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Can someone please explain to me why there is so much hate when posters start controversial topics, i mean is’nt that the point of the CR, to be a place where anything can be discussed freely and with respect. Why is it a problem among certain posters if the topic generates a heated discussion?
i mean is’nt that the point of the CR, to be a place where anything can be discussed freely and with respect.
Obviously not.
The purpose is to pay homage to the Gedolim, and let all know that the only way to Olam Haba is to follow the Gedolim (specificly my Gadol, not yours. Certainly not the MO YU “professors”).
extra ecclesiam nulla salus
Hi far east.
Great question!!
In my opinion, most people have a big emotional investment in the views they express, and when someone differs with them, it is human nature that they take it personal, and that upset takes over the points being exchanged and discussed.
When you add to the formula a medium where the contact is not face to face, the harshness can flow more freely.
It is a challenge, and it takes effort to not take an emotional turn when people disagree. People slip and say things and take on a tone that is no longer about the exchange of ideas.
Personally, I dont look to disagree just to disagree, but when I find someone who disagrees with me, for example, I very much enjoy the challenge of learning their view and responding with more clarity in trying to be true to my view.
Again, it takes effort to not go the emotional nasty route based on someone holding a different view. Some people try and mature in their ability to argue a point, others dont try and they get frustrated. I think all of us have been on both sides of that fence.
I find that the reaction you bring up most often happens when people have a lack of respect for one another.
Instead of accepting that not everyone holds the same way about everything people lash out when they see a difference.
Ideally, we should all be able to ask questions and share ideas. Problems arise when certain groups of people see an opinion that does not match (or even conflicts) with their opinion and they immediately go into attack mode.
Interestingly, so much of our learning is based on debates and discussions and yet when it happens here in the CR people immediately attack each other. I find it so peculiar how certain groups of people claim to strive for kedusha and yet will call anyone with a different tradition than theirs an apikores.
It’s a shame and it stifles good stimulating discussion.
Certain subjects should be banned from discussion in the CR.
They ALWAYS bring out vicious, nasty comments (which people probably justify to themseves by thinking that THEY -and they alone – represent daas Torah).
In fact, these subjects just generate sinas chinam, lashon hara, and motzei shem ra.
Y.W. Editors: – Stop them before they start!
The purpose is to pay homage to the Gedolim, and let all know that the only way to Olam Haba is to follow the Gedolim (specificly my Gadol, not yours. Certainly not the MO YU “professors”).
Give me a break. MO do not follow their own “gedolim” either. It is a basic tenet of current MO philosophy that rabbis have no reason to follow other rabbis who know more torah than they do.
It is for this reason that I have always maintained that one can disagree without being disagreeable. Some people find that to be a bigger challenge than others do.
Give me a break. MO do not follow their own “gedolim” either. It is a basic tenet of current MO philosophy that rabbis have no reason to follow other rabbis who know more torah than they do.
YU has Gedolim? YU has the Rav like Lubavitch has the Rebbe.
Poe.
I’ll try to explain my humble view.
There’s no one here, more than me, on here just for the FUN. That’s right! Hear All! My primary purpose of coming to this underground ‘family’ is for the fun. My serious threads starting from a year ago can attest to that.
Yet, there are some discussions that for some reason are off limits.
Open kefira (not that I think too much happens here, it once did). Lashon Hara. Ona’as Devarim. Those are REAL issurim. Then there’s Chilul HaShem, Biziu Talmid Chacham, and Elbona shel Torah. No joking matter. I change modes and I take action. That’s not the time to hide or show ‘anava’. Sometimes we’re bidden to – ?? ??? ??? ?? ?? ??.
<back to the fun>
There sooo arent.
Yes YU has gedolim Rav Herschel Schechter being one of them. Regardless of your opinion on MO, YU in fact does have some gedolim
Sure. Next thing you will tell me is that R’ Avi Weiss is a “gadol” too. How about R’ Boteach? What about R’ Stormin Norman?
End story, none of them hang their hats on themselves, they use Rabbi Soloveitchik as a crutch for their Crum MO “kulahs”, that are really just a search for an excuse to do whatever they want. Yes, there is a Rishon for that too!
Poe.
GAW – I don’t think I disagree with you, but please don’t put R’ H. Shechter in the same category as those other *#&!* you mentioned. Don’t call him a Gadol (whatever that is), but that was a bit much.
Hi far east.
The way I see it, it is not the topic. It is the poster.
There are relatively harmless topics in here and machlokes and all types of loshon problems come up.
We all have to work on those. But if someone is not willing to do that, then write them up as another internet bully, Jewish, informed, or not.
It may not be deliberate though. We all have our issues to work on. For some, they can not resist “going there” because communication is with a screen and not face to face.
GAW – I don’t think I disagree with you, but please don’t put R’ H. Shechter in the same category as those other *#&!* you mentioned. Don’t call him a Gadol (whatever that is), but that was a bit much.
OK, so who decides what? Why is R’ Norman (the Rosh HaYeshiva of YU/RIETS) any different than R’ Elya (the former Rosh Hayeshiva of Philly) any different than R’ Avi Wiess (The Rosh HaYeshiva of YCT)? Is it the hat size? Club size (Hamavin Yovin)? What?
Poe.
far east,
Can someone please explain to me why there is so much hate when posters start controversial topics, i mean is’nt that the point of the CR, to be a place where anything can be discussed freely and with respect. Why is it a problem among certain posters if the topic generates a heated discussion?
While I have never expressed or felt “hate” when a poster started a controversial topic, I think I understand why it may bother “certain” posters.
Some topics are inherently inflammatory due to the makeup of our community. When an OP poses a statement or question that is likely to inflame or arouse the trolls among us and then refrains from posting again, it gives the impression that the OP was not interested in an answer to the question (otherwise s/he would have provided feedback to the respondents) or to engage in discussion (otherwise s/he would have engaged in discussion), but rather to watch and laugh at the fireworks which sometimes results in hurt feelings among posters and provide fodder for anti-frum elements.
A related but more complex issue that does bother me is the subtle use of the CR to make attacks on the reputation of frum communities. This activity usually takes the form of:
OP: What does the oilam think of [insert controversial, rare, or even made-up-but-frum-sounding chumra forbidding X, almost always related to male-female interactions (and certainly not something obsessed over in real life) here]?
Real poster: Oh boy, here we go again.
“Right wing” troll: X is *** –> –> Absolutely <– <– *** forbidden. No. Exceptions. At. All.
“Left wing” troll [feigning outrage]: Ugh, another crazy chumra, I can’t believe such and such and so and so… I’ve seen such and such and so and so… anyone who thinks they need such a chumrah is crazy, [huff huff] even though I’ve never personally been impacted by this [huff huff], I’m sooo outraged!
Stoking-the-flames troll: What can X lead to?
etc. etc.
X becomes seemingly a big controversy. Rumors and posts get repeated as “I have personally heard that…”. Our community is made to look fractious, backwards and petty, and bloggers pretend that the discussion has legitimacy and use it to bash Orthodoxy in general.
Avram: Have you often seen topics of discussion here be used externally from this site as fodder to attack the frum or make us seem backwards?
far east
Because it’s Poe.
gavra,
when people belittle rav lamn or rav schachter you are not insulting a person but also all the torah they carry. even if you have little respect for the person (which is mum in you not the person) please do not place in such little regard the torah they have learned and teach. the torah is special enough that even when carried in a keyli you dont approve, should be given a certain amount of respect.
Rav Herschel Schachter is a GODOL b’Torah, and should be shown the same respect you would give any Godol. You don’t follow his shittah, by all means follow your own Rov. But make no mistake about his level of Torah. To equate him with some of the people you mentioned (in a clearly negative fashion), just shows that you apparently do not know much about this Talmid Chochom.
besalel – sefer torah written bi a Min gets burned. No applications – but your rule is wrong.
GAW – excuse my ignorance. “Poe” ?
gabie,
Avram: Have you often seen topics of discussion here be used externally from this site as fodder to attack the frum or make us seem backwards?
Often, no. Sometimes, yes. I’ve also seen it here.
Logician,
GAW – excuse my ignorance. “Poe” ?
Poe’s law claims that, in an Internet discussion, a deadpanned parody of a fundamentalist argument will always be taken seriously by someone. For example, the poster mosherose made a lot of Poe-style posts. In this thread, gavra_at_work has applied this law by making fundamentalist-sounding arguments bashing rabbis which, in light of his other posts, are parody, yet he is garnering outraged responses.
I personally think that some of the “outraged” responses we see in the CR are themselves parody, with the intent of portraying the fake fundamentalist argument as a real viewpoint (as opposed to responding “you must be making that up, because I’ve never heard that before”), thus turning the Poe into a straw man.
A computer doesnt become the gadol hador just because ou downloaded shas. The keyli is the deciding factor as to whether the torah therein should be honored. A person who lives not in line with torah hashkafa and principle is not to be honored. I’m not talking about anyone specifically, even if itch decides i am, i’m simply disagreeing with the argument made above.
Aha. I suspected, but didn’t know GAW well enough.
Thank You Toi, precisely my point above. If there’s one argument you want to try to bang into people’s heads here, that should be it.
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