The Georgia 6th District Facebook Group

Group Description and Guidelines

Current Version: June 2018

(Note: If you’ve stumbled upon this page through a search engine or other means, this document refers to the Facebook Group guidelines of the Georgia 6th District Facebook group. (Click here to go to the FB Page for more information.)

The following document outlines:

1. a description and purpose of the group,
2. general posting guidelines, and
3. general behavior expectations for group members.

Vision

The Georgia 6th District Learning Community is an easy to use system that allows people to use their voting power much more effectively and exert real influence on Politicians’ decisions.

Lets be clear what is happenning now!

We have a self serving political system which is largely controlled by big money and self interst groups. They are pouring billions of dollars of lobbyist money in to manipulate politicians who are constantly working primarily for re election.

How did it get like this?

The current Political System dates back hundreds of years when communication between the Politician and the voter was very limited. Interactive and optimal engagement of all the voters was not possible. This is how the party system evolved.

The political Party is a vehicle that allows voters to hand over their voting power to a group of politicians that they feel will make political decisions they they would support.

To get the voters support, politicans promote a Political “Philosophy” that they feel will persuade an electorate that they will vote in a way that the electorate emotionally supports.

The Republican Party promotes “Less Government and Lower taxes” and The Democratic party promotes inclusion and the need for a community that enables an acceptable standard of living for everyone.

Each Party therefore has a different “BIAS” which their supporters emotionally relate to. They then have to “trust” the politicians to exert that bias in peoples’ best interest!

Well THEY DON’T!

That Political Party system is not necessary today, in the 21st Century, because technology can directly link the voter to the Politican’s actions. They can use their votes on the basis of a transparent political process instead of the current purposely clandestine and deceitful one.

The Georgia 6th district provides the technology that gives our Community a practical voter engagement process, whereby, Community members can effectively form a “Voter Block” system. This is no “Party” system.  It is an “Issue” by “Issue” driven system. You will be able to link up with other voters and form virtual voter blocks on every key issue.  At its macro level the GA 6th District is the highest level Voter Block.  All 700,000 Voters in the Ga 6th could unite into one large voter block, in addition to the two large voter blocks (Liberal and Conservative) and a couple of small voter blocks, Libertarian and Green.

In order to provide members with the greatest level of relevant engagement and quality of content, we have instituted an “admin-approved thread” set up in the group. Posts will appear in the group feed/timeline once approved by an Administrator. (Note that this is for original posts and not for comments!) We have recruited plenty of admins, and we will continue to recruit more, to ensure timely review of posts. We are not trying to squelch conversation, but rather we want to “raise the bar” of quality discussion. Furthermore, this helps stop trolls before they start.

General Posting Guidelines

When you submit a post to the group, the following “best practices” are suggested to expedite approval:

1. In your post, provide relevance, context, and your opinions in a respectful manner. This group is not just another news feed – you can find a thousand other groups for that. The best way to introduce your post, whether it is a question, article, or idea you want to discuss, is to show how it relates to the Ga  6th District. Examples of what not to do:

“Here’s a link. Thoughts?” — We discourage what we call “thoughts?” posts (or links posted with no intro whatsoever) because the OP is asking for others to present their own opinions without first expressing his own. Don’t ask members to do the heavy lifting for you to start a discussion. Instead, take one extra minute and write a little summary, or even “I don’t know, please help me understand!” Just tell us what you think, and start a real conversation.

“Here’s a link. Anarcho-capitalists/Minarchists/Catholics/Protestants are all stupid and not Christian at all!” — Posts written with an incendiary tone toward fellow members will receive very little toleration. Those of us with whom you disagree are not averse to critique, but we are averse to being treated disrespectfully by those we feel may not understand our position. Your brothers and sisters in Community are not your enemies.

“Buy my book! Check out my latest podcast! Link!” — If you join this group with the sole purpose of advertising your latest project, your posts will very likely not be approved. However, new projects of a specific Georgia 6th District nature will likely be given special consideration, given that you provide context and explanation in the post itself. Furthermore, projects shared from active, engaged group members are encouraged as well.

2. Try to make sure your topic has not been covered extensively in the past. If you are asking a question about a particular topic or about the group in general, we encourage liberal use of the “search” bar to see if the topic you want to discuss has been previously addressed. For instance, “Is spanking effective?” has been discussed on multiple occasions (with literally hundreds of comments.) .  This is not to say we don’t want to discuss spanking anymore, but don’t start a thread with nothing but “Hey what do you think of spanking?” and expect it to be a super hot topic, or even approved – because you’re kind of late to the party. Instead, use the history of this board as a resource, and when re-introducing a topic do so with your own insight included. 
3. Political campaigning and general fundraising is not permitted. This board is for discussing ideas and current events, not campaign announcements or fundraising requests. Charities are great, but allowing fundraising in a group with over 8,000 members causes more problems than it solves. We don’t even approve posting announcements of “moneybombs” here. Sorry.

4. Posts promoting conspiracy speculations will not be approved. As a group committed to promoting Georgia 6th District discussion, the group has deemed that conspiracy speculations are not appropriate. There exist a host of other groups for such things, but this group is not one of them. Additionally, don’t think that by arguing the definition of “conspiracy theory” you will get us to budge on this position. You won’t, so just drop it.

EXAMPLE: “This picture/link proves 9-11 was an inside job!” Nope. EXCEPTION: A YouTube video of George W. Bush confessing to CNN that 9-11 was an inside job. You know, Nixon-style.

5. Don’t post anything you wouldn’t want your teenage child to see. We actually do have a number of young people in this group. Posts clearly laced with profanity, indecent imagery, graphic violence, or promoting racism (even so-called “race realism”) will not be approved.

General Behavior Expectations

1. Remember we are neighbors first. Everything we do and say should reflect a civil respect for our neighbors. Before you rip into somebody else for not holding the exact same position you do, remember that your “opponent” is someone you may work with or be on a tennis team with. Badgering someone because they are a Socialist/Communist/Christian/Liberal/Trump Supporter is inappropriate. Everyone in the group is at different points along the journey of understanding how to best govern a community.
2. Try to prioritize understanding someone else’s position above simply reiterating your own. Not only is this good practice for becoming a smarter person, but it also can help you when persuading others. (We readily admit this is very difficult to do, but it’s a great goal!)
3. Respect the general sensibilities of others, and please refrain from off-color and vulgar language. Treat others the way you want to be treated. “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” Repeated offenses will result in a ban from the group.
4. Communicate with the Administrators. The Admins are here to provide light oversight of the group. If you are having issues with the group or a particular problem, you are welcome to contact an Admin (look in the member list). Furthermore, Members are not permitted to block a group Admin, as blocks hinder him/her from performing administrative duties.

Finally, we encourage everybody to help promote the work of the Georgia 6th District Learning Community and follow the content:

• “Like” the Georgia 6th District Facebook page, where we regularly curate interesting articles, videos, memes, and more.
• Subscribe to the LCI email list. Whenever something new is posted, you’ll get an email the next morning. You can also subscribe to the RSS feed.
• Follow on Twitter.

Enjoy the group, it’s a great place to learn and grow!