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Author | Topic: Changes at EvC Forum | |||||||||||||||||||
arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
One note: I have not regained some posting privileges to my knowledge. There are very few forums I can comment on. I lost my password for awhile and the site wouldn't allow me to request it, apparently based on some glitch, but it's not like I've been "reinstated." my impression was that you have been banned outright on at least one occassion. am i mistaken? i seem to recall arguing on your behalf.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
I can tell you this much: I have been challenged by a number of people concerning my equity as a moderator. I am laying my own life on the line for those who don't even like me. I better never hear another word about my impartiality I took moderating very seriously, and I know you did too! i certainly percieved bias in neither you nor buzsaw. maybe on one or two small occassions, but we're all human, and nothing big enough to be memorable.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Now if we could get Faith back, the evolutionists would have their work cut out keeping the growing army of counterparts at bay. faith pops into chat now and then. i didn't ask her last time, but the time before that, i seem to recall that she stated she wasn't particularly interested in coming back. likes having her own forum. i dunno, she still lurks about here. i'll keep arguing her case simply on principle alone.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Not too many wanted to debate on Showcase, however, and now I can't start threads on Showcase showcase is dead.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
i hear the people banned from the site can no longer participate in chat?
why? Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
EvC Forum's primary purpose is to promote constructive dialogue between the two sides in the creation/evolution controversy. Those who don't share that goal do not have the right to make things difficult for those who do. percy, with all due respect, asking that moderation be fair and just is the first step in promoting constructive dialoge between the two sides of the creation/evolution controversy.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Schrafs okay. You obviously just ain't never seen a picture of Schraf. Admin IS human... you're second person in a week who's commented on schraf's looks. am i the only person who values having these people around for what they contribute to the discussion?
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
i am starting to suspect that percy has intentionally thinned out the "evolutionist" ranks to more balance the debate participant-wise.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Perhaps some (I say some) have been have been too dominant filling up the threads with responses having little edifying and significant substance, too often with intent to antagonize. i'm not sure that's a good reason to whip out the ban-stick.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
i don't think participation here should be contingent on ideological basis, or on subjective worth/lack of redundancy of posts.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
I still don't have any idea why Brenna was cleansed from the site. it's possible that he took her concern for being patronizing. or, maybe he just decided he didn't like her because she got cranky one time too many, or neglected to use proper capitalization or something. i dunno. it'd be nice if we could at least get some reasoning out of percy that made a little bit of sense.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
EvC used to be a big place too.
To those very unhappy with the recent changes I can only say that the Internet is a very big place and you should have no trouble finding venues more to your liking, but this website's purpose is not to play host to people who continually make their feelings known that they don't like it here or that they feel a significant injustice has been committed. Please vote with your feet. perhaps those that are making their feelings known are doing so not because they don't like here, but because they do. i'm not saying anything about injustice -- it's your site, do whatever you want with it. we're not entitled to anything. what i'm more concerned about is the foot-voting, forced and otherwise. the major reason this board has been so successful is the community of members here. the board cannot function without its people. maybe there will be a constant influx of new members, but we have already lost a lot with the loss of our older members. and if the people who speak up against moderation they feel is unfair all "vote with their feet" you will not be left with any people who are interested in promoting the spirit of fair debate. you can't have one without the other, because one is the other. Edited by arachnophilia, : clarity Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Everyone is raising good points, but I have just reached my limit, and I'm no longer emotionally able to continue carrying the majority of the load while getting abused for it. percy, i know i can't speak for anyone else, but i certainly do not mean to abuse you. i don't think most other people (including many of the banned people) who are objecting intend to be abusive, either. we're just frustrated, i think. adminning a site this large is a huge responsibility, and can take a great personal toll on one's sanity. this was one of my two main initial worries when you announced that you would alone shoulder all of the moderation duties. i hope you will not take this as abuse or insult, but if you are no longer emotionally able to continue carrying this load, perhaps you should step back, take a vacation or something. let some others carry this cross for a while. i say this out of both concern for you, and for the site. perhaps returning the moderation style to its older form is the only workable solution for such a place. i think it's also worth noting that brenna's comment, which you responded to with a ban, was out of equally genuine concern for your wellbeing, and not meant to be patronizing or insulting. i believe i can speak for her in this case, because i know her very well.
Schraf's Message 166 (in effect stating that I prefer people Randman and Paula Rose over serious contributors) and Trixie's Message 167 (in effect stating that I don't care about quality discussion) with all due respect, your bans have had this as an interesting side effect. the evolution ranks have been seriously thinned out, with many of the most informative posters now missing. the playing field is now somewhat level. people are just reading this as the intended effect. and i have to say, it's tempting to see things that way. hell, if that was your super secret motivation, it might not even have been a bad thing for the site in the long run. not especially even-handed, and seriously damaging to quality of information, but it sure kept the debate moving.
...are examples of just the kind of ad hominem I'm not going to tolerate anymore, because defense is an endless task, ignorement wasn't causing any diminishment, and addressment just lends them legitimacy. percy, perhaps this is the problem. i don't really think those qualify as ad hominems, especially when what we are debating is the motivation of someone who was then the sole moderator of the board. like it or not, as the admin of a debate board, your motivations will always be questioned. and those are certainly not insults. this is, i think, the same basic fallacy used routinely in politics these days, that it is somehow unpatriotic to question the administation. if the administration is doing something to damage the country, then the only real course of action that could be called patriotic is to question their actions. percy, we all love this site and what you've given us these past few years. it's just that many of us think that what are you doing is damaging to that. i've tried to voice my objections as respectfully as i can, and without any implications of entitlement. but those are very hard things to do. other who have not done so well at carefully wording their concerns have been banned because of it, for supposedly "trashing" the place they're trying to fight for.
People can go to other sites if they wish to trash me or EvC Forum, but we won't be doing that here anymore. i would rather people come here. as i said before in this thread, the single greatest thing about EvC was that people could freely voice their grievences. it ensures fairness in operations. on a more personal level, i'm also the kind of person that prefers true friends -- the kind that will stab you in the front. if someone has a problem with me, i'd rather know what it is than have them talk about me behind my back. i can understand if there's a persistent problem with a member who insists on continually posting about how horrible this place is. but this is not what these people have done -- schraf, jar, omni, et al are not trolls who are simply flaming away for giggles, or because they're mentally unstable. in the worst cases, they have posted out of frustration watching what they believe is a sinking ship. in the best cases, they have posted out of concern for the site and for you personally. and in one case, not even posted on the subject at all. maybe the comments were not the most constructive, but must one poor post be met with a lifetime ban?
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
Perhaps I should remind those suspended indefinitely that I speak on behalf of Admin/Percy as one who's been permanently banned not once, but twice. Since then I've been a moderator and here I am supportive of Admin. i would also like to respectfully remind you, buz, that it is because of the people who continually fought the moderation over your bans that you have been allowed back. the very people who are now being banned for the same actions -- bugging the moderation over bans they feel are unfair. granted, it is all at percy's mercy. but i would fight for them the same as i have fought for you.
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arachnophilia Member (Idle past 1374 days) Posts: 9069 From: god's waiting room Joined: |
I really don't know what more I can say. I know the disruption to the EvC Forum community has been extremely significant, but I've had several weeks to think about this and I still don't want the indefinitely suspended members back. I will probably never want them back. I can't count the number of times I've been persuaded to unsuspend someone and quickly regretted it, Randman and Faith being two well known examples. It was constantly argued that even though they behaved badly a great proportion of the time that because they caused very valuable rebuttals to be posted that they should be permitted to stay, in fact, that it would be better for the site if they stayed. i know i was one of the primary people making that argument. but i don't feel that's the case here. these are not repeatedly problematic posters -- they're one-time offenders. and some of them, not even that.
This is why I so strongly disagree that it is a reasonable interpretation of my recent actions that I don't care about the quality of debate or of the debaters, as you said when you referenced Schraf's reply. i recognize that you care about the quality of the debate. so do i; we just disagree about the best method to get the highest attainable quality. the problem i see is that by banning the people who object to your actions based on their principles of reasonable and fair debate, you are effectively limitting the contributors to the site to only those who do not have such strong principles of fair debate. get rid of the people who want fair and constructive debate, and you'll be left with trolls.
I'm the person who cares most, and those who make it more difficult for me to keep the quality of debate high certainly cannot be said to care about the quality of the debate. If they did they'd still be here. Instead what they cared more about was not having disruptions to their community of buddies. percy, i truly hope you understand that this is simply not the case. for instance, i strongly object to brenna's ban. i can talk to her anytime i want; we talk on aim all the time, i've got her cell number and she has mine. when she lived here, we hung out all the time. but she acted like an idiot or a troll, i would tell her so. and have, on occasion. this is not me sticking up for my friends -- you are well aware that i have quite frequently stuck up for my enemies in the past. i'm objecting because i don't see a good reason to ban her. i'm objecting on principle.
I also think that by and large the suspended members don't want to be back, because I haven't received a single request for reinstatement. because most of them still read the board, where you state every time that they will never be back. and frankly, most of them are quite disiullusioned and disappointed in what the site has become because of this. they don't want to be part of a site where they can be banned for speaking their conscience about moderation procedures. certainly, if you were to ban me because of this discussion, i would be frustrated to the extent that i wouldn't be asking to come back either. maybe it's an issue of pride or dignity. maybe it's that they don't want to be subject to the authoritarian regime.
Jar has a new board over at Dreamcatcher, the entire former EvC Forum community can be reunited there. yes, and much of the older community is there, myself included. but it's still in its infancy, and participation is currently very low. this board had something special, and i'd just hate to see it ruined. i'm not sure another board would do.
I think we've gone back and forth on this enough. I appreciate the concern, but I'm not changing anything I've done. i'm not changing anything i'm doing, either. i will keep fighting for what i think is right, including defending members i feel were banned without good reason. that's simply part of who i am, and the principles i have come to expect from this place. and i will do it respectfully, compassionately, and calmly, and if i can, without breaking any forum rules. this is not going to go away.
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