Is not answering someone's questons considered trolling?

A moderator is implying that this is the case in this thread.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=731618&page=10

Missing detail: not answering simple questions for six or eight pages. And I did say it was starting to look that way. I didn’t want to jump to conclusions and hurt your feelings.

I posted a link to the thread and so those that take up these issues in that forum, which obviously isn’t you by the way, have all of the information.

Marley doesn’t mod that forum. Nor does Colibri. If you were getting modded for trolling, you would know it. It’s OK to call people trolls in the pit, where insults are permitted. If insults bug you the pit may not be the best place for you.

Also, not answering simple direct questions may or may not be trolling, but it is definitely really fucking annoying.

You linked to page eight for some reason. I am not sure what you mean about taking up the issues, but I doubt it matters.

So does mean I can call them trolls as well even though they are moderators?

As long as you are referring to their actions as a poster. In other words, you can’t call them a troll because they close your thread or give you a Warning (aka citation).

They try to let you know when they are moderating, so if they don’t say they are moderating, anything they say or do is fair game.

(I know I say this way too often but) This brings up the question; given the totality of the exchange does it raise to the level of “junior modding”? OK - they are both mods and pretty good IMHO but since that isn’t their category or area of responsibility and they were just participating as average posters ---- if speaking as posters did they nudged the line, if speaking as mods should they have said so?

To me there some ambiguity there which is why I’m here asking the question.

I think so, but I’m not sure. I think you can call out a moderator the same way you can call out a poster, as long as you don’t call them out specifically for their modding. But the rules have long since passed intelligibility here.

At any rate, you shouldn’t call anyone a troll unless they are actually acting like a troll. Otherwise you’re just going to look dumb. Just my opinion.

It’s the Pit. You can accuse someone of trolling there; it isn’t junior modding. As Larry Borgia says, it’s not always the wisest course of action.

EasyPhil, I predict this thread will go as well for you as the other one is. I’m sure all you needed was this one to convince us you’re right.

I’m not looking for you or anyone else to validate what I’m saying or what I think, I’m just looking for clarity on what the rules are, plain and simple.

Yes, I’m sure that’s all you’re doing. Go for it, accuse away!

You’ve already accused me of trolling in the thread. No, it’s not against the rules in the Pit.

Sorry for my response. I just assumed someone asking that question must be a new poster, and didn’t look at how long he’d been here. The responses in that thread seemed more new-poster-esque, too.

The rules are not so plain and not so simple, they all depend on the circumstances and specific instance. It is certainly possible to not answer a question, and not be trolling. It is also possible to not respond to questions in a way that IS trolling. All depends on what came before, and the tone, and the situation.

:confused:

I can’t be bothered to go dig up examples, but I know in the past I’ve seen Mods mildly berate posters for demanding someone answer a question when they didn’t answer.

Context is everything.

I have certainly Modded posters for what I considered harassment.

When a sidebar discussion leads one poster to demand an answer from another poster to a question regarding a statement that is not central to the thread or that questions a poster’s actions or beliefs, persistently demanding an answer seems harassment.

When a poster makes a direct declaration regarding the central thesis of the thread, then refuses to answer how they justify their position while repeating that position without explanation, that would seem to carry a trollish odor.

Of course, depending on whether one favors the questioner or the questioned, the question may seem harassment or the refusal to answer may seem trollish. Most of the disputes around here are based on judgments and disagreement with those judgments.

The only limitation on responding to mods in the Pit is that you can’t insult us because of something we’ve done in our capacity as moderators. For things we’ve posted as regular users, you can abuse us to the same extent you can abuse any other poster in the Pit.

It’s also worth noting that the enforcement of rules against trolling work slightly differently in the Pit than they do in the rest of the board. Normally, posting in such a way as to deliberately antagonize or upset other posters is considered trolling, but, of course, antagonizing and upsetting other posters is part of the reason the Pit exists in the first place. Generally, getting warned for trolling in the Pit requires demonstrable, knowing lies - the one instance I can remember off the top of my head is a guy who claimed, in a 9/11 thread, to have lost both parents in the WTC attack, despite multiple mentions of his parents as still being alive in other threads. This does generally NOT include things like repeatedly linking to a previously debunked cite, or misrepresenting positions taken by public figures or other posters. If I have to make a call between a poster being a troll, and just being an idiot, I’ll usually default to “idiot” unless there’s incontrovertible evidence to the contrary.

Lastly, I’d like to point out that there is no rule against moderators moderating outside their assigned forum. We generally don’t do it as a courtesy to each other, but if Marley hands out a warning to someone in the Pit, it’s not automatically invalid just because Marley isn’t a Pit mod.

[HIJACK]Phil! Hadn’t seen you in ages, so cool to see you back again![/HIJACK]

Sorry, always nice to see veteran Dopers return. :smiley: