[QUOTE=OpalCat]
The only thing I don’t get is why, if they’re fine for MPSIMS, they aren’t just moved there, rather than closed. Takes just as much moderator time/effort to move a thread as close it.
[/QUOTE]
I had no idea that it was just as easy but I’ll certainly take your word for it. That’s always been hit or miss. Sometimes they move them and sometimes they get snuffed.
[QUOTE=Bea Spoke]
. . . and one Pit is one too many?
I do. I don’t see how the pit fits with Cecil at all. What is it doing on this site. Looks like an idea that’s time has passed.
[/QUOTE]
By keeping the PIT they don’t need to ban as many people. It’s the relief valve for those that can’t completely control themselves.
After this, I guess I’ll get pitted for my third time. 
[QUOTE=OpalCat]
The only thing I don’t get is why, if they’re fine for MPSIMS, they aren’t just moved there, rather than closed. Takes just as much moderator time/effort to move a thread as close it.
[/QUOTE]
I think moderators rarely move threads outside of the Pit, unless there’s been very few responses to it yet. This is probably because even if they’re not suitable for the Pit, they may not be suitable for the other forums because of the language or tone of some posts.
This said, the thread linked to in the OP could probably have been moved to MPSIMS. Maybe it wasn’t because of the “fucking” in the title: some people know better than to surf the Pit at work because of this, but think MPSIMS is okay; we’ve had complaints of the sort before.
[QUOTE=OpalCat]
The only thing I don’t get is why, if they’re fine for MPSIMS, they aren’t just moved there, rather than closed. Takes just as much moderator time/effort to move a thread as close it.
[/QUOTE]
But then again, closing a thread isn’t the final word.
If an OP would prefer a move for their thread, rather than starting a new one, they could email a mod and request the thread be moved and reopened.
I’m sure the mod would respond by either doing that, or explaining why not. Which would prevent the degree of hysterical / paranoid guesswork by members that I normally associate with mod actions.
IF a moderator catches a thread early on that should be elsewhere, it’s certainly movable. However, if there’s already personal insults in it, then we don’t want to move it to the more civil forums. As I think about, if the moderator posts a comment upon moving (and notes that the prior insults are null and void in the new forum), it might be possible to move the threads more often. Mods will discuss.
Rilchiam, on the original purpose of Pit, I honestly don’t remember. I sort of presume it was designed for flaming of all types, so probably hasn’t forsaken its original purpose as you presume. On the question of negativity and flaming hitting a new peak, I don’t doubt you (I don’t read much in the Pit), but I do think that comes and goes in cycles. Always worse around holiday time: 'tis the season to be stressed out, fa la la.
[QUOTE=Rilchiam]
…it seems that for the past few years, hostility has been creeping up. Now it’s at the point where opening a Pit thread sets the OP up as a secondary target. “I Pit the cretins who stole my car.” “Oh, that’s terrible.” “Here’s what you can do legally.” “Hey, it was an SUV! Serves you right!” [half a page later] “Well, he opened a Pit thread! I don’t have to be nice in the Pit! Everyone’s fair game, even if their planet-ruining vehicle was stolen!”
And don’t say that’s not happening. It is happening, a lot. So is it happening because the original purpose of the Pit has been subverted? Should anyone with a non-SDMB-related grievance keep it in MPSIMS (or perhaps IMHO), on the grounds that a forum devoted to flaming and accusation is not to place to admit any vulnerability?
[/QUOTE]
Not for a second would I consider contradicting someone who has just issued (her, I think?) thousandth-time unlucky post. Well I would, but in this case, you’re pretty much right.
In any fight, it is true, you’re going to have a few people there because they care about the issues, a few more who join in because they care about the participants, and a boatload of cretins who are there because, hey, it’s a fight, and they define “fight” as “free chance to act up.” It’s kind of the same in the Pit. Some pretty well-established posters, and a bunch of us peasants who are following their lead, seem to think that the forum is a place which not only requireth not tact and good grammar in the furtherance of one’s ideas, but is some sort of magic oasis where they may drop the ideas entirely, along with any ethics and civility they may pretend to elsewhere, in furtherance of their desire to electronically hit someone.
And the fact is, they’re right, as far as the moderation of the board is concerned. In a Pit thread, any sort of behavior, no matter how outrageous or off-topic or dishonest or just plain wrong is often justified by the fact that “it’s in the Pit”. It doesn’t have to be so: even the most vitriolic personal attacks could still have some rules applied to them (elementary ones: the posts have to be at least tangentially on-topic, and insults cannot take the form of accusations unless some evidence is attached). That would harm only those who wish to participate not to discuss the thread but to slander some of its participants. For me, that would enhance rather than diminish the thread.
The other problem, of course, and I think it’s one reason the Pit is getting out of control, is that moderation in some other forums (so far, not GD, much) is occasionally so heavy-handed as to stifle even the gentlest questioning of an OP’s premise(s). If there is no way to suggest even obliquely and politely that the facts may not be exactly as the OP outlines them, or that a poster’s interpretation of them may be illogical or self-serving, or that a chorus of admiration and affirmation is the only acceptable response to a thread in MPSIMS or IMHO, it isn’t surprising that posters may react extra-aggressively when and where the restrictions aren’t.
Two points:
No one has to go to The Pit. If you go there, you shouldn’t be surprised when you find that it’s a bit hateful. That’s its purpose.
With respect, the moderators are no more heavy-handed than they ever have been, IMadmittedlyHO. I have, in the course of now eight years plus of posting here, been warned or admonished fewer than five times, despite the fact that I have an occasionally ascerbic tone which makes even me cringe later. I have no trouble indicating that I think someone is talking out of their ass without obtaining the focus of the moderators in a negative way. If others can’t manage that, it is, again in my opinion, because they simply don’t want to follow relatively simple rules for behaving here.
[QUOTE=DSYoungEsq]
Two points:
[/QUOTE]
At most, I think. Let’s see:
[QUOTE=DSYoungESQ]
…No one has to go to The Pit…
[/QUOTE]
I’ll spread the word. Shall I similarly excuse the garbage some jerk dumped in the park with the wisdom that no one has to go there?
[QUOTE=DSYoungEsq]
…If you go there, you shouldn’t be surprised when you find that it’s a bit hateful…
[/QUOTE]
If I ever find anyone so surprised, I shall quote to them from this post. But I’ve never found anyone with that mindset. It’s more of, yes, this forum can get rough, and sometimes that’s a good thing, but the gratuitous slurs and canards that have nothing to do with the thread and are merely the exercise of a childish and nasty id freed from immediate consequence, can and should be curtailed.
[QUOTE=DSYoungESQ]
…That’s its purpose…
[/QUOTE]
Of course it’s not, any more than the purpose of a short poem is to leave wider margins on the page when it’s published. It’s a forum in a message board and its purpose is to facilitate discussion. The forum allows for strong language, but that latitude is not its purpose any more than football, a rough game, is a sport designed to injure people rather than score points.
[QUOTE=DSYoungESQ]
…With respect, the moderators are no more heavy-handed than they ever have been, IMadmittedlyHO. I have, in the course of now eight years plus of posting here, been warned or admonished fewer than five times, despite the fact that I have an occasionally ascerbic tone which makes even me cringe later. I have no trouble indicating that I think someone is talking out of their ass without obtaining the focus of the moderators in a negative way. If others can’t manage that, it is, again in my opinion, because they simply don’t want to follow relatively simple rules for behaving here.
[/QUOTE]
With respect, your experience does not provide any guidance for anyone, regardless of length of tenure, who has not shared your perceptions of it or who thinks that it may be merely a happy coincidence that your acerbic (no ‘s,’ please) tone stops short of triggering a negative focus on the part of a moderator, while that of others does. I have been warned and/or admonished perhaps even more rarely than you, but I would not suggest without knowledge, as you have, that anyone who has been warned more often has a lesser understanding or respect for the rules.
In my opinion, the Pit could benefit from stricter moderation, and there would be less need for it if MPSIMS and IMHO were not occasionally moderated less strictly. In short, it’s better to allow people to disagree politely, so the impolite forum doesn’t get quite so gooey with unrestrained animosity.
[QUOTE=The King of Soup]
At most, I think. Let’s see:
I’ll spread the word. Shall I similarly excuse the garbage some jerk dumped in the park with the wisdom that no one has to go there?
If I ever find anyone so surprised, I shall quote to them from this post. But I’ve never found anyone with that mindset. It’s more of, yes, this forum can get rough, and sometimes that’s a good thing, but the gratuitous slurs and canards that have nothing to do with the thread and are merely the exercise of a childish and nasty id freed from immediate consequence, can and should be curtailed.
Of course it’s not, any more than the purpose of a short poem is to leave wider margins on the page when it’s published. It’s a forum in a message board and its purpose is to facilitate discussion. The forum allows for strong language, but that latitude is not its purpose any more than football, a rough game, is a sport designed to injure people rather than score points.
With respect, your experience does not provide any guidance for anyone, regardless of length of tenure, who has not shared your perceptions of it or who thinks that it may be merely a happy coincidence that your acerbic (no ‘s,’ please) tone stops short of triggering a negative focus on the part of a moderator, while that of others does. I have been warned and/or admonished perhaps even more rarely than you, but I would not suggest without knowledge, as you have, that anyone who has been warned more often has a lesser understanding or respect for the rules.
In my opinion, the Pit could benefit from stricter moderation, and there would be less need for it if MPSIMS and IMHO were not occasionally moderated less strictly. In short, it’s better to allow people to disagree politely, so the impolite forum doesn’t get quite so gooey with unrestrained animosity.
[/QUOTE]
Ah, I see. I am not surprised you find the need for “less strict” moderation outside the Pit. :rolleyes:
The pity parties are irritating. ISTR that OPs in the Pit used to be angry, creative spittle-flecked missives; now it’s like MPSIMS with a dash of hot sauce. If you ask me, not enough Pit threads get locked up (or, preferably, moved to MPSIMS) as fake pittings. JMHO.
Goat felchers. 
[QUOTE=DSYoungEsq]
Ah, I see. I am not surprised you find the need for “less strict” moderation outside the Pit. :rolleyes:
[/QUOTE]
I apologize, sir, for my occasionally acerbic tone which, while not obtaining the focus of the moderators in a negative way, indicates that I think someone is talking out of their ass. I shall undoubtedly cringe. Later.
[QUOTE=Hostile Dialect]
The pity parties are irritating. ISTR that OPs in the Pit used to be angry, creative spittle-flecked missives; now it’s like MPSIMS with a dash of hot sauce. If you ask me, not enough Pit threads get locked up (or, preferably, moved to MPSIMS) as fake pittings. JMHO.
[/QUOTE]
I agree with this.
Asking the opposite question of** Rilchiam**, why does someone who has a self-pitying whiny rant put it in the Pit instead of MPSIMS? Almost always, whiny rants can be pointed back at the person since we all have at least some responsibility for our actions. . . even if the responsibility is to not put the rant in the Pit. So why do people take the chance of having the thread turn back on them instead of putting it in MPSIMS?
If it’s just because they think that language disqualifies them for MPSIMS, then they should be moved because that’s not true. If there’s another reason, then shouldn’t they take their chances? I’ve seen lots of OPs in the Pit start with something like. . . this is my first Pit thread. . . .like there’s some kind of honor in that. And with that comes the possibility that things could turn badly for them. But they seem to know that there’s that possibility when they post that it’s their first Pit thread.
[QUOTE=The King of Soup]
If there is no way to suggest even obliquely and politely that the facts may not be exactly as the OP outlines them, or that a poster’s interpretation of them may be illogical or self-serving, or that a chorus of admiration and affirmation is the only acceptable response to a thread in MPSIMS or IMHO, it isn’t surprising that posters may react extra-aggressively when and where the restrictions aren’t.
[/QUOTE]
:rolleyes: It is quite simple to convey all of your examples in a way that will not violate any of the rules of the other fora.
[QUOTE=Inner Stickler]
:rolleyes: It is quite simple to convey all of your examples in a way that will not violate any of the rules of the other fora.
[/QUOTE]
Oh, well, that’s a relief. Thanks.
However, even now that you’ve settled the matter, I can still say that there have been instances where I thought moderators have been a little too anxious to chase away the occasional cloud or discouraging word from their ranges outside the Pit, and a little too reluctant to moderate egregiously bad behavior in it. It doesn’t have to be Albania in the Pit and Singapore everywhere else, is all I’m saying.
Y’all are aware of why I didn’t make a fuss, right?
[QUOTE=Darth Nader]
Y’all are aware of why I didn’t make a fuss, right?
[/QUOTE]
Heh, sorry to drag you into this, sort of. I wasn’t making a point about your thread per se, just using it as an example of the sort of thing I’m talking about.
This thread has actually departed quite a bit from what I was asking. That’s fine, but I’m still curious: why is it that joke-pittings and other non-contentious fare must not be allowed in the Pit? Because technically they’re more appropriate in other forums? Maybe so, but maybe the OP wants it in the Pit for reasons specific to that thread. Joke-pittings, in particular, are a kind of satire, and they don’t work as such in a forum other than the Pit.
I now see your point entirely VarlosZ
Chronos convinced me that if the pit isolates that stuff, then friendly and serious posters can just ignore it.
And your point that no harm is done putting a few more “non hate” threads there is excellent idea.
If they are mostly just pity, so what, at least they don’t clutter the main discussion forums.
[QUOTE=Darth Nader]
Y’all are aware of why I didn’t make a fuss, right?
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=VarlosZ]
. Joke-pittings, in particular, are a kind of satire, and they don’t work as such in a forum other than the Pit.
[/QUOTE]
no, they’re not, IMHO. JOke pittings (the type of thing that isn’t allowed) are the “I pit so and so 'cause they’re so smart and funny, I just hate it! Smmooooch!”
which is why we need that barfy smile
[QUOTE=wring]
no, they’re not, IMHO. JOke pittings (the type of thing that isn’t allowed) are the “I pit so and so 'cause they’re so smart and funny, I just hate it! Smmooooch!”
which is why we need that barfy smile
[/QUOTE]
Well said. They finally had to make that rule when half of the Pit was lame ass reverse pittings about popular posters and cats.