Barbelith Underground > Policy & Help > Post-banning discussion thread

So... we've decided that one of the problems is that there is a Barbelite, by which we mean that there are certain people on Barbelith who post more and are better respected than others. Some have gone further and talked about a clique.

I tried to avoid those terms, and also "Barberoyalty" of course. I don't think, for the record, that it's just about posting more, either. After all, part of the issue with ShadowSax is that some of the contributors I have called "high-status" were being made to feel uncomfortable and were posting less.

I don't see it as being entirely about "better respected" posters in every case. Perhaps the key distinction, to my mind, is not that the "big name" contributors are more prolific, or always better at writing, reasoning or arguing, but that they seem to often come as a couple, a collective, even a mini-community. That was the point I tried to raise above ~ that I was reluctant to take issue with one individual because I knew there were loyalty-links to other, equally high-status posters. The way I perceived it, I'd be getting into a squabble with at least two posters (Flyboy and Nina, who to my reading do seem to back each other up regularly... understandably) and possibly a further group of fellow posters with the same kind of textual clout.

I don't know if this is how anyone else sees it, but it's the perception that if you disagree with one "high-status" contributor, you could be getting in the bad books of at least one other, and bringing down upon you not that one person, but also their back-up, that sets certain people apart for me.

Now, that kind of loyalty is an inevitable and positive result of long-term investment in a community, which often leads to real-life meeting. It would be ridiculous to complain at longer-term contributors because they have friends or partners and because they often want to support the people they like and care about.

But it's that sense of a sub-group that marks the divide for me. Most people here, I regard as isolated individuals apart from their shared participation in Barbelith. I feel if I disagree with them, it's a person-to-person thing, an even-handed one on one. I do not feel that way with the contributors I called "high-status".

What could be done about it? I think an awareness of it (if anyone agrees with me about this perception) is a start. An awareness that people feel this way about a group of Barbelith contributors, and feel reluctant to voice an opinion they feel might be "unpopular" with those contributors because it's not worth the comeback, might be helpful. Ganesh and Mordant both said at the start of this discussion that they found the idea of people being uncomfortable to speak up depressing and sad. But they also seemed surprised by it. I think discussing that perception and seeing whether its widespread isn't a bad idea.

What I don't quite follow is what this has to do with the process by which Shadowsax was banned, and how we can do better in the management of difficult posters. Could somebody help me out on this?

I agree with the recent posts suggestion that the connection is this: people felt reluctant to voice their honest opinion about ShadowSax in a public thread because they felt that two vocal, community-powerful moderators, who seem to work as a tag-team textual unit, really wanted one result and were angered and/or disappointed by anyone who disagreed.