Could we please lose some of the "funny" stuff?

[Leif Oh]

Friends,

Here's a true story. Not so long ago, in fact earlier this year, I joined a virtual flight network (which, incidentally, explains my absense for a couple of months from this forum). Since I work professionally with humanitarian newsletters, I thought I could make a real contribution by devising a flight adventure that took place in Central Africa, almost real-time, in the sense that we ought to use real, ongoing events, and fly humanitarian tasks on the computer according to real-world needs.

And I did. In fact I did it extremely well, and put in a lot of hard work and hours to devise some truly great tasks (even if I say so myself), interspersed with real world news from UN, USAIDS, and other sources. Enough said. It was good, and I got a great satisfaction out of it (hopefully a few others did as well).

Until the inevitable nude ladies started to appear in contributions by others. Just to give you an inkling, one was about hunting gorillas by helicopter on a volcanoe in Rwanda, and when the accompanying illustration appeared, of course it was one of semi-nude young women.

And there were a few other instances. At which point I politely asked, guys, could we please lose the nude ladies appearing around the landscape for the duration? After all, none of us make any kike or nigger jokes any longer, now do we?

At which point, of course, all hell broke lose, and I quickly, without further comments or debate, withdrew the entire website I had built for the purpose of the exercise and left the company.

Now, I really wouldn't like (and I don't have anything but myself to withdraw) to do something similarly drastic in this company, which I truly appreciate, and have enjoyed for a year or so. In fact, I have made the Cardmodels.net my default page for the duration.

So, guys, could we, please, without too much hollering, lose some of the not-so-funny stuff, which really does not have anything to bear on card modeling. I remember one of the remarks from my previous experience - "if there were women aboard we would of course not do this".

Well, as far as I am concerned, and in this particular respect, you may consider me a woman too.

Sincerely,

Leif Oh.

PS. And oh, how dearly would I not love to lose the ubiquitous references to "she who must not be disobeyed". Or is that too much to ask?

[DeWayne]

Now, I'm not the brightest bulb on the tree so forgive me when I ask, "What the heck are you talking about? Only the occasional slip of the forbidden URL and the even more rare "baiting" takes place. Did I miss something while I was running defrag and virus deep scan?
Lost in the fog,
DeWayne

[IndiQa]

WHUT!?!?!?

OOPS!! I think I just bumped into DeWayne here in the fog.

Curt

[Sticky Fingers]

Of any of the forums I visit this is with out a doubt the most polite one I have ever seen. Even when one of us slips and says something he/she shouldn't he/she normally has the responsibilty to appologize even before the mods have to interrupt. As far as pictures of scantily clad young women, I have yet to see any here but if they were on say a USAAF WWII fighter or bomber then they might be acceptable. provided they match a real example. As to the site that you developed for virtual flight to be used on that forum, the gorrila hunting scenario was in exceedingly poor taste.

[wunwinglow]

Leif, did you post this on the wrong site? I have to agree with the others, I haven't a clue what you are talking about!! This is far and away the most civilised set of forums I have ever frequented, have a look at some of the Il-2 Sturmovik flight sim forums if you want to see bad manners!!

Mystified,

Tim P

[RyanShort1]

Leif,
Just to let you know, I am similarly wary of such things and I HAVE seen them on this site. So you're not just goofy, regardless of the previous posts.
For me its more of a matter of what I believe about this world, and the Creator of this world, and what He says about how one should live. See http://www.blueletterbible.org/kjv/Mat/Mat005.html#28
I would suggest that maybe if someone just feels they "have to" post something like that, that maybe they can go to the trouble of warning us in the subject line of the initial post so those of us who don't care to see it can avoid it. Much as I like USAAF aircraft and Mustangs in particular, it does bother me when I bump into the occasional sick pic. I've even marked out pictures in my reference books.
Ultimately, you have to excercise self control, but it sure is hard when you have billboards on the highway, and folks on your own streets who flaunt it in front of you. I mean what can you do when you're driving your car down IH35 and its staring right at you?
I also come from a family where my parents NEVER, EVER talk about each other disrespectfully, even in jest. So it does disturb me when things are said such as the quotes above.
Thankfully, things have been kept fairly civil here, and even toned down a bit lately, so it's not been a big problem for me. Lets try to keep this place family-friendly, and honoring to the Lord.

Rant over, sorry if I've stepped on any toes. Well, only slightly sorry .

Ryan

[charliec]

A point of clarification here - the quote "she who must not be disobeyed"
is actually "she who must be obeyed". It's a cultural reference - it
comes from Rider Haggard's adventure story "She" published in the 19th century. The expression gets its modern incarnation among English speakers from a popular TV show from the 1980s "Rumpole of the Bailey". The long suffering main character used it refer to his domineering wife. The TV show was full of quotes from earlier English and classical literature - the "she who..." quote is one which has passed into popular English speaking culture.

If you want really offensive try Australian politician speak - my current favourite is "I will not resile from ...." - code for "perhaps I can bluff this one for long enough so the media won't notice when I change position".

Regards,

Charlie

[rkelterer]

hi all,

I am very sorry but I do not see any connection between Mt 5,28 and cardmodels.net. I think we should omit any religious and/or political discussion, there are too much different backgrounds and opinions. if something is offending anybody, please do not beat about the bush. I believe that all of us respect each other fully.

greetings from sunny austria
raimund

[wunwinglow]

Hey guys, can we chill before this gets out of hand? I love this forum for precisely the reason that it is so civilised. I like to think we are ALL sensible enough to understand that one mans meat is another mans poison, and we can discuss things in an atmosphere of tolerance and willingness to learn from others; generally about modelmaking, but other things too, without getting each other stressed out. Religious or political dogma, of ANY pursuasion, is guaranteed to get under someones skin, and BOOOOF, we have a flame war to extinguish!

I am still at a loss to know exactly to what Leif was refering, and talk of scantily clad ladies, gorilla hunting and quotes from the Bible sounds like a recipe for gunpowder to me! The fact that we model weapons of war, environmentally distructive racing cars and the wooden warships of imperial oppression, discuss swastikas and generally consume the products of a rapacious techno-society in a completely frivilous manner, means we have already crossed the Rubicon!

So please, be nice. You know it makes sense....

And if you have a particular complaint, be specific, and raise it with the appropriate moderator by private message.

Thank you!

Tim P

[JRSeese]

Tim, you stole my thunder. The incredulous replies along the lines of "are you sure you're talking about cardmodels.net?!" can be attributed to the fact that there are so many terrible sites and forums online these days. Relatively speaking, most would call cardmodels.net a very tame site. However, that does not make your point invalid - after all, "Relative morality" is why we have the world we do today.

With a large group of people of varying backgrounds and moral fiber in a forum that is public and free, though, I think you will encounter things you don't like. I do. I likely post things that elicit that same reaction in others. Yes. there are the occasional off-color references here. And as men of all ages are unfortunately wont to do in our imperfection, there is occasional digital drooling over impure pictures that may or may not be bookmarked in my favorites folder.

I personally apologize for any past and future offense that I cause. As hard as may I try to behave, I know I will likely say something that someone somewhere doesn't like. My sense of humour has always gotten me in trouble. I'll just keep trying to keep in mind what other people's tolerances are and act accordingly.

At the same time, I hope that you will be patient with all the faithful site members and ignore or pass by the offensive. I think we all have a brotherly love due to the passion for card models that we share, and does not love cover a multitude of sins?

[rickstef]

Civilized?

**GRUNT**

**SNORT**

**BURP**

sorry, had to

Rick

[Darwin]

For my two cents.....read the intro to my Arktika article. I am a member of this forum because (at least until now) I do not have to parse every word I say lest it may not be politically correct and I may somehow offend someone who most certainly is not going to return the favor and worry should they perhaps say something to which I would be offended. I have not noticed much on this site that would be considered even mildly offensive to the vast majority of the population. If postings be limited to only those things which would be guaranteed to offend no one, every forum will consist of little more than the title....and even some of those may somehow offend someone's sensitivities. The degree of civility and general decency exhibited by members of this site is little short of miraculous for the internet, where most forums only serve to demonstrate just how low the lowest human denominator really is. I would quote Justin Wilson's reply to criticisms of his Cajun humor offending some in his audience....but that truly would offend.

[Ron]

I swear !!!! it wasn't me...it was the dog!! (you forgot one in your list Rick )

Seriously now...
This place was founded on free speech. It was to be a place where folks could say what they want without fear of repercussion as long as they followed the few basic rules that we have.

Let's just keep things on an even keel and keep them exactly as they were. I don't want folks tip toeing around for fear of upsetting anyone.

This has really stunned me. I echo the others here in saying that this has to be the tamest forum on the entire net where civilized discussion
is the norm and not the exception.

Anyways...please, keep being yourselves.

Ron

[Leif Oh]

Precisely because this has proved to be a most civilized forum I dared to raise the suggestion that we might keep it that way.

Could anybody tell me what a sound-clip about a panic-stricken person who - hah, hah - thinks herself to be locked in her car just because she finds out she's dropped her keys outside, and to make it worse has the nerve to call 911, thereby documenting her panic for the whole world to know, has to do with card modeling?

Even so, would it have been equally funny if, in some way, it was clear that the panic-stricken person had been a male jew, or a male black American? Would it? And if not, why?

And I might have let that slide in merciful silence, just as I have let every instance of "she who must be obeyed" slide. Although I really am very tired of aiding and abetting in keeping old stereotypes of human relations alive by keeping my mouth shut, I have done so, since I have enjoyed the respect shown by members towards each other in every aspect that has to do with card modeling efforts.

Letting my small show of opinon on this matter slide in equal merciful silence (while perhaps, equally silently and each according to his own judgement, at least consider showing some measure of restraint in other, non-card modeling aspects) would have been fine.

Now I don't know.

Leif

[Maurice]

Leif

The link was posted under "jokes" so following it was optional. It was a good send up of the "American Way" in relation to crisis response and management in general and the use of a particular stereotype was incidental.
We each have our own view of the world and by it we live. We have to as humans.
It is the product of our genetics our experience and principally our interpretation of that experience.
Mercifully each view is unique and not only is it utterly inappropriate to attempt to impose one's own view on another it's also bloody well impossible.
Just get on with enjoying the diversity and developing your own view for your own benefit. Others may benefit from that too, if they wish, but you can't make them.

Cheers
Maurice
(in pseudo-zen-emulator mode)


(Curt - Better get outta there quick. Bumping into something that solid could be real bad for yer. )