Westwood wrote on Oct 30^th, 2013 at 9:59pm:


Actually if I remember correctly I was not the one doing the stirring but rather being stirred. I was the one being smacked around a little. And all figuratively (your turn to not read more into something than was intended Kerry)......

So you saddle up, consider if someone has a point or not, towel the cold water off and move on.

The people in the eastern part of the country, specifically NY and NJ, have a reputation as being abrasive and obnoxious. I have dealt with them in my business for some 30 years as they gravitate towards what I do. What I have come to admire about them is their bluntness.......you know exactly where you stand. There is no subtlety, no guile. There is a way forward should there be differing perspectives. You know precisely where they are coming from.

And so, from my perspective at least, I prefer the one who may be harsh but honest versus the one who is smiling and saying soothing words while the knife is in the back.

What does this have to do with canoe country? Nothing I guess but neither has the entire last page.

Is it time to change the subject? I suppose it is. 

"Sometimes what is needed is to grab someone, shake them, smack them around a little …"
I guess you're trying to be amusing, MT, but what you're describing is actually abuse.

Joe is right.  We don't need anyone to stir the pot.  If you want to stir the pot go to BTC.

Relax Joe, whats wrong with a little good old fashioned defamatory abuse to stir the pot a little? Besides, when all was said and done there may have been some benefit. Sometimes what is needed is to grab someone, shake them, smack them around a little and then throw a bucket of cold water in their face before they "get it" (unfortunately the election is over  ).

 

Too many cliques?

Not so far as I can see. We all have something to share with others in QJ, and we all have something to learn from others. I have never sensed any barriers to this kind of exchange on QJ due to cliques. Yes, some people are interested in some topics and not in others, and sometimes the same people are interested in many of the same topics. But that's to be expected, and it doesn't mean those subgroups are cliques. In any case, the defining feature of all cliques is exclusion, and in QJ the excluders (if there are any) would seem to be hurt far more than the excludees.

Too much Q and not enough BW?

Well it's certainly true that the majority of active QJers seem to spend more time canoe tripping in Quetico than in BWCA. I think it's natural to expect that their trip reports, camping and fishing tips, shared experiences, and questions to the group deal more with Q than B-dub.

But posting takes time and effort: sites like QJ only work if a significant number of people donate their time in this way on a regular basis. If most QJers make their donations in the form of Quetico-focused posts, I'm grateful for what I get. bwca.com has been around for over ten years, and it's natural that many of the people willing and able to donate their time and BW expertise should gravitate there. I don't see any unfriendliness towards BWCA paddlers anywhere on QJ - rather the doors seem to me to be wide open to people willing to post on non-Quetico-related topics.

FWIW, just scanning the headers and menus on my current page, I count five references / links to Quetico and five to Boundary Waters. I'm finding it hard to see a problem here.

Jimbo wrote on Oct 21^st, 2013 at 9:56pm:


Maybe we should change, but we won't. We will listen to you, but we won't really listen.

Proscription of personal attacks is not a "theoretical" norm. It is an explicit rule for (afaik) all discussion boards like QJ. In QJ's case, the user agreement for these forums states "You also agree not to post any material which is inaccurate, defamatory, abusive, vulgar, hateful, ..." This was discussed at length a couple of years ago, and led to the quarantining of BTC. Things seemed to have been pretty clean around here since then. Til now.

IMO the exchange earlier in this thread between PJ and MT was clearly defamatory and abusive, and should have been deleted by the moderators from the first post. At the time, I figured maybe people were off canoeing and this accidentally slipped by. But your post has me concerned that things haven't really changed, and we're headed towards more BTC-type attacks in the canoe boards, not just in the religion-and-politics threads.

As a great American statesman once said "I have seen the enemy, and he is us."

FWIW - I don't find it in forum jump.  May be a good thing.

HighnDry wrote on Oct 24^th, 2013 at 9:27pm:


I think you need something like 8 posts and 5 bucks to place out pay to play status. What anyone does with that information is up to them. Inuk mileage may vary.



Quote:


Wait, ahhhhhmmmm. OOh! OOOH! I think I got this one! Part of the reason this forum is seen differently by different people is, in a very real way, all my fault.

It's in the same place it always was except I doubt there is any official reference to it anymore if you didn't opt in. For a while, just the title of the current thread being visible generated complaints so that only lasted for a month or two. By that time BTC was hated so passionately that even the post that explained where it went is now invisible and the invitation to access was by request only was removed after a few months of no requests either way.

I get it but I don't. Even a few folks that complained about it the loudest wanted access to it. No one else really requested access after the initial rush of maybe two dozen people and there is really only a handful that actually ever say anything so no biggie. I'm a bit of a couch politics junky ... so if anyone wants to play (and it is basically politics only now) another opinion is always welcome. If anyone want's in, let me know. Change your mind, I'll be glad to make it disappear for you again. Participating members have the (MTNR) designation above their picture on the left. As I recall, posts in that forum are not included your post count and it's not cliquey at all IMO.

And for what it's worth, an open mind and/or thick skin is a plus everywhere.



I always wanted QJ to resemble a real trip so here are three things to keep in mind.

1- You guys all know there is a BW portage database on QJ with more entries than the Q database - right?

2- I think it was ten years ago that I first began asking for donations. I wanted to call it quits on the forum and was looking for an excuse to do so. Since then, I have considered this forum to be YOUR forum. Be the change YOU want to see or shut up and paddle damn it!

3- About 30 years ago, as I paddled out at the end of a particularly challenging trip for me (at the time) using "never again, never again, never again" as cadence for every stroke of the paddle for miles 'n miles before the take-out....... I haven't missed a year since but for those few hours, you couldn't have paid me enough to do the same thing again.

Are there any former members of the CCBB listserve left? I loved that forum and I still kind-of miss it. To this day I'm not exactly sure what killed it. I miss the solotripping forum too and will confess being a little bitter but I do kinda understand why that one went away. There are other forums that have come and gone. I started working on a QJ forum after the CCBB got hacked and remained broken for a while. Timing is important too.

Bottom line - the basics should be common knowledge by now but I will agree that no one on QJ falls all over themselves welcoming new folks to QJ.


Quote:

What a great line! And thanks for mentioning something I had forgotten all about YB. All I know for sure is this is a lot more interesting than discussing big boy pants again. (Oh c'mon. It's gotta be funny to someone. If you ain't flying you probably ain't trying hard enough.)

You know...I've looked for that at the bottom of my screen at the Forum Jump....and it doesn't appear to be an option on my dropdown list....maybe I need to kick in another donation..

BillConner wrote on Oct 24^th, 2013 at 5:01pm:


Bottom right hand corner where it says Forum Jump. Scroll down until you see Back to Civilization*
You need to opt in to view/participate.