Although we disagree on the Pit, I think this is a well thought out and thoughtful post.
And sure, I agree that Pitting newbies is not the major reason they are driven away. Remember, people (and dDiscourse) “helpfully” posts links to the pit, so a newbie, not maybe knowing much about the Pit, will find themselves being called a Nazi goat felcher out of nowhere.
You may be right as I was just thinking of me on that…but, personally, the Pit seems a necessity. Maybe don’t allow newbies into the Pit until after a certain time?
I just remembered one time in which I was away from SDMB for quite some time…then had a question which I thought this board would be good for. It was about Naked Singularities.
I asked my question and Stranger On A Train came in and just derailed the thread. I think he thought he was being funny but the whole thread took off after him. the question was never even remotely answered or even acknowledged. Now, Stranger On A Train is a GREAT poster. I love him. He is, IMO, on of the best, most informative posters on here. However, that thread irritated the hell out of me and I left for years thinking this community had jumped the shark and was over. If I had been truly new/first time, I would have thought this community was a joke and never come back.
Only a certain kind of newbie has this happen to them - someone who just comes into GQ and asks a normal question (not a loaded one), or who comes into CS and makes a normal comment on a TV show thread, or into a MPSIMS breaking news thread with a normal opinion, is not generally going to have that happen. It’s the ones who ask loaded questions, or make 5 controversial GD threads in rapid succession, or come into P&E waving an insurrectionist flag, etc, who attract Pit attention. Yes, someone like Beck also does, but let’s be fair, she had a definite schtick and it included starting lots of threads, that kind of false positive can happen.
And that goes for long-term posters, too. I think it’s safe to say that the majority of posters have never been pitted.
“Nazi goat felcher” is so insane and ridiculous, I can’t imagine taking it seriously. “Fucking bitch” and “Whore cunt”, on the other hand…
I think this is a major problem with how this board treats newcomers. We can be really harsh in telling them how we want them to behave.
This is also a reason I’d like “general questions” to be changed to something like “questions with a factual answer”. New posters often ask something opinion-related in general questions and get flack for it.
I try to quietly move those GQs to the appropriate forums with a small polite explanation when I see them for just that reason. Hopefully it helps.
I generally review all new threads for purposes of correcting forums and tagging the Cafe & Game Room threads.
I do like the idea of changing some of the forum names.
I would love to see the Game Room become Sports & Games or Games & Sports. MPSIMS really needs a change, but I know, Tradition! GQ is a another great example, I really like your suggestion.
GQ is the one i feel must strongly about, because i think it’s off-putting to newcomers.
Second on my list is MPTIMS, because i find it disconcerting that it’s the proper forum for posts about a death in the family or a major disaster. Its theme is not about emotional response than about fact or opinion, and something like “responding” or “thing-happened” or “musings”, or just shorten it to “things I must share”. But I’m not in love with any particular choice of name for it.
I’ve never minded “game room”, but i don’t follow many sports, so maybe it’s more of a problem than i realize.
All those years ago when we were begging for a Sports forum and to stop the idiot thread-shitters from popping in to most sports threads to say “sports are teh dumb” we finally got a forum for sports. But without the word sports in it.
I think that makes in much more confusing in the Discourse Format to determine that Sports threads go in the forum named Game Room.
Obviously not a big deal, but if we’re changing forum names, a good time to address that one also.
Agreed on this one. I am always reporting sports-related threads that keep popping up (with regularity) up in other subforums.
I keep confusing “The Game Room” with “Thread Games”. But that’s on me.
Yes, the "certain kind’ that disagrees with one of the Pit habitués. Even if only a little bit.
Disagrees with them on such things as common decency and the merits of trolling? Right you are.
No, disagrees with them on anything at all- which of course the habitués will call trolling etc.
Look, it’s unfair for the majority of long-term posters to gang up on people with differing views from them just because their differing view is that repeatedly posting thoroughly-debunked toxic bullshit is acceptable.
Plenty of people, many of them new to me, disagree with me, in various forums, without getting pitted for it. I’d wager it’s the same with other posters. So this is clearly bullshit.
Pretty well disproved by this thread alone:
I have disagreed with lots of people on this board, for various reasons, in various forums; including long-term posters and including moderators. My first posts on this board were in defense of organic farming, which is a position at best controversial on these boards (and I never did get around to answering the last replies I got there, which would have taken a chunk of time and work.) I’ve been here over two years now. I’ve never been pitted.