Vatnik

Good evening everyone.

As the mod that suggested this in the first place, a quick note to acknowledge that I am aware of this thread.

Real life is in the way at the moment and I will only be able to provide feedback later in the weekend, as I would like to give proper attention to comments here.

Thank you.

Good morning everyone, thank you for your patience.

I will try to address a few points made here. If I don't touch on your comment, it doesn't mean that I ignore you or dismiss it, it just means that I am not clear what your point is.

Trigger Warning: Based on the comments so far, I feel like some of you will be offended by my comments, so buckle up.

I'll start with the one point that quiet frustrated me: the protected group/pandering to the vocal minority (though I'm not sure who that is). I have been very clear in the previous feedback thread that the whole taking sides thing is counter productive and I don't care for it. And I don't have to explain myself, but I will any way.

On this topic, I am very much pro-Ukraine. I have the opinion that this war is the sole responsibility of Russia and Vladimir Putin. They invaded another country, simple as. No one can convince me otherwise and I am pretty sure I can't convince any pro-Russia person that they are wrong. Whenever I read pro-Russia comments, especially when some of them clearly come across as propaganda) I cringe - and think to myself how content I would be if I would never have to read any such posts ever again. And then I shrug and move on. Because, in my opinion, any time spend with such posts is wasted time.

BUT (and I use caps lock on purpose) THESE THOUGHTS OF MINE ARE IRRELEVANT TO THE MODERATOR ROLE.

The way I see my role as moderator is to try to help keep the discussion civil. And, in my opinion (which is also shared by the other mods), the word vatnik, in the WAY/CONTEXT used here offers the grand total of zero towards a civil discussion. (the words WAY/CONTEXT are also all caps on purpose, I will circle back later)

On how the decision was made and whether it was a kneejerk reaction: The decision was collective. No one mod can go on a solo run or make a decision in vacuum. It wasn't a knee jerk reaction either. I observed the WAY/CONTEXT it is used in thread for some time, then all mods had a discussion about my suggestion and after there was an agreement I posted the mod warning. I can see that other mods and admins engaged with this thread after it was created last night, explaining the rationale.

On the comment that boards is desperate for page hits: I have also been quite vocal about quality being as important (if not more important) to quantity. I don't care if there are 10 or 100 posts, as long as the discussion remains civil.

On comments regarding the charter: that's something that is a very frequent point of discussion backstage. It's great that some of it is there as give some flexibility on how to mod. There are things that are a bit more difficult to enforce. Talking about myself only, I find the concern trolling very difficult to identify/enforce as, in my opinion, it is all down to interpretation of written words. And I think written word is very easy to misinterpret. I think there were some "cries" in earlier feedback threads that the charter is getting too convoluted and may be we should go to something closer to the old rules of not being a d**k. I would be in favour of it. But people here need to remember that it will be the mods' team opinion on what constitutes being a d""k - and let's face it, many of you wouldn't come out looking any better.

On whether other words should be considered: I will mention again that the WAY/CONTEXT these words are used is important. It's baffling to me how people struggle with the concept of context (unless, of course, they pretend to struggle). There were a few words mentioned in this thread for which I will opine below - again this is just my opinion, I don't speak on behalf of other mods. I googled most of them to ensure I understand the meaning correctly. If I have misunderstood any of these words, please correct me.

• orc: russian army involved in the current war. Uncivil
• tankie: pro-soviet communists??? Uncivil
• shinner: a Sinn Fein supporter. Uncivil
• blue shirt: a right wing supporter??? Uncivil.
• gammon: had to google this one, it appears to also relate to right wing support. This one I would find a straight up insulting.
• Zionism: there is a very legitimate use of this word as a movement. If used in the WAY/CONTEXT of generic anti-Israeli commentary, it could be considered uncivil. In my opinion, this is one of the more difficult to pin down, CONTEXT would be really important.
• Hasbara: I am not sure what this means. Does it have something to do with Propaganda?
• PUL: I don't know what this is either. I assume some kind of acronym?
• Loyalist/Nationalist/MAGA/Tory: I can't think why any of these would be uncivil. My understanding is that all these relate to political parties or political movements, so I would deem them generally acceptable. Again, CONTEXT is important and these could be used in an uncivil/insulting WAY, but I think less likely.
• Useful Idiots: In my opinion, this one sits somewhere between unnecessarily aggressive and uncivil. But not a hill that I'm willing to die on.
• "Friends of Ukraine": I left the best for last. In my opinion, anyone that uses this term, especially with quotation marks, as some type of "gotcha" moment, should be banned from the site altogether, because clearly they should be in kindergarten and not in the adults room.

One observation I made as I was googling the above terms: in most big online dictionaries, most of these terms are characterised as derogatory or pejorative. I think this is a very good clue on whether these terms are civil or not. And I would argue that if you can't make your points without these terms, you are the problem. In my opinion, none of these terms offer anything towards a civil and robust debate.

One last thing, which might land me in hot water all across the board - consider this as a "Be careful what you wish for" heads up. If allowing terms like vatnik is important to you, I can ask again around the mods community if we could consider reversing my suggestion as not appropriate. But keep in mind though that in the WAY/CONTEXT the term vatnik (and other terms for that matter) is used, you could fall foul of the being a d**k rule and could be liable to warning/bans. And if that happens, I would suggest that you don't spend any time PMing me, as I will ignore the pm, although that goes against my self-imposed code of conduct to engage with all PMs in good faith. You can have your free speech, but that doesn't come with no consequences.

I will continue reading this thread intermittently, so feel free to share any other thoughts you may have, and I will try to address them.

Thank you and wishing you all a great weekend.

Thank you for this, good points.

On the Friends of Ukraine thing: naturally this is just my opinion and I can't enforce a rule on my own. I just think that it is extremely childish to use this. And I would think that this could lead to uncivil posting from "the other side" and escalate things. This is a guess of mine, as I don't read the thread all the time (one of the fastest moving in the forum), but feels like an educated guess. 🙂

On your second point: I agree that some of the Russian propaganda posted across the Internet can be quite grating (hope I spelled that correctly 🙂 ). That's why I tend to ignore it. Let them talk to themselves, like modern day Don Quixotes. If they repeat the same argument more than once or twice trying to get some reaction, they could easily meet the definition of trolling or baiting (or both) and get banned. By the way, this applies to all discussions on thread, the Russia thread is just an example. In my opinion there are at least 3 more threads in the CA forum that display similar patterns.

Thanks Odyssey.

I don't see it as a contradiction. And I don't quite understand why you feel the need to engage with people with whom you can't have a civil discussion, with whom you can't exchange ideas or reach a decision.

I note your comment about fake news and I agree that it can exist. There is an element of where people consume their news, but I can't speak for anyone on this. The one thing I will say though is: if it ever becomes a requirement for mods to check if something is true or fake news, I'll hand in my resignation as a mod.

On the concern trolling: I understand your point. I still think there is an element of how you interpret something written on the Internet. Based on reported posts, there seem to be very few people that consider this angle, seems like something that you and a handful of other members are really passionate about. That's why I expressed my personal opinion about it.

Finally, and as a general point. What I expressed in my first, long, post is just my own personal opinion. It is not a rule. It's some thoughts so, in the context of a feedback thread, we can exchange ideas. People shouldn't consider it a done deal and report posts based on this.