Okay, in regards to continueing the discussion elsewhere.
Lets assume the Dio rollercoaster is cranking up. Are the more serious posters allowed to post something like "Hey folks, THIS thread is getting silly, see you all over in “Barely legal for fun and profit? Lets discuss the moral implications! part two”?
Assume we are allowed to do it. What happens when Dio follows? And I can’t imagine he won’t. Do we go to part three, part four, part Googleplex? Hey, if you mods allow it and it actually works many of us will be happy campers. But I suspect it won’t and I also suspect you won’t allow it. You either explicity won’t allow it or you’ll just merge the threads and then still lock the fracker down.
And if you lock it before we do that (assuming it’s even allowed), what are we supposed to do after the thread is locked? PM all the serious folks and have some supper secret thread under some covert thread with a title like “I love bunnies and unicorns, don’t you?”. Or do we start another thread with nearly the exact same title and pray Dio doesn’t show up?
This is IMO the mod equivalent of tell poor people in crime ridden neighborhoods to quit bitching about crime and just move to a better neighborhood. You don’t flee the problem when its most likely to be the same thing the next block over. You fix it or at least try.
Your problem is really easily fixed: put him on your ignore list. But no one is going to do it because a)it’s not a public thing so you don’t get to gloat about a banning or suspension and b)no one wants to fix the problem, they just want to bitch about the problem.
And if dio is just talking to himself and no one is responding to him because they’ve all ignored him then he won’t be trainwrecking any threads. Even dio doesn’t post all over the place without responses.
Put dio on your ignore list. I guarantee you, you will have a happier board experience if you just don’t see the posts of people that don’t add content to your experience. Or you can whine about how you can’t have any fun without him spoiling it and I will be completely unsympathetic.
Edit: There are even browser mods that will completely strip a poster out of the board just for you. You won’t see the box that says this poster is on your ignore list, you won’t see where people quote them, it will be like they don’t even exist. You are spared their posting and we’re spared your whining. Win-win.
I don’t have anyone on my list, but I already don’t engage Dio, but that didn’t prevent the threads from being closed. Your fix doesn’t make any sense unless EVERYBODY puts Dio on ignore. That’s a lot of work.
And if not everybody doesn’t have him on ignore or there’s enough people to argue with him, then there’s enough people interested in having a conversation about the topic. If you’re viewing conversations with people as your duty to educate the misinformed dolts, you’re approaching it from the wrong angle and that goes for both sides. Not ignoring him implicitly says you find his posts to be worth your time to read and if they’re worthwhile then why shouldn’t he make them.
You don’t get it. Pretending he doesn’t exist wouldn’t keep those threads from being closed. His jerkish behavior gets under people’s skins. You want to put the onus of solving the problem on everyone else instead of the one person being a jerk. I agree with him more often than not, but I still can’t stand his jerkish behavior. When even Dio’s allies can’t stand him, he just might be a problem.
Or you can put him on the ignore list. If YOU put him on your ignore list, there’s one less person inclined to argue with him and help precipitate the thread closures. Or, you can continue whining about him in this thread. That will surely be effective and solve your problems.
Because I find your whining amusing. I never ignore people because I don’t care that deeply about discussions here. Winning an argument on the internet is like jacking off. No one cares except for you.
Why don’t people use the ignore feature who are offended by Diogenes? Answer - they don’t want to miss out on the meow factor. What a bunch of drama. And people thanking the mod for suggesting it would be okay to start another thread after a busy body closure of a good one.
No topic was being “derailed”. The OP asked “What do you think of this?” The title is asking for an opinion about the topic. Dio gave his adamant opinion, argument ensued. So frickin’ what?!
So why was the thread closed? Because people continued to argue with a certain poster? But not only is it then the certain posters fault, and none of the other arguers.
And so a mod shows up with a padlock because they deem the thread a “trainwreck”. But now it’s all the certain poster’s fault. But permission has been given to start another thread on the topic if they want - gee… how incredibly helpful.
Funny but keep in mind that the mods may well be looking for any excuse to close this thread. Once it becomes a joke/snark fest rather than a remotely serious discussion of the issue they can close yet another “WTF are you going to do about Dio?” thread and buy themselves yet another couple months.
And before they do that, I’d like to point out the latest BBQ pit thread held in Dio’s honor (a couple months ago IIRC). There were plenty of very serious/famous/level headed/long term/not complainer type posters that had very insightful and well thought out observations regarding the whole Dio show phenom.
IMO Dio is really starting to get under the nerves of some very valuable posters here and influencing their contributions (or lack of) in a negative way.
You’ve just shown exactly what it is. A one line post, stating opinion as fact, with no argument or information to back it up. So, perhaps you’d like to explain why your chosen posting style is constructive, and the people who criticise it are mistaken?
I’ll rephrase the question. How does posting one line comments, stating your opinion as fact, with nothing to back it up, lead to an interesting or informative conversation on this board?