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879. CalGal - 2/22/2000 3:28:59 AM

I'm not obfuscating. I assumed it was a given we are talking about insulting, etc.

If Cig says he's in favor of single payer and I say, that's all very well for you to want everyone to pick up your ALS bill, is that an insult? Harassment? A threat? Or a rebuttal?

880. Seguine - 2/22/2000 3:32:21 AM

"On your proposed policy, it seems like a lot of work to discern the abuse angle."

Less so than the current rules (see item 3 and its non-explanation), which are not even bounded by the personal info criterion.

881. Dantheman - 2/22/2000 3:35:24 AM

Seguine,
To take another example which occurred some time ago, in the middle of a discussion with Ace, I told him to go back to abusing plaintiffs. That can be taken as insulting (and was meant to be), and was based on information posted suggesting that he is an insurance defense lawyer. Would it be permitted under your rule?

882. CalGal - 2/22/2000 3:36:34 AM

If someone is being abusive of another person, why should it matter whether or not they use personal information (revealed online) to do it? Why is it any worse to call someone a lousy mother than it is to call someone a skank or a whore? Abuse is abuse. If a person reveals information about themselves, they have to expect it might be referenced in ways they'd rather it not. If the information is used in a way that is particularly abusive above and beyond the mention of the information itself, then it's abusive and can be handled as such. Abuse is, by definition, vague. That gives wabbit plenty of wiggle room.

I agree with Indy. If you don't mention it here, I'd like to think we protect it 100%. If you do, then you have to figure it's on you.

If there is enough desire to make this forum a nicer, less abusive place, then I think we can do that without singling out one particular type of insult.

883. CalGal - 2/22/2000 3:38:28 AM

Less so than the current rules (see item 3 and its non-explanation), which are not even bounded by the personal info criterion.

I don't understand. It's no work at all, now. Wabbit makes the call--or the thread host does. There is no attempt at all to define abuse. That is deliberate.

884. 109109 - 2/22/2000 3:54:01 AM

Seg

Yea, but understand, I think that problems stick out like sore thumbs, and the Mote manages to react (sometimes with the speed of a turning Lusitania, to be sure) based less on the the language than on the specifics, and that the folks in the know do it well.

How about this:

It is a violation of Mote policy to reveal a poster's name, likeness, address, phone number, private email address, and other such information. Additionally, if you abuse someone with private information, you'll be dealt with. That said, you cannot divorce who you are from what is posted, and we don't live in plastic bubbles, and we are human, and all circumsatnces are different . . . so be warned.

885. PelleNilsson - 2/22/2000 4:05:28 AM

It would seem to me that Niners Message # 865 substantially supports my Message # 835. We can write up pages of rules but when the shit hits the fan it is always a question of judgement -- by the hosts, by the moderator, by the community at large.

I would like to see a moratorium on this discussion which has become too heated and too much driven by rancor.

At the same time I would like to say that I have a modicum of understanding for those who see a cabal at work in here. In situations like this I can post until I fall down with exhasution without eliciting a reply. I can never really understand, because I'm not American.

886. CalGal - 2/22/2000 4:13:42 AM

Pelle,

Are you saying that people have been ignored in this discussion? I didn't respond directly to your posts, but that's because I agreed with them without comment, and I didn't think you'd want to be added to my cabal.

887. Indiana Jones - 2/22/2000 4:19:22 AM

Pelle: I also agreed with my fellow Bernese Mountain dog. I don't know if it's American nature or not, but I tend to post more when I disagree. (Except for my occasional "megadittos.")

I especially say less when I agree with someone while others are saying, "We're talking too damn much about this."

888. Indiana Jones - 2/22/2000 4:22:10 AM

BTW, would someone help me revive Pelle from his posting "collapse"?

889. PelleNilsson - 2/22/2000 4:35:30 AM

Matbe I'm too sensitive.

890. PelleNilsson - 2/22/2000 4:36:01 AM

Maybe ...

891. PincherMartin - 2/22/2000 4:37:02 AM

Pelle --

We can write up pages of rules but when the shit hits the fan it is always a question of judgement -- by the hosts, by the moderator, by the community at large.

This, and Niner's point in the first paragraph of Message # 884, is similar to the point I made earlier this morning.

It ain't the rules -- either their lack of clarity or anything else about them.

If anything, the people who have been in charge --both here in the Mote and at the Fray -- were too sensitive and polite in discharging their responsibilities.

What we need more than debate or a new charter is somebody's disembodied head stuck on a pole at the Mote Gate, with the warning "Beware, all ye who enter."

892. Seguine - 2/22/2000 4:43:20 AM

CG: "If Cig says he's in favor of single payer and I say, that's all very well for you to want everyone to pick up your ALS bill, is that an insult?"

Are you really going to claim you don't recognize it as such? Frankly, it is exactly this sort of line-toeing that I think ought to be addressed in the RoE. My proposal does so. Just as, if you're not sure where you learned "private" info you shouldn't disclose it here, if you're not sure your repetition of "personal" info is merley a rebuttal and not an insult, DON'T DO IT. For if Wabbit thinks it insulting, then under my proposal she may use all means at her disposal to ensure that you cease insulting others with their personal information. Under the proposed new guideline, you would have been advised and should know better. The "abuse" standard is that much clearer for everyone.

DMan: "To take another example which occurred some time ago, in the middle of a discussion with Ace, I told him to go back to abusing plaintiffs. That can be taken as insulting (and was meant to be), and was based on information posted suggesting that he is an insurance defense lawyer. Would it be permitted under your rule?"

Sadly, no. But I trust you'd be capable of exacting as much pain without announcing what he does for a living.

People, this place needn't have the climate of a high school playground to remain lively and amusing. I'm suggesting we promote ourselves to frat house status (which would make us mere college sophomores). I'm frankly astounded that anyone believes this should be more difficult than attempting to ride herd on the present situation.

Then again, perhaps some are simply unwilling to give up some corner of the open definition of "abuse".

893. CalGal - 2/22/2000 4:55:28 AM

Are you really going to claim you don't recognize it as such?

As an insult separate and distinct from Cigarlaw, you're an asshole who has no business posting on health care? Yes. If Cig doesn't want his illness to be an issue, he can not mention it online. If someone is unpleasant to Cig or mocking his illness directly and wabbit thinks it is abusive, I would support her deletion of those posts. I would not consider it a misuse of personal information, but an abusive post.

Frankly, I don't see how anyone can ride herd on determining what information that is already available can and can't be used.

Most forums say that you own what you write. I believe that this is at the heart of the Mote as well. Your policy gives people a pass to release what personal information they want, and then complain when it isn't used to the purpose they intended.

I also don't see why you think that the present situation is so difficult to "ride herd" on. We've only had a very few privacy violations, and there haven't been any situations of unusual abuse that I remember.


Then again, perhaps some are simply unwilling to give up some corner of the open definition of "abuse".


Why cast aspersions on motive? Why not figure people just disagree with you?

894. Seguine - 2/22/2000 4:57:56 AM

In an unrelated matter, but probably apropos of this thread:

It turns out that real life obligations and opportunities have doomed any likelihood that The Sun's Eye will continue to be published in its present form. The site will eventually be archived in full, at which point CoralReef or I will advise folks in the Mote, but for now TSE should by rights be unlinked.

We truly regret having to fold up before publishing our last planned project, a (leather-bound and scented?) version of Pelle and Uzmakk's hilarious Haysweep exchange. But in spite of the work done so far we must now admit, and with no small disappointment, that we just can't get to it.

Sincerest apologies from us both.

895. Indiana Jones - 2/22/2000 5:08:12 AM

Pincher: Good post. (I'm going to start trying to speak up more when I agree with people.)

An example of the "revealed" personal info thing happened to me recently on TableTalk. One poster there kept bringing up her father whenever McCain or Bob Kerrey was mentioned. Her father had been in the service, yada, yada, yada. Finally, I teed off on her father (not too bad...just said it was lucky for the Viet Cong her father wasn't involved in that war) and another poster said I was being horrible.

Tough. You don't hear me talking about my impending knighthood. I'd just rather not deal with all the baggage that goes with being a member of the royal family.

896. 109109 - 2/22/2000 5:08:38 AM

Seg

I'd be interested in assisting with any future venture, provided it is in some way related to porno.

897. AceofSpades - 2/22/2000 5:08:49 AM

Seg:

Your proposed rules say nothing much different than the current rules. I suspect you prefer them chiefly because they were written by yourself.

As to your unworkable "any personal information rule"-- Cal has it right. You're seeking to protect people from which they do not have any need nor desire of protection against.

You laugh off the "Niner's short," "Ace is a crappy lawyer" hypotheticals, saying "I won't get exercised about that." But if you're not going to get exercised about that-- that which your rules specifically seek to protect against-- they why bother?

You seek a change which you won't enforce? Why?

I don't like it when I'm called a "crappy lawyer" and yadda yadda yadda. It *is* used as an "attack," of course, and it *is* a use of personal information which I have revealed. I like Cellar's and Jade's witty epilepsy jokes even less.

But certainly I need no protection against people using such "personal information."

If you're not going to get "exercised" when such "personal information" is used to "attack" Niner, Cal, and I, when *will* you become exercised? Only when such information is used to attack yourself or people you have greater empathy for?

Not much of a rule, Seguine. If we're going to lay everything out all neat and legal, we'll have to include a sub-clause about information that causes some people to become "exercised."

898. AceofSpades - 2/22/2000 5:09:00 AM



Perhaps you meant: "Well, then such attacks will ALSO be banned, but who cares?"

But this is silly as well. I mock Niner's alleged (though very borderline) shortness because, you know, I can't just bust on him for being a knife-fighting taco bender all day long. I don't think I'm hurting Niner by calling him R2-D2. In fact, I sort of think it turns him on.

So why ban something which the alleged victim doesn't mind?

Perhaps you will suggest that shortness attacks on Niner won't be banned because Niner won't complain, and a complaint is necessary.

But one of things we were trying to avoid was such a victim-subjective regime, whereby the thinnest-skinned among us call for (and are granted) suspensions and deletiongs galore, but the tougher-skinned must just grin and bear it.

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