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Comments
2) Everyone should be held to them equally. Again, without popularity entering in the equation in any way whatsoever"
That's the thing, though: The mods have shown time and time again that popularity doesn't enter the equation, because extremely popular posters have been banned, and have remained banned regardless of the outcry their banning has caused. Assuming you are including Rott in the "unpopular" crowd, he is getting a better deal than, say Bon Sequitur or Scrye (or even Chagen) did, because he at least has been stated to have a chance to come back in a few weeks if he can find a way to become less of a drama-magnet. For the others, no such indication was given.
You state that you are guilty of bad behavior as well, and that may be true. However, the moderators and site admins are not omni-present. They rely on Hollers and PMs from the user base to find problem posts, and deal with them accordingly. So however you are breaking the rules, if you are doing it in a way that doesn't draw attention to yourself then you are very unlikely to draw the attention of the moderation staff.
Moreover, the mods very rarely ban someone for a single offense, or even a handful of offenses (barring things like Wiki Vandalism, of course.) In most cases, they are banned after numerous cases where their behavior was seen as directly contributing to instances of drama, with the last offenses being "the straw that broke the camels back." As I said earlier in my Shitstorm vs. Clean Trousers analogy, it is highly unlikely that someone constantly at the center of drama is at no personal fault for it, and, in Rott's case the mods feel that he did share enough of the blame that action needed to be taken. And as further proof that Rott isn't being particularly picked on here, Bon's "straw" was a comment made against Rott that was taken by many to be a personal attack.
The thing that strikes me in this case is that those who have been very vocal about their opposition to the ban have not been willing to assign any of the blame for the drama to Rott, including Rott himself. I think that this is an incorrect position, and, more importantly, the position least likely to aid in Rott being allowed back into the community. This is because the mods have made it very clear that he must find a way to convince them that he can be less of a drama-magnet in the future... and a big part of that, in my opinion, is for him to realize his own behaviors that contribute to the problem, and to correct them. Painting him to be an innocent victim in all of this will not help a lick in reaching that goal.
Again, I will reiterate that I did not want to see Rott banned. Nor did I want to see Bon, or Chagen, or Smokie, or many other tropers I knew well banned. But in all of these cases I mentioned, I believe that their own behaviors had a direct impact on the moderators' decisions.
Do I think every banning has been perfectly just? No. Snowbull's in particular seems completely nonsensical to me. But in the majority of cases, the bans have come about after a clear pattern of behavior has been established, and multiple warnings have been issued.
The last thing I'll add to this wall of text is that, if you truly feel that you need to be banned in the cause of justice, make that known to the mods. If you are persistent enough in your request, they will be happy to oblige you.
Ninja'd, give me a mo.
>That's the thing, though: The mods have shown time and time again that popularity doesn't enter the equation, because extremely popular posters have been banned, and have remained banned regardless of the outcry their banning has caused.
At the risk of undermining my own position, this is only half true. It's true that popularity is not a "get out of jail free" card, and that unpopularity in itself is not a reason for a ban, but I think it's inevitable that posters who get reported a lot, even for the wrong reasons, are more likely to be caught when they overstep the mark.
>The thing that strikes me in this case is that those who have been very vocal about their opposition to the ban have not been willing to assign any of the blame for the drama to Rott, including Rott himself.
This is my impression as well. At this point, I'm unconvinced that Rott actually knows why he was banned (hint: it was not social conservatism, nor was it that people whined about him a lot).
>Do I think every banning has been perfectly just? No. Snowbull's in particular seems completely nonsensical to me.
That is one ban I can't and won't defend. Same goes for Hatter's. I'm sorry, but I just don't know what the reasoning behind that was.
I do agree that Rottweiler certainly phrased things provocatively or insultingly at times, including the specific occasion that he was banned for.
(And before anyone protests, I'll stress that no, he is not the only one, but two wrongs aren't a right.)
It's true that popularity is not a "get out of jail free" card, and that
unpopularity in itself is not a reason for a ban, but I think it's
inevitable that posters who get reported a lot, even for the wrong
reasons, are more likely to be caught when they overstep the mark."
While I don't disagree with this, is there an indication that the more popular banned tropers had less reports against them? My understanding was that Scrye and Smokie (for example) got reported quite often, and I would classify them on the high end of the popularity scale. Which would indicate to me that it's less about popularity, and more about visibility.
You would be in a better position than I am to confirm that, however.
So yes, I suppose it is more about visibility than popularity. The distinction is worth making.
I can't speak for Myrmidon or Beholderess or Pykrete or Kino, et al, Bobby, but I certainly accept blame for the crime of causing annoyance to Fast Eddie. As I said in my formal apology, as owner of the server he is properly the absolute authority there, and I'd be a hypocrite if I didn't honor authority.
So if he lifts the ban, my plan is to stop posting in OTC and let it be what Myr aptly called a mindless circlejerk. Because while it's true that I wasn't banned for social conservatism, it is true that I was banned for causing the mods thump work (including
I mean, yes, you were annoying Eddie, but that's not what the ban was for. The specific post which resulted in your ban was not merely critical, but dismissive and disparaging of strongly held aspects of others' identities, and so caused offence. You had made similar, though typically less overt, posts repeatedly in the past. It is true that we probably received more hollers regarding your remarks that we would have had you been making such remarks about groups with which such a sizeable number of users did not identify, and perhaps it's unfair that our attention should have been drawn to you specifically and not others who are just as bad; indeed, I think it's very possible that this did annoy members of the mod team more than it would have otherwise done. Nevertheless, this was not behaviour which we would have considered appropriate from a troper of any political affiliation. Do you understand that?
Because I feel like I've been saying that throughout this thread, and been almost entirely ignored.
So according to FE, I was banned for that one post? And that one post was the sole cause, not a proximate cause within the ongoing problem of "It's annoying to the mods to get hollers about Rott"?
Furthermore, I was "dismissive and disparaging" of revising school curricula to celebrate homosexual Americans precisely because of my traditional beliefs. No traditionalist would believe in the absolute equality of fertile intercourse and homosexual acts, precisely because we reject the new-fangled claim that all behaviors are equal. The only way to avoid that in the future is to promise that I won't openly state that I believe the current orthodox interpretation of the venerated idea Equality (that not only are people of all races and both sexes equal in spirit, which I assent to as a Christian, but that all behaviors are equal) is philosophically shoddy.
That's actually a much narrower obedience than I was offering, which would be to not express any traditionalist belief in OTC, which makes work for mods because progressives holler about it.
So I'm just gonna listen to the mod, to avoid mixed signals.
The problem, as I understand it, was not that you expressed a socially conservative opinion, but that you did so in an insulting way. There had been no proposal to make California children learn "the history of people who liked anal sex". That was an inaccurate and insulting claim, and was perceived as a further expression of something which you had been doing for some time - not merely arguing against views you disagreed with, but taking a condescending approach to those with whom you disagreed.
So yes, it was because of that post, and yes, it was because of many posts. But the problem was neither the opinions expressed in your posts, nor the frequency with which those posts drew complaints. The problem was the condescending manner with which you expressed those opinions, and the tendency that this had to upset other posters.
Now, Fighteer further seems to be suggesting that you used these posts subversively, deliberately derailing threads to be about your opinions. I'm unconvinced that this was the case, but I suspect that this perception is why you were banned, rather than simply warned.
So technically, in order to prove I've changed and no longer act condescending, I'd have to get zero hollers in future, hollers being evidence of having upset people?
Tone is the issue, not the reaction itself.
Can you please elaborate on how "condescending" is subjective? Because I don't understand how, unless you have a substantially different definition of the word from the one I'm accustomed to hearing, you can consider that to be an issue here.
As for "condescending" being subjective, consider how someone like Sporkaganza sneering at religious people that idealism is self-evidently false and atheism true is not considered condescending (materialism being fashionable), while rejecting the equality of heterosexual and homosexual acts is condescending and hurts people's feelings by cutting to the core of their identity (the LGBT movement being fashionable).
Go back to the post that was thumped. You didn't say that heterosexual intercourse was superior (just as well, because that would have been off-topic since it wasn't a sex thread). What you said was that gay history was the history of people who liked anal. This is untrue and dismissive.
It would have been fine to say that you didn't think gay history was a worthwhile subject for children to study, but your comment was just crass.
@Rott:
Consider: "Apparently, I said some things on the forum here that offended people. I should not have done that, and I apologize."
Also, you don't need to apologize to everyone. You only need to apologize to FE.
I was under the impression, though, that the issue was bigger, with FE banned me for making work for the mods via all the hollers offended progressives make and thumps that result (including
However, "Idealism is self-evidently false to anyone who is not mentally challenged" and "Gay history is the history of men who like anal sex" are both condescending.
edit: Ninja'd.
I presume you are referring to Fighteer's post in edit banned? Unless I'm very much mistaken, his point was that these thumps were needed because you caused threads to derail, and that that was your fault, while the fact that you were insulted was not.
The implication, I think, was that you were causing these derails either by making off-topic remarks (apparently, though I don't recall seeing these) or by insulting the intelligence of progressives, not by having a contrary opinion.
Edit, ninja'd: Depends what you mean by "work". I believe it might come across as more sincere if you did that, because your apology in Edit Banned was unfortunately perceived to be insincere.
(Incidentally, would you mind me starting another thread about "progressives" as a term? It's not the problem here, but it's bugging me, and I don't want you to think I'm attacking you if I do.)