This is why our first and primary guideline is "dont be a d*ck".

DeVore

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/philip_howard.html

And everyone should watch it. We havent achieved it perfectly by any standard but we are, I believe, on the right road.


DeV.

IITYWYBMAD

It's a very good address. However, the premise that "the law" or the "legal system" needs overhauling, is a well trodden road. His lecture says a lot more about society, than it does about the over complicated legal system.

Society needs fixing. If that happens, the law (and all other pillars of the state) should follow. A couple of key points for me in his talk are:

"Judge law mainly by is effect on society, not individual situations"

When talking about frivolous suits:

"78% of middle and high school teachers have been threatened with legal action by their students,it's not that they would sue theirs teachers, and it's not that they would win, it's an indication of the corrosion of authority"

and

"The reality is that these cases are very rare, they don't usually win"

Another well known, and often paraphrased mantra:

"We ain't got no rules around here, we're trying to accomplish something"

Like I say, his points are very valid, and simplistic (which is good), but the law isn't really the issue, people are.

Slydice

It's on youtube aswell.

Haven't checked this one but I find the youtube version of TED Talks can be better quality/more stable playing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWdzrZdRa38

AckwelFoley

Great speech.

It reminds me of why i feel there are 1000's of people needlessly medicated in this country on Antidepressants by GP's because alot of GP's will prescribe medication to people complaining of being "down" when in my view, medication is not needed at all - they give them the meds "just to be safe"... just to cover their professional career's behind imo

I've personally seen it.

Anyhow, that hasnt alot to do with this thread topic

5starpool

I've never wanted to be a duck anyways.

DeVore

The relevance of this to our situation is that we are effectively imposing our own "legal" system here in Boards with the mods and the decisions I make. My point is to try to get to people to see that sometimes I make subjective decisions. I (and by extension sometimes the mods) make decisions on a thread/user/whatever which people here point out is not against a rule or the reverse, a thread/user/whatever is not sanctioned when people feel it should have been. My point is that hard and fast rules which are applied blindly lead us to the situation he describes where we do things which make no sense simply because we dont want to be accused of hypocrisy when in fact a more holistic approach of "is it reasonable" is much better.

"Dont be a dick" is not a law that some rules-lawyer can nitpick over, its a general "be reasonable" instruction and guideline and his talk put into words why I have always stood by it as a direction for governance.

DeV.

drkpower

snyper wrote: »

Great speech.

It reminds me of why i feel there are 1000's of people needlessly medicated in this country on Antidepressants by GP's because alot of GP's will prescribe medication to people complaining of being "down" when in my view, medication is not needed at all - they give them the meds "just to be safe"... just to cover their professional career's behind imo

I've personally seen it.

Anyhow, that hasnt alot to do with this thread topic

It doesnt, but you fall into the oft-fallen into trap of believing that there is a glut of litigation in all spheres, and that we all neeed to practice & operate in an ultra-defensive manner. I suspect it is the case with defamation (I dont have the figures but consider the millions of posts (?) on boards, the number that are defamatory (quite a few 000s I suspect), and the number of cases of litigation (very few, in the single figures?). I know it is the case in medicine. The fear of litigation in the medical world is not supported by the facts.

AckwelFoley

drkpower wrote: »

It doesnt, but you fall into the oft-fallen into trap of believing that there is a glut of litigation in all spheres, and that we all neeed to practice & operate in an ultra-defensive manner. I suspect it is the case with defamation (I dont have the figures but consider the millions of posts (?) on boards, the number that are defamatory (quite a few 000s I suspect), and the number of cases of litigation (very few, in the single figures?). I know it is the case in medicine. The fear of litigation in the medical world is not supported by the facts.

I accept you point. I make my assumption based on personal experience, and the experience of people i know.

I made a calculated assumption.

I accept i could be wrong as to the reasons they're over prescribed. But i still do feel there is over prescription.

DeVore

We used to get a threatening letter a week. Then MCD happened and also we grew BIG. Now we dont get threatening letters at all. We get grovelling letters asking us to consider threads. Most get ignored and some (the genuinely bad ones) get acted on.

As for Medicine... perhaps not here (though its certainly in the post) but friends of mine who are doctors in the states, they say they walk on by when there is a car accident because if they intervene and the patient is irretrievably and terminally hurt, they end up in court. Their malpractise costs are astronomical and lead to many many unnecessary tests being performed.

In Ireland its getting bad too, doctors cover their asses a lot.

That, however, wasnt really the topic at hand (though an interesting topic for humanities if you care to start one!)


DeV.

Orion

Great speech and ideas. If only they were practical. But they're not - people (in general) will not accept responsibility for their own mistakes and want to blame others. "It's the systems fault not mine". Until that changes nothing else will unfortunately.

DeVore

The system enables them though, it rewards them and provides incentives for that sort of behaviour. When you force people to take their own responsibility.... funnily enough, they do

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSGOR14512420070911

DeV.

Earthhorse

I much prefer Barry Scharwz's talk on the loss of wisdom which covers much of the same ground but in a slightly different way.

http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_our_loss_of_wisdom.html

I agree you should implement and maintain a subjective system with broad rules. It's better for the health of the site and its constituents in the long run by far. The down side to that is you will have more people disagreeing with, and thus disputing, the subjective calls, than you would with an objective, or seemingly objective, system.

This makes communication key; if people can see the reason why a certain call was made, particularly if it was not made under similar circumstances in the past, then they will get the feeling that some sort of wisdom is being applied behind the decision. But if decisions are made without up front, clear explanations then you can expect people to come looking for them.

DeVore

Brilliant Earthhorse, terrific lecture which says everything I wanted to get across.

DeV.

Wibbs

Earthhorse wrote: »

I much prefer Barry Scharwz's talk on the loss of wisdom which covers much of the same ground but in a slightly different way.

http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_our_loss_of_wisdom.html

I agree you should implement and maintain a subjective system with broad rules. It's better for the health of the site and its constituents in the long run by far. The down side to that is you will have more people disagreeing with, and thus disputing, the subjective calls, than you would with an objective, or seemingly objective, system.

This makes communication key; if people can see the reason why a certain call was made, particularly if it was not made under similar circumstances in the past, then they will get the feeling that some sort of wisdom is being applied behind the decision. But if decisions are made without up front, clear explanations then you can expect people to come looking for them.

+1000. I've a lot of time for oul Barry. His other ted talks are worth watching as are his books. I like his take in this vid http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6127548813950043200#

Sparks

To hell with boards, could we do a clockwork orange number on the Minister for Justice and force him to watch Howard's lecture? Please?

Delirium

Another talk on Don't be a Dick

There's a vimeo video on the linked page, direct link to the video

The Black Oil

Some good points in this talk, the humour falls a little flat, but I think he was nervous. Might be a bit off the point, but bear with it.