What should Proviso Probe do about comments?

A suggestion was made that Proviso Probe should eliminate comments entirely since the low level of discourse in comments undermines the credibility of Proviso Probe as a source.

Since All Proviso Network is available for people to make comments it seems like a reasonable suggestion to me.

What do you think?

ADMIN, new guidelines for comments

Last week we had local elections. This has caused me to reflect on both Proviso Probe and Proviso the community.

I am going to make a major change to Proviso Probe. Proviso Probe will no longer accept comments that are disrespectful to members of the Proviso community, including people who post on Proviso Probe.

I'm not sure I can describe all the ways comments can be disrespectful, but here's a partial list.
1.No talk of people's sex lives, unless there is direct connection with professional duties
2.Do discuss people's bodies
3.Don't discuss medical conditions, including mental health issues, except in cases where mental health is central to the story (e.g. Westchester case and Hubert Thompson)
4.Do not engage in name calling and insults
5.Do not attribute motivations you can't know

Does this mean Proviso Probe isn't going to allow criticism of public figures? Discuss what people do, not who they are.

Why am I making this change? I suspect that the negativity of our political discourse is doing a certain amount of harm. People and factions say ugly stuff about each other and it makes it difficult to work together in the future.

Also, I suspect the incivility hurts reformers more than it hurts people in politics to make a buck. When the discourse sinks to a bunch of name calling and allegations about porn, pedophiles and perversions the people who oppose reform can avoid the issues of substance by turning the discourse into a mudslinging contest.

As for the Proviso community, part of me would like to see the various governing bodies put the elections behind them and have the factions work together.

But part of me thinks that it would be inappropriate to give people a pass for doing stuff that is unethical or illegal. I'm wrestling with this so the line between allowable comments and not allowable may shift.

ADMIN, Russell Simmons calls for treating people more respectfully

Yahoo (Reuters, Daniel Trotta):

Prominent U.S. hip-hop executive Russell Simmons on Monday recommended eliminating the words "bitch," "ho" and "nigger" from the recording industry, considering them "extreme curse words."....

Simmons, co-founder of the Def Jam label and a driving force behind hip-hop's huge commercial success, called for voluntary restrictions on the words and setting up an industry watchdog to recommend guidelines for lyrical and visual standards.

I'm not exactly sure how it's going to work, but Proviso Probe is going to be moving in this direction, especially in decisions about which comments to allow. More later.

Atrios has posted two entries on Run DMC. In the first Atrios noted that Joseph "DJ Run" Simmons is the brother of Russell Simmons. And in the second entry Atrios wrote:

And the cover...

...which made it okay for white kids to like rap, white broadcasters to play it, and brought back Aerosmith from the dead.

ADMIN, please give generously

This week is fund raising week at Proviso Probe.

The goal for this week of fund raising is twenty five new contributors.

Please email (RadioNyberg circled “a” Yahoo spot c0m) or call me, (773) 430-3538, to make a pledge.

BLOG, how blogs can be better than traditional media

Saturday, Proviso Probe had an entry about the collision between an ambulance and a motorist.

I didn't expect the entry to be noteworthy. It was just something that happened in the community.

"Public Safety" informed me of the OptiCom system for traffic signal preemption. The system switches the lights so emergency vehicles can get the green lights/right of way.

"Firefighter for a long time" made some useful observations too.

Opticoms are great, they make traveling lights and sirens safer for everyone. The problem lies when an approaching motorist sees the light changes green and if they don’t look up in time to see it went back to red. No one expects the light to change to red 10 seconds after it goes green. Traffic light cycles like normal (yellow-red) but nobody expects it as quick as it comes.

S/he went on to write:

Anyone operating an emergency vehicle should have to go through mandatory training. Even if you have a green light you should be slowing and covering the brake. Green light does not mean the intersection is clear. Some departments mandate even if you have the green light to come almost to a complete stop at intersections before proceeding. I am not going to try and guess what happened or why without an investigation or report.

S/he also drew attention to the website FireFighterCloseCalls.com.

This story illustrates the power of blogging. The most informed people reading a blog almost always know more about at least part of the story than the people writing the blog. This is also true in newspapers, radio and television. However, blogs allow for the audience to make contributions. So, if a blog has a knowledgeable audience it can be a much more powerful source of information than a traditional media outlet.