Suspending Comments

Okay, time to take a break.

I am suspending the comments, at least temporarily.

My reason is primarily personal. I just have too many projects and obligations right now, and need to focus my time and energy. I need to take the time I spend monitoring (and writing) comments and put it into other things for a while.

Just to give folks an idea... We're getting our cultural interpretive hike going in Kipahulu to educate visitors and generate revenue for our restoration projects, and I'm helping set that up. I'm coordinating a project to organize East Maui folks around opening more lo'i and increasing our production of kalo and poi, starting with a big community gathering (PDF) next weekend. The certified kitchen in Kipahulu where we're processing poi is entering another round of development and upgrades, including probably setting up a co-op. I'm putting together several grants for Hawaiian cultural programs, for building another hale and building a pa hula, and helping with another grant for a crew to do invasive species work in Kipahulu. I'm helping put together a fencing plan for an area of upper Kipahulu to protect three endangered species—and the native forest in general—from goats and pigs (just returned today from my first East Maui Watershed Partnership meeting, in which Kipahulu Ohana is now a supporting partner, where I gave a brief presentation on our fencing plans). These are some of the most important ones, but just of few of my projects, not to mention all the websites I design and maintain, etc. So you get the idea. I need to prioritize and focus.

These are things that I hope even the most ardent opponents of independence and historical revisionists would agree are important. And in the big picture, these things are much more important than Hawaii's political status, which is just a means to help achieve a goal of increasing good and effective government, a just society, self-sufficiency and sustainability—whether through independence, federal recognition, status quo, or otherwise.

I have been thinking about doing this for a while, and though I have put it off because I really don't want to stop what has been in many ways a good thing, I feel like the time has come.

Now, while the primary reason is definitely personal, the tone in the comments lately has helped push me over the edge. We have had some very strong disagreements before, but for the most part there managed to be some level of civility and personal respect. But lately it has become in large part dominated by a few posters, some posting anonymously, who just spew vitriol, repeating the same inflammatory rhetoric over and over, abusive, threatening and calling names, without engaging in any real constructive dialog. It has taken place on both sides, but has primarily been instigated by one side (I'm sure that side will disagree with me on that, but that is the way I see it), and then unfortunately sometimes responded to in kind by the other side. The signal to noise ratio has sadly diminished to an unproductive level. This has nothing to do with people disagreeing with my position—I have welcomed that and it has fueled some good discussions. But it does have to do with the tone with which that disagreement is expressed toward me or others. I want this space to be a place where the strong emotions behind these important issues can be addressed through constructive dialog, and not a space where the negative feelings just get inflamed even more. If anyone had the goal of disrupting the comments hoping I would turn them off, they have succeeded, but of course they have also succeeded in removing what allowed them to freely attempt to rebut my posts! While the nature of the comments by itself might not have led me to suspend them, coming in the context of my already thinking about it just due to my busy schedule, it has helped me make the decision.

So, for the time being, everyone can take a deep breath and go focus on something else yourselves, or go find another forum to debate and argue in. Or start your own blogs!

I will continue to post my own posts as I have time and inspiration, but I can't say how regularly that will be. Of course I hope that folks will continue to return to read what I highlight in the news and have to say about it. I know there are lots of readers who don't comment, anyway.

I am actually going to leave the comments up for now, but I'm setting it to moderate comments, and I won't be checking the moderation queue, so comments will not be posted. So don't waste your time writing them. They'll just get deleted. But I don't want to lose all the comments that have been posted previously, and I don't see how else to do it in haloscan.

BTW, just in case anyone is curious, as of today we have had 22,538 comments. I think we started in October 2003. There have been some really good discussions over the years. But time to take a break. Maybe after a while I'll feel like opening them up again.

Mahalo to everyone who has contributed in a positive way to making the comments here the forum that they have been.

If you have thoughts about this, feel free to email me.

Posted: Tue - January 16, 2007 at 07:24 PM

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Suspending Comments

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