I got banned from a thread

Moderation is fairness. I hadn’t used the report function before the ban (I was bought up not to be a grass), perhaps I should have. I don’t think the mods have a wide enough perspective to see the troubling parts of that discussion. I’m loathe to say bias, but it kind of is.

EDIT : what I’m trying to say is, if I got banned then others should have been too.
 
And just to be perfectly upfront about it, I'd highlight in particular the comment made to Suedey from Tesco.

It's a powerful and divisive topic and people are going to use inflammatory language, but if you're going to take action against one person for it then it needs to be applied to others.
 
I think the way the thread was framed with the post at the beginning made it clear that this was such a sensitive issue that normal Moopy rules didn’t apply, so I’m not surprised mods took action once the ‘fuck yous’ started appearing - what can be said in response to that? I see why gggggg is upset though and I don’t think being banned from the thread was a proportional response. I think a good resolution is that we just hit the reset button on this and everyone just agrees not to swear and get personal in that thread from now.

btw since this is getting so many views I just want to remind everyone that’s it my birthday next Tuesday xxx
 
Suomi said:
I think the way the thread was framed with the post at the beginning made it clear that this was such a sensitive issue that normal Moopy rules didn’t apply, so I’m not surprised mods took action once the ‘fuck yous’ started appearing - what can be said in response to that? I see why gggggg is upset though and I don’t think being banned from the thread was a proportional response. I think a good resolution is that we just hit the reset button on this and everyone just agrees not to swear and get personal in that thread from now.

btw since this is getting so many views I just want to remind everyone that’s it my birthday next Tuesday xxx
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C U Next Tuesday!
 
gggggg said:
Moderation is fairness. I hadn’t used the report function before the ban (I was bought up not to be a grass), perhaps I should have. I don’t think the mods have a wide enough perspective to see the troubling parts of that discussion. I’m loathe to say bias, but it kind of is.

EDIT : what I’m trying to say is, if I got banned then others should have been too.
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Everything is a learning curve isn't it. Going forward we can use the report function to give the mods some of our perspective.
 
Kate said:
There's a difference between someone saying "fuck you" in a disagreement about your favourite Kylie album and someone saying it in this extremely sensitive and emotive topic. The initial thread was closed due to personal attacks and it was made very clear in the first post of the new thread that they would not be tolerated again. I posted a reminder of this shortly before the comment in question.
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Then why did you just give a verbal warning to Tesco who made a far more personal attack on Suede?
 
Sorry, I see that’s already been brought up- didn’t head to the last page…
 
funky said:
.The thread is about the war - it’s in the thread title - which happened after the Hamas attack. There is no attempt by ANYONE in that thread to belittle or dismiss the Hamas attack,
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That’s not entirely true though. Not to point fingers at anyone but that’s not how the discussion went in the first pages of the original topic.

At one point it was even pointed out what bad taste it was to be at a rave party next to the Gaza border.
 
Star said:
This is a productive post. Thank you. Anyone else got thoughts like this for the mod team to consider?
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It might be worth highlighting Moopy's anti-bullying policy which sets out the steps that should be taken if there is "extreme and personally offensive messages about posters, celebrities or members of the public that is likely to cause distress if read by them". This is pinned in the Forum Forum.

"The Admin/Mod team will:

1. consider any Report submitted and determine whether they believe the Report to be genuine
2. engage privately with the poster who has posted the offensive material, warn them informally and/or formally and encourage them to remove the offensive wording from their post(s)."

There are further steps that can be taken after this discussion under the policy, but I would have thought that would normally be the first step.
 
RaspberrySwirl said:
That’s not entirely true though. Not to point fingers at anyone but that’s not how the discussion went in the first pages of the original topic.

At one point it was even pointed out what bad taste it was to be at a rave party next to the Gaza border.
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Fair enough I don’t think I was involved in the thread much at the beginning and I’m sure the thread title was changed when it became about the war.
 
I feel I ought to hold my hand up and say that I should have reported that post directed at Suedey when i first saw it, soon after it was made. I think I sort of thought it wasn't my responsibility to, which of course isn't the case if you're a part of a community. I apologise to Suedey (and anyone else upset by it) for that.

Plus of course it sends a message to the mods and admin about what the rest of us may be feeling about something. Ultimately they are just posters trying to pick their way through this with the best intentions as well.
 
Star said:
If the mods get it wrong, which they will at times, let's tell them nicely what we want.
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Which we have. And nothing has been done thus far.

This is not about having a go at the mods, but I reserve the right to have a go at the decision.
 
can I just point out I hadn’t been engaged with privately or otherwise by the mods before the ban or after, or given a right of reply.
 
Well I guess this thread is my right of reply, so scratch that
 
I've been in the business of online moderation for +15 years and I would not personally ban users in the HEAT OF THE MOMENT (particularly, as established, for something that can happen elsewhere in the forum without people battling an eyelid).

In smaller communities like this, particularly when people know each other in real life or have long-standing friendships, cliques, biases and double standards in the way people are treated are going to inevitably develop. This is not to say MODS ARE AWFUL, but rather MODS ARE HUMAN, it happens to all of us. I get it wrong all the time in my line of work and I have been called up about it by RANDOS ON THE INTERNET and yeah IT'S QUITE HUMBLING.

What is a sign of a healthy community is whether it is able to afford the appropriate channels for people to have their voices heard and judged appropriately, and to learn from any mistakes.
 
Star said:
Absolutely so, but let's give them a reasonable timescaleto rectify. Poor indie is probably fighting off volcanic eruptions at the moment.
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Haven’t a number of mods replied to this thread already? There’s at least four reading it from what I can see…
 
lolly said:
I feel I ought to hold my hand up and say that I should have reported that post directed at Suedey when i first saw it, soon after it was made. I think I sort of thought it wasn't my responsibility to, which of course isn't the case if you're a part of a community. I apologise to Suedey (and anyone else upset by it) for that.

Plus of course it sends a message to the mods and admin about what the rest of us may be feeling about something. Ultimately they are just posters trying to pick their way through this with the best intentions as well.
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There's definitely a conversation to be had about how other users act when they see a post made that could offend (or in this case very visibly offends) another user. I didn't challenge it either, and mods can't be expected to be present in all threads at all times.

And I don't mean to attack Tesco here; it's a tense thread and strong opinions and feelings are going to emerge.
 
Star said:
Absolutely so, but let's give them a reasonable timescale to rectify. Poor indie is probably fighting off volcanic eruptions at the moment.
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Yes, we're talking about it but I want to make sure we're all given a chance to see and reassess, so tomorrow morning is the earliest we'll have a decision either way.

gggggg said:
can I just point out I hadn’t been engaged with privately or otherwise by the mods before the ban or after, or given a right of reply.
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I had drafted a message to send you and was running it past the other mods when you started this thread, so I just posted the general gist of it in here, since the discussion was happening in the open anyway.
 
I gave Tesco two verbal warnings because he made accusations and generalisations about Suedehead's motivations in the thread that I felt (and I'm sure the other mods agree) were disproportionate and potentially inflammatory. Had he continued, I'm sure he would have been removed from the thread as well.

I totally take into account that unconscious biases exist and we might not pick up on everything, but I'm sorry, in a thread that we are desperately trying to keep as civil as possible, I just don't see how telling a poster to go fuck themselves isn't a blatant provocation. You may chalk it up to the rough and tumble of Moopy, but in a discussion as sensitive as this one, when we have repeatedly called for posters to be civil with each other, it wasn't a constructive contribution and the only likely outcome was that the conversation would spiral further into nastiness.

Perhaps we should have temporarily locked the post again instead of banning gggggg, but I'm sure that wouldn't have sat well with everybody either.
 
It's probably important to remember that the voices in that thread are overwhelming pro-Palestine so it's very easy to feel ganged up on and be perceived as a villain.
 
VoR said:
I gave Tesco two verbal warnings because he made accusations and generalisations about Suedehead's motivations in the thread that I felt (and I'm sure the other mods agree) were disproportionate and potentially inflammatory. Had he continued, I'm sure he would have been removed from the thread as well.

I totally take into account that unconscious biases exist and we might not pick up on everything, but I'm sorry, in a thread that we are desperately trying to keep as civil as possible, I just don't see how telling a poster to go fuck themselves isn't a blatant provocation. You may chalk it up to the rough and tumble of Moopy, but in a discussion as sensitive as this one, when we have repeatedly called for posters to be civil with each other, it wasn't a constructive contribution and the only likely outcome was that the conversation would spiral further into nastiness.

Perhaps we should have temporarily locked the post again instead of banning gggggg, but I'm sure that wouldn't have sat well with everybody either.
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Can I ask if @gggggg was given the same verbal warnings before the ban occurred?
 
VoR said:
I gave Tesco two verbal warnings because he made accusations and generalisations about Suedehead's motivations in the thread that I felt (and I'm sure the other mods agree) were disproportionate and potentially inflammatory. Had he continued, I'm sure he would have been removed from the thread as well.

I totally take into account that unconscious biases exist and we might not pick up on everything, but I'm sorry, in a thread that we are desperately trying to keep as civil as possible, I just don't see how telling a poster to go fuck themselves isn't a blatant provocation. You may chalk it up to the rough and tumble of Moopy, but in a discussion as sensitive as this one, when we have repeatedly called for posters to be civil with each other, it wasn't a constructive contribution and the only likely outcome was that the conversation would spiral further into nastiness.

Perhaps we should have temporarily locked the post again instead of banning gggggg, but I'm sure that wouldn't have sat well with everybody either.
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Yet warning someone once and it being ignored isn’t worth a ban?

COME ON! It’s just siding with the voice that suits your own. Total censorship.
 
VoR said:
I gave Tesco two verbal warnings because he made accusations and generalisations about Suedehead's motivations in the thread that I felt (and I'm sure the other mods agree) were disproportionate and potentially inflammatory. Had he continued, I'm sure he would have been removed from the thread as well.

I totally take into account that unconscious biases exist and we might not pick up on everything, but I'm sorry, in a thread that we are desperately trying to keep as civil as possible, I just don't see how telling a poster to go fuck themselves isn't a blatant provocation. You may chalk it up to the rough and tumble of Moopy, but in a discussion as sensitive as this one, when we have repeatedly called for posters to be civil with each other, it wasn't a constructive contribution and the only likely outcome was that the conversation would spiral further into nastiness.

Perhaps we should have temporarily locked the post again instead of banning gggggg, but I'm sure that wouldn't have sat well with everybody either.
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I think the first thing to do is message or reply to the person who has made the post with some sort of warning or reminder. It's even in the moopy book of rules or whatever that is, that Iguana posted earlier.

Even if unconscious bias does exist, nobody does or should blame mods for that. We're all learning as we go.

We're just saying that the ban should be lifted. The ramifications of what happened can be discussed for eternity if needed, but this part is pretty clear.
 
What SHOULD happen is the temporary ban should be lifted immediately and if sanctions are to be imposed, then they should be taken after a more reasoned debate has taken place later.
 
KindaCool said:
It's probably important to remember that the voices in that thread are overwhelming pro-Palestine so it's very easy to feel ganged up on and be perceived as a villain.
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Pro-Gaza Civilians. It isn't a thread about political rhetoric.
 
funky said:
Pro-Gaza Civilians. This isn't a thread about political rhetoric.
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Hmm, there is plenty of anti-Israeli state in there too.. which is one of the things I try to push back on
 
gggggg said:
Hmm, there is plenty of anti-Israeli state in there too.. which is one of the things I try to push back on
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We should be able to be critical of the Israeli state at this time or ANY time, and any inference otherwise is quite worrying.
 
gggggg said:
I wasn’t
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To be fair, you were. Both Kate and Zen asked you to be civil, and you continued anyway. Tesco's posts were relatively close together and then he went quiet. Also, and I hate to harp on this point, what he said was an unfair characterisation of Suedehead's position, but he didn't outright tell him to go fuck himself or similar.
 
gggggg said:
Hmm, there is plenty of anti-Israeli state in there too.. which is one of the things I try to push back on
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Well yes, the Government are a target of criticism as a result of the defence of Gaza civilians. But it's not "pro-palestine" as in a thread about Palestinian independence. There's enough tragedy going on for us to be distracted from that at the moment.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that the thread wasn't created as a reflection of the Pro-Palestinian marches, where genuine support for Gaza is being muddled by extreme views on Israel. I don't think that's the intent of moopy anyway.
 
VoR said:
To be fair, you were. Both Kate and Zen asked you to be civil, and you continued anyway. Tesco's posts were relatively close together and then he went quiet. Also, and I hate to harp on this point, what he said was an unfair characterisation of Suedehead's position, but he didn't outright tell him to go fuck himself or similar.
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I think plenty would debate whether the latter was in fact more inflammatory. Would you be more offended by a 'go fuck yourself' or by a comment implying, seriously or otherwise, that you agree with the "mercy killing" of Palestinians?
 
ButterTart said:
Mods intervened twice to politely remind you to keep the conversation civil. The temporary ban was not issued out of nowhere.
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I disagree with that entirely too. Kate made a generic comment which could have been aimed at anybody (as evidenced by funky’s immediate response) and Zen’s doesn’t constitute a warning in the slightest.

I repeat- why did Tesco getting explicitly reprimanded which was then ignored not result in a ban when this did?
 
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