This paste is an edit of one that I have sent to the CAF staff twice. I have not received a reply. Hence, it’s now out in the open.
First I’d like to acknowledge and offer thanks for what you have been to me the last several years. Read over my posts, and you’ll know what I mean.
It’s my understanding that the new site will not be moderated. If this is true, could you at least make all the US political stuff appear inside a menu that users have to click?
I have felt moved to respond so many times to things that were glaring at me from the left side of my screen, at the cost of time and mental energy for prayers that I pray for others.
True, a priest may say that it’s all on me to pray and ignore, but why would he or anyone want to help something detract from prayer? I suppose the analogy would be to require a Catholic hospital offer birth control. I get that helping is different from providing, but how close to 0 does any analogy come? You get bonus points btw, for explaining that one.
How about taking half the gas out of a stock car at Daytona? Maybe throw in the dichotomy of winning or losing with the knowledge of just who wants you to win and just who wants you to lose.
A more reasoned question would come as: What effect you’d be having by isolating the invective? There’s a reason the sanctuary is only used for mass, adoration, and the like. There’s a reason Jesus overturned the tables of the money changers. Those guys could have extorted people or collaborated with the Romans or hopefully done a fair business and treated others with kindness OUTSIDE the temple.
While an objection to the analogy, ignoring the idea of course, could be that this occurred in the Herodian edition to the temple (or that the very analogy is invalid), does anyone want to see a place of beauty where people come to pray and offer to our fellow man things like solidarity, kindness, charity, support, and love in Christ metastasize to a cesspool of rancor and vitriol like in so many places both real and electronic? Has the CAF staff considered Leviticus 18:3? 3 You shall not do [a]what is done in the land of Egypt where you lived, nor are you to do what is done in the land of Canaan where I am bringing you; you shall not walk in their statutes. Does anyone want to laud Herod because the money changers who drew Jesus’ ire had to be somewhere?
Another of these questions would be to ask what effect you could have if you did force users to gain access to see such things. Certainly you don’t have to–Mary could have gone to Heaven if she had said “No thank you”–but then where would mankind be? The point at which that analogy crosses to heresy is the point I back off from that statement while still arguing the idea. In this case, you may not be allowing the anger to spread, but you are allowing it to exist. Genies don’t stay in bottles, though, so even if you were successful with that endeavor, you would still not make any forward progress.
Given the talk of looming civil war in America, do you think that forward progress may be a good idea?
Yet another would be to ask how much more fair we could be to non-US users? Someone said something recently about that in a forum. While I did enjoy reading about West Australian elections, unless I’m mistaken–and I hope I am–the whole world sees the big field on the left of the screen, where American politics are always thrown in their face. If so, how much noise are we subjecting them to? The Loud American stereotype is already bad enough. Unfortunately, there is a kernel of truth to that stereotype, but can places like CAF maybe help us make less noise? Speaking as an American, with some of their own aversions toward us as my own aversions, I would appreciate it.
Yet another would be what we could do for society by forcing users to click to access the US political stuff the same way cable companies provide users with anything they want to view with minimal moderation. Think of how much we could cool the heat–there’s an analogy for you–or remove half of the gas from all opponents’ tanks at Daytona. Think of how you much less labor intensive it would be for you to not only stop degeneration but to make forward progress!
I have a nagging suspicion about just why these changes are coming about, but I’ll keep that one to myself for now. I may give you a chance, but I haven’t heard an answer to either message I sent to CAF about this issue. That does not bode well…
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