The continued attacks on TownUnderground have become rather revealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Apparently, when someone doesn’t like what TownUnderground reports, the response isn’t to identify a factual error, provide contrary evidence, or explain why the reporting is wrong. Instead, the response is personal insults, name-calling and attempts to discredit the person asking the questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That’s not an argument. It’s an avoidance of the argument.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
TownUnderground has been part of the Londonderry community since 2006. Its purpose has always been to provide residents with information about town government, meetings, elections, public officials and issues affecting the community. The site continues to publish meeting agendas, meeting information, videos, documents and commentary about what is happening in town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The anonymous page attacking TownUnderground apparently considers it important enough to repeatedly devote its own content to TownUnderground, its readers, and people who attend public meetings. That is certainly its right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But here’s the important distinction:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
TownUnderground puts its name on its work.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If I make a factual mistake, tell me what the mistake is. Show the evidence. I’ll correct it when warranted. In fact, TownUnderground has publicly established a process for residents to submit information and opinions, including identifying the person submitting the material.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s considerably more constructive than hiding behind an anonymous page while calling other people names.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And let’s be clear about something else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Attending a Town Council meeting, listening to what elected officials say, asking questions, reviewing documents and reporting what happened isn’t \u201cscowling.\u201d It isn’t \u201cdwelling in the dark.\u201d And it certainly isn’t something that requires anyone’s permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s called civic participation.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n People are free to disagree with my opinions. They’re free to criticize TownUnderground. They’re even free to make fun of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But if the criticism is legitimate, let’s have the discussion in the light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Identify the specific statement that is supposedly false.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Show the evidence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Explain what actually happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I’ll be happy to have that conversation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What I’m not interested in is trading childish personal insults with an anonymous Facebook page.<\/p>\n\n\n\n TownUnderground will continue doing what it has done for 20 years:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Show up. Ask questions. Document what happens. Publish the information. Let residents decide for themselves.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n If that makes some people uncomfortable, perhaps the problem isn’t TownUnderground.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps it’s the questions being asked.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The continued attacks on TownUnderground have become rather revealing. Apparently, when someone doesn’t like what TownUnderground reports, the response isn’t to identify a factual error, provide contrary evidence, or explain why the reporting is wrong. Instead, the response is personal insults, name-calling and attempts to discredit the person asking the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12681"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12681\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12682,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12681\/revisions\/12682"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/townunderground.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}