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Moderation requests & discussion thereof

  
  

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33
16:26 / 11.08.06
Well, what I'm wondering is why those things are still hanging out there instead of being edited or redacted out of existence.

*** Well perhaps sine could persuaded to modify / rebuild that TMS machine for some new clients..
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
16:26 / 11.08.06
Surely the short answer to this is "because we don't do that", grant? In part because of the integrity of threads, in part because of the tendency to argue with rather than delete offensive statements, but mainly, I suspect, because if you start deleting the posts of the kind of person who might need to have their posts deleted, then in a fair number of cases they will go utterly batshit and start spamming the board with gusto, which ends up creating more work for everyone.
 
 
Olulabelle
16:36 / 11.08.06
...in fact i'd wager its about as funny as glower girls recent remarks.

I feel irritated by this, especially since it follows hot on the heels of 'some woman'. Now it's the word girl substitued for lady. I don't like the tone in which the words girl and woman are being used. I know the 'some woman' issue has been addressed elsewhere, rather comedically with everyone claiming that it was meant for them, but I don't want to gloss over the girl thing here. Quite apart from anything else it's being used to belittle Our Lady's comments, but equally terms that refer directly to women or imply femaleness which are then used to make people feel smaller make me uncomfortable. Haus put a similar sense of this feeling much better in the Temple moderation thread, with regard to Doc Checkmate's comments to Saturn's Nod.
 
 
grant
17:01 / 11.08.06
mainly, I suspect, because if you start deleting the posts of the kind of person who might need to have their posts deleted, then in a fair number of cases they will go utterly batshit and start spamming the board with gusto,

Hmm. I can definitely see this happening sometimes, but I'm not sure of it always being true, especially if certain posts are deleted/redacted and certain others are left alone.

I suspect in some cases thoughtless posts might be related to a lack of engagement with the board, which if deleted/redacted early on wouldn't lead to spamming as much as a vaguely offended apathy. Of course, after a tussle has broken out, people are more engaged, and thus more likely to act rather than not act.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
17:36 / 11.08.06
Because Triplets asked and I don't want to rot what could turn out to be a decent enough thread, if others take follow on from the couple of people who've made an effort in it:

Reason I've asked that somebody else do that things that 33 is clearly incapable of - start a thread with purpose, write coherent and intelligent posts, be members of the board who are actually worth having around - is that I figured that a thread as deeply shitty as that one can provide people with a spur to submit smart posts. Kind of "look, idiot - this is how you do it". It shows Barbelith ina good light, I think, if a thread like that can become something else by the efforts of the members here.

What I'm going to propose to do is leave it alone for a day or so, see what else - if anything - gets added to it, then put 33's posts within it and those linked directly to them up for deletion. Prune it of the useless branches (or mutated stumps, if you prefer) and give it a chance to grow without them hampering its progress.
 
 
■
22:29 / 11.08.06
My objective now is get back to why i came here the first place and leave it at that.

[Checks watch]
[Remembers he hasn't worn a watch for ten years]
[Checks bottom-right of screen]

Which was? Oh, yes, dissociation, you live for that. That's it? Whatever it is?

One thing that has been bothering me. You live in a town you say doesn't have a library. Except it does.
Not a great one, granted, but I know that if you want to bother engaging in the process of getting stuff from libraries (including music) you can.

Much in the same way that bothering to properly engage with people can also get results. You seem interested in neither.

Yes, I made a very bad call when you first joined, but a month or so of reflection has convinced me you're nothing but a troll. Please prove me wrong.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
22:36 / 11.08.06
Two thoughts on the move for deleting content.

1) Given the time delay, particularly in lightly-moderated fora like Music, there's going to be a problem with deleting before people start responding. I'm not sure that there is a way to prevent people from doing so, especially when the move for deletion may or may not go through.

2) Deleting posts on the grounds that - how many? three? - people think that they are cretinous sets a rather dangerous precedent. This place could be empty within a week.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
22:55 / 11.08.06
Well, what I'm suggesting happen to the Film thread isn't really any different than deleting trollishly stupid posts as and when they appear, which is something we've done on a regular basis in the past. It's just doing it back to front - you've got a topic that starts off with no topic, so it's the initial batch of posts that are the trollishly stupid ones.
 
 
paranoidwriter waves hello
01:30 / 12.08.06
I have to agree with Haus about deleting posts.

2) Deleting posts on the grounds that - how many? three? - people think that they are cretinous sets a rather dangerous precedent. This place could be empty within a week.

Indeed, deleting post seems problematic and a little patronising* to me and I believe it would set a dangerous precendent. It might also prove difficult in respect of being open and transparent -- a concern of mine, which I mentioned, here.

For example, there are many books I'd like to wipe out of history, but to do so would make the criticism of those books/ideas/beliefs/assumptions/etc redundant. And it's this criticism which often leads to general acceptance that there was something rotten about those offensive books (etc) in the first place.

I'm not saying we should let people go around spouting bigoted and illogical nonsense at will on Barbelith; but how we respond to this nonsense shows a lot about us as well as the nonsense (and perpetrtator of said nonsense) itself. This might sound twee, but in my humble opinion, the very fact that we try to engage with bigots shows how we are prepared to listen to each others' opinions, that we are not (or at least trying not to be) bigots. After all, wiping out all the physical and practical traces of bigotry/opinion does not remove the causes of bigotry, or show that we are (erm?) open and (double-erm?) reasonable / accountable (unless we post something like "there was an offensive post here which we have removed for these reasons); it's how we deal with it that counts.

I saw an interview once with Toni Morrison about her novel 'Paradise' (which I haven't read), and when asked to define "paradise" she said that paradise is always based on exclusion, what we don't want there. She made a very valid point, I believe, and it's one we should all remember.

But honestly, I appreciate that this isn't a clear cut issue. And I'm willing to change my opinion if proven that it's wrong (etc). I just think this is worth considering, especially when it comes to deleting posts.


* I say "patronising" because it feels like (in a very minor way) we're trying to ignore that this shit exists in real life / meatspace; as if we're shutting out a very real part of this horrible society we live in, and creating our own sort of exlusivity. I mean, I understand the need for safe spaces, but...oh... I don't know...I'm having difficulty putting this into words, and I'm probably confusing issues. I hope you get what I mean, even if it is wrong.
 
 
grant
02:06 / 12.08.06
Given the time delay, particularly in lightly-moderated fora like Music, there's going to be a problem with deleting before people start responding.

Possibly true, yes.

Deleting posts on the grounds that - how many? three? - people think that they are cretinous sets a rather dangerous precedent. This place could be empty within a week.

Dangerous? Possibly. (Empty -- but think of the acoustics!)
I wonder if this would be less dangerous if there was more of a sense of public consensus behind actions (which translates to more mods, and more mod agreements per action).

I'm mainly thinking along these lines because there seems to be more "should we ban 'im?" discussions than in days of yore -- like, three months ago -- and, it seems like, more reasons to have those discussions thanks to nuttiness in the rest of the board, which may have to do witha shift in public tolerance of goober-headedness, or might have to do with an influx of goober-headedness that we haven't seen before, but either way seems to be veering more into the realm of meta-discussions than moderation requests. Which seems to indicate a changing attitude towards the way moderators (and the moderation software) work(s), although that's admittedly a bit of a reach.
 
 
paranoidwriter waves hello
03:55 / 12.08.06
... (unless we post something like "there was an offensive post here which we have removed for these reasons ...

Although even that would (IMHO) probably be a problematic solution...Hmm...unless, say, we had a clearly labelled 'Barbelih Sin Bin', a kind of shit pile we throw stuff on and link to, but which everyone can see and smell for themselves...
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
06:59 / 12.08.06
Paranoidwriter, The problem is we don't have that structure in place and have no-one around who can code it, so discussions really have to be based around what we can do.

Grant I'm mainly thinking along these lines because there seems to be more "should we ban 'im?" discussions than in days of yore -- like, three months ago

I think the timespan is more like three or four years ago. Discussions of banning have been quiet since Shadowsax was booted in March or April, then before that there was a couple of months since that cretin was doing the 'do Jews actually control the world?' stuff in the Switchboard and Head Shop, then I forget who it was before that, the homophobe in the Creation who's name I mercifully forget?

This is possibly due to Tom opening the whole board up to Googling a few years ago. People find the board for one little thing and don't appreciate or think they need to care about the bigger picture.

Let's not forget the procedure for getting rid of anyone is generally a slow one and requires some consensus.
 
 
Olulabelle
19:39 / 12.08.06
I moved to lock the Women Friendly Barbelith thread. Has that been voted against?
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
20:30 / 12.08.06
Sometimes votes take a while to go through.
 
 
*
21:06 / 12.08.06
Re: 33 and sexism

Now it's the word girl substitued for lady. I don't like the tone in which the words girl and woman are being used...Quite apart from anything else it's being used to belittle Our Lady's comments, but equally terms that refer directly to women or imply femaleness which are then used to make people feel smaller make me uncomfortable.

Yes, that's an example of 33's inappropriateness that goes beyond just being incoherent. I agree. I support him being challenged on that point, his posts being moderated as strictly necessary to remove or mitigate occurrences of racism, sexism, and homophobia, and a discussion of further action steps. I haven't been very involved in the "delete or not?" debate, and I wonder, Lula and Our Lady, what you'd like to see happen? Could posts be moderated and tags left which say something like "Post moderated, without consent of the original poster, to remove abusive language on 0D/0M/0Y"? And if this induces 33 to engage in really unacceptable behavior, then I think I'd advocate for banning.

33: It's still your decision— you always have the choice to engage with people respectfully. If you can't do that in any space, people will tend to ask you to leave. I would like for you to see your way clear to making that choice, because I really hope you have a good time here and I know that you can only do that by behaving in an acceptable manner. We all want the freedom to act as we choose, but freedom means accepting consequences.

Paranoidwriter, you said:
* I say "patronising" because it feels like (in a very minor way) we're trying to ignore that this shit exists in real life / meatspace; as if we're shutting out a very real part of this horrible society we live in, and creating our own sort of exlusivity. I mean, I understand the need for safe spaces, but...oh... I don't know...I'm having difficulty putting this into words, and I'm probably confusing issues. I hope you get what I mean, even if it is wrong.

Barbelith is not a public space. And if someone in my home is spouting racism, and I allow them to remain even when all my efforts to get them to behave acceptably have failed, then the message I am sending is not that I am not a bigot towards bigots, but that I support bigotry, that I will continue to allow it to flourish in the portions of society I have the most direct responsibility for.
 
 
Saturn's nod
21:13 / 12.08.06
Why lock the WFB thread? What have I missed? I thought there was a lot still to do there.
 
 
Olulabelle
21:28 / 12.08.06
Saturn's Nod, I've written an explanation about why in the thread and in the WFB companion thread.

Id entity, I actually don't think that we should delete posts like 33's at all. Barbelith feels more real somehow with the things that upset us left in. Otherwise it becomes some sort of Utopian ideal, 'this is what we want', rather than 'this is how we are'.

I prefer it to be read as 'on the day in question Barbelith looked like this, this is what happened and this is how we dealt with it.'

What I'd like is for 33 to acknowledge that using words like girl and woman as terms of abuse is not OK, but I know that isn't going to happen.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
08:01 / 13.08.06
Saturn's Nod, I've written an explanation about why in the thread and in the WFB companion thread.


I don't know... with the permission of the participants, I think it could be salvaged. Since the title is not apparently clear enough - AG1 said that he did not realise that it was not only offtopic posts by M-I posters that were at risk of being deleted - one would probably want to change the title to something a bit less ambiguous, like "Female-identifying members only to post here, kthxbai". One could then, rather than challenging M-I people unable to keep winky in the magic pants cave in-thread, PM a moderator to have that contribution deleted. I'd be happy to enforce that.

So, tidy-up of that thread or new thread, but I don't think it's unworkable in principle- the number of M-I posters who didn't read the sign is actually reasonably small.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
08:04 / 13.08.06
Id I wonder, Lula and Our Lady, what you'd like to see happen? Could posts be moderated and tags left which say something like "Post moderated, without consent of the original poster, to remove abusive language on 0D/0M/0Y"?

I wouldn't be happy about that, not least because it could become very messy for the moderators. Ideally the only words we should be changing are the title and the summary, when we think they are uninformative as to what the thread's about. If I go to the fashion thread and delete 33's homophobia, there's still other people's replies which will still give a good idea of what 33 said, so I don't feel that would achieve much. And yes, we've had trolls go on spree-posting before, which is why there's the upper limit on how many things you can post per day, but there are times when there just happen to be less moderators around.

Then there's the problem of what constitutes posts that should be deleted, once you say 'this will be deleted' you'll have endless arguments over whether something is over the line or not, see 'Stumpfuckingate' for example.

If someone is posting stuff which would be unacceptable enough to deserve to be deleted, and it's not some random brainfart, then it's actually a valid question as to whether we want them on our board at all.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
09:22 / 13.08.06
Personally, I'm quite happy to see the Woman-friendly Barbelith thread locked, because I don;t believe that the decision to cordon it off as a female-only space did anything much other than help make policy discussions a godawful mess.
 
 
Saturn's nod
11:23 / 13.08.06
Having the WFB thread made it possible for me to post this which I would not have done if there wasn't that space. I value that thread in spite of what I have seen as teething trouble about the boundaries, and I had the impression that it was going to start getting increasingly more useful if e.g. some action to delete M-I posts was going to happen. But then, there's disagreement about whether it was okay for me to write that in the supposedly more protected space at all: maybe I should'a just kept quiet. It has helped me gain confidence to know that some other people found that to be a valuable contribution, so I'm starting to post a bit more.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
11:24 / 13.08.06
I think part of the point, Randy, is that it might have/have had benefits invisible to male-identifying members of Barbelith.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
13:21 / 13.08.06
Yeah, I understand that. The problem is, it wasn't helping from a strictly policy point of view. You've got a thread where the behaviour of certain members of the board is called into question, yet the thread's very nature means that they're forbidden the right to reply. There's the companion thread, but that's where the whole business becomes laughable - you might as well not have a female-only thread if posts from that thread are then being quoted wholesale and replied to elsewhere. It's not a 'safe area' if anything and everything said in it is fair game anywhere else on the board. That, as far as I can see, defeats the entire purpose.

There's also the problem that the boundary was poorly-defined. How do you know if a poster is female-identifying? We saw this happen - some posts from male-gendered members were being deleted but others were being left alone. Why? Because, I presume, nobody totally knew how some of the members posting to it identified. Our Lady's posts were left alone by moderators until OL hirself apologised for adding to the thread. Barbelith has (or used to have) this big thing going on about fluid gender identification - it's impossible to square that with the kind of thread we're talking about here.

Then there's the issue that the person who decided that the thread should be for female-identifying members of the board only is male. Winky think? That can easily be painted as a doozie of an example.

And there's the main problem, which is that if you create a thread that's only open for a minority of Barbelith's active membership to post to, you're immediately increasing the likelihood that unfair or inaccurate comments will be made without correction. See, for example, Olulabelle's post to the companion thread - which would, I'd imagine, have been posted to the WFB thread itself had it not been put forwards for locking - about how the lack of posts agreeing with her comments about 33's use of language is indicative of the fact that psots from female members of the board are ignored.

The entire situation - and I'm probably repeating myself here - is farcical. If there's to be another, similar thread in the near future, I'd want to see a greater amount of thought put in with regards to how it would function and what its remit would be before it went live, rather than just making it up as we go along again.

I also find it ridiculous that elsewhere we're agonising over whether or not posts like 33's in Music and FTVT should be deleted when posts to the WFB thread were being deleted at the drop of a hat.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
13:44 / 13.08.06
And it created an explicit barrier between male and female members of the board across the board. I absolutely hate that that happened.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:43 / 13.08.06

Then there's the issue that the person who decided that the thread should be for female-identifying members of the board only is male. Winky think? That can easily be painted as a doozie of an example.

Really? I don't recall that. I think that suggestion was made by Saturn's Nod (female-identifying) on page 2. I suggested on page 1 that male-identifying posters stayed off the thread for 24 hours, which they proved themselves unable to do. Am I mistaken?
 
 
Spatula Clarke
15:26 / 13.08.06
SN's suggested abstract change was to have it as it is right now - primarily female-identifying. I've said since that if others decided that all posts from male-identifying members of the board were to be deleted then the abstract should have been altered to reflect the fact. This was never done.

It's remarkably difficult to figure out in what order things happened in that thread as a good amount of it no longer exists. However, your suggestion that male-iding members of the board keep out of it for a period of time is, as you say, still there, and that was the first mention of it.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
15:32 / 13.08.06
Primaril ymeans primarily identifying as female, not that it is primarily for people identifying as female, I believe.

I think that the stuff about dividing the board is a bit tricky also, as it suggests that everything would have been fine if the womenfolk had not asked for a space in which they could speak to each other without male interruption, because then we would never have found out that some of the male members of the convocation were not prepared to let that happen - and, also regrettably, that some of the female-identifying members were not prepared to use the space responsibly.
 
 
Olulabelle
15:42 / 13.08.06
I think that the problem with having a w-i only thread here on Barbelith is precisely that it is here on Barbelith and accessible to everyone. Inevitably that means that the discussion cannot be conducted without m-i posters reading it, and that obviously is going to want to make them comment. I think that if there is a need for a f-i thread (and I'm becomning less and less convinced there actually is) then somehow the discussion needs to happen between f-i posters only without the feeling that m-i posters are monitoring what is being said. Perhaps this could be done by yahoo group, I don't know. I just don't think it works here.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
15:56 / 13.08.06
Ah, I misunderstood. My mistake.

Yeah, Lula. That's more or less along the lines of what I was thinking - I was going to suggest that if this has to happen, an invitation-only ghost thread be set up for the purpose. Off-board is simply easier from an organisational pov.

And male members *are* going to be monitoring what's said in any thread in Policy. There aren't enough active female Policy moderators for that not to be the case.
 
 
paranoidwriter waves hello
16:01 / 13.08.06
I also had reservations with the Women Friendly thread at the beginning, mainly because I was also a little concerned about partitioning debate, or creating boundaries and divisions. However, I've learnt a lot from those two threads (maybe others have too?) and so I'm not sure if it's a good idea to lock it (etc) yet.

'Tis indeed important to give as much freedom as possible to people from all sections of our community, especially those who have concerns about unexamined prejudice, or feel reticent about putting their foot in it (so to speak).

I therefore think we should let this experiment continue, at least for a little while. I have no problem following the two threads in tandem, and I imagine there are still issues which need to be addressed somewhere on Barbelith, so these threads seem as good a place as any. I'm not sure if the fact that male posters can read their sisters posts somehow hinders the thread as a safe-space. Although, I'd like to add that I was very disappointed when male identifying posters started posting in the WF thread. e.g. I had a problem with Twice Five Toes' earlier comment in the WF thread, and had no difficulty addressing this concern in the companion thread (although I understand AG1's concern with having his posts directly examined in this way; but you know, we all learnt from that, non?).
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
21:07 / 13.08.06
It's quite funny that the vast majority of discussion on whether the WFB thread should have been locked comes from MI posters...
 
 
Spatula Clarke
23:02 / 13.08.06
Stoats, the vast majority of discussion full stop comes from MI posters.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
23:33 / 13.08.06
Point.
 
 
The Falcon
21:58 / 16.08.06
Dear Mr. Stoat,

I realise it may have been a hard night on the booze, etc., but I will not be agreeing your change post to exactly the same post request with what you presumably intended to be a reply in the reason box.

Love,

Duncan.
 
 
miss wonderstarr
22:25 / 16.08.06
Now it's the word girl substitued for lady. I don't like the tone in which the words girl and woman are being used...Quite apart from anything else it's being used to belittle Our Lady's comments, but equally terms that refer directly to women or imply femaleness which are then used to make people feel smaller make me uncomfortable.

Yes, that's an example of 33's inappropriateness that goes beyond just being incoherent. I agree.

He's now asking me my bra size. It's not like I take personal offence, but I don't really think such behaviour should be allowed to set a precedent. [It's that Off-Beat Films thread again...]
 
  

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