Topic: Always Moving Forward: The Discussion Thread

[Neon Genesis]

Hey guess what?
http://twitter.com/szvan/status/213007261721833472

Extra bonus: 4 replies from an old forum friend!

Since when do we have "TONS" of racism at SGU?

[Karyn]

But will it be good enough for Stephenie Zvyan?

a) Probably not.
b) But she'll probably never see it.
c) I'm not sure it was written for her, or for her approval.

Otherwise, I dig it very much.

Hey guess what?
http://twitter.com/szvan/status/213007261721833472

Extra bonus: 4 replies from an old forum friend!

I'm quite pleased that Stephanie Zvan took the time to read our announcement. As for Natalie Reed - I'm not quite sure what she wants from us. If only she could express her wishes to us. Something more constructive would be ever so nice.

From what I can tell, and we've had this from other people, not just her, is they want specific rules banning people from being bigots or saying bigoted things.

eta: Racism: I think it was just teh quick stint with chelovek, but people pretty promptly put her arguments to rest.

[AQB24712]

I'm quite pleased that Stephanie Zvan took the time to read our announcement. As for Natalie Reed - I'm not quite sure what she wants from us. If only she could express her wishes to us. Something more constructive would be ever so nice.

I like Natalie but I think at this point she's probably too far gone for you guys to reach. While not sharing her vitriol (which is unfair because I am not cisgendered and so wasn't one of those people trashed) the whole deal around her leaving and then coming back and leaving again was handled really poorly. Beleth has apologized for it but really I think the only thing that could be done to undo all that is to literally erase it from the universe. I just hope people learn from the incident and make better decisions the next time something like this happens.

Wait, what?

[Louie]

I'm quite pleased that Stephanie Zvan took the time to read our announcement. As for Natalie Reed - I'm not quite sure what she wants from us. If only she could express her wishes to us. Something more constructive would be ever so nice.

I like Natalie but I think at this point she's probably too far gone for you guys to reach. While not sharing her vitriol (which is unfair because I am not cisgendered and so wasn't one of those people trashed) the whole deal around her leaving and then coming back and leaving again was handled really poorly. Beleth has apologized for it but really I think the only thing that could be done to undo all that is to literally erase it from the universe. I just hope people learn from the incident and make better decisions the next time something like this happens.

That's the plan, Johnny. I suggest we take Natalie's comments on board as an example of how someone can (be made to) feel so unwelcome on this forum that they are left with hateful feelings towards it. We're open to her suggestions on how to prevent this from happening in future. In the absence of any such suggestions from her, we should try to forge ahead regardless.

Does anyone have any thoughts on how racist/genderist/sexist posts etc. should be moderated? Where do you think the 'line' is?

[Johnny Slick]

Since when do we have "TONS" of racism at SGU?

Yeah, that kind of struck a deaf chord for me as well.

Wait, what?

Whoops! Got that exactly 100% incorrect! 

[Neon Genesis]

eta: Racism: I think it was just teh quick stint with chelovek, but people pretty promptly put her arguments to rest.

But I don't see how you can call one troll everyone else disagreed with as being "tons of racism!" unless Natalie is using some definition of the word "tons" I've never heard of before.  Maybe she got her definition of "tons" from the ever reliable source, Urban Dictionary?

[Louie]

eta: Racism: I think it was just teh quick stint with chelovek, but people pretty promptly put her arguments to rest.

But I don't see how you can call one troll everyone else disagreed with as being "tons of racism!" unless Natalie is using some definition of the word "tons" I've never heard of before.  Maybe she got her definition of "tons" from the ever reliable source, Urban Dictionary?

Let's not get bogged down on this.

[Plastique]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how racist/genderist/sexist posts etc. should be moderated? Where do you think the 'line' is?

Maybe the line is crossed when something is intended epithetically. Anything else is PC horror.

[superdave]

Beleth, this is an aside, but I think your interactions with stephanie were a little harsh and stubborn. 

But as for the post.  We gotta change for ourselves and not for the readers of almost diamonds.  I don't think we can ever please them. 

[Beleth]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how racist/genderist/sexist posts etc. should be moderated? Where do you think the 'line' is?

Maybe the line is crossed when something is intended epithetically. Anything else is PC horror.

In any way that's not intellectually-challenging, rational, and polite.

[Beleth]

Beleth, this is an aside, but I think your interactions with stephanie were a little harsh and stubborn. 

I speak as I am spoken to.

[superdave]

Beleth, this is an aside, but I think your interactions with stephanie were a little harsh and stubborn. 

I speak as I am spoken to.

fair enough. 

[superdave]

I don't think we need to do a lot more than just a simple "Did you really mean to say this, because the way you phrased it sounds like you mean x ", where x is something bigoted.
But the explicit forum is a different problem.

[TheIrreverend]

At an anonymous moderator's behest, my suggestion:

Moderation should be completely separate from users' personal accounts - that is, Beleth/Karyn/pandamonium/Louie/DRmeg378/TLV should simply be user accounts.  A new account (say: Moderator) could be created which would handle all moderator related actions, or the actions could all be anonymous and the new account used only for moderator posts such as the letter posted above.  This would (hopefully) have the effect of removing the extra weight which may be perceived to come with any post from a moderator, and to separate the opinions of "the mods" from that of the individual moderators.

Of course, implementing this now when most people know who the mods are might not have a huge impact, but if I was designing a forum from scratch, this is how I would start.  Even having a single voice might remove allegations of individual bias from particular moderators.

[Citizen Skeptic]

Does anyone have any thoughts on how racist/genderist/sexist posts etc. should be moderated? Where do you think the 'line' is?

My 2 cents, this is like trying to define pornography or having a list of banned words, or usage.

Is this such a frequent occurence and so subtle that you can't just call it when you (think) you see it and ban the repeated violators?

I find these forums to be relatively polite and well mannered compared with just about every other one I've looked at. I hope we don't have to start walking on eggshells.