Thank you to those of you who contacted me about Jens post. I agree and give this one 2 min but dont worry it will be on Mendon-Upton Public Square because I do believe in freedom of speech and an open exchange of opinions. Here goes so start your watch! First, for those of you that can’t read more than a short paragraph after 13 plus years of schooling skip this post. Just a disclaimer for the folks who always complain that their “too busy” to read any post longer than two sentences. Jen Doyle, Because I’ve seen how you operate I’m pretty sure you will either delete this post or ban me from “your page” so I’ll post this on mine as well. If you’re not afraid of transparency and freedom of speech you’ll allow it to stay and as a newsperson (she runs the Uptondaily blog) I would assume you will but I’m on the fence about that after watching you on this page. The direct conversation in response to your post that clearly is meant for me may break your “page rules” but we all know that you allow your friends to break them on a regular basis (folks have pointed that out to me) or you allow them to be broken when someone is on your side of an issue. It appears that it’s only when you disagree with someone, they are disagreeing with you or your pals disagree with them that you jump in with the “rules” and like a nanny state observer try to censor the conversation. I think the last time was the railroad issue with another parent on your page. You know it’s the kind of thing we see in North Korea and China. To be safe I’ll post it on my page as well to comply with my own rule about transparency and free speech. I never blocked anyone or told them to take their opinions or conversations elsewhere unless they were lying, providing misleading information to the public and refused to correct it, making it personal and would not let up or bringing family into the conversation. Other than that folks were free to say what was on their minds as I appreciate that we live in a free society with rights and freedoms granted to us by the Constitution. I also understand and appreciate that many generations before me fought and died to protect them as our citizens and service members do today. For a number of years folks from Upton have been telling me to watch out for you as you play both sides of the fence as a “reporter” or in your case a blogger. I give everyone the benefit of the doubt that I don’t know because I’ve learned not to judge others based on what people say about them especially when I was a cop. I did this with you even after your childish games, copying of my blog posts or the MDN within seconds of posting sometimes (I have them all recorded with times of posting) and false reporting on your Uptondaily Blog early on. Regardless, judging someone based on others opinions of them is a really bad way to operate and can stop you from getting to know someone who is a good person or from listening to their ideas because a cliques in town does not agree with their politics so they bad mouth them or deaminize them. This is pretty standard in politics but in our towns folks make it personal. You have seen it, the folks standing around at the baseball fields, cub scouts, school events, town events etc. badmouthing other parents and neighbors until they walk up and everyone says hi and chats them up until they walk away. It even happens with appointed officials and town employees! Yes, it is a bit middle school I agree but we have it alive and well here in our small towns. Today it also happens on social media with the 30/40/50 something’s who act 10. Heck, we even see it in the Town Crier against private citizens and sometimes the papers, reporters and town officials themselves join in on the attack. Keep in mind we’re not talking about elected or appointed officials but private residents. In the online version someone posts about an issue or event that’s important to them and one member of the same old crew will jump all over them. Some of these folks think they’re clever and do so in a way that slants the person without the name calling some of them use but knowing full well they are going to get their team high fiving and joining in on the kill. It’s actually pretty funny to watch and other have contacted me with this same observation over the years and just a few weeks ago on this page (Mendon Upton Moms and Dads Too). In seconds you see all of their pals clicking like and then chiming in to help with the personal attacks. They did it for a time in the Milford daily news but that’s stopped since you now have to post your name. Amazingly all those critics have gone silent when their face and names were going to be attached to their comments. I have seen play out with others in Mendon and Upton over the past 10 years. In fact one of your page followers recently messaged me about one of these crews on Mendon-Upton Moms and Dads Too (yes this page) and she called them the “mean girls club”. I’ve since had a number of people (moms) who know about the issue agree with her. They can even name most of these “girls”. It’s funny because we have a school district that works very hard on eliminating bullying in our schools yet we have a group of parents who will publically try to bully anyone who does not share their view or who will not back down when they start their attacks. I’m not talking about debating but bullying. I’ve even seem some of these folks attack one of our students publicly on Facebook for all to see. I copied and pasted the full thread it was so shocking. That young man is now a Mendon Selectman. In full disclosure I’ve taken the bait in the past and given it back to them on a personal level and I regret that but I guess you live and learn. However, one should not let a slant or a policy/issue challenge go unchallenged. If you do the other side wins the argument in the eyes of public opinion. It’s the “he claimed it’s raining out and they came on and said it wasn’t and he did not correct them so it must not be raining out” thing. That said, I was a bit surprised to again see you play to the crowd and once again attempt to shut down a topic you and a few on your “new” team might not like to hear about because it does not align with your politics in reality or by way of the politics you show in public. You know what I mean by that Jen. Like someone who has one face they show the school district, the superintendent, town officials, social media and super liberal parents when they’re talking to them and then another face they show others in emails and on the phone that may be different than the face they show the school, liberal “friends” or social media. I’m not saying that’s you…I’m just saying there are people like that. I was also surprised that you as a self-described Republican and Conservative living in a “super liberal town” (your words not mine) would again use censorship to stop a fellow citizen from sharing their views, opinions and concerns. Especially a fellow citizen who you have told in the past that, “You have many conservative supporters here in Upton. You take your name being mentioned as a bad thing because of a small outspoken group here in Upton, but there are many here in town that agree with you most of the time.” So after seeing you censor most any substantive conversation that develops on this page that you don’t like or that you think will get you “likes” I guess I’m surprised but not really surprised. You see even though we should never take others opinions about someone as the whole truth and nothing but the truth until we get to know the person we can use those opinions as clues of what might lay ahead in our interaction with that person. That said and based on a number of issues you and I have had over the past few years going back to some reporting on a school committee seat I’m afraid I have to agree that you do play both sides of the fence and do and say whatever you think is politically expedient, what will get the best reaction based on who’s in the room or will engage in the game of slanting others who you know folks don’t agree with in an effort to get them to like you. That’s really no way for a conservative Republican to act in a super liberal town because your true politics if exposed can make you the odd man out one day… By the way I posted about Common Core 9 times over five months when it was brought up by our school district or in the news and with one being a link to a story you wrote about it. If you don’t like me posting about Common Core in an effort to keep my fellow residents informed because you now agree with your brother and drank the Common Core and PARCC Kool-Aid I won’t post about it anymore. I know some folks can’t be bothered to hear about important issues that affect our kids, our schools or our towns when there are the types of things we see posted here to talk about but come on. Would it kill us as Moms and dads to have some debates about issues other than kids driving too fast on our road, how our kids are great or what spa or vacation spot we should visit? It’s no wonder our towns, state and country are in the mess they are! Was that 250 words or less?
Posted on: Mon, 03 Feb 2014 02:16:01 +0000
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