Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: How is "cheap" green? / "rehashing"

[Tim Mensch (tim-coho-l]

I apologize in advance for posting this message, which is not about 
cohousing, to the list, since we've now diverged into discussing who 
should post what to C-L. I feel that the sentiments expressed below, if 
unanswered, could hurt the list more than my one additional message, so 
here goes...

Sharon Villines wrote:
> One of the problems with mixing old and new members on the same list  
> is that the old members are tired of topics that are vital to the new  
> members. Searching the archives for messages takes away from the  
> feeling of conversation and currency that question and answer has.  
> It's more like doing research.
Brian wasn't bringing up anything new in his message distinct from what 
he alleged in his old message--he just repeated a statement that had 
already been refuted on the list. I pointed folks who missed the first 
time to the archives, so that they could see what responses had already 
been made to his claim. The original message provoked a bit of a 
firestorm of heated responses, IMHO, and I was hoping to head that off.

I could have probably communicated this more clearly by saying: If you 
want to discuss this further, please read the messages in the archive 
where this topic has already been discussed (and IMHO discredited), and 
be sure that what you're saying hasn't been said already, in respect for 
those people who read the debate the first time around.

Some people put a lot of energy into writing really good responses. We 
do them (and ourselves) a disservice if we simply ignore and forget or 
ignore those old responses. In particular, Lisa's response (which I 
linked to in my response) articulated well the problem with Brian's 
assumptions. Ignoring that and having the discussion again without 
referencing that would be insulting to Lisa and the other previous 
respondents--as if their objections to this statement were irrelevant 
enough to merit starting the discussion over again from scratch. Here's 
the link again (it's from back before the "Please trim your tails" 
headers, and has most of the relevant previous messages quoted at the end).

http://lists.cohousing.org/pipermail/cohousing-l/msg26261.html


I wasn't intending to prevent discussion, but rather to prevent 
rehashing of a discussion that already occurred--which really helps no 
one, and hurts some of our most eloquent contributors by ignoring their 
work. If someone disagrees with or has questions about something in the 
archives, by all means, post! But the more often topics gets rehashed 
with similar answers, the more the list will hemorrhage members who feel 
that the list is a waste of time--which it isn't at the moment, IMHO, 
but it could become one if it ends up as a broken record of people 
saying the same things, or worse, if it were to devolve into frequent 
"flame wars." Look it up on Wikipedia if you're too new to email groups 
to know what that means.

In response to Racheli, who said:
> That's my feeling, too -- that a discussion is very different from 
> reading stuff
> in the archives.  Thanks for articulating this!
It's a matter of respect for those people who have already contributed 
to the discussion, and a matter of respect for people who read the list 
regularly. The archives are a record of a discussion, a discussion that 
we just had six months ago, and they're still all available for everyone 
to peruse. You can follow them as if you're following a discussion--in 
either case you're just "reading stuff," after all. And if you want to 
contribute to the discussion, most of the same people are still on the 
list, so jump in!

Off-list I've gotten support for the original email, so I know I'm not 
the only one who's sick of rehashing old arguments.

Tim

--
Tim Mensch

Currently at Wild Sage (Boulder, CO): http://www.wildsagecohousing.org

Founding member of Tumblerock, a Boulder, CO area community in its forming 
stages: http://tumblerock.org