It's happened a good deal here. I remember a heated "The military SUCKS!" "*I* have a brother in the military!" mini-fluffle, and I think some social capital was applied there by some people.

That's where we lost Jen, actually.

I have a question. Seriously. It seems like there's a perception among some people that personal attacks are being posted right and left, and people are getting away with it because of social capital.

I'm not in every thread, but I can't think of a single personal attack being posted by anyone, new, old, popular or un, in recent memory. (Not since Zoe, if I had to put a date on it.) Not every post has been sweetness and light, but I can't put my finger on anything that I'd class as a personal attack. Not one post.

So I want to know, what's driving this conversation? I'm honestly baffled as to what we're really talking about.

[huh, x-post]

Two things:

a) "Clique" isn't that bad a word. Or only in the double-standard sense.

b) Social capital has no gold standard.

To expound:

Buffistas are a narrow exclusive circle or group of persons; especially : one held together by common interests, views, or purposes. Oh, you may rail at the exclusive, but the fact is, like any online community, some fit, some fall away. Never gonna be different, never has been, even outside these hallowed walls. Sub-cliques also exist. It's perfectly possible for me to stride into Spoilers and do the most newbie-fied flying leap into the avocado dip. Spoilers is a clique, I'm not in it, but still I sleep well at night.

Cliques are not inner circles. No, let me rephrase: cliques are not the inner circle. Just like we don't agree on a damned thing, we couldn't name the same inner circle. Dare you.

And on social capital. Shawn can say things to me that she couldn't say with the same lack of offense to ... Le Nubian. That pesky rate of exchange thing. Not to mention inflation. There are people, in general, with strong currency. I doubt anyone is the American dollar, though.

And so it goes.

Do we have examples of big bad posters trampling roughshod among the users, newbies and oldbies alike, kicking asses but not bothering to take names?

Or do we have a coagulation of people, thicker in clumps and mobile interacting as people do?

You can't legislate the humanity away. You can just urge people to remember just because it looks like ethernet packets when it hits your computer doesn't mean it didn't start out organic. With brain chemistry.

If you want social capital to disappear, you need to start outside this narrow hall.

A person who's a fixture around here DOES know better.

Yes, but I think it allows them to have a bad day in ways someone with no capital cannot. It's about the familiar.

If you come in and start calling everyone a bunch of stupid cunts, Trudy, I'll be shocked and amazed, and wonder what the hell happened, and be concerned, because it's out of character.

With a stranger, who's not earned any social capital, I just think, "asshole."

You tend to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, Trudy. Which is nice, I suppose. I tend to think that everyone is a potential asshole 'til they prove otherwise (capital). I'm suspicious like that. Which is a bit like not taking candy from strangers. A different sort of survival mechanism.

You'll give anyone a shot, which means you probably meet more people than I do. I give hardly anyone a shot, which means I probably don't get hurt by being fucked over very often.

You'll advocate for the weakest link, capital be damned, which is honorable. I'll cut their throat at first rumblings of trolldom, capital be damned, which i also believe is honorable.

Clash of beliefs. It's all very interesting to me.

If it's unacceptable behaivor to, say, make a personal insult it's still unacceptable even if the person has done good things for the group.

In fact, to me it's a little worse. A person who's a fixture around here DOES know better. If anything, the apology and any amends should be all the quicker because of that knowledge.

I can't argue with the above. Especially since so many of us know other Buffistas offline as well as on.

But our policing system depends on people calling others on unacceptable behavior. And it's human nature to take a comment in context. People are more likely to overlook a wrong post from someone they know, someone who's played by the rules over months or years.

Maybe that's a flaw in our system. We're not perfect. But the new kid in town always faces problems fitting in. And I don't think we do a bad job of dealing with newbies.

Of COURSE there is an innner circle.

I think it's more like a nebula or dust cloud. There's no circular edge to define the binary state IN or OUT. You can be closer to the center or further away. You can move based on your behavior. Social capital can be thought of as inversely proportional to your distance from the center.

Clash of beliefs. It's all very interesting to me.

And it would be a very dull board if we all thought alike. I mean, there's only so much Spike to go around.

I doubt anyone is the American dollar, though.

I'm two chickens.

It's happened a good deal here. I remember a heated "The military SUCKS!" "*I* have a brother in the military!" mini-fluffle, and I think some social capital was applied there by some people.

That's where we lost Jen, actually.

I remember. That's why I said "some social capital was applied there by SOME people." We could easily have lost more people.

You can't legislate the humanity away. You can just urge people to remember just because it looks like ethernet packets when it hits your computer doesn't mean it didn't start out organic. With brain chemistry.

If you want social capital to disappear, you need to start outside this narrow hall.

Very well said, ita. Thank you.