Tom, in case it’s not clear, I think you’re a fine mod. I’d be A-OK with more Toms as mods. I just point out the fact that this is an interesting business model. In most other situations, management’s opinions are strenuously made to be transparent to the clientele. Not so here. Perhaps that’s just unavoidable. But samclem (who did apologize) did cross a line. And on a board that creates a noticeable (and undeniable, except to the most zealous) bias to the left, that line moves as a result of the mods’ influence, ISTM.
Is English your first language? :rolleyes:
You’re conflating, as in fairness many do, a conservative ideology (whether one is referring to fiscal or social or foreign-policy conservatism, they’re not at all the same thing) with fealty to the Republican Party and the Bush Administration. They have been so intertwined in recent years, for very familiar reasons, that it’s become very difficult to draw a distinction anymore. But the growing number of self-styled conservatives who are now doing so, drawing that distinction once again, shows that it is possible to restore that distinction.
Conservatives do *not * get bashed here for conservatism. They get bashed for fealty to the GOP and Bush over country, in the face of fact, and without regard for the human consequences, as is proper for those defending the intellectually and morally indefensible. But the GOP and Bush are, to explain again, not coterminous with conservatism, however you wish to define the term.
But if you, like several other prominent posters here, would rather whine about being picked on than to make even the minimal effort to understand what you’re being criticized for, if you’d rather just suck your thumb and cry instead, that is certainly your privilege. A “philosophy” that can’t hold up to even the minimal scrutiny of a few anonymous yobbos on a Web message board is perhaps something that *needs * to be reconsidered - starting with the notion that it’s a philosophy and not just partisanship.
Tomndeb
I retract my statement about you. Now that I think about it I realize I’m wrong. While you’ve often argued and debated with Shodan or myself I can’t recall a time when you’ve been openly hostile, rude, or mean. In fact, you’re the main example I’m attempting to emulate with my New Year’s posting resolution, so your inclusion there was just flat out wrong.
Sorry about that.
It’s not so much a bias to my mind, but getting back to the original post, it’s that samclem was trying to get the rest of the board to do his work for him as moderator. I can see if one is looking for general help (as others have done when they might be gone for a bit; “help me look after things”, etc.) But when you decide to do it publically against one particular poster, that smacks of a vendetta which is something that a moderator shouldn;t be involved in. If you have eveidence of trollery, the professional thing for a moderator to do is to take it to the other moderators; not to the genral populace where the only real outcome (if you find the evidence) is “okay, he’s trolling … what are you going to do about it?”
Fuck you.
Right. Prior to GWB, this board was a veritable conservative circle jerk.
Ooh, you really got me there. You continue to make my point. Keep posting.
I would never have posted what I did, IF I were looking at this as a moderator. I wasn’t. Was I not clear about this?
Yes. But you’re missing the point. When my boss’s boss sits in on a meeting and tells us, “Just give me you opinion. All ranks are left at the door,” we all smile, internally roll our eyes, and react with the knowledge that he is always the boss. I’m not saying that’s completely analogous here. But “I’m not acting as a mod here!” does not change the fact that you’re always a mod. You can disagree, but do you see the point?
Now that is something this thread hasn’t seen much of … a show of class. Could’ve come right away, instead of so many pages in, but still. Yup, it doesn’t matter whether or not Scylla really posts jerkishly or not, no poster, mod or not, should post an accusation like that without having the evidence to back it up in hand. To do so is to post like a jerk and especially someone who serves as a mod should be above that. (Maybe mods should be like other posters, but more so.)
That said, wow what a lot of jerks in this thread, much more jerky than that one post, and paranoid jerks to boot.
Completely. But one of the things the moderators here have never completely understood is that, like it or not, you’re always seen as a moderator and no amount of < mod hat on > < mod hat off > is going to change that. So it’s up to you guys to show a little bit more circumspection than an average poster would, especially when it comes to gathering information about a potentially bannable offense.
The OP was wrong on certain details, e.g. Thomas did not mail the medal to Bush, he delivered it to his Congressman; there was no ceremony that we know of, only a private meeting; and the OP says Bush should have admitted not deserving it, which he did in fact do. Here’s the original article from the original source: http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:_okk-uOyV7AJ:www.thecoveherald.com/page3.html. Plus, if you’d moved on past the OP, you’d have seen Diogenes painting the whole silly thing just as I said: Bush accepting the Purple Heart in a big deal ceremony as though he’d earned it. It’s a false picture. And it’s deliberate because I corrected him several times, showing him the original article, and he never backed down.
But I’m just curious while you’re here. What exactly is it that compels you to hijack threads like this with irrelevant and bogus research about me? And I wonder if maybe you could, you know, stop it.
No problem.
Now if only **Scylla ** was man enough to accept **samclem’s ** apology, we could all sing Kumbaya.
It is with great regret that we announce the passing of SDMB hamster Speedo. During the stampede of posters combing the archives in a desperate search to stick it to Scylla, Speedo succumbed to a cardial infarcation and methedrine overdose.
He received the traditional “burial at sea”, with all appropriate honors.
Good point, which others have made. I’ll try to remember this. Thx.
Well, since we’re not closing the thread.
Yes. You’re clear about this, but several people don’t find you credible. You always have moderator under your name. You’re always representing the board. You are always staff.
What you searched for yourself and asked everybody else to search for is absolutely useless for any other purpose than for pursuing a vendetta. It looks like you went to a disproportional effort to find it.
If a uniformed policeman shows up at your door and asks to look around for illegal drugs, but “says he’s not looking to arrest anybody” would you beleive him?
You just happen to be looking for banworthy material from the past, but not as a mod? Does this become one of those cases where you search as a “member” but then act on it as a mod once it’s found? “No, my fellow moderators, I wasn’t looking for this in my moderator capacity, but Scylla’s past admission of trolling sheds light on his current activites.”
How is this different from your normal activities on the board?
Don’t you read and post like anybody else and then act when you find something actionable?
The difference in this case is that you were fishing and asking for help.
There is no distinction between your member activities and your moderator activities unless you are going to tell me that when you are just reading and posting as a “member” you ignore board violations when you see them. Do you do that?
SCYLLA, YOU’RE SUCH AN UNBELIEVABLE TRO----
[sub]Ah, fuck him.[/sub]
Scylla, you may not be a troll but you’re sure driving me batty.
It has always been the case that moderators are allowed to be normal posters, too. Moderator actions are kept very distinct from member actions. samclem has been absolutely clear about it. What part of all this is hard for you to understand? The moderators are not staff who post, they’re posters who volunteer to help keep the board pleasant and running.
More appropriately: if you’re in a public place having a conversation with someone you know to be a cop, should you fire up your crack pipe in front of him even though he’s not wearing his uniform?
Keep your pipe in your pocket, so to speak. You’ll be fine.
Scylla. If you truly think I was chasing you as a mod, then nothing I have said or can say will change your mind. I wasn’t. It would never occur to me to do this. You’ve never done anything which would require that.
But you said yourself that you were looking for evidence that Scylla sometimes trolls the board.
Trolling is a bannable offense.
Where were you going to disassociate your curiosity as a poster and your responsibility as a moderator?