Enmos
Valued Senior Member
That's exactly my point.
Perceptions of sciforums moderation
- Thread starter James R
- Start date
- Status
That's exactly my point.
Mrs.Lucysnow
Valued Senior Member
No I think what you have come across here is this growing bias and fear concerning muslims, its a reflection of what's going on in many western nations, its policy and media driven and has affected peoples viewpoints. I think there are members here who try and goad you because you are controversial but I think you are smart and educated enough to know how to deal with these kind of posters.
And yet inspite of the lax moderation here at Sciforums a user was banned after a single post for blatantly anti-muslim hate speech (after the post was deleted).
Even in your own example, Skinwalker himself says "This thread probably should have been closed ages ago. PM me if you have concerns or can make an argument to reopen it."
Even in your own example, Skinwalker himself says "This thread probably should have been closed ages ago. PM me if you have concerns or can make an argument to reopen it."
copernicus66:
I mean to tell you what I write, not your straw-man version of what I write.
Moderators often discuss potentially contentious moderation decisions, often in advance of those decisions being implemented, but also sometimes when a moderator acts in a way that some other moderator or moderators disagree with.
Not every moderator action is reviewed, for the same reason that moderators do not read every single post on the forum. For example, I don't need to read every one of your posts to work out a lot about you. Even in this thread alone you've been repetitive and single-track. Reading one or two of your posts is sufficient to work out where you stand.
In the case of moderators reviewing each other, sometimes this happens when one moderator notices an action by another moderator in the course of reading a thread. Moderators, by the way, can see all deleted posts if they wish, and the reason given for the deletion by the deleting moderator. Also, we review complaints from members. Also, administrators receive all reports, together with the moderators of the forums concerned, so often one or more moderators will review the same member complaint as a matter of course.
There's usually no need. People don't tend to depart radically from one post to the next in their posting style or the issues that they are interested in.
You're trying to wave your penis around and show what an important man you are. It's mostly attention seeking. "Hey! Pay attention to me! I'm the squeakiest wheel on the forum, and I demand oil! Life is so unfair. I was banned in the past at my own request, but now I think that wasn't fair, so I'm back again as a sock puppet. I'm just here to kick up as much fuss as I can, until I become too much trouble and get myself banned. At which point, I'll complain loudly to my friends about what an evil crowd the moderators and admins of sciforums are, and probably return again as a sock puppet to repeat the cycle again when I have some free time. Because it's all about me. Me me look at me!"
Yeah. You're fighting the good fight for the little guy. Do you feel like you're winning?
When I gave you a day off to consider whether you wished to contribute content to sciforums rather than devote yourself to babyish whining about how unfairly treated you have been, I immediately posted a notice to that effect in the appropriate thread in the moderators' forum. That notice explained to the other moderators and admins where I'm at with you. The purpose of doing that was, as usual, (a) to invite comments (if any) about a problem poster and (b) to put the other mods on notice that you'd probably return and try to kick up a stink, because that's the pattern we normally see from the likes of you. Basically, mountainhare (er.. excuse me... coperncus66), the way you're headed you are cruising for your second permaban, and it's unlikely we'll be as accommodating a third time to any future sock puppets of yours.
But I digress. The point here is that I've already "had fun justifying" your one-day enforced think session to the other mods and admins. That fun was had about 2 minutes after I sent you away with some friendly advice. It is a pity you didn't use your time off more productively, but instead chose to brew some more bile.
---
On to other issues...
Lucysnow and Bells made the relevant points eloquently, but I'll try to lay out the relevant considerations for you once more.
First, illegal and immoral activities may be discussed but there are a number of important lines to be drawn.
These lines include the distinction between discussing an illegal or immoral activity and promoting it. We have had many discussions of pedophilia over the years on sciforums. However, there have only been a couple of instances in which particular posters have tried to promote the sexual abuse of children as a desirable thing.
As has often been said by moderators, sciforums is a science-oriented site. When it comes to discussions of politics, religion, social issues and things like sex, we are quite happy for such discussions to proceed. However, there ought to be some element of objectivity involved. Which brings us to...
What kinds of people do we want as sciforums members?
sciforums is an online community. Our explicit mission statement is to maintain sciforums as a site for intelligent discussion. In a rough sense, this means we expect people to be willing to consider all sides of an issue or topic. It is probably fair to say that most of the problem posters we get here are single-minded, one-issue "preachers" of one form or another. Somewhere along the way, these people have lost their ability to even see the other side of the argument on their pet topic - or else they never had that ability in the first place. And so they stick doggedly to their guns, ignoring or evading all arguments or questions put to them, wanting only to preach their point of view. Such people are not interested in actual debate or discussion. What they want is a platform or soapbox from which to belt out their point of view to anybody who chances on their many same-topic threads.
While all soapbox preaching tends to become tedious after a while, some brands are more of a worry than others. We make no apologies for taking a particularly hard line on those who come here only to insult others or to troll (i.e. provoke angry reactions and to start flame wars). We make no apologies for taking a hard line on hate-mongers of various persuasions - e.g, racists, sexists and other kinds of bigots.
If there's a common theme here it's probably that we don't want people who wish harm on others, either directly or indirectly. We do not wish to provide a forum for such people to promote the view that the harm they advocate is acceptable or required, or to provide a forum where such people can directly take action that may result in harm to other people.
In the particular case of pedophilia, the harms to children of child sexual abuse are well documented, so we don't want pedophiles plying their wares on sciforums.
I think what you want is anarchyforums, not sciforums. I strongly urge you to start your own forum with an unlimited free speech policy and see how it goes. The experience will be illuminating for you, I guarantee. I don't think you'll find any existing forums on the internet with such a policy, for good reason. But, if you do happen to find one, please let me know. You and I can assess the quality of that forum together.
Do not expect to see unlimited free speech any time soon on sciforums. As I said, we want to maintain sciforums as a forum for intelligent discussion, and not as a forum for dropkicks of all persuasions to shout from their respective soapboxes.
You're conflating two separate issues here, either naively or in a dishonest way - I can't tell.
Discussion about how the law might be changed are perfectly legitimate here. On the other hand, discussions about how to break the law are almost invariably vetoed. For example, we immediately delete any threads discussing bomb-making recipes or details of the manufacture of illegal drugs.
We have had various threads where members have discussed their own illegal drug use. These mostly do not explicitly involve the promotion of drug use to others. There are lines to be drawn here, and this is one of the areas where moderator judgment is required.
But "society" does sanction people who engage in such behaviour, and quite heavily at that. And "society" is also quite concerned about the advocating of such behaviour. Just pick up a newspaper or watch a real current-affairs TV show and chances are that the issue will come up fairly regularly. Consider, for example, the recent fracas in Australia concerning artist/photographer Bill Henson.
As for sciforums, we are not "society" as a whole. Nor are we obliged to conform to some "average" of society as a whole. The administrators and moderators choose what kind of a site we want, and moderate accordingly. Regular members have input into what kind of a site they want too, since after all they create it. All moderators do is set boundaries, and even those are often set in consultation with the members.
There's no explicit rule that members can't advocate pedophilia, just as there is no explicit rule that members can't call for the destruction of Israel or that all black people ought to be shot. What we have instead is a set of posting guidelines. Those guidelines give a general account and some specific tips on what is and is not acceptable on sciforums. However, the best guide to what is and is not acceptable is the forum itself.
I'd advise any new member joining any internet forum to sit back for a while and watch what goes on. And that's good advice not just for the internet, but for any society or social group you're coming into from outside. As a newbie, you need to get a feel for what the group does and does not accept, so you don't put your foot in it by saying or doing the wrong thing.
I'm surprised that you have not already learned this lesson in your "real" life, copernicus66.
Now, theoretically, the moderators/admins here could maintain an ever-expanding list of specific examples of kinds of posts and threads that we will not allow. We could just add examples as they come up. What that would mean is that members would have to navigate a larger and larger ruleset over time, and new members would be drowned in minutiae.
Instead, as an intelligent community, we ask that members use their brains when they post. Read the guidelines. Observe when and why people get moderated. Don't do what they did. It's not that hard.
It appears to me that a few members would either prefer not to or are actually incapable of operating in the absence of specific, minute, point-form restrictions on their posting. The reason that we haven't set such a course of rules and regulations so far is again tied to the kind of community we want here. If you can't cope, please feel free to find somewhere else where all your doubts are assuaged and you don't have to think any more - that's if such a forum exists. No doubt you'll sink to your own level of incompetence one way or another.
And remember also: be careful of what you wish for, because you might get it.
I mean to tell you what I write, not your straw-man version of what I write.
Moderators often discuss potentially contentious moderation decisions, often in advance of those decisions being implemented, but also sometimes when a moderator acts in a way that some other moderator or moderators disagree with.
Not every moderator action is reviewed, for the same reason that moderators do not read every single post on the forum. For example, I don't need to read every one of your posts to work out a lot about you. Even in this thread alone you've been repetitive and single-track. Reading one or two of your posts is sufficient to work out where you stand.
In the case of moderators reviewing each other, sometimes this happens when one moderator notices an action by another moderator in the course of reading a thread. Moderators, by the way, can see all deleted posts if they wish, and the reason given for the deletion by the deleting moderator. Also, we review complaints from members. Also, administrators receive all reports, together with the moderators of the forums concerned, so often one or more moderators will review the same member complaint as a matter of course.
There's usually no need. People don't tend to depart radically from one post to the next in their posting style or the issues that they are interested in.
You're trying to wave your penis around and show what an important man you are. It's mostly attention seeking. "Hey! Pay attention to me! I'm the squeakiest wheel on the forum, and I demand oil! Life is so unfair. I was banned in the past at my own request, but now I think that wasn't fair, so I'm back again as a sock puppet. I'm just here to kick up as much fuss as I can, until I become too much trouble and get myself banned. At which point, I'll complain loudly to my friends about what an evil crowd the moderators and admins of sciforums are, and probably return again as a sock puppet to repeat the cycle again when I have some free time. Because it's all about me. Me me look at me!"
Yeah. You're fighting the good fight for the little guy. Do you feel like you're winning?
When I gave you a day off to consider whether you wished to contribute content to sciforums rather than devote yourself to babyish whining about how unfairly treated you have been, I immediately posted a notice to that effect in the appropriate thread in the moderators' forum. That notice explained to the other moderators and admins where I'm at with you. The purpose of doing that was, as usual, (a) to invite comments (if any) about a problem poster and (b) to put the other mods on notice that you'd probably return and try to kick up a stink, because that's the pattern we normally see from the likes of you. Basically, mountainhare (er.. excuse me... coperncus66), the way you're headed you are cruising for your second permaban, and it's unlikely we'll be as accommodating a third time to any future sock puppets of yours.
But I digress. The point here is that I've already "had fun justifying" your one-day enforced think session to the other mods and admins. That fun was had about 2 minutes after I sent you away with some friendly advice. It is a pity you didn't use your time off more productively, but instead chose to brew some more bile.
---
On to other issues...
Lucysnow and Bells made the relevant points eloquently, but I'll try to lay out the relevant considerations for you once more.
First, illegal and immoral activities may be discussed but there are a number of important lines to be drawn.
These lines include the distinction between discussing an illegal or immoral activity and promoting it. We have had many discussions of pedophilia over the years on sciforums. However, there have only been a couple of instances in which particular posters have tried to promote the sexual abuse of children as a desirable thing.
As has often been said by moderators, sciforums is a science-oriented site. When it comes to discussions of politics, religion, social issues and things like sex, we are quite happy for such discussions to proceed. However, there ought to be some element of objectivity involved. Which brings us to...
What kinds of people do we want as sciforums members?
sciforums is an online community. Our explicit mission statement is to maintain sciforums as a site for intelligent discussion. In a rough sense, this means we expect people to be willing to consider all sides of an issue or topic. It is probably fair to say that most of the problem posters we get here are single-minded, one-issue "preachers" of one form or another. Somewhere along the way, these people have lost their ability to even see the other side of the argument on their pet topic - or else they never had that ability in the first place. And so they stick doggedly to their guns, ignoring or evading all arguments or questions put to them, wanting only to preach their point of view. Such people are not interested in actual debate or discussion. What they want is a platform or soapbox from which to belt out their point of view to anybody who chances on their many same-topic threads.
While all soapbox preaching tends to become tedious after a while, some brands are more of a worry than others. We make no apologies for taking a particularly hard line on those who come here only to insult others or to troll (i.e. provoke angry reactions and to start flame wars). We make no apologies for taking a hard line on hate-mongers of various persuasions - e.g, racists, sexists and other kinds of bigots.
If there's a common theme here it's probably that we don't want people who wish harm on others, either directly or indirectly. We do not wish to provide a forum for such people to promote the view that the harm they advocate is acceptable or required, or to provide a forum where such people can directly take action that may result in harm to other people.
In the particular case of pedophilia, the harms to children of child sexual abuse are well documented, so we don't want pedophiles plying their wares on sciforums.
I think what you want is anarchyforums, not sciforums. I strongly urge you to start your own forum with an unlimited free speech policy and see how it goes. The experience will be illuminating for you, I guarantee. I don't think you'll find any existing forums on the internet with such a policy, for good reason. But, if you do happen to find one, please let me know. You and I can assess the quality of that forum together.
Do not expect to see unlimited free speech any time soon on sciforums. As I said, we want to maintain sciforums as a forum for intelligent discussion, and not as a forum for dropkicks of all persuasions to shout from their respective soapboxes.
You're conflating two separate issues here, either naively or in a dishonest way - I can't tell.
Discussion about how the law might be changed are perfectly legitimate here. On the other hand, discussions about how to break the law are almost invariably vetoed. For example, we immediately delete any threads discussing bomb-making recipes or details of the manufacture of illegal drugs.
We have had various threads where members have discussed their own illegal drug use. These mostly do not explicitly involve the promotion of drug use to others. There are lines to be drawn here, and this is one of the areas where moderator judgment is required.
But "society" does sanction people who engage in such behaviour, and quite heavily at that. And "society" is also quite concerned about the advocating of such behaviour. Just pick up a newspaper or watch a real current-affairs TV show and chances are that the issue will come up fairly regularly. Consider, for example, the recent fracas in Australia concerning artist/photographer Bill Henson.
As for sciforums, we are not "society" as a whole. Nor are we obliged to conform to some "average" of society as a whole. The administrators and moderators choose what kind of a site we want, and moderate accordingly. Regular members have input into what kind of a site they want too, since after all they create it. All moderators do is set boundaries, and even those are often set in consultation with the members.
There's no explicit rule that members can't advocate pedophilia, just as there is no explicit rule that members can't call for the destruction of Israel or that all black people ought to be shot. What we have instead is a set of posting guidelines. Those guidelines give a general account and some specific tips on what is and is not acceptable on sciforums. However, the best guide to what is and is not acceptable is the forum itself.
I'd advise any new member joining any internet forum to sit back for a while and watch what goes on. And that's good advice not just for the internet, but for any society or social group you're coming into from outside. As a newbie, you need to get a feel for what the group does and does not accept, so you don't put your foot in it by saying or doing the wrong thing.
I'm surprised that you have not already learned this lesson in your "real" life, copernicus66.
Now, theoretically, the moderators/admins here could maintain an ever-expanding list of specific examples of kinds of posts and threads that we will not allow. We could just add examples as they come up. What that would mean is that members would have to navigate a larger and larger ruleset over time, and new members would be drowned in minutiae.
Instead, as an intelligent community, we ask that members use their brains when they post. Read the guidelines. Observe when and why people get moderated. Don't do what they did. It's not that hard.
It appears to me that a few members would either prefer not to or are actually incapable of operating in the absence of specific, minute, point-form restrictions on their posting. The reason that we haven't set such a course of rules and regulations so far is again tied to the kind of community we want here. If you can't cope, please feel free to find somewhere else where all your doubts are assuaged and you don't have to think any more - that's if such a forum exists. No doubt you'll sink to your own level of incompetence one way or another.
And remember also: be careful of what you wish for, because you might get it.
I think you went too far with the windbag thing. I also think Lucysnow went too far, but it's to be expected; I hold some exceptionally unpopular views and thus it is 'ok' for her and others to do so.
As a matter of fact, I've just been warned by James that if I continue to try to 'hijack' threads, apparently by simply responding to people who bring up my views or their perceptions of them concerning adult/minor attractions, that I will be banned for a month, and if I come back and respond again, I will be banned permanently.
What's more, I am not even allowed to take any discussion to PM; somehow James thinks I would use this as a 'meeting place' for people who hold similar views to mine; he doesn't seem to realize that this is a rather poor place to meet people with similar views; for that, one need only go to the various forums that support adults who are attracted to minors.
I have now asked if I can atleast offer my email address via PM; we'll see whether James allows atleast that.
Sciencelovah
Registered Senior Member
I hope you wouldn't find it odd, but I'm going to steal it from draqon in your visitor message:
~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~
James R.! Compliments to you my master! May your days be long and prosperous.
I bow to my majesty and pray for his good health.
~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~o~
;-D
A single post? Not likely. I could link gazillions other posts that have not been deleted. The funny thing, of course, is that now its much better. When I came here two years ago, the freedom to treat theists like shit was upheld most ardently (except Jews, that is, mustn't ever say anything about Jews).
And I bet his comment has nothing to do with the fact that Muslims were being targeted in that thread, since unlike the Fitna thread where he deleted even our on-topic posts, he found nothing to moderate in that thread.
Last edited:
SAM, you should know if it was up to me personally you'd never have any Anti-Muslim threads, just like there would be no Anti-American ones however thats sort of level of moderation would probably kill this place (Well the World Events forum anyhow)
As moderator, I generally ended up not acting unless I got complaints, so it all depended on who complained.
Again, if that was consistent, there would be no problem.
However, James is quick to jump in on his own account and lock threads and delete posts which he does not agree with and you can mostly lump them under Jews, Jews, Jews, race, maybe some insults/
However, even after reporting, he won't delete or lock threads if he thinks its okay to rail against those groups (which mostly go under Muslims).
No it was a problem because then some group would come up and say that I was bias, when the problem was they did not complain as much as their opponents.
You just got to accept it, the jews control everything, this forum, the Internets, all links back to the 5 Jewish bankers, in outspace.
There other groups here who also claim oppression, like the anti-evolutionist, pedophiles, etc.
I think all groups are equivalent to each other on the internet, I think anyone should be given the opportunity to say what they want within the rules provided. May argument was that Muslims are not so special, and that any group of provocative people claims viticumhood and maltreatment, wither it real or not.
Like I said everyone is equivalent to everyone else in my book.
They are not in Gitmo because they are muslim, being muslim is circumstantial.
Its circumstantial in pretty much every country the colonial cousins are occupying nowadays.
Just like its circumstantial that threads about Muslims are not moderated on sciforums, except to eliminate/misrepresent the POV of Muslims.
i disagree.
freedom of speech comes with the price of responsibility.
yes, a person can say whatever they want but they must be held accountable for their words
Equivalent in what way?
- Status