Moderating Mapleafweb's Moderation

[Argus]

I don't understand the attention or why we care.

I feel antisemitism needs to be challenged.

[Big Guy]

I feel antisemitism needs to be challenged.

I fully agree, just like Islamophobia!

[Big Guy]

Parsing posts is a very effective method of replying to a point of view and a method used by many on this board. I am not comfortable replying to posts using that format. The process would require me to parse the parsed post and my experience has been that it leads to very long posts in which parsed posts are parsed and those parsed posts are again parsed leading to confusion. For that reason I do not reply to posts which posters have chosen to parse. I would assume that I have the right to reply or not to reply to a post referring to something that I have posted.

I have just been given a warning stating that that "Please ignore posts rather than posting comments like this: "Sorry, I do not reply to parsed posts". Since I am unable to state the reason at any time when I want to explain to a fellow poster why I am not answering a question then please assume that in the future, If I do not respond to your comment, that I am not ignoring you but unable to give the reason for my lack of response.

I believe that all posters have a right to comment using whatever format satisfies their comfort level. All I am trying to explain is that if you desire a response form Big Guy then please do not parse your presentation. Is that not a nice way for folks to guarantee that Big Guy does not challenge your views?

I have always believed that participation here is voluntary and answering a comment directed towards a poster here is not a directive but a courtesy. Has that changed?

What is offensive or disruptive about about explaining in a very civil manner to fellow posters why they are not receiving a reply from a comment that they have made about my opinion?

Edited March 15, 2016 by Big Guy

[bush_cheney2004]

....What is offensive or disruptive about about explaining in a very civil manner to fellow posters why they are not receiving a reply from a comment that they have made about my opinion?

I believe it is off topic and thread drift....sorry for the parse....but we are encouraged to trim our posts to reduce clutter.

[Charles Anthony]

What is offensive or disruptive about about explaining in a very civil manner to fellow posters why they are not receiving a reply from a comment that they have made about my opinion?

I believe it is off topic and thread drift....sorry for the parse....but we are encouraged to trim our posts to reduce clutter.

Correct. Trim Your Posts and Quotes --- 2006

The reason why somebody ignores a post does not matter. Announcing "I am not responding to your post because..." is clutter that invites more clutter and adds nothing to any discussion. If everbody did that, the forum would be a mess.

Put your notice as a re-joinder to a post that furthers the discussion but making a separate post every time is clutter.

You do not have to defend your reason. Feel free to ignore any post you want. If you want folks to know out of courtesy, use less real estate by putting that explanation in your signature or your profile page.

I have always believed that participation here is voluntary and answering a comment directed towards a poster here is not a directive but a courtesy. Has that changed?

No.

Why shut down the whole Israel thread simply because someone was using foul language and engaging in Jew baiting? Would it not be better to simply suspend that individual?

That is not the reason the thread was temporarily closed.

The thread was temporarily closed with the intention of reopening it after we decide how to intervene because the thread degraded into a mess that was no longer on topic.

Or just edit/delete the offending posts and any responses to it.

We could do that but we prefer to avoid censorship as a 1st course of action. We prefer that folks stop disruptive behavior.

We are more concerned about effecting change of future behavior rather than revising past bahavior.

Ignoring it does not make it go away.

That is why we tell folks to report AND ignore it ---- whatever "it" happens to be. You are repeatedly misrpresenting our directives.

Ignoring a behavior isolates the behavior from an observational perspective.

Isolation of a behavior is the precursor to making it go away. After isolation, the behavior goes away 1 of 2 ways: the poster stops or we stop the poster.

We can not read minds.

Every time you respond to that which you perceive to be trolling, we deem your response to be a public statement that says: "This post is worthy of a response!"

Are we supposed to take the stand that we are smarter than all of you? We could but we would rather not. We would rather you told-us-through-the-Report-function that "This post is worthy of deletion!" and proved that assertion by ignoring it.

None of you should think your responses-to-whatever-you-believe-is-trolling are distinguishable from your responses to anything else.

SHORT VERSION: The power is in your hands. You get that power by following directives.

[bush_cheney2004]

Correct. Trim Your Posts and Quotes --- 2006

See...my flowchart is working. The moderator workflow model v1.0 is nearly complete.

[Big Guy]

...

The reason why somebody ignores a post does not matter. Announcing "I am not responding to your post because..." is clutter that invites more clutter and adds nothing to any discussion. If everbody did that, the forum would be a mess.

...

It may not matter to you but it matters to me. I have no problem with another poster setting the condition under which they will reply to my posts. Then I have the choice of adhering to them or not depending if I want to interact with that poster or not.

It is your medium and obviously your decision - I believe that you are in error. On the one hand you criticize trolling and personal attacks on the other hand you limit the ability of a poster to explain with civility to another poster why they are not expanding the discussion.

In my case, what I am trying to explain to another poster is that if he/she desires a response from me then they they should not parse their post. I am not suggesting that they do not do so - that is always their choice.

When you do not allow posters to explain politely what their personal conditions are for taking the time to get involved in a discussion then you are restricting the healthy discourse between members. I have no idea why you believe that the process would lead to the forum "becoming a mess". I suggest that it would streamline communications.

As another example, personally, I do not read posts which are longer than 300 words unless I have full respect for the poster. I feel that by setting my personal conditions of my interacting with another poster they can assume that any reply which is longer than 300 words will probably not be read my me and would discourage posters to post a diatribe of garbage in reply to me on one of my posts. That would decrease the "clutter".

It would also encourage those who really desire seriously to interact with me to be brief and direct. They may choose to not interact and that too is OK with me.

I ask that you review your decision and suggest that you are creating more problems and text by not allowing members to politely explain their criteria for interacting or not with another poster.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Big Guy

[Smallc]

In my case, what I am trying to explain to another poster is that if he/she desires a response from me then they they should not parse their post.

As has been explained multiple times, we are encouraged to do just that for the sake of clarity, flow, and bandwidth limitations. If you just flight the switch in your reply box and use manual [ quote ] [ /quote ] tags it isn't difficult.

[GostHacked]

That is why we tell folks to report AND ignore it ---- whatever "it" happens to be. You are repeatedly misrpresenting our directives.

Ignoring a behavior isolates the behavior from an observational perspective.

I am not misrepresenting your directives. As you said before, it's kind of arbitrary as to what you consider trolling even if reported. Ignoring it does not make it go away. Just stating a fact... why? Well, let's look at how old this thread is.

I know I keep mentioning it, but ... again how old is this thread?

With regards to the Israel thread that was locked, it's interesting that a simple assertion of not being an anti-semite gets very very long posts telling them that they are anti-semites with such abrasiveness they get a total pass compared to a couple simple statements I have made.

I'll stop now, as everything is simply just a re#.

[Charles Anthony]

A few posts have been taken down because they are off topic thread drift. If your post is missing, then you are culpable of thread drift.

I'll stop now, as everything is simply just a re#.

Good because you do not get it.

We rely upon the membership to define specific instances of trolling.

The membership is directed to identify instances of trolling by reporting them and ignoring them. If the presumed-trolling is reported and the reporter responds to that which he has reported, then the reporter is a problem.

We do not agree with all members but when members respond to what they themselves define as trolling then the responders-to-trolling perpetuate their own problems.

SHORT VERSION: If 99% of the members Report you as trolling and they all ignore you and then you continue on with that-which-the-99%-deems-to-be-trolling, then we tend to side with the 99% and nix you.

If those conditions are not met, then the members need to learn to ignore you and move on.

CAVEAT: Sometimes the 99% are wrong, in our opinion. In those instances where we are confident that you, the 1%, are correct/not trolling, then we will side with you and tell the 99% to ignore you and move on or to politely ask you to explain so that you may enlighten the 99% crowd.

When you do not allow posters to explain politely what their personal conditions are for taking the time to get involved in a discussion then you are restricting the healthy discourse between members. I have no idea why you believe that the process would lead to the forum "becoming a mess". I suggest that it would streamline communications.

You are not being disallowed. Your civil notice/explanation does NOT need a separate post of its own. It is that simple.

Most people parse their posts as instructed. Thus, if everybody posted notices as you wish to do, the forum would be a mess. You have the freedom to deliver the same message in different ways:

1) place the notice in your signature;

2) place the notice in your AboutMe section of your Profile page;

3) include your notice as part of a reply which continues the discussion, for example:

It may not matter to you but it matters to me. I have no problem with another poster setting the condition under which they will reply to my posts. Then I have the choice of adhering to them or not depending if I want to interact with that poster or not.

---SNIP---

I ask that you review your decision and suggest that you are creating more problems and text by not allowing members to politely explain their criteria for interacting or not with another poster.

---

To Thomas Richard Harrold and everybody else,

I do not respond to parsed posts.

4) send the members a Personal Message explaining so.

Incidentally, you just responded to my parsed post and you parsed your reply. Thanks.

The answers shouldn't invade anyone's privacy and I have a hard time imagining our moderators haven't developed a sense of what those answers are.

There are no answers to your question. There are no distinct teams.

I am constantly pleasantly surprized by each 1 of you. As a reader, I am like the old-time snarky theater critic who goes to shows and says out loud what I predict the actors will say. I am often mistaken. Every 1 of you posts something that makes me say to myself: "I did not see that coming. I did not expect him to hold that political view."

Maybe it's time for a new avatar.

Great movie. Instead of changing your avatar, turn your camera around or get a color television.

You see things too much in black or white.

and the mods have really begged for more of it to help "workflow".

No. The mods have not begged for help with "workflow" ---- re-quoting yourself, your term. Rather, the mods beg for clarity among complaints.

If you want us to do something, then tell us what you want us to do.

If you want us to do something but you refuse to tell us what you want us to do, then we consider the Report to be trolling ---- if we do not agree with the allegation of trolling, that is. We tend to ignore it and move on.

Between partisans and with more or less equal numbers of complaints from each team?

What teams? Here is a challenge: Define the "teams" as you see fit.

I can only speak for myself: I do not see any tidy teams along political discussion lines. I find it difficult to take anybody seriously who perceives distinct political teams.

All I see is a potpourri of many different spices. That is the beauty of this place. You see circles and I see spheres.

I do not know how to take claims/questions of partisanship seriously because they are metaphysical concepts that do not exist in any objective manner.

If folks formed their own teams and then self-identified as members of their created teams, then MAYBE I can begin to take your question seriously but I am NOT going to pigeon-hole anybody into any man-made/exist-only-in-our-minds camps. I challenge anybody to start a thread whereby folks self-identify into groups. Call it Which Is Your Team? Red or Blue --- Canadian Edition if you will. I bet you 3 cases of beer that you will never get 2 distinct camps.

Here are some teams that I can see:

Folks Who Want To Have A Discussion

Folks Who Are On A Game Show Writing To Impress An Audience Who Are NOT Engaged In A Discussion

or

Folks Who Write As If They Are Free To Leave

Folks Who Write As If They Are Trapped Here

or

Folks Who Write As If Their Wives Are Reading Over Their Shoulders

Folks Who Write As If They Would NEVER Let Their Wives Read Over Their Shoulders

or

Folks Who Want Censorship

Folks Who Want Free Speech

or

Folks Who Respond To Posts They Claim They Want Deleted

Folks Who Do Not Respond To Posts They Want Deleted

or

Folks Who Are Polite

Folks Who Are Rude

[bush_cheney2004]

No. The mods have not begged for help with "workflow" ---- re-quoting yourself, your term. Rather, the mods beg for clarity among complaints.

If you want us to do something, then tell us what you want us to do.

If you want us to do something but you refuse to tell us what you want us to do, then we consider the Report to be trolling ---- if we do not agree with the allegation of trolling, that is. We tend to ignore it and move on.

Right...this is the desired "workflow" (my word)...to reduce moderator "workload" (your word). All is well.

Good call on that parsing thing....made me chuckle.

[eyeball]

Great movie. Instead of changing your avatar, turn your camera around or get a color television.

You see things too much in black or white.

There's some truth to that alright.

I can only speak for myself: I do not see any tidy teams along political discussion lines. I find it difficult to take anybody seriously who perceives distinct political teams.

All I see is a potpourri of many different spices. That is the beauty of this place. You see circles and I see spheres.

I do not know how to take claims/questions of partisanship seriously because they are metaphysical concepts that do not exist in any objective manner.

I don't either but I guess I take them anyway and get sucked into the vortex. I like the comparison between circles and spheres and I must be one of the least partisan people around here....maybe a little partisanship would round me out some.

I think the reason I mentioned teams was the term gamesmanship kimmy used in her reply to me prompted me to think of how many times over the years I've heard references to teams. The tone of the discussion also seemed to be touching on the relative sensitivity of posters and the "teams" they belong to hence my question. Not an important question as I probably could have seen myself.

Thanks for your insights.

[kimmy]

I just wanted to mention that I killed my first spammer on Sunday! Still feeling pretty buzzed about it.

I feel like I should get little decals to put on my computer case for each kill.

-k

[Charles Anthony]

Right...this is the desired "workflow" (my word)...to reduce moderator "workload" (your word). All is well.

To? Uh... no. You do not get it.

I did not say our goal is to reduce moderator workload. Our goal is to lead folks towards civil and fruitful discussion. That is it, that is all.

Maintaining civil and fruitful discussion just happens to reduce our workload when folks refrain from responding to posts they want deleted. Hence, the advice to avoid giving us more work than necessary in that case.

If you reject/misunderstand our motives and or our goals, that is cool. Just focus on reducing our workload if you want us to delete a post and all will be well.

[WestCoastRunner]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and suffer the wrath that is sure to come but I believe that the female posters here are getting tired of the male aggressive attacks that place on each other. Seriously, it does sometimes feel like we are back in school yard bs.

This can be an all male forum if it's what the members want but I don't think it is and I don't expect civilized posts to female members but rather, more civilized posts to each other.

[bush_cheney2004]

To? Uh... no. You do not get it.

I did not say our goal is to reduce moderator workload. Our goal is to lead folks towards civil and fruitful discussion. That is it, that is all.

"Workload" was the message....the implication is obvious.

Edited March 21, 2016 by bush_cheney2004

[Argus]

I'm going to go out on a limb here and suffer the wrath that is sure to come but I believe that the female posters here are getting tired of the male aggressive attacks that place on each other. Seriously, it does sometimes feel like we are back in school yard bs.

Your problem is not with aggressive or insulting posts. It's with aggressive and insulting posts by people who don't share your ideological beliefs and positions. You have openly applauded insulting posts recently, and expressed admiration for posters who are notoriously aggressive and insulting. Their sharing your political views clearly outweighs your desire for respectful dialogue.

[GostHacked]

I am now challenging the notion of posting videos.

We see video links and embedded links in the 'What are you listening too' thread. Is this not in violation of the new 'no videos only link too video' rule? Since those have not been removed or adjusted, then I think it is safe to say that the rule can be ditched since it is enforced in other threads, but not that one.

[Charles Anthony]

FACEPALM

I am now challenging the notion of posting videos.

We made it very clear that we make exceptions for the fun threads.

Lighten up.

[betsy]

I've been trying to pm Charles Anthony to ask why another topic was removed, but it won't accept any pm. I have to address it here:

Can you please explain why a topic, "Dear Atheist, what's the basis for your belief," was removed.

It was a legitimate question. There has been several references to religious people as believers of "fairy tales" and "myths."

The statement of the NAS had clearly put the shoe on the other foot!

It poses a dilemma for atheists....what is wrong about asking atheists to give the basis for their beliefs?

Edited March 26, 2016 by betsy

[Michael Hardner]

Can you please explain why a topic, "Dear Atheist, what's the basis for your belief," was removed.

Hi Betsy - the topic wasn't removed but you posted two topics that were very similar, so they were merged.

[betsy]

Hi Betsy - the topic wasn't removed but you posted two topics that were very similar, so they were merged.

Thanks for the explanation.

Edited March 26, 2016 by betsy

[GostHacked]

FACEPALM

We made it very clear that we make exceptions for the fun threads.

Lighten up.

So it's ok for the 'fun' threads, but not for 'serious' threads?? Where do you draw the line?

[Michael Hardner]

So it's ok for the 'fun' threads, but not for 'serious' threads?? Where do you draw the line?

Fun threads tend to be in the off-topic section, ie. Travel, Leisure, Sports, Arts & Culture... like that.

[GostHacked]

Fun threads tend to be in the off-topic section, ie. Travel, Leisure, Sports, Arts & Culture... like that.

Either it's all accepted or none of it is. Getting real irritated with these rules that apply to some things but not others.

Consistency is key here.

Also, instead of locking threads, how about you deal with the people shitting up the threads? That would be more effective and conducive to better dialogue.