Bias on the European Union forum

O'Morris

Three of the four moderators on the European Union forum are strong supporters of the Lisbon Treaty. One of them has behaved in a way that removes any doubt about his bias against the no side of the debate. oscarBravo's permanent banning of FutureTaoiseach in this thread was such an obvious attempt to silence the views of the most articulate and informed advocate of a no vote on the forum that it hardly needs any pointing out.

I wasn't altogether surprised when it happened. I could see from reading through his posts over the last few weeks that the pro-Lisbon moderators saw FutureTaoiseach as a threat. It was obvious that they were just looking for an excuse to shut him up. I'm just surprised that they didn't have the patience to wait until they could find something more substantial than "soapboxing".

I'm sure oscarBravo will be able to justify his decision on the grounds that the banning came after repeated warnings. The question isn't really whether or not FutureTaoiseach's banning was justified though. The question is whether there was bias shown in how oscarBravo chose to apply the rules. Would FutureTaoiseach have been treated differently if he had been a yes voter? There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that he would have. The yes people on that forum get away with behaviour that's far worse than anything that FutureTaoiseach has been found guilty of and I don't think I've ever seen as much as a threat of a banning being issued against them. It seems to me that people who hold the same views as the moderators seem to be treated very leniently on that forum.

Can someone with the power to overrule oscarBravo's decision please review the banning and if you find evidence of bias can you please unban FutureTaoiseach?

Scofflaw

The issue is primarily soapboxing though, although FutureTaoiseach also appears to suffer from an unwillingness not to repeat proven untruths.

There are posters who engage with the other posters, who are there to engage in discussion, and there are people who enter the politics forum to simply repeat a position ad nauseam. The latter are a particular feature of the Politics Forum, especially around public votes, and are not welcome. They're a form of troll - the Politics Forum isn't a blog, or a political advertising site, or a policy think-tank - it's a discussion forum.

cordially,
Scofflaw

sceptre

From what I can see, FutureTaoiseach is repeatedly bringing up the example of Spain as a country that didn't benefit from passing the European Constitution and using that as evidence that there's no benefit in passing the Lisbon treaty.

I'm not going to get into a debate on this forum of the merits or demerits of either the constitution or the treaty (or indeed Spain) but it's been pointed out repeatedly that given that the former wasn't brought into effect, this argument doesn't follow basic logic, let alone common sense.

While the thing about common sense is that it isn't all that common, you can call it soapboxing, you can call it barracking, you can call it whatever you like but the fact of the matter is that he's repeatedly being disruptive on this one by acting the bollocks - regardless of whether he fails to see the problem with what he's doing or chooses not to see it, it's disruptive, repeatedly disruptive.

Regardless of his views on Lisbon or the most desirable colour of socks to wear, no team of moderators has the time to be policing that kind of repeated disruption.

That's a "no" then.

O'Morris

Scofflaw wrote:

The issue is primarily soapboxing though

I don't think it is primarily soapboxing. I think it's primarily that FutureTaoiseach was the most vocal and the most articulate advocate of a no vote on that forum and I think the pro-Lisbon moderators saw him as a threat. It's been obvious to me over the last few weeks from reading his posts that the moderators were out to get him.

On the question of soapboxing, I don't see how FutureTaoiseach could be any more guilty of soapboxing than you could be guilty of soapboxing. Both you and he feel strongly about the Lisbon treaty and both of you spend a lot of time and energy arguing your case on that forum.

I consider both of you to be valuable contributors to that forum and I would be as annoyed if an anti-Lisbon moderator had banned you for soapboxing as I am that a pro-Lisbon moderator has banned FutureTaoiseach for it.

Scofflaw wrote:

FutureTaoiseach also appears to suffer from an unwillingness not to repeat proven untruths.

Which proven untruths?

Scofflaw wrote:

There are posters who engage with the other posters, who are there to engage in discussion, and there are people who enter the politics forum to simply repeat a position ad nauseam.

By position, do you mean the position that we shouldn't vote yes to the Lisbon treaty?

I think if you read through FutureTaoiseach's posts you will see that he was heavily involved in discussions. His posts were always detailed and on-topic and most of the replies directed to him he followed up on. His posts always remained civil and polite and I never saw him engaged in the kind of personal abuse that many of his opponents directed at him. That doesn't seem to be me to be the behaviour of someone who wasn't interested in a discussion.

I honestly can't see how FutureTaoiseach's behaviour in that forum was any less exemplary than your behaviour has been. That's why I'm surprised to see you defending FutureTaoiseach's treatement at the hands of a moderator who is far less tolerant than you are.

Scofflaw wrote:

The latter are a particular feature of the Politics Forum, especially around public votes, and are not welcome. They're a form of troll - the Politics Forum isn't a blog, or a political advertising site, or a policy think-tank - it's a discussion forum.

And I think FutureTaoiseach was heavily involved in the discussions. If you read through his posts you'll see that the majority are replies to other people's posts.

sceptre wrote:

From what I can see, FutureTaoiseach is repeatedly bringing up the example of Spain as a country that didn't benefit from passing the European Constitution and using that as evidence that there's no benefit in passing the Lisbon treaty.

I think it's obvious the point he was making. He was ridiculing the lazy attempt by the yes side to try to link our economic recovery with a yes to Lisbon. There seems to be a view promoted by the yes side that merely voting yes to the treaty, independently of whether the treaty itself is a good thing, will send out the right kind of message and that that will be good for our economy. By voting yes to the EU constitution the Spanish electorate sent a message that they remain at the heart of the EU and yet that didn't seem to help their economy.

FutureTaoiseach never said that the yes vote caused the downturn in the Spanish economy. He merely pointed out that sending the right message through voting yes was in itself not enough to help the Spanish prevent a recession that has been as severe as Ireland's recession has been.

sceptre wrote:

I'm not going to get into a debate on this forum of the merits or demerits of either the constitution or the treaty (or indeed Spain) but it's been pointed out repeatedly that given that the former wasn't brought into effect

That's irrelevant. Regardless of whether it was brought into effect, by voting yes to the constitution the Spanish sent a clear message that they remain at the heart of the EU. If they had voted no they would have sent a different message and that might have had negative consequences for their economy. The Spanish voted yes and yet their economy went down the drains.

sceptre wrote:

Regardless of his views on Lisbon or the most desirable colour of socks to wear, no team of moderators has the time to be policing that kind of repeated disruption.

Disruption? If you want see examples of disruptive behaviour on that forum look at all the blanket accusations of lying that the yes side regularly level at the no side.

sceptre wrote:

That's a "no" then.

To the treaty or to FutureTaoiseach's unbanning?

Do you really think the disruption caused by mention of unemployment in Spain really justified a permanent banning? Why wasn't he just given a temporary ban rather than a permanent one?

sceptre

I don't know why you're debating the merits of either side of the debate here of all places but as I said I'm not going to.

O'Morris

sceptre wrote:

I don't know why you're debating the merits of either side of the debate here of all places but as I said I'm not going to.

I've no interests in debating the merits of either side of the debate on this forum. I was just trying to offer an interpretation of FutureTaoiseach's comment about Spanish unemployment to show why it wasn't as disruptive as you claimed.

sceptre

Fair enough, we're going to have to disagree then, decision stands until and unless he can work out something with the mods that banned him instead.

Scofflaw

O'Morris wrote: »

I don't think it is primarily soapboxing. I think it's primarily that FutureTaoiseach was the most vocal and the most articulate advocate of a no vote on that forum and I think the pro-Lisbon moderators saw him as a threat. It's been obvious to me over the last few weeks from reading his posts that the moderators were out to get him.

On the question of soapboxing, I don't see how FutureTaoiseach could be any more guilty of soapboxing than you could be guilty of soapboxing. Both you and he feel strongly about the Lisbon treaty and both of you spend a lot of time and energy arguing your case on that forum.

I consider both of you to be valuable contributors to that forum and I would be as annoyed if an anti-Lisbon moderator had banned you for soapboxing as I am that a pro-Lisbon moderator has banned FutureTaoiseach for it.

Which proven untruths?

By position, do you mean the position that we shouldn't vote yes to the Lisbon treaty?

I think if you read through FutureTaoiseach's posts you will see that he was heavily involved in discussions. His posts were always detailed and on-topic and most of the replies directed to him he followed up on. His posts always remained civil and polite and I never saw him engaged in the kind of personal abuse that many of his opponents directed at him. That doesn't seem to be me to be the behaviour of someone who wasn't interested in a discussion.

I honestly can't see how FutureTaoiseach's behaviour in that forum was any less exemplary than your behaviour has been. That's why I'm surprised to see you defending FutureTaoiseach's treatement at the hands of a moderator who is far less tolerant than you are.

And I think FutureTaoiseach was heavily involved in the discussions. If you read through his posts you'll see that the majority are replies to other people's posts.

I wouldn't disagree with that last - but imagine for a moment the situation where a group is debating the merits or otherwise of a particular car, and another person joins the discussion, insisting that the car in question is great because it can fly.

At what point do you say "well, look, I'm afraid we're trying to have a factual discussion here" and politely (or not so politely) ask them to either drop the flying angle or stay out of the discussion?

FutureTaoiseach is undoubtedly a committed poster. In certain respects he appears to be the sort of political poster we don't ever have enough of - passionate and engaged. But then there's his complete disregard for factual truth - not interpretation, but facts. You can't have a meaningful discussion about anything at all if the person you're discussing with isn't going to stick to even basic rules like 'facts are facts'. There's a reason the Creationism thread in the Christianity forum is over 10,000 posts long (at a post per year, that would already be longer than Earth's history according to one side of the debate), and goes round and round and round again, so that you can dip in any time you like without any feeling of having missed anything. That comes about because the Creationists ignore any inconvenient facts, and regularly move the goalposts. Outside that thread, which has a kind of raison d'etre all of its own, that's not a tolerable stance, because it reduces everything to mere wordplay and prolixity.

I've banned FutureTaoiseach myself on a couple of occasions (1-week bans) for simply stating completely and incontrovertibly false information and insisting it was true. If he won't accept that facts are facts, he can make no real contribution to the forum, unless you count sheer length of posts.

O'Morris wrote: »

I think it's obvious the point he was making. He was ridiculing the lazy attempt by the yes side to try to link our economic recovery with a yes to Lisbon. There seems to be a view promoted by the yes side that merely voting yes to the treaty, independently of whether the treaty itself is a good thing, will send out the right kind of message and that that will be good for our economy. By voting yes to the EU constitution the Spanish electorate sent a message that they remain at the heart of the EU and yet that didn't seem to help their economy.

FutureTaoiseach never said that the yes vote caused the downturn in the Spanish economy. He merely pointed out that sending the right message through voting yes was in itself not enough to help the Spanish prevent a recession that has been as severe as Ireland's recession has been.

It's very kind of you to try to defend him, but I had it out with him the first time he posted it, and his explanation is not the same as yours. More to the point, he quite quickly abandoned any defence of it as originally stated - but about a week or so later, used it again exactly as originally stated, only to retract it on challenge, then use it again.

Now if someone can't defend their argument, and abandons it when challenged, only to re-use it again and again, that's also pretty poor form, and really pretty much troll behaviour.

Does that make sense?

cordially,
Scofflaw

O'Morris

I'm surprised that the accusation of bias has gone unchallenged. I believe that FutureTaoiseach's banning by oscarBravo was evidence of biased moderating. FutureTaoiseach would not have been permanantly banned (as opposed to being temporarily banned) for such a spurious reason if it wasn't for the fact that he was the most dedicated and articulate advocate of a no vote on that forum. He would not have been permanently banned if he had been as strong a supporter of the Lisbon treaty as the moderator who happened to be reading his post.

Do any of the moderators of the European Union forum want to challenge my accusation of bias?

Scofflaw wrote:

I wouldn't disagree with that last - but imagine for a moment the situation where a group is debating the merits or otherwise of a particular car, and another person joins the discussion, insisting that the car in question is great because it can fly.

At what point do you say "well, look, I'm afraid we're trying to have a factual discussion here" and politely (or not so politely) ask them to either drop the flying angle or stay out of the discussion?

FutureTaoiseach was not permanently banned for telling untruths. He was permanently banned for strawmanning and for "soapboxing". The charge of strawmaning was misapplied and can be ignored. That only leaves the charge of "soapboxing". I've never seen a proper definition of the term so I don't know how someone can defend themselves against the charge but purely from reading through FutureTaoiseach's posts I've seen nothing to indicate that the quality of his contribution to the discussions was of a standard that would have justified a moderator's decision to single him out.

Can you explain in more detail what your understanding of the term "soapboxing" is and why you think FutureTaoiseach deserved to be permanently banned for it?

Scofflaw wrote:

I've banned FutureTaoiseach myself on a couple of occasions (1-week bans)

Do you have a record of all the people who have been banned on that forum?

Scofflaw wrote:

I've banned FutureTaoiseach myself on a couple of occasions (1-week bans) for simply stating completely and incontrovertibly false information and insisting it was true.

Can you give an example of some of the false information that FutureTaoiseach was insisting was true?

Scofflaw

O'Morris wrote: »

I'm surprised that the accusation of bias has gone unchallenged. I believe that FutureTaoiseach's banning by oscarBravo was evidence of biased moderating. FutureTaoiseach would not have been permanantly banned (as opposed to being temporarily banned) for such a spurious reason if it wasn't for the fact that he was the most dedicated and articulate advocate of a no vote on that forum. He would not have been permanently banned if he had been as strong a supporter of the Lisbon treaty as the moderator who happened to be reading his post.

Do any of the moderators of the European Union forum want to challenge my accusation of bias?

The problem of bias is one I think we're all acutely aware of, and not one I take lightly. It's always possible I'm more prone to think an anti-Lisbon poster is an idiot than a pro-Lisbon poster of equal idiocy. As far as is possible, though, and for that reason, I prefer only to take action on foot of a complaint.

In general, though, I would say that there are a lot more No posters who only seem to enter the forum in order to post a couple of regurgitated slogans. You can view that as being an expression of bias if you like, but I don't think it is.

O'Morris wrote: »

FutureTaoiseach was not permanently banned for telling untruths. He was permanently banned for strawmanning and for "soapboxing". The charge of strawmaning was misapplied and can be ignored. That only leaves the charge of "soapboxing". I've never seen a proper definition of the term so I don't know how someone can defend themselves against the charge but purely from reading through FutureTaoiseach's posts I've seen nothing to indicate that the quality of his contribution to the discussions was of a standard that would have justified a moderator's decision to single him out.

Can you explain in more detail what your understanding of the term "soapboxing" is and why you think FutureTaoiseach deserved to be permanently banned for it?

Soapboxing is a tricky one, because there's a fine line between impassioned defence of a particular position and soapboxing. The essential difference is whether the poster engages with what others are saying, or effectively ignores them in order to repeat the repeat the same assertions. We have at the moment a very good example of a soapboxer - he doesn't, as far as I can see, actually take on board what other posters say. His posts therefore appear to be in reply to others, but aren't. He'd fail a Turing test, because his posts could be generated by a contextual algorithm that takes a couple of significant words from a post and generates another, 'personalised', assertion of his position. FutureTaoiseach is very similar, if rather less aggressive and thick-skinned.

I doubt any other forum (except the Religion forums) have the same problem of people repeating ad nauseam their fixed positions - in particular, those cyber-warriors who believe they will change the course of politics with their posts. It's worth remembering that we're not any kind of national forum, with some sort of duty to hear everyone's position no matter how bizarre or repetitive.

O'Morris wrote: »

Do you have a record of all the people who have been banned on that forum?

I don't, I'm afraid.

O'Morris wrote: »

Can you give an example of some of the false information that FutureTaoiseach was insisting was true?

I'd have to dig back through the posts in question. Ah, yes - the claim that Denmark had ratified Lisbon by weighted majority, when it hadn't. He was arguing that Lisbon had transferred sovereignty, which he claimed was backed up by the fact that Denmark had ratified by weighted majority. It hadn't, and he knew it hadn't, because he knew the numbers involved. So that was a flat lie to improve his case.

I don't know about you, but I don't think lying to improve your case is acceptable. If it is acceptable to you, how would you defend it?

cordially,
Scofflaw

O'Morris

I just noticed that FutureTaoiseach is still posting on this site. I had assumed that he had been permanently banned from all of the forums but I see that he's still contributing to the Lisbon thread on the After Hours forum.

I don't know if he has been unbanned from the European Union forum, but if not, can someone grant him access to this thread so that he can defend hmiself against the charges made against him?

Scofflaw wrote:

I don't know about you, but I don't think lying to improve your case is acceptable. If it is acceptable to you, how would you defend it?

I wouldn't defend it. I agree that lying is unacceptable and if FutureTaoiseach deliberately told lies about the Danish ratification of the treaty then I think he has done a disservice to the no side of the debate. That's why I would like to see him being brought onto this thread so he can defend himself against the charges made against him.

sceptre

At this point, you've moved completely from something that could have been read as a general complaint using a specific example to taking up a case for someone else who has demonstrated repeatedly that he's got no problem typing about things when he wants to.

As it moves to there, he doesn't need the help, he's free to start his own thread if he wishes to argue his case and not being the poster affected, you've not got sufficient connection to the poster (being someone else) to make the case for him. In law, the principle is called locus standi, though obviously we're not running a law court here.

As I said, if he wants to start his own thread on the Help Desk making a complaint about his particular situation, he's free to do so, as he always has been.

In the absence of that, we're done. I don't propose to say "no" a third time.