| It was many years ago, but someone made it pretty clear that the overseer of some state had done this or that. Now, I don't remember the names or the details, just that it was the first time that I had known of the field getting leadership's attention like that. I'm not saying the person making the accusations was in the right! I'm simply saying that I seemed to detect that state offices wanted to be sure not to step on toes (as much as possible), since it might wind up on Actscelerate.My family, so far as I know, has always had a good relationship with our state overseers, but most of us have been around long enough to know that sometimes overseers can play hardball (but, to be fair, the great D.A. Biggs said that it didn't matter what decision he made, some were going to like him, and others were not going to like him).HOWEVER, all that came about precisely because we could use pen names. I doubt anyone would have posted such a challenge under their real name (at least if they had anything to lose).Sadly, the Excellent Ministry of the Church of God Facebook page requires (as does pretty much all of FB) one to use their real name. So you can be sure that no one is going to be naming names, so to speak. In fact, just as it happened on Actscelerate, if someone was using their real name, they were sure to be either congratulatory...or very, very careful.At the same time, FB is the current wave of social media (and it's getting old now, too). If we can find a way to bring Actscelerate into the current field of social media, while allowing pen names (if desired), I don't know if it would be much different (since we may have already vented all we had to say when we were using pen names) that what we have now.But I do miss those Wild West days when we could discuss just about anything...and do it sincerely or in jest...without having to worry that someone would spread an ill word about us. |