Harm Reduction Vs External Image

[drug_mentor]

Sykik - I moved this post from another thread as I think this a good topic to discuss and resolve.


Lets be honest here, these new changes are about one thing and that is image. It seems to me the Australian forum is overly preoccupied with image and at times this can be an obstacle to HR. I have been a regular in most, if not all, ongoing codeine threads on AusDD for a long time now. It NEVER failed to amaze me, the amount of people who could of had their question answered in 2 seconds of reading, but need to post a question because they are either too dumb to understand or too lazy to have read it in the first place.

I feel like ending discussion on it really lets these people down, and regardless of your opinion on people that are either too lazy or too dumb to read a thread properly. I ask you one thing, could you think of a drug user who needs HR more? Not to mention, people feel reassured being able to have social contact and discussion with other users.

I question the efficacy of creating what you call a "megathread" in the first place, mainly because a good many are already too fucking lazy to read a thread from start to finish, or use the search engine. If you think compiling everything into one massive thread wont see this issue on a much larger scale I think you will be in for a surprise. We already have this problem with several threads covering a variety of relevant topics on codeine. I feel like having a couple of threads on different areas makes people more likely to read through the whole thing, because they are more likely to feel the majority of document is relevant to what they want to know, and even in the current state many don't do all or even most of the reading.

I guess there comes a point where its up to the mods to decide, if some HR should be sacrificed in the name of image. Frankly to me that seems contrary to our stated goals. In my opinion, this site is never going to be a major political platform for drug law reform, that has to take place elsewhere, so if thats the agenda behind the emphasis on good image. I don't think there is anything wrong with putting forth a strong, respectable image for our site at all, but if that starts to impact on the sites goals then in my eyes it is starting to become a problem. I see all the problems associated with codeine discussion, and there are a few, but I don't see closing all codeine threads as the answer. I don't really see a harm in a bit of social chatter, it is a bit of fun. We are all here for HR, but if there was no fun or sense of community I don't think many would of stayed. I don't see it as bluelights job or goal to look good in the eyes of cops, politicians, media, teachers, or any of that shit. We aren't here to change opinions, we are here to give information. I would ask, where is the REAL HR in curbing open and honest drug discussion in the name of the already impossible goal of making this site look respectable to the anti drug community?

There have been some suggestions of codeine being banned being thrown around, imho there is no real danger of this happening, and if it did it would be due to idiots continuing NOT to use CWE, not due to a few internet threads discussing CWE whether they glorified it or not. CWE threads have been on page 1 of the AusDD and OD forums for years, I have never once read any sort of media article on CWE, let alone one that named bluelight as a source of information.

I want you to know just because I have voiced some concerns and criticisms it doesn't mean I am unwilling to contribute to this megathread. The fact is there probably isn't anyone who could claim to agree with every single decision ever made in the history of BL. It's better to keep moving forward, but I do hope the mod team will consider and address some of my concerns.

 

[Sykik]

Not trying to derail this thread, but wanted to defend the HR in making that information available to people.

Lets be honest here, these new changes are about one thing and that is image. It seems to me the Australian forum is overly preoccupied with image and at times this can be an obstacle to HR. I have been a regular in most, if not all, ongoing codeine threads on AusDD for a long time now. It NEVER failed to amaze me, the amount of people who could of had their question answered in 2 seconds of reading, but need to post a question because they are either too dumb to understand or too lazy to have read it in the first place.

I concede your point, people are stupid and lazy. As a mod I would approach the situation like this, if another simple codeine related question is raised in a new topic then it will be merged with the mega thread.

The point of the mega thread is so that people like yourself don't need to regurgitate the same information over and over again. And the FAQ/Mega thread will be a resource that some people will read. I for one when I hear about a new substance read whichever threads are available on it in full. It is stupid not too.

But people are stupid, so what do we do? Merge I think is a good solution.

I feel like ending discussion on it really lets these people down, and regardless of your opinion on people that are either too lazy or too dumb to read a thread properly. I ask you one thing, could you think of a drug user who needs HR more? Not to mention, people feel reassured being able to have social contact and discussion with other users.

I question the efficacy of creating what you call a "megathread" in the first place, mainly because a good many are already too fucking lazy to read a thread from start to finish, or use the search engine. If you think compiling everything into one massive thread wont see this issue on a much larger scale I think you will be in for a surprise. We already have this problem with several threads covering a variety of relevant topics on codeine. I feel like having a couple of threads on different areas makes people more likely to read through the whole thing, because they are more likely to feel the majority of document is relevant to what they want to know, and even in the current state many don't do all or even most of the reading.

I guess there comes a point where its up to the mods to decide, if some HR should be sacrificed in the name of image. Frankly to me that seems contrary to our stated goals. In my opinion, this site is never going to be a major political platform for drug law reform, that has to take place elsewhere, so if thats the agenda behind the emphasis on good image. I don't think there is anything wrong with putting forth a strong, respectable image for our site at all, but if that starts to impact on the sites goals then in my eyes it is starting to become a problem. I see all the problems associated with codeine discussion, and there are a few, but I don't see closing all codeine threads as the answer. I don't really see a harm in a bit of social chatter, it is a bit of fun. We are all here for HR, but if there was no fun or sense of community I don't think many would of stayed. I don't see it as bluelights job or goal to look good in the eyes of cops, politicians, media, teachers, or any of that shit. We aren't here to change opinions, we are here to give information. I would ask, where is the REAL HR in curbing open and honest drug discussion in the name of the already impossible goal of making this site look respectable to the anti drug community?

You make a lot of good points, The part I bolded is particularly challenging. Image. Like you said in the eyes of the anti-drug community we are always bad. But what we don't want to do is give them a smoking gun to use against us.

BL takes the stance of we don't condone and we don't condemn and try to walk this type rope of HR first. This is hard like you know. In the end BL is about educating as many people as possible in the most politically correct way.

To educate information needs to be easy to find places. FAQs, MegaThreads. These two resources work together. Let me domonstrate:

1. The FAQ works so that new users can go here as a first port of call and get all the facts and must knows.

2. The mega thread is for more experienced people (i.e ppl that know the stuff in the FAQ OR people that want to something to be clarified) to discuss more advanced questions and discussion. The new insight gained in the mega thread is then used (when verified) to be placed in an updated FAQ.

So with both of these arms HR can be delivered all across the scale. Not to mention the fact that OD is another great resource.

Back to image vs HR. In the end without a good image BL AusDD wouldn't work. We need to look like a place where new people want to hang around in, we also need to look unbiased in the eyes of the media. We also have to protect our users from LE. Image is everything. Without it, the HR content would drop.

Image and HR are competing variables. I feel HR to the broader audience is maxed when the image is suitable.

I hope we can see eye to eye.

 

[Mr Blonde]

Great posts guys, I will wake up and then possibly contribute something to this thread.

 

[Sykik]

My view on this might not be the right one, and people's opinions are welcome.

 

[drug_mentor]

Sykik, I appreciate you taking this time to make this thread and help address this issue.

There are some things I guess I see differently than you, like when you say something like; "But what we don't want to do is give them a smoking gun to use against us." I am left wondering exactly how candid discussion of drug use is a 'smoking gun' and even assuming it was, how 'they' would use it against us? If I am not mistaken we are on a Russian server, and we have managed to keep going for over a decade without any real attempts at intervention of which I am aware. If you simply mean publicly discredit us, then you are probably right, but is it realistic to expect this is ever going to stop?

Bluelight claims to have a neutral stance on drug use, although I don't think if we are honest here it is realistic to say that is the case. It is my view that if you condone HR then you pretty much have to condone drug use. If you accept that people are going to do it anyway, and that it doesn't inherently make one morally corrupt then don't you acknowledge on some level it is not something inherently bad? It might not be totally pro drugs, but in my view it is definately not neutral either.

Another point I would make is, Bluelight is actually a discussion forum, it is only realistic to expect that on a discussion forum for drugs there will be people who use drugs and their love for substances will come across in the tone of their posts. You do also see more balanced opinions discouraging harder drug use, sometimes people on here condemn drug use all together. All these views have their place, if we were all exactly the same there wouldn't be much oppurtunity for discussion. I don't think it is really justified to censor any of these opinions. I also don't think it is realistic to act like just because I post an opinion on a discussion forum and that forum doesn't edit or delete my post that they (bluelight in this case) automatically agrees or condones that opinion, its PUBLIC discussion and there will be views on all sides.

I just kinda come back to thinking, if you take the discussion out of bluelight what the fuck is it even here for? Like if I can no longer give my opinion honestly because of some belief I shouldn't be "glorifying drug use" well that kinda sucks in my opinion. I am not saying allow unlimited off topic discussion, but where it is relevant to a topic it should be allowed to stand rather than being censored.

I feel if all people needed was big fucking FAQ's and generic ass shit like that then Bluelight just wouldn't be here. Isn't that what the vaults of erowid is pretty much? I think Bluelight is easily the most sound HR resource on the net, but if you start to take the fun and the freedom out of it then some people are going to go elsewhere, and it will be to the detriment of both Bluelight as a forum and the knowledge of the people who end up elsewhere.

Its kinda funny you say this - "The point of the mega thread is so that people like yourself don't need to regurgitate the same information over and over again," because I have honestly NEVER had a problem doing so, especially in the past when the mods gave the regular helpful posters in certain threads some social lee way.

One thing that stands out to me is that myself and numerous other people in certain threads, the CWE one springs to mind, may have been guilty of "glorifying drug use" but we were equally guilty of saving some noob who couldn't read an FAQ's liver every fucking week. I say, if the media or anyone else, can look at that and conclude that we are bad people because all they see is some kind of pro drug message as opposed to the effort to reduce harm to another individual we have no self interest in helping, then fuck them! Honestly, if they look at that and still see this place as inherently bad, what hope to we ever have of changing their opinion without distorting Bluelight into something completely unrecognisable from what it is/was?

So I guess I am sitting here left pondering exactly how improving the image in the eyes of those who don't even need the HR info is beneficial? When did looking good in a newspaper report become more important than answering less educated drug users questions with sound info? Infact, when did it even become more important than preserving the essence of a forum, which is discussion?

I don't see myself leaving this place any time soon, but I am starting to get genuinely concerned about the direction it is headed in. People have been complaining about over modding since the end of last year, and I held my tongue both out of thinking the mods knew best and just out of respect. There comes a point where if thats the direction you want to keep heading in then thats your call, but I think its about time we got a less vague response than we have been as to why this is going on, and exactly what direction we are headed in and why you believe that is best. Sykik, I appreciate you taking the time to make this thread to help me address the issue and this isn't a personal shot at you, but this "in the eyes of the anti-drug community we are always bad. But what we don't want to do is give them a smoking gun to use against us." pretty much embodies what I am talking about when I say we get a vague response if we question possible over modding. To me theres some emotive language in there to make it sound like there is a real consequence to having more open discussion, what has never been made clear to me is exactly what these consequences would be and why these are less favourable than the consequences of making this forum a less open, honest and fun place to be.

 

[thestudent14]

Interesting stuff guys.

I would like to imput ^.^

Firstly the MegaThread is something that is great and I think needs to remain because of the vast amount of learning you can do if needed. I joined this site not that long ago but was reading before I signed up. I primarily started reading the thread because I wanted to learn about what had happened to MDMA.

I soon after became attracted to the mega thread that is mephedrone, it was a longgggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg read and took about 14 pages to get to the first thing I wanted to know (which was how it tests on eztest)

Even me with my patient reading it took ages to get to anything truly helpful.
I have a solution to this. Which is conjesting them into a smaller thread like you ended up doing with the mephedrone thread. The mephedrone thread 2.0 tells you so much in the first few posts. And then if someone wants to read over the first mega thread they still have that option.

I know it may take a fair bit of time trying to find the helpful points through mega threads to open up a 2.0. But personally I think thats the best option.

As far as D_M's point about the freedom of speech aspects, it's very true that sometimes posts being unnapproved seems unfair when it's their point of view in a discussion thread. And whilst when I first joined this site I did feel it was a bit harsh with modding it was these serious aspects that made me wanna stick around.

So in the views of HR is this the right direction? I think it is but it's impossible to be certain because we really have no idea how often people read threads but don't post on them. But I can only assume that the people who have viewed this site and then have a question about something they know little of, they can usually find something relating to it on bluelight.

It's not uncommon for me to recieve PM's with simple questions. But if the discussion threads had more negative connatations I think it would deter people from sticking around. I agree that bluelight is not in any real danger thanks to our Soviet Friends, but I do believe that this site is right where it should be.

It must have been frustrating to see people not check out the FAQ but I would bet their are plenty of people who do. Also EROWID whilst amazing in it's amazingness is amazing. It's too big when you're starting to learn, you don't wanna have graphs and times and dosages thrown at you. You just wanna know the basics.

Very interesting thread guys, I will be keeping track of it, but for now I think AusDD is exactly where it should be C=

 

[MrIbis]

Erowid was where i started, before i found BL...

Basic knowledge was attained from Erowid, much more basic than i found here.

 

[Mr Blonde]

^ AusDD has sure changed a lot since I was gone for a year. The way I perceive it is that there is a lot stricter moderating going on. Sure, if a thread is being derailed then it needs to be righted again but it seems to me as if mods are cracking down on off-topic discussion that adds to the sense of community here.

I see that as a problem because the community here is what attracted myself and other users like me to stick around in the first place. By being an active member, I've learned a whole lot in the past few years and we have a wealth of knowledge to pass on to newer members. But if we lose the sense of community here, there is less incentive for newer posters to stick around and eventually build up their own knowledge and pass it on to others. I know it's probably hard to get statistics on this kind of thing, but I would be interested in seeing how many people are becoming regular users of AusDD now as opposed to in years past, regardless of the post count of the forum.

As for this whole codeine thing, which is what has led to this thread, I agree with a lot of what drug mentor is saying. I do think the codeine discussion was getting out of hand, I think possibly that was a result of a variety of things, it was becoming an outlet for a lot of AusDD users. But what drug mentor is saying about who we are catering for is a very valid question I would like to see answered by staff members. Why are we so concerned with what the media and police are thinking of us? I can see the argument that if the codeine discussion headed in the direction it was then there may have been severe consequences, but surely if the media was going to pick that up and run with it, it's too late for that?

I'm not saying I want a return to what codeine discussion was just a week or two ago, but I do think that we are focusing too much on catering to the media and law enforcements perception of this forum rather then the people we are really here to serve. I really don't think Bluelight is at any risk of being shut down, the internet filter is probably not going to pass through parliament and any publicity the site gets frankly is going to bring us more new users who really would benefit from the information that is on here and the knowledge that members like drug mentor, Mr Ibis, leftwing and others have. And hopefully, we get some new regulars to join those ranks eventually.

I will admit that I was part of the discussion which led to this and I am trying to make up for my guilt by contributing to this new codeine discussion idea in an effort to make amends to both the staff and BL as a whole, but these other issues I have raised I would like to see discussion about.

 

[MrIbis]

yeah well, we're all contributing dude... It'll be good to finish off this compilation. I think also that the more senior members here in AusDD need more direct say in what direction we are taking, rather than the 3 mods.

Theres a good group of 8-10 of us who have a strong presence here and do a fair bit of the work and development to the vibe, but don't always entirely agree with leadership.

I know its all just politics, but i think we need to think about who really should make the decisions or if it needs to be called into a party vote.

 

[phase_dancer]

I'm short of time atm, but will try to respond to this properly over the coming days. I told Sykik he's probably opened a can of worms with this thread

Well supported arguments btw guys.

 

[PsiloSubNaut]

I'm really short of time today, but i have scraped this post together over an hour or more in my spare time...

Very interesting points DM

I have been pondering some of the same questions myself for some time.

It is obvious to any BLer that has been around for more than a year or two that the forum is not what it used to be. This has a few reason, I know that a lot of old BLers have moved onto other forums for all sorts of reasons. I know many of them have gotten to a level of knowledge that BL, especially Aus DD doesn't cater for. There are also those who are disenchanted all together. Some have even stopped drug use and the research of the drugs all together.

There doesn't seem to be the same amount of new members posting in Aus DD as there used to be. Is this a direct impact of recent modding trends? I think there could be some correlation, but I have also noticed an overall drop in the HR minded drug user in recent times and a big trend towards the 'I can be more fucked than this' way of thinking. Many of the younger generation that I try to turn onto BL just don't want to know about it, anything that gets them fucked up will be eaten and that's the end of that.

I have always seen Aus DD as a BL forum that has been run with some strict Modding and I am now guilty to some extent of doing this myself. This is probably due to still learning the ins and outs of this position as both myself and sykik have only held this position for a matter of months.

One interesting thing that I wish to point out is the view that you get of the forum from the mod's side of things. You really start to see how 'some' off topic discussion can detract from threads, especially when people come here to find a quick answer to a question and they are stuck looking through endless social banter to find what they wish to know. There has to be a limit to this as it detracts badly from threads. The on topic discussion rule is a good thing for the most part and should be followed.

That said, I sometimes question who we are trying to help when we delete every single last bit of social chat. Is it the end user of substances that we are here to help or are we trying to portray an impossible image to LE and the media? We are always going to be hated by the anti-drug people after all and the bias of our forum is always going to swing toward pro drug use as we are for the most part, drug users posting about the substances that we use.

I for one am all for some amount of social chat, as long as it isn't over the top and doesn't derail the thread. It does add to the forum in a community sense and the odd funny comment etc. is a great thing. Who remembers their boring school teachers? Not me! I do however remember my fun teachers which made learning exciting. This is why I am not all for the iron fist mod approach.

As for codeine (this is why we're here after all), it was truly getting beyond a joke and some action had to be taken. The action I took in closing all threads may have been over the top, but we had 6 threads on the front page, plenty of social chit chat and lastly we had constant posts about massive amounts of codeine being consumed on a regular basis. The latter does not fit our goals. Yes, we are here to provide all the information possible to the user, but kids reading those such posts are only going to think those dosages etc. are safe and could fall into a fucked up cycle of addiction.

We should post about codeine and all the other commonly used substances in Australia and there should be every last piece of information available on these drugs in every thread.

There should not be tales of constant large doses, some social chat is ok IMO, but not 'I took 600mg codeine with 'X' potentiator last night and tonight i'm trying 800mg in combination with 'X'. That is not on and a major reason why we have come to this.

We should be providing the info, not romanticizing the drug. If the user wishes to experiment then so be it, but we should not be making out that 'X' amount is all good and why not also mix it with 'X' substance while you're at it.

I romanticize mushrooms to an extent, guilty as charged right there. I also agree with DM that I don't mind repeating the same shit every week, this is quite common and I'm always glad to help when I have time to do so. I do try to steer well clear of romanticizing addictive substances though, I have suffered from addiction over the years and I'm sure many of you also have or still even do.

Codeine being so easily obtainable and all of us mod's knowing/seeing the side effects of addictive drugs, especially opiates, is probably a major factor in the harsh treatment that this subject has recently received in Aus DD.

I know for a fact that some people only started doing CWE because of our threads and that saddens me a bit. These are people who were never abusing any prescription drugs, not people that were going to take stupid amounts of APAP or Ibuprofen to get high on codeine. yes, they may have tried it one day, but we were a gateway for them to try this sooner rather than later.

I'm out of time and probably haven't touched on everything, but those are my opinions.

Criticism comes with the Mod position

Psilo

 

[skatkid]

^^just with regards to the paragraph about ppl doing a cwe cause of bl. I am one of those people who never knew what codeine was or i could abuse it till reading ausdd years ago. i have to say tho you shouldnt feel bad. the pros of me doing codeine i believe have outweighed the minor negatives. I made this decision on my own accord and BL didnt force me. To be worrying bout how people use information is silly in my opinion and those people are always entirely responsible for their actions.
Thats one of the things about harm minimisation that i like, it doesnt assume everyone is a fucking idiot and needs to be kept information from cause they dont know whats good for themselves.

 

[drug_mentor]

I don't see what the problem with doses is, honestly it is pretty clearly outlined what beginners should be taking.

I don't think anyone is disagreeing that some of the codeine threads went overboard, what I am questioning is if your current solution is actually a better approach in line with the sites stated HR goals.

The thing that I am beginning to wonder is why we are so pedantic about certain rules in the first place, of course there needs to be some rules and guidelines set up, but what I am basically asking for is some justification of the rules because from where I sit it seems like a lot of the rules are more geared towards preserving an image that we don't even have to begin with.

"We should be providing the info, not romanticizing the drug. If the user wishes to experiment then so be it, but we should not be making out that 'X' amount is all good and why not also mix it with 'X' substance while you're at it." This part of your post stands out to me, because up until about 10 minutes ago I never felt I was overly romanticizing of drugs, but a dear friend who I put on to codeine not much under a year ago just told me I was actually very encouraging and they have since used a lot of it, as well as other opiates they never really liked before. I actually do feel really bad about this, even though we both acknowledge at the end of the day it was their choice.

It really made me rethink my stance on this issue a little bit, maybe I have taken a similar attitude to my posting on Bluelight without realising? I had a hard think and I have come to the conclusion that while I possibly was more encouraging than I thought I was, it is an entirely different situation. There is one where I am actively encouraging a behaviour in a trusted friend, and the other is giving an opinion on a discussion forum. I think when you read a forum it is a given that peoples personal opinions are going to come into it, it is unrealistic to expect this isn't the case. What we are talking about here is opinion, whether I like a drug or a drug combination or how much I like it, that is opinion and whether you like it or not it is at times actually quite relevant to a thread. It is unrealistic to take the opinion out of a discussion board. I still feel if we can't discuss on a forum, then we would be as well just jumping on erowid. If you don't allow opinion to come into it, then whats the point in giving everyone the ability to chime in? It is one thing to disallow discussion that is truly OFF topic, it is another to disallow on topic discussion because you don't want the media to run a fucking story.

"You really start to see how 'some' off topic discussion can detract from threads, especially when people come here to find a quick answer to a question and they are stuck looking through endless social banter to find what they wish to know. There has to be a limit to this as it detracts badly from threads. The on topic discussion rule is a good thing for the most part and should be followed." - This was an interesting point Psilo, one thing that always stood out to me is all anyone who wanted to know how to CWE ever had to do was read the first post of the fucking thread, yet at its peak there was a few noobs asking how to do it right every week! There was a lot of social chatter in that thread, but it didn't detract from anyone's ability to find the information they needed yet most didn't bother to look. Many regulars in that thread, including myself, felt we earned the right to a bit of fun if we are willing to answer the same god damn question 3 times a week and I feel that way to this day. Theres the HR aspect to it, the fact is half the knowledgable posters in the thread probably wouldn't of been checking in if it weren't for the social aspect of it too, but it seems that moderators often forget this easily. I am sure any of the regulars in the codeine thread would be willing to keep it tidy for you if you wanted to hand out another mod stick, I know I would. I guess part of the problem if some of the regulars views on "tidy" differ from the current mods, but surely there is a middle ground to be found?

It seems to me crying about possible codeine bans is pretty contrary to the stance that was taken a while back when determining the contents of neo doves and making the results available. Information should be given as opposed to with held in the name of keeping an abusable substance on the market longer, and this is coming from a fucking codeine fiend!

I can't help but wonder if - "but we should not be making out that 'X' amount is all good and why not also mix it with 'X' substance while you're at it." is a reference to my thread? If it is, that is pretty contrary to what I hoped to achieve with that thread, the fact is people will always poly drug use and it makes more sense to me to tell them the safest way to do it than leave them to guess. Again this - "'I took 600mg codeine with 'X' potentiator last night and tonight i'm trying 800mg in combination with 'X'." sounds like a reference to my thread, all I was doing was updating which substances on the to do list I would be trying, hence my annoyance when you closed a thread that I had worked ongoingly on for 3 weeks with no heads up.

I mean theres some stuff that obviously has to go, but I don't think that enough consideration was/has been given to heavier moderation of codeine discussion without closing every single thread on the matter. There was some stuff that on one hand was over the top, like pharmacy diaries, on the other hand though its hardly an innovative idea your average 12 year old couldn't conjure up!

I don't want to make this about codeine, although I might be a little late in saying that , what I want to know is why in general Bluelight is trying to either cultivate an image it will never have or preserve one it thinks it has but in reality doesn't? Maybe it's not about the media and LE like I was thinking, and it is about trying to appear more neutral on drugs in general? Frankly it doesn't make much sense ot me for a site full of drug users to try and act neutral, why lie about it? We are NOT fucking neutral on the whole and the truth is we never will be, nobody neutral on this issue feels strongly enough to actually contribute a lot of their time towards it. I feel like we should be trying to cater towards old, new and future members and not to fucking assholes who persecute us with bullshit news articles that would read the same whether we were saints or demons.

Aside from the issues I have addressed here, it would be cool for a senior staff member to say exactly what direction we are going in, why, what they think our current image is, what image they are trying to cultivate for bluelight with these stricter rules and why cultivating this image is at times more important than open discussion and HR.

 

[drug_mentor]

Thats one of the things about harm minimisation that i like, it doesnt assume everyone is a fucking idiot and needs to be kept information from cause they dont know whats good for themselves.

Excellently put my man!

 

[dextrous]

drug_mentor, you really do have a way with words . I've been feeling the same way about bluelight for a while now. The sense of community is gone. Free open discussion is gone. There are virtually no more social threads. It's either news, megathreads that nobody reads through (hundreds of pages - cmon..) or harm reduction. You raise excellent points about fear of image and the over moderation that is has progressing lately.

Some quotes from your favourite moderators,

The emphasis of this forum is on HR, and I for one am very pleased to see a return of more posts with a HR feel. It's natural some will feel differently on certain issues, but you can't hope to please all the people all of the time. There are other changes in the wind for Aus DD, changes that will hopefully further limit discussion on unrelated matters. Such changes might also not sit well with everyone, but as I've said before, if you're not here solely to talk about quantities consumed, looking to deal/source or just generally create havoc, then you should find these changes will improve things.

A social thread, this was raised, trialed, and after serious discussion, was decided it didn't live in AusDD. How would your thread be any different. If it isn't the previous experiment was considered a failure.

We're here to help, believe it or not.

Note: not to help you score, but to help you survive after you have.

bluelight is a harm reduction site first and foremost.

Why even call it Aus Drug Discussion? Let's just rename the forum Australian Drug Harm Reduction. Stop the confusion once and for all.

 

[Sykik]

One common theme in your posts DM is that we are allready viewed as bad and there is nothing we can do to change that. True. So I guess the main goal is to maximize HR then.

To maximize HR means we need to reach as wide as an audience as we can. How to do this? One thing I don't want BL to be a place where people feel welcome. I do not want BL to turn into something like www.inthemix.com.au. New posters should be encouraged and not be flamed. So when a new poster says "I got some coke based tripple stacks how can I roll for 12yrs on these?" You have to educate him in the best way possible, without shaming them too much. Being egotistical is not how to do this (not saying anyone is like that). But when things get too social it's hard for people to not get a bit rude in the name of humor. I'm ranting now.

Information should be given as opposed to with held in the name of keeping an abusable substance on the market longer, and this is coming from a fucking codeine fiend!

I have always held this view. Information is more precious than anything. Take any of my posts in relation to mephedrone last year.

Many regulars in that thread, including myself, felt we earned the right to a bit of fun if we are willing to answer the same god damn question 3 times a week and I feel that way to this day.

Interesting. A sense of community is something I would like to develop further. Some members of the community are more influential then others, and these members need to realise this is our forum. Just because me psilo and p_d mod it doesn't mean it is us the moderators forum. We just steer the ship, everyone is the wind that fills the sails.

With respect comes responsibility. But we need to treat everyone equally as well.

Aside from the issues I have addressed here, it would be cool for a senior staff member to say exactly what direction we are going in, why, what they think our current image is, what image they are trying to cultivate for bluelight with these stricter rules and why cultivating this image is at times more important than open discussion and HR

I guess you don't want me to comment as i'm not a senior staff member. Let us (mods) discuss this for a while, because we are a team, with no real seniority. We all have slightly different views on this issue. Because of this we can come to a well rounded rational decision.

Why even call it Aus Drug Discussion? Let's just rename the forum Australian Drug Harm Reduction. Stop the confusion once and for all.

I believe that is overacting a little. We discuss drugs here within a HR framework. This is hard to define.

Leave this with me for a while. Hopefully as a forum we can agree on how much social banter is acceptable, and how we as mods should steer this ship. And in what direction we should aim.

 

[MrIbis]

I think there is a lot more going on behind the scenes than we're lead to realize.

Or so the grapevine says.

 

[belarki]

Interesting thread guys, I'll have to come back to this when I have some more time. Will be keen to see replies from some including p_d. I think the direction of Bluelight was decided early in its inception as it was never intended to be just another drug chat forum (there are enough of those), or duplicate erowid, lycaeum, the hive etc....

 

[Mr Blonde]

I guess you don't want me to comment as i'm not a senior staff member. Let us (mods) discuss this for a while, because we are a team, with no real seniority. We all have slightly different views on this issue. Because of this we can come to a well rounded rational decision.

I'd like to hear everyone's opinion, and I'd especially like to hear the individual opinions of staff members before you guys all talk and come up with one consolidated point of view.

 

[Jabberwocky]

I guess you don't want me to comment as i'm not a senior staff member. Let us (mods) discuss this for a while, because we are a team, with no real seniority. We all have slightly different views on this issue. Because of this we can come to a well rounded rational decision.

I'd like to hear everyone's opinion, and I'd especially like to hear the individual opinions of staff members before you guys all talk and come up with one consolidated point of view.

agreed

i know hoptis is fairly strained for time, being a busy man at the moment, but i think this should be amended, the not having a sr mod or at least a more active admin overseeing forum decisions.

with lil having left she was overlooking a number of forums other than ausdd and has left some gaps in between since.

this is all of course constructive criticism.