Pseudonymous flame baits (Was: First timer, oka telugu kavita)
V. Chowdary Jampala (cjampala@quark.dayton.net)
Wed, 15 Apr 1998 11:16:25 -0400 (EDT)
After reading Sri Kathula Rathaiah's post and the subsequent
comments, I realized there is some need to throw a little light on the
background of that post so that the group does not go astray in the
discussions of this and the subsequent posts we can expect from Sri
Rathaiah and some other like-minded persons.
Not all readers of telusa have access to the Usenet Newsgroup,
"Soc.Culture.Indian.Telugu" (SCIT as it is commonly referred to), and
this post is mostly for their information. SCIT (and its cousin, the
Telugu Digest, which would collect all the posts to SCIT and distribute
through a listserv) were the first major Telugu forums on the Net. They
were bustling and thriving discussion forums with some lively, and
sometimes (often?) acrimonious discussions. In the fall of 1994, Sri
Rathaiah made his first appearence posting anonymously (or -more correctly
- pseudonymously) through the anon.penet.fi service, cricizing the posts
of Sri KT Narayana. Soon, several other posters began to use the anonymous
service to post using colorful pseudonyms such as ganDara_ganDaDu,
bobbili_puli, aakaaSa_raamanna etc.
Soon, the pseudonymous posters began posting - almost exclusively
- on caste issues; and with the cover afforded by the anonymity, began
using rather salty language to describe the posts and persons they
disliked. The noise - and the cuss words - level got to an extent where
the Digest had to stop including the anonymous posts, and SCIT has become
an unpleasandt and unappealing place to visit. I speculate that one of the
reasons behind the formation of Telusa was to avoid this unpleasantness.
The modus operandi of the pseudonymous posters on SCIT has been to
appear from time to time with a series of highly inflammatory posts. These
would, in turn attract responses from outraged (flamed) readers and the
ensuing flame war would be joined with glee by other pseudonymous posters.
This would go on for a short while and subside. In the mean time, a large
number of readers will get disturbed or disgusted with this and leave the
newsgroup, or stop posting regularly. Then, after a few weeks, the cycle
would start again.
With telusa being an open enrollment, and unmoderated,
group, it was only a matter of time before something similar occured here
(I am given to understand that similar things happened with another Telugu
discussion forum on the net, telugu vaaNi charcha). If the regular members
of this group are not careful in exercising restraint and let themselves
be drawn into flame wars and caste wars, a similar fate can befall this
group. That is the main reason for this post.
At this point, we have a 'kavita' from Sri Rathaiah (by the
way, this kavita appeared before in SCIT), and nothing disruptive has
happened yet. Sri Rathiah may be posting to this group solely for literary
reasons. But, past experience suggests that some caution is required at
this point from those wishing to respond to this kavita (or from other
posts from other pseudonymous posters in future). If any of you are
interested in discussing the literary merits of this kavita, please do. If
you have trouble with the content of this kavita, I urge you to be
extermely cautious - and keep the general good of this group in mind -
before you post your response to this group. Remember that the original
charter of this group makes it clear that the primary interest of this
group is literature, and not politics or sociology -except to the extent
it is linked with literature (e.g.: it is OK to discuss the influences of
marxism on poetry, but this is not the place to discuss the merits of
marxism itself; or to go with a more current example: a discussion of
caste and literature is fine, but not disucssion of the merits -or
demerits - of caste system).
Please remember that for a flame-war to happen, it needs more
participants than one. And consider this advice from somebody whose
profession is to study behavior: If your kid is being disruptive solely to
gain your attention, the best way to extinguish such behavior is to pay no
attention to it (and, of course, positively reinforce wanted behaviors).
Regards -- V. Chowdary Jampala