This is a post about spaces and communities. This is a post about how we create and define the online worlds we shape and inhabit, and a story that is unfolding at this moment that tests those methods. This is not a post about Winnipeg. (But it might be, soon.)  

Meet Fred Clark. Fred is a newspaper editor in the U.S. and an evangelical Christian. In 2003, he had an idea: he would blog the entire first book of the infamous Left Behind series of crapopcalyptic End Times fiction. He would break down each page, patiently slashing apart the bad writing, bad theology and bad people behind these books.

It turned into a truly awesome achievement, one that I encourage everyone interested in thoughtful things to read in its entirety. (Start at the bottom post and work your way up; then click “previous” to get the next set.) At this point, it may take weeks of regular visits to get through, but it is as entertaining, intelligent, and thought-provoking as anything I’ve ever read.

And incredibly, eight years later, Fred is still doing it. (He’s now in the midst of the second book of sixteen.)  This is a terribly uncommon level of blog commitment in itself — but he’s also doing high-quality blogging on many other matters of faith, politics, culture and society.

I discovered Slacktivist circa 2004, when someone linked the early efforts of his Left Behind blogging. And I watched as it became one of the most remarkable spaces on the web. It has made a profound impact on me not just as a writer, but as a person. I wasn’t alone: over the years, that plain and unassuming blog assembled one of the most powerful and active communities I’ve ever seen.

Fred’s posts regularly received 500 comments, or more. In their threads, discussion and debate about God and war, about astrophysics and Aesop’s fables ran together, gained steam, spawned ideas. On a blog by an evangelical Christian, the commenters were Christians and atheists, Jews and pagans, agnostics and theists of every description. There were Bible-Belt-preachin’ preachers and radical feminists, straight white single men and gay black parents. It seemed like everyone was there, and at times everyone had a voice.

The community was fascinating to watch. It largely moderated itself: the discussions, often incredibly thoughtful and highly intellectual, were vigorously defended by the community that had come to value the space. Despite the sensitive and often controversial topics, the comments virtually never devolved into the muck of mudslinging and sociopolitical-jingoism that festers in the comment sections of so many other sites. It was a thrilling site, an inspiring place to think and grow. And for almost a decade, it steamed merrily along.

Then Fred made a happy announcement: he was moving the site to Patheos, a blog-hosting site dedicated to “balanced views of religion and spirituality.”

Only things didn’t turn out to be so happy in Slacktivist-land.

Then things got worse.

To summarize the controversy: Patheos, as it turns out, hosts a lot of blogs that are far from inclusive. (I won’t link to any, but there are some blogs there that are drenched in homophobia and xenophobia, among other problems.) There were reportedly bigoted comments made by the site administrator, which I haven’t seen personally but have read reactions to.

For many Slacktivist commenters, the move came across like a betrayal: the betrayal of a space they had invested so much time in creating, defining and shaping. And they responded, hard. A schism has begun to yawn, and for the first time that I’ve seen on that community, true ugliness has infected the threads, as arguments turn personal and the personal turns nasty.

Some commenters have declared they are leaving, or just not commenting again. Others have floated the idea of starting a spin-off community for former Slacktivist diehards to recreate the space that Fred led. Some have lost respect for Fred; others, just for each other.

And Fred, one gets the impression, is now left trying to put the pieces of his community back together. But there is no picture on this box for reference. So how do you restore a virtual space which, once so firm, is now so splintered?  

What I’m more interested in and what fascinates me about this story, which is still very much in progress, is the questions it raises about online communities, and who owns them, and how they evolve.  It amazes me, for instance, that what only three weeks ago seemed like such an exceptional space has been torn apart so quickly.

To me, the most incredible effect that the online world has had on discourse is that it has created a sense of true ownership over content spaces that does not, and almost cannot, exist in most traditional or for-profit media — except for maybe the beloved small-town paper.

The Slacktivist community was made beautiful by that process. Now it is struggling to survive it.  A double-edged sword. And the comments (particularly on this post, warning, huge) are a fascinating snapshot of these new communities, wrestling with just how to handle that sword safely.

“I don’t know who you are or why you think you’re so damn important, but kindly bug off. This isn’t just some random message board and you’re not talking to some random, drive-by commenters… the trolls and jerks that show up here aren’t just invading a message board some of us like. They’re invading our home.” 

-Commenter Geds @ Slacktivist, responding to unknown commenters

As the Internet grows into its adulthood, as more and more people find their online-homes in niche spaces, often run by un- or underpaid authors, how will we learn better to navigate the balance between content creators, and content community? What services may arise to better facilitate achieving and maintaining that balance?  

Or does it all go back to basic human social skills, to a give-and-take, push-and-pull over content and emotional ownership? That’s a game which traditional media has not yet had to play much at field-level (where he who owns the transmission tower, owns what’s on it and where it goes), but bloggers like Fred Clark are learning all too swiftly.

The good news: I believe that Slacktivist will come out of this experience battle-scarred, but perhaps stronger for it.

Meanwhile, as a purely hypothetical point, it makes me wonder: what do I want this humble little space to be, as it grows to find its shape? And how will I define it?