X_Larsson:
And it would be helpful to see the justification given as a final post if a discussion is shut down.
I agree. Good housekeeping. It also opens up unpaid, volunteer mods to potential harassment, so I see both sides.
1 year
X_Larsson:
To sum it up, the many interventions by moderators are that some people are "offended" by something, even if it is not personal attacks or denigrating statements?
Alternatively, shut down preventively by moderators before anyone complains?
So discussions are not really discussions, more of somewhat uniform flow of inputs, morally approved, in the "virtues" currently "in fashion" of more conformistic parts of the society? And avoiding to potentially "hurt someone" is consistently more important than discussing the topics? (There are clearly some people that should be more protected than others.)
It is good if the contents of these applied (but not always stated) rules are clear, which they obviously are not, by looking at the numbers of stopped discussions (as I referred to in my initial question).
Again, this is posted as I see that many discussions (that I not posted in) develop in very odd directions.
Munchies:
Who hurt you?
X_Larsson:
Haha, the oh so predictible ad hominem! I am not hurt, and I have posted one question, the same as now is posted by @Letters and numbers; "When a thread gets locked, say why."
I do not care about politics, and I have only had one topic of mine shut down (obviously without any stated reason).
But in the interest of retaining some dynamics and interaction, having clear examples and justification would be good.
If I’m thinking of the same thread of yours that was locked several months back, I’d say it was because people were starting to dunk on you and there was no positive discussion going on anymore. It had stopped being positive pages back and was churning over the same ground and getting toxic. It wasn’t your fault, particularly, in as much as you weren’t being particularly hostile in return (you were getting pedantic though). It was just a blood in the water feeding frenzy. Personally, I don’t think there was anything more to say in that thread. You weren’t being convinced by what anyone else had to say, nobody at all was convinced by what you had to say, it was turning into ad homs and it was time for it to close. Seemed obvious to me, but what do i know.
1 year
X_Larsson:
To sum it up, the many interventions by moderators are that some people are "offended" by something, even if it is not personal attacks or denigrating statements?
Alternatively, shut down preventively by moderators before anyone complains?
So discussions are not really discussions, more of somewhat uniform flow of inputs, morally approved, in the "virtues" currently "in fashion" of more conformistic parts of the society? And avoiding to potentially "hurt someone" is consistently more important than discussing the topics? (There are clearly some people that should be more protected than others.)
It is good if the contents of these applied (but not always stated) rules are clear, which they obviously are not, by looking at the numbers of stopped discussions (as I referred to in my initial question).
Again, this is posted as I see that many discussions (that I not posted in) develop in very odd directions.
I don’t see a lot of mod/admin interaction on the site at all. Maybe we’re reading different threads? Fundamentally, though, this is a completely privately owned business that’s trying to be welcoming to the greatest number of people possible to get them to spend money here. That means content creators need to want to post their content here and enough customers need to want to use the site to spend their money. If that doesn’t happen, the site dies. It’s not the great town hall with unlimited free speech. It’s a business.
I’d love to see more interaction from mods/admins though. When a thread gets locked, say why. Even if it’s “the discussion in this thread has gotten hostile. Thread locked” I think I’ve seen threads unlocked after people calm down a bit, and then locked again when it turns back into a fight. A little more interaction might make what’s going on more clear. I only mod one small section of the site, so fortunately I’ve never had to lock a thread, but if it happens I will be sure to post a reason so it’s clear.
1 year
Letters And Numbers:
If Abe Lincoln had been really fat, maybe he would have survived the assassination attempt and guided the country through reconstruction.
Munchies:
Posts from a brighter timeline.
Lincoln was shot in the skull behind his left ear. I don't think anyone, even someone 2,000 lbs, is fat enough to withstand that.
Maybe JWB would have been so distracted by what a handsome big dude he was that he never would have pulled the trigger, huh?
1 year
If Abe Lincoln had been really fat, maybe he would have survived the assassination attempt and guided the country through reconstruction.
1 year
Bcain:
Great point on the sweeping dialogue. I often get caught up with the tags back and forth to make sure a reader knows exactly who saying what to who and how they are saying it, but cutting these out where possible can definitely pick up the pace. Need to remind myself not to always play to what I assume is the lowest common denominator of reader, y’all are smarter than that right? Ha
There are times when it’s necessary and times when they don’t get in the way. When I go back through to revise, I try to take a few out along the way when I can. It feels like it streamlines things.
For anyone looking for help with this, I know the ProWritingAid (which I believe is still free) plug-in for Word will identify dialogue tags, and I’m sure Grammerly does too. They can be good tools for highlighting different aspects of the way we write. Ok, taking off my lecture hat now.
1 year
Ok, so I bought a cookie at Crumbl this week and it was $6 after tip. This kid was loaded or he went broke buying cookies. It was pretty good though.
The thing that I love the best about this story is how much character development there is in just two chapters. The interactions between Janessa and her coworkers are very targeted and effective at painting the picture, the love interests shared high school background is great and is very relatable, so it helps to short cut the reader to a place where it feels like we just know who these people are. It’s hard to do in a couple chapters, but really well done here.
On a technical level, the prose is great. Sweeping up for dialogue tags (the ‘he said’, ‘she replied’s’ alongside quotes dialogue, for folks out there who don’t know what I mean) is all the rage now, so cutting a few of those where the speaker is clear might punch up the dialogue, but they’re something I lean on a lot, too, I said.
Very lovely and well done, thank you again for sharing.
(Anyone who would like to get in for March, please reach out to me! If there’s no takers, maybe we’ll do a different style of event for the month)
1 year
Letters And Numbers:
I guess to answer the OP’s question in a different way, threads get locked because mods don’t have a lot of other tools at their disposal. They can’t discipline individual users, so locking threads is the only real tool at their disposal. I’m sure admins have more tools to use, but there are fewer admins. Threads can be unlocked.
As an alternative to locking threads, having a way to mute individual users for a period of time might be helpful when one person is harassing or spamming, etc. A stop gap until an admin can review the situation.
Munchies:
I feel like muting a user would be extremely helpful. I've seen a lot of instances where everyone is having a lovely time, and then one person comes in and shits all over the place. Muting could be a useful tool until admin is able to review the situation.
I also think users being able to mute another could be nice. Sometimes, you just don't jive with another user, and not seeing their posts could be nice. When you mute them, you could see they've posted, but not what they posted. Then you could have the option to see a specific post or not. I'm thinking it would work like posts tagged NSFW on social media sites.
I’ve always been confused why blocking users on this site doesn’t work that way. It’s odd. It seems like it would make a better experience for everyone.
1 year
I guess to answer the OP’s question in a different way, threads get locked because mods don’t have a lot of other tools at their disposal. They can’t discipline individual users, so locking threads is the only real tool at their disposal. I’m sure admins have more tools to use, but there are fewer admins. Threads can be unlocked.
As an alternative to locking threads, having a way to mute individual users for a period of time might be helpful when one person is harassing or spamming, etc. A stop gap until an admin can review the situation.
1 year
Letters And Numbers:
I’m pretty much of the mind that unless it’s about size acceptance or other weight related political issues, there’s the ENTIRE REST OF THE INTERNET to talk about politics. It’s inescapable. This site can be an oasis from that. But just my opinion.
Karenjenk:
The other side is just skip over things you dont want to read and realize its all right ot be offended
Letters And Numbers:
Yup, absolutely. Half of the annoying slap fights could be avoided this way.
Munchies:
I don't enjoy talking politics on here. Only time I do is when you have bigots bigotting. Other than that, I talk about it elsewhere.
ok
1 year
