Last Year's Most Active Threads

Last year on New Year's Day, I thought that I had a great idea. Instead of writing about the previous day's most active threads, I would discuss the top 10 most active threads of the previous year. Out of curiosity, I wondered what I had done the previous year and looked at my previous January 1 post. Wouldn't you know it, I had written about the previous year's top 10 most active posts. So, my new idea was not, in fact, new. My memory was, however, questionable. This year, I have the awareness to know that writing about the top 10 most active threads of last year is not a new idea. However, I can now argue that it is a tradition. I will also follow the tradition of these posts by starting at the bottom of the list and working up to the most active thread of the year.

The tenth most active thread of 2024 was titled, "ECNL forcing Brave & Union Partnership" and posted in the "Soccer" forum. I originally wrote about this thread on February 21 of last year. At that time, I had a very dismal view of the thread because it had been started with nothing more than a rumor and quickly deteriorated into exchanges of snark and insults. Moreover, the soccer forum had proved to be the source of considerable headache, and this thread did not appear likely to reverse that trend. The topic of the thread was a rumored merger being forced by the Elite Clubs National League (ECNL) — a national kids’ soccer league — on two of its member clubs. Eventually, this rumor turned out to be true, and the thread reached 332 pages before posters seemed to have lost interest. Little did I know then, but soccer topics would routinely appear among the most active threads throughout the year.

Next in ninth place was a thread titled, "2028 Girls Lacrosse" and posted, not surprisingly, in the "Lacrosse" forum. I wrote about this thread on February 15 and, as with the soccer thread above, was not overly impressed by it. An issue with both the soccer and lacrosse forums is that I don't understand the institutions involved, which include leagues, clubs, teams, age brackets, and other groupings. These are all discussed in an alphabet soup of acronyms of which I am ignorant. The original poster started the thread in hopes of having "a civil thread about girls 2028 lacrosse." I can't say that the original poster's hopes were entirely fulfilled, but considerable discussion — perhaps lacking the desired civility at times — did commence. The thread is currently 400 pages in length and, as of December, still active.

Last year's top ten list was dominated by topics related to the Gaza War, which had started a few months earlier with Hamas' attack on Israel. Israel's subsequent invasion of Gaza led to the vast majority of Gaza being demolished, the northern part of Gaza being almost entirely ethnically cleansed, and a modern genocide. As such, the topic continued to receive considerable interest on DCUM. In addition, college and university campuses became the site of controversial demonstrations in support of the Palestinians. Israel's supporters rushed to blur the line between "antisemitism" and "anti-Israel" speech and succeeded in implementing often draconian restrictions on free expression on college campuses. Instead of having a large number of threads devoted to similar topics, I tried to keep this discussion confined to select threads. When those threads reached a certain length, generally around 1,000 pages, I locked them and started new ones. The most recent of those, and the eighth most active thread of last year, was titled, "Gaza war and College Campus Protests". I discussed this thread on June 3 last year. While the thread is currently 382 pages long and still active, the fact that this thread has lasted so long without reaching 1,000 pages demonstrates a significant drop in interest in the topic.

The seventh most active thread of last year was titled, "Hayfield Football Coach Fired" and posted in the "Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)" forum. The main thing that I can say about this thread is that it is quite the adventure. It started after a coach at Hayfield Secondary School in Fairfax County was arrested for attempting to meet with a 16-year-old boy in order to smoke marijuana. However, it quickly transitioned to a discussion about a scandal involving the residency of several of the school's football players. During the course of the thread, which is currently 397 pages in length and very much still active, there has been discussion of allegations about a recruiting scandal, a Fairfax County Public Schools investigation that exonerated the football team, a recommended suspension of the football team from the playoffs, the revelation of recruiting violations, and an admission by FCPS that wrongdoing had occurred. I first wrote about this thread on November 4, and it has been among the most active threads of the day multiple times. Some posters clearly consider this scandal to be among the crimes of the century and are demanding widespread firings of FCPS officials.

In sixth place was a thread titled, "Travis and Taylor", which was posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. The thread is, of course, about Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift. The thread was started after the revelation that the two celebrities were dating. The divergent views of the relationship were demonstrated in the first two posts of the thread. Whereas the original poster predicted that the couple would eventually get married, the first poster to respond argued that the relationship was staged as a public relations effort. This thread chronicled what has truly appeared to be a fairytale relationship. While Swift embarked on an international tour that shattered all sorts of records, Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs went on to win the Super Bowl last season and are a top contender for the Lombardi Trophy this year. This thread first topped the most active list in November 2023. At that time, the thread was 76 pages long. It grew to be 544 pages before it deteriorated to the point that I locked it. Unlike the thread, the Travis and Taylor relationship still appears to be active.

The fifth most active thread of last year is a relatively new one. Titled, "UHC CEO Gunned Down in Midtown Manhattan", and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum, the thread is about the murder of UnitedHealthCare CEO Brian Thompson. The thread was started less than a month ago on December 4 and has already reached 421 pages. The thread was the most active thread the day after its creation and has been among the most active threads most days since then. Much of this thread is taken up by debate between those who think that it is perfectly fine, if not actually laudable, to murder Healthcare CEOs and those who don't. The alleged killer, Luigi Mangione, had developed a fan club — which includes a disconcerting number of women who find him attractive — even before his arrest. Many of the posters in this thread now treat him as a hero of sorts. For some reason, the most recent posts on the thread are debating the value of people over 60, which some posters appear to believe should be set out on icebergs and left to die. I'm not at all sure what that has to do with the topic of the thread.

Fourth was a thread titled, "FCPS HS Boundary" and posted in the "Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS)" forum. The original poster asked a fairly innocent question about how often high school boundaries change in the Fairfax County Public Schools system. It was quickly revealed that it is not fear of war, famine, or pandemics that keeps Fairfax County parents awake at night, but rather fear that school boundaries will change. This thread grew to 434 pages before I locked it. However, it was soon replaced by a similar thread that is already 292 pages in length. There is no stopping this discussion despite no actual proposal for boundary changes yet having been produced. The basic concern is that, having bought expensive homes for the sole purpose of being within the boundaries of a high-performing school, posters will find themselves redistricted to a school that is less attractive to them. Whether this would be a bigger blow to their egos, their property values, or their children's education is not entirely clear.

The third most active thread was titled, "Kate's New Picture" and was posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. The thread was started after Catherine, Princess of Wales, released a photo of herself and her children. The photo was the first released since the Princess had undergone surgery. The original poster asked, "Any conspiracy theories here?" Indeed, there were conspiracy theories. What's more, many of the conspiracy theories proved to be correct. The photo turned out to have been manipulated, perhaps by Kate herself. While the Royal Family denied that she was being treated for cancer, it later was revealed that she did actually have cancer. DCUM Royal Family threads are inundated by conspiracy theories at the best of times. However, after this, the conspiracy theorists became particularly unbearable. The thread reached 515 pages before I locked it.

Second was a thread titled, "ECNL moving to school year not calendar" and, like the earlier ECNL thread, posted in the "Soccer" forum. As I previously explained, ECNL is a national youth soccer league. This thread is about a planned change to the age brackets that separate players. Currently, ECNL players are separated by calendar age while high school teams are based on school year. Schools normally have a Fall age cut-off, and some kids from a calendar year are placed in classes with younger students. When age brackets are not aligned, some kids are in one age group for their club soccer teams and a different one for their school teams. This change is to align the brackets so that players are always with the same cohort. I really have no idea why the change is so controversial, but the thread is currently 525 pages in length. This thread has frequently been among the most active, something about which I have repeatedly expressed surprise. This phenomenon was eventually explained in a comment on one of my blog posts. Apparently, posters from soccer forums across the nation have congregated on DCUM because they consider the forum somewhat better than the other forums. Therefore, the thread has a nationwide group of participants. I doubt that many of the posters in this discussion are active in other DCUM forums.

The most active thread of last year was one that was also among the most active of the previous year. Titled, "Gaza War, Part 3", this was the third iteration of the general Gaza War discussion. It was created after part 2 reached 1,000 pages. I locked this thread when it reached 943 pages and created the Gaza thread discussed above. While most observers, including me, have the tendency to date this conflict with the Hamas attack on Israel, many supporters of the Palestinians argue that the conflict was well underway by that time and that the Palestinians did not initiate a new conflict, but just carried out another attack in an already existing conflict. Be that as it may, the October 7 attack heralded a new era of the conflict. I am not sure all the ramifications of that era are yet understood. As I mentioned above, Gaza has been decimated, parts of it ethnically cleansed, and a genocide fully supported by the United States is underway. The war has severely tarnished the legacy of President Joe Biden, who otherwise had a historically successful presidency. Arguably, the conflict hurt the electoral potential of Vice President Kamala Harris, perhaps fatally. The conflict in Gaza led to another Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the killing of most of Hezbollah's leadership, and the destruction of southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut. In addition, Iran suffered from its involvement in the conflict, and as it was weakened, its ally Syria was left exposed. Eventually, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was deposed, and the country is currently in turmoil. Fighters in Yemen have essentially blockaded the Red Sea and have launched missiles at Israel. This has provoked both Israeli and U.S. attacks on the country. Arguably, the futures of 7 countries have been directly impacted by the war. We likely will be dealing with the results of this war for decades to come.