Re: the closing of Czarcasm - why are you still a mod?

[mhendo]

@Marley23

An individual warning is not a big deal. It’s a far cry from one lapse to multiple warnings, suspensions, or bans. You’ve been warned more than a few times about your tone, which ought to be a hint that not everybody perceives it as “jocular.” In other words, it’s not that you’re too hip for the room and everybody keeps misunderstanding you. It’s that you’re not communicating the way you think you are.

This post, it seems to me, actually serves to point up another important discrepancy.

Your discussion of prr here is about a repeated pattern of behavior, right? You mention that he has been “warned more than a few times about [his] tone.” And that’s a reasonable observation. An indiscretion that might not draw much attention when it happens once can, if repeated often enough, cause moderators to view a particular person in a different light.

If i accidentally insulted someone in MPSIMS, not realizing that we weren’t in the Pit, and then immediately offered an apology once i realized that i had broken the rules of the forum, there would probably be no repercussions. In fact, i know there wouldn’t be, because i’ve done exactly that. I apologized for my mistake, and the mod said “No problem.”

But if i did the same thing a number of times over a period of a couple of months, the mods would, understandably, begin to suspect that i was either trying to game the rules, or that i simply wasn’t paying enough attention to what i was doing. Either way, a formal warning would be issued, and would be perfectly justified. We see people warned and banned quite a lot for continuing to do things they’ve been asked not to do, and i don’t think anyone has a problem with it.

The problem with moderator mistakes and bad calls is that, when someone complains, each one is treated as if it were completely de novo, as if it should be judged only in and of itself.

This is why i and, i think, some other people have become somewhat exercised by some of Czarcasm’s recent decisions. If each one is simply judged in isolation, none of them rise to a level that would require any great reordering of the world. None of them alone are so egregious as to constitute a major problem. But, for me at least, in the case of a couple of moderators, these small things add up to a pattern of poor decision-making and general bad moderating. And none of that is ever addressed.

I guess all i’m asking is that you show the same willingness to evaluate mod indiscretions in context, and as part of a pattern of behavior, as you do with posters.

[NineToTheSky]

Coming back to this thread today, I see cool, calm and reasonable posts have been made by Marley23, Gary Wombat Robson and TubaDiva. With reference to Czarcasm’s absence from these threads, Gary said

An observation, though: I have spent quite a bit of time both performing customer service and managing customer service people. There are definitely times when it’s better for the service rep to hand the situation off to someone else or bump it up the ladder. Once the situation has become personal, staying involved sometimes only makes things worse.

which makes a lot of sense.

For my part, I think all has been said that needs to be said. The proof of the pudding will be how Czarcasm mods in the future. If he feels that lessons have been learnt from these threads - and I hope he does - that will be apparent by his style and actions from now on.

[elfkin477]

nm

[PlainJain]

@NineToTheSky

Coming back to this thread today, I see cool, calm and reasonable posts have been made by Marley23, Gary Wombat Robson and TubaDiva. With reference to Czarcasm’s absence from these threads, Gary said

An observation, though: I have spent quite a bit of time both performing customer service and managing customer service people. There are definitely times when it’s better for the service rep to hand the situation off to someone else or bump it up the ladder. Once the situation has become personal, staying involved sometimes only makes things worse.

which makes a lot of sense.

I disagree. If you are in customer service and you do not have the authority to appease the customers needs, and they get personal because of it, yes kick it upstairs. However if you work in customer service and you do have the authority to fix the problem, then fix it and don’t put it off on others.

That said, I do agree there were cool, calm and reasonable posts have been made by Marley23, Gary Wombat Robson and TubaDiva.

[NineToTheSky]

@PlainJain

I disagree. If you are in customer service and you do not have the authority to appease the customers needs, and they get personal because of it, yes kick it upstairs. However if you work in customer service and you do have the authority to fix the problem, then fix it and don’t put it off on others.

That said, I do agree there were cool, calm and reasonable posts have been made by Marley23, Gary Wombat Robson and TubaDiva.

I was just trying to be practical. I don’t know if that is the reason Czarcasm has absented himself from these threads; going by his previous (in)actions, I doubt it, but it is a reasonable scenario. Only he - or another mod - can confirm or deny it.

[Crazyhorse]

@NineToTheSky

I was just trying to be practical. I don’t know if that is the reason Czarcasm has absented himself from these threads

Sometimes reading the answers already given can really help clarify things:

@TubaDiva

Once Czarcasm had explained himself he was asked to stop arguing his position.

[NineToTheSky]

Ah, yes. Good point.

[PlainJain]

@Crazyhorse

Sometimes reading the answers already given can really help clarify things:

[Quote=TubaDiva]
Once Czarcasm had explained himself he was asked to stop arguing his position.

[/quote]

@NineToTheSky

Ah, yes. Good point.

Again, I disagree. My post doesn’t presuppose he continue arguing his position. My post suggests he could have re-evaluated his position and rescinded the admonitions. A reasonable case was made that up until this incident some posters voted and commented on polls without reading the entire thread. Also because of his personal feelings on the subject of the thread, his mod note was dubious at best. No continued arguing of his point is necessary.

I disagreed with his original mod note and I do feel the number of subsequent threads and the handful of posters who are carrying things too far is over the top. I realize to a small extent I am contributing to this (and I really am trying to keep my comments civil and to a minimum) but I strongly feel that moderators should facilitate board conversation, not hinder it.

[Marley23]

@mhendo

I guess all i’m asking is that you show the same willingness to evaluate mod indiscretions in context, and as part of a pattern of behavior, as you do with posters.

That’s an understandable request. I think all I can say about it is that the mods don’t do that in public, but we have discussions like that in private.