Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 To be fair, I ignore most people's posts most of the time. What does that say about you? He doesn't run the site and doesn't have to invest the time hence my lack of sympathy for his constant complaints. I've offered in the past. And when I see things not working I try to see how they could be made to work better. You seem to be content with whatever the status quo is. If he expends as much energy to ignore the annoying posters and to focus solely on the ball and not the player then he may have a leg to stand on. I don't turn the other cheek. Neither do you. If the rules prohibited going after the player, and were enforced, I could easily operate within that framework. And, in fact, that's what I'm suggesting. Then the rules are enforced against him and he can't handle the medicine because so and so wasn't suspended too. That's not the case. Usually when I complain its because of a new twist on an interpretation of the rules. No one here, I suspect, deliberately posts something they know will likely get them suspended. The problem is in predicting what the mods will consider to justify that, since it changes constantly. For the record, the last time I was suspended, so was the other party. Yet the attitude usually expressed by the mods is that everything is obvious and you should know this or that is against the rules. Provide me with a clear, clean framework and I can operate within it. It's the constantly shifting borders which catch me out. "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 (edited) Last time I logged on there were 9126 members. There are no more than a few dozen active members at this time. You hadn't picked up on this? Seriously?! I find no difficulty with the way this site is being moderated. It is free access, there is no obligation to participate. The lowest common denominator, chewing its cud, satisfied with whatever is dumped into its trough, without any desire or imagination for improving things. Colour me impressed. Edited October 25, 2015 by Argus "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Big Guy Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Keep up your rhetoric and those numbers will probably decrease. Why not stay away for a year and see if the numbers increase? Note - For those expecting a response from Big Guy: I generally do not read or respond to posts longer then 300 words nor to parsed comments.
msj Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 What does that say about you? That I place some kind of value on my time and don't bother to read nor worry about responding to every single post or part of posts that I disagree with. I've offered in the past. And when I see things not working I try to see how they could be made to work better. You seem to be content with whatever the status quo is. Things are fine here so status quo for me. If you ran it there is no doubt I'd be somewhere else. If a believer demands that I, as a non-believer, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect but for my submission. And that is incompatible with a secular democracy. Flemming Rose (Dutch journalist) My biggest takeaway from economics is that the past wasn't as good as you remember, the present isn't as bad as you think, and the future will be better than you anticipate. Morgan Housel http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/01/14/things-im-pretty-sure-about.aspx
BC_chick Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 I know that you ignore my posts and as much as I disagree with many of argus' posts I do agree with some of his points here. Charles can be very dismissive and condescending to requests in these support threads. It would be nice to have them taken seriously all of the time. True, but they're hardly left-wing biased. They've moderated a lot of my stuff and allowed a right-winger to get away with the exact same thing. It's kind of the worst thing that any humans could be doing at this time in human history. Other than that, it's fine." Bill Nye on Alberta Oil Sands
On Guard for Thee Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Keep up your rhetoric and those numbers will probably decrease. Why not stay away for a year and see if the numbers increase? I guess his insults caught up to were he had to stay in over recess, so his nose is a little out of joint. He'll be fine.
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 (edited) Keep up your rhetoric and those numbers will probably decrease. Why not stay away for a year and see if the numbers increase? My rhetoric hasn't changed in 11 years. I think people interested in political discussion would rather see people like me here than those who issue sanctimonious lectures and offer up nothing but passive agressive hostility. Edited October 25, 2015 by Argus "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 True, but they're hardly left-wing biased. They've moderated a lot of my stuff and allowed a right-winger to get away with the exact same thing. But we have no way of determining bias without being able to compare how many people on which side of the political fence are given warning message, suspensions and bannings. And they won't tell us that. "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
msj Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 My rhetoric hasn't changed in 11 years. I think people interested in political discussion would rather see people like me here than those who issue sanctimonious lectures and offer up nothing but passive agressive hostility. If you are implying if given a choice about choosing your rhetoric versus Big Guy's then I choose BG 100 times out of 100. In fact, if you are implying that BG offers up nothing but passive agressive hostility like the above reads then I'm calling you a sanctimonious hypocrite. If a believer demands that I, as a non-believer, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect but for my submission. And that is incompatible with a secular democracy. Flemming Rose (Dutch journalist) My biggest takeaway from economics is that the past wasn't as good as you remember, the present isn't as bad as you think, and the future will be better than you anticipate. Morgan Housel http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/01/14/things-im-pretty-sure-about.aspx
WestCoastRunner Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 True, but they're hardly left-wing biased. They've moderated a lot of my stuff and allowed a right-winger to get away with the exact same thing. I didn't say anything about them being left or right wing. I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Life's a bitch. You've got to go out and kick ass. - Maya Angelou
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 Let me use this topic as an example of the problems here. Charles is always saying 'play the ball, not the player'. This is supposed to be a game of soccer, then. But we have a number of people here who want to play football, and virtually every one of them is on the Left side of the political spectrum. You see them here claiming moderation is fine - probably because despite being football players in a soccer game they're rarely penalized. And you see them ignoring the ball here and instead going after the player. Because that's what they always DO, you see. No one has told them not to. Now I don't think Lefties are any more likely to be jerks than those on the Right. But I believe those on the right, and centre here have learned through experience that we can't get away with certain things, and I don't think the Left has learned that lesson. I think partly that's because those on the Left tend to be a lot more whiney than others in complaining to mommy whenever someone says something 'bad', and I also think it's because a lot of conservatives have come to the conclusion the moderators are biased anyway so there's not a lot of point in complaining. If this site wants to expand its membership it needs to put a stop to the hostile atmosphere engendered by this apparent freedom to attack the man and not the ball. Thoughtful people who come across this site and who would like to hold intelligent discussions are dissuaded by that sort of atmosphere, knowing that the instant they post something others will attack them. And this is where the moderators fail miserably. They've allowed football players to get away with playing their game instead of throwing down flags on every play or sending them off to the sidelines. "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
msj Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Let me use this topic as an example of the problems here. Charles is always saying 'play the ball, not the player'. This is supposed to be a game of soccer, then. But we have a number of people here who want to play football, and virtually every one of them is on the Left side of the political spectrum. You see them here claiming moderation is fine - probably because despite being football players in a soccer game they're rarely penalized. And you see them ignoring the ball here and instead going after the player. Because that's what they always DO, you see. No one has told them not to. Then report them aggressively. In the meantime, ignore their insults and continue to play the ball. In the meantime, stop this nonsense: I've called you out above with you implications made towards Big Guy. If you could even keep a clean rap sheet for more than a few posts then you may have a point. But you don't, so you don't. If a believer demands that I, as a non-believer, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect but for my submission. And that is incompatible with a secular democracy. Flemming Rose (Dutch journalist) My biggest takeaway from economics is that the past wasn't as good as you remember, the present isn't as bad as you think, and the future will be better than you anticipate. Morgan Housel http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/01/14/things-im-pretty-sure-about.aspx
msj Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Now I don't think Lefties are any more likely to be jerks than those on the Right. But I believe those on the right, and centre here have learned through experience that we can't get away with certain things, and I don't think the Left has learned that lesson. I think partly that's because those on the Left tend to be a lot more whiney than others in complaining to mommy whenever someone says something 'bad', and I also think it's because a lot of conservatives have come to the conclusion the moderators are biased anyway so there's not a lot of point in complaining. Now this is rich. You dominate this thread with your complaints about the left and yet you claim "the Left tend to be a lot more whiney?" This is a joke, right? And you have the audacity to call yourself Argus? Look in the mirror..... Who knows how often things get reported to the mods. Who knows how obvious the insult is being reported to the mods. Maybe "the Left" report more. And "the right" don't. Or maybe "the Right" are more obvious in their insults and the "the left" are more subtle (even more subtle than what you tried to pull above). Or some various other combinations that don't suit you. No big deal, go start your own forum then. Or make Greg and offer he can't refuse. If a believer demands that I, as a non-believer, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect but for my submission. And that is incompatible with a secular democracy. Flemming Rose (Dutch journalist) My biggest takeaway from economics is that the past wasn't as good as you remember, the present isn't as bad as you think, and the future will be better than you anticipate. Morgan Housel http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/01/14/things-im-pretty-sure-about.aspx
Michael Hardner Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 If this site wants to expand its membership it needs to put a stop to the hostile atmosphere engendered by this apparent freedom to attack the man and not the ball. Thoughtful people who come across this site and who would like to hold intelligent discussions are dissuaded by that sort of atmosphere, knowing that the instant they post something others will attack them. And this is where the moderators fail miserably. You're missing your own bias in assessing the performance of the moderators. Even if you don't know what your bias is, it's there. For my own curiosity, I picked two posters (one right, one left) who go around together on topics here quite often. I wanted to see if the right-leaning poster got more warnings or the left-one, and how that weighed against my expectations of my query. I found that the left-leaning poster did by far. Here's the thing, though: I wasn't looking into this question to test whether the mods were meting out warnings fairly as much as I was looking into this example to test whether I had any strong feeling about these two posters. I was surprised by the result of my query, as I tend to see these two posters as relative equals in terms of debating ability, and propensity to follow forum rules. I would guess that my biggest bias is that since I'm more familiar with long time posters, I inherently trust that their arguments are sincerely placed. That's just a GUESS on my own bias, but that's what I think may happen from time to time. As a longtime poster, do you see that bias ? If not, then maybe it's because you're benefiting from it. I get PMs from new posters who think that I'm out to get them because they're right- or left- leaning and I don't even know who they are. There's no way to create a system that measures "fairness units". It's a Tower of Babel... a human construct to reach heaven, to simulate godliness. It can't happen. A human system works best when people realize that humans fail but that you have to trust that they are not consciously lying or subverting the posters here. IMO putting in some kind of feedback system is a complete waste of time. It would turn MLW into a forum that talks about forum discipline. On the other hand, that may well be the end cycle for forums that stick around a long time. To my mind, posters eventually learn what these forums are really for over time, or they become so frustrated with their inability to change peoples' minds that they focus on things other than the discussion. This is all my opinion only. Click to learn why Climate Change is caused by HUMANS Michael Hardner
BC_chick Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Why is the troll still here when he admitted in chat that he's Canada First and Socialist? Sure, Argus, that's 'left-wing' bias for you. It's kind of the worst thing that any humans could be doing at this time in human history. Other than that, it's fine." Bill Nye on Alberta Oil Sands
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 (edited) You're missing your own bias in assessing the performance of the moderators. Even if you don't know what your bias is, it's there. I don't expect you to agree with me about the bias, but that's fine. My point remains. There are a number of people here who consistently play the player rather than the ball. Very consistently. In fact, virtually all the time. You can see it. It's obvious, even in a topic on moderation. So why does it continue? A while back you sent me a PM because you didn't like a post which you said was a "MLW legal insult". Well, two things. Someone else on the Left, had been doing the same thing for many months without your intervention. And there should not be a "MLW legal insult". Anyway, if you were doing anything about people playing the player instead of the ball then the people who are so consistent in their hostile and disrespectful attitudes towards other posters would have learned by now that they can't get away with it. So clearly you're not, because they are. Edited October 25, 2015 by Argus "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 Why is the troll still here when he admitted in chat that he's Canada First and Socialist? Sure, Argus, that's 'left-wing' bias for you. I wasn't speaking about trolls, but those who consistently play the player, not the ball. And as far as I can see virtually all of them are on your team. "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
BC_chick Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 It's your bias Argus. I ignore a good 3/4 of 'your' team because they can never muster up anything without calling names. It's kind of the worst thing that any humans could be doing at this time in human history. Other than that, it's fine." Bill Nye on Alberta Oil Sands
Michael Hardner Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Why is the troll still here when he admitted in chat that he's Canada First and Socialist? Why do you think I would know that ? You can't report on chat but you can capture screens, I think, and PM them. We don't see everything that goes on you see. We ask people to Report to us; I have said that often. Click to learn why Climate Change is caused by HUMANS Michael Hardner
BC_chick Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Why do you think I would know that ? You can't report on chat but you can capture screens, I think, and PM them. We don't see everything that goes on you see. We ask people to Report to us; I have said that often. As it happened, posters mentioned that there is no need for screen-shot because chat has a transcript. It's kind of the worst thing that any humans could be doing at this time in human history. Other than that, it's fine." Bill Nye on Alberta Oil Sands
Michael Hardner Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 Anyway, if you were doing anything about people playing the player instead of the ball then the people who are so consistent in their hostile and disrespectful attitudes towards other posters would have learned by now that they can't get away with it. So clearly you're not, because they are. You say you don't expect me to agree with you about the bias, but then you ask why I don't do anything about certain insults ? It's because they're not insults to my mind. That's what bias is: you see things a certain way and I do not. It's subjectivity and there's nothing to be done. Clearly you don't trust me, and yet as I have pointed out: I would guess that if anything you benefit from my biases. Click to learn why Climate Change is caused by HUMANS Michael Hardner
Michael Hardner Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 As it happened, posters mentioned that there is no need for screen-shot because chat has a transcript. That's news to me. How does it work ? Please PM me with details. Click to learn why Climate Change is caused by HUMANS Michael Hardner
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 It's your bias Argus. I ignore a good 3/4 of 'your' team because they can never muster up anything without calling names. When I see people on 'my team' who are 'calling names' its usually traced back to playing the man, which comes from 'your team'. "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
Argus Posted October 25, 2015 Author Report Posted October 25, 2015 (edited) You say you don't expect me to agree with you about the bias, but then you ask why I don't do anything about certain insults ? It's because they're not insults to my mind. That's what bias is: you see things a certain way and I do not. It's subjectivity and there's nothing to be done. Clearly you don't trust me, and yet as I have pointed out: I would guess that if anything you benefit from my biases. I'm sorry but this makes no sense whatever. To your mind it's not insults if someone plays the man instead of the ball? But that's the opposite of what Charles says we're supposed to be doing and it also goes against this site's rules on respectful dialogue and on 'playing the ball'. So do you disagree with the rules and instructions here and only selectively enforce what rules you want to enforce? Let me quote from the rules and guidelines, in case you've forgotten them. Be Polite and Respect Others No Personal Attacks It is not okay to criticize a person's character Rule of thumb: play the ball, not the person (i.e. Tackle the argument, not the person making it). Edited October 25, 2015 by Argus "A liberal is someone who claims to be open to all points of view — and then is surprised and offended to find there are other points of view.” William F Buckley
poochy Posted October 25, 2015 Report Posted October 25, 2015 For weeks leading up to the election the board was constantly spammed by far left trolls, it took far too much complaining to have any of them removed, and some were not, these same spammers were quickly dumped from other boards, but not here. There was simply no comparing the amount of extreme and outright dishonest rhetoric being posted here, it was, at the least, 90/10 for the left, yet most of it remained, o but you wonder why people imagine there is a bias? Maybe its so normal for your team to behave like such lunatics that it doesnt even get noticed, but it really comes down to two possibilities, incompetence, or bias. It becomes more clear everyday that we can go with either one because the powers that be are unashamed to be seen as either, its their right, but to deny the obvious inconsistencies in moderation that lead to these conclusions is really disengenious..
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