Due to the “lurk first” rule, it should be apparent what types of questions the Teeming Millions and possibly Cecil would consider.
In fact, there are threads and other Websites that feature “Unofficial rules” and “Questions only idiots ask” and things like that.
So, I am forced to cry bullshit in regards to your lame-assed attempt to justify the posting of inane, trollish questions in GQ or GD.
Maybe I’m missing something, Lex, but how was grienspace’s question inane or trollish?
Count me with matt, Karl, Colibri, and picmr on this one.
You seem to be suffering from several mistaken notions:
Here’s a fact: posters are often warned, by private email and those communications aren’t for board consumption. A poster may choose to quote those emails–usually very selectively–but that’s their choice. You can’t have it both ways: individual privacy and public trials.
It’s really quite simple. People agree to the registration agreement, which boils down pretty much to “don’t be a jerk”. This place is too big, too busy and too vital to dink around endlessly with jerks.
Veb
Hmmmm…well, I can see that is SEEMED like grienspace often times was just trying to get a rise out of posters, I do happen to find Manny a little intimidating. Not that I’m complaining about him, just that I always feel hesitant to post a thread in GQ, for fear it might be silly, or wrong.
But then, I’m always nervous around authority figures…
(read-Kathi’s a big wuss)
Still, I thought he just threatened him with contacting his ISP in the e-mail. Which, while not something I would agree with, shouldn’t have been made public.
Fair question, matt, and it deserves an answer.
Unfortunatly, I won’t have one today. I just went through 150 (!) threads in GQ since I last saw the boards yesterday aftenoon. In all honestly, I just don’t have it in me to give you a complete response right now.
But I didn’t want you to think I was ignoring this thread. If all goes well, I hope to give you a proper response tomorrow at about this time.
Hope that’s cool with you. Cuz if I look at one more thread today, my eyes are going to burst!
Really? Are you sure what you meant was "they have no obligation towards posters to exercise their power fairly’? I think that it’s pretty clear that they have an obligation to the administrators.
That’s right. They’re not violating any inablienable rights. They are, however, violating alienable rights. Cecil doesn’t have to have a website. We don’t automatically have the right to post here. But Cecil has chosen to have a message board, and has chosen to give us the right to post here. Therefore, we have the right to post here. I really don’t think that moderaters are exempt from the “don’t be a jerk” rule.
You are free to have that attitude, but don’t expect others to share it.
Since when do you have the right to tell others what to say?
If I saw my host insulting someone in front of me, I sure as hell would express my disapproval.
manhattan close the thread with the statement:
I saw no evidence that grienspace knew the answer to the question or wished to discuss his worldview.
Nope it was also said on the board.
From http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=54086
The only people I have seen threatened with this before are the likes of Serlin or concrete. I don’t think grienspace is in that league.
Ban him if you want but I think that to bring it to the levels that manny was talking about is OTT to say the least.
Oh, suzy, I can play Pick-Apart-the-Post with the best of them.
I thought it was pretty damn clear too, Captain Obvious as Fuck, so that’s why I didn’t make the distinction. But thanks for pointing it for all those who didn’t catch it.
Wrong. We have the privelige of posting here. You started off on the wrong foot, and everything following your basic premise reflects that.
Thanks. I don’t expect others to share my attitude, even if it is an attitude that just makes sense. I don’t expect anything of society at large, but thank you for your permission.
Truly an inept argument. It was not a commaned, but rather a suggestion. I would think that someon with as keen a grasp on the obvious as yourself would see that the “should” denotes that it was an entreaty, not a demand.
As would I, but again, you’re missing the bigger picture. You have posted another inept argument. I never said that one wouldn’t say anything when one saw one’s host insulting someone, I said that one wouldn’t advise them of how to run their household. For example, since I evidently must break it down for you, if you were to see your host ridicule another guest, you may come to their defense. However, if you see your host’s child come in and say
“I cleaned the garage, took out the garbage, did all my homework and took all the recycling to the plant. Can I borrow the car?” and your host replies with a curt
“No, you may not. Go to your room.” you may be tempted to say something. However, you may not know that the child is grounded or otherwise on punishment for something that has taken place unbeknownst to you. It is not your place to intervene or even ask. In fact, it’s rude.
In any case, the fact remains that:
It is NOT a right to post here. It is a privelige and it can be revoked whether or not you like or understand the reasons behind it.
Moderators are NOT elected officials. They do not answer to you, you answer to them.
Hi Opal.
Wheter or not you understand a moderator’s motivations for what they do is irrelevant. They do NOT need to explain themselves to you.
This is all just my opinion, I could be wrong (i.e. “full of shit”) and I acknowledge that. But you will have to come up with something better than “Stop picking on that poor poster” to convince me otherwise. Not that convincing me is all that important.
Lexicon said:
Lighten up. My post was meant as a only as a general bit of constructive criticism- I wasn’t attacking Manny’s handling of the specific case, not least because I’m not privy to all the details involved. It certainly wasn’t an attempt to justify “inane, trollish questions”- speaking of which, what do you feel was inane or trollish about the question? I do know that Isaac Asimov once wrote an essay on that very topic- I guess he must have been just an inane troll, huh.
For the record, I have a great deal of respect for the mods, and am very appreciative of all the volunteer efforts they put in to making this the enjoyable board that it is. And I’ll reiterate that I am not making any judgments re Manny’s handling of this case. That does not mean that I should not be able to make a rare suggestion, say once every 14 months or so.
The only bullshit I see here is your lame-assed kneejerk reactions to some posters asking simple questions in a rational and respectful manner.
Judas H Lexicon. Up until now I always thought of you as a stable poster.
Relax, take a deep breath, and re-read your posts. You’re jumping all over the place over a pretty simple and reasonable question.
Or are you arguing that the question should never have been asked in the first place?
Lighten up? Look, bonehead, try to keep up. I don’t really think I even need to reply to your last post, as it’s idiocy is self evident. In any case, you asked a stupid question, and I answered it, that’s all that went down.
I wasn’t talking about the question that started all this, I was talking specifically about what you said:
All I did was answer your question. I wasn’t talking about anyone in particular. I was pointing out that should it come to pass that someone posts an inane, trollish question it cannot be justified by claiming ignorance. You seem to have said that it could be, because the of the cursory written descrition of what is acceptable in that forum. I was merely pointing out that this is not an acceptable excuse.
You have read Asimov, good for you. That has nothing to do with what you and I are talking about.
To sum up:
You essentially said it’s okay to post any ol’ question in GQ because it’s not in writing anywhere what the criteria for questions are.
I say that is bullshit becuase you should lurk first to know what types of questions are supposed to be there.
That’s all. No need to wax intellectual on me, nebuli. It’s not a lame-assed knee-jerk reaction to some posters asking simple questions in a rational and respectful manner. An example of a lame-assed knee-jerk reaction would be premature ejaculation. So don’t get all righteous on me, chooch, because I wasn’t talking about anyone but you. You and your “lame-ass” attempt to justify posting any old thing anywhere.
Maybe the reason that your suggestions are so rare is because they’re stupid and they suck. If “Write a tome explaining to every idiot with a computer what they can or cannot post under every forum title,” is the best you can come up with, then there is no doubt: They do suck.
Just to point something out, in grienspace’s MPSIMS thread he says “Perhaps I was trolling, but it was certainly with a barbless hook in the appropriate pond.”
Given the levels of crap the mods must have to wade through, someone who gleefully admits to trolling probably isn’t going to get cut a lot of slack for possible infractions.
Fenris
Cnote, thanks for the vote of confidence. I am glad you have heretofore found me to be a stable poster. I assure you, my pulse is normal, and I am not seething nor am I “jumping all over the place” like a schoolgirl with ants in her pleated, plaid skirt.
It’s simply this:
The mods and admins of this board, in my opinion, are beyond reproach insofar as regular old members like you and a I and everyone else are concerned. Now, I realize I have only been here for a little over a year (don’t forget the name change) and that I lurked for about 6 months before that but I can say that I have seen all this before and it’s still just as much bullshit now as it was then. If you get warned by a mod it’s because you are doing something wrong. If you get banned, it’s because you are a stupid asshole who has no place here.
It’s not up to us, it’s up to the mods, and we can accept that or leave.
I don’t see what the big deal is, I really don’t. Everything else is just arguing with people (thankfully they are intelligent enough to argue, all my lack-wit insults aside) who are trying to convolute this premise with all kinds of supposition and conjecture.
There is a bottom-line, and they want to suspend that in order to carry on with an argument that makes no sense because of that very bottom line. It’s almost insane.
This thread is composed of thoughtful argument and meaningful but polite disagreement and does not have the words “felch” and “fuck” strewn about, with no derogatory references to the moderators’ maternal parent throughout most of the posts. So, it’s off to GD.
Oh.
Damn.
Nevermind.
I’m not commenting on this situation. Just adding that I know full well that my internet service may be threatened by much less than that. According to my ISP contract, I can lose my service with a legitimate complaint from any site I visit. If I deliberately, maliciously, or repeatedly violate the rules of any online forum or board, the owners/operators of that forum can protest to my ISP. For that matter, anyone can file a protest with anone’s ISP. That, of course, doesn’t mean all complaints are taken seriously.
Threatening to ban Grienspace from the board is one thing–the admins and mods have the authority to run this place as they see fit, and it ain’t subject to referendums. But threatening to have his ISP dump him (I assume it’s a him) is wayover the top for the apparent infraction. Sorry, manny, but unless this guy is a reincarnation or something you went too far.
Lexicon said:
The mods and admins do a damn fine job, and they have to put up with an awful lot of shit to do it. But they are human, and therefore inevitably make mistakes, lose their cools, and just get frustrated and lash out. You seem to be suggesting that no one can ever question something the M/As do–a sort of “the King can do no wrong” posture that I don’t think works, and that is not board policy. Hence the Pit forum description that includes: “This is the place for all complaints and other discussion regarding administration of the SDMB.” If our hosts wanted zero discussion of what happens, they would presumably remove that sentence and make it a policy that no one could question them.
There’s a big difference between what matt is doing here and the attack threads some of the dingfucks start. I would hope that is clear.
We can question away. I’m just saying that we shouldn’t expect it to come to anything.
And I’m not saying that mods can’t make mistakes. I’m just saying that it’s not our job or place to point them out. That’s the responisibility of the admins. We are not in a position to do such things, because we don’t have all the information necessary to make such a call.
It’s like the court of the Dope, you know? You have a case, a mod makes a decision. Maybe it gets appealed to the supreme court, which would be an admin. After that, it’s irrelevant what you think about the situation, becuase a decision has been made by the highest power.
That’s something that bugged me about Al Gore’s speech.
“I will accept the Supreme Court’s decision…”
Well, gawl-lee, Mr. Gore, it shore is big o’ you to accept a decision that will stand no matter what you do anyway. Good thing you accept it, not like you have a choice.
Sounds like the mods have already inferred that some significant transgressions had occured that were not in the public view. Since those comments have not been made a part of the “public” trial, it is not possible to evaluate whether the reaction was OTT or not.
A lot of what conspires on this board is based on trust. The people who run the board trust the members to not be jerks. The members of the board trust the mods to not be jerks. Since I’ve been a part of this and the previous SDMB community for a long time, and remember too well the problems we had with jerks that we could not do anything about, my “gut” reaction is to side with the mods. Remember when the board was hacked? Sometimes, if a member makes threats or becomes a sufficiently large asshole, trust is not appropriate.
I would suggest, though, that since the impression I get is that much of the offensive behaviour occured in a private forum, that comments to the effect that complaints could be filed with the member’s ISP be confined to a private forum as well. Yes, the misbehaviour of members can be quite frustrating, but it’s just bad form to make those remarks in front of a crowd. It makes the mods look bad instead of shining the light on the real offender, the individual member causing the problem.
The board is approaching 12,000 members. That only a relative few have been forcibly removed is quite remarkable.
Lex-
Thanks for the response. Either I’ve had a few too many tonight or you’re actually being reasonable. I can’t tell right now, but I hope it’s a bit of both.
I only jumped in here in response to your comment that poster’s should simply go along with the game and not make waves. I read it, and it may not necessarily be how you intended it, but I interpreted as, “Don’t bring this up, whatever a moderator says is right and that’s that. We’re in no position to ever question the actions of a moderator so you can just shut up! You hear me?”
Sorry, that doesn’t make much sense to me, reasonable argument wise.
Yes, the moderators and administrators of this board do a terrific job under unknown pressures and conditions that most posters are completely unaware of. But that’s the job and that’s the description they knew of when getting into it.
They wanted to be moderator’s, it wasn’t forced upon them.
If they can’t do it or are overwhelmed, maybe they should pass it on to someone who would be better at doing that kind of thing, if that’s the case.
Police do a terrific job under situations that I could never imagine, but it doesn’t stop me from being critical of them when I feel they’ve gone outside of the boundaries of their job and duties.
There’s a lot of speculation going on about this and that without the benefit of Manhattan’s response. I’ll wait for that.
Lexicon said:
Granted that nobody expects the mods and admins to take polls about what they do. (Nobody with any brains, anyway.) And granted that manny may well not give a rat’s ass whether I think he went overboard–there’s no real reason he should care. But the question had already been asked, so I present my opinion for whatever it may be worth, to him or anyone else.
tbea925 said:
As is mine–if you’re under the impression that I’m a mod-basher, you’re wrong, as I think some folks could attest to. But that doesn’t mean I find it necessary to hold my tongue (or fingers, in this case) or be adjudged a traitor–at least I hope we aren’t to that point.