Moderator behaviour (not by a newbie)

No new points to add, just my vote (as if anyone’s vote made a bit of difference) in favor of Manny and UncleBeer, whom I think are doing a damn fine job.

Okay, Mr. Gazpacho. :stuck_out_tongue:

In other words, what you actually said was so obviously false that I should have just assumed that you meant something else. :rolleyes:

Do we really have to play semantic games?

And I would thinnk that someone who looks so critically at others’ posts would look more carefully at his own:

The word “should” clearly refers to the action “if they ask you what you think… tell them”. The “shut up” part has no such modifier.

The “bigger picture” is irrelevant. I don’t care what the proper course of action is in general, I care what is proper in the situation currently under consideration.

My question: Why is it wrong for manhattan to threaten to file a complaint with a member’s ISP? Surely, the ISP would listen to the complaint and check out its’ validity. After all, it wouldn’t pay to cut off services to customers at the drop of a hat.

And I think manhattan would know this.

Think of it this way… in the past few months, some of the biggest trolls started out as some random bloke who posted in the wrong forum. Their agitation over getting reprimanded just grew and grew until eventually they got banned.

I see manhattan’s choice as being an attempt to stop such a self-destruction before it starts. “Keep this up, and not only will you be banned, but we WILL lobby with your ISP to cut off your service if we deem it necessary.” It makes more sense to have that clear EARLY ON rather than wait until a poster’s made a half dozen socks.

So that’s it. Act like a jerk, and get banned. Continue acting like a jerk, lose your 'Net service. What’s the moral of the story? Don’t act like a jerk!

Semantic games? Sorry, but that doesn’t wash. Posting here is a privilege, just as much as I consider it a privilege to be your moderator.
“The board is there, so we have a right to post to it” just doesn’t cut it, I’m afraid. This place is a great one for all of us, but it doesn’t appear in the Geneva Convention.

Hmmmmm, zo, tell uz more about zis schoolgirl fetish of yours.

I agree with that too.
This also gives me a chance to post a better response than I did last night. It came off snippier than I had intended.

And that, ironically enough, seems to me to be the issue people are taking here.

On the surface, the transgressions pointed out by Matt by a few of the newer posters seem minor and trivial, warranting something along the lines of a warning and guidance. It hardly seems like behavior that merits banning and threats to have their ISP service revoked.

Even if this was a second warning, as has been suggested, such extreme moderator measures at that point seem excessive and heavy handed. The e-mail quoted above is best directed at the truly vile and obnoxious poster. The kind of poster who’s only reason to be here is to disrupt and incense this board. The poster in question hardly seems to have reached that level of vileness, IMHO.

And that’s just it, my humble opinion. I tend to believe that tolerance and guidance, to a point, should be the running theme around here. Snuffing out ignorance means your gonna run into the ignorant more often than the intelligent, well versed, and all-knowing, poster.

you all know what this is:

you can probably guess who said that:

in response to:

which i consider a similar question to:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=54394
and almost exacly the same as:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=54261

i am not going to teach the moderators to do their job but sometimes, even though the op doesnt seem to apply to a particular forum, the intent is to have the thread answered as a general question or a great debate…
i recall for example a thread of mine about “sarcasm, name-calling and pit stuff”, which in the opinion of the moderator wasnt debatable.
recently there was a “whats wrong with descriptive subjects?”

true, it is all debatable and probably fit for the pit. we all do mistakes, some are just more stupid than others.

yes, this message board has rules and its up to the mods to enforce those rules. it seems to be a mighty difficult job to boot but that only makes the job more prone to mistakes, and to this day i havent seen one moderator correct an error s/he made.

bj0rn - …

bj0rn, I completely disagree with you, of course. But I gotta hand it to you: that post was completely understandable. Keep it up.

I think what made some people a little uncomfortable is not that manny said he was going to report grienspace to his ISP, but that it was stated that he would have him cut off. It’s one thing to say he’s going to report him, but another to say that he’s going to absolutely have him disconnected.
In the original thread, many stated:

I won’t bother quoting the email, but his position was even more forcefully stated there.

I also don’t think there’s anything wrong in having these discussions, as long as they’re kept respectful and rational. To me, matt’s decision to bring this up is equivalent to pulling a co-worker aside and discussing an uncomfortable moment in a board meeting. Maybe he had a very good reason for acting the way he did. Maybe manny will say, “You know, maybe you’re right. Maybe the next time I’m in a similar situation, I’ll react differently.” I hope as mature, intelligent adults, we can all take this thread for what it’s worth and not an attack on anyone.

I’m impressed with everyone’s level of discussion here so far. You all have made me feel better when I was starting to get a little discouraged.

wow, even after i posted???

bj0rn - comprehension comes after 0

This discussion has been far too civil. Coldfire complimenting bj0rn on his coherence? Sheesh!

As for the mods, I suppose you get what you pay for and they are worth every cent they are paid. So, how much is that Straight Dope coffee cup worth? :wink:

I haven’t gotten one yet, but I was also the hardcase who suggested an Official Straight Dope Bottle Opener might be more appropriate. What I really wanted was an Official Straight Dope Engraved Pilnser Glass–strictly for staff development purposes, of course–but that doesn’t seem too likely either.

Oh, the tragedy.
Veb

I don’t mean to, honest…

I started a reasonably polite thread and was insulted. This caused me to be in a pissy mood, and post a snappy post in this thread

For this I apologise. It was an unfortunately strongly-worded response to Coldfire’s possibly correct assertion that Iw as insulted primarily because I posted the question in the Pit, where I thought such queries had to go.

So, Veb, you are going through this misery for ABSOLUTELY NOTHING?!?!? Not even a coffee cup? I guess this explains the moderator problems, kids, because that would indicate that she’s either crazy or dumb or BOTH!

[sub]You do know I’m joking, don’t you? But only sorta, because I wouldn’t do it for nothing.[/sub]

If you think that MB’s are patrolled by trigger-happy moderators, you should try the Undernet IRC version of the SDMB. #straightdope

It is easier to get labelled a troll and be banned than it is to catch a hemorhagic illness in an east-african charnel house.

It fascinatres me how easily such lables are used by otherwise sensible people, but then we should all be familiar with how witchhunts and oppression works.

It seems to me that its the modus operandi is to first label somebody, polarise, ostracise, and then with label in place apply force to silence dissent or expresion.

We all know, after all, that Trolls deserve every bad thing which comes their way, and we should suspend normal polite rules and graces when it comes to Trolls.
So they are only getting what they deserve, arent they?
I understand that they eat babies too.

We should silence them so their poisonous arguments dont pollute our debates, and we should seek out their ISPs and demand that they should be denied service.
We should contact their employers and demand that they be terminated.
We are just and brave in this
We must protect ourselves against the Trolls, we must prevent them from disrupting what we know to be true with their falsehoods.

How do we know who is a Troll?
Why, its somebody who doesnt conform to our views and norms, after all we are good and just and polite so anything which is different to us must quite naturally be its opposite and must therefore be bad, and unjust, and impolite.

We are right to shout down Trolls, and to pursue them, and to call them by the vile epithets which they so richly deserve to make them go away.

We should ban Trolls.
Rightious Indignation is ours.
We must be firm.

Koevoet

Jophiel’s Boilerplate:

#StraightDope is not affilated with The Straight Dope, The Reader, this board or its administration. #StraightDope exists solely as an informal meeting place for people who enjoy this board to chat in real time, but has no association with this board itself.

Issues with #StraightDope should be kept off this board (as has been requested in the past) and directed towards the channel in general. Questions regarding #StraightDope may be directed to me, either in chat or via email at edamoth@inil.com or AIM with the username of Edamoth.

Take it to chat.

One thing, Veb: It strikes me that “being a jerk” is a fairly subjective and amorphous concept; such a rule, then, really isn’t the infallible boilerplate you seem to make it out to be.

Following my GD thread, I think the SDMB is like the NBA in some respects: Moderators are given the benefit of the doubt in their behavior more than regular members, long-time posters are generally given more the benefit of the doubt than other posters, and “rookie” posters are generally given less the benefit of the doubt than anyone else, absent Serlin and concrete. Which is fine and all, so long as we acknowledge that that’s the way it is.

I didnt say that it did.
I am pointing out that the mechanism of silencing dissent is common, but even more common in the chat environment.

Your point is taken however, and no further reference will be made to <reference deleted> or <reference deleted>, or even to <censored>.

Coal mines are great, but dont forget to cover your coffee with a napkin, unless you like crunchy coffee.
Regards
Koevoet, Gwala, nSibenza, cheesa cheesa.

I don’t think that’s accurate. In many ways we give rookies more leeway than regs. We figure that the environment takes a while to get used to so we will remind rookies of our guidelines. More often than not it’s just an honest mistake, and we treat it a such. If anything we come down harder on prolific posters and/or long-time members who’ve been around long enough to know the rules but choose to think that they are exempt from them.

Koe, we at the SDMB don’t silence dissent. If we did, GD would be empty. The SDMB community is full of a broad range of perspectives on many topics. I see no need to silence matt_mcl for starting this thread, or other posters for agreeing with him. We ban people for breaking the rules of this board, not for questioning our actions.

I’m sorry you’re not happy with the IRC chat, but like others have said, that has nothing to do with us mods.

Could you comment, then, specifically on the two instances which prompted matt_mcl’s OP? My point is that many regs will, now and then, engage in behavior which could be construed as “being a jerk,” depending on the bounds of that definition. Not to pick on Phil, but certainly his vitriol in the MPSIMS thread comes to mind. Or the desire expressed by one of our more conservative posters in GD that Al Gore’s press conference come to a somewhat, um, ugly end. It’s just my experience that a new poster who does something “jerkish” is given a shorter leash than a regular poster who does the same–and like I said, that may be a perfectly acceptable state of affairs, so long as it’s tacitly acknowledged. I think that manhattan overreacted to grienspace, but I also think that manny generally does a superlative job. Same with Uncle Beer. shrug Some opinions on this thread (not yours, **Alpha{/b]) seem to indicate that one can’t have respect for the mods while not agreeing with every decision they make; I don’t think that’s true.