Do you believe fluther is on the decline, or are we merely experiencing a period of “thought drought”? Or is everything just fine?

I’m 12 days away from my 9 year Flutherversary. This question has been asked many times during my time here, especially since Ben and Andrew left for bigger and better things. Everything is just fine.

Because once upon a time, this site was full of a bunch of people with differing opinions and varied life experience, and we were allowed to have discussions that provoked thought, laughter, and ire. There were enough questions daily that people could join the ones they liked and avoid the ones they didn’t, and everyone knew exactly where the “stop following” button was.

And then, somewhere along the line, entire categories of conversation were disallowed, people who were known for those types of discussion were banned or driven away, and we’re basically left with a handful of middle aged political moderates collectively rolling their eyes at anyone who tiptoes out of line.

If you were to ask me, I think it started with the bans of Wundayatta and ETPro. It was all downhill from there.

I remember ETPro. I didn’t realise he had been banned. If you could only create an alternative Fluther from the legions of the banned and the left in disgust I would join in a minute.

I’m not sure if he was banned or if he left.

Don’t you dare call me a “middle-aged political moderate”, @Muad_Dib: There’s no way that I’m going to live past 100 years – and my politics are strictly radical. Otherwise, spot on.

To anyone who’s wondering: ETpro was not banned. He never even disabled his account, just wandered off.

@longgone That’s what I thought.

Many users, including mods, left back in 2010 when Answerbag and Wisdm refugees came aboard and Bendrew tried to appease the new users with sections. They weren’t happy with the change that allowed poll questions and more social activities here. There was a large exodus at the time.

People come, people go. It’s always been this way.

I stand corrected re: ETPro being banned. There was a hell of a kerfuffle over his NSFW content, though.

ETPro contributed a lot to this site. So did Wundayatta. I was sorry to see them both go, and many others, whatever the circumstances.

And in my experience this site had gained its new members primarily from the closing of other forums – and there are precious few general Q&A sites left. So, unless MetaFilter shuts down inexplicably (I don’t see that happening) I think we’re on our own.

What about Quora?

Lol. Yeah, and Twitter might close up shop, too.

Would we get The Donald then?

I don’t think he could handle the grammatical requirements.

It would be delightful to be able to ban him from something – even if only Fluther!

Bring it on!! My use of social media is not presidential – it’s MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL. Make America Great Again!”

@flutherother Bring back the fish, please!

OK, it’s very tiring pretending to be someone who is pretending to be president.

Gosh, It’s been almost 8 years. Small forums always die like this, I’m honestly surprised so many have lingered on. First there is a community of somewhat like minded but different people getting along and getting to know each other. Problem is they then get to know each other. People say things they may or may not regret but can’t take back because everyone reminds them of it. You get the forum police who run off people who have opinions different than the herd, squabbles with moderation, drunk posts, ideological people who are obnoxious and basically take over threads…etc.. Hence, the closed curtains but no credits yet so we’ll see if there is an encore.

I think it’s a bit egotistical to think if a handful or two leave it means the end of a site.
just saying

Good answer @kidding me

I think it is certainly different than it was 5 years ago, which is different than it was 10 years ago. It does go through kerfuffles pretty regularly because a few malcontents need to complain vociferously about being moderated. I have even heard tell of somebody starting a website or a Facebook page or something to screenshot threads to preserve them in case of moderation.

I am impressed by the level of arrogance that prompts someone to do this, assuming that their (or really, anyone’s!) prose here, on this small, anonymous Q&A site, is just so deathless, so important that it must be preserved. I’ve been here for years, and I can count on the fingers of one hand the numbers of responses I have seen that really are worthy of being seen a second time.

I don’t know, the collected screenshots of the community were instrumental in understanding what actually took place during the latest “kerfuffle”, when responses seeking information (and delivering it) were moderated with incredible swiftness.

Of course, I’d never attempt to persuade someone to care one way or the other. If one is not interested in past responses, they simply need choose never to click on an old question (or visit any hypothetical archive).

Well, it didn’t occur to me that the mods were lying (why on earth would they bother?) so I didn’t need to see a curated collection of screenshots to come to a logical conclusion.
Occam’s razor. The most logical and simplest explanation given all the factors. Really, I doubt these people have time for your Grand Conspiracy.

It’s an interesting thought that someone would archive the questions and answers which have been “disappeared”. Grand conspiracy theories aside, I would find such a collection fascinating reading. I fail to understand how arrogance is involved with this issue. It isn’t about a fear that some priceless eloquence is being snatched from us, but rather a running record on the behavior of gods every bit as fallable as the rest of us.

@stanleybmanly: Did you mean “mods” instead of “gods”?

My point was basically about the level of upset that some display. I don’t believe that anyone thinks the mods are infallible, I think the upset ones ascribe waaay too much importance to their contributions here.

On another thread, a user claimed that questioning someone’s desire to remain if they were unhappy was like telling someone they could leave the country if they don’t like the president. I feel that that is a bit overblown. I liken it more to not really liking a restaurant anymore, and choosing to go somewhere else to eat.

I like it here, even with the changes, but I don’t feel that goofing around on sites like this comprises an important part of my life, any more than choosing this diner over that diner for breakfast will significantly impact how I function in the world.

I applaud your nonchalance.

Let me make sure I have everything straight:

—The things people write don’t matter, and matter even less if they’re removed.
—The people who are removed don’t matter, because they can just go somewhere else.
—Anyone who does care has “overblown” senses of self-importance
—You personally could take the site or leave it, but find it desirable to feel superior to others regardless.

And people wonder why we’re haemorrhaging membership.

I meant gods. Omnipotence

Oh, @Muad_Dib, you are, and always have been, a true master of misinterpretation in order to serve an agenda! I applaud your dedication to the dramatic.

That’s not at all what I said, you know it, but enjoy your drama. <eyeroll>

“we’re basically left with a handful of middle aged political moderates collectively rolling their eyes at anyone who tiptoes out of line.”

Attitude checks out.

Maybe we are hemorrhaging membership because of the rudeness and bullying of other members and of newbies.
You yourself said @maud dib that you attacked HC every chance you got. Or maybe when newbies come and they see questions about how bad this site is and how bad the moderation is, it turns them off and they don’t stick around.

This question and thread make me ask a different question: how important is Fluther to each of us? We each get to decide what gets priority in our lives. We are each allowed to decide the items that will get the most energy, and we can have multiple items that get energy, and we usually assign different degrees of energy to different items.

I can think of one user on this site who actually places a get deal of energy/importance to that user’s interactions here. I can think of a user with a high lurve score who checks this site perhaps once a quarter. It varies from user to user. That’s one of the beauties of life. We each get to decide for ourselves where we want to expend our energy.

It’s very difficult to decide if any one answer is better than another. I think difficulties arise when we assign more importance to our answer versus how another user answers the question of how important this site is. We each place great importance on our own answers, because we want to be right – whatever right may mean to each of us. Wanting to be right is quite normal. It’s called seeking validation. When we are children, we seek validation from our parents. As we grow, we seek it from people further afield like friends. As adults, we seek it from colleagues in our fields. If all goes well and we mature, we finally seek it only from ourselves. Very few of us get to that point.

There is a great deal to worry about in the world today. There’s climate change and the renewed threat of nuclear war. We all have multiple worries like work stress and taxes and money for groceries. It’s also a stressful time of year, the holidays.

It’s a completely normal phenomenon to live with all this stress and to choose a relatively minor area in which to decide to express our outrage at all the other stress. It’s completely normal to be overwhelmed by financial stress and to take those overwhelmed feelings and to dump them into a disagreement with a work colleague or the cashier at the grocery store or while we’re driving or any other smaller and less consequential item.

Fluther holds great importance for some of us and little for others. We all have lives away from this site, and we all express our feelings for this site in different ways. We all want our words to be read and understood by others. How important is the validation of other users on Fluther to each of us? It can be very important for some, and it can be minor or even unimportant for others. We each get to decide. Perhaps we can each be a little more understanding that others are going to have different answers.

There just aren’t as many people here as there used to be. Also, we have a couple of Jellies who are just so mean and offensive that they literally drive people away. I don’t understand why the mods don’t do something about it.