Eh, when people say it’s tough to keep up, it usually means they don’t care enough to try.
And that seems to me to be missing the point. Innocuous posting should result in zero moderation. It’s always fair to discuss whether or not something was worthy of a note, because in all cases a note is just the start.
Honestly, do you want people ignoring mod notes? Because that seems to be the suggestion here. If a mod note isn’t worth discussing, it isn’t worth even paying attention to them. I don’t think anyone wants that.
Frankly, the idea that a mod note isn’t worth discussing is extremely disturbing to me. Freaking out over a mod note is of course ridiculous (and that happens, all too often). But discussing the potential ramifications of a mod note is not at all out of bounds, because moderation deserves to be discussed if people are unsure about it.
Let me put it this way… If I got a mod note at random for ridiculous things that don’t deserve moderation, I’d be gone. I think everyone would be. So don’t attempt to minimize this, that’s very unconstructive.
I’m having trouble getting from A to B here.
If I start a hijack in this thread about how much I love Bazooka Joe bubblegum and am (rightfully) told to stop, that doesn’t need discussion. Just an acknowledgement and an end to the hijack. The fact that I’m willing to say “you’re right, my bad” and just drop it doesn’t somehow invalidate the note itself.
If the mod note was unclear though, it does. You wouldn’t just shrug because it’s only a mod note. Especially if it raises a larger question. What if the mod note said that the SDMB is being sponsored by Hubba-Bubba and you can’t mention other brands of gum? You’d certainly want that discussed, even if it was just a note. And there’d definitely be concerns if Hubba-Bubba was controlling content on the board, and could potentially be a problem for the board as a whole.
Thats my point. A mod note is worth discussing if it could have ramifications down the road. That’s what ATMB is for.
Okay, sure. That’s a little different than “if a mod note isn’t worth discussing, it isn’t worth even paying attention to.”
I’m confident guessing that the great vast majority of mod notes are never discussed and don’t need to be.
Thankfully that appears to be very accurate.
I agree, I’ve gotten plenty myself. (Well, not too many hopefully.)
My point was that we shouldn’t say that mod notes are never worth discussing, otherwise they aren’t meaningful in any way. I wasn’t trying to say the opposite, that every mod note is worth discussing.
I was trying to say, before this odd tangent came up, that one extreme is an outright ban of words that are frequently used in uncontroversial speech (which doesn’t happen, we don’t ban any words outright here), and allowing toxic speech. A simple solution is to evaluate the usage of words in context, which is what mods typically do and that’s what was done here.
As the “somebody else” in that thread, I was following up the previously posted poll with a grammatical gripe about confusing the terms “dribbling” and “driveling” and not referring to the pollster as an “imbecile”.
There are a number of words that at least historically have been used to label people with mental incapacity, but have gone into general usage to characterize stupid statements or actions by those with presumably normal intelligence. I’ve recently heard criticism of the word “idiot” as somehow being a slam against individuals with intellectual disabilities, with seems over the top to me.
I have no problem with banning the use of “retard”, which at best is a nasty juvenile taunt and at worst a slur aimed at hurting people with Down’s syndrome and similar afflictions. Casting out other terms that are useful in describing (for instance) politicians and denialists unnecessarily limits language.
How you get that from ‘I checked to try to make sure I understood the issue and decided to be more careful what forum I was posting in in the future’ I do not understand.
And I didn’t feel any need to discuss it. If I really hadn’t understood the issue, then I’d have discussed it. The poster whose post set this off apparently didn’t feel any need to discuss it; quite possibly because, when they thought about it, they did understand the issue.
But that certainly didn’t mean that I didn’t pay attention to it.
No, very often it’s the end of the matter.
You seemed to think it entirely reasonable when you said
It wasn’t at random, it wasn’t ridiculous, and IMO it did call for a mod note. Is that the sort of discussion that you wanted?
When I saw that post, I flinched so hard away from that entire thread that I didn’t even report it; I thought I’d deal with it when I had more time to sort out what I wanted to say. When I came back, I found that I didn’t need to say anything, it had been dealt with.
Apparently there was nothing whatsoever about the post that bothered you (and no, it wasn’t the word on its own that was the main issue. As multiple people have said in this thread.) Try thinking about why there are others in this thread who were disturbed about it. It seems to me that you’re the one attempting to minimize it.
I was addressing a hypothetical situation, which you seemed to completely miss. I was talking about a situation where a typically uncontroversial word was banned and moderated. You’re taking me entirely out of context. Go read my last post again, you’re misunderstanding me completely.
Stop putting words in my mouth. I supported the moderation. Multiple times.
That’s the entire point I was making. It was good moderation. You’re just making things up here.
What about any of the below suggests I think that there was a problem with the mod note that is the subject of this thread?
I think your own tangent confused you.
OK, if that starts happening here, I’ll worry about it then.
I sincerely apologize for my offensive poll.
Which hasnt happened and didnt happen here.
Again; read my post. Stop taking what I say out of context: It’s boring to have to keep repeating myself here:
This seems another of many arguments we have around here about a “naughty word list” (my words). I certainly have been caught up in that in the past.
The consensus seems such a list should not exist (and I agree).
Best summary I can make is context matters. That may be a judgement call.
It seems a moving target. We have people in society who are easy targets and derogatory words are used to describe them. Then we decide those words are “bad words” so some other euphemism is used to describe them. Then those are “bad words.”
I am not sure where it stops which is why I think context is the only cure.
Hey, thanks! Looked like a thoughtless joke, and I figure we’ve all made those. Apologizing when it’s brought to your attention is solid.
Hey, your polls are enjoyable and humorous and I always look forward to them. It’s pretty apparent you’d never deliberately be unkind. Goodness knows I’ve made blunders that seemed clever at the time.
Classy and consise. Thank you.
Yes, yes, you made up a hypothetical that has never happened and didnt happen here. We got that.
No, okay, so it’s too much for you to read my post.
I posted two extremes. One where a word was banned, another where people could get away with saying anything. I said that moderation should fall between them and that the mods tend to do that, as they did in this case, because that’s what’s healthy for the board.
I didn’t set up some crazy hypothetical to rail against. Someone took a small part of my post, took it totally out of context, and went after it as if that’s a point I was trying to make.
Please drop this hijack, and stop making up things I didn’t do. It’s very frustrating and doing nothing for the thread.