General discussion of moderation procedures

I don't know what the situation is in the states but it's the biggest con going in the UK:The Taxpayer funds research (via the funding councils) and then we basically have to pay to read the results! There was an govt inquiry and it found the profits that the publishers made on those publications to be huge (or so I remember it, I'll dig the report out in the morning).I'm in information sciences and I can't remember the last time I actually handled a journal - I just get the PDFs and download the citations straight into endnote.EDIT: OPPS off topic for here - where can we pick this up?

PLOS and Open-Access publishing maybe?Adminnemooseus

Regarding this post from the moose:Stupid's comment that gays don't take responsibility for their actions is a personal attack. I responded in kind.

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Believe me, the "Sodom and Lot, historicity and plausibility of Genesis 19" topic is not a all one I am following much. I don't know, and don't really care what lead up to that message.My "Have to slip a "Keep calm and be nice" in here" comment was a reply to your message (it was the "Meet Mr. Stupid" subtitle that happened to catch my attention), but it is also directed toward any and all who were not being "calm and nice". Perhaps I should have made it a general reply, but even message specific replies are often also general replies. "He did it first" in not an excuse. "He did it last" tends to be the one who gets caught.Adminnemooseus

The now GD thread on sedimentation and deposition with Faith seems to be lacking some guidelines on how things are going to progress.Does Faith get to pick who she wants to be the one person to exchange with and we kind of hand the torch off one at a time?I suggested the GD and volunteered to be the other participant but I recieved no confirmation as to if that was going to be the case.Where do we go from here?

Adminnemooseus writes me:

quote:

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"He did it first" in not an excuse.

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Then you should abandon all pretense of objectivity. To say that gays don't take responsibility for their actions is an unwarranted attack, just as it would be an unwarranted attack to say that African-Americans or Hispanics don't take responsibility for their actions. Had that been the statement, and an African-American or Hispanic had responded by calling the attacker stupid, I just bet you would have responded to the original attack, not the in-kind counter-attack.Simply saying that you don't pay attention to gay-themed threads isn't good enough. You're an admin; you should make at least some effort to police all threads impartially. If the admins we now have can't do the job, then perhaps we need a gay admin. God knows we've got more than enough christians on the admin roster already.

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AdminAsgara reopened the topic I had given a planned 24 hour temporary closure. The 24 hours had passed, but I was away from my computer for 3 or 4 more hours beyond that moment - Thus AA's action.She also moved the topic to the "Great Debate". This is not something I would have done, but the topic was in the messy situation that it was tough to determine the best possible course. My "GD" thoughts were that a new topic be started, with a fresh message 1.I think we need to leave the "GD" topic in limbo for now, with no one posting there. Personally, I would be inclined to permanently close it, in deference to a new "GD" topic, per previous paragraph.I strongly invite you to start a Suggestions and Questions topic on how this situation is to be handled. Suggested possible title: "The Faith "Great Debate" sedimentation and erosion topic".The essential problem is, how to have a discussion with Faith, without her getting overloaded with too many responses to her messages.Adminnemooseus

but we do hold some posters to higher standards and that is particularly true in Faith Based forums and when people are arguing from a faith based position. It may not be fair, but it is a necessary concession.You are free to attack the position. You are not free to attack the person.

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It is a "necessary concession" to allow fundies to make unwarranted attacks against gays? Since when?

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They can certainly say that they believe that homosexuality is a choice and that Homosexuals can choose to change their ways and stop sinning.It is perfectly acceptable to respond showing how stupid such a position is, how it is bigotted point of view, how all the evidence refutes it. But address the message, not the messenger.It is NOT acceptable to call the poster "Stupid". As long as they are addressing the issue, yes. It's certainly acceptable for them to say that homosexuals are sinners and damned to hell. It is not acceptable if they said YOU were stupid.Sinner you may be, stupid you are not.

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But that's not at all what he said, jar. Read it again. He said gays don't take responsibility for their actions. That's an unwarranted attack.Like I suggested earlier, let's change the context. Suppose he had said that blacks don't take responsibility for their actions, in line with the not-so-old fundie belief that blacks were an inferior race, and an African-American had responded by calling him stupid. You might have offered a mild reprimand to whoever used the word 'stupid', but I'll just bet you'd have had a word or two about the original attack as well.Saying that homosexuality is a sin is one thing, attacking the character of gays is quite another. You should be smart enough to see that.

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Don't continue to make the same mistake and expect different results. You are perfectly free to criticize the message. NOT the messenger.

I understand, but why are people perfectly free to attack the character of gays?

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First, he is responding from his theological base. It is his belief system. Know thy enemy.Second it is a general statement, a stupid statement but general.It can be attacked. For example, he could be asked to show how gays do not accept their responsibilities.But do not attack the messenger, only the message.

So they attack us, it goes unchecked except by debate. We attack them, an admin jumps in.Got it.

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