There’s something about mirrors and burning irony in there somewhere. Anybody?
Yeah, isn’t it horrible how they make threads like this disappear all the time and ban the people who propagate them? The corruption here just frightens me sometimes!
Corruption? I thought these threads tended to be about mod mistakes, did I miss the bit where the mods are taking bribes and disposing of bodies?
What on earth are you on about?
Only a mod can *order *you to move a discussion to another forum. Fellow members may *suggest *a venue that may be more appropriate, but it’s generally considered a better practice to just report the thread if you think it should be moved.
That certain moderators have at times allowed their personal preferences, outside of the actual rules of the board, to influence their moderation and/or have given the impression of doing so.
Oh, come on, why don’t you just go straight to Godwinizing what I’m saying, and save us all some time? You know you want to.
And your proof that the decision was made for the wrong reasons is… oh yeah, you disagree with the action taken. The action that you object to was within the list of acceptable actions. Therefore, it doesn’t matter the motivation, it was acceptable.
Demonstrating why it is useless for me to bother trying to find examples that you will accept. Because I found examples that I accept as parallels. And that’s the point - I accept the original action, and I think these are the same thing. Ergo, why should I bother finding more examples? You’re just going to reject them for some reason that to me is trivial and irrelevant to the point, and then use that to justify your assertion that there are no similar incidents, so that somehow proves that the action taken was, therefore, inappropriate.
There was no intent to be offensive. Let me quote twickster’s prior response:
This is how your arguments are being perceived. If your position is not coming across clearly, I am sorry.
I think you done Godwinized yer own self.
And again, you’re putting words in my mouth.
The problem is, here, 100%, that **twickster **telling people to move the AA discussion because it was a hijack and **twickster **telling people to move the AA discussion because she doesn’t like the fact that people are saying negative things about an organization that’s been very important to her and she hopes that people will just shut up about it look, to an outside observer, exactly identical.
I am not saying whether it’s A or B–I’m saying the fact that a third part *could *percieve it to be B means that the decision should have been made by someone who cannot be accused of being biased.
Again, since apparently you missed it the first time: a judge recusing themself *isn’t *saying they’re a bad, corrupt person who’s incapable of making a fair decision, simply that it’s necessary to avoid any appearance of such a bias so that the decision can’t be called into question.
Except that I’ve *always **explicitly *mentioned the OP’s request to specifically discuss AA, which you ignored because it was convenient for you.
Yes, and you’ll note that my second quote to you was a reply to her. You’re both completely twisting my words because you’ve already decided that I’m wrong, so anything I have to say must of course fit your interpretation. So even when I explicitly state more than once that I don’t think **twickster **made a conscious decision to shut down the AA debate, you both claim that of course that must be exactly what I’m saying. Because apparently you know what I mean better than I do, even when I’ve said it straight out.
Shot From Guns said:
I saw that post. I understand that point. I accept that and agree with it. My only concern was with regards to how an explicit policy might or might not work here.
I am not and have never ignored that point. I have stated that my interpretation is that the request from the OP to discuss AA was a minor component of a larger topic, and that the details of the direction that part of the discussion took did not merit being in the original thread. I have repeatedly stated that you and I see this differently. I have tried to show examples of similar threads where the component that was moderated was a part, but not the whole and not the main thrust, of the original topic and did not belong in that forum. I have tried to show parallel examples of threads that were closed because part of the discussion spawed by the OP was no longer relevant to the post and forum in which that discussion was occuring. To me those are exactly parallel cases. You say the examples I’ve given don’t fit precisely because to you, the AA component was integral to the thread. Once again, we are stuck on the fact that you disagree on the nature of the AA component of the specific example.
Does that make me the kid that keeps repeating, “Stop hitting yourself! Stop hitting yourself!”?
Is it just me, or does it seem like a handful of posters have lately turned into a group of professional whiners? Does it have anything to do with last week’s elections?
I probably should have said “you and I disagree…” in that last sentence. The way it is currently phrased comes off wrong.
And specifically, for those who still care, it’s corrupt for Mods to act in their official capacities in threads (as SFG notes) to advance arguments they made (and to suppress others they disagree with) while claiming that they’re innocently performing their duties fairly and equitably.
I’d still blast them, of course, if they’d fess up and admit, “Hey, I just don’t care for this fucken poster or his fucken position, or the horse he rode in on, and I view this as an opportunity to bust his balls, ha ha ha” but I wouldn’t be blasting them for corruption. What I mean by “corruption” is “abusing one’s position of authority for selfish purposes while claiming heatedly that nothing of the sort is going on.” Scoring debating points is NOT one of the perks of modding, as I see it.
But that’s just the problem–you and I see it differently, but you’re not bringing in examples that include the part that you obviously understand that *I see *as being important. So why are you surprised when I reject the examples that don’t include that aspect as though I’m simply dismissing them out of hand?
If you’d like to call me a whiner, you may care to take it to the Pit and do it to my face, where I can adequately respond, instead of making “blanket” statements that are clearly directed at me.
Shot From Guns said:
Okay, I doubt I’ll be able to find a situation where the mods closed a thread rather than moving it because the main point of the thread was posted in the wrong forum. If I really dig, I could conceivably turn up a thread that the main point was in the wrong forum and posters were hijacking in various ways (most probably by turning into a Pit thread) that they closed rather than moved because it was too convoluted to go in any one forum.
Basically you are asking for examples that fit your understanding of the situation, but they probably don’t exist, because if the mods agreed with you, then they would have done something different. So kudos to you that they didn’t do what they should have* for the situation as you interpret it, but you’ve still got that confounding detail that they interpreted the situation differently, so acted differently. (And I say “they” because by now it has been reviewed by more than one mod, even if only one additional one has actually posted on the topic.)
I don’t see that this is going anywhere. I feel we’re stuck at a couple of points:
-
The specific event is over. It has been reviewed by the staff, and concurred with. The thread is closed, and the moderation has been bought off on. If someone took the appearance of moderator bias, the appeal has been seen and rejected, any moderator bias was irrelevant/insignificant because the action taken was deemed appropriate.
-
The staff do not seem interested in creating a rule that moderators are required to recuse themselves from moderating a thread in which they demonstrate a strong opinion, even if that mod violates the rules they are supposed to enforce.
Continuing to discuss this does not appear to be changing anything.
*Should have, could have, would have… something like that.
This seems like handwaving to me. I see virtues in a higher standard of mod recusal, and would like to continue discussing it and recommending it. If no one wants to argue with my position, fine. Then don’t participate in that (this?) thread. You’ll have thousands for company.
But there’s a term for posting in a thread just to assert “I don’t see the point of this thread.” And it’s not a complimentary term. I’m just saying.
If you were a Mod, you could emphasize your point by locking the thread, of course.
NEW PIT THREAD!!!
Ah, well, not the phrasing that would have sprung to mind, but understandable enough.
No, settle down, I’m thinking of several.
Well, SfG, I started a pit thread so they could do that, but it seems the consensus is that you are not a whiner, and most people think you’re OK. I guess I wouldn’t worry about the one or two, if I were you. 