Lunatic

Some of the more vociferous critics of Airmax are starting to smack of antisemitism, and frankly I'm finding that a bit disconcerting. I'd like to reinforce, just for the record, that I would be honored to be moderated by one of God's chosen people, and I'm sure he would do a swell job. It'd be nice if certain users would stop invoking crude antisemitic dogwhistles and just give Airmax their full support. Jews can be more than 'community organizers'; I don't think its inherently nefarious for Airmax to pursue moderation powers. He is clearly capable of moderating without putting some shadowy elite in charge, Airmax is a committed meritocrat. Let's dispense with these ugly generalizations and judge candidates on their merits, please.

I guess most of airmax’s goons have some form of competent background in one field or another. Im convinced he has a group of educated goons looking to force their agenda down DART’s throats.

You made the right call, I have been continually harassed by him and if you think I'm the insigator, you're not thinking back far enough in the past couple weeks.

I can show you an instance in the past day alone, after that incident, where he replies to Ramshutu insulting me and provoking me to defend myself.

He enjoys spreading shit about others and acting like he's the only one who can. I still want an RO between us.

In Lunatic's opinion if you are 'aggressive' in any way, he is able to be as rude and as nasty as he pleases to 'defend' against you which in his brain equals winning the argument as to him the aggression behind his post equals strength of argument made and if he gets the last word in a thread (which he confuses semantically to be last word cross-site in all exchanges) he thinks he therefore is the ultimate 'winner' of all arguments you've been having as he's 'broken' you mentally.

What kind of person do you exactly think this is and how positive will they be for the website in the long run? This is a person who has just explicitly, for the umpteenth time, promised that unless his chosen candidate wins, he'll throw a strop (threatening a tantrum) and cry about the website and leave us.

I'm pretty fucking tired of this attitude Airmax and these 2 have, like ohhhh big bad Airmax if we don't vote him we're such ungrateful brats for the guy who didn't do jack shit for us the past few years ohhhh we will give you the win so you are appeased. You aren't special anymore, you're a background character. I'm only supporting their tantrum-based bargaining because I want the site to get popular and no other candidate gives that as a hard campaign promise.

A better response is to explain in great detail why this is such an important rule to upkeep in general.

As previously alluded,  "locking them keeps the main forum from looking like a darkest timeline version of the personal forum."

I don't believe expanding the rules with a thesis about it is merited; but much like the efforts to remove the "no insult" rule, this too can be changed by a referendum.

To get to the bottom of this we need a clear understanding of how my thread was overall more harmful than his thread against airmax.

I'll add that one is attacking a campaign eligibility which if it proved valid could affect the whole site, the other is escalation of what should usually be handled in the threads to which they originated.

Requesting I change a post, while not requiring it, is still mod intervention

Yes. It was an attempt at taking a small action to deescalate part of a situation. For some reason the guy finds his own made-up name on a screenshot to be antagonizing, to me it's a simple fix to antagonize him less via concealing said name.

Publicly warning me about ettique is mod intervention.

On that one, you crossed a line with putting things he had not said inside double quotation marks. I'm pretty sure we've all seen how badly that gets out of hand.

You are setting a standard that the reporter is automatically the victim while maintaining you do not read context. 

That's really reaching.

I think I've done well in preventing that from becoming the standard. I've rejected and humiliated multiple proposals for rules to the effect of if someone gets reported they should automatically be banned, and I've made posts like this: https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/4154-someone-is-secretly-admiring-me-on-dart?page=1&post_number=21

You can scroll through your recent posts to see how many have the little green reviewed box, and compare that to the small fraction which received any intervention; further to my knowledge none of the interventions were harmful to you. I'm not screaming "leave Britney alone!" Rather I am reviewing snippets of behavior when asked to do so, and usually scratching my head for why someone thinks every it's worth my time (recent issues with someone on the religion forum thinking their close acquaintance is too repetitive comes to mind).

but within the context of the election at least, I can see why mods must have increased discretion (given that the election process is new to the site and not all the rules were solidly established).

With regards to whether we should have locked this particular thread, I'll make my opinion clear. Personally, I think that instances like this where each side has instigated a back and forth that has persisted in some form over the course of several days, I couldn't view it as harassment, even if RM does. The policy regarding callout threads is there to prevent harassment, and in instances where they are one-sided (i.e. one side has consistently instigated and makes the callout thread, despite repeated requests to stop from the other party and a lack of engagement from them), I think locks on callout threads are warranted.

It's a whole lot harder to justify in an instance where interactions are two-sided, largely because it's just an extension of what has been going on in other threads bubbling over into a new thread. That can be a bit spammy at times, but I don't think it necessarily warrants locking the thread, and I wouldn't say that this rose to the level of spam.

Creating less work for ourselves isn't a priority, though I wouldn't say that this was tremendously involved. Rather than a question of how much work it creates for us, though, it seems that your point is that we shouldn't be putting the onus of one user's behavior on others. To that end, I agree that we shouldn't value the reporter over the context of what's being reported. We don't just take the reporter's word for it that a given response is warranted, though I'll fully admit that we don't always come to a decision having become fully aware of the context. So, when it comes to this decision, I respect that there were good reasons to let the thread stand as it was. 

I also find it somewhat difficult to know where we as moderation should draw the line with regards to what is appropriate within the election period as compared with what is appropriate in general, which becomes more difficult to know when the target of criticism is no longer a candidate. It was simple for us to establish a carve out for existing candidates and agree that it was appropriate for them to be the target of callout threads. We had not established a similar carve out for active participants in the election who are not (or are no longer) candidates. This is something we should have discussed, especially given the blurred lines you mentioned. And I respect as well that, in the face of uncertainty, it may have been better not to intervene. We employ that standard in other areas of moderation, so this wouldn't have been the first time.

That being said, we are trying to balance discretion pertinent to the election with adherence to the standards as they exist. Though this thread is only pertinent within the context of the election, if a similar thread existed outside of the election period, its context wouldn't affect our decision with regards to locking it. Applying that type of decision-making here may not have been the best move, but we're new to leading this process ourselves and learning from it. I don't say this to excuse our call - and for all that people are making this Ragnar's responsibility, it is our call, Ragnar just acted on it - but just to give some insight into what we've been considering before and after we made that call. If it leads to bigger changes (both to how and where moderation acts) that improve the site far beyond this election, all the better for it.

why is the first mafia thread I see every time I log in over the last few years always a "let's revive mafia" 

...and he likes it that way because whiteflame is now the head guy in charge. But whiteflame didn't lock the thread. RAGNAR did. See the issue?

I don't believe understanding the full context for why someone makes a callout thread is essential when we have a SOP for them. If misapplied, another moderator can unlock it with a single click.

asked me in my DM's was to edit a post that accused me of doxxing. ... What kind of backwards ass logic is it to make the guy who was falslely accused of doxxing edit a post when the post doesn't harm anyone to begin with?

I'll stand by the request (and yes, it's just a request). I don't think you would be put through any significant trouble to quickly clean it up, and it decreases the worry (valid or not) of the guy.

No need for MEEP's or any of that bull crap.

While referendums can and should be simplified down, there's still great utility in opening things up for discussion with the greater community in the general referendum process.

I will add that to the theme of what you're saying, not all rules get enforced, such as the old "no insults" rule, which was present in an earlier CoC, but to my knowledge was absolutely never enforced. On this, I'll repeat your "less action" over "more action" pitch; while not always cracking down on every technical CoC violation is very much to the benefit of the site, it would be harmful to ban people over things not present (nor implied) in the CoC.

While there are many, many issues with Mod Policy, and lots of things wrong with its application, including policy on personal attacks   - it’s purely laughable to think that this is the reason the site isn’t bigger and hasn’t taken off.

Kialo is has positively Nazi level enforcement of standards - and has taken off. CreateDebate; has almost no rules and has degenerated into an almost pathological hive of scum and villainy. With no meaningful debate and user-ship.

The success, or lack thereof of this site has nothing to do with its moderation and how it’s applied.

If you want to pretend that moderation is the issue, that simply turning down an objectively low level of moderation will make things better, that if only we didn’t lock threads of one guy calling another a c**t that this site would have a million users, you’re simply kidding yourself.

I mean come on, does anyone even believe this?

If airmax becomes president. Great, moderation will become more lassaiz fair, less interventions. The site will be just as dead in a year as it is now, with the 20 active users we have bitching about something completely different - with RM continuing to bitch about exactly the same thing.

This is not 2008 any more, and we shouldn’t pretend it is. We shouldn’t pretend that if we build it they will come. People aren’t going to find us; relying on Googles algorithms is no better. 

The only tying that will make this site succeed is critical mass and marketing. Enough user base to drive content, to attract more, to raise rankings, to keep regulars coming back. I’ve donated hundreds of dollars to the upkeep of this site, and would keep sound so if it went towards ads, or marketing. 

I mean ffs. We’re competing with Reddit, Twitter, Facebook as social platforms - we need to be pushing the debate aspect; using that as an USP,  and building upon it; not haggling over how many week ban I should get if I called RM a histrionic chuff muncher.

I don’t come back as often as I did because the site is crammed with greyparrot acting like the new brontoraptor, Wylted polluting the forums with nutjobbery, and a whole shit ton of people who will block you when they can’t argue with you any more. There’s nothing engaging, no reason for and to keep responding, rarel decent debates, and I’m too lazy to think of my own.

You’re all arguing about niche issues of niche individuals complaining about people insulting them, when the real issue is the complete lack of user engagement, outreach, linking, proportion. We should be blitzing Twitter, parler, gab. We should be forcing down the throat of every argumentative asshole on the internet that this is the site where people are wrong in the internet. This site should be flooding the internet with argument tinder. Greyparrot random bullshit of the day, Wylted railing on Jews, flat earthers, creationists - rage inducing click bait.

But backed up with multiple thetts and Oromagis. Who can drill home points and keep people engaged.

This argument about the presidency is arguing about the best way of polishing the deckchairs on the titanic.

Only 29 people on the site care about the moderation, it’s not a barrier.

If we want to grow this site, If we want to see this site become as successful as ddo was even close to its prime - it’s not moderation - it’s going to take a lot of our efforts to market the site whilst figuring our ways to generate engaging content. Light the match, pour on the gas, build enough tinder. 

I support Ragnar's decision to lock that thread based on the rules of the site, to which moderation adheres. For the purposes of the election, certain carveouts for callout threads have been made to allow users to have their say about the candidates. Those don't extend to people who are no longer running.

We can argue about whether the existing rules regarding callout threads are doing more harm than good, but the decision of whether those rules should change rests with the site and not with the moderators. If there is interest enough in changing the rules, then I would be open to having a MEEP about it.

As for whether it is "a mod by mod thing where a certain mod can do what they want", we each have the ability to lock threads and can make calls on that front. We discuss these decisions as a group and decide whether those calls were appropriate and, if necessary, reverse them.

Responding to the first few posts...

The election is new, and various rules will likely have to be refined. That said, two things I hope we can keep:

1. "Criticizing statements within an ongoing discussion, is fair game."
   
2. "Moderation reserves the rights to: Interpret and apply all policies in the best interests of the site and users therein. In most cases, a “reasonable person” standard will be utilized."
   

There is currently rule against callout threads. It's not one that gets enforced when they are aimed at staff members, and due to the reasonable person standard I don't think we need to expand it for precise stipulations. If you're on staff, or petitioning to be, you painted the target on your chest; so should seek to show the necessary qualification of thick skin... I will add that there are limitations to how much crap staff should put up with.

To me callout threads while problematic in it of themselves, are a major red flag for other issues. Thankfully they are easy to deter without taking sides in whatever dispute. Further, locking them keeps the main forum from looking like a darkest timeline version of the personal forum.

Well I would ask bish himself, but they BURNED HIM AT THE STAKE.

But at least I'm not bitter or anything.

You know I loved bish, but I feel like if bish had been moderating DDO, the religion forum wouldn't have been nearly as bad. The two may have been friendly, but that doesn't mean I would like their moderating styles equally.

I realize the president is not a mod, but he will influence moderation, and it could be said that the presidency is a strong audition for a moderator position.

I can share as much about what I'd like to see happen to the site is I want to it has nothing to do with the election and I don't know why you think you get to tell everybody on this f****** website what they can and can't do.

I'm not talking about him I don't give two flying s**** about him I don't even know who he was until literally like a week ago. Not talking about him I'm talking about the site if you think the site and him are the same thing that's your train of thought.

I am free to talk about Airmax without you harassing me actually. However, I will ask for RO that we don't talk about each other anymore, until then you can try your way and I try my way.

I'm not voting for anybody for president for this website. It's a it was a stupid office before, it's a stupid office now, it doesn't mean anything, it's a popularity contest and I'm not engaging in it. 

I know what the site is I don't need you to explain it to me. Everybody talks about why the sites dead but nobody wants to talk about how to bring people in or how to advertise or how to do anything else to get people in. And if you're going to say RM is the only problem then you need to go to some other parts of the forums and read. We're having these stupid elections for an office that has no power instead of I don't know doing some sort of fundraiser to advertise somewhere to get people to come to the site. Or host some kind of debate event with politics being the way they are how is it we can't get people here to engage in political conversation.

I am still completely requesting them to put an RO between Lunatic and I as I am not interested in being his latest victim, he is free to pick on others. If it helps Lunatic for me to admit something, I am happy I am out of this election drama, he is not wrong... Except I am not out of it and he has been harassing me throughout both before and after my dropping out. Thanks and bye.

No matter how you read that. It looks like you want to throw mud with him , but you don't want him to be able to attack you. If you are engaging in a argument with someone and throw adhoms yourself , expect to get them back. 

The site shouldn't have to deal with personal threads that's what private messaging is for.

 have yet to meet a single person outside of this website who sees this website and feels it's overmoderated, even though my ban was wrong the slew of toxicity and spitefulness as the norm here is a major deterrent. About the only attractive part of the website is the formal debating arena as most of us there, other than in a rap battle or something, have generally got decent conduct these days.

I just wish thett's poll would capture names of voters so we can have the opportunity to reason with them.

Anyone not voting airmax was never going to anyway, because they think he is too new (absolutely silly argument, considering his extremely active past on DDO, and immense amount of work put in). Regardless if people wanna stick to a narrative they will.

This is what is bothering me about the people voting for brutal. The only argument they have is familiarity, which is absolutely a brain dead justification for voting for him. 

Feels like a call out.

So much for this lolololol

You'll get the last word here too, so that you can then accuse me of:

1. Not respond out of laziness

but just before you get it, I want to point out who it is who does the other stuff and prides themselves on it.

Yeah, all of this is more gaslighting, at risk of repeating myself. And yeah, I will get the last word. I will continue to drain you mentally here. I am just getting started. The more you have to say the more I have to say. This is fun for me. 

There is only one of us with a toxic gaslighting agenda here and you've been doing it to me for my entire campaign. My campaign is over and you're still doing it.

I would have expected this from you if I'd endorsed 3RU7AL, the fact you're doing it anyway when I endorse Airmax is a big issue for voters who supported me (yes, they really exist and existed). You can play your game here, have your last word and be nasty to me. I am not interested in your abuse anymore this is a callout thread anyway.

Go on, have your last word now. You 'win' this forum debate because you get the last word. Well done, pat on the back. 

@RationalCrybaby

We will see if it's feigned or not when I give my vote. This thread is just an extension of your ego being incapable of handling negative feedback while you pretend I'm the thin-skinned one.

It's not cowardice for airmax not to respond to RCB's vitriol, because RCB has an agenda. Airmax is more than willing to debate and engage professionally with any serious questions that people have about his campaign. Even if you want to argue with him about it. But he shouldn't be encouraged to respond to blatant manipulation, so I will be the one to do. 

It is. My agenda is simple, if Airmax doesn't disassociate with your severe toxicity, it's going to badly hurt his image. The sooner he gets that, the sooner he can be saved from an inevitable defeat as he neglected this community for years and nobody owes him for anything anymore.

You have this romantic idea of him, I have the real idea. He's an antihero motivated by an ego rush. There's no other sensible reason for a guy to give absolutley zero crap about a community until there's a power position to compete for and to promise us that basically if he loses, he won't bother with us anymore.

I know what his real agenda is and I support him anyway. It's not faked and you will not succeed in driving me away from voting for the best hope the website has at not staying dead af.

Where you go wrong is you think I need to like Airmax to vote for him or support him. Like either I worship him or I hate him. You got to get some nuance, learn it.

I'd also like us to consider community events, and how we can implement those, and what they would entail.

I very much enjoy the live mafia games we do on Friday nights, and I hope we can get larger crowds for that as we make it a regular thing, but I'm wondering if there is an interest in other hangout type events.

I'd like to see us engage in competitive and cooperative video game nights, movie nights, and other things with some level of formality, as well as informal events where members can just hang out at some regular intervals. Let me know your thoughts on this, and if you have specific ideas for community gathering type things we can arrange.

I think it might be fun just to watch someone stream some new video game, or watch a sporting event together, but that might just be me, so let me know if you have any thoughts about this at all.

Show us your debates on the forums please, which page of your posts should we go through?

Do you know which of us likes our safe space? You.

You sit in forum games where you're safe to type your vitriol and bully with your 'buddies' and you consistently struggle to cope in said forum games if your friends don't turn up to back you up. 

You can barely endure the website if your bestie Mikal isn't there as your emotional support. 

You only ever engage people in arenas where you think you're more popular within it in the first place. Show me one exception. 

Before you bring it up, 3RU7AL's campaign thread was something you engaged in after you saw it was only Athias defending. I engaged from the start.

Let's be fucking real here, I've been around the block, lasted through a 'permaban' to show my love of debating and withstanding hostility and disagreement, not flinched or given a damn. I debate among the most active on and off the forums on this website overall. You are throwing stones out of a greenhouse, Lunatic.

Let me guess, you think you getting the 'last word' here constitutes a win, that's why you stick to forums.

I don't have an issue with forum-only debaters. I just think that you are confusing you continually harassing me as something that somehow is 'debating'. 

You're not debating me, you're just coming after me trying desperately to hurt my feelings to soothe your precious ego against the 1 on 1 domination happening right here right now.

This isn't your Discord, you don't have authority and don't have some bunch of buddies to laugh me out the room like you did on DDO.

I gave you a genuine burn, if you were actually thick-skinned you'd have said 'damn I'll take the L good one RM' but you can't do that because you can't recognise it for what it is.

You should have picked on somebody else. I debate anybody, anytime on practically anything (within reason and time constraints). You are the one who sits in your happy zone with your friends to back you up whenever you feel too heated and need approval so you @ them and laugh at me hoping they pile on me. I stick up for myself, my voters never spoke for me once yet clearly stated they'd vote me and why is that? I am not somebody who ever needs to rely on others for any kind of debate or conflict (unless we are talking physical life threatening conflict, but that isn't debating and I'm not about to risk dying to prove what a 'man' I am until it's absolutely necessary).

You are somebody who needs your feeling of power and 'buddies' before you really can debate. Guess what? Nobody cares. 

Go on, have your last word now. You 'win' this forum debate because you get the last word. Well done, pat on the back. 

I am referring to the ban I received on DART in Sept 2020, genius. If either of us can't handle the stress it's mr 'I play forum games to feign genuine debate activity and compensate'.

https://media3.giphy.com/media/xT1XGU1AHz9Fe8tmp2/200.gif

@RationalCrybaby

You can call me out on my bullshit all you like, my vote will do the talking for me on election day.

You did more to ruin Airmax's image than anybody could.

My old voters are now more inclined to vote 3RU7AL thanks to how you abused somebody they actually backed and liked in a thread where I endorsed him.

You are blinded by an ego and rage that I find very irritating but I guess I'm growing numb/used to it. 

@Rationalcrybaby

Oh I was banned for far less, I am used to inconsistent moderation though and as I said this is without a results-oriented mindset.

I see you violate rules, I click report. Whether you abuse me, Pie or another user or Jews in general. It is not of a concern to me.

If I say anymore it can be misconstrued as a threat of mod action. I am clicking report until you stop breaking the rules, whether by your own volition or the mods doing their diligent duty to protect site users from bullying.

@RationalCrybaby

Truthbox: Airmax1227 is called the best mod of DDO because he didn't let any others moderate it, even when he should have. He is a workaholic bitchboy who only knows how to act all big and mighty when he has to win an election and charm somebody.

On PMs, he stopped replying to me after he realised that not only he had nothing more to gain as I'd dropped out to endorse him but that despite that, I was not gonna fall for his fake charm.

Report me for the 'bitchboy' remark, you laissez-faire poser.

You're overrated and I can say it to your face.

So, drop the act that we're friends and just at the very least reply if you support or don't support Lunatic's actions. Give me the respect to reply to what I write, I don't deserve your blind eye anymore, see me and respond.

He can meme all he wants, in the end the toxicity stacks up, this is the same mod that banned me for stacked up poor conduct that was barely close to as bad as what Lunatic has done these past 2 weeks.

However, what he does isn't my concern, I am just reporting things that violate rules as that is the duty of any member of the website.

I think you misread that. 

He was memeing rm, not critiquing you lmfao.