Monday's Most Active Threads

I'm going to have to work my way up to discussing the most active thread yesterday. As many are aware, DCUM originally started as a mailing list. The first use of forums was to offload posts advertising or searching for nannies because they were creating too much traffic for the mailing list. After that, the forums grew organically and we mostly added them at the request of users. I don't remember the circumstances that led to the creation of the "Family Relationships" forum, but I am fairly certain that it would have been due to users' requests. I would never have come up with the idea for this forum and have never had great expectations for it. For years the forum trundled along almost like a backwater with nothing much happening within it. But more recently the forum has become a source of endless drama. Posters have a knack for turning the most mundane of interactions in to a double-digit page length spectacle. Such was the case with yesterday's most active thread. Titled, "Invitations haven't been sent yet" and, as I alluded to, posted in the "Family Relationships" forum, the original poster's conflict could hardly be less remarkable. Her niece, who lives across the country, will be getting married this summer. Apparently a date for the wedding has been agreed upon, but not officially announced. The original poster contacted her sister to ask if the date is solid because she wants to purchase airline tickets while they are still cheap. It will be an expensive trip regardless and she doesn't want to have to pay even higher prices later. The original poster's sister responded by saying, "Invitations haven't been sent yet" which angered the original poster and seems to have brought to the surface other longstanding resentments she has towards her sibling. The original poster seems to have meant this post mostly as a vent. The entire incident is pretty simple from the original poster's point of view. Her sister is strange and inconsiderate, she provided a strange and unhelpful response, not for the first time she has upset the original poster, and the original poster will simply ask her niece about the date instead. Personally, I can't imagine a response to this post beyond, "I understand your frustration and I hope it all works out." That, of course, is only if I bothered to respond at all, which I wouldn't have. But, those who did respond are not like me. Instead, multiple posters attacked the original poster with one calling her "way out of line" and accusing a her of pressuring a stressed-out bride. Others analyzed the sister's response, suggesting it might mean that either the wedding is in trouble and might not come off or that the original poster is not invited. No amount of assurances by the original poster that this was not the case would stop the speculation. I am not sure why the original poster chose to repeatedly engage the responders. That only seemed to cause them to pick more holes in her story or find new reasons to criticize her.

The next most active thread was the one about opposition to Diversity, Inclusion, Equity, and Belonging that I've already discussed and will, therefore, skip today. After that was a thread posted in the "Political Discussion" forum. Titled, "Missouri new law pregnant women can not finalize divorce", the original poster says that Missouri and three other states have laws prohibiting divorces involving pregnant women from being finalized until after the woman gives birth. The original poster believes that this increases the chances of domestic violence. In addition, the original poster alleges additional anti-woman measures are coming and argues that any woman who votes "red" is "brain dead". The original poster did him or herself no favors with the manner in which the thread was started. There was no link to support the original poster's claim, which caused some posters to argue the post was not true. I received multiple reports from a poster with increasing anger that I allowed the thread because her own searching had not turned up anything to support the original poster's claims. However, my own search immediately turned up multiple sources, including a Fox station, that supported the divorce issue. Moreover, other posters had no problem believing the original poster and actually argued in support of the divorce restriction. The first poster to respond claimed that, "The baby deserves two parents, even if they aren’t going to stay married". Another argued that "Every baby deserves to be legally legitimate and have a father on the birth certificate." Neither of these posters seems to be aware that both of these things could occur even with divorced parents, or indeed parents that had never been married. One of my favorite recent developments in the political forum are the frequent posts by posters who are clearly uninformed but insult the intelligence of others in their response. There was an example of this in the thread when one poster noted that part of the law's justification was that child support is reliant on the establishment of paternity. The poster continued to say, "I thought DCUM was educated" and went on to accuse posters of being "shortsighted, lacking critical thinking, and just flat out dumb." Had this poster himself employed a little critical thinking, he might have realized marriage is not always a valid indicator of paternity. Making this point even more clear, one poster claimed that this law actually protects women by making in nearly impossible for a married man to disclaim paternity and puts men on the hook for child support even if the baby is the product of their wive's cheating. From my perspective, it was interesting to see the thread evolve from "this law is anti-women", to "the original poster is lying and this law doesn't exist", to "the law exists but is aimed at protecting the baby", to "this law traps men".

Next was a thread titled, "Active Duty US Airman Set Himself on Fire Outside Israeli embassy in DC". Originally posted in the "Religion" forum, I moved the thread to the "Political Discussion" forum where it is much more appropriate. There was considerable questioning about why the original poster chose to post this thread in the religion forum and the original poster eventually explained that she hoped the topic would be seen more widely in that forum. This confirms a suspicion that I've had that posters were doing this. As for the topic itself, as the title reveals, it is about Aaron Bushnell who set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy after explaining that he did not want to be "complicit in genocide". After setting himself alight, he repeatedly screamed "Free Palestine". Bushnell died in the hospital several hours later. The Israel-Palestine conflict has been very divisive among DCUM posters, provoking multiple 1,000 post threads and continual heated exchanges. Those divisions were immediately apparent in this thread. Among those supportive of the Palestinians, Bushnell was seen as a brave hero acting on his conscience. They cited other well-known incidences of self-immolation that have occurred throughout history. But, those who support Israel eagerly attacked him as mentally unbalanced and insane. Both sides argued about the impact of Bushnell's act of self-immolation. The same extreme positions that have dominated other threads about Gaza appeared in this thread as well. Those who criticized Bushnell were accused of supporting genocide while those offering support for Bushnell were accused of supporting Hamas or being antisemitic. One trend that I've seen in the forum lately and that also came up in this thread is posters claiming that they are more informed than the average individual and, therefore, have more authority to comment on the situation. As one poster wrote, "Honestly I think that everyone on this thread who’s never been to Israel or Gaza or the West Bank and has no family there and doesn’t speak the languages should [be quiet]". I think the basis of this viewpoint is a perception that pro-Palestinian activists are naive and uninformed, simply brainwashed by TikTok. This is a description that many posters in the thread also applied to Bushnell. In response to that, I would say that I personally spent much of my Bachelor's degree studying the Middle East, received a Master's degree in Arab Studies, and lived in and visited the Middle East, including Israel and the West Bank. I once spoke Arabic sufficiently to pass the State Department's language exam, though I've since lost most — but not all — of it. So, I guess I am among those qualified to discuss this issue. What I can say is that the more you learn about the region, the more you realize you don't know. Moreover, despite the abundance of experts on the region, they have made little to no real progress toward resolving the conflict. So, maybe its time to give the young and naive a chance. However, I must emphasize, while I respect Bushnell's commitment to his values, I truly hope that others will not be inspired to follow his example of "extreme demonstration". If there is anything on which everyone involved in the discussion should be able to agree, it is that this act should not be copied.

The final thread that I will discuss today was posted in the "Relationship Discussion (non-explicit)" forum. Titled, "Unreasonable to ask spouse who is not a planner to meal plan?", the original poster went to great lengths to hide the genders involved in this dispute. So, I will refer to both as "they" and "their". The original poster says that they do most of the organizing and many of the parental and household tasks. However, their spouse enjoys cooking and has taken on that role. But, unlike the original poster who likes to plan, organize, and manage, their spouse prefers to do things in an ad hoc manner. This means that the family is often out of food because the original poster's spouse only shops for what is needed immediately. This is stressful for the original poster who has responded by urging their spouse to prepare meal plans in advance, do a weekly large shopping trip, and stop improvising meals but rather have a more structured approach. The original poster wants to know if their request is unreasonable. As could be expected, responses fell both ways. Several posters argued that a lack of planning demonstrated a deficiency in maturity and that the original poster's spouse should grow up and get more organized. To them, the failure to plan was a significant character flaw. On the other hand, many posters took the position that as long as food was getting on the table, how it got there should be left to the person preparing it. These posters were more focused on results rather than methods. Many of these posters said that they prefer frequent shopping that allows for fresher food. In terms of what the original poster might do, posters advised using meal preparation services such as Blue Apron. But, several posters advised the original poster to simply accept the situation. A number of posters thought that the primary issue was that the spouse might not have dinner prepared at the expected time and suggested focusing narrowly on that. They suggested establishing specific times at which dinner was expected to be ready and as long as those times were met, not worrying about how it came about. Another suggestion was to shift some of the original poster's responsibilities to the spouse so that the original poster would then have time to do meal planning. A whole other topic of discussion involved what to do about hungry kids between or before meals. Needless to say, posters could not agree about whether they should be ignored or catered to.