Would clearer rules regarding “trollish” behavior on the Politics sub-forum be conducive to productive discourse?

[Farfromgeneva]

A new sheriff's a comin'?
Ring out the church bells and strike up the band!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAELs42aZt4

Wait until he whips it out!

Baskin Robbins doesn’t have enough flavors.

[wgdsr]

There is nothing wrong with forum. It is fine just the way it is even if certain malcontents cry about losing the license they had to engage in personal attacks like they had in the old forum.

Please do us all a favor and don't change a d@mn thing.

We've been slow to penalize trolls. Mostly because we wanted to err on the side of caution. as mentioned above, trolling is a passive aggressive behavior. there's always plausible deniability for the troll. Going forward, we need to move the dial a little more towards penalizing obnoxiousness. This doesn't mean that Admin will agree. But... People whose posts are consistently attacks, insults, and other forms of negative obnoxiousness, they need to be slowly removed from circulation.

sounds more than a little protectionist, matnum. that doesn't always work out too well.

True but the Wild West led to a lot of dead bodies on the street and didn’t resolve itself without some regulation.

Consider the position of a founder who put in a lot of work to provide this for us all and confines in this effort to create something lasting. This site didn’t evolve out of spontaneous interaction. In that context it’s understandable to believe (and I think if executed correctly but good luck with that endeavor would be proper) that some increased management of these boards is critical existentially.

well, yeah, when folks were shot in the street or saloon, then dead bodies. that'd be personal attacks and the sin bin.

then we're talking about it for the politics threads? i see an awful lot of what can be described as trolling by the aforementioned definition. we'll see who has the sheriff come knockin' if it's put into play. evidently it won't be soon, because the impetus wasn't this thread.

[CU88]

A new sheriff's a comin'?
Ring out the church bells and strike up the band!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAELs42aZt4

Wait until he whips it out!

Baskin Robbins doesn’t have enough flavors.

Great movie

[Farfromgeneva]

There is nothing wrong with forum. It is fine just the way it is even if certain malcontents cry about losing the license they had to engage in personal attacks like they had in the old forum.

Please do us all a favor and don't change a d@mn thing.

We've been slow to penalize trolls. Mostly because we wanted to err on the side of caution. as mentioned above, trolling is a passive aggressive behavior. there's always plausible deniability for the troll. Going forward, we need to move the dial a little more towards penalizing obnoxiousness. This doesn't mean that Admin will agree. But... People whose posts are consistently attacks, insults, and other forms of negative obnoxiousness, they need to be slowly removed from circulation.

sounds more than a little protectionist, matnum. that doesn't always work out too well.

True but the Wild West led to a lot of dead bodies on the street and didn’t resolve itself without some regulation.

Consider the position of a founder who put in a lot of work to provide this for us all and confines in this effort to create something lasting. This site didn’t evolve out of spontaneous interaction. In that context it’s understandable to believe (and I think if executed correctly but good luck with that endeavor would be proper) that some increased management of these boards is critical existentially.

well, yeah, when folks were shot in the street or saloon, then dead bodies. that'd be personal attacks and the sin bin.

then we're talking about it for the politics threads? i see an awful lot of what can be described as trolling by the aforementioned definition. we'll see who has the sheriff come knockin' if it's put into play. evidently it won't be soon, because the impetus wasn't this thread.

As long as a change is clearly communicated I can’t complain. And I’ve skated the line perhaps once or twice. Possibly.

[kramerica.inc]

Get some thick skin Matnum. DMac's criticism stands true, and it doesn't mean he should find another site. If anything, one could say that if you can't take criticism regarding the sites limitations, that maybe YOU should find another pool to wade in. Works both ways

There's a truth to this. If it was sincere constructive criticism. But when someone is walking from room to room in a party saying, This party sucks! This house smells! This etc., you shouldn't be surprised when the owner of the house where the party is taking place says, You don't need to stay, you might better enjoy a different party...

Sure, the house owner could say that.

But it also helps that this is the only party in town. And said party acquired all the guests and beer from the last party that got shut down unexpectedly.

Not as fun or welcoming as the last shindig, but better than sitting home on Friday, I guess.

[dislaxxic]

Not as fun or welcoming as the last shindig, but better than sitting home on Friday, I guess.

Huh? Not a lot of difference i can see...except there is a lot less regulation here. Don't conservatives get their panties in a knot about regulation when it interferes with their...umm..."taking liberty"?? ...or is it their "freedoms"?

Just sayin'

..

[MDlaxfan76]

There is nothing wrong with forum. It is fine just the way it is even if certain malcontents cry about losing the license they had to engage in personal attacks like they had in the old forum.

Please do us all a favor and don't change a d@mn thing.

We've been slow to penalize trolls. Mostly because we wanted to err on the side of caution. as mentioned above, trolling is a passive aggressive behavior. there's always plausible deniability for the troll. Going forward, we need to move the dial a little more towards penalizing obnoxiousness. This doesn't mean that Admin will agree. But... People whose posts are consistently attacks, insults, and other forms of negative obnoxiousness, they need to be slowly removed from circulation.

sounds more than a little protectionist, matnum. that doesn't always work out too well.

True but the Wild West led to a lot of dead bodies on the street and didn’t resolve itself without some regulation.

Consider the position of a founder who put in a lot of work to provide this for us all and confines in this effort to create something lasting. This site didn’t evolve out of spontaneous interaction. In that context it’s understandable to believe (and I think if executed correctly but good luck with that endeavor would be proper) that some increased management of these boards is critical existentially.

well, yeah, when folks were shot in the street or saloon, then dead bodies. that'd be personal attacks and the sin bin.

then we're talking about it for the politics threads? i see an awful lot of what can be described as trolling by the aforementioned definition. we'll see who has the sheriff come knockin' if it's put into play. evidently it won't be soon, because the impetus wasn't this thread.

That was my first reaction as well (on the Is America a racist nation thread where this question was recently raised); where's the line between instigating a discussion and 'trolling'? humor and Inflammatory? I posed the notion that repeated behaviors that are obvious and egregious bad faith posts, especially with clearly lying claims, offered to inflame, rather than to inform or debate, could be 'warned' and then 'flagged' for penalties...enough penalties and expulsion from the game. Change the behavior or get flagged; don't argue with, much less insult the ref...

Right now, we have posters dropping out, whether already or recently giving notice that they intend to do so...most of those have been active, long time contributors, typically both from LP days and FL, and they include both left and right leaning posters, from ggait and kismet to Salty. Others dropped earlier. These folks have contributed heavily to the lax side of the forum as well as the politics side, so IMO it'd be a darn shame to lose them and instead devolve into juvenile trolling posts and angry retorts.

When this site was being created, we were asked what rules we wanted and were willing to live by, with the understanding that those would undoubtedly evolve with time...I see this as an evolution of those rules, in the spirit of a site with a light administrative hand, but which invites respectful, if passionate discourse on a wide range of topics.

Some folks have not respected that intent, IMO.

[Farfromgeneva]

Get some thick skin Matnum. DMac's criticism stands true, and it doesn't mean he should find another site. If anything, one could say that if you can't take criticism regarding the sites limitations, that maybe YOU should find another pool to wade in. Works both ways

There's a truth to this. If it was sincere constructive criticism. But when someone is walking from room to room in a party saying, This party sucks! This house smells! This etc., you shouldn't be surprised when the owner of the house where the party is taking place says, You don't need to stay, you might better enjoy a different party...

Sure, the house owner could say that.

But it also helps that this is the only party in town. And said party acquired all the guests and beer from the last party that got shut down unexpectedly.

Not as fun or welcoming as the last shindig, but better than sitting home on Friday, I guess.

When you build a house you can host your own party’s. Pretty dismissive of the effort put forth to provide this for everyone.

[DMac]

Look at the number of people attending the party. Feel the mood of the room. Certainly no worries about running out of hangers in the coat room as a whole lot more people are going than coming. Must be a reason for that.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPrdomEq5Ro

[Farfromgeneva]

Agreed, I just don’t like people telling the house what to do vs making constructive suggestions and to me there’s a huge difference.

Love the link but it is a racist town of victims asking the governor for help. Sure this is the metaphor you want to go with?

[Tommy No]

Love the link but it is a racist town of victims asking the governor for help. Sure this is the metaphor you want to go with?

[Farfromgeneva]

Do you think he meant it that way?

And in case unaware I spent like an hour defending Dmac before I realized he’s a grown man for a comment he made that even I thought was in poor taste or unfortunate but where the reaction was crazy.

[DMac]

It was about the town going to schidt, nothing more. If the video had ended after the congregation had sung their catchy little hymn it would have been fine with me.
I'm not looking for anyone's help, I can leave the party if I don't like it. Their house, their party, the can run it whatever way they want. Will ask again, how many people are sticking around the party? Lot of empty hangers in that coat room that used to have coats on 'em. Jus' sayin'.

[Tommy No]

Do you think he meant it that way?

i don't know. And if he didn't, this whole thing most certainly is. During the Trump years, people were saying racist stuff, saying lies, saying ridiculous stuff and how do you say 'thats not ok' when the potus is doing the same. behaving poorly, lying, shunning empathy of any sort became the norm. for some. and then trump is gone and though slowly, the world starts to normalize. starts. but for some, there was no going back. 'trump may be gone but not for me!' and they just kept doing what they were doing and i think thats what were seeing here. post-trump stuff. so is this guy racist/ i have no idea. i dont know the guy but i do know that in the world anf in this forum there are people who want this trump way-of-life to last forever and to be the norm again and normal human beings aren't having it. i'm surprised it took fanlax this long to shut these people down. it's may and trump's been gone for months.

[MDlaxfan76]

It was about the town going to schidt, nothing more. If the video had ended after the congregation had sung their catchy little hymn it would have been fine with me.
I'm not looking for anyone's help, I can leave the party if I don't like it. Their house, their party, the can run it whatever way they want. Will ask again, how many people are sticking around the party? Lot of empty hangers in that coat room that used to have coats on 'em. Jus' sayin'.

At least those regularly participating in these particular discussion threads...And that's the point.

How can the "party" be improved?
Or will the jerks cause folks who want to have a good time without getting puked on decide to leave?

Again, we asked for a light moderation hand...but for folks to be respectful in their discourse, else take it to Hamsterdam which has virtually no rules.

And lo and behold, Hamsterdam gets almost no usage...but over time the discourse on this part of the site has become increasingly more rancorous and less inviting to those who don't want to get puked on. So, it seems to need some adjustment.

If that occurs, and works, hopefully the Admin will be able to reach out to those who had departed and invite them to participate again.

[MDlaxfan76]

Do you think he meant it that way?

i don't know. And if he didn't, this whole thing most certainly is. During the Trump years, people were saying racist stuff, saying lies, saying ridiculous stuff and how do you say 'thats not ok' when the potus is doing the same. behaving poorly, lying, shunning empathy of any sort became the norm. for some. and then trump is gone and though slowly, the world starts to normalize. starts. but for some, there was no going back. 'trump may be gone but not for me!' and they just kept doing what they were doing and i think thats what were seeing here. post-trump stuff. so is this guy racist/ i have no idea. i dont know the guy but i do know that in the world anf in this forum there are people who want this trump way-of-life to last forever and to be the norm again and normal human beings aren't having it. i'm surprised it took fanlax this long to shut these people down. it's may and trump's been gone for months.

FYI, Dmac's a good guy, active participant, and while he can go pretty hard right at times he's neither a whack job nor troll, much less both. We all have our biases, but he's not a "racist".

But your point about the overall zeitgeist is probably right.

[Gretchen]

only poster I regret having left is PLB. And not just for his Terps and Big Ten knowledge. That played out wrong.

[Farfromgeneva]

Do you think he meant it that way?

i don't know. And if he didn't, this whole thing most certainly is. During the Trump years, people were saying racist stuff, saying lies, saying ridiculous stuff and how do you say 'thats not ok' when the potus is doing the same. behaving poorly, lying, shunning empathy of any sort became the norm. for some. and then trump is gone and though slowly, the world starts to normalize. starts. but for some, there was no going back. 'trump may be gone but not for me!' and they just kept doing what they were doing and i think thats what were seeing here. post-trump stuff. so is this guy racist/ i have no idea. i dont know the guy but i do know that in the world anf in this forum there are people who want this trump way-of-life to last forever and to be the norm again and normal human beings aren't having it. i'm surprised it took fanlax this long to shut these people down. it's may and trump's been gone for months.

Interesting I agree somewhat.

I think Dmac is a good dude for what little my opinion is worth. Thought he meant it without the background of the governor intentionally destroying the town and sending the most hated person into the town (a black sheriff) in order to run everyone off.

[Farfromgeneva]

It was about the town going to schidt, nothing more. If the video had ended after the congregation had sung their catchy little hymn it would have been fine with me.
I'm not looking for anyone's help, I can leave the party if I don't like it. Their house, their party, the can run it whatever way they want. Will ask again, how many people are sticking around the party? Lot of empty hangers in that coat room that used to have coats on 'em. Jus' sayin'.

So what do you want the solution to be? More oversight or less or no change?

I’m torn and see the merit of more oversight and not doing anything as well personally.

An interesting comparable would be the colonial pipeline where you have cyber security experts saying “don’t pay the terrorist because they’ll use the dough to fund their next attack(a) but if I’m CEO of a company who could go out of business by taking that principled stand why do I care about the next attack vs my own existence because that’s what we are talking about here. Where principle meets reality and existence (of this site) could be at risk.

[Farfromgeneva]

only poster I regret having left is PLB. And not just for his Terps and Big Ten knowledge. That played out wrong.

Is PLB Doug 7799 or Cooter. There’s 3-4 MD folks going back to LP and I’ve can’t recall who is who.