[Reader-list] A REMINDER: How to tackle spam on the reader list

[S.Fatima]

Dear Vivek
I don't want to mock your message, and although I too
get very irritated with the kind of mails you're
talking about, but I feel that your message reflects a
rather elitist attitude of Sarai.

We are treating Sarai as a kind of Pukka sahib's club
where those not wearing shoes and tie are by law not
allowed. At the same time we are magnanimus enough to
not impose that law. If someone enters without shoes
and tie, we let him come, we make a noise about it,
but don't throw the person out. We apply filters to
avoid looking at them, and sarcastically call them
"bullshit". To me that sounds like hypocracy. I would
rather have that person not enter the club at all than
allow him in and call him names.

If the reader-list is used for "a very high and
nuanced level of discussion", then let us allow only
those who are interested in maintaining the decorum.
If you allow anybody and everybody to subscribe and
post, then it is like a street. And on the street you
are likely to meet all sorts of people, and cannot
tell somebody to keep off the street.

The reality is that the noisy street exists outside
our club, and is full of sights and sounds that we do
not wish to see/hear. We want to quitely sit and talk
about those sights and sounds in the club. How long
can we ignore the reality.

S.F.
 

--- Vivek Narayanan <vivek at sarai.net> wrote:

> Dear readers of the reader list,
> 
> Please note, first of all, that I speak as an
> individual and not as a 
> member of any organisation.
> 
> As many of you know, there have recently been many
> attempts to hijack 
> and dumb down the discourse of the reader list. This
> has been done by a 
> small palmful of individuals ---- some of whom post
> as many as five 
> times a day, with comments that are, by turns,
> inane, shallow, offensive 
> or agressive.  These individuals may have a right to
> their right-wing 
> politics, although they are far from representative
> of our 1000+ mostly 
> quiet or pertinent members.  However, it has become
> very clear to me, at 
> least, that this small group of hijackers with
> knives is not interested 
> in nuanced or complex debate, merely in sloganeering
> and various forms 
> of aggression and sabotage. 
> 
> This upsets me, since the reader-list is normally
> used to a very high 
> and nuanced level of discussion, as evidenced in the
> patient, detailed 
> and endlessly fascinating postings of independent
> research fellows, 
> whether formally funded by Sarai or not, or in the
> recent exchange of 
> different views that began with Yousuf Saeed and
> Sadan Jha.  That was a 
> discussion where the answers were not necessarily
> clear, and where the 
> discussants weren't merely interested in beating
> down their opponents' 
> views with a concerted barrage of emails.   It was
> the kind of 
> discussion where people think carefully before they
> write.
> 
> This new phenomenon of windbags and Hindu terrorists
> hijacking the 
> reader list not only upsets me, but it also bores
> me.  And it seriously 
> clutters up my inbox.  I have a feeling that many on
> this list feel the 
> same, and that the recent upsurge has simply meant
> that people 
> eventually do not read any mail from the list,
> missing the good stuff. 
> 
> At the same time, deep in the spirit of the reader
> list is the idea is 
> that no one should be excluded from membership or
> from posting.  I 
> understand, and stand by that.
> 
> Those who wish to continue receiving postings from
> the saboteurs are, of 
> course, welcome to do so.  And to respond to them,
> too.  I however, am 
> no longer interested in reading mails from some
> individuals whose 
> postings I don't find productive or instructional.
> Even if there is much 
> mail on the reader list that I do want to read.
> 
> I would like to remind all of you who feel the same
> way that there is a 
> very simple solution for individuals who would like
> to declutter their 
> inbox from some of the unnecessary emails that drown
> out the valuable 
> voices of the reader list.
> 
> The solution is: you can use the message filters in
> your email client to 
> block email from certain senders, filtering by name.
>  This means that 
> any emails from a certain name will be filtered. 
> Check your help files 
> on how to do this.
> 
> In Gmail, click on  "create a filter", next to the
> search bar at the top.
> 
> In Yahoo, click on options --> filters
> 
> In Thunderbird, simply right-click on the email id
> at the top of the 
> message and click on "create filter from this
> message".
> 
> If anyone else wants to give a quick tutorial on how
> to use filters on 
> other mail programs, please do so as part of this
> thread.
> 
> You can set it up so that messages from all the
> people you don't wish to 
> read or spend time deleting go straight into your
> "trash" folder; or you 
> can create a new folder--called "bullshit", for
> instance-- and have 
> those messages alone go directly into that folder.
> 
> No doubt the aggressors will try to respond to this
> message by sending 
> one or twenty abusive emails.  Unfortunately, I will
> not be replying to 
> these messages because I won't see them.  They will
> be in my "bullshit" 
> folder.  Why not make your reader list experience
> simpler and less 
> cluttered in this way?
> 
> And now-- I'm off to read Partha's reply to the
> complex, ongoing thread 
> started by Yousuf Saeed in response to the Hindustan
> Times' article on 
> "The New Muslim".  Not to mention important recent
> research postings by 
> Jenny Chitra, Zubin Pastakia, Harilal Madhavan,
> Raman Chima, and many, 
> many others.
> 
> With regards,
> Vivek
> 
> _________________________________________
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