# Does the SDMB want polling without commentary? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [August 6, 2011, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-sdmb-want-polling-without-commentary/591763 "2011-08-06T19:39:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 42
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2011, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-sdmb-want-polling-without-commentary/591763/42 "2011-08-12T20:59:12Z")
Okay, I’m going to quote from another thread but post it here, so that I can give this a bump and a last good-faith shot at being taken seriously. I _wasn’t_ one of those given Warnings in the IMHO/avatar/poll-thread-debate kerfuffle. When there was a general mod note, I was a little confused, but I followed the direction. Nothing against **Red Barchetta** or anyone else who’s been irked by the enforcement that followed, but the threads from those people are I think easily ignored by mods with the idea that it’s a petty, _personal_ matter for just those few people who just can’t accept that acts of moderation against them aren’t going to be reversed. _Don’t feed the whiners, eventually they’ll calm down, shut up, or go away._ > [@Why won't TubaDiva or Czarscasm address these 2 questions?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-tubadiva-or-czarscasm-address-these-2-questions/591964/47): > > **Tuba** and **Czar** pretty clearly aren’t going to come back and answer those questions. Some mods tend to just ignore these types of threads when they are tired of dealing with a subject. But the complainants who got the Warnings aren’t the only ones affected by or concerned with the matter. The general non-engagement (despite some effort from **Marley** in some places) to me is far more damaging to the mods’ and board’s image than the original actions or their upholding. It’s a matter of the thinking behind them; a principled position, even that one entirely disagrees with, is better than caprice. In the absence of any explication, we’re left to imagine that there _is_ no theory at work, no articulable vision for how the board should be. This can’t be literally true–but it _feels_ that way when TPTB avoid talking about it. _This_ thread was an effort to get some discussion of such theory, free of personal piques and de-linked from the short-term context and consequences of particular threads ( **Irishman** , though not a mod, [makes the best effort to address these last](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=14131370#post14131370) on their behalf; talking through the thinking works). Certainly this thread has confirmed that the notion of polls without commentary is antithetical to a number of people’s concepts of what the board should be all about. So… what? Are all these people to think that their reaction has been read and taken to heart? Sloughed off? Disagreed with, for cause? It’s hard to tell when there’s silence on the other end. The questions I’ve asked here are, in fact, still out there. > [@Why won't TubaDiva or Czarscasm address these 2 questions?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-wont-tubadiva-or-czarscasm-address-these-2-questions/591964/51): > > What I’m confused about - and what no-one has, as far as I can tell, - responded to, is: has the rule about not commenting/debating/ interacting/whatever in poll threads in IMHO been established? It does not serve the board well for mods to ignore questions about what the board is meant to be, how it is supposed to work. To my understanding, upholding a vision of that is precisely the point of having moderation in the first place. So I say this, and not just for the question of polls without commentary, but for any area in which a confusion of apparent purpose may arise. If there _is_ a working vision, don’t keep it a secret. If there _isn’t_, let the community talk it out. Thanks. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-the-sdmb-want-polling-without-commentary/591763)._