April 21, 2008
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Writer’s Choice Featured Questions
So, inspired by AntiSoccerMom‘s post Dear Featured Questions, I decided to do a little “dumpster diving” into the Featured Question‘s chatboard. Supposedly all the featured questions come from their chatboard… but very few of them ever get selected as the featured question… and the queue only goes back to August of last year. I know I submitted at least one suggestion before that, but I guess they don’t hold on to anything past… eight months? In any event, they have more than enough questions to have a new featured questions every day, but selection is so erratic… sometimes we get one a week and sometimes we get two or three in a day. And let us not begin to discuss how awful the selected question usually is. I really don’t know who makes the choice, but the majority of chosen questions usually appeal to the lowest common denominator.
I don’t know about you, but I feel a question that can be answered with a simple, one to two sentence reply is hardly worth answering at all. Why base an entire post on it? A question that can be answered with one word is even worse. And what is your weirdest food combination? That gets featured why? With all the great questions languishing away in the chatboard…. why do we get something like that dumped on us? BTW, mint chocolatechip ice cream with butterscotch syrup… which I can have only rarely because of the chocolate allergy. See… one sentence answer… waste of time.
So I’ve decided…. if the featured question manager/creator/whatever cannot be bothered to select any of the good questions wasting away in the queue, why don’t I go in and pick some out for everyone? Every Monday, I’m going to go into the featured question chatboard and select five of the oldest questions abandoned in the chatboard queue until I get closer to the present. Then it will be one a week, every Monday. In the meantime, feel free to post your own suggested questions here as a comment to this post and future writer’s choice posts, instead of the featured question site, since if you have a Good question, chances are it will never be featured over there. Leave the featured question site to the uninsightful and unimaginative.
Answer one question or use them all as writing prompts in the coming week. And recommend these Writer’s Choice posts to your subscribers so that they know there’s an alternative to the humdrum featured questions that have been so far foisted upon us. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to make the featuredq or fq# tag automatically appear like the official featured question does, so if we want to keep track of our fqs as opposed to the xanga-run fqs, we’ll have to manually add our own tags to our posts. May I suggest writerschoicefq and wcfq1a, wcfq1b, etc for each of the chosen questions?
first five questions for this week
(from the featured question chatboard and dated from August of 2007)A. If you were sexually assaulted and got pregnant from it, would you keep the baby or have an abortion? TakingxOverxMeB. If your best friend has a significant other that cheats on him or her and you know, would you tell the friend even if the significant other treats them very well and makes them happy? Why?
ehnviedC. Why are featured questions so mundane and boring?
wayside_taco (This Xangan no longer exists, by the way. Take from that whatever meaning you like.)E. If you were really really really hungry, practically starving, and you miraculously found 1.50 in your jean pocket, so you go to McDonalds, overjoyed that you can finally eat something to shut your stomach up, and you’re just walking out of McDonalds… looking forward to eat that Junior Chicken…and you see a homeless person on the street begging for food, not money… what would you do?
carmen456654April 21st
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Comments (12)
Now one or two of those would be stimulating to pursue. A, I would pass answering but have endless comment on. B is too adolescent for my taste. C, we all know the answer, sadly; no one wants to take responsibility for a question run a muck. I’d be all over D; censorship sucks! E is a run away question…one of those that spawns many questions; my favorite kind. I have one on my site right now. Kind of a research question. I would be pleased to read your input on it.
On E, I would say that anyone so hard up is not in a position to make judgment about how to properly or best distribute charity. Rock and a hard place, is a launch point for some. It takes skill to know when to help. Anyone unable to feed themselves lacks that skill.
Tooootally good idea, actually, I kinda wish I’d thought of it first. However, I think it would be really cool if this got going and your site got a lot of traffic (I don’t know how much it already gets, but more is always good) especially with your daily Pagan holidays and rites that you post – then more and more people would read them and know more about Paganism
Always a plus. I hope this gets a lot of response.
Anyway, I think I shall go and answer one of these right now!
HOORAY!!! Great idea!
E: If I’m really really hungry, I can to go my mom’s and steal her food. But if I’m on my own, self-sufficient… charity begins at home. You have to help yourself before you help others. This doesn’t mean I need a fancy house before I give to charities, just that I need to meet my own basic needs before I can help others meet theirs.
Wonderful post!
On E. If I were really hungry and found a $1.50 I would go buy a loaf of day old bread for $.50 and a $.50 package of ham and give us both a sandwich. Problem solved and two less people in the world at hungry at the moment!
This is a fantastic idea! Thank you! Thank you!
you should totally be the Featured Question chooser person.
@BADBOYDOOMDADDY - I tried to select a strata of questions to please everyone. It seems though that E is the most popular question. I have to assume though, from my personal point of view, that if I were really, really hungry and miraculously found $1.50 in my pocket, bought a sandwich and then saw a homeless person, I’d realize that as hungry as I was, I’d have money again by the time I hit an ATM, whereas the homeless person wouldn’t have the luxury. But I’m surprised that no one’s come up with the obvious answer…. you’ve already bought your sandwich, so there’s no going back on that. Cut it in half and both parties are momentarily satisfied.
BTW… I have tried, twice now, to read your posts and nothing ever comes up but a blank screen with you starry background. It’s kind of annoying. I’ll try again, but you’ll know if I was successful or not by whether or not I comment.
@Jemstone05 - Thanks!
I do hope that my collection of Pagan holidays will be greeted with an open mind, or if not, that they just choose to skip over them.
@BoureeMusique - heh, yeah, mom’s are always good for a sammich.
You could always tell him to wait there while you went home and forraged…
@Southernlass - But you’re assuming that you knew about the homeless person before you made your purchase. You’ve already bought the sandwich. I don’t think McD’s would allow you to return it.
@harmony0stars - Ahhh but you assume I wouldn’t notice him/her before I went in the store. I’m pretty observant like that.
@harmony0stars - A BLANK SCREEN!!!??? Please do let me know if that problem persists, so I can address the problem with Xanga. On the topic, not change the subject so much as side track it slightly: On track, yes, it considerably changes the dynamic, if one had assets other than what was in the pocket; off track a bit, if one were to wish to help, there are many who need it that are not capable of bettering themselves. So, should one give to someone in need, if it is possible (for example) for that person to better themselves by defeating the dragon (drugs)? Or should one give the money to the Salvation Army, a very worthy charity? Non the less I am aware of individuals who take advantage of it because too lazy to face the challenges of life. Don’t get me wrong, most really need and I give when I can. But, there are alternatives. The question in the real world is, not should you give, but how. For myself, I question the wisdom of having done so in such fashion, both one on one and to established charities. The most rewarding (and most challenging) experience of charity I have had is in adopting a child with extremely severe disabilities.