came onto the homeschooling list I moderate and started the same
behavior.
Tia

Betsy

**I'm going to make food.**

She slices, she dices, she makes julienne fries! Yay!


** I had three extra homeschooled kids for 32 hours or so...**

I had three extra homeschooled kids for 3.2 hours or so. I must be a
light-weight. :-)


Betsy

Betsy

**
It was a learning experience, but I was tired and not in the mood for a
learning experience.
I guess those are some of the best kinds.**

We've been having those kind of learning experiences with our plumbing!

Betsy