Superhuman Unbiased Liberals (or: More Conservative Whining)

The BBQ Pit
1

This, of course, is immediately provoked by the recent banning, but addresses a more general point, I think, that has come up in the past as well. This concerns the consistent righteous indignation of many many posters (and admins) over the possibility that ideological bias can play a role in a banning. Here’s the part that I don’t get:

Bias in an endemic part of human nature. This is generally widely recognized and accepted. It is also reflected in every opinion poll that I can remember. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to think that Bush is a “strong leader”, for example. Democrats are more likely to think that he is dishonest. These are matters that do not directly relate to ideology, but are affected by bias. Similarly, in political debates, it is a given that supporters of a candidate will be a lot more likely to think that their candidate won the debate than supporters of the other candidate. (Here’s one example of such a split).

(It is for this reason that I think threads that aim to prove that liberals are biased are pointless. Not because they fail to make the point - to the contrary, they generally do. But rather because it is beyond obvious that liberals are biased and it adds nothing to point it out, and further, because it is equally obvious that conservatives are biased too, so just pointing to liberal bias is misleading and meaningless).

So it is puzzling to me how so many people can insist with a straight face that the judgment of fellow posters’ posting styles, integrity and other characteristics is not influenced by bias. How is this possible? I imagine that there are many posters out there who are sure that they are not influenced by bias. They are a cut above the rest of the human race. And I’m OK with that, and they may even be right, in some cases (though it’s pointless to argue that in a debate, as there’s no reason for anyone else to accept such an assertion). But surely when we look at the larger public opinion we have to acknowledge that bias comes into play. Is it possible that all liberals are somehow immune to the flaws that afflict the rest of humanity - that they alone can make purely objective unbiased judgments? I find it hard to believe that anyone takes this notion seriously.

But if we accept that bias exists even among liberals than it follows, as night follows day, that the collective opinion of this board - or the mainstream view - about other posters will be influenced by the ideological make-up of the board. And if in fact one accepts that the ideological make-up of the board has a skew to it, it is absolutely impossible for this skew to fail to influence the collective judgment about individual posters. (And to the extent that this collective judgment influences the admins, it can influence a banning).

I don’t see any way around this. Where is there room for disagreement?

2

There’s some degree of bias in any human endeavor.

Failing a demonstration of specific evidence of liberal bias behind the Big Banning of '03, I vote for taking this subject off life support and letting it die a natural death. **

Thank you, Izzy :smiley:

3

What part of “december was banned for trolling” do you disagree with?

4

I certainly strive to recognize, admit, and stand by my personal bias, myself.

For example, I think murder is wrong. Also, having sex with a minor, especially a prepubescent one. I have other biases, from cultural to financial, not to mention a certain institutional paranoia gathered from my job. But I do try to state them when I run into them, and accept correction when wrong.

Course, I’m a libertarian.

5

The OP more closely resembles naval gazing than whining. If the SDMB where somehow transplanted back in time to the heyday of Imperial Rome, the group dynamic would would be substantially different. Not necessarily less fair or balanced, but it’s likely that a different set of social transgressions would be treated as bannable offenses. We always swim in a sea of conventions. Bemoaning this fact does not make the water any less wet.

6

Assuming that the board has a liberal bias, you seem to be suggesting that the Moderators wouldn’t be able to recognize and look past their biases in making banning decisions. If that’s so, do you also believe that a government made up disproportionately of wealthy, white males is unable to fairly administer to the needs of all the citizens they represent?

7

Izzy, yes, indeed all humans have some bias. However, generally speaking we also assume that most of us are able to transcend those biases when operating in a professional venue - my physician, for example, is a Christian himself, however, he’s never asked for data regarding my religious views. While I am an avowed liberal, I often deal professionally with quite a few conservatives, and the difference between our views (again, generally) isn’t relevant.

So, when you speak of people on this board having biases, hell yes, that’s true. Is it also true that such biases can (note the word “can” vs. “must always”) have some (note again the word “some”) effect on how words are perceived? absolutely again - for example, you may not think of the phrase “bleeding heart liberal” as being offensive (don’t I recall you specifically suggesting that december positing that protestors supported terrorists wasn’t an insult?? or something close to that), but some liberals may in fact see it as such (especially when it’s dripping with sarcasm, as is often the case, and most assuradly when it’s intended as an insult).

however, it’s a whole other charge for you to suggest, as you seem to do here, that when given a task (ie a job, even if it’s an unpaid one) that folks cannot put aside their biases and act in an unbiased manner.

and I think you’ve not proven the charge.

8

Yes, but it was partisan trolling. Haven’t you been watching Fox News? It’s the Hollywood Liberals that are causing the right wing posters to get banned. Hollywood Liberals like Schwarzenegger, Ronald Reagan and Sonny Bono. Oh wait, they’re republicans…I don’t get how that whole hollywood liberal thing works I guess…where was I…oh yeah…banning…I’m mad about the banning. Mark Twain is good literature and should…hmm…I think I lost my place…

FWIW, I really think there should be a smiley with Cuckoo Bird coming out of the forehead.:smiley:

9

Assuming I understand you correctly, I think you are confusing bias with “having an opinion”. For example, when it comes to assessing the likely truthfulness of a set of assertions by a given poster, it would be foolish not to include one’s past experience and judgement into their motives and historical accuracy. Someone’s past behavior will lead you to form an opinion about them – this is not the same as bias.

Bias would be the a priori assumption that someone expressing a conservative viewpoint is automatically a liar. I don’t believe that one can ever completely eliminate one’s natural biases and preferences, and obviously liberals as a group are no less prone to bias than conservatives. However, it is foolish to assume that the opinions of those you disagree with are significantly affected by bias, unless you have a specific reason to believe they are.

To put it another way, if someone think syou’re an idiot, it may not be because you’re a conservative and they’re biased against conservatives, it may just be that they think you’re an idiot.**

Even supposing you are correct about the “ideological make-up of the board” having a skew to it, why would you think that the collective judgement of the individual admins is in any way affected by it? If you think the admins are biased, I think you should find evidence that supports that idea, not just assume it based on your opinion that the board as a whole is biased.

10

IzzyR, I think the important thing to note is that the vote to ban december was unanimous. They actually waited until they had unanimous opinion before instituting the ban.

If it was just one guy deciding, or a majority vote, you’d have a point, though wring’s point about professionalism is a good one. When it comes to banning, I think the staff here tries hard to keep their political opinions out of it.

I think these two facts, unanimous vote, and the staff’s professionalism suggest that this banning was not influenced by politics.

11

Actually the tinfoil hat smiley from another board seems quite appropriate as well.

:slight_smile:

12

Izzy, I think you’re ignoring the fact that bias can work in the opposite direction.

An ethical person is aware of her own bias, and tries not only to avoid acting on it, but also to avoid appearing to act on it. A judge will recuse herself from a case involving her family’s interests, no matter how indirect. A member of a Board of Directors will recuse himself from a vote involving other companies in which he has a financial stake.

And a moderator with a strong personal dislike for a particular poster (or that poster’s politics) will give that poster extra latitude, exactly because she fears letting her bias influence her unduly.

You can check back my own posts over this hoo-hah, if it’s important to you. You’ll find that I argued against december’s banning specifically – despite the fact that I hurled invective against him for lying, twisting words, and generally being a vicious snot. I didn’t argue against his banning because I enjoyed his presence; on the contrary, I argued against it precisely BECAUSE he pissed me off so much.

I believe that moderators, with cooler heads than mine, would act similarly. Sure, they’ve got biases; but they’re aware of their biases, and they’re extra-careful in cases where their biases might interfere.

You say you don’t see any way around (bias). That’s the way around: by being extra-careful in cases where your bias might interfere.

Daniel

13

It would appear that several posters have assumed that my OP was accusing the administrators of bias. No such accusation appears anywhere in the OP. (Not that I think this is impossible either. But to make such an assessment and argument might require an analysis of the moderating political configuration and personalities and the dynamics of the banning process that would be too much for my feeble brain at the moment. So I’d rather concentrate on what I actually said).

The main thrust of my argument is that almost everyone is subject to bias, and that it can be taken as a given that the collective judgment of a group will reflect the dominant biases of the group members. The extent that this influences banning is the extent to which the administrators are influenced by the collective opinion of the group. I expressed this in a parenthetical remark near the end of the OP, and perhaps should have made this point more strongly, but I think this is also valid. I rather doubt if the admins will be influenced to ban someone simply because a lot of posters clamor for it (there are specific factors that mitigate against this). But I think in terms of judgment as to whether someone is dishonest or trolling I don’t believe they can be immune to the influence of the prevailing opinions on the board. There are always iconoclasts and nonconformists who delight in going against prevailing opinion, but the majority of people tend to conform to some degree to the dominant opinion in their social group.

(I’m not here to discuss any specific banning - there are other threads open. I’m discussing a general principle.)

OK, so suppose you are a liberal and you begin posting your liberal views to the Free Republic message board. And suppose board opinion quickly coalesced around the notion that you were a naive fool. Would you discount that consensus based on the fact that you were being judged by ideological opponents? Or would you give it the same credence as you would to the collective opinion of a ideologically neutral board?

It’s hard to judge the basis for the opinion of any specific individual. There are some people who are unbiased in given instances. (In the Bush/Gore example above, although overwhelming majorities of people thought their guy won the debate there were small (3% & 8%) minorities who thought the other guy won). But when looking at the group as a whole it is a pretty safe assumption that bias is a factor, and it is foolish to assume otherwise.

14

I’d respond, except i’m biased.

15

As somone who supported/understood both, Coll’s and december’s bannings, I have no problem taking the Administration’s claims of unbiased consistency at face value – they pretty much mirror my own stand.

OTHO, I wonder how many of the conservatives that keep whining about december’s banning, took the same stand towards collounsbury’s?

Talk about bias.

16

I would agree, except…

17

Think of it these two possible scenarios:

Scenario 1:

December: Given that terrorists are trying to break the will of America and get them to leave Iraq, is it in fact the case that those who protest the war and oppose the Bush administration are actually helping the terrorists? Should they consider this effect when deciding whether to vote their conscience?

Poster 1: Interesting question. I don’t believe so, and here’s why:

Poster 2: Possibly, but on the other hand, I believe that supporting the Bush administration against my conscience is worse. I am mad at them that they would put me in this tough situation, and the blame lies totally with the Bush administration for putting us in an untenable situation in the first place.

In this scenario, is December trolling? Nope. Would the mods even have to consider doing something about him? Nope.

Scenario 2:

December: Given that terrorists are trying to break the will of America and get them to leave Iraq, is it in fact the case that those who protest the war and oppose the Bush administration are actually helping the terrorists? Should they consider this effect when deciding whether to vote their conscience?

Poster 1: How dare you! You’ve got a lot of nerve, calling me a terrorist supporter!

Poster 2: This is a new low for even you, December!

The fact is, December’s OPs continually received the ‘scenario 2’ treatment. Thoughtful or not. He became a troll, if he was, not because of his content, but because of the wild, over-the-top, vituperative reactions he got to even the most innocuous of statements.

I’ve never accused the mods of bias. They responded to a situation where one poster was continually riling up the members of the board and creating flamefests. My problem with this is that the remedy was incorrect. This situation should have been corrected by stomping on the people who kept resorting to ad hominem attacks to fair, if conservatively biased questions. If they had rigorously supported the ‘don’t be a jerk’ rule, none of this had to happen. I maintain, the best description of what happened to december was that he was run out of town on a rail.

If you turned the situation around and posted any number of lefty-oriented threads over at Free Republic, you’d get the same reaction. For example, in GD right now there’s a thread titled, “Does the GOP subvert democracy?”. Do you think the person who posted that thread just might have been accused of ‘trolling’ had he posted it at Free Republic? Same for “Hillary For President”, or “Name-Calling and Conservatives”, “Alas, The Real Reason for War Surfaces”, “Freedom of Speech: Only if Your Opinion is Pro-Bush”, or “Incompetence bordering on treason.” (about Rumsfeld the ‘traitor’, and incorrectly cited anyway).

At least Free Republic wears its bias on its sleeve, being unabashedly conservative. But this place claims to be the place you go for open inquiry, to ‘fight ignorance’.

But if December had posted these threads:

“Do the Democrats subvert democracy?”
“Name-Calling and Liberals”
“Alas, The Real Reason for Opposition to the War Surfaces”
“Freedom of Speech: Only if Your Opinion is Anti-Bush”
“Clinton: Incompetence bordering on treason.”

Every single one of them would have been a ‘troll’, because the response in each thread would have been a blast of outrage.

This is the bias I’m speaking of. This board is full of conservative-baiting OP’s. Yet, they get thoughtful responses, and often turn into interesting discussions. But when December would post a message that baited liberals, the howls of outrage would attract the attention of the mods.

18

Well, I was wrong. The OP is correct, at least in it’s parenthetical title.

19

Sam, someone else who posited december’s “are you encouraging terror by protesting the policies of your government” question would probably have not been the target of anywhere near as much vituperation - precisely because december had such a history of advancing offensive and carelessly formulated propositions, designed to enrage. He had rendered himself incapable of stimulating reasoned debate in most posters, much less influencing the views of any opponent toward his positions.

Which is partly why you should be considering the possibility that bias on the part of one or more conservative moderators/administrators pushed december over the edge. Maybe they wearied (unconsciously, perhaps) of december misstating and presenting weak, easily challenged versions of their philosophy and decided he was a threat to the well-being of the Right. Maybe a supporter of Israel took a hard look at the hostility he was rousing towards that nation and realized that he wasn’t the kindly-Jewish-grandfather-from-New-Jersey that he pretended to be, but was actually a stealth Palestinian agent posting inflammatory nonsense from a disguised IP address somewhere in the Gaza Strip, cackling demonically at the havoc he was raising.

At least that’s what I had come to suspect.

He ultimately damaged causes that conservatives espouse. The continued right-wing waving of the flag on his behalf amazes me.*

*again, I’ve never called for or cheered the banning of anyone here - and I sort of hope december makes a comeback, at least in time for the 2004 elections so we Democrats have a chance to repent of our evil. :cool:

20

I would value the collective opinion of the Free Republic board less than that of an ideologically neutral board, because I would have very good reason to believe that the Free Republic board’s members were predisposed to believe that liberal views were wrong, since the stated purpose of the Free Republic website is to “champion causes which further conservatism in America”. I don’t expect any board with a shared political goal to objectively discuss views which contradict that goal with every yahoo who joins up. A religious board, for example, doesn’t need to thoughtfully engage every dipshit who starts a “the bible is stoopid!” thread.

As an aside, my view of the value of either collective opinion would not prove anything about the nature of my posts on either board. Perhaps I was a total asshole on the Free Republic board and they eventually lost patience with me, in spite of their best efforts to encourage reasonable behavior on my part. Perhaps I was persuasive and brilliant and they were ignorant fools who hated me because they were too stupid to defend their viewpoints with reason.
**

But unlike your Free Republic example, this board has no stated political purpose, and thus no reason not to attract members with a wide variety of political and social views. It may be a safe assumption that some members are biased against certain viewpoints or backgrounds, but I don’t see evidence for a collective bias. I think collective opinions form, sure. I think there was a prevailing view that december was a jerk and a liar, resulting in assumptions being made about the motives of his OPs that would not be made about a different poster. As I said before, this is not bias, this is an opinion based on experience, right or wrong.