Rules for moderating on Modified.

[Guest_2]

language-wise I think only racially discriminating should be barred.

Also, I think the guys should get a one day pass once a year to the secret shreditas forum so we can know what the women are plotting against us...

[Moxie]

Well no one in the Shreditas forum has discussed any plots against the general forum. But I'm secretly plotting against individuals who use my gender and body parts as insults. It seriously pisses me off, and I've been known to write PM's to people who do it. Saying "cunt," "pussy," "twat," etc. could easily be avoided . Calling someone a little girl or a woman as an insult is just as offensive to me as any of those words.

Edit: That wasn't me posting as a Mod, but me as a person who posts on the forum, and obviously reads the forum.

[dyalander]

I don't know, twat and cunt, how is that different from calling someone a dick or cock, or would that offend you if you were male? What about arsehole, am I supposed to be offended by that because someone is implicitly saying a body part I posses is as bad as the twat who is acting like an arsehole. I understand you might be offended at people using pussy though because its often like saying "you're a weak pathetic girl, man up" so clearly there's an underlying gender stereotype operating. As for the others, I don't know if there's a reason for you to be offended as a female.

[BainbridgeShred]

Not to excuse their being used, because using a body part as an insult is always bad, but if I called someone a boob in another thread, no one would really give a shit.

No words should be editted, censored, or banned on modified, no matter how vulgar. Personally, I don't care if your feelings are hurt.

[Tsiangkun]

mods should not moderate any thread they have posted in.

[Jeremy]

Ok here are my thoughts on moderating.

I don't really have an issue with the rules - but rather with the method they are implemented. Having been a modertor on the two largest footbag forums for the last 3 years, I've learnt that the best first step to any problem is posting in the topic telling people what the problem is and why. Usually when I do this I give a personal reason why. Ie. "I really dislike that picture of the mentally retarded kid with the debating on the internet is like competing in the special olympics - even if you win you're still retarded because I have good friends who I have a great deal of respect for who are mentally retarded and I don't think it's fair to laugh at them for the way they were born." I find that the vast majority of time this gets a good responce from the person in question. Occasionally if it doesn't I will send the person a pm or email outlinign the forum rules and asking them to abide by them - having given two warnings - if the person is unwilling to co-oporate with me then I'll take further action. I do not view debating the issue as defiance - I only view repeating the offence as worthy of a second warning. It's good to question authority and I'm not going to punish people if they do. I'd like to see this kind of responce from moderators on modified. In fact I'm fairly sure that about 6 months to a year ago I posted up basically this process in the mods/admins forum and everybody agreed with it. Maybe I'm wrong but I certainly remember something along those lines.

Moderators should be active and prepared to work with people - not just immediatly using their powers - which in my experience often leads to more problems. I think the job of moderting modified could easily be done by one person - in fact there have been times in the past where I was the only active moderator and it was easy to keep things under control. If there are to be multiple mods they need to be following the same rules.

I also would like to see a little less politically correctness. Certainly there is a limit to this but animations of stick figures giving blow jobs is not offensive. Please if anybody is actually offended by stick figures giving blow jobs say something - but I find it hard to imagine how or why that could possibly be offensive. Also using expressions like "I will kick your ass" - while agressive, is not worthy of an edit and especially not a ban. Even if the person is literally saying that he wants to kick you in the arse - I still don't think it's worthy of an edit or a ban. A very long time ago on this forum I am sure we agreed that mods shouldn't take action just because of conflict. This is based on the fact that unresolved conflict makes the forum even worse - people then resent the people they were in conflict with as well as the mods and we end up seeing conflict between the same people continue on other topics. There is no harm in letting conflict run on - eventually people will resolve it or get bored of it. Peope who don't like conflict should not read topics that they know involve conflict. Of course it's fine for mods to ask people to be mature and civil etc. but locking those topics achieves nothing positive.

[Splint]

For these offenses warnings that eventually lead to banning will be issued:
No crime is to be discussed with the intention of commiting that crime on modified.
(eg talking about the benifits of xxx illegal drug is fine, but arranging to buy or talking about how you use xxx drug over the forum is not ok.)
No racial, religious, sexist or any other discrimitory comments are to be made in the forum.
Moderators should put their name next to all edits or moved threads, and a reason why it was edited or moved.

Why not specify "it is permitted to discuss the effects of drugs however there may be no direct references to specific methods of drug taking, or methods of obtaining drugs illegally".
I would like to see some sort of protocol for the penelties connected to these infringements, as well as a protocol by which moderators can be made accountable. I.e if there is a dispute regarding moderation how should it be dealt with? - I'd suggest a stickied thread somwhere, where the dispute can be aired, and resolved by the moderators as a whole - either upholding the initial moderation, or reversing it and penalising the moderator in some way. There should either be an apology, or the moderator should have his or her status revoked.
There should also be some sort of minimum number of moderators required for making such a descision.

- moderating limited to footbag related forums with the main intention being topic relocation and keeping forums on-topic
- edits and moves need to be accompanied by a moderator's name
- off-topic forums will remain self-moderated unless such events as hacking or topic spamming happen at which point a moderator will be required to clean up the mess

"...at which point a moderator will be required [asked] to clean up the mess."

People's ignorance should speak for itself. The most important thing to maintain is a lack of interference in moderating. As exemplified by the recent ruckus all of this was caused by moderators doing too much. Editing out offensive stuff left and right, etc. It's done in good will, but the more you make your presence known the easier and more justified it is for people to complain about your moderating techniques, whether they're grounded or not. Plus, it's really not like we're a pack of racists. Not editting out offensive words isn't going to allow a horribly offensive culture to brew on modified. It will just allow for one or two people every once in a while to show up, test the limits of this board a little too extensively, and get checked by the rest of the posters who don't want to listen to that kind of nonsense. It has happened many, many times before on this board. It works.
language-wise I think only racially discriminating should be barred.
It seriously pisses me off, and I've been known to write PM's to people who do it. Saying "cunt," "pussy," "twat," etc. could easily be avoided . Calling someone a little girl or a woman as an insult is just as offensive to me as any of those words.
arrow:I've learnt that the best first step to any problem is posting in the topic telling people what the problem is and why.
I will send the person a pm or email outlinign the forum rules and asking them to abide by them - having given two warnings - if the person is unwilling to co-oporate with me then I'll take further action. I do not view debating the issue as defiance - I only view repeating the offence as worthy of a second warning.
Moderators should be active and prepared to work with people - not just immediatly using their powers
I also would like to see a little less politically correctness. Certainly there is a limit to this but animations of stick figures giving blow jobs is not offensive. Please if anybody is actually offended by stick figures giving blow jobs say something - but I find it hard to imagine how or why that could possibly be offensive. Also using expressions like "I will kick your ass" - while agressive, is not worthy of an edit and especially not a ban. Even if the person is literally saying that he wants to kick you in the arse - I still don't think it's worthy of an edit or a ban. A very long time ago on this forum I am sure we agreed that mods shouldn't take action just because of conflict. This is based on the fact that unresolved conflict makes the forum even worse - people then resent the people they were in conflict with as well as the mods and we end up seeing conflict between the same people continue on other topics. There is no harm in letting conflict run on - eventually people will resolve it or get bored of it. Peope who don't like conflict should not read topics that they know involve conflict. Of course it's fine for mods to ask people to be mature and civil etc. but locking those topics achieves nothing positive.

Okay this is where we are so far. Feel free to debate this stuff a little further and weed out any conflicts.