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What is going on with the Current Affairs

FrancieBrady

I am not even going to bother going to the Dispute Resolution with this.It's just utterly dumbfounding that you can get threadbanned for mentioning another party or (in my case) mentioning the government in a thread on a political party. (the SF thread)

The mod there has ust gone on a round of threadbans for people mentioning them. It is a thread about SF he says, and wields the ban hammer.

Could somebody just explain how you discuss a political party when the posts you are responding to are claiming there is a better way(I.E. The status quo or some variation there of)

Just lay out how you are expected to do that. I don't believe it can be done, so maybe those who stand over these bans can explain.

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Tell me how

I have no specific input on the thread in question above but am interested in the overarching question of what is going on in CA.

Since the changeover, moderation has been an issue there. Some understandable (though barely acceptable) as part of the changeover process to the new platform and the impact of that and specifically the disappearance of mods themselves, modding tools and modding transparency.

We are now 8 months on from that changeover and more than enough time has passed to resolve at least some of these issues and yet it doesn't seem that this has been the case.

Recent observation of moderation in the CA forum is that it is entirely subjective, ad hoc, and frequently invisible in terms of transparency. This is even more so the case over the last few days/weeks it seems with posts being removed from threads without warnings or communication to the poster and without evidence on the specific post as would have been done in the past, or on the thread itself that mods are actively having to engage.

There always has been, and always will be arguments from various sides in debates that mods are biased and that is just the nature of debate on contentious topics that can cross the line in terms of being reasonable but previously, there was more transparency in this respect with more visible content from mods as to their thought process and actions.

The removing of posts without transparency and without communication to the poster unless it is for very obvious reasons such as trolling or shilling or similar is completely unacceptable in my view no matter the persuasion of a mod with respect to any given topic . In at least two instances over the last few days I have had such posts removed, one of which was highly thanked which I am only mentioning in terms of its validity and acceptance within the thread and yet it was removed without action (warning) or comment (note on thread or DM). I flagged the post that mine had responded to and asked why mine had been removed and have received no explanation or response. Posters from the 'other side' of the debate have had similar experience I gather going by their comments but that doesn't make it any more acceptable.

Moderation across the entire site is an issue with respect to transparency which I've mentioned and to compound this, the fact that it simply does not exist any longer in some areas while in others we have mods making subjective decisions outside of charter direction is unacceptable in my view.

I am aware of the skeleton nature of Boards, and of the lack of tools that existed but this is no longer an excuse for what we are now seeing and having to deal with. It seems to be that some mods are more comfortable with the room for subjectivity and the absence of transparency as to their actions and that is a dangerous environment longer term.

CA is an environment in which contentious topics are discussed and people on all sides of the debate can be quite passionate, I'm not suggesting that there shouldn't be moderation, it is critical, but that it should be reflect the instruction in the Charter and it should be visible. It is frequently neither of these things at the moment.

I have seen no movement from Boards to attract new moderators to replace those that left and while I know that that isn't straightforward either, something has to be done to overcome these issues or else it isn't really a discussion Board in the truest sense.

Beasty

There was a clear instruction repeated in the OP

"The topic is SF, not other political parties or politicians from other parties

Final warning - permanent threadbans for any posters trying to make it a discussion of other parties (where there are already active threads running for most of them)"

The warning was placed there because the likes of the OP and others repeatedly attempted to shoehorn other parties into the discussion to deflect from comments made about SF

As this is a forum specific complaint and not sitewide feedback I am moving th9is thread to Help Desk

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722251#Comment_118722251

So when somebody asks 'will SF be sending ministers to Russia if in government', it is a thread ban to answer 'we already send ministers' which is all I did and got banned. Somebody else mentioned the Greens and got the chop.

Answer the question Beasty, how do you discuss a political party going into government and not mention the government? How do you have a political discussion without comparisons or mentioning other parties. It ludicrious.

A mod without discretion is useless and just turns threads into echo chambers. Why not give a conversation like the ones mentioned a bit of latitude and then intervene if it doesn't return to topic. Occasional mention of SF happens on the government thread, is anyone getting threadbans there.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722128#Comment_118722128

Don't know about some of the issues you raise, but the problem is the way the mod is modding. He says himself that he only responds to reports, that means the trigger happy posters are doing the modding in effect. There were issues even today where a poster was trying to divert the Helen McEntee thread to an old SF story...several attempts were made, did I report it, no I didn't so he got away with it. And so what if he did.

And you are also correct that it is only an issue since the changeover. Complete over the top reacting which is probably not biased to any one side, it's just lazy modding without discretion or latitude given.

atticu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722859#Comment_118722859

So, all you posted was that ‘we already send ministers’, and not ‘We do send ministers to despotic authoritarian regimes Mark, Saudi and Russia to name two.’

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722949#Comment_118722949

Yes, in reply to a question asking the same of SF.

I answered with a fact.

CrookedJack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722859#Comment_118722859

You realise you don't have to reply to the thread? You could very easily open a new discussion to compare and contrast the current government, or any other party with SF. The problem seems to be that you want to be able to post how you like in any thread you like, despite the specific instructions on that thread.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722892#Comment_118722892

This is a confusing post.

I can't tell are you arguing here that the Mods should ignore reported posts and just mod however they like? Or that users reporting posts are somehow coping out, not like you who didn't report posts? This would be weird since I've first hand experience of you reporting what i consider to be innocuous posts yourself. You seem angry that someone "got away with something" yet proud that you didn't report it?

Look the reality is, as much as people like fighting on the internet, and the CA board is the main arena here, mods have limited time, limited tools and only human - they can't manage here perfectly. Everyone needs to just grow up and stop complaining about how this free resource is run.

Ubbquittious

I don't think CA forum is badly moderated at all compared to some others. They have always been quite fair

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722980#Comment_118722980

I replied to a question, I didn't introduce the subject.

I do report some posts but not because somebody is mentioning another party. There is a difference in a discussion that needs to reference other party's or the government and deliberate attempts to try and divert threads. That is where a mod's discretion and latitude is required. It is absent.

CrookedJack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118723015#Comment_118723015

You replied, and I discussed your reply. That's how this works.

This is exactly the point I was making. You're saying it's fine for you to report the things you feel are taking a discussion off track, but if there are things that others, mods included, think are derailing they shouldn't act? Even if there's a specific warning in thread? You describing a situation where you get to post what you want only.

You can't honestly see that as anything other than you just complaining about the referee. there was a warning on the thread, you posted in contravention of that warning, you got banned. That's how modding is supposed to work. Go start a thread to discuss the thing you want to discuss, don't use a thread where there's a warning not to and then complain about the volunteers doing their best. To do otherwise is just petulance.

Tell me how

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722892#Comment_118722892

I suspect there is some truth to what you say that some non-mod posters are effectively modding because they have a fair degree of confidence what the outcome will be.

I'm not sure if it's lazy modding given their scarcity now and all modding seems to be left to just a couple of them but I do think it is a situation they are happy with where they can just focus on reported posts and then use their own subjectivity from there. Reported posts no longer seem to be considered in the context in which they were made which is a definite change from previously.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118723059#Comment_118723059

So you are saying that in any of the party specific threads or politician ones, that if somebody so much as mentions another party then we should all get on the report buttons?

Maybe you'd have a go at the question, how do you discuss a political party without ever making a comparison or mentioning other parties?

If we did what you suggest the mods would be inundated with reports and there would be so many threads the forum would be useless.

Another question, why has the moderation changed since the changeover?

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118723012#Comment_118723012

I have to agree.

In many ways, I feel sorry for the Mods and Admins. They are clearly under-resourced and don't have the tooling available to them to manage the site as well as before and snuff out repeat offenders, sockpuppet accounts, trolls and bots.

Now, that is not to say they get everything correct, or are indeed infallible, but personally, I think they are very fair to posters, too fair in fact given the history of some posters, but anyway, just want to voice my support to them in general as the job is hard and neigh on impossible.

As to the OP, no leg to stand on IMO.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722949#Comment_118722949

Good catch. The OP was banned from that thread before, the thread ban was lifted and 11 days later they were thread banned again.

Safe to assume that the issue here is not the mods or admins.....

[Deleted User]

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118722128#Comment_118722128

The highly thanked posts were the ones calling other people names without evidence, jog on. The mods have a tough time and some posters are creating more work than others. If they had to send a message with every deleted message in the trump thread the last few days they still wouldn’t be finished by next week and you know that.

Your behaviour in the trump thread is abhorrent, no matter how much you want to dress it up. I don’t think other posters need evidence of how difficult it is to converse with you without it always returning to name calling. Maybe if you followed the charter your posts wouldn’t have been deleted.

I have been sanctioned recently too and you know what? I deserved it. I for one have never seen fairer mods around here other than recently.

FrancieBrady

The problem here is never better illustrated than it is on 'The Left, Putin, NATO' thread. I choose that one because I am not contributing to it.

There, emboldened by a mod not properly modding you have two posters using the threat of report to mod the thread themselves.

They are doing it because the mod cannot distinguish between using the report function because you don't want to answer and using the report function because somebody is deliberately trying to deflect. 'Discretion', in other words.

It's a joke, the SF thread has more or less ground to a halt now because it's an echo chamber.

Good luck to anyone who thinks that is good for politics forum.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118723112#Comment_118723112

Do other threads about specific parties have warnings in the OP about mentioning other parties? I don't think they do. You know that warning was there and decided to ignore it. You can't complain about the moderation that follows.

EmmetSpiceland

For what it’s worth, I’d like to see the mods focus less of policing CA and to focus, mainly, on AH.

CA should be more of a free for all to keep all the “types” of users that post in there. AH is overrun with CA threads and, as a result, the forum is becoming infected with, very, undesirably posters.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724497#Comment_118724497

Brilliantly illustrated. Are you saying it is ok to discuss other parties on the government thread? Because it isn't either. I got a warning just yesterday from the mod for mentioning SF in a point relating to the Government and the media on the government thread.

thefallingman

I only see an issue with one mod, i'd say everyone could name the one i mean which speaks volumes. But it's allowed to continue which i also find very odd.

bucketybuck

Is this just another help desk thread that is allowed to devolve into a Franciebrady pile on? May as well unsubscribe now.

To the point though, I have always felt that you can judge a message board by its mods approach to deleting posts. Unfortunately Boards approach is for mods to delete whatever the **** they want whenever they want, so its best to set expectations accordingly.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724924#Comment_118724924

The OP is the poster in question. Perhaps the poster best lie low given the history instead of creating new threads drawing attention to themselves. Not other people's fault if they want to give their opinion. The OP in question is arguably the most prolific poster on boards, so he ain't a rookie or a noob when it comes to these things. Personally, I think the mods have given the OP more than enough leeway, yet continues to throw that goodwill away and spit in their face. How many bans is it now? As I said, in this instance, it isn't the mod's fault.

EmmetSpiceland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724924#Comment_118724924

Nah, looks like it’s another thread used to “attack” one mod, who does Trojan work keeping this site going, because certain users don’t like getting reprimanded for not staying within the site rules.

There were 4 threads on the go at one point, a small number of cantankerous, malcontent, users ganging up and trying to get “one over” on this mod for having the audacity to call them out on their nonsense.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724036#Comment_118724036

There are no 'threats to report' in that thread. You are being ridiculous.

The SF thread will tick along nicely and survive, don't you worry.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724995#Comment_118724995

I am actually in awe of his hard work, patience and leeway sometimes...

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118724853#Comment_118724853

I'm not saying anything about what is ok to be discussed. I don't make those discussions. What I am saying is that you knowingly broke a mod warning and were sanctioned for that. If you have an issue with a warning then take that up with a mod. Disagreeing with a mod warning does not give you carte blanche to ignore it without sanction.

Beasty

The OP has proven themselves time after time to be a timesink. They have taken up more of my time than any other user on this site.

And you know what? There are more important things and more worthy users that deserve my attention.

The OP is heading ever closer to a permanent siteban if this continues.

In the meantime there's actually a real war on with real innocent people being killed. There are other threads and users in CA that I much prefer devoting the limited resources this site does have to.

Get you final comments I quickly as this thread will shortly be closed.

[Deleted User]

Ban him and he'll just re-register under another alias. Perhaps assigning him a donkey as an avatar would be more effective.

FrancieBrady

Close the thread.

markodaly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118725299#Comment_118725299

It will be easy to spot the same posting style though, posters like that cannot change their spots, as they say. The OP will cry conspiracy but won't reflect at all on themselves. People like that never do, and it comes across like a freight train in their posts. Like, if an Admin is saying that the OP is the most difficult poster they have had to deal with, you would think they would reflect on it a bit!?