No one who continues to come here ‘hates’ these boards. Many are saddened and hurt to see something they once considered a fun place filled with people they enjoyed take a turn for what they consider to be the worse under what they see as capricious rules with little recourse other than to bemoan the fact elsewhere because such complaints are not given serious consideration here.
It’s too bad that those posts cannot be seen for what they are. It’s also too bad that they garner an instant ‘not with us, therefore against us’ mentality among not only the moderators but many of the posters. When one attempts to give a serious honest reply to ‘why are you so angry?’ and is met with nothing but mocking and derision, it becomes difficult to respond with anything else.
Ah. So this is the disconnect. We don’t hate the boards. We love the boards and are truly saddened that they’re changing in a way that saps the spirit of what they once were. As I have tried to explain before and I hope that you’ll understand my meaning this time, I think that most of the Mods are doing the best job they can given the ridiculous and unnecessary recent rule changes. I think that it’s horrible that they are, for the most part, neglected by the only people empowered to change anything.
I don’t care if I can use the c-word or not but if the Pit and ATMB were changed back to how they were at the beginning of the year it would relieve a lot of the pressure, I think, and this entire message board would be more pleasant.
Secondly, there are a minority of staffers here who are clearly burned out and could use a break from moderating. Of course, who would be willing to fill their shoes when they’re gone?
EDIT: As an aside, Dex, I am sorry that you are going through the stress of the illness of a family member right now. That has to be tough and I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to discuss this with us while this is going on.
The very fact that you, and other mods and admins, are still categorizing the responses you get as being due to us “hating the boards…moderators…[and] the rules” speaks volumes about the profound level of disconnect you have from the people who are the board. You’ve been told, in as explicit and iterative a manner as it’s possible for articulate people to express in writing, that some of the rules you’ve been directed to enforce are stupid, pointless, ridiculous and unenforceable. Many of us have real life empirical experience regarding what happens when unenforceable, unworkable and stupid rules are nonetheless enforced and we know it never ends well and we’ve tried to let y’all know you’re heading this message board straight down the willy hole–not in some vicariously victorious gleeful PALATR way, but the same way you tell your best friend he needs to get off the fucking crack before he dies. Moreover, the uneven and inconsistent modding of the stupid and unenforceable rules makes it painfully clear that there is no consensus within the mod staff as to the value of enforcing those rules and this undermines EVERY FUCKING MOD ACTION TAKEN. Those of us who’re parents know that trying to make kids do stupid shit we ourselves think is stupid never works–they figure it out real quick and are relentless in getting us to admit our hearts aren’t in it. If the mods here would just say fuggit and refuse to even tokenly enforce the stupidest rules I think you’d find out in short order that you have much less dissension in the ranks. Cognitive dissonance breeds resentment.
Without the posters this board would be about as interesting, compelling and busy as The Barn House and treating people who pay to post on a message board like naughty, mentally defective children is hardly the way to keep the board busy, healthy and fun. The single most common comment new members make who come to the 'Raffe from here is how much the 'Raffe is like the way the SDMB used to be–but no longer is. Posters come over kinda PTSD’d, apologizing for everything they say and do, expecting to be smacked down. It’s sad–these people really don’t know any more what it takes to get a warning from a Dope Mod, so they just don’t post in anticipation of the smackdown. Tell me again how discouraging posters from posting benefits a message board? I must have missed that bit.
We realize the mod staff has very little control over what the rules are, but we also know that the admin staff are burnt out, absent and generally do not give a slim, pallid shit about the board–so what’s the percentage in propping up a broken system? Tell 'em to stuff their idiocy, mod the board the way you all know it should be, and let it fall where it may. What are they gonna do, fire you? Kill the board? At this point it’d be a mercy killing and is probably in the offing anyway, so let the old gal go out with a bang.
So yeah, take a vacation, kill the spam and move the threads and do the basic housekeeping and let the rest go–it’ll take a while for the infantilized posters on this board to figure out that the vast majority of actual moderating of a message board is done by the community, NOT the mods, but sooner or later they’ll wake up and kick the shit out of the petty brinksmen and the rules lawyers and the rest of the Dope-acclimated trolls but the aftermath will be a much more honest, vibrant and yes, well regulated environment.
Please, somebody, read what SmartAleq said and take it to heart. We post elsewhere because we feel that the Dope is a shadow of its former self, but the recent message boards that sprang up are an attempt to capture the essence of what the Dope used to be for us. It was somewhere smart, fun, lively and irreverent, where posting was enjoyable and there was a real energy, a zest to share in the place and its people.
Sadly, that spark has largely vanished for us here in the resentment that followed in the wake of broken promises, ill-advised rule making, heavy-handed enforcement and the creation of a “them and us” culture where the staff could barely conceal their distaste for the both the job and the members. We don’t hate the Dope, we mourn it, and we hope to carry on what was once its spirit elsewhere.
And if we do still visit to poke fun and tweak the nose of authority, please remember that we tried as hard as we could to make our voices heard when we felt it counted, and if we’re still here to hold a mirror to the Dope and its faults, perhaps that’s because there’s a lingering feeling that where passion and reason once failed, maybe in jest we can find the way to rekindle that faintest of sparks, the life of the Dope.
In other words, you’re here to make trouble. Got it. You wouldn’t be happy doing this somewhere else, you’re doing this here because you intend to cause grief. There’s a word for that. Doing this sort of shit doesn’t improve the boards at all. It might make a few disenchanted posters feel better for a while, but it certainly doesn’t enhance the boards for the majority of posters.
On an aside (NOT directed at you, C K Dexter Haven, but at other mods in this thread and elsewhere): I really, really fail to understand why people who hate these boards so much, hate the members, hate the rules, etc. still come here to moderate.
Because clearly there cannot be any middle ground between “I hate you” and “everything you do is perfect and cannot be improved”.
Certainly in every instance where several posters see a pattern and point it out, it is not because they have seen anything, but because they hate the SDMB.
As Lynn Bodoni points out, any criticism of the mods is trolling. In my opinion, doing that sort of shit doesn’t improve the boards at all. It might make a few burnt out mods feel better for a while, but it certainly doesn’t enhance the boards for the majority of posters.
This is just sad. No, really. A poster explained with some eloquence the longing and pain he feels at the loss of one of his favorite places and how he hopes to remind people of what it once was. You choose to view it not as the wistful statement it is but as an attack thoroughly disregarding his words to the contrary.
I think people make a mistake in believing that any negative feedback is unsupportive. I take a lot of comfort from the fact that I have intentionally chosen friends who, were I to embark on a self-defeating or self-harmful course of action, would have no trouble in telling me so. Would in fact consider themselves bad friends were they to ignore the danger and support me in my stupidity. Likewise I feel I would not be best supporting this board by pretending the very real dysfunction it suffers from doesn’t exist.
There have been a lot of people who have been supportive of these boards over the years who now post with ‘guest’ under their username, or have ceased posting entirely. You can continue to pretend that the board hasn’t changed, that it’s all them. Or you can acknowledge that there are two sides to every disagreement and there may be some areas where the wrong decisions were made.
Dex: I sincerely hope that whatever is going on in your life at this time it is resolved quickly and happily.
I’d say something in response but others have already said it better than I can. I strongly suggest that those of you expressing confusion reread a few of the recent threads.
Remember me? Joined in 2000, no official warnings, helpful, generally considered a good egg? You lost me in March. I did re-up at that point out of a sense of “long term loyalty”, but this is only the second time I’ve posted since March. Both times have been to simply state, again, a disagreement. Does this make me a trouble maker now?
Has it really gotten to be a state of Any criticism of mods = trolling?
No, you’re not a troll. But you are acting in a way that is destructive to the community and that is troubling.
Is that really what you want to do here? If so, that’s about the saddest thing I can think of, that you would go from being someone who thought this place was a pretty good idea to being someone who just throws rocks.
If you’re not willing to be part of the solution then you’re part of the problem.
The board is what the community makes of it. If you only come here to complain then you add nothing of meaning or substance except for complaint. You don’t build a better community, you don’t make things more interesting, you don’t fight ignorance. You only add to the noise.
Acting out is never useful and theatrics – as popular as they are here – rarely does anything but titillate the lawn chair crowd.
If all you do is poke and jibe and bitch and moan and never do anything else you’re not helping anything except to build a negative vibe. That kind of behavior never makes anything better in any situation.
If all people did was yell at you all day long would that make you feel good about what you do? No, it would make you defensive. When anyone acts from the defensive place they’re not at their best. This is as true of moderators as anyone else.
There are people that feel that beating the staff on a regular basis for any perceived fault – or just for sport – is one of the privileges of being here. Forgive us if we object.
I’d much rather you come on back and participate in the goodness this place offers. You were a part of that goodness once and could be again. You were an asset to the community for a long time. But if all you want to do is throw rocks, well, that is your choice. It’s disrespectful and ugly to all the people who do appreciate this place and want to participate and contribute but it’s always your choice.
Impressive.
Let’s review: I thought there were problems
I took these problems to you directly and respectively
I was ignored and, so, decided that my contribution was not valued here.
Have made exactly two posts in 8 months, again sadly stating problems are reoccuring, I am now
My two posts in 8 months that respectuflly disagree w/you constitutes that?
Absolute power corrupts absolutely. If you cannot accept respectful criticism, and instead see it as a personal insult, ‘throwing rocks’, ‘disrespectful and ugly’
then that’s truly sad.
My ex husband took the same stance - anyone who dared to suggest to him that he was making a mistake or behaving poorly was obviously against him. Sad, really.
throws hands in air, shakes head ruefully, pays self $20 for winning the bet
There’s a character in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid who had a line that perfectly encapsulates my reaction to the admin response in this thread. I’ll leave it to the reader to figure out which one, but his response to it would have, no doubt, been colorful.