Cactus Game Design Message Boards

I wonder if I am one of these.

Hmm...I probably am one of the "less-mature" ones. Wisdom will come of age.

Godspeed,
~Rrulez

and turning into... Robin Williams?!?

Despite my previous disagreements with the good Minister (during which I will admit I did not always act the most maturely), I am sad to see him leave for the reasons he stated. I too have noticed these things on the boards, and it is partially why I have been frequenting them less and less until recently. But it is not just the immaturity that I dislike.

For awhile, and especially during the election, the card 'divisions in the church' came to mind rather often. I would read pages and pages of debates and find some posts to be utterly disgusting. The way people take everything on these boards to a personal level and the huge diversity of political and theological beliefs represented here is not a good combination. Paul warned the churches to get along, and his warning most assuredly applies to today. In 1 Corinthians 1:10, Paul wrote, "I appeal to you, brothers [and sisters], in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought." I believe it is clear that this is not the case in the modern church, or should I say churches? For the body is divided by denomination, and within each denomination there is division. Do you think this was Christ's intent, to have His children bicker and stand divided while the rest of the world is blindly heading towards Hades?

Do not take this the wrong way; I do not mean that debating is wrong. But to leave things unresolved; to take every point as a personal attack; to disrespect the person behind their back afterward (I have personally heard this between board members); this is not okay. It is not Christlike in any way, shape or form. Neither should you take this post as a personal attack, but rather as an encouragement to THINK before you post (i.e., is this really worth adding? is it contributory to the discussion or simply a hit on someone else? is it just a simple agreement or a smiley that will take up space?), and to respect the person/people you are discussing/debating with as if you were FACE TO FACE with them.

If EVERYONE on these boards were to take these things into consideration, we could have a community of believers who may not always agree on the details of theology or may have a different view in the political arena, but are courteous and loving of one another despite their differences. If we simply LOVED one another, even if we have never met in person, we could stand as a united community, ready to defend each other at a moment's notice from the true evil that seeks our destruction. THIS is what sets us apart from the rest of the world. THIS is why we can proudly call ourselves children of God.

I hope that everyone, myself included, will carefully consider these things.

~Britta

So is this all about Open Discussion? I'm not even on there...

Lol

Pol,

I think you're right on with what you said. I was in the wrong when I thought it was the moderators fault; it was really most of the younger board members that where (and still are) in the wrong. This is partially why the board stinks, and why I don't like tcgs in general. Also the majority of the people that play these games really rub me the wrong way. If only all of the Redemption community and the rest of the tcg world was like our southeast Redemption group...

I understand why your leaving.  I left a Christian myspace group for the same reason (though in my opinion, it was worse than what's been going on here).  It's also quite sad to note that I am hesitent on inviting my group to the boards because of some of the comments made here.

On a side note, I don't see denominations as a bad thing.  It gives a variety of worship.  God made us all unique so it's hard for all of us to do the same thing.  It does get bad, however, when one denomination tells the other that they aren't part of the family because they believe in this or that (unless it's something that really does matter (e.g some church saying that all you have to do is be good to go to heaven)).  We may all worship differently but we can still be united in Christ.

If only all of the Redemption community and the rest of the tcg world was like our southeast Redemption group...

*cough*And a few of those in Texas*cough*

Back on topic, I'm on the same page with Mr. Whitten here. I was wrong to blame the moderators for my lack of interest in the boards, when the real problem was the increase of the younger and immature population of the Redemption community coming to the boards and posting freely. I like playing the game, a lot, but there are a few people who just don't sit right with me. But there's also the other side of that, there's quite a few people who I really enjoy playing with and hanging out with. I don't post nearly as much as I used to, since everytime I seem to post there is a following comment by some little kid that added nothing to the conversation, and contained no grammar or punctuation whatsoever.

Just my thoughts on the matter. I don't think there's really anything we can do to fix it, we just have to trust the members in question to learn from their mistakes and learn to post only when they have something to add.

and turning into... Robin Williams?!?

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Except for that, that was needed and totally made this thread worth reading.

I think the big problem is just the problem with internet communication in general: lack of tonal and non-verbal communication (thus people take offense to things that aren't meant as offensive as exemplified by The Music Maker's response.

Textual intertubing is what one of my professors refers to as "low-context" communication; there is little additional information beyond the words themselves.  Trouble begins when people attempt to either write or read in a "high-context" perspective, meaning they either mean something beyond what they say (sarcasm and in-jokes being prime examples), or they think incorrectly that the other person means something that they did not say (perceived slights).

If we all speak low-context and try to afford each other a measure of grace, that will go a long way.

No solution will ever solve "the whole problem".  Being aware of this phenomenon can help avoid problems that probably don't need to happen in the first place.

I found myself very disgusted recently when I was looking at Psomasters "Life or death" topic and several unnamed parties were getting in a flame war over stupid and trivial matters.
Way to show the love of Christ guys.

Polarius had made a poignant, relevant response to the prayer request. Your next post seemed to take away from that. I think Polarius' post would have been a good finale to that discussion.