The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Jonathon Naylor Editor A new Facebook page has become a double-edged digital sword, giving residents an open forum for debate but also a source of potentially baseless information. Established about three months ago, Flin Flon Post It has over 700 members whose keyboard-tapping discussions have ranged from the mundane to the intense. 'I think it's a very good site,' says Sandra Hoover, who regularly posts her thoughts. 'It lets you say things that you might not be super comfortable with if you were face to face with (a) person.' Hoover sees the page as an extension of the phone conversations and coffee shop chatter of years past, played out in a modern format. 'It's just a new way of getting your opinion out,' Hoover says. And plenty of opinions are getting out. A recent discussion on Flin Flon's uptown area and concerns over 'vagrants' generated more than 100 posts from nearly 20 different participants. One member said the 'vagrant types' are 'aweful,' while another felt that racism was the real societal problem at play. A less acrimonious conversation focused on the merits of nuclear waste storage in Creighton and whether it would scare away professionals. See ' Obsc...' on pg.7 Continued from pg.1 Other topics have included rearranged-letter obscenities on advertising signs, rising crime rates and the much-maligned tipping fees at the Flin Flon landfill. Even a topic as tedious as a change of hours at a local restaurant elicited more than 30 posts, with members regurgitating rumours and offering lessons on economics. Reflective of Facebook as a whole, Flin Flon Post It consists largely of the under-50 crowd. Most members live in the Flin Flon area, though some are ex-pats still intrigued by the issues of the day in their hometown. Denny Hyndman, who moved away from Flin Flon before returning, got quite a dialogue started when she posted that the number of derelict homes in the community is 'getting ridiculous!' The ensuing deliberation stretched across five days, morphing into a talk on the merits of a community garden, something Flin Flon currently lacks. Such exchanges have kept Hyndman going back to Flin Flon Post It, though she knows not every statement typed can be taken at face value. 'That's like any public media,' Hyndman says. 'It's always going to be biased, it's always going to come from one person, but at the end of the day it's here to stay. It's not going to go (away).' If there is one criticism of Facebook pages, it is that the absence of face-to-face contact emboldens people to go too far, to make statements so over-the-top they would never give voice to them in the non-digital 'real' world. Flin Flon Post It is, at times and to some, a reflection of this phenomenon. Throughout the comments, visitors find strong words, unprovable accusations and an abundance of exclamation points. 'People can sometimes be rude or maybe not use the right kinds of words and someone else might take it the wrong way,' says Hoover. 'So I think in some situations it could cause some hurt feelings.' Yet Hyndman believes that the page is self-regulating in that if comments get out of hand, some members will step in to lighten the mood and keep things on track. 'It should not be a place where people can just get on there and attack (someone),' Hyndman says. 'But I think there's enough rational people on there to say, 'That's enough.'' Still, there's no denying that the page has turned Flin Flon City Council, for instance, into a punching bag. Indeed council has inadvertently supplied the page with some of its meatiest fodder. As long as the comments are kept clean, Hyndman believes the page offers councillors an opportunity to help keep their fingers on the pulse of the community. As it turns out, that may already be happening to some degree. As Hyndman notes, at least two councillors have read the page and added posts of their own. One of those councillors, Tim Babcock, sees both the pros and the cons of the fledgling online forum. 'Facebook can be a great tool for sharing ideas and getting information out,' Coun. Babcock says, but 'you can't take every comment at face value and say, 'Well, I read it on the Internet so it must be true.' You have to do your own due diligence to weed out the truth from the rants sometimes.' Others have little time for a page with no guarantee the discussions are even based on fact. One resident who has viewed the page, but did not want their name published for fear of being associated with 'misinformation,' termed Flin Flon Post It 'an open forum b-tch session.' The resident called on members to 'exercise their critical-thinking skills and realize that everything that's written is not truth and that sometimes people take things out of context.' Even Hyndman, a vocal supporter of the page, concedes not all members are interested in what would generally be seen as legitimate debate. Hyndman estimates half the participants 'are on there to complain' but still sees an 'equal balance' with the other half 'there to sincerely learn.' 'I think so far everybody's been pretty respectful,' Hyndman adds. If things ever got out of control, Hyndman says, Facebook would always have the option of shutting down the page. For Hoover, that would be a shame. 'There's over 700 people now who have signed up for this,' Hoover says. 'So obviously there's a need for it.'
