Hello, my name is Jonathan Buhacoff.
I want to introduce this project to you, it’s something I’ve been thinking about for a long time.
When I read or watch the news or an opinion piece on the Internet, and I read the comments under it, I noticed there’s a lot of intolerance of other perspectives, a lot of suspicion of people’s motives, and a lot of rude and hateful comments. Sometimes I like a comment, sometimes I don’t, but sometimes there are trolls posting mean-spirited things and trying to intentionally to anger people or derail a conversation thread, and that really degrades the experience of interacting with other people.
The challenges facing humanity are complex. For those of us who are concerned about the future, we need a place where we can come together to talk about issues, share what we know, and exchange ideas in an honest and respectful way.
Some people don’t want that, so this project is not for them. It’s for the rest of us – people who do want to have an honest conversation and people who are able to respect each other and be civil, even if we have a different opinion about something. And that’s important because we’re going to have different opinions. And it’s also the best reason to get together and talk. And listen.
What I found is that people are more willing to talk openly and to listen to someone else when they feel that the other person has good intentions. So I’m inviting you.
If you want to make the world a better place, join the civ.org project. It’s about making the future better than the present.
This project is about sharing ideas on how to make the world a better place, collaborating to refine those ideas with constructive criticism and positive attitude, and finding inspiration and support in each other to take action and make that better future happen.
If you like to do your own research, to dig deep into the available evidence and analysis, this project is a place where you can share what you find. If you like to ask questions and challenge assumptions, this is a place where you can apply your critical thinking skills. If you’re shy about participating but you want to see what people are talking about and maybe just upvote what you like, you’ll be able to do that too.
If we intentionally seek out a multitude of perspectives and try to resolve differences in an amicable way, that will make our proposals better.
My vision for this project is that, together, we create an ever-growing and continuously improving set of proposals to make the world a better place, complete with an action plan. One way that I think about this project is that, similar to the way wikipedia is a place where you can find some information on any topic, civ.org will be a place where you can find or start a conversation about any topic.
We can talk about government, the environment, civil rights, entertainment, sports, business, education, nutrition, labor, technology, or whatever.
Please subscribe here for updates and share your thoughts in the comments.
I hope you’ll join the conversation.