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What the actual fuck
@cjet79's reason was good enough (it's perfectly obvious this was a trollish shit-stirrer asking questions in bad faith), but in addition, @bigtittygothgf is a ban evader, so the ban has been made permanent.
I can only speak for myself, but maybe votes will show that others concur.
I appreciate that the comment fell egregiously short of our standards, both codified in rules and informal but clear in the culture of the place (very low effort and low volume together with provocative phrasing, mainly), and personally don't like having that user around, due to history of what seems to me to be bad faith (and almost invariably low-effort) comments.
I believe that the crux of the problem is one of attitude, that mods do not justify their decisions. You don't need to litigate every call but it'd be less jarring if you cited the specific grievance, like «Too low-effort for a top level, bad track record, 1 day ban» instead of the imperious «not what we are looking for». Rapidly escalating to permaban on a unverifiable accusation of ban evasion (despite the semi-consistent policy, one you have explicitly professed too, of tolerating ban evaders unless they jump on their previous hobby horses) was also a bit much to me.
You don't have to imitate Hlynka either.
IMO we need something like the BLR back so people can drop interesting things without the expectation they write a whole essay about it to clarify their basic reaction of "I think this is bad.", "I think this is ridiculous.", "I think this is a good thing.", etc. or get the banhammer for booing the outgroup or whatever. I get the ideally that goal of this community is to solicit the essays but I would rather have a place that highlights 70% of recently interesting things with only 75% of them having extended commentary on them versus a place that highlights only 30% of recently interesting things with 95% of them having extended commentary on them, especially since multiple people in the comments will often pick up the extended commentary duty.
Personally, I'd rather hear about interesting new information concerning interracial rape rates (and, yes, not just because I'm racist against blacks, as I'd want to hear about it if it were in the opposite direction too) even if I'm not going to get the fair and balanced perspective on top about how it can be interpreted in some manner that is neutral for the raping demographic, larping as some future historian totally disconnected from present issues. Sure, I wouldn't want every post to be "Science CONFIRMS that BLACKS = RAPE" or it would just turn into heterodox /r/science or /r/politics but I think there needs to be some more intelligent way to balance this out (like multiple different feeds accomplishes).
And yes moderation communication here is also often terrible. But all productive suggestions in that area have been ignored from day one so oh well.
Though it's not nearly as bad as it was at times on Reddit, some mods here are definitely starting to get a bit too active and trigger-happy again (with modding this post probably not necessarily being the worst or even a bad example of it, but still). It seems to me when this place migrated from Reddit, they were very hands-off in its initial phase (which seems to me to be an implicit admission that the capricious and heavily-involved moderation they engaged in at times on Reddit would have strangled the baby in the cradle, which you might think would also make them rethink it in general but maybe not) and things were better than ever. Now they seem to be starting to believe that they have enough of a captive audience that they can begin to return to their old ways though. It's disappointing.
I get that not every post here is great but for the most part some random red-named post popping in occasionally going "No bad little boy don't do that!" (which is only a mildly satirically exaggerated version of how the mods here often chastise people) or throwing out random bans is about as effective as TSA security at the airport. It may occasionally find a knife, but it also misses a lot of knives, throws out a lot of non-knives or things that are maybe knife-shaped but probably not actually that dangerous, and in general annoys people and causes more contention than its benefits can justify. (Of course, this is describing the active behavior. The implicit background threat of moderation is certainly necessary, but that can be achieved while rarely if ever using it.)
False. We just don't take up the suggestions that people who want to wage unrestrained culture war would like us to implement.
It's fascinating that this is how you model our thinking. Though I'm not sure I believe you sincerely believe this.
We don't ban randomly, and banning bad actors is quite effective.
That you immediately imply that any possible suggestion that might have not been taken seriously enough by the mods here would only come from "people who want to wage unrestrained culture war" (the type of veiled insult pretty much all mods here almost always throw out in response to any suggestion that they may not be as open to suggestions as they claim, which I guess you don't seem to realize kind of proves the point), as if there is no possibility that the mods here could have ever dismissed a valid suggestion (I guess you're perfect oracles of what's a good suggestion or not, no mistakes ever?), is a great example of the terrible mod communication I was talking about. Thanks for proving my point with your arrogant and dismissive tone.
Anyway though I'm not going down this rabbit hole since I've seen where it leads: frustration and zero results for those who try to take the whole "moderation here is driven by user sentiment" stuff seriously (as you've proven by starting off the conversation with nothing but passive aggressive sneering).
I do sincerely believe it. The difference in moderation immediately going from Reddit to the new site was obvious. Maybe it's not something you implemented consciously but it sure happened.
Just keep in mind that with this new site you still need us more than we need you. An independent enterprise is always on shakier ground.
No. I was talking about you and your suggestions. Some people have made valid suggestions, some of which have, in fact, been implemented, some of which were acknowledged as good suggestions but were not implemented for various pragmatic reasons.
Nobody needs anything here. This isn't a business, and we're not your employees. We do want to attract and keep members because we all believe in the purpose of the Motte, but that doesn't mean that every individual member gets what they want or that all demands are legitimate.
My suggestions (the primary one anyway being) to bring back a moderate variation of something originally implemented by you (that is, the mods)? So you were wanting to wage unrestrained culture war?
You know, if you're not just full of shit as usual and cavalierly breaking your own rules, then please, as your own rules state, provide proof (we'll ignore the proactive part since that ship has sailed already) in proportion to your very inflammatory claim that my suggestions are primarily directed towards desiring the waging of unrestrained (a heavy adjective explicitly indicating absolutely zero restraint whatsoever, keep in mind, which would be a weakman as is also against your own rules if, even if you can nitpick my suggestions, you can hardly find grounds to claim that I'm advocating for any sort of free-for-all, for turning this place into Kiwi Farms with less restrictions, which I'm obviously not) culture war.
Go on: quote me. Except you can't, because again I said nothing like that nor even in its vein, even if you can make a credible claim that my suggestions might increase culture warring here a bit or even to some degree (but that's a trade-off implicit in all moderation matters of this kind; this version of The Motte has more culture warring than a hypothetical one with even stricter rules would and yet I doubt you would take that hypothetical version's moderators accusing you of wanting to allow "unrestrained culture war" seriously, same as me being willing to tweak this axis is completely legitimate and not automatically advocating for unrestrained anything).
So, as usual, you could have communicated like an adult (you know, being charitable like your rules state) and said "I disagree with your suggestions because X, Y, and Z." but instead you had to immediately resort to the most arrogant and dismissive weakmen/strawmen possible. (It's like how Barry Goldwater's politics couldn't simply be criticized on their merits; he had to be declared insane and accused of trying to destroy the whole world. This is how you and the rest of the mods so frequently communicate with any critics.) And this is why you persistently end up looking like a petty fool and again just prove my criticisms correct (and also why they weren't made more politely/hesitantly in the first place, if you're going to try to pull a "No u!" on any of the above).
Seriously, if you mailed your Senator or something that you wanted the penalty for a particular crime reduced or a particular law repealed and he accused you in response of wanting complete unrestrained anarchy, would you not think he's a bit unhinged or at least hypersensitive? Have some awareness. (And yes for the record I am well aware that my professed political leanings make me come off as "unhinged" as well to many, but perhaps that makes it even more worthwhile that, other than you, nobody here, including those opposed to everything I stand for, has accused me of trying to "wage unrestrained culture war". I'm not trying to be an authority figure here either.)
If you think I'm speaking only for myself, then you aren't listening. Maybe not everyone agrees with every exact specific I propose, but the sentiment is reasonably widespread.
Or better yet, let me imitate one of your redname posts, as maybe that will make you understand:
Don't do this. Way too "Boo outgroup"-y and uncharitable. Demodded for one day due to prior history pending user discussion.
You want lighter modding in general? We'll take it under advisement.
Note that for all your belligerence and being one of the most frequently reported posters, you have been very lightly modded yourself.
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