# Why was my Staving Artist Pit thread merged? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [October 4, 2012, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664 "2012-10-04T04:40:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/21 "2012-10-04T17:50:21Z")
> [@RedFury](#): > > **Miller** , thanks for the prompt response. But it appears to me you didn’t read the OP prior to your response. > > Three points – one of which has been mentioned by a few posters already. > > 1-No, it is not “it’s the same damn thing” at all and I explained why in the OP. The Paterno thread hasn’t been a pitting of Paterno since November of last year. By the fourth page of that thing, it had already converted into a mob of posters calling **Starving Artist** names, and has continued on that course for nearly a year now. It is, in all regards except its name, a pitting of **Starving Artist**. Your thread did not add a new aspect to this discussion in any substantial way. > [@](#): > > 3-Which is why, in the Pit OP you’ll notice that I asked for **that particular thread to remain open for a mere +/- 72 hours**. And I quote: As a general policy, we do not close Pit threads at the request of the OP. I’m certainly not going to rearrange my personal schedule so that I can be online in time to meet your deadline for shutting down your thread. > [@](#): > > In closing, I want to Pit **StarvingArtist** over his actions in the Paterno thread. Is that a problem? In general, I never have a problem with someone wanting to pit **Starving Artist** for any reason. I do have a problem with having two threads on the same subject running concurrently. If you want to call him names over this, there’s a perfectly fine thread in the Pit already for you to do that. I see you’ve already posted to it forty-seven times, and without looking at individual posts, I’m guessing somewhere around forty-six of them involved calling **SA** names. ---
**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/22 "2012-10-04T18:09:21Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > As a general policy, we do not close Pit threads at the request of the OP. > **[What Exit?](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=441506)** > > You seem to be such a tender young thing, and I don’t have the heart to blast you. But the Pit is (or at least was) the place where members hash out grievances and differences, so I brought this discussion here. Glad to have amused you. First,... > **[To the coward that hit my car this weekend](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=366806)** > > Saturday, I volunteered to proctor the Foreign Service Written Exam here in Lima, so that 29 young hopefuls could take the first step towards a career that I really like and think makes a bit of a difference. yeah, it meant giving up my Saturday,... [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=355952&page=4](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=355952&page=4) [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=353114&page=2](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=353114&page=2) [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=354501&page=3](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=354501&page=3) [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6199997](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6199997) Go on, pull the other one. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/23 "2012-10-04T18:19:32Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Yeah, not really seeing the mod logic here. He was welcomed to start a Pit thread about it, did, then it was merged because we don’t need another thread on the topic. Well, okay, that’s fine, but why didn’t anyone say that in the first place? If the original IMHO thread were closed with a note that said “Take it to the existing Pit thread,” then I could see the reasoning, but we were told a new Pit thread would be fine, one was opened, then essentially closed. I can appreciate that there’s a certain amount of mixed signals involved in this situation, which is unfortunate. The instruction to open a new Pit thread was not the result of consultation and consensus among the moderation staff, but rather, an off-the-cuff response to an inappropriate posting in another forum. Moderation of the various forums on this board is somewhat compartmentalized. A moderator in IMHO isn’t necessarily going to be aware of everything that’s going on in the BBQ Pit, and vice versa. This is largely by design: this is a pretty big board, the staff here are all volunteers, and we generally don’t have time to be aware of everything that’s happening in every forum at any given moment. When someone starts airing their grievance with another poster in the wrong forum, telling them to start a Pit thread is a fairly standard response. I don’t expect the other moderators here to contact me to ask me if that’s okay first, or check the BBQ Pit to see if there’s already a pit thread on the subject. That level of coordination is more of a logistical headache than any of us are really prepared to deal with, especially given that 99% of the time, it’s not necessary. This particular subject is an outlier. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/24 "2012-10-04T18:20:51Z")
> [@Garfield226](#): > > [What Exit? - The BBQ Pit - Straight Dope Message Board](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=441506) > [To the coward that hit my car this weekend - The BBQ Pit - Straight Dope Message Board](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=366806) > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=355952&page=4](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=355952&page=4) > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=353114&page=2](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=353114&page=2) > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=354501&page=3](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=354501&page=3) > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6199997](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=6199997) > > Go on, pull the other one. This may come as a shock to you, but **Giraffe** hasn’t been a moderator here for several years now. ---
**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/25 "2012-10-04T18:22:15Z")
This may come as a shock to you, but you’re making this up as you go along and it’s obvious to everyone. ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/26 "2012-10-04T18:24:30Z")
The moderating here is a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham. ---
**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/27 "2012-10-04T18:26:58Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I can appreciate that there’s a certain amount of mixed signals involved in this situation, which is unfortunate. The instruction to open a new Pit thread was not the result of consultation and consensus among the moderation staff, but rather, an off-the-cuff response to an inappropriate posting in another forum. Moderation of the various forums on this board is somewhat compartmentalized. A moderator in IMHO isn’t necessarily going to be aware of everything that’s going on in the BBQ Pit, and vice versa. This is largely by design: this is a pretty big board, the staff here are all volunteers, and we generally don’t have time to be aware of everything that’s happening in every forum at any given moment. When someone starts airing their grievance with another poster in the wrong forum, telling them to start a Pit thread is a fairly standard response. I don’t expect the other moderators here to contact me to ask me if that’s okay first, or check the BBQ Pit to see if there’s already a pit thread on the subject. That level of coordination is more of a logistical headache than any of us are really prepared to deal with, especially given that 99% of the time, it’s not necessary. This particular subject is an outlier. Are you honestly suggesting that **Idle Thoughts** wasn’t aware of the ongoing pit thread that **Enderw24** mentioned and linked in his IMHO poll? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/28 "2012-10-04T18:27:13Z")
> [@Garfield226](#): > > This may come as a shock to you, but you’re making this up as you go along and it’s obvious to everyone. If this is something I have just invented on the spur of the moment, you should have no trouble finding plenty of instances where the OP requested that I close a thread, and I complied. ---
**Author:** ![Garfield226](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Garfield226](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Garfield226)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/29 "2012-10-04T18:28:52Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > If this is something I have just invented on the spur of the moment, you should have no trouble finding plenty of instances where the OP requested that I close a thread, and I complied. You said “we”, not “I”. “We” presumably means “pit mods” and I directed you to several instances of a pit mod closing a thread at the request of the OP. Keep digging. ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/30 "2012-10-04T18:30:29Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > The Paterno thread hasn’t been a pitting of Paterno since November of last year. By the fourth page of that thing, it had already converted into a mob of posters calling **Starving Artist** names, and has continued on that course for nearly a year now. It is, in all regards except its name, a pitting of **Starving Artist**. Your thread did not add a new aspect to this discussion in any substantial way. So why keep it open if its both, misleading in title and a mob response? Personally I find it a place for **SA** to bloviate at will. Again, not exactly what I’d call it in the Pit nor is it an open pitting of him. My thread was certainly on topic: a direct pitting of Starving Artist plus an attempt to debunk an specific claim of his. Namely the disgusting Paper Towel Tube bullshit experiment. > [@](#): > > As a general policy, we do not close Pit threads at the request of the OP. I’m certainly not going to rearrange my personal schedule so that I can be online in time to meet your deadline for shutting down your thread. Come on, **Miller** , pardon me but that is a silly justification/quibble…so the thread stays open for a few hours/days more till you get to it. Big deal. Besides, note the disclaimer: “If there are no objections.” Meaning that I am hardly trying to Lord over it. Really don’t think it’s that hard to reach a majority consensus on that request. I’d also note that plenty of threads have been closed per the OPs request in the past – nothing unsual about that. > [@](#): > > In general, I never have a problem with someone wanting to pit **Starving Artist** for any reason. I do have a problem with having two threads on the same subject running concurrently. If you want to call him names over this, there’s a perfectly fine thread in the Pit already for you to do that. I see you’ve already posted to it forty-seven times, and without looking at individual posts, **I’m guessing somewhere around forty-six of them involved calling SA names**. – bolding mine. 1-OK, either close that thread or give it the correct title – if it is, as you say a Piting of Starving Artist and NOT a thread about Paterno and Penn State, it’d be the right thing to do, no? 2-And you’d be _completely wrong_ on your guess. Prior to the current clusterfuck – or up until that thread was on-topic, **roughly December of last year** – all of my twenty-seven posts were, surprisingly enough, _strictly on topic._ In addition to that, your “47” number is not correct either as it now includes at least six posts from my merged Pit thread. Yours is the last word. Obviously. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/31 "2012-10-04T18:44:52Z")
> [@Garfield226](#): > > You said “we”, not “I”. “We” presumably means “pit mods” and I directed you to several instances of a pit mod closing a thread at the request of the OP. So when **Miller** posted about ‘what we do’ - present tense verb - you thought he was discussing the entire history of the Pit rather than the actions of the current Pit mods? > [@Garfield226](#): > > This may come as a shock to you, but you’re making this up as you go along and it’s obvious to everyone. Highlighting this quote again for emphasis: > [@Miller](#): > > As a general policy, we do not close Pit threads at the request of the OP. I’m certainly not going to rearrange my personal schedule so that I can be online in time to meet your deadline for shutting down your thread. Nevermind you picked bunch of ridiculously out of date examples (from 2005 through 2007), finding individual instances where a thread was closed at the OP’s request wouldn’t prove your point anyway. **Miller** made a general statement and what he said is true: the staff here usually don’t close threads at the request of the OP. We do it sometimes, but not always. That’s particularly true in the Pit. It’s common for posters to ask that their Pit threads be closed if the thread does not go the way they hoped, and the mods usually tell them to take a hike because that’s how it goes with Pittings. In any case **RedFury** ’s advance directive that the Pit mods close his thread after 72 hours was unique even in that regard because it was an arbitrary cutoff point. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/32 "2012-10-04T18:56:41Z")
I hereby request that in the even **RedFury’s** thread is unmerged or he is allowed to start a new Paterno-related thread to Pit me, that I be allowed to Pit him for what I believe are his specious motives in doing so, and also that I be allowed to start another thread to set the record straight as to my true view in the Paterno thread, my motives for posting in it, and why I’ve chosen to carry on the fight for as long as I have, which is a point many non-or-ex-Paterno thread posters are wrong about. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/33 "2012-10-04T18:58:45Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > I hereby request that in the even **RedFury’s** thread is unmerged or he is allowed to start a new Paterno-related thread to Pit me, that I be allowed to Pit him for what I believe are his specious motives in doing so, and also that I be allowed to start another thread to set the record straight as to my true view in the Paterno thread, my motives for posting in it, and why I’ve chosen to carry on the fight for as long as I have, which is a point many non-or-ex-Paterno thread posters are wrong about. I hereby request that “Paterno” be added to the list of words that cannot be uttered in The BBQ Pit. ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/34 "2012-10-04T19:02:22Z")
Could a mod please confirm that it is now Straight Dope policy to no longer close pit threads at the request of the OP? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/35 "2012-10-04T19:03:23Z")
> [@Bob Ducca](#): > > Could a mod please confirm that it is now Straight Dope policy to no longer close pit threads at the request of the OP? Who said this? ---
**Author:** ![GrandWino](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grandwino/32/67_2.png) [@GrandWino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrandWino)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/36 "2012-10-04T19:12:33Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Who said this? Your post is bad and you should feel bad. > [@Miller](#): > > As a general policy, we do not close Pit threads at the request of the OP. So Miller is saying this is a “general policy” which is why he’s refusing to entertain the idea of closing the thread in question after a given amount of time at the request of the OP. Examples of past thread closings were shown and then soundly ridiculed by both Miller and Marley. Either its a policy or it isn’t. If it is, I’d appreciate the mods stating such. If it’s just a “general” policy, perhaps they shouldn’t direct so much scorn at the suggestion. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/37 "2012-10-04T19:15:08Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Who said this? Probably not Joe Paterno, but since he closed permanently last January, wouldn’t that make his closure policy moot? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/38 "2012-10-04T19:15:13Z")
> [@Bob Ducca](#): > > Could a mod please confirm that it is now Straight Dope policy to no longer close pit threads at the request of the OP? You want us to confirm that a policy that never existed has been changed? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/39 "2012-10-04T19:17:29Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > Probably not Joe Paterno, but since he closed permanently last January, wouldn’t that make his closure policy moot? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2012, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664/40 "2012-10-04T19:20:23Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > … **Miller** made a general statement and what he said is true: the staff here usually don’t close threads at the request of the OP. We do it sometimes, but not always. That’s particularly true in the Pit. It’s common for posters to ask that their Pit threads be closed if the thread does not go the way they hoped, and the mods usually tell them to take a hike because that’s how it goes with Pittings. In any case **RedFury** ’s advance directive that the Pit mods close his thread after 72 hours was unique even in that regard because it was an arbitrary cutoff point. You apparently missed reading my response to the proposed closing: > [@RedFury](#): > > Come on, **Miller** , pardon me but that is a silly justification/quibble…so the thread stays open for a few hours/days more till you get to it. Big deal. Besides, note the disclaimer: “If there are no objections.” Meaning that I am hardly trying to Lord over it. Really don’t think it’s that hard to reach a majority consensus on that request. I’d also note that plenty of threads have been closed per the OPs request in the past – nothing unusual about that. Besides, this would hardly qualify \*as a thread that backfires on the OP - – if anything, it was the opposite by a margin of something like 70 positives responses to one negative (and a suspect one at that) and the expected scroll by **SA**. And that was in less than three hours. Or the time it was allowed to stand on its own. You and Miller are certainly digging your heels on a very thin ledge. Trust you are wearing really thick soles. This whole episode is beyond absurd. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-was-my-staving-artist-pit-thread-merged/636664.md?page=3)