Yep. As a matter of fact, **CarnalK ** has a lot of class. I misjudged and misunderstood him for a long time until he explained to me how he views and approaches snark. It is an art to him, and he is its curator.
The fact of the matter is that at least two mods — **Colibri ** and **Skip Magic ** — were posting as members in the OP’s linked thread but still threatening him with official warnings and notices that he was walking on thin ice. I spoke out about that, as did Zoe, just before **Giraffe ** decided to close the thread. I hadn’t even read the whole thing, but I saw that at the end and asked them to please consider separating their modding comments from their member comments.
To me, that smacks a bit of cowardice — don’t you forget who I am, dude, 'cause I can pull some strings and knock you down. No mod hat. No mod underwear. No mod anything, other than their titles. I hate it when people identify someone as unpopular or undefended, and then proceed to lash out at them, confident that they can do so with impunity. It’s a sandbox mindset.
Now that mods can behave that way and we can bash banned people who can’t defend themselves (an issue touched on in a recent thread), precious little remains to differentiate the Dope’s Pit from the middle-schoolish rant forums of any moderated board out there.
Oh, what a crock of stupid bullshit. Surely you’re not so ignorant of how the Pit operates as to really believe this claptrap. **CarnalK ** chose to criticize our moderating in the Pit. We’re not required to “put on a mod hat” every time we reply to a Pit thread.
In any case, while we were discussing moderater actions we were not actively moderating the Pit thread. I did not take any moderater action against CarnalK in the Pit thread, hence there was no reason to identify my action as moderating.
You may have been confused because earlier in the thread Frank chose to give CarnalK some advice simply as a poster. But that’s not SOP.
Without judging CarnalK, who has no more need to be judged than any other poster until rules and moderators get officially involved, I’ll content myself with suggesting that moderators try to, let’s strive for a neutral verb phrase, “wake the fuck up.” I think that’s it.
It’s not just that Colibri, known for idiotically self-regarding posts long before he, as a moderator (or not, as he may choose after he pokes up his head and looks around) , accused CarnalK of trying to post “behind our backs,” when he might have realized that as far as this board was concerned that was (let’s put it very kindly: impossible), or that SkipMagic, finding himself angry in one thread, chooses to bluster in another without ever latching onto any solid ground in either one. With respect to Liberal, it’s not quite cowardice, and it isn’t dishonesty, and it stops just shy of middle-schoolish bullying. I really don’t know what to call it.
You declared that you had previously given him a break by not giving him an official warning, and assured him that you will not cut him the same slack in the future. (Cite.) Is there any member, other than a mod or admin, with the authority to give someone an official warning? Such times as when you speak like that, you should put on your mod hat, in my opinion, or else frame your opinions the way any member would have to.
Theme music. When a moderator is speaking ex catheter, somewhat beyond the pale of a normal member (there must be at least one normal member…), but short of the full formality of moditude (i.e., requiring a full and explicit donning of The Hat)…
This mode could be easily identified by an overlay of theme music. “Pomp and Circumstance”, pehaps. “Flight of the Valkyrie”, something from Zappa.
In situations like this, its always best to offer something constructive.
I have really no idea why anyone would think I was cowardly for putting my complaints in that thread. The worst I could reasonably be accused of is being puckish. I wanted to hijack the joke hijack. I knew if I started my own thread I would have been accused of over-reacting and would have mainly garnered “whine” jokes. No thanks.
I actually already said everything that needs to be said in the other thread, and unless he’s a complete simpleton, Polerius most certainly knows I didn’t actually request one in the post he linked. But since he clearly wants to stir the shit I’ll link y’all up. What set it off:
[post=9756860]Starts with:[/post]
And what I think is about [post=9765786]the final word[/post]:
Well, many of us are no better than we should be. Even I, paragon of rectitude that I am, would have likely allowed Jamie Lee Curtis to have her way with me without the assurance of a commited relationship, or even the blandishments of flowers, theater tickets, and champagne.
Naturally, age has brought wisdom, and I stand ready to firmly repel such off handed seductions, should any be forthcoming. I am advised that this is best for my own health, well being, and emotional security.
Luci, thanks for your personal sacrifices and most importantly for the visual. A Fish Called Wanda, what a wonderful film that was. To be young again.
Wait one minute! I do believe she’s only a few years older than I am.
No, no. Alas, I have a wife and I do believe you were ahead of me anyway. If you’ll allow your self to be corrupted in such a tawdry manner.
I had to Google Cherry Jones. Sounds like heaven for your husband. I guess I should try to see a play, maybe get a little culture in my life. I do enjoy museums and I have many meteorites and fossils. I’m going to pass them along to my niece and nephew. I already inspect them with them and tell them about where there are all from. They love the big magnifying glass, and the prisms and other specimens of rocks and minerals. Good God ! I just remembered I’m in the pit.
That cite does little to defend your prior post. We don’t need to put on our “mod hat” when we’re explaining ourselves, particularly by request or when attacked in the Pit. Explaining that someone was out of line and that we will be watching in future does not amount to, as you put it, “mods… were posting as members in the OP’s linked thread but still threatening him with official warnings and notices that he was walking on thin ice.” This implies that it’s only the disagreement with mods that will warrant an official warning. If you can point to such a warning, be my guest, but unlike the great majority of forums out there we neither warn nor ban for challenging our moderators here, as you well know.
Like fluiddruid, I don’t see any basis whatever for your statement that I was posting “as a member” in the thread under discussion. Since we were clearly talking about my moderating, and since CarnalK’s status of being on Final Warning was part of the discussion, I don’t think that my statement that I was going to stick to the letter of the law regarding him in the future required any further qualification.
You really are some piece of work, Soupie. Just because I took you to task for being a sanctimonious, holier-than-thou, judgmental blowhard in a long-ago thread, you decide to take a poke at me here. You really need to let it go, pal.
(And in case anyone needs any clarification, I am posting here as a member, not a moderator.)
A quick search shows that he’s interacted with you one time, outside this thread, in the past year. While King of Soup can indeed be a sanctimonious blowhard, your thinking that he’s carting around a 2 year grudge comes off as either paranoid or slanderous. Given your performance in the past few threads, I’m leaning towards lying.
I remark on Colibri’s penchant for idiotically self-regarding posts, and he immediately responds by accusing me of harboring a years-old grudge against him for insulting me, though we’ve had almost zero interaction since. The irony does burn, but let us not ask for whom.
CarnalK did the work, otherwise I’d not have even the slightest notion that Colibri (who seems not to know what “irony” means, although I’m willing to believe he’s been burned a few times) and I ever had a direct exchange. If Colibri assumes that my criticism of him in this thread must necessarily be the result of some long-ago discovery of his that I’m a sanctimonious blowhard, it’s just another symptom of his narcissism – file it along with choice phrases of his, like “CarnalK chose to criticize our moderating in the Pit,” and accusing him of trying to post “behind our backs.” Sometimes I am a sanctimonious blowhard (I console myself with the fact that I’m usually right and often polite). But I don’t get angry at or pay much attention to the the accusation – heck, CarnalK may well have thrown it at me since Colibri looked up the necessary words. It’s sometimes true, and it’s good for me to be reminded of it once in a while.
But I’m rarely stupid, seldom egocentric, and never hypocritical. Master Colibri hits that trifecta again when he asserts that in threads pitting members against moderators, he should be able to play one or the other or both at whim and only later decide which post should have which label.
In this thread, Colibri is posting neither as member nor as moderator – just as an asshole. He does too much of that, I think.
