In a thread in which the main subject is pchaos, there was another little side discussion that occurred, which Marely23 told me to take to ATMB. It went like this:
So here I am in ATMB, asking what would one have to do in the Pit for the moderators there to even consider trolling, if pchaos doesn’t come anywhere near it?
Lucky for you, you don’t come near it. Unfortunately for pchaos, he is pushing it. You may be about to witness it. Lucky you…
IMHO, it should be nearly impossible to (officially) troll a thread where you’re being pitted. His “contributions” to other threads are a different matter, however.
ETA: It’s simple, if you don’t want a troll to troll more, don’t pit them.
AU - Goading pchaos to apply directly to TubaDiva for a mod position, since Marley wasnt having it, is surely an example of what you’re asking about.
Let me start off by saying that I haven’t been following the linked thread, so the following is my general philosophy about moderating in the Pit, and may or may not apply to that particular situation.
It’s pretty hard to get dinged for trolling in the Pit. Trolling is generally defined as posting things just to piss of other posters - which is the explicit purpose of the Pit. There is a line, however, which is that you have to be posting things you actually believe. If a poster is taking a controversial position, not because he actually holds that position, but simply because he wants to provoke a reaction, then he’s breaking the rules and could draw a warning or an outright ban.
The tricky part is figuring out if a controversial position is genuine or not. There’s no opinion that’s too stupid or hateful that you can’t find someone, somewhere, who actually holds it. I tend to give a pretty generous benefit of the doubt in situations like this. Absent concrete evidence that a poster is fucking with us, I take people’s stated opinions at face value. The sort of evidence I’m thinking of would be, say, suddenly taking a position that’s dramatically at odds with a poster’s previous statements, or posts on another message board where the poster brags about trolling the SDMB.
I should also mention that I don’t consider hyperbole to be trolling. A poster stating his genuinely held beliefs in an extreme or over-the-top manner is generally not going to draw any moderator attention.
Miller and I have identical philosophies on this topic
Although Miller did an excellent job defining trolling, it’d be entirely accurate and more concise to say: you’ll know it when you see it. The more time you (general) spend on the internet, the easier it becomes to suss out a troll.
I’m not a mod, of course. This isn’t an official board stance, or anything like that. Just some general wisdom.
There you go borrowing philosophies instead of coming up with your own!
have they ever considered starting a church?
Keeps the overhead low here on the Board.
which is why a number of posters have been permitted to clutter up Great Debates longer than I would like. I don’t figure that it is the staff’s job to impose our own beliefs on what a poster, (idiot or troll), can post, so it is possible for a troll to last a bit longer by giving us the impression that they are just really dumb or stupidly hateful.
IMHO - it was this particular posters comments in a couple of other threads - outside of the GD debacle - that is what makes him a troll and worthy of the PIT - his willfull ignorance is an entirely different matter.
FTR -
Banned for trolling in the Pit – I don’t know if this counts, but we did have one guy lie and say his parents died on 9-11 when he was losing an argument. Unfortunately for him, he had made references to them being alive elsewhere on the board, so he was quickly found out.
We very recently had a thread locked for somebody trolling in the pit. I believe a warning was issued, the thread was closed, and the moderator comment was along the lines of “This is a formal warning for trolling in the pit. Congratulations, that really takes effort.”
Unfortunately I can’t recall what that thread was.