New (Regular!) ARLnow Column on Cycling/Transportation

[dplasters]

I enjoy discussing things with people who genuinely can be persuaded their original viewpoint is skewed in some way. I also try to come into any conversation with the knowledge I could very well be wrong.

This site, being the overly educated bastion that it is, often does engage in real, honest, engaging discussion. Sometimes we engage in pedantic silliness. Perfection is hard, no? Anonymous comment sections on local new sites are several steps down the conversation quality ladder. Somewhere between “populist drivel” and “cesspool”.

Forums can work because they develop a sense of community about them. That sense of community can run the gambit between 4chan/b (or more locally-ffx) and something more like here. But at least its not news story comments. Which can only be one upped by youtube comments.

[Rod Smith]

Very nice, dasgeh! Looking forward to future columns. Sadly it seems the central point, that drivers benefit from cycling too, and from cycling infrastructure was lost on some…

[dasgeh]

@Rod Smith 108990 wrote:

Very nice, dasgeh! Looking forward to future columns. Sadly it seems the central point, that drivers benefit from cycling too, and from cycling infrastructure was lost on some…

Eh, you can’t win ’em all. I actually didn’t think the comments were all that bad (though worrying about my water breaking and me killing some kid is… odd.)

Fwiw, I don’t think commenters are representative of the population at large. As long as I had a few non cyclists nodding along, it was worth it.

[rcannon100]

Know your audience. I do not think that the comment section of ArlNow is reflective of anything other than the trolls that live under the MVT. Indeed, many media sites have altered their comment policy or even removed comments as a result of the tendancy of comments to degrade to LCD and contribute almost nothing (kinda like comments here on the forum). I might recommend an alternative strategy. Instead of wasting your time engaging trolls – why to reinforce what gillian is saying through tweets, blog posts, or messages sent to the ArlCo board.

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