unacceptable behavior in a poster

in a community that prides it self on striving for civil discourse and intelligent, rational, and factual debate these kinds of comments that in someways go after a poster's family in ad hominum attacks can not be tolerated.

as certain modertaters actions have made it abuntently clear that they feel such behavior is appropriate I'm asking you the entire community to help stop this behavior and to shun this poster and any other who relies on such tactics.

if any of you want to know why I feel this is in such poor taste and why it upsets me so much please pm and I'll tell you why.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Are you seriously offended by the opinion of a stranger? You should grow a thick skin. I look after a sick parent myself and the opinions of people who put their "independence" before their obligations has never been of any importance to me. If I remember correctly, BR's wife was or is wheelchair bound - maybe he is projecting his needs on others.

True independence is living your life by making your own decisions not allowing other peoples opinions to colour them.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

I'd rather you tell us here, in the open, here we can all see what you you mean. Why hide your opinions when this is a forum to express them in?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Actually, he was talking about you, not your family: and aren't you famous hereabouts for making wild-eyed accusations about posters who disagree with you?

Pot, meet kettle.

 

Unless you have mentioned this sensitive family business in another thread, and he is making a direct reference to it,
you are overreacting.
Maybe you have good reason to overreact, but you are still over reacting.

Insults are an art.
Buffalo occasionally comes out with some fine examples.

He really nailed me once, the B******.
I as talking about Sarah Palin and he accused me of having sexual fantasies about her.
(Actually he was a bit cruder than that)
How does he know these things?
I nearly took down my Sarah Palin wall calendar.

 

Do you live in your mommy's house?

 

Dont worry phlogistian says that to me all the time, even though I do not live with my parents anymore (He was citing topics I made when I was like 15, 16 years old on this forum).

He calls me a stupid paranoid pothead who lives with his parents and blah blah blah blah blah. After reading your topic I feel I should be more upset with all the ad hom attacks I recieve that are wayy worse. :L

 

Doesn't seem much wrong tbh.

 

This and That

I must disagree. We do, in fact, condone personal insults. We do so every day. We even have criteria by which statements are determined insulting or not, and by which insults are determined to be either inappropriate or, as you have suggested—

"He replied, quite fairly it appears, that you might have a bit of growing up of your own to do."​

—appropriate.

All else aside, we should not promote this myth that "sciforums in no way condones personal insults".

We might also recall in late 2009, a dispute between moderators led to an attempt to overhaul WE&P, including a mass lock of all threads before the overhaul date, an attempted zero tolerance policy, and so on. The catalyst for that episode was when one of our politically conservative moderators—elevated specifically, we might recall, as a quota appointment to provide the appearance of balance—went so far in his special protection of Mr. Roam as to propose someone be banned for trading insults. And when asked about Mr. Roam's conduct, be it anti-"Muslem", denigrating nicknames and abuse of people's monikers, and similar family-based attacks against members, the moderator's response was that he hadn't seen any of it taking place in his jurisdiction over time.

So what we're seeing here is a repeat of insulting conduct that we have, in fact, endorsed over time.

And you have endorsed that endorsement. Regardless of what you think of PJdude, or this particular episode—and it should be noted that while PJ indeed told Mr. Roam to grow up, he was able to do so without raising family considerations, and one might even go so far as to say he rightly told Mr. Roam to grow up—it only damages our credibility as site staff to promote the obviously untrue myth that "sciforums in no way condones personal insults".

In a broader context, I would also point out that this is part of what makes people upset with governing authorities in general. For many, it's not so much the rules themselves, or even the fact that said rules are enforced poorly and inconsistently, but, rather, the authority's arrogance in expecting that they can say such things and people should believe them despite evidence to the contrary.

One of the reasons people around here invest so much in this petty game of trading stupid insults is that we do, in fact, endorse it. Indeed, a primary effect of our desire to protect low-effort, anti-intellectual members like Mr. Roam is that many people don't see the need to continue to put any real academic effort into their posts. Go back and read through the exchange ("The Wisconsin Issue, #175-ff). Mr. Roam is just recycling talking points.

If in all his years, Mr. Roam had ever bothered to post an educated argument in good faith at Sciforums, we might be able to find something for his defenders to cling to. But our constant pandering to such low-effort, fact-free, anti-intellectual posting has done more to chill the exchange of ideas in this community than any reasonable suppression of bullshit ever would have.

Mr. Roam is a problem we could—and should—have handled years ago, yet for some reason—apparently, the appearance of political balance—we have condoned and endorsed his behavior to the point that many of the disciplinary actions against him have been begrudgingly given because other people have browbeaten the relevant moderators into dealing with him.

This doesn't mean that PJ, or anyone else, actually needs to shoot back, but what are people supposed to think when they see Mr. Roam's behavior so protected? The message we, as staff, send is that such behavior is not only acceptable, but worthy of active defense.

• • •​

Beyond the immediate, there is also an historical context. Mr. Roam has made this jab before. The staff did not take action even after repeated complaint. Indeed, politically conservative moderators receiving the complaints were upset at PJ for even complaining. So when PJ got the message and started shooting back at Mr. Roam, one of our politically conservative moderators proposed action against PJdude, believing Mr. Roam to be utterly innocent of ever having insulted anyone. Apparently, in all his time as a moderator, my associate hadn't really been paying attention.

And over time, the more people have tried to tie PJ's hands, it's been specifically to give Mr. Roam room to abuse people.

 

the ignore function works wonders in this area.
when a poster resorts to name calling it usually means " uh, i don't have any legitimate sources so i will throw a hissy fit."
buffalo has been banned before for such behavior, apparently he didn't learn from his mistakes.
the mods will get tired of it and send him to where "the buffalos roam".

i consider this no better than what you are complaining about.
if you have something to say then say it in front of god and everybody.

 

i don't follow their conversations.
is this true PJ? do you 2 often snipe at one another like this?
once something like this starts and gets a grip it will be hard to end it short of banning both of you.

 

infighting amongst the staff should not be tolerated.

 

So who will watch the watchers?

 

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

the reason what he says bothers me is because to me its trivializes what she and every other person with MS goes through every single day

 

As users of the board, certain moderators routinely engage in antagonizing members and insulting them often for reasons of ideological disagreement and nothing else. I'm not sure why this thread is an issue at all.

 

if he wants to go after me fine. but do not involve my family. their is no need for him to even mention my mother in way shape or form.

I should have known this is the tack you'd take.

in other words your relying on your own biases.

I'm offended that someone feels the need to bring my family into this when they can't prove their points. I'm ignore the fact it is a personal attack but than again you have decided its ok for people to attack me.

still pouting lies. you don't get to decide what my motives are I do. I try and avoid him if at all possible because of his tendency to bring my family namely my mother into the debate in personal attacks against me

God so because I have a problem with someone bring my family into the debate it gives you the reason to personally attack me?

all I want is for my family not to be mentioned

he isn't using personal information about me. he is just being a concending asshole to me for poiting out his misinformation something which by yours and the other moderators lack of action

sciforums doesn't you and the other mods do.

I try to anytime he doesnlike what I say he brings my family into. which I have a problem with. I'm on this board noit my mom not my dad not cousens aunts and uncles. I'm sorry you feel I'm childish in thinking things that having nothing to do with thisboard being mentioned in attacks against me.



oh and for you information one of the reasons it bothers me is because his arrogant fucking rant is wrong. So maybe instead of continuing your little fucking vendetta against me you actualy enforce the rules you claim too and not break them your self. because if you treated your own actions the way you treat mine you would have permabanned you sorry ass long ago.

 

Yeah I'll admit a bit of strife came between the two of us when I felt string refused to enforce the rules in regards to Byfallo so rather than deciding to let my self being attack I started going back. sadly this gave string and than later james the cover of claiming well you both do it to refuse to do anything about the attacks.

 

like all I want is for the mods to step in as they have in the past for others to go mentioning and refering to people's families against their wishes is wrong. All I want is for him to stop mentioning my mom or my family in any way. they are seperate from my being here and I want to keep it that way. I don't think that is to much to ask.