by Diane L Richard, Editor Upfront with NGS
Caveat – as Dick
Eastman says – this piece does contain personal opinions! And, in this case, those opinions expressed
are purely mine and they are NOT the opinions of NGS, though they are about the
genealogical community! That said ...
The Legal Genealogist
(Judy G Russell) often talks about the law and how it impacted our ancestors,
how we can use it to learn more about their lives, how it should be
interpreted, and how it impacts us as we do our research, and much more.
The law is very important in our lives just as it was in the
lives of our ancestors.
You may or may not know that there had been a legal suit,
involving genealogists we are familiar with – Cynthia Howell (aka Cyndi’s list)
and Barry Ewell (MyGenShare.com).
This case was recently “dismissed with prejudice.” Read a brief statement here.
We will never know the full details of what mediated agreement was
reached.
We do know that our genealogy community has witnessed this
most “basic” right to sue. It is
unfortunate that such became necessary and that it did is now part of history
...
On Facebook (FB) (and I’m sure elsewhere) there have been
some “discussion” about the merits and fall-out of this case – fairly
passionate in support of both parties, curious about the details, and much
more. Unfortunately, it is easy to become
negative towards one another for our views and with regards to what are the
perceived merits of the case, its resolution, personal history with those
involved, etc.
Now let’s turn to Ancestry.com – many of us are individual
subscribers or use this database via our local library, etc.
I am personally bothered by all the negativity I have read
recently in online genealogy forums – not just about these two high-profile
situations and just in general. It has
taken many forms and much of it is excruciating painful to read – there are
many genealogy-related forums that I no longer participate in or even read
because of the excessive negativity and personal attacks.
Yes we have our differing opinions. Yes we can agree to disagree. Yes we can discuss the pros and cons of the
two search options or the suit or whatever else. Yes we can provide feedback to Ancestry.com
about our thoughts on what makes for the best search engine. Yes we can respond to comments posted by
others in a respectful manner.
Though, do please consider – is what you have to say
appropriate to be “publicly” posted?
Might you write a personal message?
Were you using your filters? Just like in every day life – do we say
everything we think as we think it? Or
do we “pause” “consider” “filter” and then respond.
Having been brought up to believe “treat others as you would
like to be treated” and to also behave “professionally” (another way of saying “treat
others as you would like to be treated”) – judgmental and personal attack
statements just have no place in our community or the world. It makes me think
that the ability to quickly type and disseminate ones thoughts does result in a
bit of a disservice to us all.
It’s personal and yet anonymous. It’s off the cuff though now permanently
archived until eternity. This just wasn’t
a conversation that was had – it’s documented for all to see in perpetuity.
Ask yourself – if you were in a room and having a frank
discussion with others in our community – would you “say” the same things some have
recently written? If you were on the phone
with a friend and said some of what we have recently read, would you then want
to see those words in writing? It’s like when you have a personal argument with
someone – did you count to 10 before responding?
Please, let’s be civil and forward thinking as we
communicate via the web. Was that “personal”
or “professional” bridge just burned worth it? Did you even realize it was
burned in your fervor to make “your” point in whatever forum you were
communicating in?
There is so much to love about the advances in technology
and communication. There is so much to
love about our ability to readily communicate with people around the world.
And, there can be so much to regret if we act (translate
that into post) something too quickly ... written words are much much harder to
take back. In fact, it’s almost
impossible to take back a written word, or at least a publicly written
word. As we all know, it takes but a few
minutes for someone’s publicly posted comments to be spread throughout forums
both familiar and alien to us.
Please remember that just yesterday we celebrated the 4th
of July – the founding of our country.
It’s founding was based on conflict and ultimately let to the
Revolutionary War ... Not all conflicts though, need to lead to a war. Reasoned and open and polite/respectful communication
can benefit us all.
As a country, we have used adversity and conflict to become
the nation we live in today. Let our
genealogical community also use adversity and conflict to become stronger – let’s
just try to do it in a meaningful, respectful and problem-solving (e.g.
positive) manner ...
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8 July 2013 -- We had a nice
discussion on FB about this post and I wanted to “share” part of it as an
addendum to the post. You can view such as a “first pass” at
addressing the issue raised by Lorine.
Additionally, look for a guest post on 11 July 2013 on this topic!!
The dialogue is reprinted with
permission of both authors.
Lorine Massey -- Diane, I hope I am
saying this politely but it is bothersome to me and thus I have to speak up. I
loved your article and believed it was addressed appropriately to the entire
global genealogy community -- until you said " we celebrated the 4th of
July – the founding of our country." By saying that you immediately
revoked the article encompassing the entire global community of genealogists to
the American genealogy community. I am not sure you intended that (I hope not)
but that sentence did it. Because as I know you are aware, we are a global
community and not all of us live in the USA. I confess to feeling
disappointed when I reached that point in your article and thought to myself
"well, once again we Canadians, Brits, Aussies, Germans, etc are the
forgotten people. Guess we aren't part of the genealogy community" I'm not
meaning to sound spiteful or rude so I hope you take my comment as well-meant,
but I am disappointed. And yes, if we were speaking together on the phone or in
a room I would say this to you - gently, but I'd say it
Editor (aka Diane) -- I hear you
Lorine and you are not rude at all! My original thinking was that I used the
4th of July celebration here as a "launching" pad (along with all
that has recently happened) and so that kind of was the genesis of the article
... and, I did not intend at all to be US-centric (my English relatives are all
horrified also!) ... No offense or exclusion was meant ... open to suggestions
on how best to address!
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