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Comment Section Undergoes Revamp

Jan. 30, 2013

A great deal of work goes into the reporting and writing of the Sunnysidepost.

Accuracy is important and so too is professionalism.

Unfortunately some of that professionalism is being undermined by the comment section—where some readers are posting comments that are inappropriate and irrelevant to a particular story. This is drowning out those people who have good ideas and arguments that are worth being heard.

Therefore, from this point, objectionable comments that do not deal with the topic will NOT be approved. Furthermore, there will be a tougher view on what is deemed racist or sexist.

Despite being a fervent supporter of the First Amendment, it is time for the comment section to change.

Christian Murray, editor

 

email the author: [email protected]

60 Comments

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Barbara

know it’s nitpicking (and not for publication) but it is Grand Central Terminal, not Grand Central (statin). Grand Central Station is the Post Office on Lexington and 45th.

Glad to hear you’re keeping a rein on some of the more outrageous comments. It’s easy to complain, too much effort into making things better.

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Slainte

Lucky Lou wrote: “There are plenty of people who comment who have valid, informative and interesting things to say.”

In other words, people who agree with him.

Lucky Lou also wrote: “Those whose comments fall outside of those parameters are welcome to start their own news(less) site to house all of their vitrol, ignorance and stupidity. ”

In other words, anyone who doesn’t agree with him.

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sully

…thank you …..i was deterred by some comments, thinking them inappropriate and at times offensive…..i like the idea of this site being a forum for the community to share diverse ideas in an adult,diplomatic manner…..without the nonsense….thanks again!

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Lucky Lou

I wholeheartedly support this move by Sunnyside Post. I am all for firey disagreement on the issues that arise from the stories posted here, but they should be discussions on topic and not grounded in cliches, stereotypes and conspiracy theories, all things that seem to run rampant among a handful of the commentors. I have never found Ruben’s comments funny or englightening. I think this website is a real service and the more I learn about Sunnyside after having moved here over 7 years ago, the more proud I am of this community and the more I want to become involved in its betterment. There are plenty of people who comment who have valid, informative and interesting things to say. Those whose comments fall outside of those parameters are welcome to start their own news(less) site to house all of their vitrol, ignorance and stupidity. The rest of of us with brains, compassion and common sense will stay here. Good work, Christian!

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Slainte

P.S.

I should also add that IMO the Sunnyside Post has been absolutely indispensable for anyone wanting to know what’s happening in the Sunnyside/Woodside area.

The site owner should be proud that it has attracted people of all backgrounds, educational levels and political persuasions; many of whom take the time to comment, even if those comments can sometimes be annoying, politically-incorrect or just plain silly. I’d say the SP fits the definition of “common ground” in that sense.

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Slainte

The blog owner is entitled to manage his comments section however he sees fit. It’s true that we have free speech but nobody else is obliged to provide you with a platform for it.

Having said that, the charm of news blogs like this is the rough and tumble and unpredictability of the comments section – (how many times do people click back to read the main stories again as opposed to checking in on the latest comments?)

And the diversity of opinions expressed is exciting but it seems that diversity isn’t always a good thing, even in a borough that prides itself on it.

There are also those who only want to hear opinions that coincide with their own, those who only want their own views confirmed. There are those who denigrate people who don’t agree with them, call them names and even imply physical threats – then with breathtaking hypocrisy, lament the lack of polite discourse.

Some commenters like to act as palace guards for favorite local politicians and have a meltdown when someone dares to criticize them. They might even want to take your name down as McCarthyite intimidation tactic.

Obviously, this site is right up their alley, or soon will be.

Either way, as far as who gets to say what here, it is indeed the blog owner’s call. That much I agree with many of you on. Best of luck.

Slainte

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Jemma

Oh thank God! I hope this is the last batch of comments on this site and I just want to come here and read the happenings of the neighborhood. That’s what this site should be about to begin with. If anyone feels otherwise than take the time and effort to build a site that is a message board and you people can insult each other all day long on it.

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43rd@43rd

“Mike Novak January 30, 2013 • 10:55 am
Make everyone accountable for their words.
Make everyone post with their real, verified names.”

So Mike, you want us to register for freedom of speech? Imposing restrictions onto the 1st Amendment just like the 2nd, and treating everyone a criminal under these restrictions and “patriot” acts. Name Verification? So come to where I live and demand my ID and maybe issue background checks before we are allowed to type or own a computer or to think? Treat us all as criminals because of the improper actions of the few and take away our freedoms because some misuse them.

Sorry, I thought this was the country my great-great-etc… helped create and fought for. Guess I was wrong. My family came across in 1632 and I’m sad to say this country has truly gone far astray from its aspirations during my generation.

There may be no better country in the world to live in terms of Freedom, but that doesn’t mean we’re as free as we should be by once “inalienable” rights.

A foreign friend of mine said a couple of decades ago how great America was because we had the freedom to burn own our flags. Sadly a few years after that Congress attempted to pass the Flag Desecration Amendment (that failed by just one vote).

The more freedoms we allow to be taken away due to fears or closed-mindedness the more enslaved our children and theirs will become.

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Anonymous

Good for you. There were some clearly mentally ill folks monopolizing the comments. Difference of opinion can be expressed in a constructive adult way. That was not what was going on here. If people think that means this site is a “dictatorship” then they should move elsewhere for their free speech. We all have the freedom to start our very own hate or love filled blogs devoted to Sunnyside news. No one is stopping us. Stop complaining, or maintain your own news blog.

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Ministry of truth

what if I am THINKING racist and hateful thoughts and thinking that I don’t want to be part of the Sunnyside Post Party where all people must think alike, will you come up behind me and put a bullet in my head like the dude in 1984?

Winston Smith lives!!!

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birdmann

*yawn* yeah i gotta tell ya. love the long paragraphs about basically nothng interteresting BRING IT ON!!!

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Sunnyside Native

Oppressed Masses needs to take his daily Viagra, get lucky with somebody (anybody) and learn to play nice! HE is emotionally and socially stunted. Where is the crying emoticon? Good for you Christian taking control of your own website! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

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Pete

Good work Christian. Btw I for one would be willing to pay a subscription fee for access to the Post.

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TheRealRuben

Sunnyside Post has become Pretentious, to house the pretentious hipsters of Sunnyside.

it has come full circle.

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Marty Concerned

Thank you very much for providing an internet message board where we can voice our opinions in an educated manner …Bye Bye Ruben & Good Riddance too ,I’m sure you ,and possibly a couple more clowns 9 Not many really ) are the reason for this.You will find another kids message board where you can join!

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Oppressed Masses

One suggestion, if I may. Please ban the use of emoticons in the comment section. They really make the comments look childish.

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Oppressed Masses

With tamer comments, what will posters like Sunnyside Native have to talk about with her friends at the bar?

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Sunnyside

Oh quit complaining people, this site is OWNED by SOMEONE, that means they can make whatever rules they see fit. The free speech argument is invalid. There is a clear line that I’ve seen way too many people cross here and I’m glad the Post put stricter rules in place. If you don’t like it make your own Sunnyside website and go post your nonsensical and off-topic crap over there. Either that or get a life

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Sunnyside Native

Good idea, Christian! As you are a dog owner, feel free to delete Oppressed Masses crazy ramblings about dogs. 🙂 He needs a dog to make some friends. 🙂 All the people who posted as some form of Ruben pretty much ‘hijacked’ this forum/blog a couple weeks ago. Although it was entertaining to some extent, it was nonsense. And as a person who is bilnigual to both English and Spanish, thank you for declaring the blog comments to be in English.

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Nom de Plume

Yes Julia. Between the outdoor cafe seating and the sidewalk dog poop, Sunnyside is giving the French capital a run for the money. All we need to do is re-name Queen of Angels to Notre Dame and we’re on our way. And we already have at least one bitchy waiter.

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JuliaJ.

The French comments are about what the dogs do on the sidewalks. Comment dit-on en francais, “LOL?”

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86Mets

English only?

Sunnyside is a multicultural community. Spanish is also widely spoken here. Why the hatred an discrimination against non-English speaking residents?

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Local Hamburgler

“All comments are to be in English.” — Sunnyside Post

Whoa, easy there… You’re cruisin’ for a bruising Christian.

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86Mets

@O’Shea

Sunnyside s’est déja transformé en ville cosmopolitain comme Paris. Comme Paris, il y a les crottes de chien partout sur le trottoir.

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86Mets

Moderator,

Why do you leave up Mike Novak’s comment in which he expresses a desire to physically harm other commenters?

How is that not considered inappropriate under your new commenting policy?

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JuliaJ.

Censorship. Very nice. Welcome to the brave new world. There is difference between “hate speech” and opinions with which one disagrees. Healthy debate is essential.

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86Mets

“Kicking” people “to the curb” he doesn’t agree with seems to be Mike Novak’s idea of civil discourse.

My comment pointing this out a few minutes ago has already been deleted but Novak’s bellicose threat of physical harm remain on the thread.

Seriously SP, are you really that interested in cleaning things up here or just getting rid of people you don’t agree with?

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Deniz

I am encouraged by the cleaning up of the comments section. As the primary source of information in and about the neighborhood, the “fun” bantering that goes on here really does hinder the flow of any sort of meaningful dialogue to take place between neighbors. I also thinking requiring email addresses a good idea – I’ve had people use my name for example – whether inadvertently or not. Anyway, best of luck to SunnysidePost.com! Thank you for all that you’re doing – we’d be in trouble without you –

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Roy Doodiehead

Comments are stupid and a waste of bandwidth. No insight has ever come from a comment nor has anyone ever changed there mind or become enlightened from one. They are just echo chambers where people with no other outlet go to rant and say useless, usually racist things. Just drop the comments section altogether. No news site needs them beyond trying to boost eyes on ads. There isn’t any other purpose besides that.

And yes, this applies to this comment I just made.

Sincerely,
R. Doodiehead III. Esq.

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TheRealRuben

Krissi,

censoring language…fine, Banning outright racism and hate speech, fine. I’m not talking about not liking the latinos from the north side, I’m talking blatant Nazi stuff, ok I understand

but that’s not whats been going on here in this site, the mod has chosen to be Judge Jury and Executioner. This is no longer a public news media where the mod is exercising his right to release the news to the public, he’s controlling his environment.

so this is no longer a public outlet for Sunnside, it’s just some guy running a news site for sunnyside. Good luck with that in all its gloried ‘professionalism”

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CircleK

Require login or at least include a thumps up for people to click and sort comments by greatest thumbs up. That way people read a few good comments and once the reach the obnoxious ones they know to stop.

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Krissi

86Mets

There’s a difference between differing opinions and abuse.

He’s not infringing on your rights of free speech. If you want an outlet for your opinions, you are more than welcome to start your own blog.

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Krissi

Oh Thank you. I love you for writing this blog and am so happy to listen to different viewpoints about the community, but lately reading this page has been more stressful than it should be with the misplaced anger, racism, and overall nastiness of the comments section.

I’m not saying that it should all be sunshine and roses, but we should be expressing our viewpoints in a CONSTRUCTIVE way.

Oh, and I use my real name on this.

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TheRealRuben

Mike is the kinda guy who supports Sopa and Pipa,

I like my privacy Mike, I don’t need some maniac looking me up and coming to my house to have a “word” with me because he disagrees with my right to freedom of speech.

you want my social security and date of birth while you’re at it Mike?

buncha damn elitists up in Here

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Mike Novak

Make everyone accountable for their words.

Make everyone post with their real, verified names.

Kick the cowards and racists to the curb!

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TheRealRuben

I TOLD YA, I called it, I told you that it was a slippery slope to start choosing which comments stay and which comments go. Now the moderator has changed the site into a DICTATORSHIP,

you just cut your traffic in half

For the rest of ya, Everytime you see Squirts the Change bum. THINK OF MEEEE!!! MUAHAHHAHAHAHA BYEEEEEEEE

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Sunnysyde

Some of you can just go to gothamist where there is only 1 serious comment out of 100, you may be welcomed with your “funny” comments over there. There is no thumbs up or + here, so most people don’t care about your clever jokes or puns or near racist comments.

Something happened the other day at the corner of greenpoint and 46th ave. There was a man lying on the sidewalk and fdny and nypd were both on the scene and there was a police tape in front of the dentist.
I am very surprised that this blog misses to cover these kind of incidents. Also we rarely hear about the stuff happening until it happens and then we hear about how quiet or busy it was.. Instead of focusing on comments, we need more quality content. Require registration (not facebook) and allow subscription to the blog post we commented, there will be less and less multiple peopleposting with same name over and over.

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Oppressed Masses

So does this mean we will no longer read comments about a priest performing miracle cures on dogs?

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you all make me laugh

Well I guess I won’t be visiting this site anymore. The comic banter of the comment section was the highlite by FAR.

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local

Good idea! The comments section used to be colorful and interesting, but lately it’s turned into a cesspool of idiocy and hate. Glad changes are on the way!

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No Name

I wish we would use Email address required since I have seen letters and someone using the name I have used and I dont want anyone to associate me with those letters!

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Sue

I support this- Sunnyside Post is an excellent source of micro-local news and, frequently, ideas are raised in the comments section that are helpful. Yet in its present format, reading the comments section is like running a gauntlet filled with masked people screaming abuse. Let’s try for civility.

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Fernando

I am sad to hear this. Half the fun of this website was reading all of the comments. Especially from all of the Rubens.

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