This is from the Mayor’s Facebook page:
A NOTE FROM MAYOR WARREN’S CAMPAIGN:
Earlier today, Mayor Warren was thrown from his bike after hitting a pothole in Stow, MA during a 60-mile training ride for the upcoming Pan-Mass Challenge. EMT’s responded to the scene and transported Mayor Warren to Emerson Hospital as a precaution. The mayor was released from the hospital a few hours later with minor injuries and orders to rest.
Mayor Warren looks forward to resuming his training for the Pan-Mass Challenge as soon as he is able.
Here’s to a quick recovery Mr. Mayor.
Why would anybody give a thumbs down to the comment, “Here’s to a quick recovery Mr. Mayor”?
Hoping for a quick recovery, and a new appreciation of why cyclists report potholes more frequently than other road users.
Gail – This is why a few of us recommended just having thumbs up, not thumbs down. I’ve seen this happen on other posts here where it’s hard to imagine why anyone would dislike them – just look at the posts on “Nevertheless they persisted”
http://village14.com/2017/06/30/nevertheless-they-persisted/#axzz4mRFbG4yd
Some other very good sites, such as Universal Hub, just have thumbs up. That avoids this gratuitous nastiness.
@mgwa: My understanding is that just a thumbs up wasn’t an option. I suspect that Universal Hub has a few more resources than V14. I guess we’ll just have to stay confounded about people’s ill wishes.
Hope the Mayor recovers swiftly and gets back on the campaign trail. He’s raising a lot of important issues and his voice will be missed while he gets well.
Glad Mayor Warren is okay. I’d like to second the above comment from mgwa. I love it here on Village 14, but in my opinion the thumbs-down feature should not be part of this forum.
I hope the Mayor is okay. The following comment is not about this specific thread but about the topic that has come up within it.
A few weeks ago I made an appointment with the top dog, the big cheese, THE head honcho of this blog. I had to go through fifteen layers of underpaid underlings to even make the appointment and at the designated time, had to go through ten layers of security before finally being ushered into the inner layer, but not before swearing an oath that I wouldn’t reveal their identity, not even their gender.
I expressed my dismay at the thumbs-up/down system on the blog to this person. While this individual raised some good points for its existence I still maintain that it’s irritating at best, a discouraging tool used to dampen discussion at the worst. Nuanced opinions and writing deserve more than a lazy click of the button.
Unfortunately, my opinion wasn’t shared by this Grand Poobah. Fortunately, it only took me a few days to recover from the bruises I incurred when the floor underneath my chair opened and I was sent hurtling down a long chute to be deposited into an alley outside.
@Mark: I feel your pain. Jerry Reilly can be brutal.
My clumsy fingers on my phone have accidentally clicked thumbs down when I meant thumbs up. Makes me feel kinda bad.
@Mary (and everyone): You can change your thumb choice (or errors). Just click on the opposite thumb. On my browser there’s a slight delay. But, give a few seconds, it will change.
Whether or not thumbs down is a good idea when discussing local issues is one thing, but the option should be removed when wishing a person well when s/he has been in an accident or otherwise incapacitated. If it can’t be removed as an option, then the question about its value to civil dialogue is appropriate.
I don’t think anyone using the thumbs down against the Mayor or anyone who suffers hardship, injury or loss will look very good or get any mileage out of it. Knowing Setti, he was probably pushing his bike full gear at top speed when it happened. That has pluses and minuses. Glad he’s okay and forging ahead.
Sincere good wishes for a quick recovery for all the Mayor’s bruises! Hope he gets back to training asap!
BTW, thumbs up or down was the sign given by Emperors or the hordes watching as to whether to finish the human kill in a coliseum fight. Barbaric then, barbaric now, too. Words are definitely better.
@Mark Marderosian: That comment deserves two thumbs up!
Fortunately the mayor went down in Stow without serious injury. The pothole he found there a couple of days ago was probably quite like the one I discovered 10 years ago on Centre Street while doing laps around Crystal lake that sent me down with bleeding facial cuts, and a broken wrist. It’s a good thing he wasn’t riding on our roads given their historical and current day condition. Dare he not ride here ?
While on the subject of potholes- Dips-o-facto: the process by which a municipality will not purposely fill roadway aberration higher than the level surface allowing for the settling over time which has a tendency to create dips in the roadway. The municipality’s policy is directly proportional to limits of liability and whether or not, as in Newtons’ case, is self insured. Universally true in Mass., smaller towns are more efficient in their road maintenance operation; correspondingly Newton tax & spend affluence keeps more employed – much like the FDR works progress administration of the 1930’s – but that was then..