Banned From Sustainability & Environmental Issues

Oscardela

I've just noticed that a poster has been banned from the Sustainability & Environmental Issues. The offence seems to be to have questioned an argument, in a discussion, made by another member who also happens to be a moderator.

The moderator made a claim that "The "polluter pays" principle: the person who pollutes (ie in this case emit carbon) should pay for what they emit, as opposed to leaving it up to the rest of society to pick up the tab" ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....2&postcount=32 )

When another member asks "Can you please explian how carbon is a pollutant." ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....2&postcount=35 ), the response is to end the discussion and threaten the member with " gullon, I'm not going to say it again - no in-thread discussion of moderation and keep that discussion for the relevant thread." ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....6&postcount=36 ).

I'm curious to know how questioning someone on a relevant statement they have made in the course of an argument (in this case an apparently incorrect statement) can be judged by that same person to be "discussion of moderation?

It seems that, if questioning a moderator about the arguments they make in a discussion is deemed to be "discussion of moderation", and everyone therefore forbidden to question them about their arguments, then that means that any discussion in which a moderator takes that view, and wants to participate, is effectively rendered neutered and brought to a close.

Has the view of boards really developed into a situation where no one is now allowed to question the arguments of a moderator?

Cookie_Monster

Those links are all not working, has the thread been deleted?
EDIT: here's the thread
http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056102571&page=3

Insect Overlord

Oscardela wrote: »

Has the view of boards really developed into a situation where no one is now allowed to question the arguments of a moderator?

No, it has not.

One can debate the topic of a thread with all other posters, including mods.

One cannot debate the actions of someone in their role as a moderator in a thread, because that takes it off-topic. It's always been that way.

hightower1

Seems a bit ridiculous alright. Now I'm never in that part of boards nor will I be but seems like if there is a thread discussing carbon tax then at some point it seems relevant that you will need to discuss adn explain how carbon is a pollutent seeing as were discussing a tax on it? Otherwise anyone who wants to enter the discussion on any thread there which in some way touches on carbon needs to reference a whole other thead in order to understand.

(This needs to be done with thread charters but as most posters are aware of the general rules of posting anywhere here its not needed 99% of the time to read the thread charter on every post)

Prob the mod was loosing an argument and didnt want to admit it so just threw a random ban out in order to save face imo.

Oscardela

Insect Overlord wrote: »

No, it has not.

One can debate the topic of a thread with all other posters, including mods.

One cannot debate the actions of someone in their role as a moderator in a thread, because that takes it off-topic. It's always been that way.

I'm sure on that we can all agree.

However it seems to avoid the specific issue raised, where the moderator in question was debating in the discussion and made a point that carbon was a pollutant. When asked to clarify how he considers carbon to be a pollutant, his response appears to accuse the member of being off topic, and instructing him "...no in-thread discussion of moderation and keep that discussion for the relevant thread...".

Are you saying that you, too, consider it off topic to ask another member, as in this case, to clarify a point he has made? If so, is it always off topic to ask another member to clarify a point he has made, or just in this instance? And, if the latter, what is it about this instance that makes it off topic?

looksee

I just had a look at the thread in question, and it does seem that the mod was using his/her position as a mod to deal with arguments. I did not get the impression that anyone was trying to discuss moderation on the thread, they were looking for information that had been part of the discussion.

I usually accept mods' decisions, but in this case it did seem the mod was 'pulling rank'.

Insect Overlord

Oscardela wrote: »

Are you saying that you, too, consider it off topic to ask another member, as in this case, to clarify a point he has made? If so, is it always off topic to ask another member to clarify a point he has made, or just in this instance? And, if the latter, what is it about this instance that makes it off topic?

Okay, I just had a quick read of that thread. Having looked at it, I can see where the confusion has come from. I won't say much more about it because there's already a thread in the Dispute Resolution forum about it.

I still stand by my earlier post as how things should work. One specific case from forum shouldn't be taken as a signal that the whole site is changing.

Oscardela

Insect Overlord wrote: »

Okay, I just had a quick read of that thread. Having looked at it, I can see where the confusion has come from. I won't say much more about it because there's already a thread in the Dispute Resolution forum about it.

I still stand by my earlier post as how things should work. One specific case from forum shouldn't be taken as a signal that the whole site is changing.

The thread in the Dispute Resolution forum is about the member involved trying to have his ban overturned. It appears, from that thread, that Scofflaw does, in fact, think it's ok for a moderator to join in a thread and make an argument, and then if anyone asks the moderator to clarify their argument, its justified for the moderator to take asking for clarification as a challenge to his authority and to be question his moderation. Furthermore, Scofflaw appears to be saying that it's fine to then ban anyone from a thread who asks questions of the agruments put forward to a moderator, about the moderator's on topic arguments in a thread.

If I am right in reading scofflaw's interpretation, then how can anyone engage in discussion with a moderator if no one is alowed to question their arguments?

davebloggs

Oscardela wrote: »

If I am right in reading scofflaw's interpretation, then how can anyone engage in discussion with a moderator if no one is alowed to question their arguments?

They can't, it's a privately owned site and they can and do do what they like, if you don't like that there are plenty of other sites to visit where the ban hammer isn't so prevalent.

Oscardela

davebloggs wrote: »

They can't, it's a privately owned site and they can and do do what they like, if you don't like that there are plenty of other sites to visit where the ban hammer isn't so prevalent.

Of course 'doing what you like' has consequences. The internet is an increasingly competitive place, and if it becomes less and less attractive and less and less enjoyable to use one site, some users will leave that site in favour of a competitor.

If a site is seen to be unfair towards its 'customers', and is also seen to, tacitly or otherwise, turn a blind eye towards unfairness towards it's 'customers', surely that can only hasten that process.

curlzy

Oscardela wrote: »

Of course 'doing what you like' has consequences. The internet is an increasingly competitive place, and if it becomes less and less attractive and less and less enjoyable to use one site, some users will leave that site in favour of a competitor.

reddit.com is quite good but it goes too far the other way! No moderation at all really, so you see people getting away with trolling, flaming and being really really nasty. In general though I do think boards moderators are good but there'll aways be power trippers in any circle. I think if you're in the right though and you contact enough moderators they will do the right thing or make each other do the right thing, in the end.

djpbarry

Oscardela wrote: »

The moderator made a claim that "The "polluter pays" principle: the person who pollutes (ie in this case emit carbon) should pay for what they emit, as opposed to leaving it up to the rest of society to pick up the tab" ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....2&postcount=32 )

When another member asks "Can you please explian how carbon is a pollutant." ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....2&postcount=35 ), the response is to end the discussion and threaten the member with " gullon, I'm not going to say it again - no in-thread discussion of moderation and keep that discussion for the relevant thread." ( http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost....6&postcount=36 ).

From the forum charter:

djpbarry wrote: »

Please observe the prefixes when contributing to a thread. For example, if a thread is prefixed with “Advice”, that is not a cue to post your own personal opinions on climate change. If a thread is prefixed with “Policy”, then questions on the chemical composition of coal are out of place. We appreciate that there will be a certain degree of overlap, but where it is obvious that prefixes are being ignored, infractions and/or bans will follow, possibly without warning.

bonkey

Oscardela wrote: »

If I am right in reading scofflaw's interpretation, then how can anyone engage in discussion with a moderator if no one is alowed to question their arguments?

Its very simple - do so in a topic-relevant thread.

You wanted to discuss something off-topic. You were told it was off-topic, and you decided to continue to argue the point.

That it was in response to a moderator is neither here nor there, other than that it pretty-much guaranteed the moderator would see it.

After the first warning, you could have started a new thread, or found an existing, relevant, thread and posted there and posted in the original that you had taken the point to a seperate thread.

Alternately, you could have PM'ed the moderator, and asked them if they could split some of the posts to a seperate thread, as it was a topic you'd like to discuss, but accepted that it didn't belong in that thread.

Failing that, you could have PMed the moderator and asked them how you should best continue.

You had options.

Scofflaw

Oscardela wrote: »

The thread in the Dispute Resolution forum is about the member involved trying to have his ban overturned. It appears, from that thread, that Scofflaw does, in fact, think it's ok for a moderator to join in a thread and make an argument, and then if anyone asks the moderator to clarify their argument, its justified for the moderator to take asking for clarification as a challenge to his authority and to be question his moderation. Furthermore, Scofflaw appears to be saying that it's fine to then ban anyone from a thread who asks questions of the agruments put forward to a moderator, about the moderator's on topic arguments in a thread.

If I am right in reading scofflaw's interpretation, then how can anyone engage in discussion with a moderator if no one is alowed to question their arguments?

You're not in fact correct, and I've addressed the issues in question in the DR thread. The poster in question chose to take the position that a moderator who warned posters they were going off-topic was necessarily and obviously 'suppressing debate' through mis-moderation, when that was not in fact the case.

As has been pointed out, the question of the justification for classifying carbon dioxide as a pollutant is irrelevant to a discussion of how a carbon tax will work. It's a red herring which distracts from the actual debate.

Similarly, a thread on the economic costs of carbon tax in the Politics forum isn't a thread for discussing the science behind climate change - the science is accepted by the government, and arguing that there's no basis for the tax is an irrelevant distraction, because the tax exists, and will continue to exist despite any poster's personal views on the science that justifies the tax. The same with an issue like gay marriage - if the thread is about the legal implications of the Act for gay couples, someone who posts to say that it should never have been allowed in the first place is rather obviously a grandstanding bigot making irrelevant noise. It's slightly less obvious in cases like climate change, but no less the case.

regards,
Scofflaw

Overheal

I've looked at the thread a few different ways and agree with Scofflaw on this one. I can see why the user felt Macha was being pro-tax, or even stating her own beliefs or theories on carbon pollution/taxation and thats why the moderation appears at first inspection to be self-serving.

But that wasn't what was going on, she(?) was simply stating the Carbon Tax definitions as provided in fact. Those facts are what are founded on the assumption/theorem that Carbon emission is a pollutant: expecting Macha to prove that it was a pollutant was wide of the central topic. Simply put, she never put forth the argument that it was a pollutant: it was only stated as such to explain the Carbon Tax, which assumes it by default. It's a matter for the Environmental Sciences forum, in all fairness.