Moderation

It was but it's no more there. Thank you (and Bob)!

Always the solution proposed. Ignore. Turn the other cheek. An approach that burdens the victims (and innocent bystanders) while washing one’s hands of the perpetrators. Make the majority contort to avoid bad behavior.

Is your idea of a well-run public park one where visitors just avoid the steaming piles of excrement (dog, and otherwise) littering the walkways? Should nothing be done to control those producing said excrement? I presume the goal here is a welcoming community. One in which we can more-or-less roam freely.

A less stressful solution is that one can save themselves the bother and not visit this site at all. I deal with enough argument as sport in my professional and (sadly) personal life. I am speaking out assuming this is not what Bob, Alan and the community are aiming for.

(And no, I’m not new to the internet. My credentials, like those of many of my colleagues here, go back to USENET discussions. I’m tired, not naive.)

I do want to give credit where due. Things have seemingly improved in the last week or so. Two weeks(?) ago I was very close (on multiple days) to just throwing in the towel here. Not worth expending my energy, and a waste of my recreational free time, to be faced with the toxicity and negative vibes I was seeing in thread after thread in which I was participating. Threads that were home to productive, useful discussion and debate until one or two agitators joined.

For what it’s worth to the team, the site should be fun, useful, and yes, occasionally host to spirited debate. Multiple views encouraged. But not dodgeball, with a group of children who always aim for the crotch. Otherwise I’ll just spend my time elsewhere. That’s okay with me — but is that what we’re striving for?

I want to add one thing. For five years I was a member, and shop supervisor, of a local maker space, 200+ members, that successfully operated under one guiding principle…

Be excellent to each other.

I don’t agree that this view is misguided.

That is very similar to DPReviews

Rule 1 - Be Nice. There is no other rule policy.

How well did that work over there? :-D

jaberg also wrote: a load of stuff.

I knew it… a supervisor !
LOL

oh… I couldn't give two-hoots about dog litter in public parks.

That is the very thing I was addressing, along with Bob’s discomfort towards it.

In the case of our maker space those who couldn’t, or wouldn’t, abide by the policy were excused (or removed). It worked there. Setting the problem of specific moderator abuses aside, perhaps DPR was too tolerant of such behavior overall.

I’m advocating we don’t throw the baby away with the bathwater here.

An amazing post, coming as it does from a member who makes a practice of repetitive confrontational rudeness !!

Say, I make a post that doesn't have any upvotes, and a joker comes and downvotes it.

Yeah, if I could have a "down vote" this post would get it.

I remember being singled out, more than once, by a virtual crowd of "haters" and collecting a lot of down votes over at DPR. The problem with down voting is that it encourages negativity and generally bad behavior. The antidote that could be offered by up votes just isn't as effective. I don't think we should allow this site to become another social media cesspool.

I can remember when DPR introduced the up- and down thumbs. Soon the down-thumbs outweighed the up-thumbs by a large margin and they hasted to remove the down-thumbs.

@ArvoJ

If you find an ivory tower, let me know, I’m in the market for one...😎

I’m beginning to think that a lot of people here have led very sheltered lives !

If you are uber-sensitive to different views and opinions, then maybe online forums are not for you.
This is a global open forum, a broad church with many personalities… suck it up, or go mow your lawn. lol

nil desperandum