OK peeps, I am seeing a lot of flamewars lately which go off-topic of this comm. I am also getting dozens of reports about people reporting each other for “rudeness” or “trolling”. I don’t want this comm to start becoming a drama haven, so I want to try and prevent people getting worked up like this.
What do you think about me starting to deploy strategic 1-day bans for people who I notice are getting into flamewars? If not, what else do you suggest to help people remain civil?
Don’t just upvote/downvote. I won’t take these into account, I want actual comments about this to better make a decision.
The amount of trolling and debatemebros keep going up each thread and it looks like people are just trying to start drama here now rather than report actual mod abuse. I’m not sure how you could improve this, it seems like every one of these kinds of communities turn into drama communities with people at each other’s throats each thread lol. I think temp bans would help for the most egregious offenders, but locking threads after a certain timeframe might be better? Considering the comment threads keep going on and on for some of them.
What would that timeframe be though? A week? A month? A day? Ultimately, what would that matter even - why is it bad to respond to something three months later, e.g. asking a follow-up question “was this matter ever resolved - did you manage to get in contact with the admin/mod and what did they say?”
The problem with that approach is that it penalizes people other than the offender (I assume here you mean locking the entire post, not just a comment chain underneath it?), e.g. if you take time to think about the scenario, read it thoroughly, go gather some additional references, type out a reply, and not even necessarily to the person inflaming the conflict but others who happened to respond more quickly, but then bam, your well thought out and crafted message is rejected, bc you did not deliver it quickly enough, and because while you were treating the matter seriously, a flame war was breaking out, but it’s not like a chatroom where you can see the messages coming in live?
It makes sense for the people involved in spreading drama to be affected/penalized, but why discourage discourse elsewhere by others in the community? And all the more so the ones delivered more slowly, while allowing the most hot-headed quick replies to go through before the post can be locked.
Any abuse reporting or appeals system will invite some general “they’re saying things I don’t like” complaining, that’s just human nature for some people. And the fact that this is a open forum makes that a hundred times worse, and makes it harder to keep an outsider perspective.
That said, some people just need to think before typing. I don’t think locking stuff would work on such a small community
I’m ok with a penalty box. Pointless bickering gets this sub off topic. It’s tough because people come here ready to air grievances so I think that pre-charges the atmosphere and makes it that much easier for things to get off the rails
It’s tough because people come here ready to air grievances so I think that pre-charges the atmosphere and makes it that much easier for things to get off the rails
You put in to words what I was struggling to find. People are often already a little charged up when they show up here, that’s the nature of this kind of board.
My suggestion is to warn the user first, and then if they don’t comply a 3d ban. Because:
- Cooperative users are quick to comply, even without punishment.
- It helps to show other users the limit of what’s considered acceptable in the community.
- When people get really worked up, a single day is not enough.
Trolls are a different can of worms. I think that users who are blatantly trolling should be removed = permabanned; there’s no place for those.
[Replying to myself to avoid editing the above again.]
Ah, I propose an explicit rule for this comm: “off-topic is only tolerated if non-divisive, non-derailing, and in the comments”. That gives people some room to chitchat, but would do a quick work of “ackshyually u don’t have rules against flamewars right”.
Well, this is drama heaven because it’s for users who aren’t legible to post in fedidrama (because they’re involved themselves) and then they end up here. And IMO the posts kind of set the tone. You often start out with a negative impression after reading the post, and then you’re likely to be negative. And it doesn’t help that other comments are negative or low quality as well… Then it’s super easy to drop what’s left and just shitpost.
I’m not sure if I want to continue reading anyways. It’s several posts a day of people whining about something they brought upon themselves. Often something completely insignificant like one removed post/comment or a one day time-out from shitposting. And half the people don’t listen or get anything, neither does OP, and the commenters just flame about arbitrary things, or attack each other for their strongly held opinions… I’d say a bit more moderation would be worth a try. But don’t listen to me, I’m probably not the target audience of this community.
People love a good circle jerk, this is a genuine fedi content source, and it serves transparency purposes which other social don’t even have…
People who don’t like can just block it.
So unless bad faith behavior like reporting people endlessly is happening why shut down engagement albeit sometimes low quality
It is rather ironic that sub about mod abuse is getting abused
Hmmm
I think you got it down to the exact issue at hand: Do we want moderated communities, or do we want a free speech platform without limits. I would prefer the former, and I think you’re arguing for the latter. That’s kind of fundamentally incompatible. At least on some levels I can’t see how we’d reach an agreement here. There is one way, and you brought it up, and that’s technical means. Have the software separate us into distinct spaces so I don’t have to read low quality posts, hear people whining about stupid things, and I get just tech-related stuff in a tech community, and all other spam and off-topic ramblings get removed.
I’m not really for unmoderated platforms. We’ve seen several attempts at that fail miserably. And we kind of have 4chan for circle-jerks, you could as well just go there. But I’m liberal. I’d like to just peacfully co-exist with people holding different opinions. If that’s possible.
You can have moderated communities without every community having to cater every user. Personally, I think that’s part of the beauty of federation. Some comms & instances can be locked down and heavily moderated to create “safe spaces”, others can encourage open discussion with minimal moderation.
Short bans are like spritzing a cat in the face. It’s Skinnerian conditioning. It works.
Just make sure the behavior you’re conditioning for is the behavior you want. Trolling doesn’t mean “harsh language.” Trolling is the infuriating nonsense that makes reasonable people reach for harsh language. Sometimes, a rude response is entirely deserved.
Trolling doesn’t mean “harsh language.”
… right. that’s incivility.
Trolling is the infuriating nonsense that makes reasonable people reach for harsh language.
what is the criteria when clear incivility is justified?
Fuck civility. “Be nice or die” is a gift to cautious bastards. It’s a formula for bait.
People need the ability to bluntly call horseshit, when faced with horseshit. Polite phrasing of said horseshit makes it worse. It creates the dynamic of bullying, where an honest response to abuse is treated as justification for that abuse.
Demanding that every response should take ten times more effort, all of which will be ignored, is a rule crafted for trolls. If someone can keep going ‘oh so you mean [not what you said]? wow that’s ridiculous and awful and pushes me further right,’ and any sane reply like ‘shut up, troll’ is what gets banned, then the rules favor and protect fffucking obvious trolling. And yet: that’s what too many moderators choose. Spotting rude language is easier. A forum free of blunt responses feels like you’re helping.
But it’s fundamentally not rewarding honesty, accuracy, or actual constructive conversation. It’s pretending that bad faith doesn’t exist.
oh so you mean [not what you said]
this is the definition of bad faith. just report it.
