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[Silver Night]

Targeted moderation, bias, 'looking for an excuse', poor justification and extremely broad interpretation of rulesets.

Never did see Louella being moderator material. Guess this proves it.

For the reasons others are mentioning here, and in my own post right here, I'm officially asking the Backstage administration to review Louella's position as a moderator, as I feel it's not conducive to a positive environment or the high standards of moderation Backstage needs.

[mod]As a note: While we encourage discussion of moderation, this section of the forums still falls under the Backstage rules and guidelines. That means that that discussion needs to be conducted in a way that is respectful of your fellow members, including moderation staff. Please keep that, and the other guidelines, in mind when posting.[/mod]

[Mizhara]

Keeping all those things in mind, the post still stands.

[Silver Night]

Something which many people could better understand is that just because they have an opinion, and they express it, and they believe that it is correct, that doesn't mean they are exempt from the rules. In fact, even if the opinion were verifiably correct, if it were a breach it would still be a breach.

For example: 'Ships have crew. Idiot.  '

Would get you modded. And that is factually correct, not just an opinion, but it still breaks the guidelines.

So, you can express your opinion - or even state facts, with citations if you'd like - in a way that follows the guidelines of the board, or your posts will end up moderated - regardless of how correct you feel that opinion is (or indeed, if you were stating a fact and citing peer reviewed journal articles, for that matter). Correctness isn't the metric. Respect for other members and staying on the right side of the guidelines and rules so that we maintain the atmosphere of the board is.

[Saede Riordan]

I rather don't see Mizhara's post as breaking any of the forum guidelines Silver. Its well written, concise, and imo, avoids attacking Louella as a person, just her position as moderator.

That said, I agree with Miz.

[Victoria Stecker]

So, question, sort of related to the discussion. We need to express opinions (and even facts) in a respectful manner. If the opinion you’re trying to express is “I don’t think Person X is up to the task of objectively moderating this board,” what is a respectful way to say that? No matter what, you’re explaining why you don’t think someone can do something, which is probably not going to involve complimenting them. Besides digging out a thesaurus to find the most neutral words possible to use, what can someone do?

We can polish a turd, it’s still a turd.

You can phrase it however you want, you’re still saying something uncomplimentary about someone’s abilities, in this case their ability to moderate.

[Saede Riordan]

Vicky makes a good point here. You can complain about someone really nicely, but at the end of the day, complaining is complaining.

[Mizhara]

I think the point was that some things that needs to be said just can't be said without touching upon uncomfortable viewpoints.

[Ken]

Especially in light of the situation that precipitated it, I read Miz's post as a perfectly legitimate and clearly defined statement of frustration and a respectful appeal for review of staff accountability by the mod team.  No eye rolls.  No name-calling.  No four-letter words.  No problem here.

[Ciarente]

"I disagree with Mizhara's interpretation of the rules, here. I think that her decision to post was hasty, and I hope in future this sort of thing won't happen again, because I don't think it's a direction we want Backstage going."

vs:

"I never did think Mizhara was Backstage material. Guess this proves it."

Q: So you want us to act all lovey-dovey?
A: Yes. Deal with it.

Q: Doesn't being polite to people I disagree with make me a hypocrite?
A: No. It makes you a grown-up.

[Victoria Stecker]

While I can appreciate that saying "You're not backstage [moderator] material" might not be the way to go around it, what you've got there are two different statements. One says "I think you might have been a little hasty and made a mistake" and the other says "I don't think you should be a moderator."

If we feel that someone should not be a moderator, how should we convey this? Is it even something we're allowed to say? Would you want us to go through and give a list of reasons and basically make a case for why someone should be removed? And is there a way to do that while being 'lovey dovey'?

[Ciarente]

I would suggest that if you wish to make personal complaints about an individual on the moderation team, a PM to other members of the volunteer staff here would be more appropriate than choosing to ignore the guidelines of the forum.

The moderators apply a far looser standard to the PMs we receive than to post published to the entire Backstage community and preserved in public for the life of the forum.

And to our responses, of course.

[Mizhara]

I am extremely opposed to hiding such things in PMs. When the moderators actions are public and the prices paid for bad moderation is on the users themselves, then the discussions and debates on said moderation should be in public as well. To have an open dialogue on such things instead of hiding it and pretending problems doesn't exist in public is paramount to trust in such a community. Hiding it just means the trust erodes slowly but surely.

Edit: This also ensures that the rest of the community can weigh in and say "you're wrong" to the ones asking for such review of moderators or standards, which is important.

[Bacchanalian]

Something which many people could better understand is that just because they have an opinion, and they express it, and they believe that it is correct, that doesn't mean they are exempt from the rules. In fact, even if the opinion were verifiably correct, if it were a breach it would still be a breach.

For example: 'Ships have crew. Idiot.  '

Would get you modded. And that is factually correct, not just an opinion, but it still breaks the guidelines.

So, you can express your opinion - or even state facts, with citations if you'd like - in a way that follows the guidelines of the board, or your posts will end up moderated - regardless of how correct you feel that opinion is (or indeed, if you were stating a fact and citing peer reviewed journal articles, for that matter). Correctness isn't the metric. Respect for other members and staying on the right side of the guidelines and rules so that we maintain the atmosphere of the board is.

I think a better example would be saying "Bacch is an asshole".  While technically 100% correct, it's not very nice and as such probably would be moderated. 

[Morwen Lagann]

I think a better example would be saying "Bacch is an asshole".  While technically 100% correct, it's not very nice and as such probably would be moderated. 

... Dude, I've been in fleets with you. Calling you an asshole is excessively nice in comparison to what you could be called for the things you do to our eyes every seven or eight links.

As for the issue of things "needing" to be done publicly, I disagree, and stand by Cia's suggestion of PMing the moderation team privately about the issue.

People need to be more proactive about reporting posts they feel are in violation of the rules, and about bringing up issues they see as being harmful to the Backstage community. Bringing up these issues in the way they have been brought up this time around does get our attention, but it is not a particularly productive way of doing so.

[Silver Night]

Stating that you think that someone's position as a moderator should be re-evaluated in the light of recent events would be alright - though whether any such evaluation took place and whether the results would be what you wished is another matter.

Posting a non-constructive message gloating about being right about someone 'not being moderator material' is not alright. Nor is stating as fact things that are both opinions and divisive. As with any discussion, whether it's regarding a moderator, or a point of PF.

Also, I want to clarify, the reason to use PMs isn't to 'hide' things. It is because there is a lower standard applied than to public posts as far as moderation. If you find that you cannot express your opinions, regarding the moderator staff or otherwise, in a way that stays on the right side of the guidelines with a public post, then expressing it more privately might just be an additional option - since as mentioned we generally don't apply the same standard, particularly when it has to do with 'forum business'.

This is all fairly off-topic, and I apologize for starting this separate discussion. I'm going to go ahead and split this discussion into it's own thread.