WTF is Wrong with the People who Attend Town Hall Meetings?

[alcibiades_mystery]

I'm watching the Harper's impeachment forum, and every single fucker in the audience feels the need to make a 5 minute speech rather than just ask a fucking question. Every single one. Not one can formulate a question of any value, despite the fact that everyone of them are being admonished about halfway through their stupid little speeches! It's truly unbelievable.

This is why I stopped going to Dem meetings. Every single asshole has to make a speech. Ask a question and STFU.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. I agree completely!

WTF?!

[Hekate]

6. It was a very good forum, but I had to turn it off during the Q&A

Maybe the offending ones are just badly in need of group therapy -- so they can process their grief and rage, and then be able to focus on more productive pursuits.

Trying to be charitable here.

It was a good forum, though. Gods bless John Conyers. And :wow: John Dean continues to redeem himself in my eyes.

Hekate

[FreedomAngel82]

8. Hear hear!

They're both great guys and I'm glad they're doing what they can.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

9. They got better towards the end...

but jeez, those first 4-5!

[Yupster]

33. Agree Viva

I think people see an audience and can't resist even if the audience isn't there to see them.

[liveoaktx]

2. I had to laugh over it too but for both parts-the moderator is a little

testy, visibly over it. Yes, they should get to the point, but he needs to mask his annoyance.

[Bozita]

3. I wish this would continue for a few more hours

It makes me feel better.

[Stephanie]

4. I was there

It was raucous. Of course every wild character was the first one online. But what do you do? Pre-screen the questions? This process was pure democratic anarchy. There were four microphones, two in each side of the floor and the balcony, and whoever was first in line got to speak.

[FreedomAngel82]

10. I would at least say to keep it short

[Pastiche423]

31. OMG! You were there?

Sitting here in front of my computer, 3,000 miles away w/my speakers blasting, I thought it doesn't get better than this.

But, you were there! I can only imagine the energy in that room.

How many attended?

[Octafish]

37. Put questions down on paper and collect them during the discussion.

That way, the moderator can cull the best and most-frequently asked ones for the panel.

BTW: Why the heck didn't Lapham state the problem with the mass media is centralized corporate ownership? I wish I was there, if only I could figure out how to make that a statement.

[BattyDem]

5. I'm not defending their behavior, but ...

perhaps they feel the same way that we often do - like our voices are being stifled and there is no one to speak for us. We have DU, which allows us to vent and discuss things. Maybe they have no other forum where they can be heard, so when they get to a Town Hall Meeting, they ramble on because they are so happy and grateful that people are listening to them. :shrug:

Like I said, I'm not defending their behavior - it's annoying and it "kills the clock" so not as many questions can be answered during the meeting - but remember how you felt on the day you found DU? That's probably how many of those people feel when they get to a Town Hall meeting. :-)



On edit: It's the moderator's job to stop "speeches". If someone begins to ramble, the moderator should interrupt and say something like, "I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude, but we want to answer as many questions as possible tonight and the only way to do that is to keeps things moving. So would you please ask your question? Thank you for understanding."

[ReadTomPaine]

32. Bingo.

There's substance to what the OP is saying, however this wouldn't be half the problem it is if rank and file Democrats were actually properly represented. They are grabbing the mike like a person dying of thirst grabs for water.

The solution, of course, is to make sure they have a voice throughout the process so they don't need to claw desperately for the rare chance to feel like someone is listening to them. Democrats have been having a problem with this for years - opposition the DNC's current grassroots organization efforts are a good example of this.

Well spoken Republicans get cushy jobs and a party funded future. Well spoken Democrats get plagiarized.

[FreedomAngel82]

7. I do agree

They don't have all the time in the world.

[proud2BlibKansan]

11. It's called democracy

These people are obviously angry and want to vent. Maybe they don't have any questions. Did you think of that?

[Name removed]

13. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[smtpgirl]

12. I am sorry to say

That you are on the money with this one.

You can't preach to the choir

[ken_g]

14. ABSOLUTELY agree! Everyone's got a speach, or a website or

a (self-published) book to plug. Ask a GD question or STFU. It's not easy putting a panel like that together and they act like they're the only one in the room. JESUS!

[Kurovski]

15. At one point I found myself saying aloud

"If you want to run for office, then RUN!"

[Minstrel Boy]

16. It's true everywhere, about everything.

I hate it. I wish sometimes when I hear they're "opening the floor" the floor really would open.

[CAG]

17. It reminded me about the anti-war rally in DC last fall where

it turned into a 4 hourlong rendition on saving hooted owls in mongolia, mustached-women in romania, obese giraffes in australia, twelve toed men in central america, and Texas quail for justice (oops, that one became kind of important recently).

Its funny when the freepers make themselves look stupid, its painful when lefties do.

[radio4progressives]

18. what a profoundly unthinking post..

think about what the issue is.. think about three stolen elections.

think about tens if not hundreds of thousands of people killed based on lies.

think about the fact that absolutely NO ONE is holding this Executive Tyrant accountable.

Think before you shoot off your mouth and demonize the disenfranchised who have no voice other than forums like the one that was held tonight.

think about bondage and enslavement, for just a minute or two.

and then think about it again until you feel that duct tape around your mouth and the hood over your head and the chains around your feet.

and no one speaking out for you.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

19. Sorry, you're over your time limit... Did you have a question?

:P


:hi:

[alcibiades_mystery]

21. Since this isn't a question and answer forum with a limited time frame

I don't mind the usual speech here. ;-)

Bandwidth aplenty, if ya just keep donating.

[Kurovski]

26. You're bad!

:spank: I could learn a lot from you!

[alcibiades_mystery]

20. Oh, I didn't realize that asking people for basic consideration

was the equivalent of chaining them up and taping their mouths.

Unthinking? The only ones who weren't thinking are the dimbulbs who rattled on for five or eight minutes with a long line of people waiting behind them. perhaps you prefer such a selfish society. i do not.

[liveoaktx]

22. The problem I had wasn't with whether the people were being rude

at the mike or whether the moderator should be firm with him, but he was so obviously rude and annoyed.

[alcibiades_mystery]

24. He only became rude when the speechifiers refused to listen to reason

I often saw the same problem on Howard Stern. Callers would go on and on, digressing into this and that, and oh, one more thing, and the other, ad nauseam, until Howard would finally say WHAT'S THE POINT?? I suspect that most people are simply incapable of functioning in soundbite economies. They are speaking in public and lose all sense of time and place. It's a weird phenomenon, but the moderator has to do that job. He's really an advocate for the last person in line who will never get a chance if current speechifier doesn't, finally, at last, shut up.

[liveoaktx]

28. Even if the audience was rude, I don't think the moderator had

to be too. He could have just politely CUT THEM OFF and kept going.

[proud2BlibKansan]

34. Amen

:yourock:

[Dora]

23. I hear you, and I agree.

Ask your question. Ask your question. Ask your question.

If you want to share your feelings, the step away from the microphone and share them with the person you're seated next to.

The microphones are for people who want to ask a question and will spit it out in 2 minutes or less.

The microphones are not an invitation for you to present your platform to an audience who is otherwise here to listen somebody's ideas... and that somebody ain't you.

[quiet.american]

25. Have to agree, albeit in not quite so colorful language.

Don't know what happens to people at these things. In love with the sound of their own voices? Self-absorption?

Ask the question!

[JI7]

27. because that is the type of person who is likely to attend Town Halls

[Kurovski]

29. Hehehe...I think you got it!

The simplest answer is often the truest.

[Sydnie]

30. I think you are correct

People don't go to a town hall meeting to learn, they go because they have an opinion that they want heard.

[Oilwellian]

35. You're overreacting just a tad

You should be happy to see so many Americans willing to speak about the criminal activities of this administration. I was glad to see they had an opportunity to ventilate. In case you haven't noticed, there are millions of us who've reached a boiling point. Judging from the anger in your post, so have you.

[NuttyFluffers]

36. i noticed this phenom, too. i think people are starved for true discourse

but haven't learned that the forum that they are in is not the same format like an intimate dinner party. i think this whole "let's not talk politics, religion, or anything remotely passionate, personal, or intellectually stimulating" american sensibility has been bad for our society. we end up with people who are positively starved for any sort of human contact on a higher mental level. actually we end up with people are just positively starved for human contact on any sort of terms beyond superficial.

lots of people are not taught the proper nuances of different discussion formats and venues. americans tend to have a bad time determining what to do and where (if this is noticeable in other nations, i apologize, but i haven't seen it in my travels - i'd love to know otherwise). americans, as adorable as they are, have an incredible lack of savoir-faire and social timing (or grace). at movies, coffee houses, art galleries, museums, concerts, classrooms, mass transit, waiting rooms, etc. americans don't know appropriate flow of conversation from my experience. too often they want to tell you their life story (darling, love you, but i'm just on the bus, i couldn't possibly care that much about your lifelong issue with bunions). they offer interjections in even the most mundane circumstances, with often trite observations, and stare at you with partial shock of hearing their own voice and longing for another's reply. americans are very lonely apparently.

i agree that forensics is critical for basic collegiate education and i'm glad many colleges institute these requirements for graduation. but wouldn't it be wonderful if there'd be other speech courses on the art of discussion in its many forms? i think it would be precious knowledge to impart what the assumed rules of conversation according to its different formats and locales are. we are not born knowing, and apparently there's huge swaths of our society who are not getting this training readily in the normal course of their lives.