# Revisiting the BBQ Pit- Boon or Bane? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [June 16, 2021, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413 "2021-06-16T17:43:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/101 "2021-06-17T12:55:46Z")
There are some good arguments to be made as to whether the Pit is good or bad for this board from a business stand point. But to say that one can be “bullied” or “abused” is just absurd in my opinion. This is a recreational board. One does not need it, nor will it affect their lives any any meaningful way should they stop using it. Online bullying can only occur when the victim cannot reasonably avoid their aggressors. Like school children who have to go to school and face their aggressors posting hateful stuff. And like coworkers for the same reasons. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/102 "2021-06-17T13:06:11Z")
> [@keeganst94](#): > > {…} And for all the complaints of the Pit being primarily for vitriolic attacks against other posters, that has not been the case for years, if it was ever the case. Currently only 5 of the top 40 threads in the pit are about a poster at all - so 12.5%. {…} I’ve been here long enough to have participated in the Giraffe era pit and y’all have rose colored glasses on if you think it wasn’t orders of magnitude more vicious back then. And re: _pitting other posters_, back then you could set your watch by whether it was Der or Starving at the top of the forum. One other thing, if, say, Starving Artist had made it pet hobby horse to heartily suggest getting rid of the Pit at every opportunity we’d have seen right through the actual reason he wanted that. ---
**Author:** ![tricoteuse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tricoteuse/32/4334_2.png) [@tricoteuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tricoteuse)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/103 "2021-06-17T13:15:58Z")
> [@CairoCarol](#): > > A few years ago I was a founding member and moderator of a message board that splintered from a poorly managed board. In the event, we succeeded - exactly one poster stayed with the old board. During the design process, I advocated heavily for something like the pit (the board we split from had prissy rules and no outlet for taking off the gloves). > > We ended up creating a pit-like forum that is not accessible to newbies or anyone who is not signed in. To gain access to our “pit,” one has to have been a member for 3 months, made a minimum of 200 posts, and make a special request for “pit” access. > > It’s worked like a charm. These days, it is rarely used, because we’re a smallish group and we like each other, so we don’t need to pick on each other. But racy stuff and the occasional argument still ends up there. > > If the Pit was sequestered from new users I’d be okay with that. However, getting rid of the Pit entirely would be quite disappointing to me. This is why we need Like buttons! ---
**Author:** ![tricoteuse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tricoteuse/32/4334_2.png) [@tricoteuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tricoteuse)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/104 "2021-06-17T13:18:35Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Then there are the posters who clearly piss everyone off, but don’t technically troll or break the rules. Those are almost never going to get moderated. You wind up with “you need to be nice to these people who are aggravating you!” > > The idea that, if the mods don’t do anything, that’s just the way it is–that’s not a great way to keep people around. If a place is a frustrating place to post, people just leave. And this too. If I hadn’t had that outlet I would have left the board in a second. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/105 "2021-06-17T13:25:21Z")
> [@RitterSport](#): > > I can’t think of another way to deal with posters who constantly lie, argue in bad faith, or sealion their way along. > > Great debate: > Poster 1: Some position > Poster 2: Lie, distort, sealion > Poster 1: That seems wrong for these reasons, and here are my cites > Poster 2: \ > > Option 1: > Pit: > Poster 1: Poster 2 is a lying troll who won’t engage in good faith. (all is well) > > Option 2: > GD: > Poster 1: Poster 2 – you’re lying and you won’t engage in good faith. > Moderator: That’s a warning for you, Poster 1 This. Often none of the posts is actually reportable. It’s the overall pattern that’s the problem. There should be some place where members can point this out. Time-limiting pit threads would work against that function, as often it’s a pattern through multiple threads and over significant periods of time. – having said that: Pit threads often seem to include a great deal of people just calling each other names with no evidence. I’m not sure how to prevent that while still allowing the legitimate criticism that’s off limits in the other categories. And this is a point: > [@Joey\_P](#): > > when we have a member and each time that member posts, directly below it I see a link to “[member] is a dumb jerk”, I feel kinda bad. Especially if it was a mostly neutral post, at least to someone not involved in the omnibus thread. Sometimes people are making entirely reasonable posts, often on some other subject, and that Discourse function can’t tell the difference. > [@Czarcasm](#): > > How do other boards without a BBQ Pit equivalent handle it? Back when the snopes boards still not only existed but had active moderation, basically what snopes or Barbara said went. That system had its own disadvantages. > [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > > [@RitterSport](#): > > > > Option 2: > > > > > GD: > > > Poster 1: Poster 2 – you’re lying and you won’t engage in good faith. > > > Moderator: That’s a warning for you, Poster 1 > > Option 3: Say, “I’m sorry, but this discussion is going nowhere, and we will never agree, I’m out.” Then stop posting to the discussion. There are other people reading, including others who are posting, members who are reading but not posting, and total lurkers who haven’t joined. If people just refuse to engage with anyone who’s persistently posting falsehoods and/or seriously misleading information, then that’s what this board will fill up with. > [@filmore](#): > > Since we have mods here, let them handle the situation. Problematic or disingenuous posters can be flagged and the mods will either issue a warning or a ban. Again, very often there is no specific reportable post. Each of them, taken separately, is fine; or at least could have been made out of reasonable ignorance, and deserve an explanation instead of a report or a pitting. The problem is in the overall pattern; sometimes a pattern in multiple threads over months or even years. And as @MrDibble points out in post #44: mods who are used to a particular frame of mind often don’t see problems with a pattern which posters with different backgrounds may find obvious. > [@DemonTree](#): > > Preventing newbies from seeing the pit until they have reached a higher trust level seems like a good idea. > [@DrDeth](#): > > I have seen newbies come in, get pitted, and leave. Yes, they were mostly sorta goofy, but it does take a while to get those boards temperature to know how to fit in. Maybe newbies couldn’t either post in the Pit or be pitted. It takes a while to build up a pattern of nastiness or sealioning, after all; and the mods can handle obvious trolling and/or individual obviously out of line posts. > [@filmore](#): > > rather than discussing a legitimate issue about how someone is lying or being problematic, it’s a curse filled rant about how awful the other person is. I don’t know whether there’s any practical way to say ‘in the pit you can call another poster a troll or a sealion or a racist or a misogynist or whatever, but you can’t just call them names and irrelevant insults, you have to be complaining about specific behavior that you can point to.’ (I’ve never really understood the insistence by some on these boards that they must be able to swear, let alone the insistence that they must be able to use specific swearwords. I don’t mind the words, or at least the nonsexist ones; but it’s a lot more important to me that there’s someplace we can call somebody a sealion or a racist than that we be able to call them an expletive-expletive-expletiving sealion or racist.) > [@filmore](#): > > the subject line of a pitting should just be generic and not disparaging. Lots of people see the subject line of threads even if they don’t visit the Pit, like in the Latest, New, and Suggested thread lists. A newbie coming to the board seeing a thread title like “Soandso99 is a shitstain sewer scum!” is going to have a negative view of Soandso99 even though they may have no idea who that is. So make the pit titles something neutral like “I declare a pitting of Soandso99” and keep the name calling inside the thread. That looks like a genuinely useful way to get around that problem. > [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Linking to other threads from the Pit is not allowed How are we supposed to point out what the person’s being Pitted for if we can’t quote examples? And the link direct to the thread the examples are from is very useful for context. The other way around works: don’t allow linking to the Pit from other threads. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/106 "2021-06-17T13:29:30Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > {… }The other way around works: don’t allow linking to the Pit from other threads. Which is the way folks have historically told a Pittee that they were being Pitted. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/107 "2021-06-17T13:30:48Z")
Getting rid of the Pit would kill this board faster than it is dying already. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/108 "2021-06-17T13:34:17Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Which is the way folks have historically told a Pittee that they were being Pitted. True; and it’s true that the pittee should be told about it. It would be possible to just announce there’s a Pit thread without linking; or that one announcement could be allowed with a link, but otherwise linking a Pit thread (say, as a way of making a point in a discussion) could be forbidden. If Discourse is going to keep doing it, though, that doesn’t seem very useful. So maybe I’ll just withdraw that suggestion. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/109 "2021-06-17T13:34:21Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > y’all have rose colored glasses on if you think it wasn’t orders of magnitude more vicious back then Boy Howdy! It used to be The Wild West, and was a hoot. Now, it’s like an episode of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood and quite dull. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/110 "2021-06-17T13:37:42Z")
I’m pretty sure I’ve only pitted one poster, and that was over some disagreements that I was explicitly told to take out of the ATMB forum. We had a reasonable conversation and came to a mutual understanding. But it was not a conversation that could have been had in any other forum. If we had not had that conversation, we would probably still be at odds with eachother. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/111 "2021-06-17T13:39:14Z")
> [@Grrr](#): > > But to say that one can be “bullied” or “abused” is just absurd in my opinion. This is a recreational board. One does not need it, nor will it affect their lives any any meaningful way should they stop using it. Would you say the same for any other hobby? Just give up doing the thing you enjoy to avoid the abuse? ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/112 "2021-06-17T13:42:00Z")
> [@Gatopescado](#): > > Boy Howdy! It used to be The Wild West, and was a hoot. Now, it’s like an episode of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood and quite dull. Yeah, I have a very clear recollection of a post the beloved Scylla made just before cuntflap happened where he tore Poster Not Named’s entire life apart . . . but since he didn’t call her a cunt of tell her to go fuck herself it, at least on its face, was perfectly fine under Ed’s ‘Snuggly Puppy’ Pit. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/113 "2021-06-17T13:43:53Z")
I believe it is exceedingly easy to avoid the Pit, or a single thread in the Pit while still enjoying the rest of the board. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/114 "2021-06-17T13:44:29Z")
> [@thorny\_locust](#): > > (I’ve never really understood the insistence by some on these boards that they must be able to swear, let alone the insistence that they must be able to use specific swearwords. I don’t mind the words, or at least the nonsexist ones; but it’s a lot more important to me that there’s someplace we can call somebody a sealion or a racist than that we be able to call them an expletive-expletive-expletiving sealion or racist.) I don’t see a point in banning swear words; the content of what you say is far more significant and has far more potential to offend than how many expletives you can pack into the sentence. > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > How are we supposed to point out what the person’s being Pitted for if we can’t quote examples? And the link direct to the thread the examples are from is very useful for context. Break links, remove attributions from the quote by deleting everything but the name, or just copy and past what you want to quote. > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > The other way around works: don’t allow linking to the Pit from other threads. Since Discord inserts the link-backs, there is functionally no difference between linking from the pit and linking to the pit. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/115 "2021-06-17T14:09:50Z")
I don’t think the Pit _as a place per se_ is necessary. I don’t think there is much to be gained by being superficially polite elsewhere but still insulting people in the Pit. Threads are already being derailed by obliquely calling people liars anyway, so the strength of the language is not what makes the level of discourse here low. Now, I don’t know exactly _how_ polite we need to be here overall, but I don’t think designating the Pit as a freer zone for epithets than other places is what needs to be preserved. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/116 "2021-06-17T14:14:05Z")
I’d be in favor of new rules, or even a ban, of attacking other posters in the Pit, but it’s a useful place for unloading on public figures and people in the news. I don’t want to lose that. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Librarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_librarian/32/402_2.png) [@The\_Librarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Librarian)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/117 "2021-06-17T14:23:41Z")
You can do your “unloading” in every other forum. Of all omnibus threads in the pit only the “Trolls…” would be against the rules in other fora. Most of the others would fit in Great Debates just fine. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/118 "2021-06-17T14:29:53Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > > [@thorny\_locust](#): > > > > How are we supposed to point out what the person’s being Pitted for if we can’t quote examples? And the link direct to the thread the examples are from is very useful for context. > > Break links, remove attributions from the quote by deleting everything but the name, or just copy and past what you want to quote. Which makes it difficult for anyone to find the context. > [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > I’d be in favor of new rules, or even a ban, of attacking other posters in the Pit, but it’s a useful place for unloading on public figures and people in the news. I don’t want to lose that. Whereas I think we could unload on such people in other forums, just without swearing at them; but the Pit’s the only place we can discuss patterns of behavior by other posters. I’ve already explained why I think that’s important. > [@DemonTree](#): > > I don’t see a point in banning swear words; the content of what you say is far more significant and has far more potential to offend than how many expletives you can pack into the sentence. I’m not actually suggesting banning swearing in the Pit; it seems to be more important to those who want to do it than it is to me. I just don’t understand the importance; and it does seem to me that it contributes somewhat to the existence of posts that are just noise, not criticism of anything specific. But I suppose we’d have those anyway, and while it would be nice if they were at least more inventive, some of the most repetitive noise isn’t actual swearwords anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/119 "2021-06-17T14:50:21Z")
I disagree. It’s not just the ban on obscenities, it’s the tone of the posts. It’s hyperbole vs fact. A couple of months back, I was ranting (in the Pit) about broke-assed redneck conservatives trying to boycott products when they have 0% of the consumer buying power in the US. At that point, a couple of people jumped on me……0%? Where did you get that statistic? Which would’ve been an appropriate response if I had posted in P&E or Great Debates. But this is was the Pit - it was me yelling “You don’t have a dime to you name! It was a freaking insult, not a statistic, I know you probably have a couple of quarters behind the sofa cushion. I mention this one for a reason, because when I first wrote it I thought the thread was in P&E. The original said something like “liberals have the lion’s share of purchasing power when it comes to consumer goods”and included some cites. Then I realized it was a Pit Thread, and I edited that out and put it the rant about broke-ass conservatives with no money. I would venture to say that my best posts have been in the Pit, and these posts wouldn’t have been appropriate as written for Great Debates or P&E. I’ll just say that sometimes I enjoy writing in a style that I don’t think is suitable outside the Pit. ---
**Author:** ![Kron](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kron/32/12444_2.png) [@Kron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kron)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413/120 "2021-06-17T14:57:34Z")
> [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > I’ll just say that sometimes I enjoy writing in a style that I don’t think is suitable outside the Pit. Yes, and this alone is a good enough reason to keep the pit around. I much prefer the looser, more natural tone we get in the pit versus other forums. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/revisiting-the-bbq-pit-boon-or-bane/944413.md?page=7)