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I started a topic at CSS Forum while facing a drastic change in the moderation there by Dave Hards. He was found to edit-destroy the meaning of some forum member's posts in order to fit his tone and view of things; such destroyed signatures and participation in matters fertile to the CSS and to hang gliding in the USA--- matters that affect the unfolding of real actual hang gliding (which, I hold, will be shown to be impossible without meta aspects riding right along at all times). Of course CSS forum owner may do whatever it wishes and has the power to do; that is not disputed; but what is done with that power defines that forum; this is a discovery adventure---discover just what the CSS Forum wishes to be and how it wishes to exercise its power. I have been an actual spirit member of CSS since its birth; I have not had the funds or agreement-of-red-tape to fulfill the legal relationship with CSS, the club; I have been an actual participating member of the public forum at the CSS website. At any moment, the moderator there may block any member from participating; that would be the exercise of that moderator's power; whatever is done will have its natural effects; the moderator there may form whatever he wishes and he will get whatever are the natural results of his actions.
Here is my topic starter there: "Form Integrity"
Dave Hards has deleted fair rational content from the CSS Forum. We might hold back on "they" yet; maybe it is just Dave Hards' acting alone without oversight.
Perhaps oversight by the CSS officers and members will take some time;
the CSS officers and members will be approving or disapproving of Dave Hards' gross censorship
of opinion. If Dave Hards' censorship is the new face of CSS forum, then that forum will have
emptied itself of values and merits that it carried for so long. It will be very sad if the CSS
supports an empty shell of a forum where just Dave Hard's party line is allowed.
Forum members who treasure their time invested to post thoughtful notes to others may have to think twice, as their efforts may be deleted by Dave Hards.
What will be the nature of the CSS Forum with regard to posts? Hopefully CSS will have exactly what it wants; it is just that things have become very confusing when Hards deletes and changes others' posts. The CSS officers are urged to examine the full set of changes and deletions that Dave Hards has executed recently; and then announce the kind of forum that will be expected by forum members.
THEN Nate followed with:
Here is the Nate's birthing of mHG along with Aldpal's continuation and expansion at a forum that is changing at CSS:
__NATE__'s picture __NATE__ replied on Mon, 11/09/2015 - 23:10
HANG GLIDING VS. META-HANG GLIDING
From my perspective, as a regular pilot, i can assure you of this forum's integrity on the basis of all i've learned from it; information that has proved quite useful. For example, the other month i posted a video of a launch and half a dozen experienced pilots give me coherent feedback on fine tuning position at crestline launch per various conditions. Along with a few other details, this proved very important to my subsequent launches at several locations. Even better, I can learn a lot from other pilot's postings of technical specifics. Stuff useful when i'm near or under my wing. By any account the forum is a fantastic resource and, for me, its integrity is represented by the collective experience voluntarily behind it.
Any product of human invention is a tool; turns out every tool has its job. Strengths and weaknesses. So what is this forum's job? Seems it is to communicate about the actual activity of hang gliding itself. The subject of the sport's organization and management is not hang gliding! In logic or philosophy, one would call this 'meta-hang gliding'! Abstracted from 'hang gliding' to 'about hang gliding'. So two distinct fields emerge, they are related, but so is everything. One would not even need to be a pilot to be a meta-hang-glider. More concretely: i am not even thinking about USHPA when i am rigging my wing, or setting up an approach, positioning at launch, entering a thermal with other wings, wondering when the next fly-in is, or if there is a vario for sale.
But one should be able to see that such topics are the reasons people use this forum, that's what it is good for. No moderator is going to scuttle posts about flight durations, maps, or new ridge soaring spots, Heck, even JD's flight video sountracked to music by "The Smith's" is still on there. Why? Because its actual hang gliding. If there were posts that continued on and on\back and forth about Donald Trump, a TV show, or golf it might imaginably be targeted for removal. Certainly for golf. Not because of anyone's views, or as a matter of integrity, but just because its not actual hang gliding, it doesn't represent what has been productive about the forum. Subtle, but meta-hang gliding (mHG, let's call it), is not hang gliding. Its appears as politics to me. Exactly what many of us wish to leave behind as we drive north up Ben Canyon Road on any flyable day.
reply
Aldpal's picture Aldpal replied on Tue, 11/10/2015 - 01:07
FORUM DECORUM
Forum Integrity vrs Forum Decorum. In general, I agree with Nate's sentiments regarding this Forum. Joe (Faust) are you an active member or the CSS? Your profile says you have been a member (of the forum only?) for 2 1/2 years but you are not listed as a current CSS member on the club directory. If you are a only a "guest" on the Forum and not a full CSS member I consider it Poor Form Chap, to critique this Forum. If you would like to see any changes to the CSS perhaps you should join our club first. If you are in fact a current member perhaps you should get the directory updated. I also take issue with a non-USHPA member (and also not a full CSS member) like Bob K using this club Forum to disparage a full USHPA and CSS member like Alan Crouse, who is running for a position in the USHPA elections. Trying to influence an election in an organization that you are not a member of is beyond poor form. Our CSS club and flying site has developed an excellent reputation in the flying community, through the hard work of lots of members over many years. Currently the Forum is not an "in house" members only discussion board. It is open to the public literally worldwide, and the content or banter that appears here reflects on our image. I personally have no problem with threads that devolve into excessive or unending rants or "bitching sessions", being deleted by who ever is moderating our club's forum. See you in the air, Alan (not Crouse)
==================== All are welcome to explore mHG
=====================
I'll start my little part:
Take a bit of hang gliding, say one is in the air hung from a wing; one has a free-flight gliding kite system going then. Be in USA airspace. A jet zooms by and hits the gliding kite system; all pilots die; people on the ground are injured by the falling debris. Property is damaged. The incident is published around the world. With God eyes we look into the hang glider pilot's actual full self during his or her flight; and we notice that he held a very narrow view about just what "hang gliding" is ACTUALLY. S(he) was flying as though hang gliding actually was just being in a position of airspace. What was neglected was that ACTUAL HANG GLIDING is a complex happening that ever involves aspects of itself: communications, weather, traffic, positions, politics, relationships with ground, juxtapositions with structures, wildlife, decisions by people in power, decision by people not in power, and more. Forgetting what hang gliding ACTUALLY IS, the hang glider pilot got into deep trouble and died, killed a jet pilot, damaged people and structures on the ground, changed the scene for others in many ways. The hang glider's pilot's narrow view of what hang gliding actually is got him into death where he no longer hang glides in USA airspace as he floats in a casket. ACTUAL hang gliding has integrated many aspects and dimensions; some will have some of the dimensions be termed "meta" and try to separate such "meta" aspects from actual hang gliding; but others will understand and see that any actual hang gliding act carries with it unavoidable (but not thought about) its other aspects. Not thinking about an aspect does not mean that that aspect is not integrally riding along with the other aspects of a hang gliding act.
CSS Forum is invited to be whatever it wishes to be; I will easily acknowledge whatever CSS Forum becomes at the hands of its moderator; it can become narrow or large; no problem; but as long as there is a communications window open then birds will perchance fly in and cause wakes with flights. That CSS Forum may block people's text and presence all it wishes; it will become what it becomes. I will be happy to record descriptions of its history in Hang Glider History places. Dave Hards has changed things there; his meta actions have an effect over actual hang gliding. Does the CSS leaders want to have the Dave Hards' censorship pattern?
===========================================================
FOR THE RECORD, HERE IS A COPY OF MY REDUCED POST AT THE CSS FORUM AS OF NOV. 10, 2015, AT 6:55 A.M. PST:
Nate has presented a focus on what he termed "meta hang gliding" but he put a hyphen which I do not as "meta" describes the whole integrated phrase "hang gliding". This topic thread aims to explore meta hang gliding (mHG). Though one might think about what is going on in mHG when doing some other actions, that does not mean that mHG is not active and influencing those other actions. Nate would be going up a canyon and making a turn in his hang glider and not thinking about the mHG influences operating. The adventure of exploring hang gliding and its meta aspects is the topic herein. See what can be seen! Have fun. At first blush, and the way I have seen actual hang gliding for 50 years: one cannot do any hang gliding without there being involved right then and there much meta hang gliding; that is, my first blush comes up with something different from Nate's phrases. Rather, in my first blush, I propose that EVERY ACTUAL HANG GLIDING ACTION integrally involves meta hang gliding in very many ways. Let's see how others think. And I will develop my thoughts too along with others on the topic.
I started a topic at CSS Forum while facing a drastic change in the moderation there by Dave Hards. He was found to edit-destroy the meaning of some forum member's posts in order to fit his tone and view of things; such destroyed signatures and participation in matters fertile to the CSS and to hang gliding in the USA--- matters that affect the unfolding of real actual hang gliding (which, I hold, will be shown to be impossible without meta aspects riding right along at all times). Of course,CSS forum owner may do whatever he wishes and has the power to do; that is not disputed; but what is done with that power defines that forum; this is a discovery adventure---discover just what the CSS Forum wishes to be and how it wishes to exercise its power. I have been an actual spirit member of CSS since its birth; I have not had the funds or agreement-of-red-tape to fulfill the legal relationship with CSS, the club; I have been an actual participating member of the public forum at the CSS website. At any moment, the moderator there may block any member from participating; that would be the exercise of that moderator's power; whatever is done will have its natural effects; the moderator there may form whatever he wishes and he will get whatever are the natural results of his actions. Will the CSS Forum have a place for the aspects of actual hang gliding that ride along with each and every flight? Or just Dave Hards' aspects or just Nate's aspects, etc.? How open will the coming future be for the CSS Forum?
==================== All are welcome to explore mHG (meta hang gliding) in relation to the integrity of the CSS Forum's unfolding future; the past has been strongly great; will the new censorship bring blessings to the forum and to the CSS corporation? Will the new Hards' censorship advance hang gliding in San Bernardino County? Has the new Dave Hards' censorship lifted the integrity of the CSS Forum or dragged down the level of integrity of the CSS Forum?
=====================
I'll start my little part:
Take a bit of hang gliding, say one is in the air hung from a wing; one has a free-flight gliding kite system going then. Be in USA airspace. A jet zooms by and hits the gliding kite system; all pilots die; people on the ground are injured by the falling debris. Property is damaged. The incident is published around the world. With God eyes we look into the hang glider pilot's actual full self during his or her flight; and we notice that he held a very narrow view about just what "hang gliding" is ACTUALLY. S(he) was flying as though hang gliding actually was just being in a position of airspace. What was neglected was that ACTUAL HANG GLIDING is a complex happening that ever involves aspects of itself: communications, weather, traffic, positions, politics, relationships with ground, juxtapositions with structures, wildlife, decisions by people in power, decision by people not in power, and more. Forgetting what hang gliding ACTUALLY IS, the hang glider pilot got into deep trouble and died, killed a jet pilot, damaged people and structures on the ground, changed the scene for others in many ways. The hang glider's pilot's narrow view of what hang gliding actually is got him into death where he no longer hang glides in USA airspace as he floats in a casket. ACTUAL hang gliding has integrated many aspects and dimensions; some will have some of the dimensions be termed "meta" and try to separate such "meta" aspects from actual hang gliding; but others will understand and see that any actual hang gliding act carries with it unavoidable (but not thought about) its other aspects. Not thinking about an aspect does not mean that that aspect is not integrally riding along with the other aspects of a hang gliding act.
CSS Forum is invited to be whatever it wishes to be; I will easily acknowledge whatever CSS Forum becomes at the hands of its moderator; it can become narrow or large; no problem; but as long as there is a communications window open then birds will perchance fly in and cause wakes with flights. That CSS Forum may block people's text and presence all it wishes; it will become what it becomes. I will be happy to record descriptions of its history in Hang Glider History places. Dave Hards has changed things in the CSS Forum; his meta actions have an effect over actual hang gliding. Does the CSS leaders want to have the Dave Hards' censorship pattern? CSS and CSS Forum might be having an identity challenge; is the Forum large enough to actually hold the public with varied perspectives?
