What kind of rule is this? A server manager (that would be Yen) who is looked down upon and frequently ridiculed by nearly all major forumgoers manages in his final days to increase his standing among them simply by getting banned and then committing an act of corruption (the nature of which to this point remains unclear) to the detriment of his server in an act of protest against the "Graal staff". In other words, it does not matter that he was a corrupt manager and seen as a person who frequently used the forums simply to cry for attention - in the end he was able to elevate himself to a more respectable status among major forumgoers simply by "fighting the staff". They don't even care
how he fought them, just that he did. Such is the state of the relationship between the major forumgoers and the Graal staff. Of course, everyone knows that major forumgoers have little contact with the vast majority of staff on Graal servers, they care mostly about the forum staff, and so to them "forum staff" and "graal staff" are synonymous. It doesn't matter to them that Yen's Zodiac corruption wasn't directed against a single moderator, in their minds he fought against the forum administration by proxy.
Of course, the forum administration have heard that the major forumgoers hate them before, and, in the instances that they decide to respond rather than delete, they generally bring out one of two defenses, one (used pretty much exclusively by Moon Goddess) is to claim accountability only to Unixmad. A valid claim, but it is suspicious in that Unixmad's rubber-stampery is legendary, she is accountable to him but she would likely keep his approval regardless of how she moderated (barring extreme actions). Another defence, used more often and even by Unixmad himself, is to claim that forum governance is carried out in the interest of the majority of forumgoers, not just the major forumgoers. Despite detractors outnumbering supporters, the fact that the majority of forum users don't care (even though it's because they don't use the forums enough to care) legitimizes present forum policy. What this defence advocates (or would advocate, if anyone actually took it seriously) is in reality an environment of near-zero moderation. If apathy
is support, than the best forum policy is one that maximizes apathy. The members who do not care (the majority) do not care because they do not come into contact with forum administration or forum policy (they do not
experience moderation). The best way to maximize apathy is therefore to ensure that as few users as possible
experience moderation. There is no need for rules (except one rule to ban posts that may expose Graal Online to liability) in the ideal forums advocated for by the reasoning of the administration - they should simply seek to maximize apathy by moderating only when there is an outcry by the memberbase to do so (since feeling that moderators are not moderating where they should moderate is also contrary to apathy) and afterwards let the members get back to not caring.
Of course, that's because the forum administration don't
really want to maximize apathy (nor do I), they just noticed that most members didn't post enough to care and used that fact to come up with an "on the fly" justification for the present forum policy (of course, since members who don't post enough to care are unlikely to be affected by most types of realistic forum policy, this reasoning can be used to justify pretty much
any kind of forum policy, though of course the one I described above trumps all others in claim to this justification.) Nor are they really trying to moderate in accordance with the principle of "benefiting the majority of users". Anybody who thinks that Sam tried to calculate how much his deletion of Ed's post criticizing EM policy regarding elf spawns on 2K2 would benefit whom and then concluded that it would benefit the "majority" before he deleted it is kidding themselves. Moderators usually just have an intuitive reaction to a post (that it is "bad") and thus delete it, with very little consideration of whether or not it breaks the rules (though they usually do delete posts that
do break the rules.) Sometimes they'll put serious consideration into a deletion, but that's because their intuitive reaction is muddled. It's not that they aren't sure whether or not they should delete the post, just that they aren't sure whether or not it's "bad".
Except that
all members who read posts have intuitive reactions/opinions/etc about them. Yet the opinions of a moderator are enforced, whereas those of an average member are not. In other words, a moderator's personal opinions on what should be deleted/etc are made more
valid simply because they are held by a moderator. This is ridiculous. It is also equally ridiculous to say that a moderator's opinions on what shouldn't be deleted/what shouldn't be a rule are more valid simply because they are a moderator. It doesn't matter that the rule against non-graal-related links is silly, a moderator should enforce it simply because it is a rule. Moderators should
enforce the rules, all the rules, and nothing but the rules (by the way, pretending a post breaks rule 3a when it doesn't is not part of enforcing the rules). They can, of course, have opinions on what should and shouldn't be a rule, but those opinions shouldn't be subject to special treatment (i.e. being enforceable) simply because they are held by a moderator.
Of course, ways of addressing problems with the rules should exist, in particular it is important that bans, moderations and the rules be discussable, because the official forums are
the only place where the staff get a real chance to defend themselves.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Darlene159
Allowing people to start accusing others of wrong doing, with or without proof would be a bad idea in the public forum.
Proof can be faked far too easily, and needs to be verified (if it even can be). If someone does fake these things, it gives the person being accused a bad name for no reason, except that someone is mad at him/her.
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This is a post from Moon Goddess a from a while back in which she attempts to justify outlawing discussions of corruption, etc. Firstly, we can see that this policy is subject to a double standard. Allegations against Yen, for example, can be thrown around fairly freely (remember that according to Moon Goddess these allegations should be disallowed
even if they're true.) Beyond that, it completely denies the victim a chance to defend themselves publically whereas it does very little to prevent the accuser from spreading the allegations. The accuser can freely spread them on the client or on other forums and go unopposed (especially on forums where staff are prohibited from joining), whereas the official forums are often the victim's only opportunity to defend themselves. For example, when rumours that I speed hacked began to spread on 2K2 (that is, on the client, where mounting a serious defense is extremely difficult), it was
I who chose to bring them onto the forums because I knew that the forums were the best place to publically expose the allegations as ridiculous.
Or you can just keep things the way they are and have the next guy who deletes his server seen as a hero too.
01-24-2007, 03:26 AM
Linear Mode
