Dex, a request

About This Message Board
1

I didn’t want to hijack this thread, so I’m starting a new thread. Lately, it seems like more often than not your posts reponding to me in ATMB are either filled with all-caps shouting or sneering sarcasm. It’s a bit unfair, in that there’s no way for me to respond in kind and remain within the rules, but it’s also just flat-out rude. And, given your vocal support for the need for greater civility on the boards, a little disappointing.

You don’t have to respond to my posts if you don’t want to, but if you do, I’d appreciate it if you’d make an effort to show me the same courtesy I’m showing you.

Recent examples (the quotes link to the posts):
[
[QUOTE=C K Dexter Haven]
Giraffe’s (Post #42 above): You can ignore your lawyer’s advice all you want. Whether corporate lawyers are too squeamish, that’s an interesting topic for debate IN ANOTHER THREAD. In any case, we, the moderators at the Straight Dope, are required to follow the lawyers’ directives. The moderator who fails to do so, won’t be moderating long. The rules here are the rules, and these have been in place and enforced for a lonnnnnng time. Anyone who doesn’t like it: well, there are lots of boards that aren’t moderated, please go there and be happy as a clam. Happy as two clams. Or as happy as a clam can be.

Wasn’t there a big to-do just a few weeks ago because we DIDN’T squelch a discussion about things within the law, and about changing the law through legal means? I guess hobgoblins are the consistency of etc etc.
[/QUOTE]
](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11744377&postcount=44)
[

](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11550052&postcount=55)
[
[QUOTE=C K Dexter Haven]
Thanks, Giraffe, I nearly spurted my vodka and tonic on the keyboard. That’s gotta be the funniest bit of bullshit I’ve read on the Message Boards in a lonnnnnnnnnng time.

That was, of course, the original premise. That was the way we wanted to run things. That’s always been the way we wanted to run things: don’t be a jerk was originally felt to be the only rule we needed. And then, the clamor and outrage were overwhelming. People whined that the rules were unclear, unfair, not specific. Mods were reammed up and down and beaten against the wall. “He got away with saying ‘Oh, fuck you, you fucking fuckface asshole cunt’ so why can’t I say ‘Oh, fuck you, you fucking fuckface asshole cunt fucker!’?”

Yeah, what a great idea, let’s drop all these fuckin’ rules and just go back to “Don’t be a jerk” and leave it up to the mods to administer ad hoc. HAHAHAHAAHAHAHAH. Again, thanks for my biggest laugh in ages.

[/QUOTE]
](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11517671&postcount=99)

2

Isn’t this something better resolved privately? You two were mods together for a long time. Email each other and work it out.

3

I don’t see why Giraffe should have to take this off the board since the nasty remarks he had to deal with were out in the open…

4

Nah, I think it’s probably past time to get this out in the open.

5

Absolutely. It’s not just Dex. If ATMB is to be a bastion of civil discourse, then it needs to work both ways.

6

I completely support this thread.

7

This statement contains an extremely large “if.”

8

I suppose you’re right. I should have added “as** Ed Zotti **desires.”

9

And it’s not just Giraffe.

10

Oh, I know that very well.

11

Bumping this thread as a courtesy, as it seems possible Dex hasn’t had a chance to see it. I’m sure he’d never be so cavalier as to completely ignore a polite request for clarification in his own forum.

12

I have about five minutes online before I need to get back to the hospital. No, I hadn’t seen this thread before.

The huge all-caps were NOT directed at you personally, Giraffe, but at half a dozen posters who were not paying attention to moderator comments.

On the other comments: I’m not sure what you’re saying. I’m possibly harsher in my comments with you than with other posters, because I expect you to know better. The instances that you’ve cited, I called “bullshit” on what you were saying. You are perceived as speaking with some authority as a past moderator, and when you make statements that are not in line with the new practices – practices that you resigned rather than have to follow – I do feel obliged to be sure it’s clear that your comments are out of touch, at best, and out of line, at other times.

13

Yeah, I almost fell into the pernicious trap of thinking that Giraffe might have a useful and informative viewpoint to share, but Dex’s Cartman style posting has reminded me that there is no God but Cecil and the Striaght Dope is His Message Board.

No, I’m not good with subtlety.

14

And you better not forget it either!

15

I keep writing up responses and then deleting them because I don’t want to fight with you, Dex. I don’t want to parse through your posts line by line and point out places where you’ve used unnecessary barbs, or yelling, or sarcasm in response to posts that had none of those things, and then rehash the topics of the threads that led up to those posts. Really, I just want to be able to occasionally post my opinion in ATMB and not have you be a jerk about it. I don’t think that’s too much to ask.

The fact that I volunteered here as a moderator here in the past shouldn’t give you special dispensation to crap on my posts. I’m still an SDMB poster, and I still want the board to remain an interesting place to read and post. I think an important part of that is public examination of how we do things, and coming up with ways we could do things better. So I’m going to throw out my ideas in ATMB from time to time. I’m not speaking as any sort of authority figure and/or saying that’s how things are under the current rules, I’m just offering my viewpoint as a poster as to how things could potentially be improved.

I’m sorry if you’re angry that I resigned, Dex, but it wasn’t because I suddenly hate the SDMB and want to see it fail. I just didn’t want to enforce rules I couldn’t explain and didn’t agree with.

16

This is an antinomy that, were they to be honest in admitting it, is affecting every mod and admin on this board to one degree or another, and rather than take the forthright approach that Giraffe used and simply resign, leaving whatever King Shits of Turd Hill might remain sitting in solitary splendor y’all are doing a very crappy job of attempting to enforce unenforceable and demonstrably stupid rules. Except for the ones who’re using the unintelligble, unenforceable rules as a shield to enact the sort of petty arbitrary sniping and power trips they’ve always wanted to do anyway. Most of the posters on this board aren’t complete idiots, however, and are completely aware of the disingenuousness and arbitrary nature of the rules as well as the enforcement thereof, and many have a vested interest in the board remaining viable. Hence the pointing out of the publicly noticeable nature of the Emperor’s willie and the bootlegger slide rapidity of the Mod Wagon Circle Maneuver.

Posters, including Giraffe, are not the enemy, the enemy is the ones who hand out unenforceable edicts and then wander off elsewhere to brush up their resumes, leaving the unpaid volunteer mods to shovel the resulting shitpile. Why in hell don’t you guys just go on strike?

17

I agree with everything Giraffe and SmartAleq have said. I don’t suppose my opinion has much weight, though, since I’m a known Splitter.

18

I’m sorry that I don’t have a long and quiet response, but again, I have a few minutes here and there between rushing to and from the hospital and trying to get life organized.

I have no anger on account of your leaving, Giraffe. Just the reverse: I think that was the best decision that you could have made. I am sorry that you perceive me as dumping on you, such is surely not my intention. In the examples you cited, however, in one you were violating the rules (personal insults), and in the other you made a suggestion that was pretty much frivial (portmanteau of trivial and frivilous) to “ignore the company’s lawyers.”) You carry a great deal of respect here, and I felt the need to respond fairly strongly when your comments were out of line or your suggestion impractical. I’m sorry if you perceive that I’m picking on you in some fashion; it was not intentional and I was certainly not aware of it. I will try to watch such behaviors in the future.

On an aside (NOT directed at you, Giraffe, but at other posters in this thread and elsewhere): I really, really fail to understand why people who hate these boards so much, hate the moderators, hate the rules, etc. still come here to gripe about the mods, the rules, and the boards.

I think that would be a very interesting suggestion, for the mods to take a few days off. I’ve seriously suggested it. Unmoderated boards are so much more free, no nasty rules. No eliminating spam or links that wreck your hard-drive. No eliminating porn. Let everyone insult everyone, like they do on so many other boards. Let people post under sixteen or seventeen different names to support their positions. Yeah, I think it would actually be a good lesson… if there were any posters left when we started moderating again.

19

Um, I think the strike suggestion was to show TPTB that the moderators are unhappy with some of new rules, not to teach the rest of us a lesson.

I also believe there is a continuum of moderation from one that which is perceived as heavy handed, capricious and snarky to the complete absence of moderation. We are somewhere in the middle and people are concerned that the tone is drifting toward the heavy handed/snarky end of the spectrum. No one wants an unmoderated board.

Whether or not the moderators are actually unhappy about the new rules is a question that remains open.

20

I appreciate the response – perhaps both of us have simply been misreading each other’s intended tone lately. For my part, I’ll try to be careful to avoid making statements which could be misread as carrying any sort of authority beyond that of a regular poster.

Thanks for taking the time out of what is clearly a hectic, stressful period for you right now. I hope things get better sooner rather than later.