It’s cynical to believe that is hardly productive to have any sort of political discussion? Specifically on the Internet?
I’d just ask that you step outside and leave the political lens at home. There’s a large world out there just waiting to be explored, and tons of fascinating people that you’ll never have the pleasure of meeting if you expect to align with it all politically.
It’s never been this bad before, and I will lay the blame at the feet of the pandemic. There’s not a ton going on, and aligning yourself with a political party is a sure-fire way to feel included in these times of isolation. Its very sad, really.
I’d just ask that you step outside and leave the political lens at home. There’s a large world out there just waiting to be explored, and tons of fascinating people that you’ll never have the pleasure of meeting if you expect to align with it all politically.
You can do that without leaving the political lense at home though, in fact I belive even moreso due to the fact that if you don't leave your bubble normally people tend to stick to their in group and such groupings tend to share a big subset ob their beliefs so IMO its less likely to have the pleasure of meeting people who don't align with you if you keep your political lense at home.
It’s never been this bad before, and I will lay the blame at the feet of the pandemic.
I don't think the pandemic is the cause for the tribalism it just shows it clearer. Also people are technically not aligning themselves with a party in that specific case more with movements.
I can see where you’re coming from with that last point, but I have a hard time following the first.
You’re right that it’s technically always been like this between the political parties. But, with the pandemic, it’s stripped away all other avenues for expression.
Though where I don’t follow with your first point is, say you’re a Liberal/Republican. If you don’t put that aside, you’ll be looking for the political queues to help guide you in your exploration. Therefore, you’re journey has already been predetermined and you haven’t grown as an individual.
It’s cynical to believe that is hardly productive to have any sort of political discussion? Specifically on the Internet?
I’d just ask that you step outside and leave the political lens at home. There’s a large world out there just waiting to be explored, and tons of fascinating people that you’ll never have the pleasure of meeting if you expect to align with it all politically.
It’s never been this bad before, and I will lay the blame at the feet of the pandemic. There’s not a ton going on, and aligning yourself with a political party is a sure-fire way to feel included in these times of isolation. Its very sad, really.
Yes, that is cynical. Again, the internet is a place where people act differently than they do in other contexts, but that doesn't mean political discussion can't ever be productive. That notion is a little hyperbolic, frankly.
Look, the fact that you think it's even possible to leave the political lens at home is due to your privilege, full stop. I can't leave the political lens at home, as a queer person, when TheOnlyOne[+string of numbers] is here saying we shouldn't even have Magic cards depicting queer characters because it's somehow inappropriate. I came out as queer at age 13, incidentally, the idea that it's inappropriate for certain age groups is pretty curious and bigoted, but whatever. The politics are here; they've already been here and I am merely replying to them. It's other people who are injecting politics into the discussion, and once it's there, I'm supposed to ignore it? These politics may be invisible to you because you aren't adversely affected by them. And if it doesn't personally affect you, you project that same feeling onto everyone. This environment is not welcoming to me or to my community, and it's not welcoming to a great many other communities as well. There's lots of different people out in the world who are worth interacting with; Nazis aren't among them. Bob wants it to be uncomplicated, well it's not complicated. Nazis are bad. It's ridiculous it even needs to be said. And I'm not even saying "ban the Nazis." Just let the community make it clear that we disagree with them. That's all.
It is the height of presumption to tell me to get out of my "bubble" as though I'm the one who's in a bubble here. I know lots of people with different political views; many different views have been expressed here. I don't get to have a bubble, because I live in your world. There is no bubble for me even here. Having a bubble honestly sounds like a pretty nice luxury to me.
Though where I don’t follow with your first point is, say you’re a Liberal/Republican. If you don’t put that aside, you’ll be looking for the political queues to help guide you in your exploration. Therefore, you’re journey has already been predetermined and you haven’t grown as an individual.
I do believe the exact opposite because if you "leave the lense at home" you still do it but subconciously and its easier to fight that urge when you know it's there.
An example of that is say you are into Metal and you want to go to a festival if you just go out and explore its much more likely that you choose a Festival that is closer to metal than not. However if you know that is your taste and you want to explore it is much easier to make a concious desicion to avoid going to the same type of festivals you always go to.
Hope that clears up my line of thinking.
Edit:
I can't leave the political lens at home
and that too, a lot of things you say that are opinionated come from your personal views which include your politics and to you it may be harmless but to others it isn't because it affects them personally.
Yeah, everything after “privilege“ was white noise. You don’t know me, and you don’t know my story. Yet, that didn’t stop you from making wild assumptions. Therefore, proving my point.
Yeah, everything after “privilege“ was white noise. You don’t know me, and you don’t know my story. Yet, that didn’t stop you from making wild assumptions. Therefore, proving my point.
Consider this conversation over.
See you can't leave your political lense at home when it comes to certain subjects.
And no he doesn't know your story , but what assumtions did he make with that statement as I genuinly don't know what assumption he made with the statement "your privilege?"
Yeah, everything after “privilege“ was white noise. You don’t know me, and you don’t know my story. Yet, that didn’t stop you from making wild assumptions. Therefore, proving my point.
Consider this conversation over.
Actually, I do know your story. You previously talked about how you have a black daughter, using her as a human shield for yourself against any and all criticism.
You previously talked about how you have a black daughter, using her as a human shield for yourself against any and all criticism.
Now that without backup is a personal attack.
I know people do that as I have some in my family who use me and my sis for that too (half african american/ half german). But that is a serious accusation. And in no way furthers the discussion.
You previously talked about how you have a black daughter, using her as a human shield for yourself against any and all criticism.
Now that without backup is a personal attack.
I know people do that as I have some in my family who use me and my sis for that too (half african american/ half german). But that is a serious accusation. And in no way furthers the discussion.
BuffSam89, You can't really say I was making assumptions about you because we previously had an exchange which I remember. But you did make assumptions about me being in a bubble.
For reference, it was in regards to the Queen in Eldraine. Personally, I found that to be a bit “token”, as it strays from source material and historical accuracy. And furthermore, I find most “token” inclusions to be forced and unnatural without a significant attempt at fleshing out the character. I didn’t feel like they did enough to do so. So I used my daughter as a point of reference and how she could, and has, reacted to her complexion compared to others in the land of make believe and how she has, at times, felt forced to “like” a character because they share the same skin tone.
So asking somebody to not look at everything politically is insinuating that you live in a bubble?
Edit:
And while I did use “You” and “You’re”, I wasn’t specifically speaking to you, personally. I’d same the same thing to Flossedbeaver, Theonlyone, and MikeyG.
You're right, it is a token. But you came into that discussion when the context was people complaining about Queen Linden being black for baldly racist reasons. Then, because you were being interpreted as also racist, you mentioned your black daughter. I find that to be problematic behavior and I also don't really get the reasons for your objections (isn't the point to stray from source material? It's a high fantasy setting, what historical inaccuracy?). You can give people representation without it interfering with fleshing out characters. The two things are not at odds. WotC doesn't flesh out their characters because their content is over-marketed and generic. Multiculturalism isn't the cause of that.
Edit:
So asking somebody to not look at everything politically is insinuating that you live in a bubble?
I'm referring to when you said:
There’s a large world out there just waiting to be explored, and tons of fascinating people that you’ll never have the pleasure of meeting if you expect to align with it all politically.
I don't expect everyone to align with my politics. I'm an anarcho-communist, less than 1% of the population of the U.S. shares my views. Trust me, I'm accustomed to coming across people I disagree with, and most of the time there's not a problem. But having to establish that I deserve to be treated with human dignity is a pretty black-and-white issue for me.
I would have posted my response in that thread but seeing it is still locked I will say it here.
(Although I think we've strayed a bit too far offtopic)
land of make believe and how she has, at times, felt forced to “like” a character because they share the same skin tone.
That is a serious issue I've personally had to struggle with as well but from what ive been reading from your agruments there thats not the point you were making with that I agree that tokenism is bad buts your stance was she needs to be explained. // Why is she the only one needing to be explained? Sometimes a characters skin tone/ethnicity is an important part of their story sometimes it's not for her it's not, so why does it need a bigger part just to explain why shes black and here. Is it forced inclusion? Maybe.
Is it bad if it is? In this case not really if it would be forced and stereotypical that would lead more to tokenism. The way they've done it there (I didn't read the Books so cards only) just makes her look bland. And that makes her fit right into the whole court.
I fail to see what one thing has to do with the other tough.
You may find my behavior to be problematic, similarly to how I find yours to be problematic as well.
I don’t understand the point of representation without there being an effort for it to be meaningful. For instance, at our company we just hired a VP who’s of middle-eastern descent. He’s the only minority VP, and was hired for a newly created position to oversee an already established department in an attempt to spread the workload. That’s a checked box. There is absolutely *zero* meaning to his hire aside from optics. He wasn’t promoted internally, they created the position he filled, and he is basically a head-piece for an already functioning department. Then, to top it all off, they added him to our senior leadership team. I see zero value in that. It doesn’t persuade any of the minorities on staff to do anything differently. 2 of our black managers were miffed, considering the job was filled when 70%+ of the workforce had been furloughed. People want representation, but they also want the opportunity to be the representative.
Admittedly, I hadn’t read the novels and wasn’t entirely educated on her character. But, the choice of being a black woman married to the king was just so incredibly PC that it sucked the fantasy element right out of the character, thus creating the “token” status. While Teferi has a much longer list of source material, he, his wife and daughter were fantastic additions to the MtG universe and full of flavor.
edit: for the sake of clarity and to help illustrate my point. If Marvel made a White Black Panther, without the fleshed out story like they had for White Tiger, I would have a similar reaction. It would be criticized for different reasons, of course. But, it doesn’t take a White guy playing black panther for me to like the Black Panther character or story.
Whether or not my behavior is problematic wouldn't excuse yours. But Kamino_Taka is correct that litigating over that issue doesn't accomplish anything. I'm here because I'm trying to solve a problem as I see it. Not everything I've said has been effective in doing so. But your position that good faith is impossible has got to be a non-starter.
MtG characters are almost never meaningful anyway. Teferi has the advantage of being around for such a long time that the amount of lore associated with him fleshes him out more than just about any of the characters that are around today. A queen in a plane we might not even come back to is bound to be more of a flat character compared to that, and sometimes it's okay for there to be flat characters as long as your rounder ones are well developed. When you have a lot of flat characters and you make an effort to make them representative, having that as a baseline does help somewhat to move toward more meaningful representation. But we have to be clear about what's going on and ask for WotC to do better.
I would fully agree that corporate approaches to representation aren't and can't be adequate. I have no love for executives in the first place, but inclusive hiring is still overall absolutely necessary.
I don’t understand the point of representation without there being an effort for it to be meaningful.
The point is that can be you?
But, the choice of being a black woman married to the king was just so incredibly PC that it sucked the fantasy element right out of the character, thus creating the “token” status.
So a black woman needs to be special to be married to a king? I do not understand how that sucked the fantasy out of her character.
Weren't you the one who said your daughter feels like she is feeling forced to like a caracter because of their skin tone. Yet a black woman needs to be fully explained in a way so she could be someone she is beeing forced to like? Why cant it just be a queen who happens to be black. Why the need to make so much drama about this. Just because she is black doesn't mean she is forced to be a certain way to be a viable inclusion. The whole point of representation is normalization. Thats why variety is also key and sometimes you have to have bland characters.
The reason I said that you can’t talk politics in good faith is because it affects everyone differently, and you’ll always be in favor of policies and practices that benefit you(not personally, though technically). Are you really going to tell me you’d be in favor of policy that would negatively affect you? No, absolutely not. So, regardless of where you align on the political spectrum, you’re still looking out for numero uno when all is said and done. In almost every case, and it’s evident here, what people will be looking out for is their $$$. What is in their best interests. While it is true that not every policy has an impact on the dollars and cents, you most often aren’t getting those policy’s in isolation. There is give, and there is take. That’s why I can’t get behind the current divide in our country based on Liberal Vs. Republican. It’s deeper than that.
Take me for instance. I was never in favor of Obama-care. As a manager in what would be considered a “small business” in terms of business practices and organizational makeup, it was a total net-negative on our operation and my staff. Were there positives? Certainly, but not for me and not for those close to me. So, why should I endorse a proposal like that? I know that the above is overly simplified but I think you get my point.
Similarly, take the BLM movement. After the death of George Floyd, there was support from pretty much every group in the United States that something needed to change. It’s “systemic”, as I’m so often reminded. If a system is broken, you first need to identify the point of failure, and then proceed with the rebuild. A system as large as the police force in America isn’t something that is going to change over night. Hell, it can’t be changed in a year. It affects too many people to institute radical change. It requires people to Vote. Get involved. Become educated. But, it appears that many are unsatisfied with the speed at which the gears are turning. And destruction has followed. I can’t get behind that. I won’t. I’ll push for change, but I haven’t received any comfort from those asking for it that it just won’t be as bad, or worse than it already is, just for different people.
Human nature dictates that, when push comes to shove, the vast majority are in it for ourselves.
You guys really believe this discussion has anything to do with what this topic here is about ?
I mean if at all, it shows that politics can very easily become the main topic, when the start was Magic related.
This is the exact type of conversation that i would think is much more appropriate in a 2-person private message conversation as its just 2 people quoting each other and responding to what the other said.
Its not that i would shun such a conversation, i also think its valuable to have them, to at least get an idea what the other point of view is thinking (even while strongly disagreeing with it) , but this is still a Magic forum and its oh so easy to get completely distracted into a total politics discussion (and the bad parts when people are attacked personally, their view diminished, insulted or labeled as the enemy ; thats absolutely avoidable and only makes any discussion toxic and aggressive).
----
If discussions like this should happen, it needs a sub-forum for just that, so discussions that drift into this politics can be moved to that place and not distract users that dont want to have anything to do with it.
As thats the main deal.
If a Rumor Mill discussions is all about Magic cards and it drifts into politics, the entire thing has to be locked, people get moderated, warnings, time-outs and what not need to be thrown around ; while its probably easier to move such a discussion into a forum on its own.
----
A bunch of people feel like quite the need to have this kind of dialog, especially in the current time ; while lots of other people come to this gaming forums to AVOID politics and just focus on the game.
The reason I said that you can’t talk politics in good faith is because it affects everyone differently, and you’ll always be in favor of policies and practices that benefit you(not personally, though technically). Are you really going to tell me you’d be in favor of policy that would negatively affect you? No, absolutely not. So, regardless of where you align on the political spectrum, you’re still looking out for numero uno when all is said and done. In almost every case, and it’s evident here, what people will be looking out for is their $$$. What is in their best interests. While it is true that not every policy has an impact on the dollars and cents, you most often aren’t getting those policy’s in isolation. There is give, and there is take. That’s why I can’t get behind the current divide in our country based on Liberal Vs. Republican. It’s deeper than that.
There's a distinction to be made between personal motivations for supporting a policy (because it benefits you) and the underlying principles that commit a person to a policy. If you say you believe in universal liberation, for example, then you're being consistent with that principle if your support of liberation extends to groups you're not a part of. Most people would probably say they like the idea of universal liberation, you can test their consistency by issue. And it happens to be the case that solidarity makes for good praxis.
So that means that sometimes you end up supporting positions which benefit you less than others potentially would, for the sake of values like equity. And in a way the same thing happens with other ideologies. For example, poor people can be libertarians even though libertarianism in practice disproportionately favors the benefit of wealthy interests. A typical libertarian would probably believe that it's actually beneficial to them as well, somewhat as an article of faith. Others would accept this cost as what is due to maintain the liberty of property rights. Two poor people could have a political argument even though their economic interests are the same.
It doesn't necessarily have to be a zero-sum game. And if you consider the fact that your interests as an individual are inter-implicatory with the interests of humanity as a whole, identifying the principles which lie underneath personal motivations is precisely the process of good faith political discussion.
Take me for instance. I was never in favor of Obama-care. As a manager in what would be considered a “small business” in terms of business practices and organizational makeup, it was a total net-negative on our operation and my staff. Were there positives? Certainly, but not for me and not for those close to me. So, why should I endorse a proposal like that? I know that the above is overly simplified but I think you get my point.
Wanting to live in a society where people don't needlessly die from lack of healthcare might be a reason.
Similarly, take the BLM movement. After the death of George Floyd, there was support from pretty much every group in the United States that something needed to change. It’s “systemic”, as I’m so often reminded. If a system is broken, you first need to identify the point of failure, and then proceed with the rebuild. A system as large as the police force in America isn’t something that is going to change over night. Hell, it can’t be changed in a year. It affects too many people to institute radical change. It requires people to Vote. Get involved. Become educated. But, it appears that many are unsatisfied with the speed at which the gears are turning. And destruction has followed. I can’t get behind that. I won’t. I’ll push for change, but I haven’t received any comfort from those asking for it that it just won’t be as bad, or worse than it already is, just for different people.
Human nature dictates that, when push comes to shove, the vast majority are in it for ourselves.
What's best for self-interest in the long run isn't a pure focus on the self. Psychopathy, for example, is considered a disorder because at the end of the day, psychopathic behaviors aren't functional. The fact that most people consider psychopathic behavior to be shocking is a sentimental rather than scientific reason for its categorization as a disorder. Not that there's anything wrong with sentiment. And there's nothing wrong with having self-interest, either. But that shouldn't be the only thing that determines a person. And we can also choose to create a world that is not "push comes to shove."
Our current political system is designed to change very slowly. When everything in the world is happening faster than it did back during the writing of the Constitution, and the large, time-sensitive issues we're facing, it makes sense to be impatient with gridlock. Frankly, I think it would be insane to not feel impatience.
When the point of the issue in a system is fundamental, the change required is radical. "Radical" from radix, meaning root, as in "to get to the root of the problem." Most people share your feelings that they don't want radical change. But issues like corruption are definitely fundamental to the system. People have been acting out now because they want to draw attention to and raise awareness of the call for radical change. But we certainly wouldn't be ready to push radical change through without popular support, and if we tried to things likely wouldn't be any better than they are now like you say. You're right that people need to learn more about various issues and be informed when it comes to determining the course of action. And I think the outcome of that education will be the recognition that just voting and participating with the political system as is will not and cannot work. But we're a long ways off from people accepting that, unfortunately.
while lots of other people come to this gaming forums to AVOID politics and just focus on the game.
I can agree with this. It appears I was “sucked in”, but it can be difficult to just cut some conversations off.
I think the biggest takeaway here is, if everybody who’s clamoring for change went to the appropriate channels and put that energy there, rather than bicker with a bunch of nerdy *********s, we would probably be further along in this process. I think this year has been the most “actionable” I’ve seen from the groups that are most vocal, but Buffsam89 isn’t the one whose going to be making the changes. Vote. Get involved and play your part. Who cares what MTGSalvation censors or allows, aside from the obvious red flags. The energy directed here needs to be fed into the appropriate channels. And from there, a trickle down effect is certainly to ensue.
If discussions like this should happen, it needs a sub-forum for just that, so discussions that drift into this politics can be moved to that place and not distract users that dont want to have anything to do with it.
As thats the main deal.
If a Rumor Mill discussions is all about Magic cards and it drifts into politics, the entire thing has to be locked, people get moderated, warnings, time-outs and what not need to be thrown around ; while its probably easier to move such a discussion into a forum on its own.
They could reinstate the Discussion forum. The site is probably not inclined to do so, since apparently it was retired because it required a heavy amount of work to moderate for no doubt obvious reasons. But I agree this is a workable solution.
It is not my intent to lock down this thread, as it is a primary method of reaching out to staff. Likewise, outside of extreme situations, I would prefer to not issue infractions in this thread, as I do not want people to fear or question their ability to bring their issues, thoughts, and ideas here.
That said, this thread got very personal very quickly, so I'm putting a brief pause on things. I'm also going to ask that personal attacks on other users not take place here (or anywhere else on the site).
I think we have seen very clearly here how a conversation can easily derail, and change the flow of topic to something other than what it was intended to be.
I would also like to take a brief moment to apologize for my earlier post. My exasperation, frustration, and loss of patience very clearly came through in my tone, and that was unacceptable. I deeply apologize for my lack of calm.
I agree that not everything is politics but most opinionated statements unless very specific stem from personal beliefs which include politics so techically alot of statements are political including the statement to not post anything exlpicitly political. Stems from the personal belief of Shut up and do the thing you are here for and only that. That is similar in vein as all the people said about the kneeling of the NFL players protest that they should just shut up and play the game because this is not the place to do that.
Your analogy to the NFL situation is... apt, and thought provoking. Thank you for that.
I do consider there to be a difference however, in reach, scope, timing, and purpose.
The NFL protests were about dedicated and heroic players using their influence and position to reach out (even at personal risk) to bring awareness to a wider audience that was not informed.
Posting on these forums does not involve a user's influence in reaching out and raising awareness to a larger audience. An anonymous user has negligible influence, the reach of the site is very closed to a specific facet and small. In short, I disagree that the context is in any way similar.
However beeing against a on topic political discussion is something I don't understand.
So how's your view on Magic related politics?
We do realize that there will never be a clean differentiation. This is brought up in the "Inclusion in the MTG Salvation Community" announcement that was made, but I will rephrase it here. When Wizards releases statements that inherently have a political judgment - such as removing ties with an artist, or removing existing art from the game, we understand that discussions on those topics will contain some inherent politics.
So long as the intersection of the two remain Magic focused (and not inflammatory/racist/prejudiced) the discussion remains on-topic. The problem occurs when the discussion moves outside of being magic related, or when racist or other prejudicial comments start being made.
This site is about Magic. If you want to talk about something Not Magic - you've come to the wrong place.
I know this is a bit pedantic but if thats the case why do we even have the Talk and Entertainment, Mafia and Forum Game sections?
Are you in favor of getting rid of these with a statement like that? I don't think you do, so I think you don't agree with your own statement and this was more of a heat of the moment thing.
Let me rephrase - Yes, we have areas dedicated to allowing the community to bond over things which are outside the realm of Magic. Those topics are perfectly fine in their designated areas - however, if someone were to bring those topics into the Magic related section of the forums, they would no longer be acceptable in the context of their environment.
My quote above refers in particular to the Magic forums, and in concept of the Site as a whole (If people have come to this site, it is likely that they did so in the main focus of discussing Magic. While it is theoretically possible that we may have Mafia players who have somehow arrived here and joined who have no interest in Magic, I believe that overlap would be small).
Yea, some topics have a very high tendency to drift away from Magic into politics.
If its about specific artists, "racist" card art being banned, or some policy of WotC, its basically always in some way or form political grounded already and people will either agree or disagree with them on their political reasons.
I answered this above, hopefully well enough, but I shall restate: There will never be a perfect division when it comes to inherently political statements made by Wizards. These clearly will want discussion by the Community, and our goal as staff is to try and make sure these discussions remain on topic.
Inclusion of gay characters in a card game for 13 year old kids, is that needed ? is it helpful ? is it even necessary ?
Some people have very strong believes in that regard, and drastically different too, so its quite natural that such topics will get to that point and if a moderator stifles the conversation because its "no longer on topic" some people get angry about it, as it feels to them like their view is no longer welcome ; while the moderator decision is just to prevent a more excessive drifting away into the political realm.
This site will always stand by the side of inclusion. Any comments stating that such inclusion is unnecessary, unhelpful, or morally incorrect will not be tolerated.
It's important to be honest about it. So yes, if you're going to be political either way, I think a good maxim would be to lean toward allowing discussion. This way, you have people happy with their ability to express themselves and so on, meaning the results are effective for maintaining the health of the community which is your charge as the staff here.
So here's the thing:
I still disagree with the concept that anything and everything is inherently political. Perhaps this is a difference of definition or scope between us.
People are not happy with discussions. There is no if and buts about this. Whenever a political discussion occurs, it is very easy to spot from the reports table - each person immediately reports any comment their opposition makes for being inflammatory. Each person wants us to infract their opposition for being closeminded, a troll, a flamer, or being racist - because clearly people whose views don't match their own are wrong, and immoral.
Other people are not happy with the conversations. My favorite report this year went along the lines of "I respect this persons views, and agree with them, but I am tired of seeing this discussion brought up again in every thread."
We do not have the staff to moderate a forum designated to this kind of discussion. We used to have a forum dedicated to this type of discussion, we did not have the staff then, and the forum devolved into 4chan lite. I have no desire to moderate a 4chan lite, nor do I believe it is feasible, nor appropriate for this site. Perhaps one day we will have staff that is interested in bringing this back, and willing to moderate it, and perhaps even make it appropriate for the site. Currently, none of those are true. I will die on this hill.
In fact, that this ONE thread has managed to get derailed, in a matter of hours, I think clearly shows the difficulties that a thread dedicated to politics will bring, let alone an entire forum dedicated to this concept.
At no point have I suggested that we should bring up politics "every 15 seconds." In fact, the issue I have been pointing out is the trend of political posts hating on groups being posted in threads for causes as minimal as a card depicting a black person. People have a natural desire to want to respond to such content which you have disallowed. But the reverse doesn't happen (people randomly posting leftist or centrist political takes out of the blue), because the nature of politics differs by ideology and this leads to different behavior.
Every spoiler season this year, at least one thread, if not multiple, have gone off the rails. The 15 seconds is exaggerated, however I stand by the concept that the Rumor Mill is not the place to have these discussions. I also stand by the statement that this site is not the appropriate place to host a forum dedicated to that. I most assuredly stand by the fact that hosting such a forum would be a nightmare, and would be an unmitigated disaster given the site's current resources.
This is simply not the place for this.
2. So the options again are either to enforce bias, or to be biased anyways? Again, I disagree. Censoring to one extreme or another can only be harmful to all involved. This is a site that exists to discuss Magic. This should be feasible without overcomplication.
To the contrary, it's entirely possible to not be biased in the matter. The non-biased perspective would acknowledge that one view is extreme and the other is not. The non-extreme (BLM) would only be possible to consider as extreme in the biased perspective that compares and defines it in relation to the extreme one.
The extreme I was referencing here was the action of forcefully advocating a position by moderating against anyone of a differing opinion.
I do not personally believe that BLM is an extreme position, nor do I believe that it (should) be inherently political. Somehow it has become so, but I will fight and die on the hill that it is not.
Likewise, while I will not personally advocate for bluelives, I will advocate for the people that use it in a manner to support police against violence, and against calls to violence against police. To this end, it has become the Site's current stance that moderating against BlueLives in signatures would be that line of overmoderation that you mentioned. I can only emphasize, again, that this currently appears consistent with literally every other business. I have not found a single one that approaches this differently.
I take it you're referring to bluelivesmatter here. I'm speaking more generally about hate groups, and it seems to me no coincidence that those same hate groups also are favorable towards bluelivesmatter. The lovely thing about reason is that we can draw inferences about things that lead us to opposite conclusions of popular opinion.
The context was not clear - in part Hate Groups in general have no place here. The KKK, All Lives Matters, and White Lives Matters are not allowed. Thus, I am now confused as to your original post. Your point was "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". If you're talking about Hate Groups in general, this point is invalid, as we do not allow them. The only context that made sense is the current discussion of whether #BlueLivesMatters should be allowed on the site.
If this association was in error on my part, I apologize.
3. The site is not here to pass moral judgment. You know what else would be detrimental to a community? Excising anyone with a differing viewpoint than your own.
The idea that excising people with different viewpoints than mine would be harmful to the community... is a moral judgment. Politics, after all, is a subset of moral theory. However, I haven't advocated for the excising of people just because their views differ from mine. Earlier in this thread, I engaged in polemics against the political positions you were kind enough to state in order to demonstrate that we're both partisan. I don't think you should be excised just because I disagree with you, because you haven't advocated for things that are inherently dehumanizing. I can recognize that you in good faith believe your views are what's best for a variety of people (a moral judgment).
I'd like to touch again on the claim that the site isn't here to make moral judgments. This is false on its face, because the forum has rules of conduct in the first place which are based in moral judgment. Bob, you earlier introduced the term "moral" into the discussion and I was appreciative of you doing so because its frequently the case that people have a dismissive attitude about whatever they term "moral" due to its subjective connotations. If we were so inclined, we could engage in a discussion which in every explicit sense was only descriptive and leave its normative character as subtextual, but I don't think that would be a very sincere, clear, or constructive approach. Every decision we make in life entails a moral judgment; we could take no action otherwise. You can't avoid making moral judgments, just as you can't avoid being political, and maturity involves acknowledging this.
This... feels like it's getting into semantics. While I can see what you are arguing, I doubt that you do not see the point I was trying to make.
Yes, every community, every nation, every group of people will have laws and rules based on the morals it wishes to emphasize. However, there are some topics that are disagreed upon, ambiguous, or otherwise in contention. While each of us on the staff, and the owners, may have our personal opinions on these topics, the Site itself is not here to pass judgement on those. The site is not here as a platform to advocate for a cause in contention. Each of us that wishes to do so, does it on our own time, in our own locations.
There is also the issue that the quote of mine you placed is in reference you your point 3: "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". Given the context of the preceding posts about the validity of BlueLives, and that Hate Groups in general are not allowed here, the association was the inference that your point was associating BlueLives as a Hate Group. Thus, the context of MY quote about passing moral judgement is that it is not this Site's duty or prerogative to make the judgement about whether or not a group qualifies as a Hate Group. We'll leave that to those better suited for it.
4. And what overzealous and authoritarian approach are you referring to here?
A simple request to keep discussion to the topics that this forum was made for?
Or that if people fail to follow the rules of the community, they are asked to leave?
Is it really that hard to understand "Please follow the rules, don't be a jerk, or we will ask you to not be here?"
Intervening in discussions just because they're "off topic" is very likely to be excessive.
Intervening in off-topic discussions is literally our job. If every thread were to turn into a thread about gardening, this would be a terrible Magic site. Replace "gardening" with any single other topic that is not Magic, and that statement remains true. Even Politics.
Now, perhaps there is some remote set that will come out that provides an overlap between gardening and Magic. Then, gardening might find itself on topic... if it remains related to Magic. Replace "gardening" with any single other topic that is not Magic, and that statement remains true. Even Politics.
5. You know what else would affect revenue? Becoming a Magic site that doesn't discuss Magic.
I don't see how this is the necessary outcome. I suspect that politics is something that will rarely come up because most people here are primarily interested in discussing Magic and that's not going to change.
This past year has proven otherwise. Politics has repeatedly come up, and been disruptive every single time. Every time, people report the opposition, and people not involved in the discussion report it and request that it please just stop.
I agree that people are primarily interested in discussing Magic. That's why discussing politics here is disruptive. That's why discussing politics here is not appropriate.
Never mind that Magic itself is expressly political, apparently provoking political responses with choices as simple as depicting black people in card art. The controversies here are over something really basic, which essentially distills to the question of whether humanity is universal or not. Such a basic controversy can't go unresolved.
Depicting a black person in art is not Magic being expressly political. In fact, there is literally nothing political about depicting a black person in art. The only thing political, would be the person making a political statement because a black person was depicted in art. The art is not political, Magic is not being political, the person is.
Humanity is universal. I will stand by that, and the site will stand by that.
Yes, I am human and can be frustrated. I also do have my own personal opinions, though as I am in a position of some sort of authority here, I do my best to refrain from exercising them too strongly, lest people inadvertently believe those statements to be on behalf of the site, rather than myself. (The site has had issues with some moderator opinions and pieces being mistaken as site policy rather than personal in the past). I also do wish to avoid potential optics of bias.
While everyone will have their personal biases, I can do my best to try and keep it in check and moderate as objectively as possible.
I'm willing to bet that you don't go to a Walmart, or a Target, or even a McDonald's to shout at people about your views on this.
Well, no, and that's a bit of a strawman. I don't do that, I doubt anyone here does. Speaking for myself, however, when I'm in a public space (like a forum) and I witness ignorant comments or bigoted behavior I will (if safe) say something. And, in my experience, the reverse is also true and I've been in public and have had bigoted things said to me (usually for being ~*~TOO GAY~*~ but sometimes for other social justice/progressive statements). Being in public and never experiencing socio-political issues in everyday places is completely foreign to me.
Perhaps it is a bit of a strawman, but that was also a bit of the intention. There are topics that have been derailed to extreme political discussion, which goes beyond what you discuss.
For me, though, I'm going to take your advice and I'm going to go. I'll probably lurk and hibernate, see if the site changes again, but this clearly isn't the place for me anymore.
This does make me sad. You have been an excellent influence on the forums, and a very long time standing member and accomplished moderator and admin of the site through trying times. Your departure does deeply distress me, as it clearly shows a dissonance in what the site is and should be.
They could reinstate the Discussion forum. The site is probably not inclined to do so, since apparently it was retired because it required a heavy amount of work to moderate for no doubt obvious reasons. But I agree this is a workable solution.
The debate forum was well intentioned, and started off well and well moderated. But it quickly went down a black hole. Towards the end of its existence, debates were not held in good faith, and there was a tendency to argue and make contrarian points just for shock and attention. There ended up being multiple "debates" which were nothing more than outright trolling, as well as rife trolling throughout what might be considered legitimate debates.
And this doesn't even touch on the topics found in the NSFW Debate subforum (which I am personally confused why was ever a thing here).
Looking at the retired forum, there are 11 threads that needed to be deleted in the first page alone, and another 9 on the second page. That's not healthy. There are also a significant amount of red text, and banned members in the responses.
I am well aware that there were several mods that held the forum in fond memory, however there was solid reason to shut it down at the time. Perhaps it could return one day, but today is definitely not the time.
===
A reminder: This thread is not to replace the debate forum. It is to discuss site policy, or to bring matters and concerns to the attention of the staff and owners. It is not the place for philosophical, theoretical, or political debate.
It IS the place for discussion about the Regulations of the site.
For those wondering about direct contact with the owners of the site: I will discuss with them if there is a way to make this feasible, but my guess is that it less likely. MagicFind operates a large number of sites, and part of the purpose of the staff is to be the intermediary to the Owners, so as to limit being swamped. The owners are aware of this thread, but unlike all of us, I doubt that most visit the site on a frequent basis, let alone daily. That's what the staff is for.
I will happily forward relevant concerns, and if any of those concerns involve staff (or even myself), forward and alert them to those, while limiting my personal involvement to the best of my ability and ethics.
So here's the thing:
I still disagree with the concept that anything and everything is inherently political. Perhaps this is a difference of definition or scope between us.
You're using the word "political" in its colloquial sense. Which would be fine in most situations where there isn't a need for extreme clarity as there is in this discussion. "Politics" comes from poleis, the city, as in having to do with life in the city. The most precise and technical usage of this word, as a subset of moral theory, is essentially ethics in its social aspect in the broadest possible sense. We should defer to this definition because it is the definition that is favored by expertise and it is necessary for us to gain greater clarity about the topic.
For example, when you say depicting Queen Linden as a black woman isn't political, I think you mean in a colloquial way something like: we ought to have a consensus that such representation is normal and desirable, that its normalcy is self-evident, and not subject to dispute. And this is exactly where the "devil's advocate" conservative comes in and tries to pick apart at the assumption that it's not political, rationalizing possible objections to the practice to contest its self-evidentiary nature. I prefer to nip this behavior in the bud by acknowledging that the representation is a conscious, intentional choice by WotC to redress the earlier lack of representation in their card art. Yes, this is political and it's not a bad thing that it is. "Politics" doesn't have to be a dirty word here. If you define politics in such a way that its activity is concluded to be pointless (e.g., "people arguing about values that are impossible to resolve"), the definition will be a self-fulfilled prophecy of self-defeat.
In my experience, the best way to deal with devil's advocates is to beat them at their own game. What conservatives hate most about their perception of "liberals" is that their opponents are wishy-washy relativists, unprincipled pragmatists, who assume they're automatically right because "conservatives are dumb" and so on. I have found it effective to disillusion these notions.
Similarly, I would point out that my definition of "systemic racism" comes from sociology. As a science, sociology is interested in natural phenomena in its scope of inquiry such as racial disparity. It's an empirical fact that racial disparity exists and, at the risk of oversimplifying, we say racism is the cause of racial disparity. But what does this mean? The idea that the prejudices of individuals is sufficient to explain racial disparity is not supported by the data. What is supported is the idea of historical forces, economic and institutional, forces that people's actions can contribute to even if their conscious intentions contain nothing of the sort as a goal. This goes against the colloquial definition of racism but again we must defer to the definitions that allow our inquiry to proceed rationally.
2. People are not happy with discussions. There is no if and buts about this. Whenever a political discussion occurs, it is very easy to spot from the reports table - each person immediately reports any comment their opposition makes for being inflammatory. Each person wants us to infract their opposition for being closeminded, a troll, a flamer, or being racist - because clearly people whose views don't match their own are wrong, and immoral.
3.Other people are not happy with the conversations. My favorite report this year went along the lines of "I respect this persons views, and agree with them, but I am tired of seeing this discussion brought up again in every thread."
Ok, but you can't separate out the causal effect of you as an administrator making pronouncements against political discussion and the expectation within the community that political discussion will not occur.
No policy will result in a utopia where everyone is happy. Some people indeed do not want to see political discussions. I suggested earlier they could block the people having them. I think it's better to leave it up to the forum member's choices than having the staff intervene.
Growing up in school, I remember that it was often the case that children would tattle on one another over every trivial thing. The wisest teachers were the ones who, in most cases, would tell them to resolve their issues on their own to spare themselves an unnecessary workload.
We do not have the staff to moderate a forum designated to this kind of discussion. We used to have a forum dedicated to this type of discussion, we did not have the staff then, and the forum devolved into 4chan lite. I have no desire to moderate a 4chan lite, nor do I believe it is feasible, nor appropriate for this site. Perhaps one day we will have staff that is interested in bringing this back, and willing to moderate it, and perhaps even make it appropriate for the site. Currently, none of those are true. I will die on this hill.
You might end up having to die on that hill unless you can assure me that you're taking actions that will make this possible.
In fact, that this ONE thread has managed to get derailed, in a matter of hours, I think clearly shows the difficulties that a thread dedicated to politics will bring, let alone an entire forum dedicated to this concept.
This thread had a digression, although I found it to be useful because it shed clarity on an issue as a case example and it resolved itself and we moved back to the original topic shortly. Maybe my tolerance for digressions is unusually high. This is why I don't want hair-trigger interventions by staff.
The extreme I was referencing here was the action of forcefully advocating a position by moderating against anyone of a differing opinion.
I do not personally believe that BLM is an extreme position, nor do I believe that it (should) be inherently political. Somehow it has become so, but I will fight and die on the hill that it is not.
"Black lives matter" is an affirmation of the underlying political principle that all lives matter. That all lives matter is something virtually no one would dispute, so the fact that black lives are currently not being treated the same is an inconsistency with the principle, which entails some political change must occur to bring us back into consistency. I don't see the need to die on a hill for this one. Denying that it is political is somewhat counterproductive because it trivializes the severity of the issue. If you said "genocide is bad" is not political while a genocide was occurring, you'd be erasing the political reality that there really are people in the world who want to commit genocide and turning a blind eye to them is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible.
The context was not clear - in part Hate Groups in general have no place here. The KKK, All Lives Matters, and White Lives Matters are not allowed. Thus, I am now confused as to your original post. Your point was "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". If you're talking about Hate Groups in general, this point is invalid, as we do not allow them. The only context that made sense is the current discussion of whether #BlueLivesMatters should be allowed on the site.
If this association was in error on my part, I apologize.
A person does not have to explicitly state that they're part of the KKK to be part of a hate group or use hate speech. They are frequently characterized by the use of dog whistles, which I consider bluelivesmatter to be.
Denying that systemic racism exists against POC is also something I think is hate speech. It has occurred in this thread. And all that is required for people motivated by this hate is to drop inflammatory bombs in random threads for the damage to be done. There is nothing moderators can do directly about this behavior which would satisfy me. But members of the community have the ability to assure one another by coming together to oppose it. That's the thing that's missing from the current picture and you're severely underestimating the value and importance of this quality in making this an inclusive space. That's why I've called for equitable exception to be made for this activity.
This... feels like it's getting into semantics. While I can see what you are arguing, I doubt that you do not see the point I was trying to make.
I'm speaking from my academic background. I'm sure it probably does feel like mere semantics to you. But I can only say it's something that is of vital, critical importance to me.
Yes, every community, every nation, every group of people will have laws and rules based on the morals it wishes to emphasize. However, there are some topics that are disagreed upon, ambiguous, or otherwise in contention. While each of us on the staff, and the owners, may have our personal opinions on these topics, the Site itself is not here to pass judgement on those. The site is not here as a platform to advocate for a cause in contention. Each of us that wishes to do so, does it on our own time, in our own locations.
There is also the issue that the quote of mine you placed is in reference you your point 3: "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". Given the context of the preceding posts about the validity of BlueLives, and that Hate Groups in general are not allowed here, the association was the inference that your point was associating BlueLives as a Hate Group. Thus, the context of MY quote about passing moral judgement is that it is not this Site's duty or prerogative to make the judgement about whether or not a group qualifies as a Hate Group. We'll leave that to those better suited for it.
Then I suppose my only recourse is to collect evidence. Very well. I still want to get back to some of your earlier requests as well as time allows.
The debate forum was well intentioned, and started off well and well moderated. But it quickly went down a black hole. Towards the end of its existence, debates were not held in good faith, and there was a tendency to argue and make contrarian points just for shock and attention. There ended up being multiple "debates" which were nothing more than outright trolling, as well as rife trolling throughout what might be considered legitimate debates.
And this doesn't even touch on the topics found in the NSFW Debate subforum (which I am personally confused why was ever a thing here).
Looking at the retired forum, there are 11 threads that needed to be deleted in the first page alone, and another 9 on the second page. That's not healthy. There are also a significant amount of red text, and banned members in the responses.
I am well aware that there were several mods that held the forum in fond memory, however there was solid reason to shut it down at the time. Perhaps it could return one day, but today is definitely not the time.
I understand the difficulties involved here but I think it's worth the investment to make this a reality again. I'm sure you derive absolutely no personal enjoyment from having to continue to discuss this issue with me. Tell me your plan so that we can move on.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I’d just ask that you step outside and leave the political lens at home. There’s a large world out there just waiting to be explored, and tons of fascinating people that you’ll never have the pleasure of meeting if you expect to align with it all politically.
It’s never been this bad before, and I will lay the blame at the feet of the pandemic. There’s not a ton going on, and aligning yourself with a political party is a sure-fire way to feel included in these times of isolation. Its very sad, really.
You can do that without leaving the political lense at home though, in fact I belive even moreso due to the fact that if you don't leave your bubble normally people tend to stick to their in group and such groupings tend to share a big subset ob their beliefs so IMO its less likely to have the pleasure of meeting people who don't align with you if you keep your political lense at home.
I don't think the pandemic is the cause for the tribalism it just shows it clearer. Also people are technically not aligning themselves with a party in that specific case more with movements.
You’re right that it’s technically always been like this between the political parties. But, with the pandemic, it’s stripped away all other avenues for expression.
Though where I don’t follow with your first point is, say you’re a Liberal/Republican. If you don’t put that aside, you’ll be looking for the political queues to help guide you in your exploration. Therefore, you’re journey has already been predetermined and you haven’t grown as an individual.
Yes, that is cynical. Again, the internet is a place where people act differently than they do in other contexts, but that doesn't mean political discussion can't ever be productive. That notion is a little hyperbolic, frankly.
Look, the fact that you think it's even possible to leave the political lens at home is due to your privilege, full stop. I can't leave the political lens at home, as a queer person, when TheOnlyOne[+string of numbers] is here saying we shouldn't even have Magic cards depicting queer characters because it's somehow inappropriate. I came out as queer at age 13, incidentally, the idea that it's inappropriate for certain age groups is pretty curious and bigoted, but whatever. The politics are here; they've already been here and I am merely replying to them. It's other people who are injecting politics into the discussion, and once it's there, I'm supposed to ignore it? These politics may be invisible to you because you aren't adversely affected by them. And if it doesn't personally affect you, you project that same feeling onto everyone. This environment is not welcoming to me or to my community, and it's not welcoming to a great many other communities as well. There's lots of different people out in the world who are worth interacting with; Nazis aren't among them. Bob wants it to be uncomplicated, well it's not complicated. Nazis are bad. It's ridiculous it even needs to be said. And I'm not even saying "ban the Nazis." Just let the community make it clear that we disagree with them. That's all.
It is the height of presumption to tell me to get out of my "bubble" as though I'm the one who's in a bubble here. I know lots of people with different political views; many different views have been expressed here. I don't get to have a bubble, because I live in your world. There is no bubble for me even here. Having a bubble honestly sounds like a pretty nice luxury to me.
I do believe the exact opposite because if you "leave the lense at home" you still do it but subconciously and its easier to fight that urge when you know it's there.
An example of that is say you are into Metal and you want to go to a festival if you just go out and explore its much more likely that you choose a Festival that is closer to metal than not. However if you know that is your taste and you want to explore it is much easier to make a concious desicion to avoid going to the same type of festivals you always go to.
Hope that clears up my line of thinking.
Edit:
and that too, a lot of things you say that are opinionated come from your personal views which include your politics and to you it may be harmless but to others it isn't because it affects them personally.
Consider this conversation over.
See you can't leave your political lense at home when it comes to certain subjects.
And no he doesn't know your story , but what assumtions did he make with that statement as I genuinly don't know what assumption he made with the statement "your privilege?"
Actually, I do know your story. You previously talked about how you have a black daughter, using her as a human shield for yourself against any and all criticism.
No idea how that has anything to do with politics.
Now that without backup is a personal attack.
I know people do that as I have some in my family who use me and my sis for that too (half african american/ half german). But that is a serious accusation. And in no way furthers the discussion.
I'm referring to this post.
BuffSam89, You can't really say I was making assumptions about you because we previously had an exchange which I remember. But you did make assumptions about me being in a bubble.
Edit:
And while I did use “You” and “You’re”, I wasn’t specifically speaking to you, personally. I’d same the same thing to Flossedbeaver, Theonlyone, and MikeyG.
Edit:
I'm referring to when you said:
I don't expect everyone to align with my politics. I'm an anarcho-communist, less than 1% of the population of the U.S. shares my views. Trust me, I'm accustomed to coming across people I disagree with, and most of the time there's not a problem. But having to establish that I deserve to be treated with human dignity is a pretty black-and-white issue for me.
(Although I think we've strayed a bit too far offtopic)
That is a serious issue I've personally had to struggle with as well but from what ive been reading from your agruments there thats not the point you were making with that I agree that tokenism is bad buts your stance was she needs to be explained. // Why is she the only one needing to be explained? Sometimes a characters skin tone/ethnicity is an important part of their story sometimes it's not for her it's not, so why does it need a bigger part just to explain why shes black and here. Is it forced inclusion? Maybe.
Is it bad if it is? In this case not really if it would be forced and stereotypical that would lead more to tokenism. The way they've done it there (I didn't read the Books so cards only) just makes her look bland. And that makes her fit right into the whole court.
I fail to see what one thing has to do with the other tough.
I don’t understand the point of representation without there being an effort for it to be meaningful. For instance, at our company we just hired a VP who’s of middle-eastern descent. He’s the only minority VP, and was hired for a newly created position to oversee an already established department in an attempt to spread the workload. That’s a checked box. There is absolutely *zero* meaning to his hire aside from optics. He wasn’t promoted internally, they created the position he filled, and he is basically a head-piece for an already functioning department. Then, to top it all off, they added him to our senior leadership team. I see zero value in that. It doesn’t persuade any of the minorities on staff to do anything differently. 2 of our black managers were miffed, considering the job was filled when 70%+ of the workforce had been furloughed. People want representation, but they also want the opportunity to be the representative.
Admittedly, I hadn’t read the novels and wasn’t entirely educated on her character. But, the choice of being a black woman married to the king was just so incredibly PC that it sucked the fantasy element right out of the character, thus creating the “token” status. While Teferi has a much longer list of source material, he, his wife and daughter were fantastic additions to the MtG universe and full of flavor.
edit: for the sake of clarity and to help illustrate my point. If Marvel made a White Black Panther, without the fleshed out story like they had for White Tiger, I would have a similar reaction. It would be criticized for different reasons, of course. But, it doesn’t take a White guy playing black panther for me to like the Black Panther character or story.
MtG characters are almost never meaningful anyway. Teferi has the advantage of being around for such a long time that the amount of lore associated with him fleshes him out more than just about any of the characters that are around today. A queen in a plane we might not even come back to is bound to be more of a flat character compared to that, and sometimes it's okay for there to be flat characters as long as your rounder ones are well developed. When you have a lot of flat characters and you make an effort to make them representative, having that as a baseline does help somewhat to move toward more meaningful representation. But we have to be clear about what's going on and ask for WotC to do better.
I would fully agree that corporate approaches to representation aren't and can't be adequate. I have no love for executives in the first place, but inclusive hiring is still overall absolutely necessary.
The point is that can be you?
So a black woman needs to be special to be married to a king? I do not understand how that sucked the fantasy out of her character.
Weren't you the one who said your daughter feels like she is feeling forced to like a caracter because of their skin tone. Yet a black woman needs to be fully explained in a way so she could be someone she is beeing forced to like? Why cant it just be a queen who happens to be black. Why the need to make so much drama about this. Just because she is black doesn't mean she is forced to be a certain way to be a viable inclusion. The whole point of representation is normalization. Thats why variety is also key and sometimes you have to have bland characters.
Take me for instance. I was never in favor of Obama-care. As a manager in what would be considered a “small business” in terms of business practices and organizational makeup, it was a total net-negative on our operation and my staff. Were there positives? Certainly, but not for me and not for those close to me. So, why should I endorse a proposal like that? I know that the above is overly simplified but I think you get my point.
Similarly, take the BLM movement. After the death of George Floyd, there was support from pretty much every group in the United States that something needed to change. It’s “systemic”, as I’m so often reminded. If a system is broken, you first need to identify the point of failure, and then proceed with the rebuild. A system as large as the police force in America isn’t something that is going to change over night. Hell, it can’t be changed in a year. It affects too many people to institute radical change. It requires people to Vote. Get involved. Become educated. But, it appears that many are unsatisfied with the speed at which the gears are turning. And destruction has followed. I can’t get behind that. I won’t. I’ll push for change, but I haven’t received any comfort from those asking for it that it just won’t be as bad, or worse than it already is, just for different people.
Human nature dictates that, when push comes to shove, the vast majority are in it for ourselves.
I mean if at all, it shows that politics can very easily become the main topic, when the start was Magic related.
This is the exact type of conversation that i would think is much more appropriate in a 2-person private message conversation as its just 2 people quoting each other and responding to what the other said.
Its not that i would shun such a conversation, i also think its valuable to have them, to at least get an idea what the other point of view is thinking (even while strongly disagreeing with it) , but this is still a Magic forum and its oh so easy to get completely distracted into a total politics discussion (and the bad parts when people are attacked personally, their view diminished, insulted or labeled as the enemy ; thats absolutely avoidable and only makes any discussion toxic and aggressive).
----
If discussions like this should happen, it needs a sub-forum for just that, so discussions that drift into this politics can be moved to that place and not distract users that dont want to have anything to do with it.
As thats the main deal.
If a Rumor Mill discussions is all about Magic cards and it drifts into politics, the entire thing has to be locked, people get moderated, warnings, time-outs and what not need to be thrown around ; while its probably easier to move such a discussion into a forum on its own.
----
A bunch of people feel like quite the need to have this kind of dialog, especially in the current time ; while lots of other people come to this gaming forums to AVOID politics and just focus on the game.
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
👮👮👮 #BlueLivesMatter 👮👮👮
There's a distinction to be made between personal motivations for supporting a policy (because it benefits you) and the underlying principles that commit a person to a policy. If you say you believe in universal liberation, for example, then you're being consistent with that principle if your support of liberation extends to groups you're not a part of. Most people would probably say they like the idea of universal liberation, you can test their consistency by issue. And it happens to be the case that solidarity makes for good praxis.
So that means that sometimes you end up supporting positions which benefit you less than others potentially would, for the sake of values like equity. And in a way the same thing happens with other ideologies. For example, poor people can be libertarians even though libertarianism in practice disproportionately favors the benefit of wealthy interests. A typical libertarian would probably believe that it's actually beneficial to them as well, somewhat as an article of faith. Others would accept this cost as what is due to maintain the liberty of property rights. Two poor people could have a political argument even though their economic interests are the same.
It doesn't necessarily have to be a zero-sum game. And if you consider the fact that your interests as an individual are inter-implicatory with the interests of humanity as a whole, identifying the principles which lie underneath personal motivations is precisely the process of good faith political discussion.
Wanting to live in a society where people don't needlessly die from lack of healthcare might be a reason.
What's best for self-interest in the long run isn't a pure focus on the self. Psychopathy, for example, is considered a disorder because at the end of the day, psychopathic behaviors aren't functional. The fact that most people consider psychopathic behavior to be shocking is a sentimental rather than scientific reason for its categorization as a disorder. Not that there's anything wrong with sentiment. And there's nothing wrong with having self-interest, either. But that shouldn't be the only thing that determines a person. And we can also choose to create a world that is not "push comes to shove."
Our current political system is designed to change very slowly. When everything in the world is happening faster than it did back during the writing of the Constitution, and the large, time-sensitive issues we're facing, it makes sense to be impatient with gridlock. Frankly, I think it would be insane to not feel impatience.
When the point of the issue in a system is fundamental, the change required is radical. "Radical" from radix, meaning root, as in "to get to the root of the problem." Most people share your feelings that they don't want radical change. But issues like corruption are definitely fundamental to the system. People have been acting out now because they want to draw attention to and raise awareness of the call for radical change. But we certainly wouldn't be ready to push radical change through without popular support, and if we tried to things likely wouldn't be any better than they are now like you say. You're right that people need to learn more about various issues and be informed when it comes to determining the course of action. And I think the outcome of that education will be the recognition that just voting and participating with the political system as is will not and cannot work. But we're a long ways off from people accepting that, unfortunately.
I can agree with this. It appears I was “sucked in”, but it can be difficult to just cut some conversations off.
I think the biggest takeaway here is, if everybody who’s clamoring for change went to the appropriate channels and put that energy there, rather than bicker with a bunch of nerdy *********s, we would probably be further along in this process. I think this year has been the most “actionable” I’ve seen from the groups that are most vocal, but Buffsam89 isn’t the one whose going to be making the changes. Vote. Get involved and play your part. Who cares what MTGSalvation censors or allows, aside from the obvious red flags. The energy directed here needs to be fed into the appropriate channels. And from there, a trickle down effect is certainly to ensue.
They could reinstate the Discussion forum. The site is probably not inclined to do so, since apparently it was retired because it required a heavy amount of work to moderate for no doubt obvious reasons. But I agree this is a workable solution.
That said, this thread got very personal very quickly, so I'm putting a brief pause on things. I'm also going to ask that personal attacks on other users not take place here (or anywhere else on the site).
I think we have seen very clearly here how a conversation can easily derail, and change the flow of topic to something other than what it was intended to be.
I would also like to take a brief moment to apologize for my earlier post. My exasperation, frustration, and loss of patience very clearly came through in my tone, and that was unacceptable. I deeply apologize for my lack of calm.
Your analogy to the NFL situation is... apt, and thought provoking. Thank you for that.
I do consider there to be a difference however, in reach, scope, timing, and purpose.
The NFL protests were about dedicated and heroic players using their influence and position to reach out (even at personal risk) to bring awareness to a wider audience that was not informed.
Posting on these forums does not involve a user's influence in reaching out and raising awareness to a larger audience. An anonymous user has negligible influence, the reach of the site is very closed to a specific facet and small. In short, I disagree that the context is in any way similar.
We do realize that there will never be a clean differentiation. This is brought up in the "Inclusion in the MTG Salvation Community" announcement that was made, but I will rephrase it here. When Wizards releases statements that inherently have a political judgment - such as removing ties with an artist, or removing existing art from the game, we understand that discussions on those topics will contain some inherent politics.
So long as the intersection of the two remain Magic focused (and not inflammatory/racist/prejudiced) the discussion remains on-topic. The problem occurs when the discussion moves outside of being magic related, or when racist or other prejudicial comments start being made.
Let me rephrase - Yes, we have areas dedicated to allowing the community to bond over things which are outside the realm of Magic. Those topics are perfectly fine in their designated areas - however, if someone were to bring those topics into the Magic related section of the forums, they would no longer be acceptable in the context of their environment.
My quote above refers in particular to the Magic forums, and in concept of the Site as a whole (If people have come to this site, it is likely that they did so in the main focus of discussing Magic. While it is theoretically possible that we may have Mafia players who have somehow arrived here and joined who have no interest in Magic, I believe that overlap would be small).
I answered this above, hopefully well enough, but I shall restate: There will never be a perfect division when it comes to inherently political statements made by Wizards. These clearly will want discussion by the Community, and our goal as staff is to try and make sure these discussions remain on topic.
This site will always stand by the side of inclusion. Any comments stating that such inclusion is unnecessary, unhelpful, or morally incorrect will not be tolerated.
So here's the thing:
Every spoiler season this year, at least one thread, if not multiple, have gone off the rails. The 15 seconds is exaggerated, however I stand by the concept that the Rumor Mill is not the place to have these discussions. I also stand by the statement that this site is not the appropriate place to host a forum dedicated to that. I most assuredly stand by the fact that hosting such a forum would be a nightmare, and would be an unmitigated disaster given the site's current resources.
This is simply not the place for this.
The extreme I was referencing here was the action of forcefully advocating a position by moderating against anyone of a differing opinion.
I do not personally believe that BLM is an extreme position, nor do I believe that it (should) be inherently political. Somehow it has become so, but I will fight and die on the hill that it is not.
Likewise, while I will not personally advocate for bluelives, I will advocate for the people that use it in a manner to support police against violence, and against calls to violence against police. To this end, it has become the Site's current stance that moderating against BlueLives in signatures would be that line of overmoderation that you mentioned. I can only emphasize, again, that this currently appears consistent with literally every other business. I have not found a single one that approaches this differently.
The context was not clear - in part Hate Groups in general have no place here. The KKK, All Lives Matters, and White Lives Matters are not allowed. Thus, I am now confused as to your original post. Your point was "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". If you're talking about Hate Groups in general, this point is invalid, as we do not allow them. The only context that made sense is the current discussion of whether #BlueLivesMatters should be allowed on the site.
If this association was in error on my part, I apologize.
This... feels like it's getting into semantics. While I can see what you are arguing, I doubt that you do not see the point I was trying to make.
Yes, every community, every nation, every group of people will have laws and rules based on the morals it wishes to emphasize. However, there are some topics that are disagreed upon, ambiguous, or otherwise in contention. While each of us on the staff, and the owners, may have our personal opinions on these topics, the Site itself is not here to pass judgement on those. The site is not here as a platform to advocate for a cause in contention. Each of us that wishes to do so, does it on our own time, in our own locations.
There is also the issue that the quote of mine you placed is in reference you your point 3: "3. A balance which is inclusive to hate groups is toxic to the cohesion of the forum community". Given the context of the preceding posts about the validity of BlueLives, and that Hate Groups in general are not allowed here, the association was the inference that your point was associating BlueLives as a Hate Group. Thus, the context of MY quote about passing moral judgement is that it is not this Site's duty or prerogative to make the judgement about whether or not a group qualifies as a Hate Group. We'll leave that to those better suited for it.
Intervening in off-topic discussions is literally our job. If every thread were to turn into a thread about gardening, this would be a terrible Magic site. Replace "gardening" with any single other topic that is not Magic, and that statement remains true. Even Politics.
Now, perhaps there is some remote set that will come out that provides an overlap between gardening and Magic. Then, gardening might find itself on topic... if it remains related to Magic. Replace "gardening" with any single other topic that is not Magic, and that statement remains true. Even Politics.
This past year has proven otherwise. Politics has repeatedly come up, and been disruptive every single time. Every time, people report the opposition, and people not involved in the discussion report it and request that it please just stop.
I agree that people are primarily interested in discussing Magic. That's why discussing politics here is disruptive. That's why discussing politics here is not appropriate.
Depicting a black person in art is not Magic being expressly political. In fact, there is literally nothing political about depicting a black person in art. The only thing political, would be the person making a political statement because a black person was depicted in art. The art is not political, Magic is not being political, the person is.
Humanity is universal. I will stand by that, and the site will stand by that.
Yes, I am human and can be frustrated. I also do have my own personal opinions, though as I am in a position of some sort of authority here, I do my best to refrain from exercising them too strongly, lest people inadvertently believe those statements to be on behalf of the site, rather than myself. (The site has had issues with some moderator opinions and pieces being mistaken as site policy rather than personal in the past). I also do wish to avoid potential optics of bias.
While everyone will have their personal biases, I can do my best to try and keep it in check and moderate as objectively as possible.
Perhaps it is a bit of a strawman, but that was also a bit of the intention. There are topics that have been derailed to extreme political discussion, which goes beyond what you discuss.
This does make me sad. You have been an excellent influence on the forums, and a very long time standing member and accomplished moderator and admin of the site through trying times. Your departure does deeply distress me, as it clearly shows a dissonance in what the site is and should be.
The debate forum was well intentioned, and started off well and well moderated. But it quickly went down a black hole. Towards the end of its existence, debates were not held in good faith, and there was a tendency to argue and make contrarian points just for shock and attention. There ended up being multiple "debates" which were nothing more than outright trolling, as well as rife trolling throughout what might be considered legitimate debates.
And this doesn't even touch on the topics found in the NSFW Debate subforum (which I am personally confused why was ever a thing here).
Looking at the retired forum, there are 11 threads that needed to be deleted in the first page alone, and another 9 on the second page. That's not healthy. There are also a significant amount of red text, and banned members in the responses.
I am well aware that there were several mods that held the forum in fond memory, however there was solid reason to shut it down at the time. Perhaps it could return one day, but today is definitely not the time.
===
A reminder: This thread is not to replace the debate forum. It is to discuss site policy, or to bring matters and concerns to the attention of the staff and owners. It is not the place for philosophical, theoretical, or political debate.
It IS the place for discussion about the Regulations of the site.
For those wondering about direct contact with the owners of the site: I will discuss with them if there is a way to make this feasible, but my guess is that it less likely. MagicFind operates a large number of sites, and part of the purpose of the staff is to be the intermediary to the Owners, so as to limit being swamped. The owners are aware of this thread, but unlike all of us, I doubt that most visit the site on a frequent basis, let alone daily. That's what the staff is for.
I will happily forward relevant concerns, and if any of those concerns involve staff (or even myself), forward and alert them to those, while limiting my personal involvement to the best of my ability and ethics.
Retired EDH - Tibor and Lumia | [PR]Nemata |Ramirez dePietro | [C]Edric | Riku | Jenara | Lazav | Heliod | Daxos | Roon | Kozilek
You're using the word "political" in its colloquial sense. Which would be fine in most situations where there isn't a need for extreme clarity as there is in this discussion. "Politics" comes from poleis, the city, as in having to do with life in the city. The most precise and technical usage of this word, as a subset of moral theory, is essentially ethics in its social aspect in the broadest possible sense. We should defer to this definition because it is the definition that is favored by expertise and it is necessary for us to gain greater clarity about the topic.
For example, when you say depicting Queen Linden as a black woman isn't political, I think you mean in a colloquial way something like: we ought to have a consensus that such representation is normal and desirable, that its normalcy is self-evident, and not subject to dispute. And this is exactly where the "devil's advocate" conservative comes in and tries to pick apart at the assumption that it's not political, rationalizing possible objections to the practice to contest its self-evidentiary nature. I prefer to nip this behavior in the bud by acknowledging that the representation is a conscious, intentional choice by WotC to redress the earlier lack of representation in their card art. Yes, this is political and it's not a bad thing that it is. "Politics" doesn't have to be a dirty word here. If you define politics in such a way that its activity is concluded to be pointless (e.g., "people arguing about values that are impossible to resolve"), the definition will be a self-fulfilled prophecy of self-defeat.
In my experience, the best way to deal with devil's advocates is to beat them at their own game. What conservatives hate most about their perception of "liberals" is that their opponents are wishy-washy relativists, unprincipled pragmatists, who assume they're automatically right because "conservatives are dumb" and so on. I have found it effective to disillusion these notions.
Similarly, I would point out that my definition of "systemic racism" comes from sociology. As a science, sociology is interested in natural phenomena in its scope of inquiry such as racial disparity. It's an empirical fact that racial disparity exists and, at the risk of oversimplifying, we say racism is the cause of racial disparity. But what does this mean? The idea that the prejudices of individuals is sufficient to explain racial disparity is not supported by the data. What is supported is the idea of historical forces, economic and institutional, forces that people's actions can contribute to even if their conscious intentions contain nothing of the sort as a goal. This goes against the colloquial definition of racism but again we must defer to the definitions that allow our inquiry to proceed rationally.
Ok, but you can't separate out the causal effect of you as an administrator making pronouncements against political discussion and the expectation within the community that political discussion will not occur.
No policy will result in a utopia where everyone is happy. Some people indeed do not want to see political discussions. I suggested earlier they could block the people having them. I think it's better to leave it up to the forum member's choices than having the staff intervene.
Growing up in school, I remember that it was often the case that children would tattle on one another over every trivial thing. The wisest teachers were the ones who, in most cases, would tell them to resolve their issues on their own to spare themselves an unnecessary workload.
You might end up having to die on that hill unless you can assure me that you're taking actions that will make this possible.
This thread had a digression, although I found it to be useful because it shed clarity on an issue as a case example and it resolved itself and we moved back to the original topic shortly. Maybe my tolerance for digressions is unusually high. This is why I don't want hair-trigger interventions by staff.
"Black lives matter" is an affirmation of the underlying political principle that all lives matter. That all lives matter is something virtually no one would dispute, so the fact that black lives are currently not being treated the same is an inconsistency with the principle, which entails some political change must occur to bring us back into consistency. I don't see the need to die on a hill for this one. Denying that it is political is somewhat counterproductive because it trivializes the severity of the issue. If you said "genocide is bad" is not political while a genocide was occurring, you'd be erasing the political reality that there really are people in the world who want to commit genocide and turning a blind eye to them is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible.
A person does not have to explicitly state that they're part of the KKK to be part of a hate group or use hate speech. They are frequently characterized by the use of dog whistles, which I consider bluelivesmatter to be.
Denying that systemic racism exists against POC is also something I think is hate speech. It has occurred in this thread. And all that is required for people motivated by this hate is to drop inflammatory bombs in random threads for the damage to be done. There is nothing moderators can do directly about this behavior which would satisfy me. But members of the community have the ability to assure one another by coming together to oppose it. That's the thing that's missing from the current picture and you're severely underestimating the value and importance of this quality in making this an inclusive space. That's why I've called for equitable exception to be made for this activity.
I'm speaking from my academic background. I'm sure it probably does feel like mere semantics to you. But I can only say it's something that is of vital, critical importance to me.
Then I suppose my only recourse is to collect evidence. Very well. I still want to get back to some of your earlier requests as well as time allows.
I understand the difficulties involved here but I think it's worth the investment to make this a reality again. I'm sure you derive absolutely no personal enjoyment from having to continue to discuss this issue with me. Tell me your plan so that we can move on.