I’ve been considering all the suggestions in the commenting changes thread. One thing that is obvious: We have a problem, Houston.
But it is also true that I feel a hesitation to post because I will be considered an outsider and not worthy of acknowledgement or response.
Broken Things
Hi – another extremely-long-time lurker, very infrequent commenter here. I don’t have any solutions, but reading this comment thread made one problem very obvious: when people ask for more charity, less hostility and knee-jerk dismissiveness, several regular commenters respond as if they’d been told to stop saying fuck.
amrie
I’m another very, very longtime lurker who has commented only a few times. I almost always agree with PZ and the majority of usual commenters, but I’m still really afraid to comment here and be ripped to shreds by the very people I admire so much. I commented the other day one minor criticism of something PZ said, and suddenly I’m “ranting” and “slamming” and being condescended to about whether I read the OP. I’m afraid to go back and see what other responses I got. I love reading this blog, but it’s true that it’s not welcoming to people who aren’t regular commenters.
Dingo Abbie
I hear it in email and on Twitter, too — lots of people who are reluctant to join the conversation because they’re afraid of the highly-charged, buzzing atmosphere, and don’t want to risk the very common lightning strikes. The first step to fixing a problem is admitting that there is a problem. I also see it in the thread itself, where there were a few instances of people turning to snap and bite at each other.
There is a problem. Now we have to define it so we can fix it. A lot of the conversation focused on “the regulars”.
Possibly it’s just me, but the Lounge reminds me of the high school cafeteria tables where the in-crowd sat. Woe betide the nerd who even looked too long at the kids sitting there. I understand that the Lounge regulars are comfortable with each other there and you are not a high school clique but rather a group of intelligent, mature adults.
Al Dente
The defensiveness coming from some regulars in this discussion is aggravating, I agree, PatrickG. Others have been open or are opening up to criticism and suggestion, which is nice. I don’t know if its enough to turn the blog’s comment section around.
People who don’t belong to the elite group of posters on this blog often are treated very badly. It’s a fucking shame.marinerachel
I think people are accidentally unwelcoming by relying too much on the opaque insider language that Al Dente mentions. So one thing that might help is if we all tried to write comments, even Lounge comments, with newbies and irregulars in mind. In other words, we should inject completeness into responses rather than relying the readers’ knowledge of Pharyngula regulars, memes, and history to fill in the gaps—knowledge which non-regulars necessarily lack and can’t easily gain without displaying their ignorance and marking themselves as “outsiders.”
A. Noyd
Try to see it from my perspective. I’ve been at this for over a decade. Who are these “regulars”? This is a different crowd from the people who were here ten years ago or five years ago. Many of you will move on. I’m accustomed to impermanence and change, and I really don’t see anyone here with a privileged position, and that newbie commenter today might be writing furiously here a year from now. Or not.
So I’m kind of insensitive to the idea of some kind of imaginary hierarchy, because there isn’t one. There’s me, and there’s the rest of you.
That said, there are some of you who’ve settled in, are familiar and comfortable with the mores around here, and some of you who are unsure about what the heck is going on. One question is whether making the place more open to new commenters (I want to!) would make it less comfortable to old hands (it will!) and whether that would lead to more people leaving than joining. It doesn’t have to lead to an exodus, but change is necessary.
Remember that the status quo selects for people who are okay with persistent hostility. Maintaining that status quo reflects a choice to exclude those who are not okay with persistent hostility.
Chris Clarke
Yep. We have to break things to make them better. Everyone who is comfortable right now? Resign yourself to some discomfort. That includes me. So here’s one good suggestion.
may I suggest the following guideline?
Respond to another comment with the initial assumption that it was made by someone who is your equal.Dywalgi
Assume they are your equal, but also don’t assume that they have all the background. Explain with the idea that they can catch on just as well as you can.
Now treating new commenters as equals does not imply that we need to knock off these mysterious “regulars”. I also got some clear signals of resentment towards those people who are currently familiar with the Pharyngula tropes. I sympathize with where this next comment is coming from, but no, this is not going to happen.
To open up the base of discussion the change is to limit the number of comments. New commenters and the oldest commenters are limited to 5 comments per day. This keeps comments focused and on topic. New commenters feel more comfortable wading in and the positions of old commenters will no longer overwhelm the topic. To bring in new commenters, it is as simple as banning old commenters. This can be done merely by eliminating 2 old commenters. It’s also effective to change moderators.
waldenpond
More empathy for new people is a good thing, but it works both ways: the “old” people are also valuable contributors. I might consider a voluntary request for people to limit their loquaciousness (talk about it in the comments!), but let’s be clear: the rules are not about punishing people for enjoying the atmosphere and who comment a lot.
Something else that might help new folks come forward is if some of us who have been commenting for a few years were to become lurkers or at least lurk a little more. Maybe that would make room for other people to feel comfortable and less like there is a cool kids table they can’t sit at.
Jackie the social justice WIZZARD!
Rather than asking the noisy ones to lurk more, I’d rather see the lurkers speak up more. Rather than suppressing some, I’d rather change the environment to encourage more.
Another big issue: civility.
I have found over the years those who are most against incivility want to be able to discuss controversial topics in a Vulcan like manner, and dismiss the emotional responses. Which makes them incivil….
Nerd of Redhead
See Chris Clarke’s comment about the status quo above.
The point of that piece was that a fetish for civility can obscure legitimate discourse. It was never intended to mean that routine incivility in the face of disagreement is superior to making a habit of attempting to be kind.
Fetishizing civility is bad. Fetishizing incivility is worse.Chris Clarke
That’s important: disrupting conventions is a good thing, but there are lines that have to be drawn, where smashing things for the sake of smashing things becomes unproductive. That’s what we’re arguing about: where should the lines be drawn?
I’m a long-time lurker and infrequent poster, but I feel that if any rules are implemented to require greater civility in the discussions there must also be clear-cut rules spelling out that bigotry will not be tolerated, and extra moderation will be required to keep those types out. A ‘civility’ policy can often have the unintended side effect of giving tone trolls official weight, and bigots can be extremely skilled at using these policies to shut down those with legitimate anger and turn comment sections into platforms for their own disguised hate.
Demeisen
I got a hint of some serious concerns that civility would be used to encourage tolerance of MRAs or slymers or stalkers or harassers. Nope. I’m always going to be intolerant of those types! Relax, you’re going to be allowed to smack them down with extreme incivility!
Could there perhaps be some sort of standardized responses from the suggested mods to comments blaming minorities for being oppressed, rape apology, questioning people’s gender and calls for people to be unemotional about things like forced birth and sexual harassment? Because those sorts of aggressions are far more abusive and triggering than the often rightly enraged responses they receive.
I question the use of the word “abusive” to describe telling a bigot (even one with the best intentions) to fuck off.Jackie the social justice WIZZARD!
Yes, please do continue to bash at those people. Really, did you think I was going to urge everyone to be nice to creationists?
The problem isn’t how we deal with people way outside our norms, it’s how we deal with the ones on the edge. Or even the ones who share our goals fully, but maybe say something on the edge.
Can you find a way to incorporate a Pharyngula-appropriate definition of rudeness into the rules? Something along the lines of – refusing to read a link is rude if you’ve asked the question it answers, as are patronising and demeaning language, an apparent refusal to answer commenters who might be women, the assumption of total ignorance in others and rambling on about something but refusing to address questions/read the counter argument about that very idea. Also endless repetition of the point you made which is being challenged.
Maureen Brian
Those are bad things. Some of you accepted, desirable, valuable commenters do them, too: stop repeating yourself, please. Good commenters say something new and informative; boring commenters are predictable.
I think civility is both too loaded and too loosely defined by most people to be a useful frame for this discussion. A much better one is ethically. The commentariat needs to treat new/unfamiliar people, even those who are disagreeing, in an ethical manner. That also means not using safe space as a brute cudgel to smack down new/unfamiliar people, disagreeing or not.
Caine
Yeah! I’m the one with the brute cudgel!
There were concerns about monitors. I think they were seen as privileging yet another subgroup above everyone else, yet that wasn’t it at all: it was more another set of eyes who’d let me know when something was going on, because with the volume of posting here, I’d often lose sight of things.
Given the fast pace and long term acquaintanceship among people here, charity first is a tall order. PZ implemented the monitor system to help deal with that, but the monitors don’t want to monitor, and many long-term regulars whined about it so much, they (the monitors) just faded into the background. I think the monitor system could work, and work well, if there was a consistent presence by monitors in threads, guiding the discussion when needed, and reminding everyone of the commenting rules now and then. People would get used to monitor presence eventually, and it would go a long way in helping new people to feel a bit safer about diving into the legendary shark tank.
Caine
This is more of an actively interventionist program than I’d initially imagined — instead of just “Spill on aisle 3!” notifications to me, the monitors would have to be a little more involved in warning people to quit spilling stuff in aisle 3. What do you all think?
Would it help if people who were monitors and moderators had separate accounts for that purpose? So that if they commented with a note or warning in a thread, it would be via an account that just says Moderator or Monitor or whatever. That way if someone like Crip Dyke and Caine, who might want to participate in the thread as a regular commenter, but also want to issue a Monitor Note as a reminder of a rules violation, can do so without giving their comments extra authority, and without also drawing ire or disrespect of the authority of the Monitor Note, on the basis that is just one person who was commenting in the thread and then suddenly makes a command.
Anteprepro
Related:I could just set up an anonymous monitor account, give the monitors the password, so they could post notices when a discussion goes off track. That account would have no special privileges. This would be easy to implement, not sure if it’s desirable.
A good general rule for monitors:
Mods should NEVER be used to decide who is right and who is wrong. Good mods are there to remind people of the values that we are striving to put into practice. If something written goes diverges from those values sufficiently to cross a hard boundary a mod would alert PZ or, in the high-power-mod version, redact the smallest possible amount of a comment necessary to pull the comment back over the boundary.
CripDyke
Here are some general suggestions. How you should start an argument:
We need to be careful not to get on a high horse and gallop into a dudgeon. Righteous wrath is righteous, but let’s check to be sure that we are right.
Menyambal
How you should respond in an argument:
As a general idea: Perhaps we should think of things in terms of proportionality and escalation. Respond with a tone and attitude proportionate to that of the comment you respond to. Do not escalate unless that person, through time, erodes whatever charity you would give to them, either through an obvious and undeniable lack of honesty in how they debate and/or through fairly clear bigotry.
Someone who is rude can be met with rudeness. Someone who is polite but is simply mistaken about a matter of fact should be met with politeness. Someone is polite and is a bigot is rude, and can be met with rudeness.Anteprepro
And how you shouldn’t end an argument.
At the same time, however, there are generally one or two people who seem intent on trying to make that person grovel. They’re not attempting to educate the person who is open to changing their mind. They just keep plugging away at telling that person they’re awful. At that point, it’s not just counterproductive. It’s also a failure to update assessments of the situation coupled with punishing someone based on the outdated premises.
Stephanie Zvan
Here are a few specific rules.
1. Do not take disagreements off thread unless the interlocutors both agree to do so, or are booted. It is really bad form to argue with someone, and then shit-talk them in the TDome or elsewhere.
2. Assume good intentions, at least of people you have seen here before. We all like to say “intent doesn’t matter” but of course it does. (I would really like people to stop using the ‘intent isn’t magic’ phrase to justifying assuming bad intentions–that was never the purpose of the phrase. It’s purpose was to explain how intentions aren’t an excuse to justify harm.) Sometimes people don’t say things in quite the right way. Sometimes they say something you misunderstand. Instead of jumping on them immediately, ask them a question. Assume they aren’t a terrible person making a horrible argument.
3. Stop objectifying people. Stop treating people like they are whetstones for your rhetorical barbs. Stop haggling, stop nitpicking, stop intentionally misunderstanding them and forcing them to explain over and over what seems perfectly clear. I don’t mean that you shouldn’t ask for clarification. But there’s a difference between asking “Hey, I didn’t really understand what you mean by that. Can you please explain?” and telling them what they must have meant (usually the most outrageous form of their statement), forcing them to be on the defensive. One is talking TO a person; the other is talking AT an object.
4. Allow learning to happen. No, this doesn’t mean that you are obligated to educate, but it does mean that you don’t denigrate a person for not knowing what you know, or having learned what you have. So often in SJ circles we attack first, before considering the ramifications on a person who is otherwise a friend. The principle of charity is too often lost. This is why I don’t often participate in this space anymore. I am tired of communicating in this way. I want us to be able to learn and grow in public. We absolutely have to have a space to be wrong, and to be open about being wrong and to ask for help. I would much rather contribute to your learning than go through a frustrating, multi-hour conversation of rhetorical point-scoring.Cyranothe2nd
Those are useful suggestions, and I think the charitable assumption is a good one…except, unfortunately, it’s too often false — we have a lot of trolls. But it might be a good idea to move towards demanding strong evidence of trolling before hulking out on them.
I’m not so much a fan of these rules, but I see where they’re coming from.
PZ’s desire appears to be a shift towards learning, so here are some suggestions:
1 – ban “evidence or gtfo” statements. They mindlessly privilege the consensus and shutdown discussion. Why not say “I disagree. Here is evidence against your claim … … Do you have any evidence to support your claim?”. At worst this can be used to build up a SJ FAQ that you could point people to in future to save time.
2 – Anonymize posting. The fear would be rampant trolling, but it sounds like lots of the anger here is personal and ego-driven, this would stop that nicely.
3 – Limit the rate at which an account can post (e.g. 1 every 2 hours). This would help diffuse tension as people can’t engage in rapid back-and-forths and would dissuade trolls. It would also disincentivize pile-ons as joining a pile on would prevent you posting anything else for 2 hours.worksfromhome
I’m definitely not going to anonymize posting. I want to know who I’m talking to. The other two I’m not going to demand an enforcable option, but it might be nice if people didn’t just demand evidence, but also explained what they were looking for and why one kind of ‘evidence’ is poor. I’m also not going to throttle comments. I will say that one of the primary signs that alerts me that a conversation has gone off the rails is when half the comments are from one person.
I’m also not keen on 10 comments, each one containing a one-liner. Think before hitting the comment button.
One more thing:
PZ, if you have rules in this place you need to be a bit more rigorous about enforcing them. Not enforcing the rules is nearly the same as not having the rules in the first place. And if you’re too busy to do that then the place won’t change much.
Lofty
Ack! WORK???!? You are cruel and demanding commentariat.
Anyway, that’s a lot of stuff. I’m looking for more input — some of those ideas are difficult or unworkable. I also don’t want a great big long list of Rules to Obey, but more some simple general guidelines that don’t require referencing Law 73, subsection IV, paragraph 2. I am not going to invite rules lawyers to camp here.
Here’s one I was thinking of.
Before you post a comment, think to yourself: Is what I said educational, entertaining, or congenial? It has to be at least one of the three, or you shouldn’t waste the readers’ time saying it.
There was also some talk about how if I’m going to have to WORK at this more, I’m going to have some other enforcement options than just banning someone outright. Temporary suspensions are doable. I could disemvowel comments that break the spirit of the rules. I could just leave a little red note on the comment, rebuking the person. I’ll have to think of entertaining ways to chastise from on high to make it more fun.
I’m not done. I’m still thinking. Fire away some more.
I’d like to pipe up to say I really appreciate the dialogue that is taking place in this discussion. People are offering up many suggestions, and I think most everyone is committed to making this an even better space. So, while I don’t have any great suggestions myself, good work, everyone.
–
(that would be congenial, no?)
Hm. Is there a way you could inflict a style on a comment as rebuke/reward, much like the old gumby blockquote? Possibly different styles to indicate which combination of educational, entertaining, or congenial they have epically succeeded and/or failed at. Downside: some serious design effort and coding may be needed, there.
A secondary difficulty seems that the approach scales poorly.
I still think a balance needs to be found. I wonder if there’s a way to keep the zero tolerance for bullshit while still being… generally… nicer.
I really wish I could be more helpful, but I fear I don’t have any ideas that haven’t already been expressed (I’m clearly not original).
Yes, I could also put offending comments in Comic Sans.
I’ve always heard the ‘three comments’ rule: give someone three comments to show they are interested in a dialogue and not either a troll or wanting to monolog about their pet subject without having to deal with questions. (Obvious exceptions are things with enough intended insults* that the person either is a troll or has no clue how to operate here and is beyond help).
I wonder if it would be better to have a rules and a ‘community norms’ post. Rules being the stuff that can get you banned or moderated, but norms are the aspirations for what the community wants discussion to be like.
* Intentions aren’t magic, but people with good intentions have a far better chance of learning than those with bad intentions. If you have good intentions, I’m going to be a lot more ‘XYZ is kind of hurtful, so don’t do it unless you intend to’. Bad intentions get a ‘screw you too’.
Maybe I’ve been reading all the wrong threads, but it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a reference to the 3-comment grace period. That was a good idea, when people remembered to follow it.
Thanks for the hivemind moment, Becca Stareyes!
I am all for zero tolerance for bullshit, even if it is expressed in a non-nice way. It is the (existing / prevalent) tendency to declare everything that doesn’t jive with the party line as “bullshit” that keeps me from posting here (more).
Some of the comments mentioned in the text are – in my opinion – very well on point: charity, assume good intentions. Hell, just don’t assume bad intentions! Don’t think everyone who is not you is an enemy!
I think I will just keep reading, lurking and see if this community can manage such an approach.
I honestly think the current rules are great. They just need proper, consistent enforcement. Expanding the role of the monitors, as suggested in the OP would in my view go a great deal towards having that done. As for the anonymous monitor account, I don’t have an opinion. I’ve never been a monitor, but I’ve seen the pushback against them.
I know this has been said before, but it bears repeating – tread carefully with rules pertaining to civility and the enforced charitable interpretation of posts. Those kinds of systems are sadly all too easily exploited by the kind of person who, as an example, questions the humanity and right to bodily autonomy of marginalised groups, but does it in a manner that scupulously observes all the superficial conventions of civility. It is not only possible but very easy to express the most heinously dehumanising bigotry while never being less than polite in term of the words used, if not the concepts discussed.
Similarly, when emphasising education (a good idea in general terms in my opinion) beware of creating too much space for the type of troll who employs the technique of ‘just asking questions (often called JAQing off) to engage in deliberately triggering discussions under an outwardly justified guise.
Now, to avoid being too much of a Negative Nigel, let me say that I do whole-heartedly agree with this;
Thinking before posting is always a good idea, and if a comment is neither educational, entertaining, or congenial then it really is a waste of keystrokes.
PZ
Ahh, you old softie! Show some titanium!
I don’t post here very often and don’t even read the comments very often. I didn’t even the comments on the last post on this subject and I have very little to offer on solving the problem. But following needs to be posted.
Becca Stareyes @5
I particularly like the idea of community norms. Things like:
*Read the thread comments before commenting since objections and observations may already have been answered. (I remember the Grenade thread where the same things were said over and over again because people would not read previous comments.)
* Sexist, racist, ageist, etc. slurs are not acceptable. It doesn’t matter if c*nt is a term of endearment in northeastern Rutlandshire, don’t use it here.
* Don’t keep making the same argument over and over again, especially if it’s been refuted.
* Trigger warnings are helpful and sometimes necessary.
* When responding to a particular comment, give the poster’s name and post number. Please use <blockquote> to make it obvious that you are quoting someone.
I’m sure there’s other norms that I’m missing that would be useful.
One thing I really don’t understand is when people get all bent out of shape when someone misspells or abbreviates their nym. 99 times out of 100 no malice is intended, and if it is intended, so what?
.
I would agree that there are those who get very hostile to anybody who takes issue with PZ. I have done so occasionally, in what I consider to be an entirely polite and substantive manner, and attracted foaming at the mouth berserkers. I think PZ can largely take care of himself where reasoned dispute is concerned.
As for reading previous comments, generally I agree with that although I don’t see anything wrong with weighing in to endorse something. Also in very long threads that isn’t always practical.
On the whole though, I have to say I haven’t perceived a big problem. I think we should all have reasonably thick skins. Since you can’t hear the tone of voice or body language blunt talk may come off as more aggressive than intended.
As someone who reads by avoid commenting for some of the reasons quoted I wholeheartedly agree with the “educational, entertaining, or congenial” guideline. I’d like to think that’s how I police myself in various fora. I’d bold the “at least” though, but then I feel there’s nothing quite as entertaining as education in a cloak of ironic congeniality. :->
Another longtime lurker, infrequent poster here. I’m glad this discussion is happening, and I think Chris Clarke’s comments about civility and incivility are particularly on-point.
The site with the best moderation system I’ve seen online is Metafilter (where I also lurk). It’s not a perfect system, and I don’t think an exact port of Metafilter’s policies would work or be desirable for Pharyngula, but on the whole I think they do a pretty remarkable job of balancing the goal of open discussion with the need to filter out the dreck. And of course filtering out the dreck also helps promote more interesting open discussions; rather than every thread about feminism becoming a 101-level discussion that’s a fight between MRAs and/or clueless anti-feminists versus feminists who understand the issues, the discussions can move on to more interesting aspects of the topic. (Though admittedly Metafilter has been struggling more with this particular issue recently.)
I think a couple of ideas from Metafilter are possibly portable. One, when moderators post moderating comments, it’s set in a clearly recognizable style different from a post by a non-moderator or a moderator simply participating in the discussion.
Two, moderators will take an active role in guiding the discussion when it seems like it may start going off the rails. E.g., if a subset of commenters are pulling the conversation off-topic, the moderators will issue an explicit directive to drop the derail, and any subsequent comments continuing the derail are deleted. This can be effective if, say, someone makes a stupid, provocative comment only tangentially related to the main topic, eliciting a dozen well-intentioned and even valuable rebuttals, which nevertheless suddenly make the discussion all about the stupid, provocative comment instead of the main topic.
And three, “meta-discussions” about how a thread is going or whether a particular commenter is acting in good faith are sent to a separate discussion forum (MetaTalk). Perhaps a meta-thread could take the place of Thunderdome: not a no-holds-barred thread, but one in which commenting standards are still slightly relaxed to allow things like subtle trolling or just personality clashes to be dealt with.
This requires a fairly hands-on approach to moderation that may be more challenging to implement here but maybe there are at least some ideas which could be adapted.
Anyway, back to lurking.
Gen @ 9:
This is pretty much what I was going to say. I don’t think new rules are necessary. What is necessary is consistent enforcement of the rules. People won’t acquire new habits and follow changes without it.
I love the idea of community norms separate from actual rules, too. I can think of one to add, though perhaps in different wording: play the ball, not the player. Attack the idae, not the person.
LicoriceAllsort (from previous thread):
Thank you. Yes, I think that caveat would be a very good idea.
I like Biogeo‘s suggestions in 17 as well. I think that could work well together with expanded monitor responsibilities and community norms as well as suspensions as talked about. I also agree that people on suspension shouldn’t be talked about or replied to.
Is what I said educational, entertaining, or congenial?
And no longer than necessary!
(Quibble – I for one sometimes find a well-articulated flame war entertaining, & occasionally educational – but have no idea how to phrase a commenting rule to exclude the poorly articulated ones.)
To repeat my earlier query: can anyone point to other sites (dealing with hot controversies and emotional topics among a diverse population) with clear commenting policies that work?
Perhaps appending the community norms to contentious posts? I know Dana Hunter does something similar – potentially hot topics (feminism, racism, etc.) get a red-fonted footnote, with a reminder about the rules of commenting, what will/will not be tolerated, and a link to the further commenting rules of her blog. It’s not a big thing, but it certainly helps to keep these things in mind.
Though knowing PZ’s love for clickbait posts to rake in the cash, he’d probably need one at the end of every post. :P
But Dana also moderates the hell out of her blog, so…
My personal impression, as a longtime infrequent commenter, is that Pharyngula threads take “yes feed the trolls” too far. It’s okay for people to slam trolls, but it feels like that’s all that ever happens. I read blog comments because I want to hear new ideas and drill down into details, and the perpetual remedial lessons being given to trolls just isn’t conducive to that.
One of the consequences is that I almost never have a positive interaction on Pharyngula. Either people treat me like a troll, or they completely ignore me. I could tolerate the misunderstandings if they didn’t constitute 90% of the interactions I ever have.
I think it would help if you clarified the intentions of the space, possibly on a thread by thread basis. The purposes of the Lounge and Thunderdome are at least easy to understand. What about the rest of the blog?
Primarily a safe space for people with a particular set of shared experiences to socialize and express themselves? Then it’s important to specify who and exclude those from groups who may make them feel unsafe. Say who’s wanted and immediately moderate out anyone who isn’t.
Issues up for debate? The the possibility of dissent is the whole point, but the benefits of debate can only follow if reasonable rules of debate are maintained. If some types of dissent are considered unacceptable, exclude them up front. Say what’s not acceptable, and moderate it out of existence. Also, it’s in the nature of debates on social justice that some topics are unsafe for some people. When trigger warnings are provided, people should understand that the contents of comment threads may also be unsafe.
A hub of diverse viewpoints and opinions? Tricky, because it inherently comes with uncertainty, a high risk of mutual incomprehension due to language and cultural differences, different viewpoints born of radically different contexts. Limited diversity, then? Say which.
A hub for making new coverts to the blog’s primary goals, (which I take to be atheism and social justice)? To work, this requires a high tolerance for ignorance, and experience and willingness to share ideas over and over again – as well as an understanding of the issues involved in diversity. Not happening, then? But CripDyke’s workshop (sorry if I got the name wrong) seems like a successful format.
A place for activists to exchange information and tools? Something like the thread on the police and racial justice in the USA? Someone needs to keep everyone radically on topic and moderate out or reroute stray comments to other threads.
Mud-wrestling match / piranha tank for cathartic shouting matches with any random creationist, evangelist or anti-social justicist who’s willing to drop in? All you have to do is figure out how to keep baiting them!
Standard blog+comments? People need to understand that commenters are primarily addressing the OP and not trying to engage in extended debate with other commenters. Set that rule and enforce it. I’m pretty sure this is not what you’re looking for, but… some of the functions listed above are more usually performed by forums.
Just adding a personal experience:
I was a slightly more frequent commenter for a number of years up until a few months ago. I knocked off after catching hellfire in a comment thread. Like most normal humans, I erred and said something stupid and thoughtless (we do that from time to time, we humans–horrible, I know!).
The responses were interesting. There were some people who were able to state clearly, forcefully, and yet without malice, where I was wrong and insensitive. They minced no words, and their anger was obvious, but they targeted my words and suggested I do some better thinking.
There were a couple of others who were fucking vicious shitholes, doing the verbal equivalent of jumping up and down on me with spiked boots. They did this immediately, not offering even a crumb of benefit-of-the-doubt. As I said, I’ve commented here for years, not often but enough, so I know they weren’t reacting to me as if I were some known troll. They just were lashing out, dealing pain for the sake of dealing pain, following some sort of fucked up Hammurabic Code, perhaps.
Progressives/Liberals are just as capable of being online bullies as conservatives. Let’s not kid ourselves that just because we (probably) have our hearts in the right place that we’re not still humans, with the full range of human shittiness available to us.
Let’s also not pretend we can’t tell the difference between “angry but civil” discourse vs “lashing out viciously” discourse. If you say something in such a manner that you would get punched in the snoot if you said it that way in person, then you’re just hiding behind the lack of proximity and using it as a shield for shitty behavior.
We know what abusive behavior looks like. It is different from corrective anger.
Is there a possibility for something like thumbs-up, thumbs-down checkboxes? See if the community as a whole can regulate the situation by having people downvote abusive comments and upvote cogent ones?
Good, but I’d add two more constraints: try to be concise and clear.
1. Concise. I’m guilty myself of expansive overwriting. When I recently lost a long comment to a refresh glitch, I rewrote it shorter, and better, I think. This is PZ’s blog, not ours. He can be as verbose as he wants. We should keep to the point. Besides, if you take as long as I do to write a response, someone will probably already have said it, and if you refresh to catch up, you risk losing all your…
2. Clear. Especially in criticizing the positions of others. My worst experience in commenting on blogs was when I was banned from one some years ago for reasons that are still mysterious to me — especially since the point I was making in disagreement with the host later appeared in a book written by the blog host. I can only assume we actually agreed, but lack of clarity was making both of us talk past each other. I don’t really worry about that here, because as Cervantes said @ 15, “I think PZ can largely take care of himself where reasoned dispute is concerned.”
I really liked PZ’s “dungeon” of many years past, where you could see just what kind of commentary posts tried his patience. But I’m sure that was hard to maintain.
I’m an old regular, and I was never the most prolific commenter, but i have been reading and commenting with varying frequency on Pharyngula since 2006. I comment very little these days, and I have to say that I will miss Thunderdome, not as a place for unfettered hostility, but as “the other” open thread. I’m just not going to get involved in the Lounge, I don’t have the time or inclination. Thunderdome was a random, meandering conversation that generally moved slowly enough to keep up with every couple of days, occasionally punctuated by shitstorms of diverse origins, be they trolls or spats among regulars.
And that brings me to what I find less congenial to free exchange of ideas than uncharitability across the board is quite simply the weight that has come to attend to interpersonal relationships between old regulars who have come to despise each other. I generally find my loyalties conflicted in these situations, which is inhibitory to engaging in any such discussion (whatever I say in such an environment where an old beef is getting aired is likely to be perceived as favoring one side over another and often enough I find that I admire both parties but in the details find both of them to be behaving atrociously due to animosity toward the other.)
And in my mind, that kind of thing is the price we pay for having a community. However “like minded” a group may be, the larger it is and the longer all its members have been around each other, the more pairs you’re going to find whose history has led them to despise each other personally. I would like to see some kind of soft rule that discourages airing these disputes in the comments, but that opens up all kinds of other questions. Each party in such a dispute is likely to believe the other has forfeited the same right to this space that one enjoys. So the effect could be perceived as “Oh, so I’m just supposed to let [commenterX] spew their crap here and if I don’t like it then I’m effectively banned because I can’t stand the sight of their ‘nym”
So I don’t know what can be done about it. I just wanted to chime in and say that over the past couple of years, the lateral cracks off the edges of the Deep Rifts have wormed their way into the commentariat, and the (subjectively, seemingly) constant rehashing of deep-seated disagreements or enmities, in every. single. thread makes reading the comments and contributing much less fun than it was in “the old days”
*stares wistfully into the middle distance from rocking chair*
Also, get off my lawn.
Becca Stareyes @5
@Al Dente #13
I like the emphasis on norms also.
@ PZ
(1) I was thinking of something that was very much along those lines. I’m not sure if helpful fits in there but that’s often what I ask myself in posting a comment—do I think the comment is “helpful” in that it moves the conversation along, adds another viewpoint, or makes a clarification?
(2) The second sentence is framed in a way that is a bit too admonitory for me. I would say something like “If your comment is not one of the three [four], give some thought to what it is before and if you post.” That promotes self-awareness and self-monitoring and also allows for some “expressive” comments that might not fall into one of the categories.
As a long-time lurker/reader, extremely infrequent commenter, I very much appreciate that this discussion is taking place. I’ll admit to feeling very intimidated with regards to commenting on the blog due to the semi-frequent hostility that crops up. A lot of the time I feel the hostility is warranted, some of the time I don’t feel that it is.
As an IT person (though I suspect mechanics may have a similar sense of this), this whole subject rings of situation whereby a few users (or even many users) complain, “the system is really slow lately – can you fix it?”. In all such cases, my default assumption is that there is, indeed, a problem. However, I have learned that before taking any action, it’s best to verify the scope of the problem, determine that it’s a problem I can fix, AND determine the most expeditious / least intrusive approach to solving, by doing one thing first: Get specifics.
What component is running slow?
When did you first notice the problem?
How slow is it (and how fast did it used to be?
And most importantly, worth more than everything else combined: can you DEMONSTRATE the problem to me?
This step can be the difference between “We need to spend $100k to upgrade our servers” or “Technology X is too slow, we need to migrate our application to technology Y” vs. “Jill needs to spend a couple days tweaking the load-balancer” or “Susan needs to re-schedule the cleanup routine so it runs off-hours.”
I see a similarity here, with a very generalized complaint “The comment section is too unfriendly/hostile.” But unless I missed it, though PZ has cited numerous actual complaints of a problem; he hasn’t provided links to specific examples of the problem.
What I’d recommend is a “diagnostic” stage: For a limited period of time, add a button next to each comment that allows readers to flag comments as “this comment disinclines me, personally, to contribute to this conversation.”
Basically a “soft” version of the traditional “flag as abusive” buttons (which address a completely different problem: identifying and banning assholes).
Make it clear that the flag is temporary and meant to gain insight into an on-going issue. Something along the lines of:
1) Flagging is anonymous (except to PZ, who’d need to weed out IPs of trolls)
2) Flagging is non-published, so will not constitute public shaming of the commenter
3) Flagging is non-detrimental (i.e. no ramifications to the original poster).
Over a period of time PZ will hopefully be able to either
1) Collect enough examples of the types of comments that – per his judgement (this is his blog) – clearly use a style of communication he’s unhappy with
or
2) Have vindication that despite all the noisy complaining, it’s a non-issue (e.g. the majority of complaints being for comments that are, say, indistiguishable from the tone/attitudes that PZ himself employs and enjoys).
If the former, PZ could run a focused post-diagnostic thread wherein he shares some problem comments, explains what he finds problematic about them, and opens discourse for solutions. Such a thread could be run with strict rules making it clear that feedback must be focused on the content of the examples (not the commentators themselves), that the examples cannot be used as ammo against the “transgressor” outside the post-diagnostic thread, and with proposed solutions being evaluated on their likelihood to reduce the unwanted content in the cited examples.
That, plus it has a term-of-art working definition of “regular commenters.”
I have a forest of suggestions, but feel pretty cynical about whether they’d be implemented. One thing I’d like to see is a “zeroth law” for the Lounge: either the Lounge rules apply, or they don’t – you don’t get to pick a fight with someone and then use “BUT LOUNGE RULES” to shut them down when they respond in kind.
No, it was easy — it didn’t need updating that often. But the usual idiots would point to it and scream that I was a ban-happy censor, rather than that I was totally committed to transparency.
They were much happier with sites that would ban more often, but just kind of silently disappear you.
Hi all – thanks again for continued worthwhile comments.
Re: how to deal with comments that violate rules, I don’t think comic sans-ing or “disemvoweling” are likely to be a sufficient deterrent to put off severely annoyed commenters or hateful trolls. How about replacing them with a note explaining that they were deleted and giving the reason why. Forcing the commenter to take the time to re-write their post seems a better deterrent and maybe the extra time would prompt them to reflect on their attitude. Serial offenders could still be temporarily suspended.
Pen’s suggestion (comment 26.) for different types of threads is interesting (if elaborate!). Dave Futrelle does something vaguely similar over at WHTM where most threads are un-safe, but with regular safe threads too. Clearly PZ does not want to entertain mras etc in any threads, but perhaps a couple of grades of safety might be useful.
@Becca Stareyes, #5:
We’ve got those already, in a single combined post. One finds it by looking at the first link in PZ’s “Profile” section.
Or did you mean that it would be **more** helpful to have 2 separate links, each containing half the info?
@Add Hominem*(-1), #6:
no, it doesn’t get much play, though I sometimes see references or links dropped to the commenting rules where it’s listed. (the same rules I linked above)
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I’m interested in the talking to equals/condescending thing. It has been suggested that we avoid condescension but also that we treat commenters as equals.
Frankly, my harshest criticism is for my equals/superiors. If they’re >= me, and I see the problem, what fucking excuse do they have? I have zero time for someone with a PhD in ethics and a masters in public administration who supports the death penalty at all, much less as practiced by the United States.
However if I assume that you’re missing some information and proceed to provide it, it’s easy to come across as condescending.
In the larger part of your comment, Dywalgi you discussed something that I don’t think of as treating someone as my equal, I think of as a combination of generosity and decency and maybe patience.
What I **think** you were trying to get at was the freedom to be wrong. I’ve written about that before. Humans get things wrong. I get things wrong. Getting things wrong is part of learning. We should be able to be wrong now and then without losing the respect of our peers. This doesn’t mean that there’s some generalized equality. If I am a PhD high energy physicist, I don’t have to take every comment on the Higgs seriously just because we’re all equals.
The tricky thing here is that getting things wrong in public gets us corrected – and that’s how we learn. I said above getting things wrong is part of learning, but it’s not sufficient. It’s getting things wrong where someone with the right answer can see what we did that results in the new information that moves us forward.
But for tons of people getting things wrong in public is scary-as-fuck. People reasonably don’t want their worth or their motives judged only on the basis of their mistakes, but it is also quite quite common for people to conflate criticism of their mistakes with criticism of themselves.
I don’t ever want Pharyngula to be a place where mistakes and misinformation linger uncorrected.
What, then, can we do as a community to make it possible for others to throw in their thoughts despite the fear of public error?
This isn’t about making it easier for people to throw in thoughts that are vile or evil or whatever other synonym you can compose using those 4 letters. This is about making it easier for people to throw in thoughts that are in error.
****Special difficulty: PRATTs: these can come from genuine errors, not purposefully reasserted by trolls. They don’t necessarily involve evil. Will a quick smack down of a PRATT feel the same to a lurker as a quick smack down of any other idea? Especially in cases where the lurker hadn’t encountered the proposition a thousand times?
I support temporary bans for rules violations – it’s much better than “restricting” people to the Thunderdome. Particularly if the new Thunderdome will become less hostile.
I strongly support anonymous monitoring. I also agree with Gen #9 and Caine #18 that the current rule are fine, but lack enforcement. In order to make sure the rules are obeyed the monitors need to constantly remind people of them and transgressors must be quickly dealt with.
_________________________
CJO #29
PZ said in the previous thread that the Thunderdome isn’t going away. It’s going to be less hostile and its name will be changed to reflect that, but otherwise the Thunderdome will remain.
TL/DR: I like making the monitors more active
Long time reader of the blog, seldom reader of the comments. And this is my first post on the comments. I think I have read them enough to get a flavor of what is described here. My pent up desire to comment here is now been overcompensated by this lengthy first post.
I used to be moderator on a very active travel board where passions ran high. We had similar issues and over time new moderators were added. As the board grew, the number of mods grew at a faster pace until we felt that there was enough for stability. Most any issue could be dealt with in less than 24 hours. The mods were invited. They were the kind of board members who were helpful and who got asked a lot of questions on the board anyways. There was no volunteering or campaigning for mods status.
Moderators who were able to both post and moderate under the same handle. The moderators had a back channel where they could talk about offenders and decide who got banned or suspended. A poster could be put on moderation. Once put on moderation, any of the moderators could approve a post. Or wait till more moderators chimed in if there was controversy. Any mod could suggest a suspension/moderation but there was an inner circle that had the final say. All of this would happen back channel. We also had a rule that if you were on moderation, you could only post once on a thread until your post was approved. Or deleted with a message going out explaining the reason.
The weakest point of the system was the fact that moderators posted under the same nick as they moderated with. This caused some resentment when a mod spoke as a board member and voiced an opinion as a member, not as a mod. But it was also very good in that people saw how each person moderated and could call the mods by sending an email to the administrator, in this case, that would be PZ. If the mods were anonymous, that couldn’t happen. And if they were anonymous to all but PJ, then there could be a lot of tension in the mods group.
The strength was that the most common thing a mod did, beside bitch about Alice or Joe back channel, was to gently remind folks that they were near, just over, or way out in space with no ground to stand on. In the last case, a lot of times the comment was deleted. Mods were expected to be on the board nearly daily.
Having the mods be open forced them to be careful. A lot of times when you wanted to step into a controversial issue, you would go back channel and get feedback. But if things were exploding, you could step in and take action. I also liked that a thread could be temporarily closed with a message of “lets cool off for a bit.”
And really, being put on moderation was the most powerful tool. It took a commenter who was abusing the board and let them know that they were way out of line and slowed their output down to a trickle. As I have found with my Twittr account, the ability to post many replies in a short period of time does not always lead to wisdom. But setting a limit of 3 posts an hour or whatever is arbitrary and heavy handed.
We had 9 moderators, 3 in the inner circle. We all became good friends and met on our travels. There were enough mods to let “a” know that they had a vendetta with x or, conversely, a blind spot.
FWIW. I can be a little intimidated by the commenters here, both intellectually and by tone and presumed superiority. And I participate on some free wheeling comment boards.
PZ, can you turn comments off on contentious threads when you’re not around to check? Scalzi does that – his mod style seems to work quite well. The mallet of loving correction is often in play, and he doesn’t hesitate to apply it even to regulars who are going off track or following up a topic he’s requested be dropped.
It’s all very well saying that you can be rude to bigots, but how do you decide who the bigots are? I have seen some people go ballistic on others and label them as “human garbage” because they disagree on a topic, or choose to discuss it at a time they think is wrong, or use a word they think is wrong, and no evidence or argument will ever change their minds. And they ever more will raise this everywhere they see that person pop up elsewhere.
It’s worth remembering that authoritarianism is a plague that can infest both right and left. Remember the Jacobins? The Maoist re-education camps? And, please, don’t even try saying “no true leftist”, it’s exactly as convincing as “no true christian”.
A recent example of this has been disagreement on Charlie Hebdo. Arguing in their support makes you racist slime garbage deserving of nothing but contempt and shouty twitter harrassment. (What these would-be gate-keepers of Correct Thought make of Christiane Taubire & SOS Racisme is a mystery because they are as evidence-resistant as any creationist.)
I wonder how I would be received now, if I came in with an argument I made years ago that restricting 3rd trimester abortion to require medical reasons and support from a doctor would be OK with me. I suspect I would be verbally bashed as raging misogynist slime. Back when I did suggest it, people explained to me that the politics of abortion in the US are totally different to the politics in Australia, so no, it wouldn’t work as I had thought. (Which for the record was to sneakily take the wind out of the ‘pro-life’ sails while restricting exactly nothing in reality.) It was an interesting discussion on tactics and politics.
@ 15
Yes, this I can agree with. For myself, I really don’t care what random posters have to say about me online. I’ve been called an idiot, (by Caine, no less, almost a badge of honor), told I “wasn’t helping,” and had various other epithets heaped on me. So what? I’m sure they had their reasons. I had an opportunity to express my opinions on subjects that mattered to me, and that is all I deserve. I’m with cervantes. I think this problem is being blown way out of proportion.
I have a suggestion that would have a similar effect to a “dungeon” that might help with the other end of this situation. A series of “wanted posters” or funny way of representing a collection of information about specific individuals with toxic behavior that are used as “anti-role models” (what’s the word for that?) We could make a whole collection of them. (Maybe even a card game for the truly twisted)
I’m sure that there are people out there that have behavior that is not only easily captured in screenshots and dissected creatively, but who can also be documented to a level that makes social payback easier to fight (and maybe even fun to fight). If commentators had examples of the behavior they were supposed to avoid that would really help. That is the sort of thing that I have used to learn about things like this over the years. I always learn better from real-world examples and I know I’m not the only one.
Related to one part of Siggy’s experiences (and several others), maybe we should not only worry about the hostility but also encourage positive interactions with other commenters as well. Praising them for good posts and what-not. I believe WMDKitty on this thread or related to this thread noted that she regularly makes comments that are not addressed and she feels ignored, so I think it would be nice if we could incentivize people to actually be willing to make a post that is nothing more than a nod of agreement with someone else’s post. And/or having a thumbs up and thumbs down (or flag) system in place could also help with the feeling of being ignored.
Also, some additional input:
Crip Dyke, the comment about treating others as equals was working against what appears to be the common attitude of treating the non-regulars that are criticized as an Other, as an inferior class that is unworthy of the charity that we give to regulars and/or people we agree with. I agree with your sentiment, that it is most galling when someone equal (or even superior!) says something that is both erroneous and lends itself to bigotry. But the point is that, when you address that person, you address them as a peer and not a child who needs to be educated, and not as a moral monster who needs to be fought off. (Though such treatment might be warranted for the more idiotic cases, like creationists, or the more odious cases, like MRAs. I think a key is that this should be the exception to the rule, not the default, S.O.P,, as it basically is at present time).
And minor point for worksfromhome: PZ usually does leave some kind of comment for at very least the first edited post in a thread, explaining why something was deleted, or disemvoweled, or comic-sansed, etc. So I think that such an explanation was implied. But it is also an important addition that isn’t ALWAYS used, so it is important to bring it up.
This strikes me as being a tad wilfully naive. We could say something similar about a school classroom: there’s no hierarchy, there’s me (the teacher), and the rest of you (the students). Claiming that the lack of an official status means there is no social hierarchy is to ignore the fact there very often is one regardless; this is just how we social creatures work. The regulars will join in an argument on the side of the established name without hesitation, and will flock in numbers and surprising ferocity if an unknown or barely known name gets snarky with a known.
Surely this doesn’t come as a surprise? For years, you have known that the commentary here has been aggressive. You have mentioned it on numerous occasions, even boasted about it. Encouraging, celebrating the aggressive approach to commentary has the very obvious effect of …well, encouraging aggression. The solution to this is not necessarily a new rule – a person that wants to mock someone will always find a way to be just passive-agressive enough to avoid breaking a specific rule – but a reversal of that encouragement. Tell people to chill out with the new* voices, assume everyone has a clean slate so to speak until they demonstrate otherwise over the course of the conversation.
*By new voices, I specifically mean commenters that appear fresh, or at least those that comment infrequently enough that they don’t have much of a history. This specifically excludes those that have deomnstrated themselves to be bad-faith arseholes time and time again, e.g. the usual slymepitters.
tomh:
While part of me agrees, there is a key issue: We are interested in providing a safe space, so it is hypocritical to ignore the many, many good and honest people who are saying they have felt abused or scared off by the climate here. In addition, just because we personally may feel like it isn’t that bad and that we have a thick enough skin to take it, doesn’t mean that everyone else feels the same way, and it doesn’t mean that everyone should be expected to grow the same thick skin. If there is a chance that we are taken as more aggressive or hostile than we actually are, due to bluntness or the nature of being highly critical or the willingness to criticize minor issues with disproportionate force, that doesn’t mean that other people should just expect that there will be misunderstandings and deal with it. It really does mean that, if we really want to not be bullies, that we try our best to adjust our way of discussing and debating so that we reach a state where we can reasonably say that we are doing our best to avoid seeming cruel and wrathful over minor issues.
The issue is slightly blown out of proportion. By some. But it is an issue, and it isn’t one that is easily dismissed, and it is certainly one that we should address.
Can we please, please, please address the problem of calling people “dishonest” for nothing more than disagreeing?
anteprepro @41 – thanks! I appreciate your patience.
While I agree that us old farts can tone things down, I do think that the newbies need to listen too. We recently had a newbie show up and demanded, using almost verbatim, a script from the slymepit, where they were demanding information on feminism. Interestingly, nobody flamed them immediately, but instead suggested looking up the information on their own, and even offered some search words. Nope, we were mean and they deserved the information. Still going according to the slymepit script. This set many people’s hackles on edge. It was explained to them what they sounded like, and why they should stop. Didn’t stop, further explanations and demands. This went back and forth for a while, and most of us weren’t hearing anything other the script. Why couldn’t the newbie, when told they were sounding like X, say “how do I not sound like X”. Newbies need to listen and respond to what they are being told too.
It’s not that hard to say “why do I sound like X”? And listen intently to the responses. The situation would have resolved itself much quicker had that happened.
@kevinkirkpatrick @32
I like the data-driven approach here. As a more general point, I think that, too often, people jump to “solutions” before having a clear or even accurate idea of what “the problem ” is—and I think that is what has happened somewhat here.
I’m not so sure the OP states the problem properly: “That’s what we’re arguing about: where should the lines for civility be drawn?” I see the issue (or one of the issues, really) as one having more to do with a generalized tendency for some responses (not all) to comments to be not helpful but hostile— that’s how I read frog’s insightful comment and that’s how I interpret the comments of the “newcomers” on their reluctance to comment—commenting for them, it seems to me, is a bit like treading in a minefield, you don’t know which step will lead to an explosion. That’s not quite, to me, a problem of “where the lines for civility should be drawn.” My point is not whether PZ or I am right about stating the problem, it’s that I agree with you—I think we are not quite clear on what the problem is or, more likely, problems are.
That said, a very specific comment about your comment: if such a flag system were implemented, I’d add a small comment box to allow some input as to why the person has flagged it. That would give PZ some more data to assess the flag—he’d have the person’s reason rather than supplying his own.
WMDKitty: Good point. Is it accusations of “dishonesty” specifically that are at issue, or do you think that it is just an issue of making ANY kind of accusation, or attempts to divine poster intent or mental state, with insufficient justification? Regardless, this would be an important part of charity.
worksfromhome: No patience required here, but you are welcome anyway. I appreciate the input and thoughts you have been giving. Same for the other new (or newish) faces who have taken the plunge to comment here and have been giving measured and insightful advice about how to deal with the issues at hand. Hopefully it will help make a climate that you all will feel comfortable staying around for.
anteprepro
It’s a bit of both.
First, I have been repeatedly accused of dishonesty, and the person who did that would only say that “it’s obvious” instead of showing where I had been “dishonest”. If I’m mistaken, show me. If you can demonstrate where I’m wrong, show me. Don’t just sit there and act like anyone who disagrees, for any reason, is a lying liar who lies.
Second, there’s an awful lot of “mind-reading” going on, people assigning ulterior motives when they have no actual knowledge of the poster’s intent, and insisting that when you said X, “what you really meant was Z.” The irony of this is, it’s usually the same people flinging “dishonest” as an insult that are using this highly dishonest debate tactic.
Sorry, guys, I know I’m beating a half-dead horse, but it really grinds my fucking gears when I — a person who takes pride in their honesty — am accused of dishonesty without factual basis for the accusation. It’s also triggering — you know my abuser read and employed every technique in The Abuser’s Handbook*, and he was quite fond gaslighting and mindfuckery. He’d continually accuse me of being dishonest, of cheating, or whatever, to the point where he drew up a list of ridiculous “rules”, and the whole time, he was the one who was lying and cheating.
So, yeah, the dishonesty thing? Has got to stop.
*I don’t think “The Abuser’s Handbook” is an actual book, but I would not be surprised to find out it’s an actual Thing.
(Sorry about the double post — I remembered the asterisk right after I hit “post”.)
anteprepro #41
Please, no. We’ll become Facebook – with people competing for likes and collecting them as a sign of status or truthiness.
WMDKitty: Okay, I can definitely see why accusations of lying/dishonesty are especially problematic. I am with you.
AlexanderZ: I will count that as one Thumbs Down for the Thumbs Policy.
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tomh @ 39:
As you saw fit to specifically bring me into things, I’ll detail why I disagree with you. I’m not proud, or satisfied, or in any happy that I once called you an idiot. I feel bad for it, and even worse that you remember that, and felt it was appropriate to bring up. While there are times it would be right to call someone an idiot, I think I could seriously save such statements for those who truly deserve it, but not in cases where there’s a disagreement. I don’t like being called an idiot, and I don’t see why anyone else would feel differently. Being told I had an idiotic idea or an idiotic attitude wouldn’t bother me nearly as much as “god, you’re an idiot!”, with the added bonus of making me want to explain said idea or attitude. Going after ideas and attitudes is way to spark and continue discussion.
It’s not okay to expect people to have a thick skin, and brush every single thing off. Some people can do that easily, and some can’t. I have a very thick skin, forged in the fires of usenet, but that doesn’t translate to enjoyment of epithets heaps falling on my head. I don’t think the problem is blown out of proportion, either. For all the years I’ve been here, I’ve made a special effort in threads to reply to unfamiliar people, trying to help them in feeling comfortable, and by way of encouragement, because I love new voices. I’m generally on my own in that, because other people will be too involved in arguing. It’s as much of a problem that new people are pretty much routinely ignored until they post enough to become recognizable by most of the commentariat, or greeted by that heap of epithets. It’s also damn near impossible, to try and keep up communication with someone who is in the midst of being piled on or otherwise abused – that I know from way too much experience. And even when I’ve successfully reached an understanding with someone in that situation, they rarely stay because their experience was so overwhelmingly negative.
This goes back to what Chris Clarke said, about Pharyngula basically rewarding only those people who are good with persistent hostility. It’s deeper than that, though. Commenting here on a regular basis, in the atmosphere of persistent hostility tends to make for a worse person, one whose first reaction is exclusionary hostility, with an extremely short fuse, to boot. I would prefer to be a better person. A better person operating in an atmosphere which aids and supports thoughtful, ethical behaviour.
I wonder if part of the problem is the difficulty of having useful conversations in a single numbered thread. Seems like it promotes rapid responses, suppressing considered, thoughtful commentary.
I usually never read a thread again after posting a comment here. I may be an incurable narcissist, but perhaps I simply don’t want to expose myself to the possible results.
Several people have suggested that commenters need to have thick enough skins to comment here, but surely that is exactly the problem. Are you suggesting it is impossible to comment in a way which will not cause hurt? I think the good people here are better than that.
I’d also like people to consider whether it is possible for someone to be intelligent, educated, well versed in the topic at hand and still disagree with you. Crip Dyke’s comment at 36 seems to say that if someone disagrees it can only possibly be because they are woefully or wilfully ignorant. The corollary of which is that all intelligent, educated people should agree with you, because you are right. Even empirical science doesn’t work that way, let alone casual discussion.
Are we aware that comments can be linked to individually? It might help the flow, but I have a feeling links are generally avoided in these threads…
Nerd @46
You’re right. To be honest, someone turning up with a long list of demands is unlikely to be coming in good faith and so probably deserves the boot. Obviously people should be welcome to ask questions, but they can’t expect/demand personalized answers. I’m sure something like this could be included in a commenting guide (if it isn’t already).
WMDKitty @44/49
I agree accusations of dishonesty are rarely helpful and just likely to antagonize/upset. Reminds me of playing tennis with my dad as a kid. Sometimes he would get frustrated (he was a semi-pro, I was mostly-shit) and accuse me of not trying. Always annoyed me as he had no way to tell if I was not trying or just not good. Mind-reading in general is bad, but I think it’s fine to call someone out for arguing in bad faith if you genuinely think that’s the case, just give them a few posts first and if uncertain, ask. Maybe monitors could help out in this scenario.
Caine @53
And that’s one of the reasons we love you, Caine.
Hi there,
I’ve been reading Pharyngula since I think I saw a post from it on Panda’s Thumb circa 2005 I think? In a sense I guess that makes me a reg, but I seldom comment. I am generally of the ilk of commenting if/when I have a differing view I don’t see represented by other comments and this usually means taking up a position that is not agreed upon by many and consequentially sometimes I receive lots of replies – many casting subtle aspersions using secret code words that I am basically familiar enough to understand the sometimes malevolent intent in using them.
This is unpleasant at times, but this is not a big problem for me – indeed I basically enjoy being challenged this way. Unfortunately, my style is often criticised as ‘Vulcan like’ which is a trigger for me as sometimes I feel inhuman and disconnected (and it has been the go to for loved ones who are hurting and lashing out from time to time) as if I was an alien or robotic and emotionless (psychosis is a bitch) and I either have to leave the discussion or suffer through this indignity and swirling dervish of horror.
This however, is a struggle that is not visible and I find it hard to criticise someone too harshly for it for how could they know? I tried to pick a user name that gives a clue (I’ve had two since I first started – neither has received suspensions or anything and if PZ wants I’m happy to reveal the other username – it seldom posts too), but I’m not sure that has worked to my advantage. I have had many a rough and tumble a discussion over the decades on the internet so although I do find it difficult to have a discussion with someone who is emoting more than talking (and in an environment where I don’t feel safe to ask someone to reduce their emotionality in their communication for fear I will suddenly be a Spok like dictionary atheist philosowanker tone troll or what have you, I feel struggling through a discussion is burdensome, and I have enough mandatory burdens of my own!)
What’s also hard is following the discussions closely so that I can know who is generally being a horrid person I can afford to ignore and who was being a horrid person in the heat of the moment. If someone is trying to explain something to me and I don’t get it, it helps to go back through their previous posts, which is clumsy and relies on browser functions and it’s easy to get lost in. I don’t mind the flat display of a blog commentary section, but linkages between posts would be really helpful (sort a semi-threaded idea, I realize you have ruled out threading previously but frankly my brain is not built for following flat file discussions like these can get). If I can quickly skip back in a ‘reply to’ type chain I can orient myself better if a discussion goes on more than two or three posts. Especially with multiple people chiming in who have not previously been closely following the subthread as things go on and the whole experience feels messy and confusing with a need to repeat because you aren’t sure if the person you are talking with has read your second comment where you feel you have already explained this misunderstanding or that.
When its all taken together, I don’t feel that any opinion I have is novel or interesting enough that I feel motivated to share it and defend it at Pharyngula almost all of the time. Other places? I have no problem – and there are some causes not mentioned here that exacerbate the issue which is definitely not within your solution set. Such as the fact that there are so many people at times! But yes, I can’t promise I’ll feel safe posting here regular even with policy changes I think some of these are reasons I don’t feel comfortable.
WMDKitty @ 56:
Aaw, thank you. Just so you know, I do think the dishonesty accusation gets tossed about way too much. There are definite times when someone is a dishonest interlocutor, but in most cases, it’s not good or necessary to assume malice a/o dishonesty. And I can’t even express how much I dislike those who love to toss “liar!” around. That sort of thing is not remotely productive.
Alexander Z.@51:
I’m not so sure of that (but you may have a better sense of the present group of Pharyngula commenters). Disqus apparently enables upvotes/downvotes by default (or maybe doesn’t even allow it to be disabled); I am a pretty regular reader and commenter at three or four sites that run on Disqus, and I’ve really seen no sign of those sites’ groups of commenters (as groups; naturally there are sometimes some individuals who act well outside group norms) “competing for likes and collecting them”. If they’re doing it, they’re doing it pretty much in the background (as far as I can tell). And it seems reasonable that blogs with a (not necessarily constant) focus on a particular topic (or several foci), like Pharyngula and the ones I’m thinking of, would be more resilient to ‘like addiction’ than Facebook (as I imagine it to be; I’ve always carefully avoided looking at it, but isn’t it more individual-focused than topic-focused?).
Having said all that, I wouldn’t use a thumbs-up/thumbs-down feature myself (I never do on Disqus), either actively or passively; so I don’t have a fish in this particular kettle.
For the record, folks, I am ON YOUR SIDE. But I rarely post, because I only post when I feel that I have something to add. More often than not, what I want to say has been covered very aptly by other people. So when I do post, it is usually something that is an alternate or even opposing viewpoint, or else I am asking for clarification of something I don’t properly understand. The last time I posted, Crip Dyke did a fine job of explaining where my thinking had gone wrong, and I was glad of that. I was also glad that nobody read my history of posts, a history in which I awkwardly learn things through being cuffed like a wayward lion cub. You’d think I was a troublemaker. But, honestly, I’m not.
It’s like the time I went into an atheist chatroom, years ago before I even thought of being one myself. I had never met an atheist, but I had read some works on humanism, and my father had just copped to being an agnostic, so I wanted to find out more. After a while, I asked, “OK, so what about faith?” I wanted to know what the atheists thought of the idea of faith and whether it could ever be justified, and what you’d say to someone who was trying hard to be faithful. Instead, the chat erupted like I’d recommended Kryptonite supplementation to Superman. I was banned within fifteen seconds of raising the question. I’ve been an out atheist for fifteen years now, and an atheist chat moderator for six of those years, and I would never treat anyone the way I was treated, even if it meant being made a fool of occasionally. I didn’t remain the fool for very long. At least two “obnoxious trolls” stuck around and became atheists and my friends later on.
@ 36 Crip Dyke
Yes….but not exclusively. I’ll try to elaborate, please bear with me as I try to find balance between being clear and being concise.
By ‘equal’, I mean first off, as a human. Their experiences, knowledge and interests will certainly be different than your (please assume a general ‘you’ in the following) own, and will inform the way they express themselves. How you interperet what they say may not be what they meant, and remembering the human tendency to privilege out own perspective and project it onto others can make it a lot easier to keep from reacting disproportionately. Mostly, I think this part comes down to checking personal reactions against what the poster could reasonably and (dare I say it) charitably have intended.
Secondly, re. areas of knowledge. I don’t generally assume that everyone I speak with is as knowledgeable about, say, Early Modern French military history, however, I do assume (until proven wrong) that they are just as capable of picking it up as I am, it is just that their starting point is one that I have passed. This means that differences of opinion are a matter of exposure and interest, rather than deliberate ignorance or idiocy. From the other side of that, if it is a subject about which another poster has a greater degree of knowledge and experience in, it behooves me to respect that point of view as one that they, my equal as a person, know more about than I. Which is often a lot harder and quieter.
Key here is ‘until proven wrong’. Also note that this does not imply any obligation to educate…I am personally of a temperment that WILL usually try, but that is not a fair universal assumption.
Does that make more sense? I will happily babble on further, but I suspect that I already sound like I have erected a pulpit.
41 Anteprepro
Yes! This! Far more succinct than I!
Caine sez @ 53:
A few weeks ago my phone rang, and I was expecting a call, so I picked it up, but it wasn’t who I was expecting. It was a man who had made a comment on one of PZ’s threads here two years ago. He seemed non-threatening and sincerely upset, so I talked to him for a few minutes and asked him to send me an email. He did, and in that email he explained that my response to his comment had stayed with him for two years.
But not in that warm, fuzzy, happy ending way of finally seeing the light because of an abrupt reality check. My response had hurt him, and he hadn’t been able to let go of it.
He included a link to the thread and told me the nym under which he’d commented. His was what many people here, myself included even today, would reasonably characterize as a clueless comment. An apparent unthinking repetition of an MRA trope, though much more clueless than malevolent.
My response was a drastic escalation.
In the previous thread, a number of people asked for specific examples of the kinds of comments that are the problem here. A couple examples were provided, but given the heat the discussion turned into a bit of a pile-on that PZ then asked folks to stop.
In the previous thread, there were also charges that not enough people pointing out problems were willing to point any fingers at their own behavior, that the conversation had devolved into a “I am right and those people are wrong” slagfest in multiple directions.
So here’s a specific example of the kind of thing that is wrong with this place that satisfies that second desideratum: me pointing a finger at myself as part of the problem. Perhaps others will take this as an example and offer some of their own.
I had the opportunity in that exchange to make inroads against the commenter’s invalid assumptions about the topic. My comment instead made things worse, caused a fellow human being pain, and made him less likely to consider my point. Which my response didn’t really even mention.
And yes, the commenter I reacted to was, in the most generous compassionate and civil take, asking a question that equated to a Point Refuted A Thousand Times, to clarify the PRATT acronym used above. I have to react to such points all day every day, on topics ranging from Boyan Slat’s Ocean Cleanup to how cats kill more birds than solar facilities. It’s frustrating and I hate it and it is why I could never be a fourth grade teacher. And without doing that work our ideas never spread.
No one was holding a gun to my head to explain patiently why the commenter was wrong. I leapt in to make snide comments out of a sense of irritation and probably to sublimate some of the frustration I had from elsewhere in my life.
As Caine mentions above, and as I said when I left, the climate here was an impediment to me being the person I want to be. That feeling has come back in spades even poking my nose into this place the last couple days. I take full responsibility for anything I’ve said here either in the past or in the last couple days… but a climate in which the kind of comment I linked to doesn’t seem too far out of the ordinary makes that work to be the person I want to be more difficult.
I have no idea how many people my assholery here hurt. I have no idea how much my assholery here set back the discourse on issues that are important to me.
There’s one example.
Regarding mods.
Mods could have a special font or icon to signal the use of Mod Voice. That’s better than a special mod account.
Mods need a private hang out where they can share insights and ask opinions from others about problem threads or posts. They can train one another up here.
tomh @39:
I think this comment minimizes the frustration many people have expressed both here and in the prior thread, as well as the people that have privately contacted PZ. You or cervantes may feel like it’s not a big deal, but for others who wish to participate, or who have and got treated badly, it is a big deal.
Chris Clarke, you’re a mensch.
You too, Dywalgi.
I don’t need you to “babble on,” but “equal” can refer to a lot of different characteristics.
“Equally human,” “equally a part of the conversation,” “equally valuable as a commenter,” and “equally deserving of respect,” might get at some of what you’re saying.
Note in big, glowing argon/mercury letters: “equally valuable as a commenter” does not imply that each comment is equally valuable.
Also, while the first one isn’t up for challenge (absent a 13 year old Ukrainian born in an Apple laptop-fab plant), the following three could be undermined by behavior that makes it clear that a party was monologuing, inane, or vile (respectively).
These are merely starting points that (typically) require much more than a single comment to force us from. A very first comment such as, “Kill all the Crip Dykes,” is rare, but I think it is clear to everyone we need not wait for comment 3 to start using harsh language in response. I don’t know where to draw the line on comments egregious enough that we skip the waiting period, but there obviously is one.
@Dan Dare:
This exists, though it isn’t that active.
As a long time lurker and infrequent poster, I want to weigh in. It’s hard for me to actually say something, I’m worried that people I often agree with will disagree with me. It’s silly, perhaps, but its how it is. I feel there is a threatening atmosphere here if someone steps off the reservation in a comment. That said, I have two suggestions.
1. Emphasis attacking the idea, not the poster. Too often this gets confused. People who are less informed or less careful may say things that are racist, for instance. Pointing out that it was a racist comment might horrify that person, because they never thought about it that way. Yet there is a tendency to assume the poster intended to be racist.
2. If a troll goes unpunished, so what? I’m here to discuss ideas, not watch some slymer get his. Is it really so terrible for somebody who is is wrong and irrepentant to remain wrong? Because I guaranty you aren’t changing any minds by going after someone until they stop responding.
@Crip Dyke,
I am in complete agreement. Likewise, that there are some opening comments that deserve instant savaging.
I think a lot of it comes down to how far along in knowledge and political opinions one posting here is expected to be before reasonably expecting hostility. Setting the marker too far in will result in an echo chamber, with anything divergent being greeted with animosity. If the purpose of the blog is at all educational, then it is only fair to expect some posts to have some room to learn in. Set the line too far out, and it isn’t safe. Possibly some guidelines about what can and should be met with pitchforks and torches would help, so it isn’t ambiguous and left entirely to the sensibilities of individuals.
@anteprepro, #41:
This is a very helpful formulation.
I don’t want to work against the spirit of this at all, and possibly not even the letter.
But trust is something that starts out with a default value and goes up or down. The default value is based on the individual and that individual’s willingness to trust, and then the up or down is based on the behavior of those to whom the individual is extending trust.
We can work as a community on setting an expected initial level of trust, but it’s not treating someone as an inferior class if that someone is treated **only** with this default level of trust while many regulars are treated with more…provided that “more” is trust actually earned through behavior.
I, for one, have made a lot of anti-oppression comments over a long period of time. I’ve also made a lot of dry, sarcastic comments. That dry wit can seriously get me misunderstood by some, but others who have read many of my comments might laugh (or groan, or cry, depending). They aren’t extending me “charity” by interpreting a comment that might seem on the surface to be pro-oppression as actually sarcastically expressing fatigue at persistent ignorance. They aren’t denying a new commenter “charity” by interpreting a comment by its surface meaning – there simply isn’t a track record to use to infer a meaning other than the surface meaning.
This even agrees the letter of your “rule” (for lack of a better term, I don’t mean that you’re literally imposing rules with duties and consequences) if “charity” includes only that portion of trust that is extended unearned at the beginning of a relationship.
tl:dr I agree almost entirely with Chris Clarke.
—
I don’t often comment here, not because I’m a lurker but because I’m a polytheist who just doesn’t care that you’re all so wrong. I’m here for the cephalopods and the tangled bank. As atheists go you’re not so goddess-awful, so I do sometimes read your comments but I’m not here much to say a lot.
—
Freedom is (and should be) unruly. Even in the ancient WWW past, it was amazing and awesomely freeing to talk to everybody everywhere instead of your own town. Back when CompuServe was $10/hour BBSs would (nevertheless) require that you limit your posts to allow for those who were less rich and to make sure that each post you made was as concise as you could manage because reading it was literally costing someone. You were also required to be directly relevant to how the conversation was currently going and this included the unpopular/unresponded to posts-you were not allowed to have not read them.
—
Words in this blog’s comments are too cheap. I took Rhetoric in High School. Yeah, they still taught that.
There are rules for how to act as a Moderator on a discussion panel. Over the decades I have found they work fantasticly great in real life. They also have worked spectacularly well in the groups that I myself have moderated. They are labor intensive, even if everyone is mostly well behaved a Moderator has to be listening/reading/watching in real time.
If you want your comment threads to work the way you say you want them to work, PZ, it’s going to require more work than just from you, and your Mods are going to have to have some autonomy. I created two more equal mods to me to manage several thousand posts per month, and the extra eyes and opinions were IMO necessary.
Heh. I read the OP and skip the comments. Most of your regulars are class D douchebags. I’ve been reading you since Scienceblogs. 2006 maybe? You’re a decent guy, PZ and many if not most of your ideas resonate. I’m an old white guy, but I’ve learned most of what I know about feminism and equality from following the links from here. I’m a better person – more open to listening, more open to new ideas, more empathetic and compassionate than I was as a younger man. I always love getting the science education you offer. But the comments? Ha. Yeah, I’d rather have my nuts ripped off in an industrial accident than be lectured by your regulars. So I don’t read them anymore. Maybe if some of them were kinder, more empathetic and compassionate… heh. I just cracked myself up.
[So, following your example, you think it would be fine for others to respond to your comment by just calling you a “Class D Douchebag”? There is a profound lack of self-awareness in your words. –pzm]
[meta]
Such a focus on proscription and enforcement, when the ostensible goal is inclusiveness!
Again, I note that inclusiveness of commenters is negatively correlated to commenting restrictions, though in contrast it is positively correlated to tolerance of commenters.
PZ:
I’d prefer transparency and accountability, but I’m pretty sure I’m alone on that one. If anon monitor accounts are set up, I think it might be a good idea to cycle out all the current monitors.* As it is right now, a number of the current monitors rarely comment anymore, and some never responded to the monitor group at all.
* You did say (when you started the monitor group) that you’d be cycling people on a regular basis, which I do think is a good idea.
Honestly, the thing that keeps me from commenting very often (I’m a longtime lurker) has less to do with the regular commenters here than the fear that I may become a target of “the anti-FTB crowd” and find my entire online existence picked apart just because I happened to agree with PZ about something at some point.
serena — That, too, is a good point.
Chris Clarke @ 64:
Your honesty and willingness to take a good look at yourself is an example to us all, and I can’t thank you enough, Chris.
I expect my assholery has hurt a great many people. I am deeply sorry for that, for being so thoughtless. That isn’t enough, though. I have to commit to being better, to being thoughtful all the time, for that sorriness to mean anything at all.
John Morales @ 74:
It’s time for more intervention, and enforcement, because just setting down good rules and expecting people to follow them didn’t work. Obviously. You also have a deep bias when it comes to rules, John.
One other practical point, there may well be commenting rules and guidelines but most likely few newbies know where and what they are. Putting a link in or near the actual comment box, or alongside the ‘jump to comments’ link might make it more apparent.
Honestly I’m not sure what could compel people to read it. I just know that the first time I even saw the link in the sidebar was five minutes ago, when I went to look. I never read anything left of the main column. Seems unlikely I’m alone in that.
I can’t tell you how to fix commenting rules to make this community a better place because I have no idea what would be effective. What I can note is one major reason I gradually stopped regularly reading and commenting. I’ve watched this blog for over a decade change from an amusing place to bat around creationist chewtoys and talk about cool science to be a barracks of battle-hardened regulars always on the lookout for the next grenade rolling into the tent. It’s not fun anymore.
Maybe it’s just me. But it seems like the levity has mostly dried up and given way to weary dispatching of trolls and humans who look sufficiently troll-like on first skim. The comment sections I read seem repetitive and tired, maybe because new people are reticent to speak, maybe not.
I’ve noticed this with several of the social justice based fora I’ve been part of. The community begins light-hearted, toys with trolls, bonds over in-jokes, approaches each other joyfully. Gradually, the in-jokes are determined to be Not Funny and new ones stop replacing them. There are more call-outs. The range of acceptable discourse becomes narrowed. Trolls are met with boilerplate responses; the coats of the regulars have lost their snine, but their fangs are still sharp.
Will there ever be another Walton?
Caine, it is true that I think a deontological approach to enabling the sought-after virtues to which Pharyngula aspires is crude (at best!), but that was not my substantive point.
(In case it remains unclear: that point was about tolerance as a preferable approach)
—
As an addendum: not accepting certain behaviours and expecting certain behaviours are different things; the moment the latter is enforced, it effectively becomes a type of the former — an “expectation”.
I realize there’s nothing any commenting rules could do about my particular concern, so forgive me if what I said sounded snide in any way. All that said, as a lurker I do appreciate the discussion threads as much as (if not more than) PZ’s post content. It may be true that pile-ons have occurred (whether due to complacency or perceived superiority or even glee in thrashing idiocy) but overall I am grateful to those who do articulate things I either don’t understand or don’t have the nerve to talk about. I hope none of this discussion-about-how-we-have-discussions deters “regular” commenters from saying the things a lot of us non-regulars and lurkers might not have heard before.
tl:dr Some of us are scared off of discussions for reasons outside of PZ or the commetariat’s control, so thank you to those who do, err… talk about stuff, n’ stuff.
I love this blog and I visit it almost every day. I often read the comments but rarely, if ever, comment myself.
My $0.02…
1.) A HUGE yes to attacking the idea and not the individual, including not accusing someone who disagrees with you of lying without strong evidence to back it up. If nothing else changed, but personal insults were called out/shut down immediately I think the atmosphere here would improve tremendously. (And for the record, I don’t think the atmosphere is always bad. I have learned a lot from reading the comments and following the discussions).
2.) I value safe spaces. I also see the need for learning environments and heated debate. I don’t think there is a “happy medium” between the two, and I think PZ will have to determine which he wants to foster.
Would it be possible to maintain the main comments section as safe space for marginalized people while simultaneously adding a new set of threads for “101 Education”? You could still implement the charity/civility/ethics rules, but in this case, if some well meaning but clueless person (or troll) made an obviously ignorant and triggering post, they could immediately be shunted to the “101” Thread.
This would specifically be for the comments that were rape apologies, or racist, or homophobic (etc) – the ones that have been addressed a million times already and we’re all sick to death of hearing (like “what was she wearing” or “wow, don’t take it so seriously” or “black on black crime”). Commenters who had the mental reserves of strength to deal with them could then follow to the “101” thread to try to talk to them.
I think the civility/charity rules should still be in play in the “101” thread until intent (are they a troll? Are they arguing in bad faith?) is determined. Civility in this case may be easier, however, because a hurt or triggered individual isn’t forced to continue to confront abusive content in the main space – hopefully only people who felt willing to educate would head over to that thread.
That would (I hope) free up the main thread for safe discussion and debate over disagreements that don’t call someone’s basic humanity into question.
It seems like this would require Mods that at least have the power to stop someone from commenting on the main thread if they refuse to move to the “101”, and honestly, as long as PZ maintains final control, it seems unreasonable to expect him to properly moderate this blog all alone.
–
No matter what happens, I know I will continue reading, if not commenting. I thank you all for the time, effort, and energy you put in here, and wish you the best :)
Dear Atheists, it’s Smoggy here, your friend in Christurbation,
Just writing in to say I love this mental masturbation,
‘Bout who said what to whom, and when, and whether it was toxic,
I’ve laughed so much I cannot breathe, I think I’ve gone hypoxic.
It always does me good to see you tie yourselves in knots!
You godless think you’re just so bright, and folks like me are clots!
But now it seems you’re human, just like the rest of us!
But ‘cos you don’t believe in God, there’s no one you can trust
To take the blame for being utter shits to one another,
Except your unbelieving sister and your atheistic brother.
Because you do not have an insane God you have to fear,
Nor a sweet and gentle Jesus you can turn to with a tear
And ‘fess your sins, absolve yourself, and promise to do better.
There’s only you to answer to. And hence my little letter,
For being good when Godless is like driving with no licence
You alone must be the one to give yourself good guidance
Without books of commandments, you’ve only got one choice,
To pay attention to your humanistic inner voice,
And let the golden rule determine how you treat each other.
(That is unless your best friend is that gay bear named Floyd Rubber
Who likes to have his penis pierced and testicles inflated,
Which from my own experience, is highly over-rated.)
So as you go on thinking how to talk to one another
Remember this advice from Smog, your friendly old sheep fugger,
To temper all the rules you make with some self-preservation,
Or else the thing you want to say is just perseveration.
And so adieu, to you, and you. But mostly to PZ
That tireless old scrapper for honest good old ‘T’—
Meaning Teapots, Truth and Thoughts of Atheism Plus
A bracing form of unbelief that will kill or cure us.
…………………………………Yours in subservience to an insane Deity
…………………………………Smoggy Batzrubble OM4Jesus
@ #73 bybelknap wrote:
So you don’t read the comments, but you know this about the regulars. Mighty clever of you.
On whether freezing a hot thread would be abused by people wanting to stop a discussion.
1. If people don’t flame the person, how could they stop the discussion?
2. That person could be zapped more easily for trolling.
3. If people are flaming the troll, is that really a discussion?
4. Freezing a thread gives everyone a cooling off period. So rather than affirming repeatedly agreement that someone is: “A human shit stain on the face of humanity” or even if people are being more creative and original with their insults where it might offer some form of entertainment; you come back after the adrenaline has cleared your system with a cogent, substantive remark.
5. Also, playtime over for any troll trying to deliberately antagonize people.
Most importantly, an innocent new person doesn’t get a baptism by fire.
ohohohoh #84
smoggybatzrubble
is that really you??
it looks like you
(and Floyd)
How are you?
I feel that the comment policy is fine, but how many people actually read it? Trolls and drive by creationist certainly don’t. I propose quizzing us on the comment policy before commenting. Perhaps using a variant of the CAPTCHA to ask us a question each time we comment. For example;
Doxing, or publishing other people’s private information is:
A. Always allowed.
B. Allowed if they are assholes.
C. Never allowed.
If we type in C. Or never allowed, our comments are posted. Anything else gets you a link to the comment policy. You could also include question on our community
goals as well.
I believe that well worded question (not like the extremely easy example I used) could serve as both a filter for trolls, and as a reminder for the rest of us.
[Bad example. One of the things I find truly disgusting about trolls is their fetishization of their troll-enabling privacy, and making “doxxing” the greatest crime they can imagine is absurd & stupid. –pzm]
Chris Clarke @64,
First of all, I’d like to point out how incredibly creepy I find it that the commenter in the thread you linked to tracked down your phone number to whine to you about your comments on Pharyngula. And considering that the thread in question was related to boundaries and creepy behavior, I’d say he vindicated everyone you and everyone else said about him.
Second, if I didn’t has some basic trust in you I’d think you were making this up. This guy — who jumped into a thread about street harassment to demand a list of what’s ok and not ok to say to women — supposedly spent two years sweating over a comment from you? I’d say he proved your point: women are supposed to shrug off comments on the street unless he agrees that they’re sufficiently “bad,” but he gets to be so outraged that he calls you up years later for an explanation? Perhaps if he’d spent a fraction of that time exploring the subject, like by reading some of the links other commenters provided, he’d have learned something about why his comments provoked the reaction they did.
If that’s an example of the kind of “contributor” who’s being scared off by the supposedly rotten behavior of the Horde, then I guess I must be one of those folks who’s Part of the Problem, because I just don’t get it.
Auntie Kris @88,
Your proposal would be a good one if the problem was a lack of familiarity with the rules, but I don’t think that’s the case.
Trolls are very familiar with the rules; as some self-confessed former trolls have admitted, many of them study the rules carefully so they can (claim to) stay within them while provoking violations by others.
Well-intentioned newbies might fail know the rules, but from what I can discern they’re not perceived as the problem; to the contrary, it’s the regulars who are accused of being unduly harsh to them. And the regulars are pretty confident that they know the rules or where the line is, or else this wouldn’t be happening.
After two posts and a few comments, I’m still not really sure I know exactly what PZ wants changed. It’s the Phil Plait “Don’t Be a ****” problem all over again: when you don’t point to specifics, it’s hard to know what you want changed. And I get why PZ doesn’t want to make this about specific posts or posters, and tried to redirect the last thread when it started going down that road, but… it still leaves us with a problem.
PZ has, and wants, a subjective rule set, not some list of technical rules that can be gamed. I agree with that. But I just don’t know how, short of some more active guidance and commentary (if not enforcement), his wishes can turn into reality.
I agree with the folks who have mentioned John Scalzi as a model — but again, Scalzi often pops into a thread several times to issue polite reminders, warnings, and clarifications of The Rules, in addition to outright Malletting. It’s a higher-maintenance job.
Similarly, although I could not articulate for you precisely the difference in Rules, I know from experience that Ophelia Benson has stricter standards than PZ, and I sometimes find myself rewriting draft comments there because “well, this isn’t Pharygula and that probably won’t fly here.” But I know that because she’s an active participant in her own comments sections and issues nudges and warnings from time to time, so I get some sense of where the line is. For PZ, the popularity of this blog and the volume of comments makes it hard to do that, but it still feels like I don’t know where PZ wants “the line” to be, and I don’t know how any of us are going to figure it out without some specifics.
You’re speaking to someone who is on record as having been “scared off” by the behavior here. A number of other people in this thread and the previous one have said likewise. And yet the person I described, whose participation I described up front as clueless, is the “kind of contributor” you’re going to fix on as being dissuaded? You really want to go that route?
Well, I don’t. Because the whole explicit and upfront point of my story was not that we should have brought that guy into the fold, but that my response made things worse.
And that’s the sum total of energy and time I have for this topic and this community.
Caine, CD, seachange, PZ, thanks for the kind words. Again, I wish you all well coming up with a system that works for… well, that works for PZ, to be honest, seeing as it’s his blog.
Chris,
I’m not suggesting that there isn’t a problem.
I’m suggesting that we not throw babies out with bathwater, and for that reason, while I admire your willingness to call yourself out for regretted behavior, I think you were being too harsh on yourself, and in the process offering up an inaccurate example of The Problem. Again, for noble reasons, but a poorly chosen example doesn’t shed light on the problem even if it was chosen for noble reasons.
If The Problem is whatever behavior drove you away (and though I consider myself a somewhat regular, I truly am in the dark as to what went down there) or drove away the other people who have complained, then let’s talk about that. (Or let’s the rest of us talk about it, if you don’t have the inclination.) But your post made it sound like you were offering up your comment to Damien whoever as an example of The Problem, and so I don’t see why you’re giving me such a reaction for saying that I don’t see why that’s so.
All the best Chris, your comments on this were right on and very helpful. We’re all still here (even Smoggy!!!, and John Morales who might be the most-hated commenter here and wasn’t he made to feel it over the years) because we care about Pharyngula. But it’s getting harder and harder to hang around. Now these 2 threads have become a mixture of “Mistakes were made but not by me” and the chief bullies morphing into reformed bunny rabbits.
[Speaking of not helpful…there can be no change if you assume insincerity and malign people who express a willingness to change. –pzm]
I absolutely love Chris’ comment above:
That pretty much explains most of the aggression and bullying going on here (add some alcohol) in my experience.
And Nepenthe @80,
is exactly what happened here.
This is what I mean by commenters need to be equal. Enforce new rules to have personal attacks considered a no-no fullstop, demand quality in comments, consider restricting the number of comments someone can make. And get everyone to change their nym.
New start with clear rules. Yes people will inevitably recognise some writing styles, but I don’t see any other way to start again. It’s not realistic to expect new visitors to the blog to read the legal fineprint before commenting (would you?), and if those 2 threads have shown anything it’s that sniping, bullying and yelling will not go away unless it becomes socially unacceptable here.
I’m a little hesitant about the whole “assume good intentions” thing. I realize that it’s very jarring to someone who means well to be swamped by hostile comments but, in my experience, that most often happens when someone has said something that those who are very experienced with social justice will have heard a million-billion times before, regardless of how often they comment at Pharyngula specifically. We’re just really godsdamned tired of hearing it and explaining it and that’s not unreasonable. It’s not unreasonable to be sick to death of every thread on X topic turning into explaining some basic concept to some new commenter. Every time racism comes up, we spend 100 or more posts explaining the difference between personal prejudice and systemic racism. Every time PZ posts about someone committing some horrific crime, we end up going in circles with someone about ableism/othering. Posts about trans* issues often spiral off into more cis-centric topics. Posts about sexism in X context often spiral off into discussions of X. And so on. It’s not unreasonable to be really damn tired of that.
Maybe we could ask for volunteers to compile some references which rebut the more common things that come up and add them to a sticky post. Monitors could then link the new person to that post with the explanation that the point they’ve brought up is outside the scope of that particular thread and that they can find a discussion of it in this other post. Any questions they have about the contents of that sticky post should be confined to the sticky and that any attempt at further discussion of it in the current thread will be regarded as a deliberate derail. People back in the current thread would be advised that they’re not to engage with the new person unless they’re on topic. It seems like a reasonable compromise to me in that regulars don’t have to feel like they’re leaving a harmful idea unchallenged while while well-meaning newcomers aren’t being dogpiled.
Further to rq’s idea of tagging posts, maybe tags that say whether 101 level questions/comments are acceptable. In threads where 101 discussion is OK, that also comes with the understanding that social justice jargon is to be kept to a minimum, especially where the jargon-y term has a colloquial counterpart. Using racism as an example, in a 101 thread, instead of arguing that a social justice definition of the word “racism” be adhered to, just make it clear when you’re talking about interpersonal prejudice vs. systems of oppression. I like the idea of tags because it means that, if you’re not up for explaining feminism 101 for the 100th time this week, you can just steer clear of that thread altogether or if you’re a newcomer you can at least have a heads up that a certain level of competence on the topic is expected if you’re going to comment.
This would cut off a lot of people who are in different time zones. You’re awake, you’re home from work, you’d like to comment, damn, only that PZ is now rightfully asleep. It would foster US centrism.
Alethea
See, this is one thing that is galling me about this entire discussion.
I am not denying that there’s a lot of hostility to go around here, but this framing as if it’s just one group of meanies beating the all innocent people on the other side is not OK. It’s not a one sided behaviour. How do I know? Because I have been at the receiving end of a lot of it myself. And framing it like that really does a disservice to those who actually get caught in the crossfire.
I don’t know. Maybe you think I deserve the shit that’s been flung at me. Maybe you think that this truely is a one sided issue. Maybe you don’t realise that your framing above is actually hostile, mean, unfair and not contributing to a friendlier and more generous climate. Maybe you don’t even realise that you just accused people here of condoning and encouraging harassment. Maybe you don’t give the others credit for having actual passionate opinions they arrived at after a lot of thinking. I don’t know.
Caine
I missed the end of the blockquote.
With preview.
From “This” onward is my comment, before Caine’s
Giliell
No worries, happens to us all.
Hi. I comment very rarely. It’s been months since I did.
Yes, I was at first a little apprehensive when it came to commenting here, because I was usually at awe at the amount and quality of the discourse (I don’t mean “raaawr stab Mongols are the exception!” level of kaboom) — it just made sense. I could write a long spiel about how those who can read the tones of people they’ve (with respect/calling them out when they’ve had a logical fallacy or brainfart) been talking to for ages have the upper hand…
They kind of don’t when a new person shows up. I agree with much of Chris Clarke’s arguments. I find myself agreeing with PZ, too, especially about the point about anonymity being a bad thing. And Caine, although this may partially because I’ve had a few nice conversations with Caine about pets. (Hi.)
I haven’t commented in a long time due to circumstances, but I’ll try and channel the awkwardness that I felt and to an extent still feel as I’m writing this as… well, a very rare commentator. Thus, this is how I felt and feel, and how the possible new faces might react (this is not science, this is a gut feeling) to older voices they view with awe and respect. Or not, which might be the case.
I always thought of the as new faces and old faces trying to both figure out how to properly communicate with each other. You’re not entirely sure whether or not the person on the other side of the conversation is exposing in good faith what they’re trying to express: expressing one’s entire idea of a certain situation as wittily as someone else might is hard. There’s a communication style you have to learn to read and express yourself in every situation in a different culture, no matter how you’ve learned to listen to it.
It’s a kind of mutual culture shock, and veterans and rookies end up fumbling for mutual understanding that only comes through experience. I’m writing this, and I’m not sure if you’re getting my point even if I’m trying to get it across.
That’s where I started to feel a bit like Nepenthe. @80
And started to wonder if rorschach @93 was basically hoping that with new nyms and rules, anonymity might come. I doubt it. And it wouldn’t work. (Also, why would you want that? It reeks of a sham.)
These are growing pains. The inevitable fact that at some point people will always feel that this is part of their life and time, important to them and who and what kind of discussion is safe and cozy. And it’s not wrong. Nor is stomping down on trolls. But let’s face it, much of the time the comments are already an on-going chat by familiar voices heard and responded to by familiar voices and, on occasion, threading in so many different directions. Add a new voice to it: will they be assumed to be working out of good faith, even if they’re genuinely trying to fit their voice into a conversation carried by veterans who know where the limit is with people they’re used to?
Trust me, I’m second-guessing every word I’ve written thus far. And like Dingo Abbie, I respect many of you for your argumentative skills and insight. But maybe I’m not as toughened up as you are when it comes to responding to logical arguments.
This is just my perspective of how intimidating it might be to comment here. Not how to fix it.
Has it been noted yet that few people read every comment on every post, or even every post? Just throwing that up on the table… scurrying back under it for now :D
A word about ‘pile-ons’ and the very reasonable suggestion that commenters should post concisely and not too often.
Suppose I say something, and 20 people disagree with it, while 10 agree, all of them making different points in different ways, though some of are fairly similar. It’s just flat-out impossible to address that in a way that’s honest, complete and acknowledges everyone, let alone does it concisely and without swamping the thread with multiple comments. And yet, people regularly use a failure to fully address every comment as a reason for dismissing the whole argument, or even, in some cases, a reason for villifiying the original poster. I have no idea how to solve this particular problem.
Delurking to add another data point (should kevinkirkpatrick at #32 be correct and they´re needed). I like to read the comments on some of the posts for extra information or viewpoints. What intimidates me most is usually either:
– someone blowing up over a comment that seemed harmless to me because the person blowing up has a personal backstory with the poster or:
– someone blowing up over a comment that seemed harmless/good faith to me because I don´t know said comment tends to get abused by bad-faith-commenters.
In other cases I may or may not agree with tone and content but I´ll generally understand what´s happening so it doesn´t bother me much.
I stopped commenting and reading the comments a couple of years ago. Too many amounted to maniacal swearing at people who expressed even a mildly different view. The blog comments had degenerated close to the level of YouTube stuff. I continue to read PZ’s posts, but never look at the comments at all. I don’t feel I’ve missed a thing. And I’ve posted this without looking at any of the 101 comments to the post either.
I’d suggest two simple rules
1) Don’t be an asshole.
2) The moderators decide what behavior constitutes being an asshole.
I would have posted this in the original thread, but have been away for a week or so and am still playing catch up.
I tend to lurk on forums, it’s just what I do. I’m very self-conscious in real life and as such, stepping into a new spotlight is never an easy thing for me to do. I’ve lurked Pharyngula for quite a few years now (7 I’d say) and have even ventured out of my self imposed bunker to comment occasionally, but I can probably count the number of times I’ve done that on one hand. There is another reason as to why I don’t post above that which I have just mentioned however.
There are, on occasions, times where I feel that I have an insight or opinion on the topic at hand that (rarely) hasn’t already been at the very least touched upon by the commentariat, if not already thoroughly discussed. The problem I have is that I’ve been lurking here long enough to feel that I’d need to spend 3 hours formulating a one or two paragraph response, then another 30 minutes deciding whether what I’ve written can in no way be misread by any one of the users of this forum, lest I incur the wrath of the Horde. There just seem to be so many trip mines littered around the place to try and negotiate and most of them are on particularly delicate triggers, that in the end I don’t bother (and because comments can move so fast around here, by the time I get there, someone’s probably already made my point).
It’s frustrating to me because I know I’m on the same side as the commenters here. There are a lot of regulars here that have more knowledge on many of the topics and more (and in certain cases horrifying and painful) life experiences than I. I’ll happily take a back seat to those people and when they talk, I listen and try to change my perceptions and prejudices. What disappoints me is the fact that whilst I’d stand shoulder to shoulder with pretty much anyone here in an “us (social justice) versus them (insert opposition to progress group here)” situtation, there are very few people that I’d actually willingly consider ever wanting to meet face to face, almost exclusively because of the mental cartwheels I envision myself having to do to make sure I didn’t inadvertently piss them off. Someone way up there mentioned that some commenters seem to lie in wait for someone to trip up, almost as though they willingly misinterpret any slightly ambiguous statement to view it in the worst possible light and then visciously set upon it.
Having read all of the 100+ comments previous to posting this, I can see why some of the people react the way they do and why should we have to suffer fools gladly? I think what I’m trying to say is that I’d feel a lot more confident bringing my thoughts to the table if I didn’t have to second guess everything I’m doing or thinking of doing. Benefit of the doubt until proven otherwise? Reserve the verbal flensing for those that desperately need it. Maybe that’s what I mean.
Hi,
do you know of any blog with a empathic, passionate and rational commentariat and a atmosphere conductive to discussions? If so, could you take a look at their comment policies and adapt some of them?
Yesmeansyes springs to mind for me for these criteria, lesswrong is rational but sometimes lacks a bit of passion or empathy.
Best of luck in your considerations!
Everything 104 Wrath Panda said applies to me also.
Just want to offer my respects to Chris Clarke re this thread (and to everyone who’s taking a really constructive attitude to what is a superficially simple, but in practical reality quite recalcitrant, problem).
Wrath Panda @ 104
This is a thing that I sort of get, but sort of not. I understand feeling like you need to be extremely careful formulating a comment sometimes to the point that it may seem unwieldy. I’ve experienced that many times but what I conclude from it is that, if I can’t articulate it in such a way that it doesn’t trip any triggers, that means maybe I need to give a little more thought to what I was going to say. In my experience, when someone says something inadvertently ignorant or harmful, as long as they don’t double down when called on it, The Horde is really pretty quick to forgive. Take that for whatever it’s worth.
Maybe a way to approach that is to ask a question in the form of “I have an idea about XYZ that I haven’t seen anyone else bring up but I’m struggling to articulate it without it coming off as bigoted in some fashion. Would someone be willing to meet me in the Thunderdome (or possibly a whole new open thread set aside for this purpose ) to discuss it?” I think that would signal to the regulars that you’re asking in good faith (someone who wasn’t asking in good faith probably wouldn’t hesitate to toss their opinion out there) and would avoid derailing the thread.
I can remember one comment, it was unrelated to the normal type of stuff, (it had to do with MacOS and some software for reading this blog on another format.) I was really scared to do it, I almost took it down.
That said, I was greeted normally. But it was hard to do, and I left it at that.
Al Dente @ 13:
Purely as a technical matter, it would be nice if the system would (a) put the blockquote-y bits in automatically, and (b) let you click on references to read the whole message.
That would make it easier for people to post “Asked here, answered there.” comments for people who want to answer comment 13 before reading through the other 96 comments first. (Guilty!)
I personally am thankful for the hostility towards bad ideas or mistakes, because it means that when i fuck up, i’m almost guaranteed to be told so very explicitely. This is useful and to some extent is what makes this comment sections so worthwhile. We all make mistakes or fail to recognize mistakes made by others. Bad thinking, bigotry, mistakes, etc, are not ignored or tolerated, they are beaten down to the ground and burned down so that no new sprouts appear. It’s aggressive, it can be kind of brutal, but for many of us, it works. I can , however, see how it doesn’t work for everybody. For some, the level of aggression is too much, we’ve all read examples.
Mind you, i would point out that in many occassions, the person complaining that the aggression is too much is in the wrong or is outright tone trolling…so not all the alarms are justified, but certainly it doesn’t mean that there aren’t occasions when people are needlessly and pointlessly torn to pieces. The latter case seems to me to be minoritary, but that’s just my perception.
So, like i said, i think there are real benefits to a good chunk of the aggressiveness, simply because some things are simply not acceptable and being very explicit about that is good and fully justified, but at the same time, it can become so much that it overshadows everything else in the discussion, and beating the bad thing down and making sure it is forcefully and aggressively repudiated becomes the only objective.
Caine put it better here:
@54
I’ve definitely noticed that in myself. Again, some of it i think is good and useful and justified….but there’s also part of it that is problematic. I’m not entirely sure what the best way to promote the good side and limit the bad side of the phenomenon is, though…
Many technical solutions are not available to me. This is a blog on a shared network with many other blogs — I do not have direct access to the guts of the code, and asking for plug-ins and tweaks specifically for my blog would make me a special case and a problem require special handling in updates and global changes.
So no automatic scanning and flagging of new commenters, no major commenting features.
I’ll also point out that there are over 840,000 comments here, and the number is going up. When I go in to just search for all the comments by a particular user, it takes a while…so doing that for every comment would hit performance hard.
I have been reading Pharyngula for 6 years now, and doubt if I have left even one comment. In real life I can have good conversations with people even on sensitive subjects where we disagree. But in real life I am alert to non-verbal signals of disagreement or resistance, and moderate my words or attitude. This is true even when engaging a real-life troll; I know when to back off from assholes.
A suggestion I will make is that every comment be checked by the author for real-life viability. Would you say exactly the same thing to someone across the table? In the same way? So that you can have the same influence? This might contrain us to post more carefully but more productively. After all what the heck are we even posting for? Isn’t it to influence one another’s thinking? If verbal violence in real-life will turn people off, why wouldn’t it online as well?
Long time reader, (pre-SB days from a link from I don’t remember where) and I still occasionally comment, just not as often. (And I know I’ve laid some turds over the years, even if I try to be constructive.)
There are a few reasons I rarely comment any longer. One is because after I do say something which was stupid or hurtful, once I recognize it I tend to pull back my commenting frequency because I know that I need time to learn or calm down. It’s a personal thing and I’m not recommending that this works for everyone, but it does for me.
Another reason is that generally when I do get a chance to read the posts there are usually between 20 and 100 comments already. I do try to read most comments because they are interesting, but either what I would say has already been said, or the conversation has moved so far from the OP that it doesn’t really seem worth it.
Then there are comment threads which rapidly turn into a thread where a new commenter is asking a basic question and the reactions are to; A) complain in the thread about how clueless the commenter is, B) call the commenter a fool for not looking outside the thread for answers, C) point the commenter to a fairly complex web-site or long comment thread and telling them to, “read all this before coming back here.”
You see, one of the problems I see in the Pharyngula comment threads is that the regulars have educated themselves. They are interested in the same topics PZ writes about, they have discussed these topics extensively and have generally reached a consensus. For someone new to the comment threads this discussion hasn’t taken place and the consensus is not obvious, just like it wasn’t obvious to the regulars when they started.
The education of the regulars, the consensus reached, is not, in itself, a bad thing or a problem. But it means that, as people have written up-thread, that there are land-minds in many comment threads. What is worse is that some of the regulars will explode at some subject points, and other regulars are sensitive to other subject points. So to write a comment without sending someone who is very comfortable commenting here (a regular) into a fit, requires extensive knowledge of all the regulars and where their particular fuses are.
I suspect this discourages commenting by newcomers.
I can think of two things which are likely to encourage more people who are not regulars to comment.
First, increased moderation and encourage the regular commenters to stop making complaints about clueless newbies and calling a new commenter a fool. When I mean encourage, I mean the moderators can make a note on someone’s comment that this behavior is no longer a good idea as it discourages commenting, or if the comment is only a complaint about ignorance remove the comment. In addition, moderators should be able to edit a comment with a note indicating where the answer to the basic question can be found (see below). This would also, hopefully, discourage a commenter with a basic question from being sent to five different places with different, sometime contradictory, answers.
Second, find or build a SUBJECT X: 101 section. I would suggest that this should start with definitions with possible links to more information. I say this because while a full appreciation of, e.g., social justice issues, might require several hundred pages of reading, a one sentence definition is probably enough to answer most of the basic questions a new commenter has.
I know the second suggestion has been tried before with a wiki. But that seems to have been fallen by the wayside. It might be enough to pick some standard references already existing on the web, like the Skeptic’s Dictionary. Or build a table of standard links like Panda’s Thumb.
The key here is that A) the same, agreed upon, references are used, and B) the moderators are expected to be the first people to point out those links. I would also suggest anonymous moderators, simply because being told by a moderator of a policy or link is a lot less confrontational than being told by a well-known, long-time, regular that the commenter is a idiot.
A discussion continuing with commenters not agreeing with those references would be fine, but I think this type of policy would greatly reduce the fear of irritating a regular who would publicly react with a “Not This Again!” post.
Of course, this would require near-constant moderation, and is a lot of work. I don’t have the time for it. I defrauding my employer as it is, I should be working on a report on the RF emissions of a tire-pressure monitor.
And, of course, my $0.02 is only worth as much as you paid for it. Even solicited advice needs to be weighed before being deemed worthy.
Reading many comments from people saying “I want to participate but I’m afraid I’ll say something that can be interpreted wrong” just made me realize: Fuck, we created a self-fulfilling prophecy. We scared away the good people, the interesting people, the people who want to learn. Those who kept coming were in large part assholes*, so we felt justified in treating them badly. I’m sorry folks.
*no, not each and every one was an asshole, but just remember the last couple of assholes who came tp actively strip up shit, do “social experiments” etc…
+++
As much as I understand the spirit of that idea, it also reinforces the power dynamics in society at large. Men do say a lot of outrageous things about women who tend to react politely. White people say a lot of clueless racist shit and black people are very careful not to appear angry.
@104 Wrath Panda
I think i understand what you mean, but at the same time i can’t help but feel that all those trip mines are not annoying things you have to try very careful not to trip on, lest the commentariat rip you to pieces, but rather, things that are absolutely necessary to keep the place civilized. Basically if the trip mines are triggered, it’s because something awful has been said. I don’t think innocent comments falsely trigger the mines…at least not often enough that it’s significant, and i’ve seen too many cases of people thinking that they’ve said nothing wrong, when they’ve said something really awful.
There’s a very sensitive trip wire on this comment sections for sexist stuff, for example. I’ve never seen it go off without justification. If people activate the alarm it’s not because the sensor is too sensitive, it’s because they’ve said something sexist, and it’s important to expose it.
If i’m trying to post something and i keep having to edit it in order to not set off the alarms….maybe what i’m trying to say is not a good idea…maybe i’m in the wrong and i need to consider that i’m making some major mistakes…
If i keep stepping on mines, maybe i’m the problem…and if i’m annoyed but my being wrong being pointed out…then maybe i’ve got more problems than i thought…
Nobody likes being told every single thing that you do wrong, specially not in the moment, but that doesn’t mean that those things weren’t wrong or that you being told about each and every one of them is not tremendously useful and educational.
If a comment is triggering any of the sexism, racism, homophibia, transphobia, classism, ableism, etc, alarms…i personally want them to go off every time. I don’t want anything to slip through the cracks unnoticed, whether i’m the one making the offending comment or somebody else. If commenting without triggering any of those alarms is a problem for someone, i think it’s safe to say they are the problem, otherwise it should be fairly easy to navigate the comment sections without triggering any of those.
If the people complaining about how these alarms and trip mines are making commenting difficult, are talking about some other kind of stuff, i’d apreciate it if they were more specific about what that is, because it’s not readily obvious to me.
Giliell, professional cynic -Ilk- at 115: “..it also reinforces the power dynamics in society at large.”
But the power dynamics in society are real, albeit arbitrary. As a woman of color who was an immigrant and is an engineer, I have had a lifetime of dealing with privileged and clueless people. If I react explosively to every sexist racist comment, I would be ignored because people just do not like to be forced to admit at gunpoint that they are wrong. Even when they are and know it at some level. When I need them to hear me and eventually acknowledge their error, I have to pay attention to their own baggage and react constructively. Or my chance to teach that person is lost. My personal schtick is to enact exaggerated overt contempt, in look and word.
I am verging on telling people how they should communicate, and I will stop here. From my perspective, if more attention were paid to having one’s comment be received effectively, the result might be both more welcoming and productive.
I dont think assuming good faith is required. The problem I have is what appears to be the default assumption of BAD faith. The number of times ive seen people get shit on hardcore which usually takes on the form of accusations and value judgements for a) expressing the same idea differently, b) disagreeing on marginal issues or c) saying something legitimately dumb but readily correctable out of ignorance became staggering.
It’d just be nice if, before one takes a shit on someone else, makes an unflattering value judgement about them and/or accuses them of being the kind of person who does XYZ, people asked themselves “Is this warranted? Is it possible I misunderstood them? Misread their post? Am I reading tone into their comment? Am I looking for something to be pissed off over? And even if they did say something dumb, does it warrant calling them an asshole/suggesting they’re a person of little value/implying they routinely engage in other unsavoury behaviours?”
I’m a bleeding heart. I give people the benefit of the doubt to a fault. I do not advocate others waste their energy assuming good faith to the extent I do. All its ever accomplished for me is time wasted and a broken heart. I would never suggest others adopt the forever-patient with the truly hopeless attitude I have.
Theres a happy medium though. People who literally haven’t said or done a thing wrong get taken to the cleaners here because people attribute negative qualities to them regardless of their words. They don’t even have to say something dumb to get shit on because the default assumption is bad faith and people see what they want to see. There ARE people who haven’t said or done anything questionable who receive this treatment here.
There are also people who are treated like horseshit because they disagree with a minor aspect of a greater issue they overwhelmingly agree with the regular posters on. I cannot wrap my mind around how that is reason enough to tell someone they’re a terrible person who probably eats kittens.
I’m realise sometimes well meaning people DO say something completely awful out of ignorance and it is hurtful and shouldn’t be tolerated. I don’t think it’s that hard to tell whether someone’s just an asshole or fucking dumb though. One definitely deserves to be told to piss off. The other deserves a CHANCE to learn from their mistake though. If after being told “Hey dude, the implications of what you just said really suck so please dont” they dig in their heals I get telling them to piss off too but not before confirming they are indeed a hopeless jerk.
Questioning whether an extreme reaction is warranted prior to unleashing one would be beneficial.
I think it would also be good if those people who are spending the most time talking about whether ‘we’ should be charitable to the ignorant and clumsy understood that this blog doesn’t actually represent the pinnacle of achievement in the understanding of social justice. Clearly, it’s a fantastic eye-opener for some people, they keep on saying so. I’m having a different experience. I’m often painfully aware of people arguing viciously from a position of half-grasped theoretical underpinnings whose full consequences and ramifications they don’t know how to work with, a limited variety of real life experiences especially across cultures, and a tendency to think of their own as central. I daresay there are people who could come along and teach me something – in fact I enjoyed FTB a whole lot better when that was the case.
Could those people who are talking as if they have the highest ground by definition please try to stop and remember that they don’t? How would they like to be treated by those who are on higher ground than them? Do they even know how to respond to the suggestion that they’re missing plenty better than the people they like to tear apart?
I agree with change as long as the unique “feel” of this blog doesn’t change. Pharyngula has educated me and I think made me a better person. And that is not just PZs posts but the commenters here also, almost equally as much. So change if needed but not too much.
Regarding the issue of misinterpreting comments:
Oh fuck yes. This has become a major issue here. There are some regulars (and I include myself here back when I commented regularly) who seem to deliberately attempt to interpret comments in the worst possible light. This is a problem, and a place where the three comment rule is important. Think a comment is problematic, but it is open to interpretation? Ask for clarification. If the commenter is still vague, ask again. Don’t open up with both barrels until you’re certain the commenter is a troll/irredeemable bigot.
Dreaming,
I agree with you…in part.
I think that the tricky bit occurs when the person commenting knows…or suspects, that they are the problem. Not deliberate trolling, but trying to learn or apply learning correctly. I’ll use myself as an example:
I shudder when I think of how horribly I could have misstepped two years ago were I to have commented on anything involving trans people. Not out of any deliberate bigotry or intent, but simply because I had no personal motivation to understand past the raw basics. Having taken the time to reflect and educate myself further, I am confident that my politics there are sound and quite consistent with those in this space…however, I am uncomfortable expressing them because I lack the language and, equally important, nuance to do so. In trying to be a good ally, were I to comment, I am quite sure that I would inadvertently stumble my way through a minefield…with predictable results.
So, I keep quiet and listen…because I know that any but the most painstakingly phrased contribution on this subject on my part could be hurtful. But…I am certain that there are other similar subjects that I *think* that I know enough about to be safe, and may be mistaken on, and I believe this is true for most people. For me, the main benefit to a charitable reading of comments is that it encourages the potential offender to learn (to their own benefit) and to clarify (to the benefit, I hope, of those who would be hurt by a less charitable reading). Obviously, exceptions in all directions should be dictated by common sense.
Giliell @ 95:
Yes, exactly. I think we need to stop that too, because it just keeps us focused on being hostile, concentrating on getting the first punch in, so to speak.
Thanks A. R. Totally agree. There have been a number of times I’ve thought “Some people are really dedicated to seeing others’ comments in a negative light”. Like, it would require work to interpret their posts as bad but someone’s found a way!
@ 117 Dreaming of an Atheistic Newtopia, wrote,
I don’t see that anyone is suggesting that comments which are sexist, racist, homophobic, reflect classism or ableism, etc., should be ignored.
However, look at the language we are using to discuss this: “Alarms”, “trip mines”, “land minds”. I think the language reflects the perceived common reaction within this commentariat when comments of that nature occur. And I think a fear of provoking an explosion does deter commenting.
When a sexist, racist, homophibic, transphobic, classist, ableist, etc., comment is made in these forums there is a wide range of responses. These range from gentle corrections, to a general announcement to the thread that a particular commenter is tired of these questions occurring. From helpful links to almost inarticulate rage. And these reactions can all occur in a single thread from a single comment (although that is rare).
The commenters here make a personal judgement on how honest a person is about making a statement, and how open they are to correction, and some commenters are more willing to give the benefit of the doubt than others that someone is sincerely mistaken.
This was the inspiration for the three-comment rule several years ago, to enable the patient responders to get a chance to correct an honest mistake or reply to an honest question before the nuclear option occurred.
While it’s fine to talk about “Alarms”, “trip mines”, “land minds”, we should also be talking about “corrective dialog”, “pointing out unexamined bigotry”, and “teaching moments”. When those are not working, then it should escalate to “Alarms” and “Clue-by-fours”. Our responses shouldn’t start with flame. (In general at least, there are some commenters who are clearly asking to be savaged. The most painful this we can do to them is ignore them, but sometimes it’s fun to chew on them a little.). But since we are all subject to impulsive actions, and I certainly include myself in this, it may be better to have a general policy that moderators make the responses to sexist, racist, homophibic, transphobic, classist, ableist, etc., comments. And the moderators who are chosen should be people with high levels of patience and a desire to teach, not flame.
teejaykay @ 98:
Hi, Teejaykay! I’ve missed you.
tomh @ 85:
Bybelknap did comment here for a short while, I remember them. There wasn’t any need for an implication of dishonesty.
Jeff W @ 48:
Or a small menu of choices, which would make collating data easier. Downvote due to abuse, unhelpful, or senseless babble. Upvote for cogent point, contribution to discussion, or entertaining wit.
Flex @ 126:
Hallo, Flex! It’s really good to see you again. I agree completely. There is one commenter here who often makes it a point to talk about how when they first arrived at Pharyngula, they were still holding a lot of sexist and racist attitudes, attitudes which seemed relatively liberal and acceptable in meatspace, where we are all swimming in sexism and racism. They go on to say that being here was a very eye-opening experience, and has helped them to recognize bad ideas and attitudes, but they weren’t beaten into the ground over these things, but guided and corrected over time.
It’s important to recognize that everyone here is not a magic saint, always having the right ideas and attitudes. We’re all products of the societies we grow up in, and everyone has a number of fucked up ideas and attitudes, and it takes time to recognize that and get to a better place. If we all keep in mind that learning, growing, and changing is a process, it might help the kindness factor a bit more.
I would like to be part of comment threads on which expatriarchy comments more often.
To Gilliel @115
Well, the Black British (generalising a bit) seem to be exceptionally good at making their point crystal without demeaning or disrespecting the humanity of the person they’re speaking to – which includes not expecting them to be other than humans typically are. They seem to be perfectly capable of being angry without actually attacking someone. I don’t think it’s because they’re being ‘careful’, I think it’s because they’ve got standards and values. So why not everyone else?
@123 Dywalgi
I see what you mean. My only objection is that whether the bigotry is deliberate or not, it makes little difference, because it’s still bigotry. I’ve been on the side of making a bigoted comment without realising that’s what it was, and thinking that my intention was the purest among the pure. I was wrong. I found out because people told me, and that to me is very valuable.
It’s the “intent is not magic” thing again….While we know intent matters, to some extent, we can’t read people’s minds and the fact remains that a bigoted comment is a bigoted comment. The person making it might not think of themselves as having a bigoted view, or might consider themselves to be squarely on the good ally side, but they can be wrong, and it’s not going to be them who decide if they are right or not.
I’ve seen many times (and i’ve done it myself) someone claiming to be “on the good side” and complaining for being attacked despite being on that good side. The point is, they weren’t, at least on that specific point they are being told off for. I think we sometimes assume that because we are on the right side of many issues, we are owed extra slack, or that nothing we can say can put us on the wrong side of an issue, but that’s absolutely not the case. I think this is a very common problem, and it seems to me that the best cure for it is being told in no uncertain manner that no, you are definitely not on the right side just because you generally feel like you are, that’s not how it works, it’s not up to you to decide. If your intentions are good but you still said something bigoted….you said something bigoted…and that clearly shows that you have bigoted attitudes that you need to work on, no matter how much on top of it you think you are.
Often times, i think people use the “why are you attacking me, i’m on your side” defense as an excuse not to explore the idea that they might have actually fucked up.
In the example you brought up, the charitable approach puts all the responsibility on the offended party, rather than the offender. It puts the onus on trans* people, or their allies, to grit their teeth, endure the abuse and hold the offender by the hand while they explain why what they said was bigoted and hurtful, while the offender goes scotch free for their fuck up. This isn’t fair. It puts the people on the right side on a constant duty to do all the work and suffer all the consequences.
I know this isn’t exactly what you were talking about, but i think it relates to it.
@126 flex
Point taken. I only used that language because it had been used by the people i was responding to.
On the policy level, I’m skeptical that anything will help much. Downvoting is awful because people respond to downvoting by arguing harder. Upvoting might just make infrequent commenters know for sure that they are unloved rather than just having a general feeling.
I wonder if threading might help? Other sites on FTB have threading so I know it’s entirely feasible. I’m not fond of threading, but you can use it to sequester conversations with trolls into subthreads. It also allows more opportunity for a dissenter to clarify or change their mind, since their clarification is right there rather than way downthread. But don’t let the threading go too many levels deep, or we’ll end up having conversations with trolls taking even *more* space due to larger margins.
Expatriarchy
Different strokes for different people I’d say
Dreaming of Atheistic Newtopia
I don’t think that’s what we’Re arguing about. I think the argument is about approaching those things differently. Two examples come to mind, one in the recent gun thread, the other in one of the Caitlin Jenner threads. In the first example, folks pointed out that “call the police” carries a lot of white privilege because not everybody can do so safely. In the second people were commenting on how she’s so beautiful and feminine and folks pointed out that this is a discourse that harms transwomen as it reinforces a particular set of feminine beauty ideals. Both were, in my opinion, examples of well done. Folks had problematic premises/ideas that were harmful and they got informed that those things are hurtful and why. Constructive, informative.
And yes, the folks who had those ideas had established themselves before as bona fide commenters, so people assumed, rightly, that they were uninformed, mistaken, open to having those ideas challenged and eager to learn. Many of us usually don’t do that when somebody unknown makes the same mistakes.
As I said: We scared away good folks and as a result only got the bad folks.
I like Anteprepro’s suggestion of a separate account for moderators and monitors. Not only would this allow the moderator to participate in a discussion as an individual yet still be separate from the need to step in as moderator. It would also alert and reassure lurkers & occasional commenters that the discussion is in fact moderated via the user ID “Moderator” in bold at the top of the post.
@131 Dreaming of an Atheistic Newtopia,
Understood, and I only mentioned it in my reply to you because you were the latest person using that language. I did notice it upthread, but by the time I formulated my comment you were the last one using it. I tried to diffuse any perceived accusation against you by using the inclusive word “we”, but I suppose I should have been more explicit that I was in no way pointing at you for this behavior.
@129 Caine,
It’s good to be fondly remembered. And not entirely expected. A few years ago, at the start of the whole elevator-gate rumpus, I put my foot in my mouth rather badly here. So badly that once I realized what I had done I was afraid to even revisit the thread where I wrote it. I know that I should have gone back and apologized, but I didn’t. I still feel bad about that comment, but one thing it did was made me step back and read and learn for awhile. I still lurk and read about 80% of the comments, which has been eye-opening, but I have come to the conclusion that this space is probably better served with less people like me (middle-aged, CIS, white, male professional engineer) commenting (there are plenty of us), and more people like me listening.
So I listen. And I try to learn.
I’ve been a regular reader and a rare commenter since the Scienceblogs days. As in, I remember when Walton was a libertarian. I enjoyed the rough and tumble, back when it seemed like the broader goal was a fun place for discussion, poetry, recipes, and general good times. The nastiness was fairly well directed at true trolls who were well fed and then chucked with much ceremony and pomp under an appropriate bridge. You could talk about mental health without SC bombarding you with links to their awful blog.
A lot of the suggestions in the comments have the potential to return some of that good spirit. Some of that spirit isn’t possible anymore because of this place being a target of groups like the slymepit. I guess what I would like to see would be more good-natured troll-feeding and less “fuck you, we’re done.” I mean, “fuck you, we’re done” has its place, but not usually at the start of a conversation. If Pharyngula had been what it is now 10 years ago, I cannot imagine that Walton would have stuck around to become a feminist vegetarian immigration lawyer. I think of them as this place’s greatest success.
A thought: The “intent is not magic” meme needs to go away. Sometimes intent does matter, perhaps not to the person injured, but it does matter when we are engaging the offender. Should we treat someone who without malice makes a racist statement exactly like we would treat someone who clearly makes that argument with *intent* to cause pain? Of course not. And that wasn’t the original purpose of the meme (“not intending to hurt someone does not mean that they won’t get hurt”). But all to often, the meme is used to dismiss cases where intent actually is important to how we should view a commenter.
Sayamika @ 136:
I think paying attention to how things are phrased might be good, too. Pardon me for using you as an example, Sayamika. In the quoted sentence above, perhaps something like “You could talk about mental health without being bombarded by links to a personal blog” would have been better. That’s saying the same thing, but without calling someone out (who isn’t here, by the way), and risking a major derail because someone’s feelings got hurt. Also, your personal judgement as to a personal blog doesn’t speak for all people, so that would get other people jumping in to defend said blog, and so forth.
@133
I can see how those kinds of responses work, i’m not against the, by any means, and i get the point that when someone has already stablished a certain good rep, their mistakes are less likely to be met with hostility and more likely to be responded with informative, educational explanations of how what they said is problematic.
My contention is that i’ve seen people assume that their good rep. is stablished and that despite their problematic comments, they are good people.
I also submit that if someone is so offended by the tone used to correct them or let them know they said something problematic that their response is to leave and not come back, maybe they are not such good people after all….?
I have no doubt that some good, worth-while people who would have been receptive in different circumstances, have been scared away, but i don’t think this means that the good people were scared away and we only got the bad people…that presuposes that good people react to being critisized by leaving the scene and that people who comfront the hostility thrown at them, make the effort to understand the substance behind the hostility, learn from it, and stick around a slightly better version of themselves than they were before, are the bad people…
I get that you were probably generalising, it’s just that it seems to me to be a highly problematic generalisation.
@dreaming
I see where you are getting the impression that I am advocating total responsibility for interpretation on the part of the reader: however, rest assured that I am not. If someone says something out of line, of course they should be told, clearly and with no room for interpretation, how and why they crossed a boundary. And if someone is hurt by it of course it should be made known, if they are comfortable sharing.
But, at the same time, if that response is one aimed solely at inspiring shame, guilt, and grovelling for forgiveness from the offender, and righteous indignation from those who ‘know better’, it is not helpful to anyone. If we want educated allies, we must be willing to have a hand in that education, and very few people learn best through public or private humiliation.
We should be careful of one another as fellow human beings, *of course*, and made aware of what is acceptable, and if we have caused accidental harm. But at the same time, I do not think it is an unreasonable expectation to post with the understanding that our readers are mostly adults, with autonomy and responsibility for their own emotions and reactions. If I step on someone’s foot on the bus by accident, I expect to be told, so I can apologize and avoid it in the future: I do not expect, or accept, being berated for the rest of the ride by all my fellow passengers for what was, certainly my fault, but not my deliberate action.
Sorry, that should have been “are in the bad people camp” in my previous comment.
Seven of Mine: Shrieking Feminist Harpy @ 108 & Dreaming of an Atheistic Newtopia @ 116/117
I can see what you are both saying; perhaps I can re-phrase to make my intended statement a little clearer. It’s not the content of an actual statement that I want to make that I’m worried about, it’s more an underying worry that I’ve inadvertently put something in there that’s going to be misrepresented (wilfully or otherwise), even though re-reading several times doesn’t alert me to any “don’t post that” phrases. Call it paranoia I guess?
I think, for me at least, that I’ve conditioned myself to expect a negative reaction, even though I’m almost 100% certain that I’ve not got anything in the post to warrant it.
A small but subtle change might help:
Vitriol should still be allowed, but it should be aimed at the target’s behaviour rather than the person themselves. For example, instead of “You’re a repellent pig-ignorant jerk”, write “I’m fed up with your repellent pig-ignorant arguments”. It still gets the point across, but it makes things less personal.
Speaking of vitriol, Steersman is trying to comment here, and getting caught in the filters. I’m not approving it.
FUCK OFF, STEERSMAN.
Slymepitters are eternally banned here, and the sealion costume fools no one.
Cross-posted from the Thunderdome-
I have a question about pile-ons. I just composed a comment to Krog Marc (KM) in the That’s a slightly better apology thread. I did so upon reading one of their comments, but not any responses to it. After I hit ‘submit’, I noticed that several other people also criticized KMs comment. So I kinda feel like I added to a pile of critical comments of one person. For lurkers, this might look like a bunch of people-many of whom are regulars-criticizing one person. And yet, I took the time to compose what I think was a well-articulated comment that addressed something that KM said that bothered me. Is that enough to balance out the possible pile-on? Or should I have read the entire thread first to see if my criticisms of KMs words were already addressed? Or should I simply not have said anything?
Giliell @ 115;
Very succinct! I think you’ve gotten to the heart of it. I often don’t comment for fear of saying the wrong thing, to add my voice to the crowd of lurkers and semi-regulars. There’s no room for education for someone who doesn’t have a very thick skin, here.
Fixing it? Compassion is the only general principle I can think of. The regulars have a long history of arguments and discussions to draw on that has brought them to rough consensus. When a newcomer stumbles on some point, they’re told that they need to (fucking) do their homework. But – I don’t have time to go read the comments, or do all of the searching involved in getting myself up to speed! That’s a huge investment. So people just leave, instead of making that investment.
(That’s a hypothetical me, I *think* I’m on the same page as most of the regulars here)
I think is boils down to the statement that’s sometimes made around here, and other places, “It’s not my job to educate you.” Which is true! But it’s also the difference between a welcoming place that accepts and welcomes newcomers, and a place where newcomers aren’t allowed. I don’t even think a set of links to “Social Justice 101” is adequate, either – making someone feel welcome is about giving them personal attention, and throwing a link at them is the opposite of that, often.
I think that you need hosts more than mods, myself. Door-greeters and guides, that sort of thing. Some are doing that already (thank you!) but it can be drowned out by the aggression sometimes.
Dreaming of an Atheistic Newtopia
I’m not sure we’Re talking about the same thing.
I’m not talking about people who commented, got a hostile reaction and left (more about this later), but those who have written in this very thread that they never commented in the first place out of fear that a mistake would result in a massive, personal, hostile take down. We lost the input they would have made.
No, I don’t agree and I think that this is part of the problem. Heavens know that I have spent nights crying after particularly nasty fights, I know I took time out after such times. I stuck around (and undoubtly contributed to others experiencing similar things) because for me this place still offered more. I wll not make a judgement about somebody because they evaluate the situation differently and decided that the bad outweighed the good. We cannot simply dismiss all those who cannot flourish in such an environment as not worthy to be here.
Are there people who simply take their ball and go home because they got offended at being criticised, no matter how they were being criticised? Absolutely! But we will only find out if we try in a less hostile way first.
flex @135:
I agree that stepping back, being quiet, and listening can be helpful (I’ve largely tried to do that in this thread, for instance and for a while when I first began commenting here at Pharyngula, I did that on threads about feminism, race, or gun violence). But I think there is another function that commenting can serve-showing support for people who are marginalized.
Additionally, just because you possess several forms of privilege, I imagine on some axis you’re underprivileged. If so, then discussions that center around that particular axis are ones where your perspective might be useful/interesting/welcome.
I’ve been trying to think of something helpful to add to this, and one of things I’ve been thinking about is that I may be too angry in general to be of much help in a place like this.
*My* default, is that I actually prefer the kind of troll that attacks with slurs and foul insults, I can fight that – and perhaps I enjoy the fight too much – but here I find that even mentioning that I find [someone’s] comment patronizing or dismissive has itself been met with a kind of “oh, you’re on Team Woman” or other justifications. I don’t mean to tar everyone with the same brush, but for me as an abuse survivor, it only takes one or two of those responses to get me thinking that this the kind of place where Anna needs her flamethrower.
I guess, that maybe this is my problem, and I’m trying to think of the fairest and safest solution.
Tony @145
My gut feeling is that a pile-on of well-articulated comments is much better than a pile-on of poorly-articulated/hostile comments so I wouldn’t worry too much. However, I am surprised that you say you posted without reading the whole thread first (particularly as your language suggests many people do this…?). For whatever reason, posting without reading the whole thread never occurred to me. Maybe I’m super-anal, but my approach (where-ever I am posting) is to read the whole thread, write a post in a separate program, re-load the thread and read any new comments, update my draft comment as necessary (maybe deleting it if it’s no longer helpful), repeat the reloading/updating as necessary, and only then post my comment. I guess this isn’t necessary if the topic of the thread is just to collate people’s individual experiences, but if you are replying to someone else this seems appropriate and maybe a “read the whole thread” guideline from PZ would be a good idea. I would be interested to hear everyone’s thoughts on this matter.
Thinking more about it and reading more of the comments on this thread, if I had to choose one attitude that has most contributed to changes in demeanor in social justice themed blogs it’s the belief that every comment exhibiting x-ism must be stomped out aggressively and at length, until the writer either changes their mind publicly and apologizes, leaves, or is banned. That’s why pile-ons occur, why dead horses are beaten until unrecognizable, and why “experienced” commenters feel like words on a screen are a land-mine.
There are other options that don’t let things slide. There’s the “nice story, bro/that’s nice, dear” option, in which it’s pointed out that the comment was x-ist and further protestations are ignored or mildly mocked. There’s the “we don’t do things like that around here” option, in which a single moderator explains that something is against community norms, end of discussion.
worksfromhome @150:
Yeah, I should have read the thread before commenting. I latched on to something KM said and went from there. I need to be more careful in the future (I will say that I read the thread up until KMs comment, just none of the subsequent ones).
Sorry, Giliell, i did think you were talking about something else. Your point is taken.
As for the second thing, i got the impression that you were making the evaluation that such people are necessarily good people. Unfortunately i gave the opposite impression, that they are bad people. I think in fact we both agree that a judgement of their character can’t be made solely from that alone.
@140 Dywalgi
I think i have some trouble understanding why “inspiring shame, guilt, and grovelling for forgiveness from the offender, and righteous indignation from those who ‘know better’” is such a bad thing, because it actually kind of works for me…I don’t usually feel like that (as understood whithin the context of a comment section) is necessarily a disproportionate response to making a comment that is bigoted and hurtful. That’s probably something i should work on, because saying it like that right now doesn’t sound too good… so thanks for your comment. I’m aware that my instinctive response to someone hurting me is humilliating them, something which i often only notice that i’m doing until after it’s done. It’s a form of vengeance that i too frequently have trouble realising is even that, vengeance, so i tend to view it as proportionate and justified, which means i not only do it, i also respond to it when it’s done to me because i automatically think “well, of course, i did this, so i deserve it”. I respond well to it and i assume others do as well. Thanks again for bringing it up in your comment, i was having trouble realising why that kind of retaliation can be a problem.
@ #150
I thought I was the only one nutty enough to do all that. Guess not.
Dreaming,
No problem, it is something that I am hyper aware of because, like you, I both respond to it and it is my first reaction to feeling harmed. Un(?)fortunately, I think that this space will never be without a share of poats which very much do merit a good dose of vengeance, so, there is that, at least. Thank you for putting forward such well reasoned responses and challenges to my comments…it has made me think a lot about where I stand, and I value that a lot.
@145, Tony! The Queer Shoop, wrote,
That is a very interesting question.
I just went and read all the comments in that post. Yours was the 8th comment to respond to KM (at that point), and in my opinion you presented a position and expressed a concern which none of the previous responses did. (KM’s opinion my differ.) I wouldn’t say your comment was too much to pile on KM. But because of the number of comments I also would caution you to not to take it personally if KM doesn’t respond. (And based on your posting history I doubt that you will.)
I also suspect, based on the time-stamps, that many of the replies were being composed at the same time, so most of the responses to KM were unaware of what other people were writing. There is a feature over at Adam Lee’s blog which I really like, but it requires nested threads. It will report when someone else is typing a response to a comment. If I see that happening I’ll wait until I see what someone else wrote before commenting myself. I don’t think something like that would be possible here.
Now KM may be a drive-by, so we’ll never get a response. KM might also be overwhelmed by the (at this moment) dozen of responses both correcting him and asking him questions. None of the responses were, again in my opinion, particularly vicious, but if KM is the type of person to take it personally he might do so.
But even if KM wants to respond, he’ll be trying to respond to 10+ people. And if he only responds to a couple, the others may feel slighted and make a comment about that. I’ve seen beleaguered commenters try to put all their responses into a single post, which also tends to irritate some readers. I don’t know that I’ve seen a good way for anyone to respond to a dozen comments directed at them at once. The time it takes to format and then formulate a response to each comment take enough time that if you try to respond to a dozen comments you get accused of ignoring some.
If we want to talk about good-faith assumptions, that’s another one I would suggest. That if, during a discussion, the comment you wrote doesn’t get a response, it doesn’t mean it was ignored. By default it should be assumed that it was read, but not responded to because either; A) you made your point, or B) there was no reasonable response possible.
Ultimately, I don’t know that there would be any means to stop dog-piling. This community has the courage of their convictions and are fairly forthright in expressing them rapidly. But it can be recognized when a dog-pile occurs and once a dog-pile is recognized we can try to step back for a moment and see if the subject responds rather then keep piling on.
I’d like to point out that with all the disadvantages with dog-piling, there is an advantage. It shows the recipient and other readers that there is a consensus within the community for a viewpoint. The number of responses to KM would have been significantly smaller if the matter was still being discussed and the question was open.
Giliell @115
savant @146
re: first-time commenting.
The first time I did, I was terrified, so much so that I commented and didn’t come back to that thread to see what had happened with my comment (if anyone read it at all). Came back months later with a different ‘nym, still a lot of fear.
I’m still afraid of commenting. I’m still afraid of doing things wrong or saying the wrong thing, even though I’m perfectly okay sitting around in the Lounge and putting my feet up on the comfy chairs.
But I figure as long as what I post has as much of my personal opinion (e.g. ‘Cute squid!’) or as little of my uneducated opinion (e.g. ‘hey found an article that’s kind of related, was interesting’), I should be fine.
Anyway, that’s me, and I only stuck around because I was stubborn. I almost didn’t stick around. It looks, sadly, like a lot of people didn’t. I would like to help in the fixing of this.
I’m not sure about solutions, but I’ve been glad to see commenters that I haven’t seen in a long time coming into these two threads with their input.
I’ve also noticed good things already on a couple of other threads (as well as this one, actually). People do seem to be trying to be charitable, and when they haven’t been, they’ve been gently and articulately called out; even ‘regulars’. I don’t know how long it will last, and I worry a bit that it might go too far (for me, at least).
At this point, I agree with the idea that more enforcement of the current rules, by and for everyone.
Hmm… My last sentence should have ended with ‘is the way to go’.
rq @157,
I’m afraid to post sometimes, too. I mean, I don’t worry about offering hugs in the Lounge, or even plugging Elder Daughter’s bird photos, but anything serious? I don’t want to offend anybody, I don’t want to get squashed like a bug, and besides, somebody’s probably already said it, and said it better. But a lot of that is my own insecurities, and my problem, and I’m still hanging around anyway.
If temp. suspensions are going to be happening, there should be some rule about who involved in the argument gets suspended. “Everyone who commented” probably isn’t a good way to go, but neither is taking the one person at the center and only suspending them, when a lot of what they were doing might have been responding to other people baiting them.
rq @157:
I recall a few times when I thought you were going to stop posting, and I was quite sad. I’m thrilled you’ve stayed (which I’m sure you know). Now I’m doubly resolved to do what I can to help improve the atmosphere around here. Because I don’t want more wonderful people like yourself driven away. I’m not saying you felt like departing bc of the environment, but given that I’ve grown to like you, I have to wonder how many other friendships I (or others) could cultivate with people if they stuck around.
(btw, I didn’t recall that you had a prior nym)
Long-time lurker here, I check almost daily and post a few times a year. I’ve had a problem with the pile-ons (if that’s what they are called now) for a while. It used to be sniny fangs or using decayed porcupines or chew toy, or whatever. The chew-toy effect is why I never have really actively commented. I used to enjoy watching the regulars shred newbies but my tolerance for vitriol, even well-intentioned or born of extreme frustration, has almost disappeared in light of the targeted harassment campaigns that people like Rebecca Watson and Anita Sarkeesian has received. Maybe it’s the focused targeting, the intense vitriol, I don’t know, but this has made obsolete (for me at least) the one-time value of watching a good, sniny shredding of a new chew toy on Pharyngula. It’s just too similar for me, and I will not participate nor do I want to watch it happen. I don’t know how often the chew-toy effect still happens since I eventually stopped reading comments of anything that even seemed remotely contentious. I do consider myself a part of the community here, but I’m the fringe part that listens to the main speaker then leaves before the rowdy folks knock over the dessert table.
I liked the diagnostic idea by kevinkirkpatrick.
Perhaps since code changes wont work, simply emailing links to the posts could be done instead.
Tony
As I said, it was only the one comment and I can sort of recall which thread it was (something about gender and women’s capabilities vs. those of men) but it was (by now) a good few years ago, so it’s really an outlier in my commenting history. :) Anyway, this is off-topic. And I’m glad I’ve stuck around, mostly due to people like you. ♥
Regarding my concern about pile-ons, PZ had this to say in the final page of the Thunderdome:
That was a relief to hear. Because in addition to the observations made by Flex @156-
it’s not like most people are sitting around coordinating a pile-on.
(I haven’t read any of the comments yet.)
Quoting PZ –
That echoes something Tony Pinn said on the social justice panel we were both on last Friday – that if you’re not uncomfortable with a particular push for equality and against privilege, then you’re doing it wrong.
He was saying it’s not easy, it’s hard; it’s hard to give up privilege. If you don’t feel uncomfortable…well that’s a sign that you haven’t given anything up yet. (That last is my gloss, but I think it’s right.)
screechymonkey @ 89 — Exactly. I was so weirded out by this guy finding out Chris’s phone number and calling him. That brings up a lot of problematic, to put it mildly, confrontations from my past. “How did you get my phone number?” usually ended up with me being threatened and calling police. If not worse. It reads as if Chris is somewhat annoyed by this but doesn’t find it alarming.
Chris Clarke @ 91–
The explicit and upfront point of your story may have been lost on the people who are freaking out about people stalking you. As we have been stalked. (I don’t mean to put words in your mouth, Chris Clarke. I really do respect you and just want to point out how others could not read your “whole explicit and upfront point” which exists in your experience. You feel bad that your response made things worse. We’re worried about how talking back to our abusers made things worse. This is a common statement absorbed; it’s stated from abusers and regurgitated from the abused. This is why, in my opinion, it’s problematic.)
This is all I can contribute to this thread, which is why I don’t usually comment. I have read for eight years, commented here and there on things I feel “emotional” about and have never been slammed. When I was a total newbie I was welcomed. I generally listen more than speak which has served me well.
I’ve lurked for a long time but don’t comment because I rarely feel like I have much to contribute. This one thread is funny because it’s the one place my own perception of lacking value to contribute might actually contribute to PZ.
And I’m not gonna lie, the crowd makes it difficult to feel like I have much to contribute. Partly because there are people with much better things to say due to lived experience or education, and also because I’d like to avoid being misunderstood or putting my foot in my moth and being savaged.
A few thoughts:
1) I think the piling on is less nowadays than in the past. If anyone dared to contest a point of PZ’s 2 or 3 years ago, he really did seem to have his Dolph, Jimbo and Kearney to give them noogies and purple nurples. I don’t see that as much anymore.
2) Some issues evolve…..three or four years ago I used to get savaged for suggesting that Ayaan Hirsi Ali was a pretty shitty human being….now it seems a lot of the “regulars” have come around to that same recognition. I’ve seen that with other issues, mostly regarding class and intersectionality (Charlie Hebdo is a good example), where early venom eventually alchemizes into a mutually respectful difference of opinion.
3) The emerging acceptable standards against able-ism are not necessarily well-known outside of a fairly narrow swath of the progressive blog-o-sphere. So when a commenter says “Sarah Palin is blind to the needs of the working poor”, or “Mitt Romney is tone-deaf to XYZ”, or “Rush Limbaugh is a big fat moron”, or “that Supreme Court decision was soooo lame”, I think some of the regulars might pause before launching into attack mode, and consider whether the commenter is actually a nice person on their side. Gentle corrections to poor word choice? Yes, absolutely. Attacking the commenter as an evil hater of differentially abled people? It just seems like too much of a “Gotcha” game. I see a whole lot of regulars using terms like “Third World”, that are completely unacceptable to the Anti-Developed victims of colonialism and imperialism, but it what they’re saying is supportive, that’s rather the point.
4) The “Reply” option would be helpful. Then it centers a specific disagreement (or agreement) onto its particulars, and doesn’t unnecessarily de-rail any larger theme. I’m sure there’s a reason PX removed it a couple of years back, but I miss it.
5) Once a comment thread gets into three digits or so, I feel it’s unfair to insist that a person read every single previous comment. If I think I have a reasonable point to make, and it hasn’t been made in the first few hours of commenting, I don’t think it’s rude or presumptuous to bother making it.
6) Some of the vitriol over block-quotes and “citation please” are plainly intended to stifle conversation, not encourage it. If I repeatedly claim some absurd fact, then sure, demand I provide evidence, but I frequently see regulars here getting all huffy over Chicago Rules Of Style equivalents, that the vast majority of humankind, not to mention regulars on other blogs, haven’t a clue about. I must note that nobody EVER demands block-quotes or “citation please” from commenters they agree with.
If you go with your gut, the result will be a load of poop.
If you formulate a question carefully and study it with science, you may learn something interesting, even if you don’t meet the intended goal.
But I am not a scientist, so until you dig up a social scientist for some real advise, here are some more unfounded speculations to add to the pile.
One of the important problems, as I see it, is that all the regulars and most anybody likely to be interested in the topics common to pharyngula has probably had so many rough encounters with people arguing in bad faith that they have developed a strong habit of predicting bad faith based on a few key phrases found in the first 10% or so of any comment – thus, the assumption of bad faith is often reached before the majority of a comment is even considered.
I feel like I have seen that phenomenon develop on practically every blog I read which blogs about anything controversial.
That’s why I intersperse my blog reading with lots of paleontology blog reading – there just not that many strongly emotional and damaging controversies around paleontology, so the phenomenon has not occurred on any paleontology blog I read regularly, making it a necessary relief to read them.
I am extremely skeptical of the potential to make a controversial blog simultaneously a safe space, for anyone, and yet also welcoming to arbitrary strangers. If you discuss controversial topics, you will attract a high portion of people who come precisely because they intend to argue in bad faith. Therefor it is probably not feasible to make it a safe space without first being highly selective about what comments are allowed to appear in the first place.
For a safe space, if a comment is not on a short, carefully maintained list of people who have a record of demonstrated good behavior, it should not be posted at all until someone with known good judgment can review it carefully.
Furthermore – the moderation queue needs to prioritized according to occurrence of known trigger phrases, so that moderators read comments which do not contain known trigger phrases first, and are thus more likely to give such comments due consideration before deciding to enable a comment to post.
I could go on. That’s not really enough, but it would be a good start.
Ophelia Benson:
It is worth remembering that those of us who say this are ourselves often still enthralled by our own privileged delusions which we have not yet recognized. Someday, we will learn, we hope.
But I am speaking only of privileged delusions. Privilege itself, often cannot be given up. Only the delusions which come with it can be unlearned.
I have been reading along, and was trying in vain to short circuit the t-dome conversation that got shut down due to excessive nastiness. (it is the thread previous to the current skull and bones, for anyone who wants to check it out) It isn’t the first time I have tried to intervene in what I perceived as some pretty horrible behavior on the part of regulars who I generally agree with and respect. The awful Chris Clarke thread that caused him to leave is an example of the unjust pile on problem behavior. I think there has been much less of that particular issue because of that thread, which is sad. I wish there was a policy or group standard to call a time out on any discussion that is clearly devolving into petty, mean-spirited hostility. I will attempt to find a some good basic sources online, but one of the tenets of effective communication is to always be aware of the difference between assertiveness and aggressiveness. If your comments are intended to be hurtful, and serve no other purpose, they are aggressive/ hostile unhealthy communication. It is entirely possible to assertively have a healthy difference of opinion without hurtful insinuations as to other peoples motivations or moral character.
Paul K at #158
I recall, years ago, in an academic program that dealt largely with group dynamics, one professor said something like “Often just talking about the problem makes it go away.” (Take that as far as you want to.) What he meant by that is that (usually after a bit of rough-and-tumble “storming”) people develop a bit of meta-awareness of the problem and their own relation to it and can act differently with respect to it. I think something like that is going on here.
I’ll add myself to the group that joined with the intention of commenting regularly, but was perhaps a bit put-off by the amount of venom that I’ve seen in the comments section (justified or not). I’m a big boy and I don’t shy away from productive debate, but I really don’t enjoy reading sneering, self-congratulatory comments or personal attacks. No one has bothered me, and I’m not calling anyone out or insulting the community here, just adding my two cents.
As another long time lurker, I will add my experiences to the list. PZ’s blog has been important to me for a number of years, and I always read the comments section since it’s full of brilliant and often entertaining people. But it is a place that I dare not venture. I have commented two times that I can think of (under various names), though there are possibly others long in the past.
The first time I can recall, I commented out of general confusion regarding social interactions, because I do not understand them. Most of the replies were not offensive, nor were they helpful. They were mostly snide comments about how it’s not that hard to just go and talk to people. I can’t particularly remember why, but I recall the comments making me feel like I was wrong, and I should just apologize and disappear. Though I would like to mention that there was one “regular” commenter who was very helpful and made sense to me. The commenter was Azkyroth, and the comments led me down the road to eventually discovering that I am autistic. So thank you for that Azkyroth, you were a great help to me, though I never mentioned it. I, like many others in these comments, fled the thread not to return.
The other time was less successful. I had wanted to talk about a specific controversial issue with people here, because I respect their opinions. But I knew it could potentially be a problem given the nature of the subject, and I wanted to be able to talk about it as reasonably as possible. So I commented to ask if it was okay to bring up such an issue, and mentioned my concerns about doing so. Almost all responses told me that my speech patterns were reminiscent of a number of MRAs, trolls, etc and had warning bells going off in their heads. It made me feel very uncomfortable and unwelcome, so I dropped it and left.
Basically, in my few experiences commenting I have felt very foolish (though I’m sure that was not the intent) for things beyond my control. The first time, I felt foolish for not being able to talk to or interact with people, and most did not understand that these are things I do not understand and have great difficulty with. The second time, I felt foolish for the way I construct sentences, and like anything I may have said would not be taken on its own merit as I had already been associated with an unwelcome group before discussing.
I don’t know how to solve any issues there may be here. I will in general be too frightened to participated in a community with other people regardless of what changes are made, but I wanted to share how I felt about my experiences, in case they can help in some way.
@ Rise Kujikawa #176
I think that’s one of the most moving (and helpful) comments I’ve read on this—or any other—blog. Thank you for taking the time to share it.
@anbheal:
The dirty little secret is that if you make a point that hasn’t already been made, no one will know you didn’t read the whole thread.
Maybe we should create a community norm around this, but any time there’s a long thread and something has been dealt with above, I think the polite thing to do is point out that the new comment’s content has been addressed and give a name of a key player to search (or some other info/search term) that will enable the new commenter to find their answers.
**IF** at that point, however, the commenter insists that one replies to the new comment and refuses to read the previous comments addressing that idea, “read the fucking thread,” isn’t out of line.
Just in case some find it helpful–there is a cognitive bias that I think is relevant: it’s called Curse of Knowledge.
It can be really difficult, once you know a thing, to put yourself in the position of a person who does not know it–even when you were that person yourself not so very long ago. This is as true of social justice issues as it is of anything else.
Rise Kujikawa and quite a number of others who have posted to say simply why they don’t post – thank you.
(my apologies for not searching for everybody’s names; I’m thinking essentially of the many interested-but-mainly-or-wholly lurkers. fwiw, I don’t often post outside the Lounge or occasionally the place-formerly-known-as what is now the Mended Drum for some similar reasons)
*waves at Caine* Missed you too. I’ll pop by your place to comment shortly. First.
And wow. Yes, Giliell. You snatched the words out of my mind. I was struggling with how to describe the fact that it feels like a sandbox where people who really feel the same way most regulars/veterans do about issues get show down for chiming in. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy, as you said. I’ll admit cynically that I always expect this to happen when something becomes so cherished by a group of people: visions of how and why things should be like a) instead of b).
If I were a wee bit more cynical, I’d almost call the regular commentators part of the circus only for the reason that so many lurkers admit that they check PZ’s blog daily, avec or sans the comments depending on how busy I am IRL. But I won’t, since it seems everyone is aware there is a problem. And so far the conversation seems mainly civil. Yes, I like it here, lurk or no.
Yay! Constructive commentary!
re: not reading 100+ comments
In that case it should also not be expected* that people reply to those comments if the argument has already been raised or the question been answered. Other commenters are not free education tools and research assistants. If you don’t have the time to read the comments, fine, but it would be unfair to demand that others take the time to engage you.
*note I’m saying “expected”, not “allowed”. If people want to engage, fine. But since folks raised the point that they’re feeling ignored when nobody replies to their comment I think this is important, ’cause you can’t have your cake and eat it.
+++
Another thing:
Since old grudges came up in several ways during this discussion, I posted this idea in the Drum: You can request that somebody leaves you alone. They don’t reply to you or your arguments, you don’t reply to them or their arguments. If their argument is truly that bad, others will spot it as well. If they don’t, maybe your evaluation was clouded by the old grudge.
Pharyngula is one of my must-read blogs, and I always make sure to read the OP. The comments … not so much. When the main point of a comment section is to smack down trolls rather than have an interesting, substantive discussion, I tune out pretty quickly. And when the main point of the comments is to smack down trolls, you pretty much start finding them everywhere.
I think the best way to explain why I skip the comments is to offer an example:
In a discussion of an attack on a “Draw Mohammed” event, one commenter wrote:
which brought this response:
I’ll skip the more obvious points about tying the first comment to the murder of Sikhs being quite a stretch and working yourself into a froth in a fit of headgear-based outrage being a bit dopey. Instead, I’ll point out that the second commenter was just wrong–Some Muslims do wear turbans, and the turban is considered a tradition in Islam. Specifically, Shia religious scholars wear white (or in some cases black) turbans. (Covering your head by wrapping cloth around it is a pretty obvious idea, and, in fact, people in many different cultures wear “turbans.”) To the extent these scholars issue fatwas (judgements or interpretations) calling for the death of an author or preventing women from living their lives (each of which they’ve done) “bullies in white turbans” is an excellent description. And then there is “Do you mean a Keffiyeh?’ A keffiyeh is not particularly Muslim. It is worn by some Arabs–both Muslims and Christians–but has no religious significance, In the West, it is largely associated with the secular Palestine Liberation Organization. And, of course, most Muslims are not Arabs. If you are going to flame someone for ignorance, but do not even have the basic information about it that you could have learned by reading the Wikipedia article (Turban, Keffiyeh) on it, you need to take a good, hard look at what you are doing. (Sorry if I’ve gone on a bit long here–The point of this paragraph was not to discuss headwear, but to show that the second commenter was completely ignorant of a topic they purported to care deeply about.)
That comment is a bit of an extreme example, but I usually find something like it on those occasions when I do read beyond the OP, which reminds me why I normally give the comments a pass. I understand when someone in a nonprivileged group vents at ignorance about their group, but that is not what seems to be motivating the second commenter–They don’t appear to be either Muslim or Sikh but simply want to be outraged on someone else’s behalf. They don’t actually care enough about the particular issue–or the people involved–to learn anything about it, though.
PZ’s posts are knowledgeable and informative, enlivened by his own take on them. When he’s outraged by something, it spices up the post. The comments are too often all spice, no meat–or, perhaps, spice disguising rotten meat.
If I could offer some constructive advice–people should strive to be interesting, informative, and correct. Having a particular set of political beliefs doesn’t automatically give you superior knowledge or insight. Google topics you don’t understand particularly well before posting.
Another long-time reader and lurker here. I don’t generally comment because I always seem to be rather late to the party and am kind of obsessive about reading all comments before commenting. I also tend to select posts with a lot of comments if I’m looking for a way to kill some time.
When it comes to commenting, I’m my own worst enemy but at least I learn a lot!
So I caught up again.
It seems that the “attack the attitude, not the person, do not question motives and honesty unless you have evidence” pops up pretty often, so even if it is not written in the rules by PZ, perhaps it should be adopted by commenters themselves.
Now I understand what was meant when Chris Clarke left because the atmosphere here was “taking a toll on his soul”. And I must add, that on reflection I noticed this myself. Although I mostly only read comments (for reasons previously stated), and although I usually am pretty charitable and do not call people names, reading Pharyngula has slightly warped my perception of “normal” discourse and in retrospect I lost some of the patience I previously had and I got more snarkastic. It might be a case of correlation without causation – after all, I aged in the meantime as well – but it might not.
For me, if a few years ago my honesty was not brought into question simply because I did not understand some things that were considered trivial by regulars (like the difference then between “The Lounge” and “The Zombie Thread”, I might not be subsequently afraid to ask. And perhaps I would learn some things a little faster. I learned them still, when someone else got chewed on. I simply often had to wait untill someone says something clueless in order for me to get the clues I needed for further reading.
Last but not least – I learned about the concept of “othering” from commentariat at Pharyngula. My understanding of the concept leads me to conclude that calling people holding dissenting opinions (whether clueless, awfull, malicious or combination thereoff) “chew toys” is othering too. To use it descriptively in retrospect might initially have had some poetical value as a metaphore, but when it became a meme, it became a problem. It became to be a label that intentionally dehumanizes the dissenters into objects and as such its purpose – and effect – was to reduce the empathy and charitableness of commenters.
Perhaps the “tit for ocasional two tats” strategy should be kept at the back of the mind of everyone around here. After all, we are not in competition and people perusing the stragegy can – and with high probability will – meet the tentacle wielding banhammer.
I’m reading and processing a lot in here.
For now for anyone wondering about creating habits this might help.
How Long to Form a Habit?
Wow, I’m honestly surprised to see this conversation.
I’ve been lurking here for years, after getting completely savaged in the comments. I like savage comments. I join some forums just for the drama, and that’s a big part of why I started following Pharyngula in the first place (apart from the atheism). However, I rapidly found myself surrounded by what felt like in-group/out-group warfare. It was not just dramatic, it was actively distasteful and off-putting. I stopped reading comments here completely, and stick to the posts.
I’m happy this is being discussed now.
Personally, I don’t care if a small group of people is elevated above the others, if their job is to moderate and they moderate effectively.
RE: not reading 100+ comment threads
I try to at least skim the threads, so that I have an idea of what was said by whom. Failing that, I’ll use CTRL-F, and check for some keywords on the topic I want to bring up. If I find something, I’ll address it/build on it/attack it as I feel is warranted.
For instance, I searched for the word “charity,” and I haven’t seen anyone write anything along the lines of my next point, though if I remember right some of it was addressed in the last thread.
—
RE: charity
I think there are two types of charity. The first is about intent: if a person writes something that appears wrong/contentious/aggressive/etc, do we assume that’s an accurate reflection of their intent, or do we give benefit of the doubt and give them a chance to explain? This is the point of the “three post rule,” at least in my estimation: assume goodwill for a set period of time/posts.
The next type has to do with addressing ambiguity in our opponents arguments. If there are several plausible interpretations of an argument, we shouldn’t be assuming the worst possible argument, even if the best one is still wrong, unless we have good reason (e.g. they’ve made this argument before and we already know where it’s going). We generally don’t have any good reason to assume the worst of the newbies, because they are, by definition, new and unknown.
—
That seems really obvious in hindsight. I’m embarrassed I missed it.
[@ Jacob Schmidt #188
I was just about to post this comment when I saw yours about charity. I’ve been interpreting “charity” throughout the comments as very similar to “provisionalism.”]
Just to toss this out there: here is a link to “Gibbs’ Six Characteristics for a Supportive Climate” (the specific document is apparently written for educators but the concepts are applicable to groups, generally).
I think the provisionalism vs. certainty characteristic is particularly powerful in this context. (Provisionalism means a kind of open-mindedness, investigating issues, problem solving, genuinely searching for information and data. Certainty is more conclusory.) I interpret some of what people are mentioning—the “mind-reading,” trip mines, the misattributions—as being more on the “certainty” rather than “provisional” side of things. (It might also be on the evaluative, rather than descriptive, side, another pattern.)
According to the chart at the link, a supportive group is characterized by provisionalism, rather than certainty. That doesn’t mean that someone can’t be “certain” of something (and be absolutely right)—it’s not a point about one’s own knowledge or perception. It’s more about how members of the group hold that certainty, if any, “in suspense,” to invite and test hypotheses—even about what a person might have meant in making a statement—not only because it probably leads to better results, but possibly just because provisionality does create a supportive climate.
(The other patterns mentioned in the linked have varying degrees of applicability as well, I think.)
Just for you.
And this, too.
Thanks for the intro, sayamika.
sayamika
As a long-time lurker, you know where the Lounge and
TZTandThunderdomeMended Drum are at.Please come on over.
Not having threaded comments makes it hard to ignore off-topic threads, and if you don’t read until the end of the day it’s very easy for someone to think you’re replying to something you’re not replying to. It’s also hard to figure out if what you have to say has been said already.
Also, calling someone an “asshole” or an “asshat” or any other insult should not be allowed. If someone says something you disagree with, then respond to the content without insulting the person. Presumably that’s the purpose of a comments section – to comment on the topic.
When you have sunk to the level of insulting another person you are no longer engaged in discourse or debate. That’s why I haven’t posted here in a long time and advise others to avoid the place — discourse too often gets lost in the dust.
p.s. I haven’t been here enough to know how many actual trolls show up vs. how many ordinary posters are being mistaken as trolls, but the best way to invite trolling is to have a group of posters who are easy to set off. No troll will waste his/her time on people who can’t be predictably riled up. I used to be a mod in the old iidb, in the morality area, and trolls didn’t bother us much despite our section including so many hot-button issues. We actually kept things civil and had few flame wars. We were well prepared with counter-arguments for inflammatory posts and we used them. If you don’t take the bait you won’t have a problem with trolls.
Okay, apologies if this or similar has already been said (I often come into threads late, and I don’t have time to read it all, hence why I comment so rarely, but I feel it’s worth it this time). If I could recommend one guideline, it would be this:
Comment as if you’re speaking to a person sitting across the table from you.
This is about civility only, not about, say, courage to speak up, or whether or not you’re “out” in real life. Keep in mind it’s another person on the other side of the internet; the fact that you’re speaking in text doesn’t make incivil words any less hurtful.
Eg., if you’re talking with someone you barely know in a bar, and they say for instance, “Boy, X is really lame, right?” You could:
A. Chew them out for their casual ableism.
B. Mention that “lame” is actually ableist, and possibly explain why.
C. Ignore it.
Ideally, option B would be best. I think keeping the person you’re talking to in mind would help push people toward that option when appropriate. Of course, it isn’t always appropriate. Someone who drops the N-word in their first comment isn’t likely going to respond positively to a polite education on the matter, so there’s no point in bothering.
(And continuing this metaphor, I’m now the guy who hasn’t been paying attention to what anyone’s said, but thinks what he has to say is worth everyone else listening to him. Um… sorry. I’ll try to read comments later.)
I guess I’ll add to the “rarely comments” list. I have read here (and at sciblogs) for years, but only rarely comment and almost never on topical posts. I have always read the comments though, and from that I learned a lot about many “SJW” topics, or even just how to debate productively. However, lately I skim more than I read because it also seems to me that the same things are said by the same people over and over again. I see less productive discussion and a lot more confirmation of already held ideas. So while I still read PZ’s posts for ideas/information, I get less out of the discussions. But, I also quit frequenting certain forums that helped me to find PZ for the same reason. That may just be a function of already agreeing or being familiar with the ideas.
As to why I don’t comment, I think most everyone else has summed that up. I often start to write a post and then just close the window without posting. This happens for a few reasons, often someone else has already posted much of what I wanted to say or else I know someone will so I just don’t bother.
The bigger one though is that I don’t have the time necessary to fully attribute my ideas, and this is important because the first time I posted here I got called on failing to post references to my ideas basically, not in a mean way but I know the drill here and if I’d continued without digging up references I expected to get chewed up (it was really minor too). Regulars rarely do this or need to because everyone is already familiar with their ideas giving them a shortcut. This just means I feel generally that I lack the time necessary to become known within the commentariat to get that shortcut. I also cannot be around to keep discussing the way I see most people do, so sometimes I think about making a comment and realize I just can’t discuss it right then anyhow. Also, I’m just shy.
The last one though is the format. I find it difficult to follow discussions or continue discussions here in the way I can on discus or a forum. So I just give up sometimes, meaning what few posts I’ve made were probably hit and runs.
So I don’t have any great ideas for making this better, but as someone else had suggested collecting data points there’s mine (and I will actually post it too). But I still enjoy the blog, and I have learned a lot.
I always surf along well behind the current post, because Pharyngula is a delicious place of sanity and interest for me, essential entertainment during my work day, so I never want to get to the first post and run out of blog to read. Which is one reason I very seldom comment, because posts are days old by the time I get there, and no one is reading any more. I wouldn’t ever comment without reading all the comments first, and that delays me even further. Also I most always agree with the general opinion so have nothing to add that hasn’t been said better, and my anecdata are not important.
But I have been lurking here for at least 6 years and I’ve learned a great deal; I like to think that the words of Pharyngula regulars and unregulars have made me a “better person”, made me think better, and made me better able to argue for causes I hold dear (pretty much the same causes Pharyngula holds dear). The regulars may all feel that they’re still thrashing the same points over and over and no progress is being made, but personally I think I see changes in attitudes slowly spreading. Of course there are still deep pits of trollage (youtube, yahoo). But people today are more forward in calling out misogyny, racism, toxic religion, etc, as sources of current evils, they are better prepared to mock eg. creationism and climate change denialism with solid argument and evidence, and they show lower tolerance for trolling, abuse, ableism, threats, safe-space violation, and all sorts of undesirable behaviour that used to permeate the internet unchallenged and unrestricted. You guys ARE making a positive difference.
But I did rather like the blog more back in the old days, when the better sorts of trolls came here to argue their ideas – creationists, libertarians, anti-choicers, the dense and priviliged, people who were prepared to write out long ranty illogical screeds full of “data” and “arguments” and “logic”. Great fun! But history changes and current topics change; this blog is not here for me to amuse myself reading finely-crafted and scientifically aware take-downs of silly claims about the age of the earth, it’s about whatever PZ thinks is important today.
What the regulars might not realise though, is that while you guys don’t know me at all (nor any of the other lurkers – isn’t it 80,000 views per day?), I know you. Your attitudes, opinions, stories and techniques are very familiar to me; I’ve watched you and learned from you for 6 years now. I can recognise some regulars by the style and content of their comments without glancing at the nym, and the ones who go off predictably and often inaccurately were beginning to seem tiresome, excessive and unhelpful.
If I made a comment that was orthogonal to the general opinion, I can predict to which regulars’ comments I’d be making the following replies:
A) _____, I can by no means say that I agree with your words, but I’ve learned from watching you deal with others here that that might not say anything good about me. I don’t yet think that I’ll come to agree with you after thinking about this for a couple of days; my opinion will always be my own, but I’ll give it a go.
B) Fuck off, ____.
C) ____, I haven’t answered your comment because I have no idea what your words mean. Even googling a couple of them didn’t help. I’m going to need a translator.
In other words, I guess this is what PZ is getting at – how to reduce the number of comments to which one sincerely needs to reply ‘Fuck off’.
Now I’m so far behind the front end of the blog that PZ will never see this, unless –
PZ PZ PZ!
Let’s see if that does the trick :)