Pit rules have been revised

[E-Sabbath]

Okay. So, hypothetically, I think you’re a flaming cupwaffle, DSYoungEsq. And we’re in a debate about… call it gun control. And you’ve accused me of wanting to cut arms off bears. I think you’re not only misrepresenting me, but telling purposeful untruths. And things get heated.

A mod steps in… can we still take it to the pit? The pit is for things that get heated, but we can’t get heated in the pit anymore.

[Shodan]

@acsenray

I have read the thread and I ask this question because I don’t feel like I’m getting the explanation I’m looking for.

And several people have been asking for a clarification of the rules as well, with an equal lack of success.

People have complained about the rule being vague and unenforceable, but most social rules are vague.

Not vague, at least in my case, but contradictory. Contradictory both to itself (‘you can be insulting but not abusive’ - feel free to define the difference if you can) and to the free-wheeling vulgarity that characterizes the Pit.

And I don’t see anything that would help me understand why people thought that a rule regarding standards in the Pit affected the value of the SDMB as a whole. What I am trying to understand is what exactly makes being able to insult people such an important feature of the SDMB that restrictions on it would make so many people raise such a stink, threaten to leave, and proclaim the “death” of the boards.

Two reasons -[ul][li]See what I said above about the free-wheeling vulgarity. Part of the fun of the SDMB is that there is a forum where flaming is the order of the day. “It’s just a message board” applies there in a particular way that’s liberating. Nothing of what is said there needs to be taken seriously. So we are free to express our Inner Asshole in ways that hurt no one. [/li]
Do you think people really mean it when they express the hope that their opponents attempt sexual congress with an operating WeedWhacker? Sure, sometimes it’s your turn in the barrel, and you get Pitted - sometimes, embarrassingly enough, for something you said that was stupid. But it like sparring - you get knocked around sometimes, but the process is rather entertaining, and you even learn something more often than not, if you approach it in the right spirit.
[li]Because nobody will seem to give us a straight answer. [/li]
If this is to address a minor issue, why so sweeping a change? Why can’t those making the change explain exactly what they expect? Ed himself has said that not all of his “explanations” were meant to be taken seriously.

But all objections are swept aside with “I knew you’d overreact” and “don’t worry, nothing much has changed” and “trust the mods”. And especially “wait and see how this works out”. Why can’t they make their agenda plain on what goes and what won’t? What if I guess wrong and get banned? I am not exactly Mr. Popularity around here.

If that the intent, as some have suggested - get rid of the Charter Members because the $7.48 isn’t enough to offset the loss of revenue because I don’t have to look at the ads? [/ul]
Longer than I expected.

Well, you asked.

Regards,
Shodan

[jackdavinci]

@acsenray

It seems to me that we live almost our whole social lives learning how to live with rules like that. How am I wrong about that?

@Starving_Artist

Well, most of us don’t go around insulting each other in RL like we do here, nor do we come in for the rude and insulting behavior that we get here.

People definitely use more colorful language with the people they are buddies with in real life, and in locations and contexts where it’s appropriate. The Pit is the electronic equivalent of the locker room. You wouldn’t use that sort of language or bring up those topics at a fancy restaurant, sure. But that fancy diner is only made possible by the existence of the locker room as an outlet for our id. If we had no place to be profane and talk about our sexual conquests, all that stuff would just start seeping out at other times. And it would probably be worse than the stuff in the locker room. Because a lot of stuff goes unsaid there just because you know you can say it if you really have to. Once there’s no outlet, the threshhold for what seems urgent to say gets much much lower.

@I_Love_Me_Vol.I

The second prong should be the mass civil disobedience I suggested further upthread, i.e. as many of us as possible freely use as much “potty-mouth language” (as in: fuck you, cunt-face!) against each other in the Pit until TPTB either ban all of us, or relent. […]Let’s get on it, OK?

I’m in, name the thread!

[raindog]

@I_Love_Me_Vol.I

This idea deserves to be reiterated, and often. Feel free to quote me (and That Guy) on this. Often.

I would suggest that Adblock plus should only be the first prong of a stategy to get this board back to where it needs to be.

The second prong should be the mass civil disobedience I suggested further upthread, i.e. as many of us as possible freely use as much “potty-mouth language” (as in: fuck you, cunt-face!) against each other in the Pit until TPTB either ban all of us, or relent.

The third prong (can you say “prong” on the SDMB anymore? It sounds so… dirty and abusive!) and last resort is that as many posters as possible take a 6 month hiatus until TPTB get the picture and reverse their really rather awful new policy.

Let’s get on it, OK?

First prong of the strategy?? Are you kidding?

Perhaps we can all throw ourselves on the ground and vow to hold our breath until Ed relents.

[raindog]

@storyteller0910

With all due respect, you’re missing the point, Ed. Ed, I don’t know if you’ll actually read this, or if you care. I have barely 2,000 posts to my name in many years posting here, and I doubt I’ve made much of an impression on anyone who doesn’t play Mafia or care about baseball. And just to provide a bit of context on my own opinion: I am absolutely certain I’ve never called another user a cunt. My own posts very rarely contain profanity (although they certainly do from time to time), and I’m pretty sure I’ve never started a Pit thread attacking another poster (unless Brett Favre is lurking out there somewhere, in which case, gosh, I’m sorry, Mr. Favre. Please stay retired).

But I want to respond to the above, because I think you’re mis-stating the source of objection to this new policy, or rather, oversimplifying it. It’s easy enough to dismiss complaints as people who want only “the ability to call other users cunts.” But for my part, it is not the ability to call anyone anything in particular that drew me to the SDMB; it was the sense that here was an online community where intelligence - and quality of expression - were valued.

I think this policy is a reversal of this, a blow on behalf of ignorance. The idea that “fuck you” is somehow automatically stupid and uncreative and a string of words you pulled from Roget’s is indicative of greater intelligence and creativity is just flat wrong; it’s intellectual pretentiousness at its worst. I personally value choosing exactly the right words to convey exactly the meaning I want, and in some cases, “go fuck yourself” is precisely right and a string of donkey-penis references is simply not. I want the ability to choose the right words (or to make the attempt, anyway), because the precision of language is my particular interest.

Cervaise has rightly received acclaim for some of his longer, more elaborately worded insults, but I have seen him offer much shorter, blunter, and more profane insults, as well. That he is able to use them correctly and in their proper places is an indication, to me, that he is intelligent - certainly more so than someone who expends huge amounts of effort trying to find a $50 equivalent to “asshole” when “asshole” is exactly the right word, because he’s convinced himself that “asshole” is inherently smarter.

Specific words, specific constructions, are never stupid or unimaginative on their own. The failure to recognize this suggests that the commitment to intelligence that this board purports to have is really a commitment to the appearance of intelligence - to the ability to say, "look, our discourse is elevated because we don’t say ‘fuck you’ - and the ignorance and pseudo-intellectualism of that stance is disappointing to me as a user.

In theory this all makes sense. The problem is that we don’t live in a theoretical world. We live in a real world, and in this world of ours the profanity you’re getting all misty eyed over is usually ham handed, banal, crude and witless.

This isn’t the first time someone has made the [tenuous in the best circumstances] that there is something downright elegant in calling someone a c*nt.

Profanity can be used intelligently. There are times it is the exact word, for dramatic or literary effect. There are few H.L Menckens or Dorothy Parkers around here though. I don’t think there is any “failure to recognize” that there are creative, witty uses of the word. In real life however, that rarely happens here.

TPTB aren’t coming down on a group of witty, brilliant scribes that use rank profanity selectively, creatively, indiscriminately, and with wit, they’re taking a stand against vicious, senseless, high school drivel.

[DocCathode]

@raindog

In theory this all makes sense. The problem is that we don’t live in a theoretical world. We live in a real world,

Oh sure, we live in the real world- in theory anyway.

[TVeblen]

@Mtgman

The chilling effect on expression and interaction is what concerns me.

Call me a maverick (“Bret! Bart!”) but not even this bothers me most. I rarely cuss and can’t remember resorting to obscenities to convey my gems of wisdom.

The rules changes bother me because they’re almost guaranteed to cause more problems than they solve. I don’t want to see mods and admins shove vulnerable body parts into wringers. I don’t like, at all, feeling reluctantly alienated from the board.

The fact is, there were a pretty solid set of Pit rules in place that posters helped develop. Not all suggestions were incorporated, by a long shot, but the process made a huge difference. It took some time, and a lot of back-and-forthing, but in the end posters understood not only the rules themselves but also the ‘whys’ behind them. All of that hard work and mutual understanding was just tossed away.

If the goal was to stem so much of the reflexive mod bashing, then how to do that could have been posed in a sticky. Sure, a lot of automatic ‘hate The Man’ garbage would have cropped up immediately–but so would calmer, more reasoned responses from posters themselves. Pay-to-post included a hardcore sense of entitlement among some–some, not all–posters. But the fact is the relationship changed just as soon as money changed hands.

The customer sure isn’t always right, and there have been plenty of hilarious, invective-filled Pit threads that gleefully blew the myth to smithereens. It’s worth remembering how infrequently that customers-as-assholes ridicule was applied to paying members here. I don’t care a whoop if the most dedicated board bashers and rage junkies flounce off in a huff and never return. Good riddance. (Though even rage junkies can be unintentionally hilarious at times. Ruthless, froth-speckled self-parodies, some of them, and don’t even realize it. Enough to make skilled satirists weep with envy)

BUT why on earth alienate and confuse good posters when it’s so easy to avoid? You want folks to like this place enough to pay to play here. So just lay out your concerns openly, ask for feedback then listen to it. It probably would have earned a helluva lot more support and appreciation than expected. Instead of building some solid support, now the mods and admins have to do all the heavy lifting.

ETA: I don’t understand how you’re drawing the lines on abuse. That isn’t passive-aggression or baiting. It’s confusing.

[Mister_Armageddon]

@I_Love_Me_Vol.I

The third prong (can you say “prong” on the SDMB anymore? It sounds so… dirty and abusive!) and last resort is that as many posters as possible take a 6 month hiatus until TPTB get the picture and reverse their really rather awful new policy.

Let’s get on it, OK?

I’m all for it, but I think there’s something we need to watch out for.

In the past, we’ve managed to pressure TPTB into reversing some of their decisions. There was one over ads, I think, which was rendered irrelevant after
we went back to free posting and they put the ads in anyway. The usual pattern for this, though, is that the user base gets angry for a few days, the admins gauge the reaction, and then pretend to knuckle under by granting some minor change to the rules. They get what they really wanted in the first place, and the usual legion of bootlickers comes out to congratulate them. And no one notices that they’ve been screwed with a spiked dildo as opposed to a chainsaw.

If we’re going to do this, we do it all the way. No compromise. No let up, either, which is why I think just up and leaving is a mistake. We need to remind them every day that we don’t like this, and keep it up. The previous Pit rules did not need changing, and this needs to be shoved in their faces until they either acknowledge they were wrong or make it clear that they don’t care what we think. THEN we can leave, and good riddance too if that’s the case.

[Cluricaun]

@raindog

Perhaps we can all throw ourselves on the ground and vow to hold our breath until Ed relents.

<THUD>

[Dr.Drake]

Again, Ed, I think you’re hearing only what you want to hear. This is not a twelve-page thread of people who are angry because they want to call each other names. This is a twelve-page thread of people who are angry because you have removed the assumption that we are adults and will act as such (with occasional intervention from the mods). The new rules make several insulting presumptions based on no evidence. Show me where the Dopers have been behaving so badly that we need a rule change. Show me why “don’t be a jerk” doesn’t cover these instances. Your intentions are fine, it’s your implementation that’s high-handed, unnecessary, and insulting. Your condescension is only partly in words like “relax.” It is most evident in your refusal to hear what the vast majority are saying.

None of us needs to swear to make a point. That’s a red herring. We are endlessly creative and can find other ways to let off steam verbally if necessary. But you have not yet explained why you think it’s necessary other than some vague feeling of unease which you cannot or will not articulate.

[raindog]

@Dr.Drake

Again, Ed, I think you’re hearing only what you want to hear. This is not a twelve-page thread of people who are angry because they want to call each other names. This is a twelve-page thread of people who are angry because you have removed the assumption that we are adults and will act as such (with occasional intervention from the mods). The new rules make several insulting presumptions based on no evidence. Show me where the Dopers have been behaving so badly that we need a rule change. Show me why “don’t be a jerk” doesn’t cover these instances. Your intentions are fine, it’s your implementation that’s high-handed, unnecessary, and insulting. Your condescension is only partly in words like “relax.” It is most evident in your refusal to hear what the vast majority are saying.

None of us needs to swear to make a point. That’s a red herring. We are endlessly creative and can find other ways to let off steam verbally if necessary. But you have not yet explained why you think it’s necessary other than some vague feeling of unease which you cannot or will not articulate.

No evidence?

FYI…“MPSIMS” is not The Pit.

[HoboStew]

@Mister_Armageddon

And no one notices that they’ve been screwed with a spiked dildo as opposed to a chainsaw.

Uh huh. No overreactions here. Perfectly normal healthy response to a simple, small rule change that will affect 0.01% of the posts.

[Risha]

I ask yet again, Ed, I really, truly, and with absolutely no hyperbole do not understand the difference between insults and abuse as you are setting down in rule #2. I can’t comply with a rule that I don’t understand! Everything else aside, I DON’T WANT TO GET BANNED. Or even in trouble. Just freakin’ explain it to me, please?!?

[mlees]

@raindog

In theory this all makes sense. The problem is that we don’t live in a theoretical world. We live in a real world, and in this world of ours the profanity you’re getting all misty eyed over is usually ham handed, banal, crude and witless.

This isn’t the first time someone has made the [tenuous in the best circumstances] that there is something downright elegant in calling someone a c*nt.

Profanity can be used intelligently. There are times it is the exact word, for dramatic or literary effect. There are few H.L Menckens or Dorothy Parkers around here though. I don’t think there is any “failure to recognize” that there are creative, witty uses of the word. In real life however, that rarely happens here.

TPTB aren’t coming down on a group of witty, brilliant scribes that use rank profanity selectively, creatively, indiscriminately, and with wit, they’re taking a stand against vicious, senseless, high school drivel.

[gump]I’m not a smart man.[/gump]

Unintentional red herring, in my humble opinion. Taking out the cuss words from my drivel will not turn it into non-drivel.

[Miller]

@raindog

No evidence?

FYI…“MPSIMS” is not The Pit.

Oh, do you finally have some cites you’d like to share?

[I_Love_Me_Vol.I]

@Mister_Armageddon

If we’re going to do this, we do it all the way. No compromise. No let up, either, which is why I think just up and leaving is a mistake. We need to remind them every day that we don’t like this, and keep it up. The previous Pit rules did not need changing, and this needs to be shoved in their faces until they either acknowledge they were wrong or make it clear that they don’t care what we think. THEN we can leave, and good riddance too if that’s the case.

You are quite right–this is not something to be done lightly. It is something that will need to be VERY organized and include as many posters as possible, and it will take determination and a willingness to be banned. The “civil disobedience” Pit thread I suggest can not be started willy-nilly. There has to be agreement among enough posters before the thread is even started. I have to go (right this second) so I will add more later.

Hopefully, it won’t have to go this far anyway. Ed (and the others) can clearly see which way the wind blows on this–but will that be enough?

[raindog]

@Miller

Oh, do you finally have some cites you’d like to share?

No, I’m enjoying the mass temper tantrum.

[raindog]

@I_Love_Me_Vol.I

You are quite right–this is not something to be done lightly. It is something that will need to be VERY organized and include as many posters as possible, and it will take determination and a willingness to be banned. The “civil disobedience” Pit thread I suggest can not be started willy-nilly. There has to be agreement among enough posters before the thread is even started. I have to go (right this second) so I will add more later.

Hopefully, it won’t have to go this far anyway. Ed (and the others) can clearly see which way the wind blows on this–but will that be enough?

Well, it looks like the count is 3 at this point, 2 of which have post counts of less 1.0/day.

If you’re going to rush headlong over a cliff over a simple, reasonable, benign ferpetessake, rule change, I would suggest you’ll need a few more. :dubious:

Perhaps you can Google “Jonestown” for strategy ideas.

[Gadarene]

raindog, do you want to take a crack at the 12 items I listed in post #523? I’ll repost them here for your convenience:

[ol]
[li]You’re an idiot [/li][li]You’re a stupid idiot [/li][li]You’re a dumb idiot [/li][li]You’re a smelly idiot [/li][li]You’re a fucking idiot[/li][li]You’re fucking stupid[/li][li]You’re a moron [/li][li]You’re a mouth-breathing cretin [/li][li]You rode the short bus to school [/li][li]You must come from a long and illustrious line of inbreeding to have achieved your present state of mental capacity [/li][li]You were dropped on the head as a small child, weren’t you? [/li][li]You don’t have the intelligence that God gave granite [/li][/ol]

Once again: Given that Dex has already stated that “You’re stupid” is fine and “You’re a cunt” is not fine, what side of the line do each of these statements fall on – acceptable insult, or unacceptable abuse?

Go on, give it a try.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@C_K_Dexter_Haven

There are minimums standards of behavior everywhere else in the world. I don’t believe you’d say “Fuck off” to your children or grandchildren if they annoyed you. I don’t believe you’d say “Fuck off” to the librarian who told you your book was overdue. I don’t think you’d say “Fuck off” to a neighbor who asked to borrow a cup of sugar. I don’t think you’d say “Fuck off” to a police officer giving you a ticket. These are all people you’d like to go away and leave you alone, but you have other ways of communicating. All we’re saying is that you need to communicate to other posters without using abusive, vicious language. We’re not giving you a list of forbidden words, we’tr saying it’s all about context.

That’s true–but it’s also true that my children, neighbor, and police officer wouldn’t ever imply that I didn’t care about the suicides of gay teenagers, because I didn’t think gay people’s lives were important. If my children, neighbor, or police officer ever made such a repugnant implication about me, I’d probably respond with some pretty harsh language.

This is the thread in question. I maintain that "Fuck you, Spectrum was precisely the right response. I made other responses in the linked thread, but being able to tell him “fuck you” was the appropriate response to his loathesome misrepresentation of me, and indeed was far less abusive than his posts about me.

Prohibiting such a post is a poor idea.

Daniel