Top products from r/metaboardgames

I'd love to send you a book that is only so so, but has the most wonderful discussion on the human brain and how we classify information. Throughout childhood and young adulthood we build up neural nets in our brain called attractors. As these build up, they harden, and we "see the world in those dimensions", literally firing off concepts when things match them. BTW, the book isn't about any of the below, it just had that one attractor section.

Both sides of this see things in terms of their attractors. It's why propaganda culture, and ideology works.

You have an attractor in your brain that sees "red". I share that. Most (but not all) of the people here do too.

You have an attractor in your brain that sees "politics" here, I have one that sees "Stuff that people on the conservative dimension in the social sphere see as politics that would be kept out of discussions that are for everyone", and I have one that says "Stuff that people on the progressive dimension of the social sphere sees as 'finally recognizing how much popular culture craps on them'", that for some god awful department of shitty names called privilege.

It takes a bit of mental effort to let both fire, but people can learn to do this, it's called mindfulness. The building up of a set of mutually contradictory attractors that do let a brain settle on a simple conclusion is called nuance, you, and many people, have this in some areas of their lives, but everyone takes shortcuts here, because you can't function if everything is like that. Constant intellectual discomfort is.....uncomfortable.

However, as this is one of my roles, I do keep both of those there in my mind. It's one of the benefits of being around a lot of very different people, you get to understand them and import their viewpoints into your brain.

> politics posts

> it's no ideology

The first of these two statements is something your mind has as an attractor. It feels like change, possibly unwanted change from people who are often dicks as you see change and feel at least intellectual discomfort from fiddling with those other ideas and ways of seeing.

The second is you stating "My brain does not see the ideology". You literally just said "I don't have an attractor for that". The fact you don't recognize "no ideology" as "what's pretty standard for an american of my age, as made by books, movies and propaganda", but there is an attractor in your brain too for this stuff. It's just not well labeled to you. You're not mindful of what it represents.


I believe you, and I believe you that the presence of these ideas causes intellectual discomfort.

Lets talk about a somewhat moderate person the "other side" (not someone who conducts war about it on twitter about it, someone moderate):

We do moderate political speech, "vote for X", "here is a board game about Trump", etc. This probably isn't obvious, as it's been moderated away.

They see what you see as "politics posts" as shit that's always gone on to them which has put them in a one down position from you for decades/centuries/for all time, not politics. Some do take political action around it, but that's not the primary goal. They are publicly saying "I don't like this stuff" or "can we find something better/more elaborate" but they are fundamentally having a different pattern match go off. They have been silent in the past about it because there was not a reasonable space to say negative things without retribution.

They see "it's no ideology" as "that person doesn't see how this shits been hurtful to me". They do see an explicit ideology in modern culture. They start throwing out terms like heteronormativity, privilege and white supremacy, as those are the names, to them, of that "no ideology". It's their attractors. And then tribalism comes out where people start retreating to their nice, uncomplicated in-groups because who needs all this intellectual discomfort and "hey did they just call me a racist by implication?" comes up to people

It's all about the different attractors. You both literally see the world in different ways, and of course you like your way. But that doesn't mean we should just fold into one or the other.

Remember how I said the benefits of being around a lot of different people is that you get to understand them and import their viewpoints into your brain? Be around these people, hear their viewpoints, understand how their brain works, and understand their quiet, unsaid attractors as well. Then for the love of god, use that power for good, understanding how everyone is individually pained.

> "only votes matter"

It was never claimed, and the quotation marks are unjustified.

> complete bullshit

Spoken like a leader. Proof by profanity?

> make your own

Maybe consider taking your own advice? This whole schism could have been avoid by creating /r/serious_boardgames or something, rather than modifying an existing community.

> I'll continue working on curating /r/boardgames to be the best board game forum I can

Nobody doubts that. What is being doubted is your ability to make a good one.

> cause some people to be upset while they get used to them.


This is not how to lead effectively. This is known as bad management. Read a simple book on it like The One Minute Manager or many others, and you will learn that what you are doing is a textbook example of how to do things terribly, and that there are much better ways to lead people. Here's a hint: part of it involves listening to people.

They recommended The One Minute Manager.