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1 is a perfectly debatable topic given a definition, which is essential in any debate
2 has a BoP, just like any debate
3 is the same as 1
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Whether or not the resolution is subjective in this case depends on how it is operationalised. The instigator has a responsibility in any debate to define terms, and here they need to define "best/worst." Typically this means a criterion to establish how the instigator knows that X is the best/worst will be stated at the very start of the debate.
Eg
Oromagi is the best debater
best = better than all other debaters on the site as measured by elo rating.
in this case neg might argue against the definition, but in any case where he doesn't, you have a perfectly fine, non-subjective debate.
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quality forum debates shouldn't compare to mafia games in post volume. If they do, they're likely devolving into low quality flame wars and spam.
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@Barney
I think it strikes a good compromise between using an unqualified set of judges and having a meaningful judgement. I've actually never considered using an aggregate statistic for before/after positions in an audience to judge a debate. That way they don't have to explain to the audience how to judge a debate, they can just find out who was more persuasive overall. But yes I agree it's a far from perfect system and there's a few nuances that I'd like to know too.
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@Barney
The side which is more compelling should theoretically never have less people agreeing with it after the debate than before.
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@Polytheist-Witch
lighten up. it's a small community, no point in being alarmed.
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@Logical-Master
What community powers do you observe this community as having, pertinent to the checks and balances you suggest for mods?As long as the community has the power to keep mods in check, I'm fine with it.
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Did we learn nothing from the DDO elite my friends?
This is a smashing idea. 100% support.
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@drafterman
yes, my knowledge of the english alphabet is godly too.
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@drafterman
Supa is a gen X. The millennials are the last generation who will notice monty python references, I'm calling it now.
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@drafterman
well we aren't really rolling out new policies on a biweekly basis is the thing. We just need someone with extra powers who can enforce the CoC. A mod seems like a more ideal system than a commune imho.
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@drafterman
This doesn't sound like a mod system moreso than Athenian democracy.We should take turns to act as sort of executive officer for the week but all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special bi-weekly meeting by a simple majority in the case of purely internal affairs or by a two thirds majority in the case of more important issues.
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@bsh1
#5 is the only one I could anticipate issues with. If nobody is voting on a debate, and the one vote present is a violation of the CoC it's guaranteed protection from the community at large. Not all users may be willing to use report features even when they know another user ought to be reported, so perhaps putting the onus of reporting on the debater essentially may not bring about a net benefit.Does that mean you agree with all 12 points?
There's also the issue of newb debaters not knowing that they've just been vote bombed and being led to believe that it's a normal way of voting.
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@Buddamoose
Priorities are clearly out of whack, and that's enshrined in the letter of the law, which does in fact prohibit saying mean words, but not doing mean things.I disagree on the "not doing mean things." Harassment and doxxing are disallowed per the letter of the CoC. The issue I've had from the beginning is the sections on "hate speech" are only ever going to be subjective and lead to inconsistent applications. That inconsistency will cause disfavor and anger at the percieved injustice of it.Not to mention, people overwhelmingly dislike PC/SJW nonsense like "hate speech." This is why leftbook groups are lucky to hit 100+ members, and groups like AnCapistan, which legitimately leaves the rules at "don't doxx people like a fuckstick" are filled with members that numbers well into the thousands. Cause at the end of the day, people generally don't care if a group or site they're a part of has bigots. They'd rather be a part of the site where the soup du jour is memes about school shootings, blackface, or whatever troll topic is the flavor that day, then a place where language is policed.Cause at the end of the day, the best argument against distasteful and/or hateful ideologies, is to just let them speak. As a bonus it tends to be humurous to boot.
I agree with all of this, but I would still call the behaviour coming from Tyrone and RM high tier toxic and abusive. Whether or not it should be allowed is apparently not contentious -it is allowed. Banning "Tranny" but allowing "Fuck you bitch" is not sensibly consistent.
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@Tyrone
None really. Tbh if you're gonna have a flame war that's between you. My issue lies elsewhere, as you noted. That's really all my participation in this discussion comes down to.He insulted me, I insulted him back. I don't see what the big deal is.
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@Tyrone
This for example, has far greater capacity for harm than flippant use of the word tranny in a conversation.Go fuck yourself.
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@Tyrone
It's not the behaviours that are allowed that concerns me, it's the behaviours that are banned despite what is allowed. This has all been mod sanctioned so far, which is fair enough imo. But words like tranny and nigger are banned, despite all the other shit that goes down. It's an example of symbolic offence. The mod policy is less interested in avenues of real abuse, and more interested in avenues of symbolic abuse.It's ridiculous that this sort of behaviour that's been going on in this thread is allowed to stand, but using symbolically offensive words goes too far.Both should be allowed to stand. I commend Bsh1 for allowing me and RM to duke it out without any significant moderator intervention. None was needed.
Some of the things in this thread are really cutting close to the line of what I could call real abuse. I find it hard to cognate that word policing has a logical basis when this behaviour is defined as acceptable.
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@DebateArt.com
have members been abusing the report feature?
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I don't see an issue with Bsh1, I see an issue with the policy. It's ridiculous that this sort of behaviour that's been going on in this thread is allowed to stand, but using symbolically offensive words goes too far. Priorities are clearly out of whack, and that's enshrined in the letter of the law, which does in fact prohibit saying mean words, but not doing mean things.
/Abstain.
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@bsh1
what happened to your Laissez-faire moderation style you previously identified with?At this point, your just stirring up drama. But, in answer to your question, no, he can't say that. He can use any of hundreds of others ways to address you, but may not use slurs.
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@Polytheist-Witch
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@Polytheist-Witch
you should quote the post you reply to, I'm not sure what you mean without context.
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I watched kids roaming the streets as I went home today. Upon self-reflection I noticed this was the first time I've referred to teenagers as kids. This is all the scare I need for this years Halloween.
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@Vaarka
do you derive pleasure from this activity?
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@YeshuaBought
perchance, do you have Bipolar I? If they're unwittingly making you relive a trauma you should be a bit more clear about what you want others to do, otherwise you won't find co-operation.
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It's always good to establish what both opponents are expected to argue for in your introduction. That way your opponent can't challenge the debate's underlying assumptions. I don't think you should explicitly outlaw kritiks in your debates because it might be ambiguous when a fundamental challenge to the debate's assumptions are warranted or not. Just specifying the case that your opponent must represent is enough.
For example: Topic is "Automation is a significant threat to future prosperity." To prevent any underhanded attempts to render your argument a non-debate, you could say "Con must show that we stand to lose prosperity as a direct result of automation" in your description. This would stop Con from arguing "We were never prosperous, thus there is no propserity that automation can threaten."
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So in context, OP is asked several times by mod if she wants the debate removed, doesn't respond but still complains about moderation. Gotcha.
Tisk.
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@YeshuaBought
you can report and block. You're not compelled to participate in that debate. Also note that he's baiting you, so interacting with him is clearly not wise if you think you're going to be upset by it.
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@Jhhillman
In policy debate, hou win an argument as long as you techically said it. If you say the words "plan can't solve becuase china hates trump" and htey miss it, than you min that argument. And yes, I am from the USA.
I don't know why but this makes me angry lol. This is an objectively terrible rule to impose on debaters.
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@Death23
OK I just read this post from you https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/557?page=1&post_number=20 and your speculative arguments are completely based in fantasy. To demonstrate this, I'm going to restate your argument the way you said it, except I'll reverse your conclusion and show you that it's equally valid:
Say you have an online community with rampant hate speech. There are 3 schools of thought within this community; Groups A, B and C. The hate speech from group A will offend groups B and C. The hate speech from group B will offend groups A and C. The hate speech from group C will offend groups A and B. As users are offended, they increase participation in the community. Eventually, what will happen? Well, here's what's going to happen - The group that makes the most hostile and offensive environment will drive the other 2 groups to increase their own posting in reaction- There's much much diversity in opinion coming from that situation.
If we don't do A then B will happen is the sort of bare assertion you're not allowed to make and get away with. You're bringing bags of ideology in with you that you've simply assumed is true a priori. I'm sorry to say but you're going to have to discard the assumption of infallibility in your presumptions.
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@Death23
You don't see the consequences. This is a debating website. It relies on user generated content and fulfills its purpose best when there is a broad diversity of opinions within the user base. Hate speech may create an environment that's intimidating, hostile or offensive to reasonable people. Users will leave in response to that environment.If there happens to be any social value to a particular example of hate speech then it's incidental, not intrinsic. That value can be had without the consequences by expressing oneself in a way that isn't intimidating, hostile or offensive.
No, this is entirely untrue.
To claim that anything that creates an environment that's intimidating, hostile or offensive to reasonable people should be banned goes way beyond hate speech. Half of all the posts in the last thread were unambiguously hostile, people may have been offended and the default argument of choice in the religion forum is intimidation. You're not specifying hate speech here.
When you come to a debate site you are expected to understand that other views may offend you. Other people may hate you. If the aim of our censorship is to increase the number of individuals on the site by making it less hostile, you're dealing with etiquette. Refer to my first point, this is not specific to hate speech. All offensive speech should be banned if the aim is to prevent "intimidation, hostility and offense." In fact far more that just offensive speech.
The assumptions you're building off, such as 'hate speech is too hostile for a debate site' are wrong to begin with. You need to take a few steps back and address them first before basing a claim on their falsely supposed infallibility.
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The difference between abuse and hatespeech can often be the difference between calling someone a nigger, versus using the term nigger in general. One is (contextually and conditionally) abusive and the other is hate speech, however the latter does not need to be moderated.
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@Death23
If an attack is directed at your person then you are being personally attacked. The difference between that and an attack that is not directed at your person is whether you are being targeted for harassment or not. Being a target of harassment can have psychological effects above and beyond merely being offended by what others say. Cyber-bullying for instance may have real life consequences on an individual, hate speech does not.What's the harm in ad homs and personal slurs if it's not the offensive nature of them?
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@Imabench
does censorship of "hate-speech" constitute acceptable mod practice.Sorry Im late, what I miss?
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@Death23
This is a debating site. It needs users with diverse viewpoints. If users feel bad then they're liable to leave. That's the practical problem with hate speech, ad hom attacks or whatever else people feel like doing that has negligible debate value and causes other users to feel bad.
Ad homs and personal slurs are harmful, regardless of them being valuable to discussion. "Hate speech" is not harmful to discuss and whether it contributes to discussion is contextual and entirely plausible. If I want to deligitimise and mock transgender individuals as being mentally ill then that's fine. No group is protected from ridicule and there's no grounds to protect a group from ridicule either. Feel free to mock Christians, Muslims, straights, gays, liberals, conservatives etc. Nobody is special and nobody gets protection from scorn and derision.
Being offended means absolutely nothing.
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tough luck boi, you're a white guy. No minority privilege for you!I don't know but the fact zeichen can speak to me in such humiliating way and get away with it disgusts me. Zeichen can speak I'll of my mental health, tell me I'm a pathetic jo-life loser and bsh1 won't do shit about it, tells me it's my fault for talking to her. When it suits bsh1 he victim blames.
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Let's talk about hate speech.
In the context of this site, it's been defined as "derogatory words which apply to a specific class of people." (Bish, 2018)
What is the rationale in enforcing their non use? Is moderation of hate speech beneficial to a debate site? Does hate speech have any non-trivial consequences? I'm going to make a few points here:
1. If hate speech is banned for it's capacity to offend, then all offensive speech should be banned.
The rationale behind banning 'hate speech' is surreptitiously to protect minority classes from... something. I know I'm not going to face consequences for using the term 'white trash' when referring to Trump voters, or egregiously labeling all men misogynists. Bish has said previously that hate speech can describe anything that derides a class, but mainly applies to marginalised groups (minorities). Hate speech is therefore derogatory words which apply to specific minorities. So why ban it?
The worst effect of hate speech conceivable is that you will offend someone. You calling someone a tranny has no ability to impact their actual lives, only their emotions. The basis of hate speech censorship is therefore to protect the feelings of individuals who identify with a minority. This is a fair assessment of the rationale to ban hate speech.
The issue herein is that the fundamental justification for the censorship is to prevent offense. Hate speech is merely something which easily causes offense. It doesn't always cause offense (not all African-Americans will care if someone calls them a nigger), but because it is expected to cause offense, it's banned. How do we know this standard I've just concocted is true? Because words and terms that are labelled hate speech must simply be derogatory to a certain class of people for it to qualify.
'Hate speech' is a misnomer, as it infers the intent of hate in loaded terms when hate may not exist. If it's the hate part you want to ban, then let's be intellectually honest and understand that it's the offensive speech that needs to be banned. How do we know what constitutes offensive speech? That's for me to decide, and I elect to be offended by the suggestion that hate speech ought to be moderated. Thus, out of consideration to my feelings, you should not censor anything I say lest you offend me.
2. When faced with subjectivity, moderation should reflect group norms (barring Mike's whim)
From point 1, hate speech is subjective, it may or may not cause offense, and it's the offense that is actually the intent of censorship, not specifically the words themselves. If the site does not have any transgenders on it, is there any justification behind banning the word 'tranny?' Maybe, because a tranny might be watching. If the discussion is between two or more members however and both or all participants implicitly consent to using offensive words on each other, what does censorship accomplish?
A group of white kids comes to an agreement that when talking among themselves, they will not call each other 'nigger.' Why? If there is nobody around to be offended by your 'hate' speech, the rationale for censorship sinks. Again, hate speech must be offensive for it to qualify, thus a statement that won't offend anyone cannot be considered hate speech. Subjectivity is inherent in this definition, and on this site that subjectivity is the basis for moderation. Naturally, censorship of speech on a platform intended to promote free discussion is an antithesis to the site's values.
To police something which isn't the same for every person, there comes a point where you are going to have to draw an arbitrary line and declare that any statements north of here go too far. The basis for this should be a product of site culture and consensus. It can also be an explicit declaration of Mike, who as the owner gets to decide the rules irrespective of member opinion. It does not fall to a single member of the community, particularly a mod, to decide for the community where these lines should be drawn.
3. Abuse and harassment rules are better than hate speech rules.
All this can be solved by considering the speech at the individual level. If an individual insults someone with the malicious intent to degrade their self esteem or otherwise emotionally harm them, then that statement is abusive. We have rules in place that prohibit abuse and these are great rules. For the most part they are black and white. When they aren't, mod discretion fills in the gaps. There is no need for hate speech rules on top of this.
"It could be symbolically offensive to others who could theoretically be present in this discussion." No.
"Minorities are harmed by your use of derogatory words." No.
"People exist in class structures, many of these classes are victims of an oppressive system that is perpetrated through the words you use." No.
"Your identity can be threatened by the words others use to describe you." No.
Take all your assumptions listed above and discard them. Not only are they not true, they are harmful subjective opinions that you should keep to yourself. Using them as a basis for policing the behaviour of others is called something very special in the modern political climate: Oppression.
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@bsh1
The words have evolved beyond their historical roots. They have taken on more a meaning of the n-word towards those particular groups. I think that's sufficient grounds to preclude their use.
You really have to be a highly privileged white dude to believe this. Outside of liberal culture exists the minorities that don't tie self value to the words you use to describe them. This phenomenon is very unique to the West and specifically the Western left. I've noticed this BS seeping into the Australian far left from the US and I'd wish it'd just stay in the US. Convincing minorities that they need to be cuddled, babied and protected from the mean, nasty words that can be used on them is the basis of a culture of de-empowerment that creates victims out of classes and attempts to convince those classes that they are individually powerless before the systems of oppression that rule them.
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@Tejretics
We have no such consideration for unrefuted arguments. I did a quick google and it seems the point of spreading is to win by presenting more arguments than the opponent can refute. That's imho a clear exploitation of rule technicality.
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@Jhhillman
What are the metrics used to judge debate winners in the US? If you tried this in Aus you would simply lose on presentation manner and comprehensibility.Yes, it is. It's worse now. People regularly spread above 400 wpm. There are schools that teach their debaters to simply spam shitty arguments at ridiculous speeds. Those debaters win tournaments. Krikiks are weirder now too. I can see if I can send you a file for one I recently acquired. It's indescribable.
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I don't think the community stands to gain anything from airing dirty laundry. Explanation of a ban is only owed to affected parties, not every member on the site. Confidentiality is favourable here imo if you want less drama instead of more.
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this one is entirely optional but is a solution to one of the most common stalemates that occur in a debate: what do you do when neither side agrees on the definition.
IRL this happens a bit and many incompetent debaters will completely ignore their opponents material in favour of using their own definition for the topic. The solution is that the prima facie definition is correct unless contested, and when this is contested and both sides disagree, both sides should use arguments such as "even if his definition were correct, his argument still fails because..." and then also present the material that your definition would require. This way the debate still goes on as there is a ground where things are being contested, which is essential to have a debate in the first place.
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@bsh1
Notify them that the debate starts in Round 1, they should use the description section to define terms and outline what their position is and what position a prospective challenger is expected to debate. A debate argument should be formatted with paragraphs, use subheadings to denote arguments and use inline citations whenever sources are being cited. Debaters should be conscious of the reader's perspective, as they are the voters. Making things easier for the reader goes a long way towards presenting a professional argument. You could include little things like placing rebuttals before arguments or summarising the opponents arguments succinctly if rebuttals are being placed after so the reader doesn't have to refresh their memory by scrolling up. For technical debates you could recommend or link to one of the standardised essay formats. All arguments should be proof-read for spelling and grammar as well as conciseness.
Etiquette includes things like ad hominems, not posting images of text to circumvent character limits, not using comments section to store arguments or sources without mutual agreement, formulating a decent RFD when voting etc. Newbs should be advised against Votebombing, how to report poor conduct, vote trading is not acceptable etc.
If you wanted to go one step further you could include fundamental debate philosophy that all debaters should be aware of. Fallacy for example is best avoided by conceptualising one's argument as a syllogism and identifying if the conclusion follows strongly from the premises. If not, the argument is either weak or fallacious.
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@bsh1
maybe a paragraph on how to debate, put simply. You could just cover setting up the debate and some etiquette.
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