2018-10-11 09:23:09

Moderation!

For a while the moderation team have been concerned about Ironcross's behaviour, in particular his  habit of losing his temper and launching rather unpleasant personal attacks on members.
He's received several warnings, and the matter was addressed with him privately.

Unfortunately, it has finally got to the point where a ban was necessary, therefore he's been banned from the forum for three months.

Please let this be a note to members.

There has been a lot of negativity on the forum recently and not just from Ironcross.

Disagreements are fine, holding different opinions to others is also fine, but there is a distinct line between

"I don't agree with you because"

and "That is stupid you stupid idiot!"

Sadly Ironcross crossed that  line once too often, and this was the result. So please everyone else take notice.

We can and will ban members if it becomes necessary to preserve the harmony of this forum.

disagreeing is not a personal attack, you can agree with someone without forming a linch mob to go after people who hold a different position, and just because a person disagrees with you about any given subject that doesn't mean they're a lesser species, or that they hold negative opinions about everything!

The internet these days is getting far more factional than it used to, with people ever more quick to form given mobs more than willing to go after the mob on the other side just for disagreeing with them, or still worse, go after one member of the opposing mob en mass.
Well we won't have that sort of thing here!

Most people on this forum are a minority, and everyone on this forum enjoys audiogames, which is after all the main reason we're here.

So, unless we want to see a few extra bannings, might I suggest people try and treat other forum members with respect.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 09:38:16 (edited by Dan Gero 2018-10-11 09:45:15)

@Dark Wait, what? OK, I know that me and him got into it a while ago, but does that really matter? As far as I'm aware he hasn't done anything recently, and by recently I mean the past week or so. He did insult me a few times but I wasn't exactly innocent either, so shouldn't I get banned or at least get a mod warning? I'm not saying I want to get banned, but I feel that since we were both getting angry at each other it would be more appropriate to punish us both in some way. Personally I feel that I wasn't as much in the wrong as he was, but that may be my bias talking and I may have been a lot worse than I think I was. Also, despite my best judgement I kept looking at the flame wars going down on the forum, which along with other things in life has been causing me a lot of stress, which I'm sure is not very healthy. I probably need a break from the forum for a while, to insure that I don't force unneeded stress upon myself. I've been told that I get so stressed over things that I could wind up having a heart attack at a young age if I'm not careful.

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2018-10-11 10:38:05

@shotgunshell, no it wasn't any arguement he had with you on this occasion, it was his reaction in post 69  Caccio's  concerning his ban from WEBl which was the tipping point. I will say given the flame wars you  mentioned, the mods have been looking at  behaviour of users a little more carefully, and unfortunately Ironcross has, as I said crossed the line a little too often, for example you recall some of his posts in the Jaws/NvdA topic.

We did communicate with him privately and try and resolve the situation otherwise, since we wondered if there was a little more going on behind the scenes which we did not know about, but unfortunately it seems not, just a case of a temper running high, and this has unfortunately been the result.

Things have been getting waaaaay! too negative on the forum recently, with a lot too much bashing which has spiraled all too often into personal attacks, and while Ironcross has been one of the chief offenders, he is not the only one, therefore we ask users to please consider their behaviour on the forum a good bit more carefully in the future so that this sort of unpleasantness doesn't happen again.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 10:46:53

I will simply say that I entirely disagree with the mod’s choice here. Brandon didn’t break any forum rules. He had harsh wording in some of his posts, but nothing to warrenta ban. And let’s not leave the facts unmentioned, some of these people more than deserve a textual derailment every now and then.

I used to be a knee like you, then I took an adventurer in the arrow.

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2018-10-11 11:00:24

Site and forum faq wrote:

8: Am I allowed to disagree with other people on the forum?
Yep, go ahead, differences of opinion and good reasoned discussions are what this sort of community is all about. The only rule is keep it civil, and keep the discussion about the issues rather than getting personal.
Saying that you think such and such a view is wrong, or that you don't agree because of so and so is fine, but saying that everything a person says is terrible, calling a person an idiot or something more insulting or saying a certain person is just useless is not.


Please note there is nothing in this rule concerning anyone "deserving" anything.

One of the major jobs of moderators on this forum is to impartially make  judgements about the quality of a given discussion, rather than its content on one side or another. If we started saying  person x "deserves" being insulted and person Y can do as they like, because we happen to agree with them we'd  quickly descend into factionalism and anarchy.

Indeed, Connor's above post is a very good example of how to disagree gracefully.

Think of it this way. If your having an argument with someone, punching them is going to get you in trouble with the police,

"sorry your honour but he deserved it for being a total moron"

Really won't wash in front of most judges.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 11:04:13

Yeah, I have to agree here, the forum in general has gotten incredibly toxic of late. Still not gamefaqs levels of terrible, but yeah. I've even been guilty myself of being a bit negative here. I think people might just be frustrated with the way the world is going, I know I am.

Take care, it's a desert out there.

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2018-10-11 11:09:42

Just noticed this topic. Check out post 73 of the joke moderation topic for my view on this.

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2018-10-11 11:20:40

@@DarfVader, it was the remark about "blindy excuse shit" 

Up   until that point,  the topic remained  heated but comparatively civil, that was however the point where lines were crossed, and given Ironcross passed warnings this was the consequence.

As I said in post five, it doesn't matter that you disagree with someone, much less what you or anyone else think someone "deserves", what matters is how opinions are expressed.

I will say this post on its own would not have usually had this consequence, usually it would've resulted in a mod warning, but given that Ironcross was already on code red in terms of behaviour this was unfortunately the result.

I'll also add that this wasn't  my decision alone either, hence why the topic was temporarily closed for review, nor was it a decision I took lightly, actually I'm really not happy that the forum has got to this level of negativity and these sorts of draconian measures have become necessary.

Maybe its as stirlock said, just that the world generally is getting pretty harsh and negative and full of mobs on one side or another who are incapable of being reasonable.

Either way, I hope this topic will be a wake up call to some members and so people will think before breaking out the flame throwers in future.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 13:29:22

still can't understand what was wrong with ironcross's posts, didn't expect this from the mods here

2018-10-11 13:40:35 (edited by JaceK 2018-10-11 13:43:27)

If anything I'd argue Caxio should be be dealt with as wel for his attiude in the exact same topic. Said attitude comes off as overly hostile and downright arogant and abrasive. THat IMHO is far worse than one post telling him to stop his 'blindie excuses shit'...which was the result of numerous Caxio posts that led up to that point and Iron losing his temper and basically saying what what people were thinking. If anything I'd argue to unban Iron but give him a warning for it. Iron was simply going of of what Caxio was putting out there. Caxio was contributing far more to the toxic nature than Iron was, far as the topic went. Caxio after all started off swinging at a game without providing any proof besides his word, no logs, no other side to balance it out then was hostile to people, myself included when questioned. THat is far, far more toxic than one post that may have, depending on interpretation been badly worded but frankly that was going to happen sooner or later given how heated things were getting in the thread. From my point of view I was trying to defuse things but Caxio was only interested in, and I MIGHT be wrong, continuing the entire argument and belittling anyone else who was, in his view, 'wrong'. He in my view deserves a talking to by the mods about his attitude for blasting another game, for not listening and oh by the way carrying on the anger when people were trying to defuse the situation.

Har, Game FAQs....wasn't ever that bad. Try the League of Legends forums or Youtube comments if you want toxic.ne

EDIT: I think what set Iron of was Caxio bringing disability into it and flat out ignoring what Dark told him, then carrying on playing the 'I am a blind disabled guy' card. Which in various ways he was told wouldn't work...and carried on doing it. Iron wasn't having any of it and went off on Caxio. I'm not saying if Iron was right or wrong. I'm saying I get why Iron lost it and called him out on using his disability as an excuse to blast games and belittle others who have oposing viewpoints.

Warning: Grumpy post above
Also on Linux natively

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2018-10-11 13:53:51 (edited by Orko 2018-10-11 14:03:11)

As the rules of one forum I used to visit put it, "Discuss the topic, not the person."

I have nothing against Ironcross regardless of what he might say or think, but I have seen him push the boundries of civility a number of times, and just knew that unless he toned it down, he would pay a price.

I would propose to those of you who think that banning him was a bit much, that that is probably because you've never been the target of his often poisonous tongue. I have, and he's been handed moderation warnings several times. I have no opinions about whether three months is too much or appropriate, just that something needed to be done.

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2018-10-11 13:53:52

Ironcross has been a valued contributor with a tendency to occasionally toe the line. It's that latter point, not (just) the argument with Caccio, that informed this decision.
If it were about that, well, the topic in question was about 10-day bans, wasn't it?
I'd say that 3 months is a bit much. A week or two, maybe. IDR how often there's a shorter sentence, but I would reserve bans lasting 30 days or more for big, obvious problems, and 1-30 days for "No, seriously, knock it off" type things between warnings and long-term bans.

看過來!
"If you want utopia but reality gives you Lovecraft, you don't give up, you carve your utopia out of the corpses of dead gods."
MaxAngor wrote:
    George... Don't do that.

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2018-10-11 14:27:20

Hi.
Well, as much as I don't want to say it, it was probably a good idea to take Ironcross out of traffic for a little while. Yes, he is a good and inteligent contributor to the forum with the tendency to step over the line a bit.
But saying that his moral standards are somewhere hidden and directlyy telling someone that he could make his life a living hel, as seen in the pol for training material topic is in my eyes something the moderators should react to, what they now did.
I don't find the banning of 3 months to harsh or anything, I hope he learns from his mistakes eventually.

Greetings Moritz.

Hail the unholy church of Satan, go share it's greatness.

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2018-10-11 14:45:16

Orco's really one to talk, given that most of the time ironcross went off at him was due to shit he started himself. You wouldn't know that now... the guy abuses that delete button like it's going out of stile.

The lesson here for all is: Be as much of a dick as you like, just make sure you're back later to clean up before the mods sea!

Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.

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2018-10-11 15:45:23

Okay guys, just hold on. I wasn’t around to see the incident, but I do feel that three months was maybe a bit much. Maybe one month would’ve been ideal, maybe not. I, personally, feel that three months was maybe overboard. Just my opinion.

Hopefully, we'll get a fully accessible open world game someday.

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2018-10-11 15:47:40 (edited by Orko 2018-10-11 18:37:53)

Careful there, Exodus, your message treads dangerously close to the very reason Ironcross was banned, do you really want to join him?

I see nothing wrong with removing a message I posted that I later decide was a mistake. I guess I could just leave the message in place and just edit it to say "Deleted", but I prefer to just remove it completely. At least I am willing to go back and correct myself when it is warrented. Others here would just leave it, and like a bull in a china shop, watch the pottery fly.

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2018-10-11 16:37:09

I am finding myself rather disheartened by the fact that people seem to firstly misunderstand where the line between  attacks and strongly held views is, and secondly believe that just because a person holds an unpopular or even unreasonable opinion, if another person engages in a personal attack due to the opinion, that attack is somehow vindicated.

Again, I believe this is due to  standards of polite discussion on the internet declining and radical factionalism increasing.
To clarify however here is a brief and entirely made up example::

Bob: "swamp is a really stupid game. You can fight off zombies but if you die there is no consequences. Yes, some people go hardcore,  this should not be a choice, everyone should be hardcore and allowed to kill each other. Its only that swamp players are entitled blindies who can't cope with anything bad happening to their characters and want a save little  environment to play in. That is the only reason swamp is popular because people can't cope with the real world or a game with real challenge."

George: "what the hell do you mean? You lose a hole  bunch of stuff when you die, its hard getting experience, and anyway, plenty of mainstream games have options not to engage in pvp if people don't want to, so why is this a "blindy" thing as you put it?"

Bob: "It is a blindy thing because it is all about safety. Blind people are too used to having everything provided for them and limits removed. If blind people really want to play mainstream games properly  need less of this coddling, and more properly written games with permadeath and really tough difficulty."

George: "I just said, there are mainstream games without pvp options, why is pvp such a major thing? your not listening to my opinions here"

bob: "In swamp nothing bad does happen when you die, oh yes you have to get your stuff back and maybe kill more zombies, but as the game is so easy anyway   grinding is dull. Actually, I bet the developer of swamp just made the game that way so people can grind and grind in a safe environment whilst paying out money since the developer knew they were selling the game to poor little blindies"

George: "Bob for goodness sake! in swamp you do lose out when you die even if your not in hardcore. Plus, just because you find swamp easy doesn't mean everyone does, and there are other games with pvp options out there if you want them"

Bob: "But swamp is the most commonly discussed and most popular fps, which is why it should be a propper fps game with real challenge, not just a safe place for blindies to feel good about themselves"

Max: "bob, you are an idiot! why can't you listen to other people's opinions,  get off your fucking high horse for a second and stop calling everyone who disagrees with you blindies. Really do you know anything about mainstream games? Why don't you stop talking out of your arse or get off the forum"

In this case, max would get the warning. Bob holds a deeply unpopular, and erroneous opinion which he believes to the hilt and will not change his views despite being presented with counter examples, he likely gets on the nerves of everyone on the forum, especially those who enjoy Swamp, yet annoying as it might sound, Bob is not actually breaking the forum rules.

he's entitled to his opinion and entitled to express it. He did not personally attack anyone, his comments about "blindies" in the swamp community were generalised and not specific.
Max on the other hand, even though people would likely applaud his opposition to Bob's unpopular views is the one who stepped over the line and directly resorted to personal insults against Bob.

George Argued bob's opinion, and got exasperated (as he would), but remained civil in spite of the fact that even  he manifestly is getting somewhat annoyed at Bob.

This is the line between debate and attacks.

People are entitled to their opinions, unpopular as they might be, there is no rule that a person must change their opinions, neither does holding an unpopular view, or even an insufferably annoying view make anyone "deserving" of personal attacks.

I hope this clears up the mods position on the subject, and shows why the action against Ironcross was necessary in this case.

As to the time of Bann, a ban needs to be long enough to stick, and   in this case to clear the air.
I personally really do hope when and if Ironcross returns to the forum next year he will remember what has happened and continue his otherwise valuable contributions to the forum without his temper causing him to cross the line as unfortunately he has slightly too often.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 16:49:33

So now you made this topic, to let pepple post here, to disagree with you. Although i didn't see those posts from Yroncross, but i still think, that if you don't want others to say bad words, then for the sake of God, don't generate more arguments yourself!

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2018-10-11 17:01:05

I'm afraid master of death I'm not really sure what you mean.

I posted this topic to let everyone know what is going on, and yes, ere their opinions.
Thus far, none of the opinions, whether agreeing or disagreeing with the decision have been expressed with personal attacks, so what is the problem exactly?

If you have any doubts about what I mean by personal attacks, please see post 16 where I tried to explain the concept.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 17:02:26 (edited by Shadowcat 2018-10-11 17:04:05)

I personally have to disagree with this decision as well. Ironcross may hav a bit of a temper problem sometimes, but it's never completely unwarranted, usually he just says what people are thinking but won't say and actually still has a point to make. lol
But in all seriousness, I get where the mods are coming from... but direct, personal conflict is a part of life. You can always attempt to shield people from that, in this case the ban, but that leaves people off guard when something similar happens somewhere else, and nothing happens because the admins of said place prefer to stay hands off, and let discussions run their course unless it actually gets really, uber frickin' serious. But anyway, what's done is done, I guess.

"You know nothing of death... allow me to teach you!" Dreadlich Tamsin
Download the latest version of my Bokura no Daibouken 3 guide here.

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2018-10-11 20:13:51

No way. With all do respect I totally disagree with the decision.

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2018-10-11 20:23:55

I still don't understand why nobody has called me out yet. I know you're talking about a different topic but I'm talking in general. When all of that stuff was going down, I could have kept my mouth shut and stayed out of the topic, but I went after ironcross directly, calling him a keyboard warrior and other things like that. I still feel like my words to him were warranted because I was trying to stop him, but according to the forum rules I did cross the line a little bit.

Discord: dangero#0750
Steam: dangero2000
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2018-10-11 21:05:59

post 22: go delete the posts where you got out of hand, It'll be like it never happened! For bonus points, come back here and play the victim card. tongue

Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.

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2018-10-11 21:13:40

It is entirely probable shotgunshell that you crossed the line slightly at some point, I don't personally know which topic you mean. however, Ironcross has crossed it consistantly and frequently, in innumerable places and has been warned about that fact on previous occasions, hence this consequence.

People are free to disagree with the decision of course, that is fair enough.

One thing I will say though is that people must have noticed the general amount of negativity around on the forum lately, the tendency of topics to spiral out of control into flamewoars, the greater level of opposition to views that are perceived as unpopular, or people's habit of radically splitting into armed camps on given issues.

The fact we've finally  had to implement such extreme measures on this forum, whether people agree or not, shows that  are having a problem here.

Part of what has  this community what it is today has been the friendly atmosphere, people's ability to share different views, play games and in general cooperate with each other.
Recently, that good atmosphere has been turning extremely sour, and words like "clone", "entitled", "blindy"  been flying around waaaaay too often usually in an unpleasant way.

So, whether people agree with the decision or not, I will ask everyone to please think carefully about the attitude under which they post, the over all tone of any debate, and the fact that just because someone holds radically different views to you, or even is slightly annoying, they still deserve to be treated with respect, after all ,we are all still a minority interest in a large and mostly unfriendly world, and should be therefore more likely to cooperate or at least disagree gracefully, rather than initially begin any debate with the desire to knock each other down.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2018-10-11 21:29:53

You know something...and it's really, really simple...

You don't want drama or people to not be hostile to each other? Don't start drama. Seriously. It's.....that simple. If Caxio had kept his opinions to himself, no ban. If Orko didn't start things with Iron, and delete posts, and Iron didn't respond to that, no drama....I could go on. THat won't ever happen though given everyone has differing viewpoints and stances on what personal attacks are. It's like I call my closest friends bastards and assholes. Yet on here those would fall under personal attacks, but if I'm among close friends we'll all cal each other assholes, bastards, shitheads, etc. It's all about context and there is no single way one rule fits every single occasion. I've read some posts where it looks like somebody was being insulted but it later turns out both were joking around and I got that upon reading the post, whereas others may not...so no, a one size fits all rule won't work at all I feel.

Warning: Grumpy post above
Also on Linux natively

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