A question/suggestion to the moderators

[Quinctia]

We're back to stupidity here.

Most adults don't understand that, that's why the US is so screwed up right now when it comes to issues like gay marriage, and if I had believed everything I read on the internet when I was under 18, I'd be in for some major trouble now.

You're really not giving anyone under 18 much credit, and that's a shame.  People aren't helpless little children til they hit that magic number, and they can handle a lot more than you think they can.

[Marhis]

I may be wrong, but I think that the "rule of 12" on this forum is not for taking care of less-than-12-years-old, but more for preserving who's not 12 from someone else's twelviness(sp?) .

[calalily]

I have to agree with the objections of trying to make the site more exclusive or protecting young kids.  My kids are threatened and patrolled by me on the internet, and I don't see why we should take care to protect them in this forum when their parents aren't.  

If they don't get it here - they'll pick it up on the street  :shock:  :lol:

[alia]

We're back to stupidity here.

Ahem. I deal with several 9-13 year old kids every day.

Kids are smart. In fact, they are extremely smart, but teenagers are likely to stick with prejudices and opinions they have heard from their peers or from their parents, or something they've read on the internet.

Teenagers define themselves by what they are not, and can be extremely judgemental/discriminative towards minorities. Unfortunately, if they never start questioning those ideas, they might stick with them for the rest of their lives.

I have been talking with teens about gays and other minorities, but unfortunately most of the times I can hear the kid's parent's (cliched) opinions when they talk about gays.

And just for the record, gay marriage is legal in my country, my sister is a lesbian so I have no problems with gays and I live in Europe.

Edit:

I may be wrong, but I think that the "rule of 12" on this forum is not for taking care of less-than-12-years-old, but more for preserving who's not 12 from someone else's twelviness(sp?)
.

True. :lol:
My post was an answer to quintica. But yeah, I am all for banning the kids from the forum, mainly because I spend so much time with them every day I really don't want to read their spam also when I'm not at work.

[BlueSoup]

It's illegal to have a member under the age of 13 on the forum without parental consent.  Since we are not about to go that route, we just ban them all.  And seeing as Pescado lives by the rule of 6, that gets rounded down to 12.

[Quinctia]

I'm sorry you feel that way.  I've had plenty of intelligent discourse with the teenagers that I work with, and the annoying, ignorant teenagers are on even proportions with the annoying, ignorant adults.

I was going to type a long explanation about why I've come to the conclusion that teenagers who believe differently than I are easier to deal with than adults, and have more interesting discussions, but it comes down to this.  The older you are, the more set in your ways you are.  Teenagers can and will switch identities at the drop of the hat.  Finding where they belong is an important stage of development, and they can and will change their core beliefs and their social groups.

Licensed high school biology teacher, here.  I couldn't do middle school, (the age group you work with), they'd drive me nuts.  But we're talking about older than the COPPA limit, so teenagers.  Where I have my experience.  More like 13-18.

Also have three years under my belt in retail in a hardware store where I've got plenty of experience with blue collar adults.  The adults are parrots, too.

I've been in fandom for years, and the most annoying, stubborn drama whores are the middle aged women, in my experience.  It's kinda hard to ID them ahead of time, though, and we can't exactly ban all women over the age of 30, that would be ridiculous.

[Max_The_Repairman]

Heh... honestly, I like that the registration agreement notifies you that you must convincingly act more intelligent than a seventh-grade reading level. The Rule of 12 sounds much nicer than 'If you act like an utter moron, you will be fed to the sharks.'

...

Of course, if anyone managed to devise a system whereby people who cross a certain threshold of unintentional or intentional idiocy, they were immediately dropped into a tank of angry sharks, I'd gleefully recommend using that instead...

Or "Those who are not in aspirational failure are welcome"?

[The ISZ]

I'm sorry you feel that way.  I've had plenty of intelligent discourse with the teenagers that I work with, and the annoying, ignorant teenagers are on even proportions with the annoying, ignorant adults.

I've been in fandom for years, and the most annoying, stubborn drama whores are the middle aged women, in my experience.  It's kinda hard to ID them ahead of time, though, and we can't exactly ban all women over the age of 30, that would be ridiculous.

I have to say my experience has been the same as yours.  I have found that most of the people in forums and chat rooms that are annoying and act juvenile are women over the age of 30.  I don't know why this is, but I find them to be more of an irritant than the kiddies.  Of course this is not always the case.  I do realize that folks of all ages can be annoying and ignorant.

[littlemisspirate]

...we can't exactly ban all women over the age of 30, that would be ridiculous.

Actually, between personal experience and years of reading Fandom Wank, I'm pretty sure that 90% of all internet drama could be headed off by banning all women over the age of 30 for the Internet.  But that statistic isn't watertight, and you might get much of the same effect with less of the discrimination by just banning everyone between 35 and 50.  Teenagers, on the other hand, are young, and can be trained.

[Célimène]

Online communities form with their own rituals, norms and defense mechanisms based on commonality. There the neuroses and prejudices of their members are embraced and nurtured. God help you if you interrupt the delicate balance of things. No one demographic holds the monopoly.

[Noodles]

I've been in fandom for years, and the most annoying, stubborn drama whores are the middle aged women, in my experience.  It's kinda hard to ID them ahead of time, though, and we can't exactly ban all women over the age of 30, that would be ridiculous.

It's true in retail and service jobs as well. I hate belligerant 40-60 year old women as they are the absolute worst to deal with (Note I said belligerant, not all in general)

[Surelyfunke]

This is very joyful. I can't wait till I hit 30.

[Got_Nerd]

I, also, must agree with the 30 year old women rule.  In the Harry Potter fandom, there are a whole bunch of women who write editorials on a scarily regular basis.

And then, when someone disagrees with the theory, they're shot down on the basis of 'being disrespectful' to the author.

 :roll:

One extremely good reason why I don't participate there any more.

[dorquemada]

One extremely good reason why I don't participate there any more.

I don't see any reason whatsoever why a sane person should risk approaching Harry Potter fandom closer than by a parsec.

[cakewalk]

Someone to noted certain misogyny in some of the lastest posts?  I'm sorry, but those comments they seem me very unjust and discriminatory. :evil:

I don't want to start a sex war, but It is not correct to judge to all for which do a few.   :roll: