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[Ciarente]

More than  a year ago, when this forum was created, the following mission statement was put up in lights:

Backstage is a place for EVE players to discuss aspects of EVE-Online, particularly as they pertain to role-playing, in an open and mature environment.  Old and new, pirate and bear - all are welcome!

Our intention is to offer a culture that encourages discussion over argument and mutual respect over enmity through the use of clear posting guidelines along with explanations of what is considered acceptable and unacceptable; meaningful discussion is to be valued above theatrics and hyperbolic argument in pursuit of 'winning' threads..  The main idea here is that while IC people might be enemies, the forum is OOC and as such people should act like adults discussing their mutual hobby.

This was never an uncontroversial project. Opinions were expressed to the original moderation team that the forums should have different kinds of moderation standards - ranging from moderation but with no expectation of civility and consideration to no moderation at all but pre-emptive perma-banning of certain individuals (the list of said individuals, of course, varied depending on who was doing the suggesting).

None of these were considered adequate by the founders of this forum. The idea behind Backstage was to create a place for the discussion of Eve without flaming, flame-baiting, trolling, thread-wars and general bullshit and ass-hattery.  There is the whole rest of the internet for that, if that takes your fancy. It does not take ours.

It was not and is not intended to be the forum for the resolution of all IG and OOG grievances, conflicts, disputes and arguments.

It was not and is not intended to be the first and last resort for all RP related matters, subtexts to the IGS, Eve fiction, CAOD and other forums.

It was not and is not intended to be the place for carrying on disputes from the wide range of OOC channels in-game.

Nor will you be exempted from moderation standards because you:
a) feel strongly about a matter; and/ or
b) occupy a particular position in game; and/ or
c) express an opinion the moderators agree with; and/ or
d) harass moderators in or out of game in response to moderation; and/ or
e) disagree with the rules; and/ or
f) dislike the moderators; and/ or
g) are convinced your particular post is more important than the rules; and/or
h) believe that a particular individual is not worth civility.

The moderation team will continue to apply the rules and standards of Backstage to the best of our ability in our entirely volunteer capacity in order to maintain a forum which meets the original purpose of Backstage. 

It is true that given these rules and standards, it is not always possible to express an opinion on a heated and contentious issue with a full flow of free form invective.

We consider that to be a feature of the forum, not a flaw.

[Casiella]

TL;DR:

[Alain Colcer]

I hereby declare my allegiance to the code described above, and solemnly swear to follow it and promote it.

(kinda tongue in cheek, but honest)

[Saede Riordan]

It was not and is not intended to be the forum for the resolution of all IG and OOG grievances, conflicts, disputes and arguments.

It was not and is not intended to be the first and last resort for all RP related matters, subtexts to the IGS, Eve fiction, CAOD and other forums.

It was not and is not intended to be the place for carrying on disputes from the wide range of OOC channels in-game.

It might not have been intended, but I feel like backstage needs to allow things like this. It might require a change in moderating methods (not standards, which I think are fine) but there needs to be a fair, balanced, unbiased, moderated place to settle disputes and conduct things. Why can't that be here?

[Casiella]

Because dispute settling nearly always leads to violations. The Internet has many places for such things, after all.

[Ciarente]

It was not and is not intended to be the forum for the resolution of all IG and OOG grievances, conflicts, disputes and arguments.

It was not and is not intended to be the first and last resort for all RP related matters, subtexts to the IGS, Eve fiction, CAOD and other forums.

It was not and is not intended to be the place for carrying on disputes from the wide range of OOC channels in-game.

It might not have been intended, but I feel like backstage needs to allow things like this. It might require a change in moderating methods (not standards, which I think are fine) but there needs to be a fair, balanced, unbiased, moderated place to settle disputes and conduct things. Why can't that be here?

If you see the need for such a forum, then by all means, set up, administer, and moderate one. That is not the purpose of this forum.

[Silver Night]

It is often much better to settle such things privately. If part of the process needs to be public, it is often the last part, when a statement explaining the resolution might be released.

Public conflict resolutions generally invite the participation of the public in a contentious issue. I'm not sure I see a lot of situations where involving people who aren't principals in a conflict (aside from, for example, bringing in a neutral third party arbitrator, which is very different from involving the public at large) would be desirable. Assuming the goal is resolution and not winning in front of an audience, in any case.

If you have something you want to try and resolve here, that's fine. However it will be subject to the same rules as every other thread and participants will need to post accordingly. We've seen a couple of recent examples where it was attempted and they didn't. The Catacombs are there both for transparency and to provide an example of what not to do.

If you'd like a place to resolve disputes and you feel it can't be done within the guidelines here, I suggest private communications, IG OOC channels, or even Chatsubo. Alternatively, you can always create your own place for discussion.

[Saede Riordan]

Part of the issue with settling conflicts in private is that in private there is no oversight or moderation at all, which means that in private two people trying to settle something are significantly more likely to just be at each others throats. It also forces you to face down someone who might intimidate you, or verbally walk all over you, which means settling them in private often just cannot be reasonably expected to happen.
By not letting disputes happen and settle out, you create rifts in the community that won't heal, and will lead to resentment on the part of everyone involved. Instead of dealing with the other person in an environment they consider safe, they keep their issues bottled up until they come boiling out at the seams. If instead of being so conflict averse that all disputes are smothered, backstage takes on the perspective of civilly and respectfully settling disputes, I think it will lead to a whole lot more positive growth for the community.

Now yes, having this happen in public can cause issues, since it invites people to take sides in an issue and turn something low key into something big, but I don't think I've really seen that yet, anyone outside of the principle who has been involved in these debates seems to (for my perspective) have done so in a rather polite, and neutral way. Just stating their opinions on the matter, etc.
I'm not asking the moderation to be more lax, however, I am asking them to not be so strict as to stifle and smother attempts at civil discourse. Because despite that topic involving the SF dealie being in violation of the rules, it was far, far more calm and level headed then I'd ever really expected to see out of the debating parties.

[Orthic]

Interesting issue. On the one hand, Backstage is one of the only (if not the only) forum where a lot of us coexist. It's also the only forum where people are forced to be mature (or at least civil) or be modded. In a sense, the other readers and the mods become your 'neutral' third party, making sure everyone plays nice on the playground.

That said, as we've seen with the two or three threads discussing recent events, they lead to just about numerous breaches of the forum rules, hence the clarification that that's not what this board is for.

Could we really use a forum like that? Absolutely.
Is that what this one is for? Nope.
Could it be expanded to that? Possibly.
Would that mean a metric shit-tonne of additional work for the mods? Yep.

[Casiella]

Nikita, with respect: if two parties cannot deal with each other civilly unless the Backstage team intervenes, then they have deeper issues. And it's not our job to teach them or fix them. Those of us who volunteer our time to moderate this site -- especially Silver, who pays for it -- simply don't have any interest in taking up that mantle. Others certainly can choose to do so, and I applaud them for it. But we've made a different choice here.

[scagga]

It was not and is not intended to be the forum for the resolution of all IG and OOG grievances, conflicts, disputes and arguments.

It was not and is not intended to be the first and last resort for all RP related matters, subtexts to the IGS, Eve fiction, CAOD and other forums.

It was not and is not intended to be the place for carrying on disputes from the wide range of OOC channels in-game.

It might not have been intended, but I feel like backstage needs to allow things like this. It might require a change in moderating methods (not standards, which I think are fine) but there needs to be a fair, balanced, unbiased, moderated place to settle disputes and conduct things. Why can't that be here?

Perhaps if you could kindly explictly spell out the pros and cons of such a change your point of view can become clearer to your intended audience?

My view in this instance is similar to that expressed by the Mr Silver Night

[Bacchanalian]

So if various RP entities can't discuss current events with each other that they may have diverging views and opinions on, what the hell can we do here?  Circlejerk to whatever crumb of RP that CCP actually gives us?  Start a billion threads asking what type of music each others' characters listen to?  What color socks they wear?

I dunno.  Seems to me like there's a line here, and the moderaters are erring on the side of "if you disagree with anyone, get the fuck off our forums with it".  Seems pretty silly to me.

[Mizhara]

So if various RP entities can't discuss current events with each other that they may have diverging views and opinions on, what the hell can we do here?  Circlejerk to whatever crumb of RP that CCP actually gives us?  Start a billion threads asking what type of music each others' characters listen to?  What color socks they wear?

I dunno.  Seems to me like there's a line here, and the moderaters are erring on the side of "if you disagree with anyone, get the fuck off our forums with it".  Seems pretty silly to me.

This. It's getting to the point where RP issues get stamped down to simmer and stay on a low boil until they erupt instead of just getting the problems fixed when they happen. I already know one such event that exploded and led to alliance division and severe OoC issues further alienated people. If shit had just been dealt with as it came up, it wouldn't have gone that far. Take that and look beyond alliance level issues, and you face the problem of the communication gap. Backstage is unique in it's ability to bridge that gap.

Sure, there's more to Backstage than the above, but it is the one forum that bridges the OoC gaps between entities and since any hint of disagreement on all other RP stuff gets stamped down and frowned at, removing this too removes the purpose of Backstage.

[Casiella]

I dunno.  Seems to me like there's a line here, and the moderaters are erring on the side of "if you disagree with anyone, get the fuck off our forums with it".  Seems pretty silly to me.a

No, we welcome disagreements. We don't allow arguments. As the FAQ specifically notes:

Debate or discussion involves people putting forward their ideas and opinions. Argument is when people start fighting over whose ideas or opinions are 'right'. For example, if you find yourself responding to a post with anything along the lines of 'You're wrong, because...', stop and think. Don't sit there working out what's wrong with someone else's idea. Propose your own, and tell us all the ways in which it's awesome. Everybody wins a discussion: nobody wins an argument.

Strange as it may seem, given some of the forums on the internet, but it is possible to have an honest exchange of views without being rude, hostile, offensive, aggressive or bullying. That kind of behaviour destroys communities, virtual and otherwise, and Will Not Be Tolerated.

[Jade Constantine]

Might surprise some people to find me holding this opinion - but I don't have a great problem with the way current backstage moderation is handled at all. And I can see the point that is being made here about stamping on arguments and frothing.

The SF vs Moira thread is an object lesson in what can be right - and what can be wrong.

Scagga's initial post asking for whats going on with the war was fine, as were some of the initial responses. I gave a report that referenced various aspects of the public threads and all was well.

Then ... well, it got overtaken with trolling, frothing, insults and what were fairly obvious attempts to "fight" an ic propaganda war here.

I still have absolutely zero comprehension on what Verone was complaining about with his massive post that triggered the thread split and locked section.

It simply became an argument for the sake of argument and opportunity for peanut gallery commentators to get their pin-pricks in while they thought nobody else was looking and it was almost entirely pointless.

I mean, people's private eve-mails and ooc chatlogs personal trust broken and posted up for what exactly ?

Nobody acted badly in those mails. The only bad thing was that they were presented here for public amusement and trolling and to enflame the argument.

It was as I said, almost - entirely worthless from start to finish.

I think Bacc and I had a decent interchange there, but otherwise it was just bangwagon jumping partizan nonsense and I can see why the mods here don't want it.

I also would like to think that Backstage could be a medium for people to speak and genuinely settle misunderstandings and things - but for that to happen the moderators do need to be utterly merciless with 3rd party peanut gallery trolls who have nothing to do with the principle points and just want to use the opportunity to act like assholes on the internet.

But as mentioned by Silvernight - perhaps we could simply talk to each other a bit more?

Its a valid option.