Is there an option such as picking a different font, spellcheck or color in the reply?
Brille
“Wet Floor” sign does not mean do it.
It is certainly the case that people carry past baggage with them. It is also certainly the case, Con#3, that you are on the “receiving end of the biases” of Straight Dope Staff. I wonder why that should be?
The shit that has been dumped on Staff is not evident in this post. As I said, I have undoubtedly committed the sin of allowing past frustrations to get the best of me, and not keeping my mouth shut.
I have committed the second sin of continuing to read this thread, long after it serves any useful purpose. I saw a legit question; I answered it.
You may take this as an apology for those sins… I’ll do three Hail Cecil’s and I’ll stop smoking.
No one SMOKES anymore.
Brille
“Wet Floor” sign does not mean do it.
Since I was out of town, others have already posted most of what I would have added to this thread. And there’s no point responding to C3’s whines because logic has nothing to do with his complaints, all of which have been responded to before. So there is only one thing really left to respond to.
DIF said:
First, let me note that it wasn’t that thread, but the Jon Benet Ramsey one. Second, actually, Phil didn’t start it, somebody else did and I warned them. Then Phil & you jumped in and I posted a general warning to everybody. Then you decided it didn’t really apply to you and that you could just go ahead and continue to insult Phil. So I followed through on my warning and deleted the insults. Actually, I didn’t go as far as I warned I would – I said I’d delete any messages containing insults, but I let the rest of your message stand (including the part where you attacked the way I was moderating) and just edited out the insults. You then asked me to delete the previous insults and I said no. I’d already posted the warnings about them. I’m not sure what you mean by saying I “seemed to make quite a bit of doing so,” but I told you what I’d told you earlier – any further insulting messages would be deleted. I’m terribly sorry that you thought the rules and that warning didn’t apply to you, but believe it or not, you don’t get a special exception just because you wanted to get the last insult in.
Perhaps you should have reviewed the proper thread.
…yeah…David B deletes insults against those that he sides with and leaves the insults toward the ones that he disagrees with.
…he also hurls insults at me regularly.
…a real model of a moderator is he…I’d bet that the obvious behavior of David B prompted the OP by STARK.
Contestant #3
I don’t know why your’re so concerned, Connie. Mr. STARK doesn’t seem to care anymore. He hasn’t shown up here since he started this rehashed topic six days ago.
Let me see if I’ve got this right.
Two people were arguing and insulting each other. The official staff member stepped in and said, “OK, enough, stop it or I will take action.” One person stopped. The other person did not stop. The official staff person took action against the person who did not stop. That person then complained about being treated unfairly.
Do I have that right?
It sounds depressingly familiar.
No, you don’t have it right.
Persons A and B (who shared a viewpoint with the moderator) were insulting Person C (who had a dissenting viewpoint).
Moderator says “hey, stop that and furthermore I’ll delete any further occurances”.
Person C, signs on, reads insults hurled by Person A and B and hurls retalitory insults toward Persons A and B.
Moderator deletes retalitory insults from person C (who’s viewpoint the moderator disagrees with)
Person C says "hey, why don’t you delete the insults of Person A and B too?
Moderator says (effectively) “No, I’m not gonna do it and you can’t make me”.
Got the picture?
Contestant #3
Yeah, Deceased Equine, it’s a big conspiracy, dontcha know. Everybody’s out to get C3 and anybody who agrees with him. Oh, sure, it may look simply like we’re enforcing the rules, but C3 knows how to look past any obvious explanation and find the secret motives behind them. In fact, I probably used special mind control techniques to make DIF ignore the rules and the warnings and post more insults just so I could edit them out.
It’s nothing as complex as a conspiracy. It’s very plainly and simpley David B using his moderator position to advance and protect his opinions while tearing down his opposition. Very un-moderator-like…
Contestant #3
aha! Seems to me we have an easy resolution to this, since the facts are there for all to see. I confess, I have NOT read every post in detail – in part because I don’t care about the topic, in part because I don’t wanna read 111 posts.
I read from the end backwards, and the critical bits seem to me:
- 9/16 at 3:48 PM, when DavidB posts his first warning that things are getting out of hand
- Next gratuitous insult occurs on 9/17 at 11:54, issued by DIF
- At 11:59 on 9/17, DavidB posts his second warning and intent to delete/edit.
- The next post is DIF’s, and is edited.
I do not see any posts by any other party after 11:59 on 9/17 that include gratuitous insults. I do see the “retaliatory” comments by DIF, issued after first warning but before second warning; there was no editing of those comments.
Seems to me that the evidence of plain eyes, and open to anyone, supports DavidB’s position and disproves Con#3’s.
Please note – it is not possible for a Moderator or Administrator to edit a note without the warning “Edited by…” to appear at the bottom. Deletion of a note, of course, leaves no trail.
DavidB declines (for obvious reasons) to edit ex post facto – to go back and edit out the insults before his warning.
So the trail is there for all to see.
You have summarized it well, Dex, but don’t expect C3 to pay any attention. After all, he claims:
Anybody reading the thread can see this is simply a blatant lie. The only material that has been edited were the insults by DIF (after he was explicitly warned that would happen) and this morning I deleted a message by Daniel P Bostaph, who came in just recently to insult two other posters (one of whom was, I believe, C3!)
All arguments (whether against or for the viewpoint I happen to hold) were left completely intact. Hell, as I noted above, even DIF’s maligning of my moderation was left alone! Yet C3 continues to lie in proclaiming this had something to do with my opinions when it is obvious that this was nothing of the sort. But that’s about what people around here have come to expect from him, I’m afraid…
slythe:
Slythe, I understand the point you are making. The point you seem to miss is, that I believe the board’s source of funding is largely irrelevant. If you’ll review the user’s agreement, I think you’ll see the basic rule is: don’t be a jerk. Two paragraphs further on, this general proviso is specified more thoroughly; and may I point out that, if the paragraph in question were truly enforced, most of the people who make this board worth reading would be history, what with all the “knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening”, etc., posting going on? Nowhere does it say revisions to the rules or operating procedures may not be suggested. It also says that messages may be deleted for any reason or no reason, but I dare say if that really happened, it would be no violation of the rules for those who are not deleted, as well as those who are, to nonetheless ask why; and if the the only response was, “Because we wanted to, that’s why! The SDMB: Love it or leave it!”, a great many people would do so. It therefore seems that ‘the rules’, such as they are, are rather loose to begin with, and loosely enforced to boot. So, when the rules suddenly do get enforced, it seems entirely fair to wonder why.
Slythe:
.
Fair enough; will do.
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CKDextHavn:
I believe if you recheck the post you will see that it was I who asserted that “quickly dismissed” was pretty much subjective. I reviewed C#3’s posts to that point and do not find a use of ‘cur’. Taking you at your word for the length of discussion, it would help those of us who ‘came in late’ if you could point to a posted summary of those meetings. Nothing very explicit, just a “one person said, then another person said, etc. Then Ed pointed out, etc.”. Just saying, in effect, “we kicked around a lot of ideas for a couple of days and in the end everyone agreed with what Ed said . . .” doesn’t help much. It’s only by having something such as that to refer to that it can be shown all viewpoints were indeed considered.
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John John: If someone hasn’t e-mailed you, or you haven’t already discovered them for yourself, there are several tutorial-style posts to this forum which contain the information you seek.
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David B:
Indeed, I should have. I stand corrected, and I thank you for the correction. I also withdraw my congratulations.
You continue:
You issued a warning after C#3 issued one of his patented flares at (IIRC) Big Iron. Then VegForLife responded to one of my previous responses in a way I took to be insulting, and I made reference to the S.E.T.H.II thread and said he was behaving – inappropriately (so, go read it). A few minutes later, pld – totally missing the point of what I had just posted, BTW – ended his post by calling me an idiot. You issued your second warning at 11:59. At 2:01 p.m., in response to both jodih (IIRC) and you, I issued the message you edited. By 2:16 you had the deed done. Almost two hours to respond to one insult, versus 15 minutes to read, edit, and respond to another. Like I said originally, a peculiar sense of timing. Oh, and I’m sure you have far too much to do to spend all your time chasing down every little backyard barbecue. Certainly, not when it serves your purposes. I noted the use of the phrase, ‘deleted, as promised’, and your characterization of the deleted words as insults. I interpret this as your way of saying, “I yam wot I yam!”
And, see, David, here’s that other pesky thing about trying to be both a moderator and a full participant. While one of the sentences you removed was clearly directed at Phil, I maintain that the other wasn’t that insulting at all – it was an admonition that if you wanted to bitch to someone about insults, bitch to pld. Admittedly, I used a term more familar, perhaps, to a pipefitter. Those readers who happened by in the fifteen minutes before you bowdlerized it will know what I mean.
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CKDH says:
Well, let’s all hope CK turns out to be a better administrator than he is a “fact-checker”, since he managed (working bass-ackwards, as some might say) to completely ‘overlook’ pld’s ‘toss off’ reference to me at the end of his 10:00 a.m. posting on 9/17. Since CK has clearly made himself a party to the dispute, one might infer a deliberate attempt to slant the truth, but not me. I know that CK just messed up. Moderators/administrators will mess up from time to time. And one of the worst ways (IMO) they mess up is to make themselves participants in controversial threads on boards they personally moderate.
What’s the saying? No man can be the servant of two masters?
‘Edited’ to some; censored, to others.
Ummmm . . . had yours checked lately, CK?
Well, I’m glad someone finds this new ‘rule’, that a moderator can’t, or won’t, 'edit ex post facto’ so obvious. I don’t see it on the user’s agreement page. I guess that’s just another way the moderator gets to show his/her powers – they can make up the rules as they go.
DavidB continues:
You’re just too close to it to see, D
David B. Do you have to watch this board 24 hours a day? If not, how can you catch something that might get by while your sleeping, or some such 
Or do you just have electronic cops out there, trained on C#3’s every unbiased word? 
David B. Rules!!
DIF said:
Well, gosh, DIF. I’m so sorry that I was too quick to respond to your rule breaking. I mean, I obviously should have purposely avoided looking at the message board just so you could insult somebody in direct violation of the warning I’d posted.
Get a grip, man. I read the board when I can. If I see something that needs moderating, it gets moderated when I see it. I don’t have ESP and don’t sit around waiting to see if DIF is going to violate a clear warning to stop the insults. Frankly, all you’re doing now is pissing and moaning 'cus nobody got to see your “last word” insult after I had specifically said it would be deleted.
Serves my purposes? It doesn’t serve my purposes to have people in my message area breaking the rules so I have to spend time warning them and then editing or deleting their messages. I’d much rather everybody simply obeyed the rules. Usually, when I’ve posted a warning to ask people to cool it, they have. Most people don’t see a warning to stop insults and say to themselves, “Well, that obviously doesn’t apply to me because I didn’t get a chance to get the last word in.”
You can interpret anything you want – you obviously were unable to interpret the meaning of a warning telling people to stop posting insults, though. I said that I would delete insults, and when you posted some, I deleted them, as promised. If you want to try to read some strange meaning into that, all I can say is that any such meaning is all in your head.
Alas, it’s not up to you to judge (and, considering you knowingly posted an insult after you were told to stop, it obviously shouldn’t be up to you to judge). I saw it as another insult and deleted it. Would you have been happier if I deleted the entire message, instead of just the insulting parts, as I’d previously indicated?
No matter how I answer, it’s obvious that you’ve already made up your mind as to what you think (damned if I do, damned if I don’t). That aside, the answer is simple – I said I would delete further insulting messages, and I did. Period.
Oh, please. I don’t do mind reading. I have no idea why he posted it. My guess is he was annoyed by C3 and Big Iron, and said so – in terms that were unacceptable.
Do you even realize how ridiculous you are making yourself look? Do you expect anybody to take you seriously with this nonsense? As I said earlier: Get a grip.
[[Did daniel post a couple of quick, gratuitous insults because he’s also following this thread, and he ‘sensed’ what you needed was the opportunity to ‘be big about it’? Could someone, knowing full well how slavishly the poor little schlemiel follows your postings (like that late one on Friday), even have put him up to it?
“Aw, jeeze, conspiracy, conspiracy!”.
No. My point is not that there’s some sort of willful conspiracy going on … ]] DIF
Er, isn’t that what you just suggested above? That someone “put” bostaph “up to it” so that David could make himself look good?
Slythe, please don’t mistake my silence for disinterest. I asked a question in an honest appeal for answers. I hadn’t spoken earlier because the mods were still (kind of) answering. BTW, why do you refer to me as Mr. STARK?
I know a thread is free to roam where it will, but the incessant arguing is getting nowhere and I am truly interested in how the moderators view their roles. I know there are extensive disagreements between some moderators and posters, but if y’all could save it for another thread, and if you mods would answer my queries, I’d really appreciate it.
So far in 35 replies, only CKDextHavn has really given a straight answer about what he sees his role as. (DavidB, I know you said “others have already posted most of what I would have added to this thread.” Does this mean CKDextHavn summarized your view precisely?
I am truly interested in what you moderators (yeah, all of you!) think about this. In an attempt to put this thread back on what I see as its track, I would welcome your thoughts on these questions:
· How do you view your role?
· Do you see any conflict between your position as moderator and your position as poster?
· If so, how do you personally reconcile these conflicts?
· How does the Chicago Reader view your role?
· Does it jibe with your view?
~ Complacency is far more dangerous than outrage ~
Stark, you’re right – we got a bit sidetracked. Sorry 'bout that. Ok, on to your questions:
My role is to enforce the rules of this message board, specifically in the Great Debates area. To do this, I am expected to read every thread, every day, at least once each day, if not more.
No. I’d been moderating FidoNet conferences for about a decade before I came here, and I participated in every single one of them. Like Great Debates, they dealt with controversial issues. At one point or another I moderated the following conferences: Politics, Skeptic, Church&State, FMS (False Memory Syndrome), Sci&Tech, Music, UFO (assistant moderator with a True Believer as main moderator in charge), a number of local conferences (which could get just as heated as the national ones), and probably some others I’m forgetting. Were there people, like C3 and DIF here, who accused me of playing favorites? Of course – that’s the last resort of some whiners who don’t like to play by the rules (or in some cases, the first resort). But in the Politics conference, one of the busiest in Fido, the whiny liberals accused me of moderating them harshly because I’m a conservative, and the whiny conservatives made the same accusations at me because I’m a liberal. Hmmmm… At one point I told them they really needed to decide who I was favoring! The fact is I favored neither – I just enforced the rules. To tell the truth, I even lost a couple of “friends” over it (I use quotes because they obviously weren’t the friends I thought they were if they couldn’t respect the rules of the conference and recognize that they were going to get moderated just like everybody else).
So maybe some people can’t understand what it’s like to be objective themselves, and they assume everybody else is like them. But we’re not. I am, and will remain, objective about enforcing the rules here – whether or not some people whine and act like they should receive special treatment.
As far as I know, to enforce the rules of the message board.
I haven’t been told otherwise. 
<< Taking you at your word for the length of discussion, it would help those of us who ‘came in late’ if you could point to a posted summary of those meetings. Nothing very explicit, just a “one person said, then another person said, etc. Then Ed pointed out, etc.”. Just saying, in effect, “we kicked around a lot of ideas for a couple of days and in the end everyone agreed with what Ed said . . .” doesn’t help much. It’s only by having something such as that to refer to that it can be shown all viewpoints were indeed considered. >>
Well, no. These debates (and others) were private for the very reason that we wanted to be able to express our ideas freely and then take a united stand once agreeement was reached. Publishing the results of such private discussions would be … well… counter to their purpose.
The point is that comments and ideas generated from the TM’s are seriously discussed by the Moderators and Administrators. Sometimes those discussions are public (as this thread), and sometimes those discussions are private (as the decision to continue posting as Moderator and as Member under the same name).
[[ The basic complaint is that moderators should not indulge in arguments
on the boards they themselves control since it will inevitably lead to charges of unfairness, and when it would be a simple matter to move the thread to a board the moderator doesn’t control.]]
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That would mean moving a thread to a possibly less appropriate forum simply to give the moderator an opportunity to sound off in a non-moderatorish way? That’s not why we move threads.
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It don’t matter where we post, it still says “moderator” under our names.
All of us have strong opinions on certain pet topics, and sometimes it’s really hard not to get emotionally involved in certain threads and/or to take sides with certain posters. Sometimes there’s a grey area between offering information and/or clarification and dominating a thread with our own emotional opinions or arguments. I personally don’t think that’s my role as a moderator. But hey, we’re human and we lose it once in awhile just like anybody else.
However I have seen practically no instances in which moderators on this board have deleted posts unjustifiably. There’s not a light trigger-finger in the bunch from what I’ve seen.
Jill