That’s fine @Miller, but, for the record, the rules as written (being very careful to be clear) don’t carve out an exception to the definition for Troll in the Pit, just that rules against trolling apply even in the Pit.
The sub forum rules for the Pit spells it out a tiny bit better:
No trolling
By trolling, we mean posting of inflammatory comments solely to get a rise out of people. If we feel your primary goal as a poster is to make people mad, you’ll quickly find yourself on the road to banning. On the flip side, the fact that a poster consistently makes you mad doesn’t automatically make them a troll. No trolling
So the earlier section I quoted seems to still apply. But that is IMHO, and yes, we normally cut a lot more slack in the Pit. But, my opinion, and apparently that of other posters in that thread, along with the way they pursue their points, is that the poster does fall under the standard. Thus my suggested compromise.
Not disputing that your moderation of the Pit is remarkably even-handed even with posters you disagree with, just that this poster certainly feels like our other ‘bright line’ tap dancers. They’re aware of it, and doing the “I’m not touching the line” and will continue to do so until they’re given strong reason not to do so. And a note would be a good first step.
Now to be fair, as I understand it, the dispute between you and the posters is the troubling “If we feel [their] primary goal as a poster is to make people mad” (emphasis and descriptor modified by me). Which is inherently subjective. But even if you feel they don’t reach that standard yet, reminding them and heck, even the thread IN GENERAL that these are the rules in an omnidirectional note can’t hurt. I can’t do it for fear of junior modding of course.
Essentially, you can opt in or out of any forum (category). If you go to the main page for it, and click on the little bell icon, it gives you the option of “muting” the forum, which will pretty much prevent you from noticing it.
Whether we can set the defaults for new users? Not sure.
It’s not supposed to be. The purpose of the Pit is to vent/rant about things that make us angry. It is to be able to call out those who act badly.
Yes, that sometimes results in people saying things that piss others off, but that’s different than deliberately trying to piss everyone off for your amusement.
If you don’t think he’s doing that, fine. But I push back on the idea that such is the purpose of the Pit.
Even if magellan01is trolling (and I’m not saying he is), his contributions have engendered useful and interesting discussion. But there are numerous posters in that thread whose sole contributions have been to pile on with drive-by snark and random insults. Of those posters, there are a couple who habitually do almost nothing else, no matter what thread they’re in. They’re maladjusted wastes of space, and magellan01 is worth a thousand of them, if only by virtue of the fact that some responses to his posts have been of high quality.
I don’t think that’s what was meant. One or two posters mentioned “opt-in” in the sense of having to apply for access, which has to be approved by a moderator. The ability to mute a forum is a very handy feature, but it doesn’t solve the problem of keeping disruptive posters out of contentious forums, especially a forum like the Pit which is, quite properly and by design, very lightly moderated. And of course, if a mod can approve access, a mod can also revoke it. I haven’t participated in the thread that the OP is complaining about, but I took a quick look and the poster in question did indeed completely derail it.
I’m not saying this is necessarily a good idea nor do I know if Discourse even supports such a feature, just clarifying what was meant. The one board I know of that requires approval for access to contentious political topics is one where the admin is rather obsessed with keeping everything polite and civil.
Actually, I didn’t offer the idea in either sense. I am of course aware of the ability to mute forums, which I have done and find helpful.
I was responding to @Czarcasm’s concern that topics from The Pit, appearing in the feed and perhaps earning a look from unwitting perspective new members, might turn some bona fide!new members, wish to engage in good faith and civil discourse only, off to the SDMB altogether, as they might not realize that what flies in the pit won’t necessarily fly elsewhere. The idea, then, would be to make the forum default to “muted” in the parlance of discourse.
In short, the idea is meant to be protection for, not protection from, new members.
Those who do stick around would, presumably , pick up on the idea of the pit in due time, at which point they may choose to opt-in (unmute) if they so desire, with no moderator action required (unless and until they misbehave, naturally).
FWIW, I am not wedded to this idea, I merely suggested it as responsive to @Czarcasm.
I know, but I think one or two other posters did mention the “apply for access” idea, which solves both problems, and I know it’s been implemented on other boards. Again, I’m not endorsing it, just mentioning it. I would actually prefer NOT to have such a function because it would reduce the number of participants in the Pit.
But to the extent that many serious discussions occur in the Pit, IMHO there is perhaps some justification for moderation in the case of blatant, trollish hijacks to useful discussions.
My objection is a simple one and I think it’s the reason why it should never and will never, ever happen.
The Pit is a place to air beefs about a person, whether it’s a newbie or an established person. If you cannot go to defend yourself, then that is patently unfair.
I know that we do have sort of a “speak in hushed whispers” thing going on in the Trolls thread, where we try not to link to a thread or post, or @ someone, or even sometimes mention their full name, because we suspect they are not posting legitimately and their participation can disrupt the thread. That’s a bit of a special case though, other threads in the Pit are more general gripes and it’s very appropriate or even expected for a person to respond.
I think it would be a monumentally terrible thing to exclude people from the Pit.
Being opt-in is not “exclusion,” it’s keeping the noise down so new homebuyers don’t get spooked by the sounds from the basement brawl happening next door to the open house. Should they choose to move in, they are still welcome to join the brawl at any time they wish, just as soon as they find out about it, which shouldn’t be too long if they pay attention and/or read the rules.
Actually, no, that’s something nobody has said. The suggestion was to make a “forum” opt-in. You are the first one to say a thread should be opt-in.
In which case… That seems less objectionable to me, though there would have to be a good reason to set it up that way. But I guess there might be a point where that might not be a bad idea.
Except for the “automatically accepted” part. One board that has such a policy for political forums asks “why do you want access?”, although I suspect that it’s not so much the answer as the poster’s history that determines the decision. IIRC, you have to be a member for a certain minimum time before even being eligible for the restricted forums.
Once again, I’m not advocating such a policy, but let’s be clear on what it might look like. I would also re-iterate that the admin of this particular board is very much obsessed with avoiding confrontations and maintaining a particularly high level of civility, I think partly to enhance the site’s attractiveness to advertisers. There are a number of policies there that I disagree with.
