My irritation with yout example also comes from its innate absurdity
If you said "launch yourself into the sun" it would also read as an obvious a joke to me. Just as silly
I am a graduate teaching assistant in Philosophy. In other words, I am a seminar teacher and a PhD candidate, and I specifically study the sources of meaning in communication. This is also why I have a bit of an academic interest in the topic at hand since the normative restrictions on interpretations are something I had not given that much of a thought before. Obviously, language use is always normative to some extent but then there is this question of what can justifiably be expected of those whose judgements rely on their interpretations.
The 'alpha vs non-alpha' or whatever that thread was, was also devolving and needed the moderation there. Remember it however you want, but it ended in a bad place and the moderation isn't what brought it there. Sure, it was great at first even if people were being stubborn, but people ended up literally saying they were getting heated and that's not exactly what leads to good discussion. Like, what debate is good when people are getting heated? That sounds kinda *****ty to me. Regular posters literally calling it *****posting and trolling. People getting upset in a 'peasant vs pauper posters' way, people claiming others need to claim their 'innocence' to prove they aren't *****posting. Humphrey responding to moderation by asking 'what's wrong with you', which is pretty classic 'don't post like this cause that's how ********s post.' Like, re-read the end of that discussion and tell me that steve_man's modertation wasn't called for, and if you believe so I think you're being a bit delusional. That's just not how adults have reasonable discussions, we are above the age of 12 and we should act like it like we almost always do except in that thread by the end. Handling it internally is kind of a classic forum mistake that never works out, and it wasn't getting handled internally there no matter what anyone may say otherwise. Also, the moderators handling it *is* handling it internally--using these forums is essentially renting the space from mtgsalvation.
Otherwise, there's like little-to-zero moderation. I think, if anything, we're magnifying a couple instances and acting like its a problem, when really its not the case at all.
Also, FWIW, you can dispute your moderated posts. I msg'd a mod who infracted me back in the day for telling someone to 'google it' in reference to them asking what the MODO cube list or something like that. I asked him why he thought it was rude, he responded back, we didn't agree, but we also talked about it and he understood my mindset on things. I think you can avoid a lot of the context issues if you talk with the moderators, and I think the same can be said going the other way with better explanations from the moderators on why certain posts get infraction with specific examples.
I've been flagged a couple of months ago for a sarcastic comment, but disputing it is kind of pointless.
Let's take VariSami's joke. I don't even remember it, but I've got a good memory and I've read the relevant thread a couple of times. Which means my brain took it in, didn't flag it for being remarkable and promptly forgot about it. Reading it now, I actually do find it rather funny, if only because we all know _i0 is frequently leaning in the direction of hyperbole and sepukku is an extreme act to match those extreme opinions. It's a joke based on what we know about _i0, it may be tasteless, but it's not actually a bad joke.
However, there's no point in trying to explain that kind of joke to a passer-by who happens to listen in. It'll always look bad. Moderation is a difficult job.
Handling it internally: I've been part of small communities without moderation and it really wasn't a problem. Sometimes people get passionate, but that's why we're here in the first place, isn't it? Sometimes people are a bit too sharp, but that's what happens to us in real life too. We generally know how to take it, because we know each other, so we shake it off or talk it out and move on without any need for moderation.
As for magnifying, it seems like we had a couple of instances lately, whereas the years before were extremely quiet. Not sure why that is. Ultimately in a small community like this our passion drives our participation. Having moderators stepping in and giving out warnings that seem kind of random and inappropriate in our context (even if I know why they happened) doesn't really improve the community. That's something that we (have to) do on our own. It's not like the community is dysfunctional by any measure.
Disputing it actually isn't pointless, and is definitely the solution to moderation you don't agree with as the moderators are also human as you yourself are. Maybe not a literal dispute, but a message saying your intentions and a conversation go way further than saying nothing and getting mad about it or whatever. I agree the seppuku infraction was silly, but you can bet that something like that probably doesn't happen again if you approach them like, 'Hey I get that suicide is a sensitive subject but I used seppuku because it's an extreme example that I personally didn't take seriously can you explain why that earned an infraction?' Then if the moderator isn't living in the land of reality you contact someone above them and ask if that's a stance that's agreed across the board, and if not then what can be done to fix that in the future. The moderators are here to serve the interests of mtgsalvation because this forum is public and they want to make sure civil discussion is occurring (which it wasnt by the end of that 'alpha vs' discussion), but they are also humans that make mistakes and just like *****ty posting can happen so can *****ty moderator, but that doesn't mean they can't be reasoned with.
And yeah, passion is great, but getting heated isn't. When people are angry, that's when bad discussion happens and people say things that hurt others. Is that what we're aiming for? There's no reason to get angry when discussing magical cards, and yeah people are willing to accept it now, but how many sharp moments need to happen before someone actually gets hurt?
The regular cube forums were severely unmoderated for years, and now we have a reputation of not being a great place. Things have changed considerably as we've become less tolerant for *****ty behavior, but so many people left because *****ty behavior similar to the 'alpha vs' discussion occurred. It's not a problem now, sure, but why not nip it in the bud before it becomes one? Why can't the bar for acceptable conversation involve not being *****ty to one another? It's not like *that* even happens that often, but outside the seppuku answer there is minimal moderation and the moderation that does occur is typically because of *****ty behavior.
But, overall, this will blow over if you let it, because it's really minimal. We are really magnifying a small sample size.
This could be a mountain/molehill situation. People don't like having thier culture affronted, I suppose.
Also
Contesting infractions may end with a pleasant "yeah I get it" from a mod but I havent seen it actually accomplish anything. No retraction, or pass to continue behaving as you had been.
This could be a mountain/molehill situation. People don't like having thier culture affronted, I suppose.
Also
Contesting infractions may end with a pleasant "yeah I get it" from a mod but I havent seen it actually accomplish anything. No retraction, or pass to continue behaving as you had been.
Definitely a mountain/molehill situation. And that goes both ways too. Moderators are less likely to have an open discussion when the previous discussion is 'they need to mind their own business' without hearing their end of it. They need to give their end for it to be heard, sure, but only the irrational walk away from a rational conversation without at least gaining some empathy, and in that case things are different, but the interactions I've had with moderators on here have almost always ended with an understanding which is where you want to be.
You probably haven't seen it accomplish anything because it hasn't happened in public. I've done it on a couple occasions and it worked both times. We may not have ended eye-to-eye on the position of my comment that received an infraction, but the mod at least knew my intention wasn't malicious enough to receive the trolling/flaming infraction. I know, it sounds crazy, but sitting down and hashing out your problems you have with a moderator in private does way more work than complaining about it in public.
And it probably has accomplished more than you noticed. When the issue is noise and the solution is silence, one only hears the screeches of moderation because they stick out and easily move past silence because what is there to note about business as usual?
Leelue, you and I have had conversations in private where we reached a point of understanding at the end and I feel like we're cool as clams, why is it implausible for the same to happen with a moderator whose moderation you don't agree with? It's not a guarantee, but that's a much better first step vs what's going on in this thread.
As far as I can see pretty much everybody who has contributed so far has an appreciation for the kind of difficulties the moderators face when they're doing their job, even if there is disagreement. As long as that's true I can't see what's wrong with discussing recent moderation and our reactions to it, we're not bashing or attacking anyone here.
Right but how are these issues fixed without involving the mods themselves? That's where the conversation comes into place. You say that the people in this thread appreciate what the moderators do, but part of what the moderators do is moderate discussion so it doesn't end with people getting pissy and heated. And then when it has recently (outside of the seppuku example) people have complained about the moderation. So it would be a reach to say that people are actually saying what you're implying they are, at least both in tone and text.
Pissy and heated conversation leads to angry and offensive/rude/mean/etc., and I really don't think that's the type of atmosphere mtgsalvation and the moderators want for these forums, and despite what members here are saying I don't think they want this forum to potentially turn into a place where that regularly happening is OK. And when you self moderate i.e. accept that type of behavior, that's where it goes. Like any hole in a dam, at first it may only happen a little, but when you accept *****ty behavior as something that can be self-moderated without infractions then you are setting yourself up for failure.
This is what happens when you decide to 'rent space' on a public forum. It would be like going to IHOP and being loud, and then getting spoken too when being loud turns to yelling and being angry/rude/etc. It's really not asking a lot to be civil, and mtgsalvation has every right to enforce their standards here, especially when it gets as nasty as the 'alpha vs' discussion got at the end.
And in terms of the seppuku example, that would be like going to IHOP and getting kicked out for saying something that is overall subjectively offensive i.e. not actually offensive. Suicide may be a sensitive subject for some, but if that IHOP manager kicked you out because you said you were going to kill yourself in a sarcastic way then they're overstepping their boundaries and etc and they're in the wrong.
The point is, there is room to grow on both sides, and growth only happens when both sides have a conversation that understands where the other is coming from, and I don't think we're there yet if we look at that 'alpha vs' discussion as something that ended anywhere close to acceptable, the same way that moderation is far from an acceptable standard if the seppuku joke receives an infraction.
Second and last warning, take the conversation to PMs / related threads. Continuing to even follow up on these conversations on this thread will result in this thread being locked, individual disciplinary action, and deleted posts.
Which still seems just incredibly stupid.
Also, community standards for discussion mean a lot more when they're agreed upon organically rather than decided by some guy with a big red rubber stamp on the lookout for the phrase "drawn and quartered".
Those infractions seem entirely related to civility, actually, because there were many points where that discussion wasn't civil.
Don't ignore how after that warning Izor and Leelue definitely weren't anywhere closely remotely close to civil with Izor's accusations of *****posting and getting heated about Leelue's claim to put quotes in his signature to rag on them. And then we can't ignore how Humphrey responded to the moderation in the worst way vs a calmer reaction he could've had that actually would've accomplished something, which still led to him calling people snowflakes. And there was a *lot* of borderline/actual trolling flaming going on that comes with incredulity. Like, think of it however way you want, but the sarcasm that comes from some users (unfortunately myself included) does no one any good when done in that context i.e. in argument. Like, what purpose does the sarcasm serve other than to be divisive?
steve_man could've done a better job of moderation in that he should've added more instead of the standard one-line moderation, but it wasn't like he was jumping into a conversation where people weren't accusing others of trolling and *****posting. That's the kind of environment we want? Where we have to police those types of claims, that we harbor a community where those claims can have the legitimacy they have/had? And he even said he received multiple complaints from different users. Just because people aren't always posting doesn't mean they aren't part of the community and their opinions don't matter, in fact if we had less sarcasm/derision/etc they might be inclined to post more.
But guess what? When the discussion drifted from what it was back to amonkhet conversation, it was great again! And the reason was people stopped being rude and nasty and dismissive and derisive and etc. That should always be the goal--talk about cards that aren't negative towards the one saying it. Saying a card is trash is one thing, but implications towards the posters when solely posting about cards is a complete other.
steve_man is also a new mod, too. There are growing pains. There is learning when to put your foot down, and when to let discussion happen. This is why the open discussion with him and hear his side of things without jumping down his throat when he explains anything is important as well.
Determining community standards is great, but we cant ignore that the baseline of 'try not to be a *****head' is the necessary requirement apparently of posting on mtgsalvation means not being sarcastic/derisive/etc.
--------
But really though, I think this is mountain/mole hill. I bet if people did their best going forward and this was forgotten about, it would be really really really easy to move past.
You're talking about mountain/molehill, but you make an awful lot of that one thread. I care less about the alpha/kaladesh thread and more about the kind of thing that happened to VariSami and me tbh, because those are instances where implicit community standards clash with the way the forum as a whole is moderated. Those are the kind of penalties that seem most out of place to me as a result. You also say we need to have a conversation, but the kind of moderation we've seen isn't about having a conversation.
I teach kids for a living. If you have a problematic kid, the first thing you do is talk to him/her, because you need a relationship with that kid to solve those problems. This is especially important if the events we're talking about aren't outright violations of rules, but borderline behaviour. If you want to enforce rules in a problematic group, the way you do it is you gather the group and come up with rules as a group. You draft a document with those rules and have people sign, so that, whenever someone violates them, you can point to that document and say "this is what we all agreed to."
Notice how at the center of it all is simply initiating a conversation as the person who has to maintain the rules? It's very different than going on a forum and reading the community guidelines or moderation standards. Not to harp on about it, but using the example _i0 cited, "More talk about Amonkhet / Pauper, less everything else." is not about initiating a conversation. Neither is dropping random warnings (which I call random, because that's what they will look like to people in borderline cases where community standards clash with moderation style because no conversation happened). _i0 can correct me, but if I read him right, that's what's bothering him. I didn't like it either. Again, part of this is that this forum doesn't feel like a big community to me, because I only frequent the P&P subforums, where we'd actually have the opportunity to talk things out because we are such a small group. It's not about creating more works for the mods either, it's as simple as rephrasing the sentence I cited above or dropping a pm instead of just slapping on a warning saying "two more and you're banned", especially in cases where the mods could recognize that the infraction was probably down to this neck of the forum woods being a different kind of community than say, the commander section.
It's not about us being allowed to shout each other down really.
"I know, it sounds crazy, but sitting down and hashing out your problems you have with a moderator in private does way more work than complaining about it in public. "
I did take it to the mod in private. In fact, I am preeetty sure this is the first time I have ever spoken about the incident, even in the thread where it happened.
He sympathised with me, sorta, but the rules stayed the same, my infraction remained, and nothing changed.
I don't know why you assumed that I didn't
"I know, it sounds crazy, but sitting down and hashing out your problems you have with a moderator in private does way more work than complaining about it in public. "
I did take it to the mod in private. In fact, I am preeetty sure this is the first time I have ever spoken about the incident, even in the thread where it happened.
He sympathised with me, sorta, but the rules stayed the same, my infraction remained, and nothing changed.
I don't know why you assumed that I didn't
I haven't assumed that as I'm not a mind reader and, unless I missed it, you hadn't mentioned you talked to the mod. And neither has anyone else. My tone would change completely if everyone actually did contact him about this, but without that being said over multiple posts where it could've, why would I assume that?
You're talking about mountain/molehill, but you make an awful lot of that one thread. I care less about the alpha/kaladesh thread and more about the kind of thing that happened to VariSami and me tbh, because those are instances where implicit community standards clash with the way the forum as a whole is moderated. Those are the kind of penalties that seem most out of place to me as a result. You also say we need to have a conversation, but the kind of moderation we've seen isn't about having a conversation.
I teach kids for a living. If you have a problematic kid, the first thing you do is talk to him/her, because you need a relationship with that kid to solve those problems. This is especially important if the events we're talking about aren't outright violations of rules, but borderline behaviour. If you want to enforce rules in a problematic group, the way you do it is you gather the group and come up with rules as a group. You draft a document with those rules and have people sign, so that, whenever someone violates them, you can point to that document and say "this is what we all agreed to."
Notice how at the center of it all is simply initiating a conversation as the person who has to maintain the rules? It's very different than going on a forum and reading the community guidelines or moderation standards. Not to harp on about it, but using the example _i0 cited, "More talk about Amonkhet / Pauper, less everything else." is not about initiating a conversation. Neither is dropping random warnings (which I call random, because that's what they will look like to people in borderline cases where community standards clash with moderation style because no conversation happened). _i0 can correct me, but if I read him right, that's what's bothering him. I didn't like it either. Again, part of this is that this forum doesn't feel like a big community to me, because I only frequent the P&P subforums, where we'd actually have the opportunity to talk things out because we are such a small group. It's not about creating more works for the mods either, it's as simple as rephrasing the sentence I cited above or dropping a pm instead of just slapping on a warning saying "two more and you're banned", especially in cases where the mods could recognize that the infraction was probably down to this neck of the forum woods being a different kind of community than say, the commander section.
It's not about us being allowed to shout each other down really.
It was brought up by someone else. And it was the only other concrete example outside of the seppuku and one other option. The seppuku example is easy to go over--unwarranted, I agree with everyone about that--but that thread I have a hard time agreeing that the moderation was unwarranted. Could sreve_man have explained himself further? Maybe, but we also could've not gotten to the point where *multiple* users are reporting the discussion.
Also, Steve man is not a teacher, he is a hall moderator. He's not going to give a ***** what the kids are doing unless they're smoking in the bathroom, which is what happened at the end of that thread, and what he mistakenly smelled with the seppuku joke. If, as a group, it was decided to draft a set of rules and it looked well enough to work and you brought it to Steve man or a site admin or whatever, that would be one thing, but it's not steve_mans job to enforce rules that haven't been made yet it's his job to enforce the site rules.
So maybe, funnel all this into some action, it's a lot harder for a moderator to do what you all want without it being explicit, even if you think what he should or shouldn't be doing is obvious. What we're doing here is a great first step, but the next step is being about that action.
You're on someone else's forums (that someone has to pay for); it's not a matter of need, its just 'the rules' and when things get reported, moderators respond. Sometimes they do a poor job, sometimes they don't, but I've never been on a forum without moderators, at least public ones like this that involve thousands of other people. And while this community is small in comparison to the rest of the site, it's still part of the rest of the site. In fact, these subforums probably wouldn't exist if mtgsalvation wasn't as large as they are. Riptide Labs, unfortunately, is a good example of how hard it is to sustain continual discussion when you're part of a small forum like them vs a larger one like MTGsalvation that people can stumble upon or show up at the top of google searches. Moderators are a necessary part of public forums, of which mtgsalvation is.
There are lots of places like that IRL, called 'bars' or 'clubs' or 'community centers' and etc., and they all involve some sort of moderation as private establishments get to determine what can and can't be discussed there to a degree, along with who can go and who can stay. These often include things like 'don't be a dick', 'don't say racist *****', 'don't incite/troll/flame', like if you're at a bar being rude to everyone or saying racist ***** there then there's a chance you're going to get kicked out. The term 'forum' derives from the IRL concept.
Maybe the community does or doesn't need a hall monitor role, but when you choose to participate on someone else's forums that's what you sign up for.
What should be happening, instead of complaining about moderation occurring, is someone starting a thread to hammer down what policies are wanted around here for moderation. If it's a big enough deal to mention, then it's a big enough deal to work together and find a solution for. The goal is to improve what's been going on--as long as you're part of mtgsalvation, 'no moderation' is inherently not an option, so 'set community terms & standards' is the next best option.
Salmo, your tone made it sound like you made an assumption. I was also talking about an incident separate from the infamous incident, which is what I thought you were referring to.
Salmo, your tone made it sound like you made an assumption. I was also talking about an incident separate from the infamous incident, which is what I thought you were referring to.
Question to the Peasant community: should there be a separate Peasant+ discussion thread? For anyone who happens to not know the term, Peasant+ just means the silver-bordered restriction is broken and rares have been added at the cube owner's discretion. In my playgroup, it started with a cycle of fetchlands and became a slippery slope that we tumbled straight down... one of our worst offenses was Swans of Bryn Argoll, which I've had to draw a hard line at. Despite my experience, I don't feel like anyone's Peasant+ cube is so far above the power level of a normal peasant cube that they can't participate in the threads. Honest opinions welcome, no offense will be taken.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
~400 Peasant++ : List : Draft
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!
I see no reason to ostracise but if people with Peasant+ cubes feel they need their own corner to discuss which rates work best while retaining a certain power level, go for it. I was under the impression that some such threads about rates to include already exist, though.
Draft it on Cubetutor here, and CubeCobra here.
Treasure Cruise did nothing wrong.
If you said "launch yourself into the sun" it would also read as an obvious a joke to me. Just as silly
I just don't get the blinders the mod had on
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
I am a graduate teaching assistant in Philosophy. In other words, I am a seminar teacher and a PhD candidate, and I specifically study the sources of meaning in communication. This is also why I have a bit of an academic interest in the topic at hand since the normative restrictions on interpretations are something I had not given that much of a thought before. Obviously, language use is always normative to some extent but then there is this question of what can justifiably be expected of those whose judgements rely on their interpretations.
The 'alpha vs non-alpha' or whatever that thread was, was also devolving and needed the moderation there. Remember it however you want, but it ended in a bad place and the moderation isn't what brought it there. Sure, it was great at first even if people were being stubborn, but people ended up literally saying they were getting heated and that's not exactly what leads to good discussion. Like, what debate is good when people are getting heated? That sounds kinda *****ty to me. Regular posters literally calling it *****posting and trolling. People getting upset in a 'peasant vs pauper posters' way, people claiming others need to claim their 'innocence' to prove they aren't *****posting. Humphrey responding to moderation by asking 'what's wrong with you', which is pretty classic 'don't post like this cause that's how ********s post.' Like, re-read the end of that discussion and tell me that steve_man's modertation wasn't called for, and if you believe so I think you're being a bit delusional. That's just not how adults have reasonable discussions, we are above the age of 12 and we should act like it like we almost always do except in that thread by the end. Handling it internally is kind of a classic forum mistake that never works out, and it wasn't getting handled internally there no matter what anyone may say otherwise. Also, the moderators handling it *is* handling it internally--using these forums is essentially renting the space from mtgsalvation.
Otherwise, there's like little-to-zero moderation. I think, if anything, we're magnifying a couple instances and acting like its a problem, when really its not the case at all.
Also, FWIW, you can dispute your moderated posts. I msg'd a mod who infracted me back in the day for telling someone to 'google it' in reference to them asking what the MODO cube list or something like that. I asked him why he thought it was rude, he responded back, we didn't agree, but we also talked about it and he understood my mindset on things. I think you can avoid a lot of the context issues if you talk with the moderators, and I think the same can be said going the other way with better explanations from the moderators on why certain posts get infraction with specific examples.
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Let's take VariSami's joke. I don't even remember it, but I've got a good memory and I've read the relevant thread a couple of times. Which means my brain took it in, didn't flag it for being remarkable and promptly forgot about it. Reading it now, I actually do find it rather funny, if only because we all know _i0 is frequently leaning in the direction of hyperbole and sepukku is an extreme act to match those extreme opinions. It's a joke based on what we know about _i0, it may be tasteless, but it's not actually a bad joke.
However, there's no point in trying to explain that kind of joke to a passer-by who happens to listen in. It'll always look bad. Moderation is a difficult job.
Handling it internally: I've been part of small communities without moderation and it really wasn't a problem. Sometimes people get passionate, but that's why we're here in the first place, isn't it? Sometimes people are a bit too sharp, but that's what happens to us in real life too. We generally know how to take it, because we know each other, so we shake it off or talk it out and move on without any need for moderation.
As for magnifying, it seems like we had a couple of instances lately, whereas the years before were extremely quiet. Not sure why that is. Ultimately in a small community like this our passion drives our participation. Having moderators stepping in and giving out warnings that seem kind of random and inappropriate in our context (even if I know why they happened) doesn't really improve the community. That's something that we (have to) do on our own. It's not like the community is dysfunctional by any measure.
And yeah, passion is great, but getting heated isn't. When people are angry, that's when bad discussion happens and people say things that hurt others. Is that what we're aiming for? There's no reason to get angry when discussing magical cards, and yeah people are willing to accept it now, but how many sharp moments need to happen before someone actually gets hurt?
The regular cube forums were severely unmoderated for years, and now we have a reputation of not being a great place. Things have changed considerably as we've become less tolerant for *****ty behavior, but so many people left because *****ty behavior similar to the 'alpha vs' discussion occurred. It's not a problem now, sure, but why not nip it in the bud before it becomes one? Why can't the bar for acceptable conversation involve not being *****ty to one another? It's not like *that* even happens that often, but outside the seppuku answer there is minimal moderation and the moderation that does occur is typically because of *****ty behavior.
But, overall, this will blow over if you let it, because it's really minimal. We are really magnifying a small sample size.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Also
Contesting infractions may end with a pleasant "yeah I get it" from a mod but I havent seen it actually accomplish anything. No retraction, or pass to continue behaving as you had been.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Definitely a mountain/molehill situation. And that goes both ways too. Moderators are less likely to have an open discussion when the previous discussion is 'they need to mind their own business' without hearing their end of it. They need to give their end for it to be heard, sure, but only the irrational walk away from a rational conversation without at least gaining some empathy, and in that case things are different, but the interactions I've had with moderators on here have almost always ended with an understanding which is where you want to be.
You probably haven't seen it accomplish anything because it hasn't happened in public. I've done it on a couple occasions and it worked both times. We may not have ended eye-to-eye on the position of my comment that received an infraction, but the mod at least knew my intention wasn't malicious enough to receive the trolling/flaming infraction. I know, it sounds crazy, but sitting down and hashing out your problems you have with a moderator in private does way more work than complaining about it in public.
And it probably has accomplished more than you noticed. When the issue is noise and the solution is silence, one only hears the screeches of moderation because they stick out and easily move past silence because what is there to note about business as usual?
Leelue, you and I have had conversations in private where we reached a point of understanding at the end and I feel like we're cool as clams, why is it implausible for the same to happen with a moderator whose moderation you don't agree with? It's not a guarantee, but that's a much better first step vs what's going on in this thread.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Pissy and heated conversation leads to angry and offensive/rude/mean/etc., and I really don't think that's the type of atmosphere mtgsalvation and the moderators want for these forums, and despite what members here are saying I don't think they want this forum to potentially turn into a place where that regularly happening is OK. And when you self moderate i.e. accept that type of behavior, that's where it goes. Like any hole in a dam, at first it may only happen a little, but when you accept *****ty behavior as something that can be self-moderated without infractions then you are setting yourself up for failure.
This is what happens when you decide to 'rent space' on a public forum. It would be like going to IHOP and being loud, and then getting spoken too when being loud turns to yelling and being angry/rude/etc. It's really not asking a lot to be civil, and mtgsalvation has every right to enforce their standards here, especially when it gets as nasty as the 'alpha vs' discussion got at the end.
And in terms of the seppuku example, that would be like going to IHOP and getting kicked out for saying something that is overall subjectively offensive i.e. not actually offensive. Suicide may be a sensitive subject for some, but if that IHOP manager kicked you out because you said you were going to kill yourself in a sarcastic way then they're overstepping their boundaries and etc and they're in the wrong.
The point is, there is room to grow on both sides, and growth only happens when both sides have a conversation that understands where the other is coming from, and I don't think we're there yet if we look at that 'alpha vs' discussion as something that ended anywhere close to acceptable, the same way that moderation is far from an acceptable standard if the seppuku joke receives an infraction.
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Which still seems just incredibly stupid.
Also, community standards for discussion mean a lot more when they're agreed upon organically rather than decided by some guy with a big red rubber stamp on the lookout for the phrase "drawn and quartered".
Don't ignore how after that warning Izor and Leelue definitely weren't anywhere closely remotely close to civil with Izor's accusations of *****posting and getting heated about Leelue's claim to put quotes in his signature to rag on them. And then we can't ignore how Humphrey responded to the moderation in the worst way vs a calmer reaction he could've had that actually would've accomplished something, which still led to him calling people snowflakes. And there was a *lot* of borderline/actual trolling flaming going on that comes with incredulity. Like, think of it however way you want, but the sarcasm that comes from some users (unfortunately myself included) does no one any good when done in that context i.e. in argument. Like, what purpose does the sarcasm serve other than to be divisive?
steve_man could've done a better job of moderation in that he should've added more instead of the standard one-line moderation, but it wasn't like he was jumping into a conversation where people weren't accusing others of trolling and *****posting. That's the kind of environment we want? Where we have to police those types of claims, that we harbor a community where those claims can have the legitimacy they have/had? And he even said he received multiple complaints from different users. Just because people aren't always posting doesn't mean they aren't part of the community and their opinions don't matter, in fact if we had less sarcasm/derision/etc they might be inclined to post more.
But guess what? When the discussion drifted from what it was back to amonkhet conversation, it was great again! And the reason was people stopped being rude and nasty and dismissive and derisive and etc. That should always be the goal--talk about cards that aren't negative towards the one saying it. Saying a card is trash is one thing, but implications towards the posters when solely posting about cards is a complete other.
steve_man is also a new mod, too. There are growing pains. There is learning when to put your foot down, and when to let discussion happen. This is why the open discussion with him and hear his side of things without jumping down his throat when he explains anything is important as well.
Determining community standards is great, but we cant ignore that the baseline of 'try not to be a *****head' is the necessary requirement apparently of posting on mtgsalvation means not being sarcastic/derisive/etc.
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But really though, I think this is mountain/mole hill. I bet if people did their best going forward and this was forgotten about, it would be really really really easy to move past.
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I teach kids for a living. If you have a problematic kid, the first thing you do is talk to him/her, because you need a relationship with that kid to solve those problems. This is especially important if the events we're talking about aren't outright violations of rules, but borderline behaviour. If you want to enforce rules in a problematic group, the way you do it is you gather the group and come up with rules as a group. You draft a document with those rules and have people sign, so that, whenever someone violates them, you can point to that document and say "this is what we all agreed to."
Notice how at the center of it all is simply initiating a conversation as the person who has to maintain the rules? It's very different than going on a forum and reading the community guidelines or moderation standards. Not to harp on about it, but using the example _i0 cited, "More talk about Amonkhet / Pauper, less everything else." is not about initiating a conversation. Neither is dropping random warnings (which I call random, because that's what they will look like to people in borderline cases where community standards clash with moderation style because no conversation happened). _i0 can correct me, but if I read him right, that's what's bothering him. I didn't like it either. Again, part of this is that this forum doesn't feel like a big community to me, because I only frequent the P&P subforums, where we'd actually have the opportunity to talk things out because we are such a small group. It's not about creating more works for the mods either, it's as simple as rephrasing the sentence I cited above or dropping a pm instead of just slapping on a warning saying "two more and you're banned", especially in cases where the mods could recognize that the infraction was probably down to this neck of the forum woods being a different kind of community than say, the commander section.
It's not about us being allowed to shout each other down really.
I did take it to the mod in private. In fact, I am preeetty sure this is the first time I have ever spoken about the incident, even in the thread where it happened.
He sympathised with me, sorta, but the rules stayed the same, my infraction remained, and nothing changed.
I don't know why you assumed that I didn't
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
I haven't assumed that as I'm not a mind reader and, unless I missed it, you hadn't mentioned you talked to the mod. And neither has anyone else. My tone would change completely if everyone actually did contact him about this, but without that being said over multiple posts where it could've, why would I assume that?
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It was brought up by someone else. And it was the only other concrete example outside of the seppuku and one other option. The seppuku example is easy to go over--unwarranted, I agree with everyone about that--but that thread I have a hard time agreeing that the moderation was unwarranted. Could sreve_man have explained himself further? Maybe, but we also could've not gotten to the point where *multiple* users are reporting the discussion.
Also, Steve man is not a teacher, he is a hall moderator. He's not going to give a ***** what the kids are doing unless they're smoking in the bathroom, which is what happened at the end of that thread, and what he mistakenly smelled with the seppuku joke. If, as a group, it was decided to draft a set of rules and it looked well enough to work and you brought it to Steve man or a site admin or whatever, that would be one thing, but it's not steve_mans job to enforce rules that haven't been made yet it's his job to enforce the site rules.
So maybe, funnel all this into some action, it's a lot harder for a moderator to do what you all want without it being explicit, even if you think what he should or shouldn't be doing is obvious. What we're doing here is a great first step, but the next step is being about that action.
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Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Like, imagine any real-life setting where that's the case
Who would voluntarily spend their free time there
There are lots of places like that IRL, called 'bars' or 'clubs' or 'community centers' and etc., and they all involve some sort of moderation as private establishments get to determine what can and can't be discussed there to a degree, along with who can go and who can stay. These often include things like 'don't be a dick', 'don't say racist *****', 'don't incite/troll/flame', like if you're at a bar being rude to everyone or saying racist ***** there then there's a chance you're going to get kicked out. The term 'forum' derives from the IRL concept.
Maybe the community does or doesn't need a hall monitor role, but when you choose to participate on someone else's forums that's what you sign up for.
What should be happening, instead of complaining about moderation occurring, is someone starting a thread to hammer down what policies are wanted around here for moderation. If it's a big enough deal to mention, then it's a big enough deal to work together and find a solution for. The goal is to improve what's been going on--as long as you're part of mtgsalvation, 'no moderation' is inherently not an option, so 'set community terms & standards' is the next best option.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Sorry if there was miscommunication there!
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Warning: Not for the durdly-hearted!