Terr and BrainGlutton

What I mean is that it is not only liberals that would report rule violations, it will also be people that look at the facts regardless of the politics, IOW there is more than just partisans in a board like this one.

Yes, but the whole point is that when you decide to look and report can be influenced by the poster in question. It’s the same thing we see in debates, where folks on the left are challenged less than folks on there right. I’ve seen threads go on for a full page before anyone bothers to check if the OP is accurate or not-- but only when the OP is a left-leaning poster. Let a right-leaning poster start an inaccurate OP, and the thread will never get beyond a few posts before someone challenges it. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, it’s like Richard Parker noted earlier-- bias built into the system.

I wonder if that is just a coincidence, or if a message board that was originally devoted to fighting ignorance attracted mostly liberal members.

Indeed, I’m just saying that another thing tipping the balance is that many points or memes that are of “the stupid, it burns” variety are coming from the conservative side.

I’m old enough to realize that it was not always like that. Nor I deny that the liberals do come also with irrational points.

For my part I’m on the record of putting down people from the left that are against GMOs or nuclear power. If they are also breaking the board rules then yes, the attention they get also will make it more likely that I will press the report button.

I’ll be bold enough to suggest that some take issue with your posting/debating style, not your politics per se.

If this statement is off-topic, I’ll desist from this point forward.

I am having a hard time not believing that the “I’m so oppressed and discriminated against!” conservative posters here are not whooshing the rest of us, satirizing “micro-aggressions” and all that. Because boy their claims of discrimination are far more gossamer than the most hypersensitive of those claims.

Wait–is “the liberal” here tomndebb? Do you really think its his status as a liberal, not his status as a moderator who partook in the discussion, that most risks bias in how he’s moderated?

I am risk averse, and with much more reason than you, which is why I weaseled around “butthurt,” hinted at “craven,” and did not allow “sound like a massive baby” to cross my fingertips. :wink: You are playing with the modern conservative fantasy about being oppressed which, regarding you, HAS ABSOLUTELY NO BASIS IN REALITY. As I explained earlier, as a member of the SDSAB you have reasons for concern about warnings that have NOTHING to do with your politics, but you have not been modded for your politics–ever.

I suspect your “whipped pup” concerns are disingenuous: Unlike Shodan you don’t like to make a show of pissing people off. You prefer taking a loftier, more lawyerly tack, coming this><close then, when another poster reacts, you whip out your plausible deniability and show how you did not exactly say what you are accused of. It’s your thing, enough that “to bricker” is a verb with some of us. We all have our things.

In closing, you are not being oppressed and to claim so leaves you looking far more thin-skinned than we who have known you for 15 years know you to be. I mean, who do you think you’re talking to? We KNOW you. I, for one, do not buy your claim that one measly warning years ago made you timid, when your posts show otherwise. Give it up and play the hurt innocent to some jury of strangers somewhere.

Indeed, in Shodan’s case it’s an example of the board’s lenience towards conservative posters, as he posted a remark with the word “lie” immediately after a moderator tried to settle things down by putting a halt to posters calling each other stupid. This sort of running up to the very edge of what is acceptable is warnable. (Years later Shodan would report a post with the term, “deliberately distorted”.)

I suspect that Bricker’s lawyerly tactics are what piss people off. On this interpretation, I take Bricker’s side. We’re here to fight ignorance and deploying his legal knowledge while making fine distinctions is legitimate and even to be encouraged in my view. I’ll also concede that the alloy of a lawyerly approach with conservatism causes him extra problems. That’s not to the good.

The idea that the mods are out to get him is something I disagree with, though I do think Bricker got tripped up by a shifting civility bar.

Incidentally, prior to his April 2015 warning I’d say the slings and arrows actually improved his posting quality, ironically. Since then, his speech may very well have been chilled, I don’t know. (Note: “Chilling effect” is a term often used in first amendment contexts and free speech discussion. Cite: Chilling effect - Wikipedia ) Usage here is a little overwraught: I’ll quote wolfpup again from the June 2015 thread and add emphasis:

That’s the actual potential downside of a higher civility bar. I don’t take conservative oppression arguments too seriously. I do think that some posters are better at some shticks than others. I’m careful with one liners, as I often fear they are insufficiently humorous (also my language can veer towards turgidity). I think Bricker’s formalism makes for strong arguments; in the rarer and rarer occasions when he mouths off he inspires pile ons. I suspect that rankles a little, but again it also makes for stronger arguments on his part, IMHO.

[QUOTE=John Mace]
I noted this a few pages back, and the more I think about it, the more I think this may be in play.
[/QUOTE]

One piece of information that might inform us as to whether this could be part of the problem or not is: Can one of the mods give us a rough idea of how many warnings are issued because a mod discovers the offending post on his or her own vs a mod being notified by one of the posters that an offending post exists? If the latter is the source of only a small percentage of the warnings issued, then it’s probably not a significant source of bias.

C’mon Bone. It’s not hard.

Terr racked up more warnings over the past 2 years. He also received what has been depicted time and time again as typically a final warning. People are usually banned on the first warning after a one month suspension (though not always).

1 week suspensions have never been depicted as such. Never. This was a straightforward application of past practice.

I don’t really follow suspensions so I’m not familiar with the practice. The way I was interpreting the moderation was that regardless of how you get to the suspension point, you got there. That’s why I’m making that distinction. Obviously if we are adhering to the 1 week vs. 1 month suspension then different treatment could follow. No example is perfect :slight_smile:

You a funny guy, homie. Sayin’ “I’m careful with one liners” and then layin’ down somethin’ like that. “can veer towards …” Hee, hee, hee.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I rarely attack the board’s conservatives for their views themselves. I have gone after them when they play that game where they find a counterargument or counterexample to some point raised in a thread, and regardless of how weakly argued (or dubiously sourced, or tangential, or raised in bad faith, or the handiwork of obvious hacks) it is, they expect their counterpoints to be treated as equally legitimate, no questions asked. Everyone’s arguing “A”, so I’ll find someone arguing “B”, and now there’s no way to be sure “A” is right because “B” exists. Terr did that shit constantly, and it’s tedious, and soon the thread turns into pages of iiandyiiii multiquote arguing with some stubborn ass who gets to turn the thread into a personal wank-fest. It’s BORING.

One problem with assuming that the number of times conservatives get shouted down vs the number of times liberals get shouted down is indicative of bias, is the hidden (IMO, wrong) assumption that behind it all, conservatives are actually right half the time and liberals are right half the time.

It is possible that liberals are actually right about issues more often than conservatives are, and the majority of Dopers (who, IMO are centrist not liberal) side with those who are right, not Right.

Are you talking about threads in GQ? Cause that’s the place where people seek factual answers.

Nope. Because there is no evidence your claims are true. You bring up something that isn’t even connected to being moderated for your conservatism, and Shodan is one of the harshest people on this board. He skates the line. If what you say were true, Shodan would be on the edge of being banned.

Neither of you have brought remotely convincing arguments. I already explained why your argument is unconvincing, and you didn’t even try to provide a counterargument.

Shodan can in fact post in the way you claim you can’t. So either there is some other reason you can’t post that way, or, more likely, you are mistaken.

Well, this example from GQ shows that factual answers are not under the domain of the ones that deny that humans are responsible for the current warming observed. I should note here that after years of investigating the issue it is clear that in reality those posters are relying on sources that are using ideology to get things wrong.

The mods did give notes (and one warning) to the contrarians for not following the OP guidelines, the only warning was because a poster did make a political jab in GQ, but it is clear though that if the jab was coming from a liberal it would had received a warning too.

I invite you to consider the subtle distinction between “correct” and “right”…

And here we have the exact problem. Views are being shut down not because of truth or factual correctness, but because they don’t fit the echo chamber’s view of “right”. That’s an absurd thing to do if you want to fight ignorance, or just want to be a reasonably educated and well rounded person. It’s literally Orwellian, trying to destroy certain opinions and viewpoints.

Just because you consider something to be racist, for example, doesn’t mean it actually is, and it also doesn’t mean the view is wrong.