What do you expect from your moderators?

[apparition]

I personally don't have a problem with the moderation on the forums, but since this topic came up...

Before an answer to "What do you expect from your moderators?" can be given, I think there should be an answer to "What is expected from forum members?" Has that already been answered? If so, a lot of this post can be disregarded.

I'm not deeply involved with the Arma forums, so it seems to me the only universally applied "rules" that are consistently enforced are the "F" word restriction (system-moderated) and spam prohibition (system/moderator-moderated). All other moderation is arbitrarily applied by individual moderators based on their ideas of what is acceptable or not. All other codes of conduct are assumed to be understood by forum members.

Concord's right, ideally idiots shouldn't act idiotically on the forums. But that just doesn't happen. Sometimes they don't even know they're doing something wrong. This is the only forum I actually frequent, so I probably make sillyass breaches of conduct. I might even be pissing someone off by posting this right now and I wouldn't even know why.

Generally, how the forum is moderated should be agreed upon (at least by the moderators themselves), consistent, and stated somewhere. Otherwise, no one can expect anything since the word directly relates to something that is consistently predictable. The disagreements I've read through on this thread seem to reflect inconsistency. I take it moderating isn't an easy task. Maybe it is, I wouldn't know. I do know that some people don't like rules, order, organization, etc. and that they don't want to force anything onto others. However, if there really is some ambiguity of how efficiently the forums are being moderated, then it might be helpful to do so. At least draft a statement of what is expected of members, who the moderators are, and what they can do (which Lucifer pointed out at the beginning of this topic). Rules, guidelines, whatever... It could even be as simple as a link to a third party page describing common problems on forums and how to avoid them.

Personally, I expect moderators to simply and objectively point people in the right direction and keep things organized without affecting content. ALL of the rest should be left to the forum members to handle.

[subby]

I agree +1

[gawdzilla]

I find it funny that posts like these remain unwarned and untouched:

And we hate you. Not the English or the UK as a whole, because that would be irrational and petty (sort of like elevating the significance of a ball game over a country's independence from colonialism). No, we just hate you, Liz. And not motivated by some absurd xenophobia, narcissism, or sociopathy, but because you, individually, are a rotten human being.

And a post like this one:

Call the police? I'm a sociopath remember, I'll kill them all!

gets removed.

[noob_saibot]

These admins obviously have a boner for Phytotron. Perhaps it is time the admins here raise his level to [+1 WARNING LEVEL]. Seems as though the people who registered on this forum prior to 2005 get some sort of special treatment, but I could be wrong.

Is this a threat??

Can someone just euthanise noob_saibot, please?

[Tank Program]

I find it funny that posts like these remain unwarned and untouched: [...]

And a post like this one [...] gets removed.

That was me. It's about who I expect better from. At this point will all know how Phytotron acts, and he is consistent in it. But you Deadmau6, that post had flame bait written all over it and I would have expected better from you.

[Z-Man]

Not to mention it's the kind of comment that freaks some people out and they call the police.

[gawdzilla]

Ok ok, fair enough. But I still think you guys need to do something about his comments, just because you expect it from him doesn't make it acceptable? I'm fine with poking fun at me (and others) but that quote of him.. come on now...

[apparition]

That was me. It's about who I expect better from. At this point will all know how Phytotron acts, and he is consistent in it. But you Deadmau6, that post had flame bait written all over it and I would have expected better from you.

Not to mention it's the kind of comment that freaks some people out and they call the police.

No offense dudes, but this makes it seem like neither of you have adequate and fully functional bullshit filters.

Phytotron's hardcore comment very seriously attacks someone. I don't care who that comment was about. It could have been made about any number people and it would still be a disgusting example of hatred that would be best removed from this forum. If someone said that shit in that tone in real life in front of however many people witnessed it here on the forums, I'd expect some serious backlash. I was really bothered by that comment, but I didn't say anything because I was waiting for some form of consistent and objective moderation and later put it out of my mind. Now that the comment is back in the open I want to say that it wasn't right for Phyto to make that statement and it wasn't right for you to leave it up. I don't care if it coincides with your opinion of Lizmatic or not, you all made a subtle point by allowing that comment to stay up for everyone on the forum to read. And now, instead of taking responsibility for that decision, you chose to perpetuate some absurd paranoid view of people taking stupid comments too seriously AND leave Phytotron's comment up?

I don't care that it was Liz that his comment was directed at. The main point here is that this is a very serious flaw in your moderation and not at all what I would expect.

And in the future, keep shit like that in your head Phytotron.

[Lucifer]

I missed it. I'd have removed it and sent him a warning. Using 1000 word essays to tell people to get a life is one thing, but asking any random person to kill someone is quite something else.

[Z-Man]

Just to note, Phytotron's comment is taken out of context, it's a response to "(I hate you all)", which was just the culmination of other comments along the same lines in that particular discussion. Take that as a joke if you will, but "I hate you too, because ..." is a valid and more differentiated response. In this post, he is precise. Personally, I find the posts where he overgeneralizes, deduces that anything anyone does that he disagrees with directly as a character flaw and conscious attack against himself and predicts the downfall of our entire civilization from it (yeah, I'm exaggerating) much more offensive and warn/moveworthy. Yeah, his "we" here really just means "I and those thinking like me", and of course it's not nice. But there is no nice response. Well, carebears would perhaps find one, but while carebears are fine and all, we don't want to force everyone to be one. Removing it would have meant removing Liz's earlier comments, and they were intermingled with votes, so that would have meant editing, and you guys hate it when we edit posts.

And it's not like anyone is immune from moderation. In fact, Phytotron has several warnings on his head and some posts of his removed as well. All of you are complaining all of the time that ooh, we moderators hit so hard on them while that guy over there is so much worse and gets away. a) no, he doesn't, and b) chances are you're worse than that guy and just don't know it.

Lucifer: Kill? Where? Are you sure you're not confusing the posts?

[Lucifer]

Can someone just euthanise noob_saibot, please?

This one. I know, euthanise means to put someone out of their misery, but it means to do so by taking their life.

What we've got here are basically two groups of people singling each other out as targeting them and angry that they don't think we moderators are doing anything about it. It's Phytotron vs (the other group), and my personal view is that both sides are completely wrong about what's going on.

Well, except that both sides *are* singling each other out as they accuse each other of doing, and both sides get defensive and point fingers whenever anyone points out that both sides are doing it.

But as z-man says, we are dealing with it. I'm sure several of us moderators have PM exchanges with people from each side on the matter (I know I do), and at least one person has been banned already (although maybe not explicitly for this particular problem, just that this problem is part of the reason).

We're also seeing some behavior lightening up.

Keep in mind, y'all, that deep down inside, we don't want to ban anybody. So the change we're trying to make is one where everybody gets along. If you're not willing to make that change, sooner or later we'll make the decision to ban you, it is inevitable. But right now, you have a choice to be part of the solution and just get along. Quit taking things so personally, quit attacking everything you don't like about someone, and quit whining that nobody cares. This is true about people on both sides of the issue, and what's also true is that you are all each responsible for your own behavior. You can't keep saying "He made me do it". No, he didn't. You did it on your own. Stop it.

[Phytotron]

Just to note, Phytotron's comment is taken out of context....

Right, Liz deliberately left out the bit where I quoted her (this is all more of her playing games, I can only assume). And moreover, as Z-Man pointed out, read the whole thread. Also consider the context of the forum as a whole. Single threads do not exist in isolated vacuums. Around the same time, Liz had been making several other "bashing"-type remarks of the same nature in the World Cup and soccer/football threads. My comment was a critique on that stuff, if a strident one.

(Sidebar: Is she actually English or Dutch? For some reason I was under the impression she's English, which is why I referenced them, you see.)


And of course that remark toward noob_saibot wasn't a threat; it's facetious. Again, context. (Might also be worth noting that some time after that he had come into Shrunkland and was talking all about how we're "boys" now or something, and was behaving civilly. Maybe he didn't mean that. )


So, I know some of my comments can be hard to take—

Just every now and then you seem to take people, shake them by the shoulders, and slap them in the face.

—but there's a difference between my stuff, which is typically criticizing or chewing someone out in response to something they've already said or done; and other, basically unprovoked, instigative acts of antagonism, etc. That's not to say, "they made me do it;" rather, it's making what I see is a qualitative distinction. That's why I don't consider it an attack and don't complain when someone makes a sincere, substantive criticism of me, even if I think they're off-base.

[Lackadaisical]

[...] so that would have meant editing, and you guys hate it when we edit posts.

Which still seems to happen. I'd expect from moderators to keep from editing non-malicious posts, even if they mean it well. It just seems so patronizing.

[Phytotron]

Never was clear on that. What exactly did epsy do?

[Z-Man]

I think he replaced the image with a better one, possibly of smaller size. We should be more transparent there.