Censorship on the boards

[pogokat]

some people are upset:

 

lets hammer out whatever is bothering you guys here...go for it, and maybe we'll get some good opinions form all around

[strawbossisevil]

People come to this site to post their thoughts.

 

Unless you have two threads with exactly the same content (f.e. Trade Jenkins) or contains inappropriate comments or language, I see no reason why a thread should be closed.

 

As far as Brewer Fever's post. There was no real thread started about Durrington and Macgruder's role on our team and how we should have improved in that regard. It's a decent topic to bring up. Especially since there is opportunity for different opinions, like my own, that our best prospects are best served playing everyday than once or twice a week. But because someone decided to close a perfectly good thread, I wasn't able to hash out my thoughts on the subject and that is plain annoying.

 

Its the moderator's job to police these threads. It is not their job to decide who's conversation is worthy to be on the site, and who's isn't. That's the elitist attitude that many want to see removed from this site.

[1992casey]

I think the moderators here do a fine job. I would have a couple small requests, though.

1. When a thread is locked, giving a brief reason why might help a similar situation from happening in the future. That happens most of the time, but it should be the practice all the time.

2. When a thread is locked because it's a duplicate, making it a practice to always link to the thread with current discussion would be extremely helpful. Sometimes thread titles don't make their subject matter all that apparent. One thread was locked recently with only these words: "Locked, dupe." That would be enough to throw a newbie and could unintentionally imply elitism.

I see tonight's thread or threads in question have been removed, so I can't quote exactly what was said that struck me. I'll try to paraphrase, though. A member suggested something like "there should be several venting threads." That's exactly the kind of thing moderators should want to prevent, and Brewerfan.net's mods do an excellent job of doing that.

[strawbossisevil]

I will say that tonight was more of an exception, than how this site is normally run.

 

Normally I haven't seen too many threads shot down with legitimate material in which people had put legitimate effort into producing.

 

Tonight however seemed to cross a line and that's why I piped up. I can imagine just how frustrating it would be for someone to consider my posts as not being worthwhile enough to keep around for further posts, and I can imagine that the majority of those in charge here at BF.net would not like to treat others with that disregard.

 

I guess, my thought is this. You have the power as moderators to lock and close threads and there are definitly times you should use it (f.e. when I started a second game thread one min. after another member). Just use a little more thought and judgement next time when doing so.

 

P.S. Thanks for all that you do for keeping this site, clean and family friendly. You are all to be commended for that.

[Brian the Automator]

I just got home tonight, so I wasn't able to see the fireworks outside of the in-game thread.

 

Let me just mention the fact that moderating's a very tough job, and since it's often a judgement call, is definately open to scrutiny.

 

With that said, perhaps we should develop several "canned" phrases we can use when locking down threads or deleting posts. That way, if a moderator's really irked, a message won't come off as "short" or "elitist".

 

This forum has grown by an alarming rate over the past year, and every high and low in the season is amplified. Every 4 game losing streak is the end of the world, and every time the team strings a couple of wins together, wild card mania sets in. While the enthusiasm and interest is appreciated, I urge every one to keep level heads when writing posts. I find myself often with several posts and replies that I decide never to post because they're rash and/or in the heat of an argument.

 

The posters who've earned the most respect (I think) are the ones who take the high road... not "fighting fire with fire". These things escalate horribly out of control in a hurry, and what's even worse is that writing electronic messages doesn't allow for voice inflection or nonverbal types of communication that makes things more clear.

 

These are just things to keep in mind as you go about your day-to-day posting. I think we have a maturity level here that few other forums get (for the most part). I'd really like to keep the site a place for well-thought out discussions rather than knee-jerk posts and "flame war 2005".

 

None of us get paid for this gig, so let's take it easy on the moderators. That's not to say that if you don't have a legitimate concern you shouldn't raise it (which was done politely in this post, and I appreciate it), but we're human beings... and we need to make judgement calls to make sure threads don't spiral out of control and escalate into forest fires which infect subsequent threads.

 

Thanks for reading this, and thanks for making Brewerfan.net successful and an awesome way to waste time. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

[nullbyte]

Brian, maybe you can petition the ezboard people to implement some self-policing features. If a post gets 5 (or 10 or whatever) votes, it gets automatically canned. You know, something like:

 

o This is a duplicate thread

o This post is stupid, delete it

o Cuss words!

o Fake cuss words!

o This poster is a dingleberry, tempban him

 

Ok, ok, so this is all tongue-in-cheek http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif But it would be a nice feature.

[brewerjamie15]

I'd like to applaud the fine job that the moderators do for this site. These moderators are often the same folks who contribute to BF.Net's success with great articles, and informative posts.

I realize that knowing when to "step-in" or "ease off" requires a delicate touch especially when dealing with almost 2,000 users.

I think that people need to be more cognisent of that fact and not be insulted if they had started a thread that was locked or deleted because of an odd turn the thread took.

Brian mentioned that it's easy to misinterpret someone's post, which is something we all need to keep in mind. Honestly, it's easy to take something the wrong way and then get defensive.

One other way a post can get quickly shut down is when a poster decides to flat out insult another person, or be condescending at the very least. These people not only appear foolish to the individual that was insulted, but they appear foolish to the entire board, so why not just disregard them and let silence be your reply?

 

One thing I'd like to mention along with the previous thoughts is this:

I once saw it said that "If you don't want your 5 year old saying a word, don't post it here."

Could having the word "pissed" added to the curse filter be considered?

 

Thanks guys. I appreciate the efforts of the Moderators and Brian (especially Brian) and I appreciate the fine conversation by all of you here.

[Brewer Fever]

I was told the topic was "venting thread-ish" when it was locked.

 

The topic was about the significant playing time Magruder was getting in terms of ABs in key situations. I began to go into depth about Brewers reserves over the years, and how we continually give important roles to retreads. Hardly a one-liner rant.

 

The danger with having a "venting thread" is that it seems any topic than slants negative get looped into that conversation and in turn gets locked. Without analyzing the thread, I see it has already happenned today.

 

I will say this. When things are going well for the Crew, the board swells with enthusiasm. As a result countless retread topics appear on the positive side as well. "3rd base is really not a sore spot", "Dana Eveland could be the 5th starter we need to put us over the top". It seems rehash threads that are positive are allowed to stack up and remain repetitive without restriction.

 

My sense is that the staff here tends to frown on negativity and welcome any postive topics even if repetitive. Well, after 12 straight losing seasons, it's kind of ridiculous not to expect negative issues to be at the forefront of people's minds. Given the Brewers track record, how can a serious message forum expect all negativity to be condensed into one thread. It gives me the impression that this site is steering less for the fans, and more for impressing the Brewers organization with a "rah-rah" atmosphere.

 

I have no problem seeing a one-line blanket rant being locked and re-directed. My topic was comprised of historical data and stats...far from a one-liner. Maybe the mods need to be instructed on what is a meaningful conversation and what is a rant that adds nothing.

 

Finally, I had a hard time seeing my thread banished while posters around the board go about insulting people's intelligence and sobriety unfettered. When I protested my thread's demise, I had a poster characterize me as a drunk. I haven't had a drop to drink in years, don't do drugs and by all means am an upstanding citizen. I did however get worked up about censorship. I just think its odd when perfectly legitimate topics get policed while mindless insults fly under the radar. Not really consistent with the intelligent conversation we are told is the goal here.

[Brian the Automator]

[ My sense is that the staff here tends to frown on negativity and welcome any postive topics even if repetitive. ]

 

I think the case here is that you get more repetitive negative topics than positive ones. I know i've closed down a few "player X is hot" threads because there were other ones going.

 

Now, unfortunately, I wasn't able to view your specific thread because it was deleted before I got a chance to read it. What I _did_ see from you was a post that said "FU to the person who deleted this" (or something to that effect). That's against the rules of the board, and no matter how upset you were, we can't have that. I also saw some posts in the "Back to my own self" thread that I had to delete as well, because they were protests about a previous thread deletion. In the future, these things need to be taken up with the moderators or in a post on the Issues forum, rather than a passive-agressive style of protest.

 

Again, I can't comment on what happened last night, because I came in after things were deleted... I saw that you and pogokat had some type of dialogue, so I'm hoping things were hashed out.

[Brewer Fever]

I just want to add that a got a private message from the person who locked the thread. It included an apology and I appreciate and respect that. I'm glad I protested. I regret the way in which I protested, but nonetheless it needed to be a loud protest in order to bring the issue to attention. I think my post above has some validity and I hope to see this board at the very least slam on the brakes down the slippery slope its heading. Personally I'd like to see somewhat of a reversal, since a single, "negativity" thread is going too far already. Time will tell.

[Brian the Automator]

[ Personally I'd like to see somewhat of a reversal, since a single, "negativity" thread is going too far already. Time will tell. ]

 

I think that's an over-generalization. It's a "venting" thread, not a "negativity" thread. While venting IS a form of negativity, not all negativity is venting.

 

Venting is:

subject: ARRRGH!

body: "AARRRGHH.... I CANT TAKE IT NO MORE!$!$"

 

Negativity is:

subject: Changes in the rotation?

body: Brewers have now lost X games in the wild card hunt. X pitcher has now had X many bad starts in a row. Perhaps it's time to insert player X and X in the rotation, as player X has been getting shelled as well.

 

In between those two is the gray area where i've asked the moderators to use their judgement. If your thread was more type B than type A, I apologize (and it sounds like this particular moderator already did). When i'm available to moderate, i'll also do my best to make sure others don't do things like call you a "drunk", as that's certainly not appropriate either.

[ja002h]

It started out fine, then took a "I refuse to spend a cent while those idiots are Brewers" turn.

[Katuluu]

Exactly what is the slippery slope that Brewerfan is heading down?

[Brewer Fever]

Exactly what is the slippery slope that Brewerfan is heading down?

 

4 words...

 

topic of this thread

[Brian the Automator]

[ 4 words...

 

topic of this thread ]

 

That implies that censorship is ALWAYS a bad thing, doesn't it?

[Brewer Fever]

When censorship targets "judgement" calls...yes it's a bad thing.

[Katuluu]

So was it censorship when they deleted your's and lithium's trolling?

[Katuluu]

When censorship targets "judgement" calls...yes it's a bad thing.

 

You are going to need to expound on this further. You seem to be implying that the mods specifically targeted you, which is a slippery slope in it's own right.

[Brian the Automator]

[ When censorship targets "judgement" calls...yes it's a bad thing. ]

 

Outside of a pre-determined set of "naughty" words, isn't EVERYTHING a judgement call?

[Brewer Fever]

So was it censorship when they deleted your's and lithium's trolling?

 

You can simply read through this thread to see that the thread that was deleted was far from trolling. The moderator who deleted it has apologized and admitted as much.

If you aren't aware of the entirety of what took place, you'd probably be well-served to refrain from labeling those involved.

[Brewer Fever]

Outside of a pre-determined set of "naughty" words, isn't EVERYTHING a judgement call?

 

You just made my point. Censorship should be limited to concrete and specified targets. Judgement should not play a role. I'm a student fresh out of a Constitutional Law course. Our Constitution keeps grey areas and judgement calls out of the reach of censorship.

 

Anything that is a judgement call, should be kept away from censorship. That's precisely a slippery slope.

[Brian the Automator]

[ You just made my point. Censorship should be limited to concrete and specified targets. Judgement should not play a role. I'm a student fresh out of a Constitutional Law course. Our Constitution keeps grey arwas and judgement calls out of the reach of censorship.

 

Anything that is a judgement call, should be kept away from censorship. That's precisely a slippery slope. ]

 

This isn't America. This is Brewerfan.net.

 

We've been doing this since 2001, and for the most part and until recently, people were civil. I fully believe it's been our rules and the type of moderation we do here that has kept this site successful. If we limit peoples' "freedom" in the name of preventing anarchy, that's what we're going to do.

 

There are other places where the rules aren't so strict, and I think it's because those rules aren't so strict that people have come here.

[Katuluu]

You can simply read through this thread to see that the thread that was deleted was far from trolling. The moderator who deleted it has apologized and admitted as much. If you aren't aware of the entirety of what took place, you'd probably be well-served to refrain from labeling those involved.

 

I was there for the entire epsiode, and the thread lithium started was quickly turned into a trolling thread that you directly contributed too. You'd be well-served to not deny actions that others know to be true.

[Katuluu]

Brian is absolutely right. This website is a private organization, and as such it has the right to restrict whatever speech it chooses. You can even look it up in the Constitution.

[Brewer Fever]

And that is rapidly why the quality of this site is weakening in my opinion. Censorship is on the rise here. And that to me is a negative when it's directed at judgement calls. It's sad actually. Almost as sad as the response I got that this is brewerfan.net, we run this ship they way we want, not the way America is run.