I love what Margaret Sabo Wills said about LACTNET, and the
comparisons with Lactnet on Facebook, and I wholeheartedly
agree. This LACTNET has been a lifeline to me since 1996 when I was
a lone IBCLC in Zimbabwe. It remained a lifeline when I emigrated to
Australia in 2003 and finally to England in 2005. Through all the
early years and the later years LACTNET has been a source of
unparallelled information, camaraderie and introductions. One of the
most exciting spin-offs continues to be the chance to actually meet
Lactnetters on several continents, and many have become close
personal friends.
And Margaret describes very well some of the differences between this
LACTNET and the Facebook Lactnet. There's one other aspect which I
would like to add, with regret. The Facebook Lactnet can show a
level of competitiveness, flaming and disrespect which I've never
seen here - and that's a shame. Whether that's because our tireless
list-mothers moderate the list so well, and remind those who stray of
expected Lactnet Netiquette, I don't know. But this feels like a
safe place where IBCLCs and others involved in helping mothers to
breastfeed are able to air differences and present new information in
a way that helps us all to learn and appreciate another point of
view. The discussions are... well... professional.
This sometimes doesn't happen on the Facebook Lactnet pages. I
recently dared to support the views expressed on tongue tie by one of
our colleagues who has enjoyed tremendous prestige and respect for
many many years. Her blog urged caution, and it spoke to me. The
discussions deteriorated in a quite alarming way to become downright
unpleasant and personal. Accusations flew back and forth implying
and sometimes asserting that some of us didn't know what we were
talking about or seeing - it was awful. This kind of judgmental
discourse is terribly destructive, not least because it stifles
debate. It's also so unnecessary. Differences in practice and
opinion are best discussed respectfully. I have colleagues on other
lists where we argue all the time, but we remain friends and have
collaborated over many years to advocate for breastfeeding in special
situations.
It's reassuring to know that, although the volume of posts has
diminished in the last couple of years, this LACTNET still attracts
3400-odd subscribers (last time I looked) - and remains such a
vibrant and dynamic source of so much professional support, as
Margaret describes. I recently offered a handout to subscribers who
emailed privately, and I have to say I was amazed and delighted by
the response. We have all sorts of colleagues out there whose names
I've never heard of!, as well as old friends whose voices are now
seldom heard..... Let me encourage all those lurkers to jump in to
the discussions. Let's hear from you and have the benefit of your
experience and thoughts. Or even your inexperience and fresh ideas
if you're comparatively new - this forces us to re-examine some of
our possibly out-of-date practices. And by all means, let's keep
this LACTNET in the same format, and with the same mindset that it
has always had. Vive LACTNET, a safe forum for the exchange of ideas
and opinions and always a wonderful source of info, education and
entertainment. @>----
Pamela Morrison IBCLC
Rustington, England
At 05:00 12/01/2015, you wrote:
>Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2015 08:57:48 -0500
>From: Margaret Sabo Wills <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Lactnet on Facebook
>
>Just saw this question -- As a long-time reader of Lactnet (though
>up and down with how well I keep up with it -- so maybe this has
>been discussed in more depth already) I want to comment on the
>Facebook angle. Another LC on-line discussion I belong to has
>migrated much of its discussion to Facebook, and (while this reveals
>that I'm not a digital native who grew up with it), I'm finding the
>format to be an overwhelming jumble. There are with multiple
>threads going on simultaneously, with comments being added to
>threads way down on the page, and, if one isn't fast enough, or
>visiting multiple times a day, comments can slip down to the hidden
>realms before one reads them. Longer posts can get split up. It's
>also not easily searchable. And it's all at the mercy of whatever
>changes Facebook wants to make to their format, their storage, and
>policies-- and while the participants may squawk about not liking a
>change, they pretty much go along. Facebook is a business, not a
>public utility -- it has no sense of obligation to our higher
>purpose. (And even the Yahoo groups, which are an easier format,
>aren't necessarily there for the ages, and their recent format
>changes are a pain. Hmm, just grumpy here in general.) I know that
>Facebook was seen as the hip, new way to communicate, and we
>certainly do need to make younger lactation consultants feel so
>welcome and listened to in our graying profession, because they live
>in the house of tomorrow -- but I'm told that now that grandmothers
>are all on Facebook, younger people are becoming less and less
>interested in it.
>
>On the larger point -- Lactnet is a wide and deep resource, that
>devoted listmothers watch over and maintain. One can go back and
>catch up after a few weeks away and feel that they saw
>everything. The archives are treasure -- sure, there are some goofy
>posts -- but whenever I have an unusual situation, it's such a
>comfort to be able to search the archives that reach back for so
>many years now. The maintaining of the archives, and the search
>feature is valuable to our profession. If I weren't supposed to be
>doing other stuff right now, I could go back and search for whether
>this discussion has already taken place.
>
>Discussion and camaraderie is important, regardless of the format,
>and I'm sure that some people love the Facebook approach -- find it
>lively and easy and stimulating. But so much of that discussion is
>likely to be lost for the long term.
>
>Margaret Wills, Maryland
---
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