A&A Feedback

keane2097

GreeBo wrote: »

At a far, far earlier point I found the posts about FSM asinine and tedious, but since they are A&A backed, game on I guess.
Its certainly a hell of a way to run a constructive feedback thread.

A lot of us find the FSM stuff tedious I dare say.

robindch

GreeBo wrote: »

[...] since they are A&A backed [...]

A+A doesn't do "backing", despite you seeming to think so. If posts are not against the forum charter and there's no major backlash from forum users against them, then they're let stand, especially if they're interesting, entertaining or provocative - ideally, all three.

Do try to avoid confusing "not against the forum charter and therefore let be" with "supported by prejudiced moderators".

GreeBo wrote: »

Its certainly a hell of a way [...]

Ooooo, I see what you did there - very witty indeed

Delirium

GreeBo wrote: »

I honestly dont see how you think comparing religion to a virus couldn't be inflammatory. You are accusing people with religious beliefs of spreading a disease.

Would you be ok with me saying "The Irish spread through the world like a disease" or perhaps I should pick Jews, I think some German guy tried that before and it ended badly though. Weirdly the Jewish community took offense.

It may be an interesting topic for an Atheist, but to someone religious its not "interesting".
Again, I'm fine with it being allowed, but dont pretend that the forum is aimed at everyone with an equal footing.

so you're suggesting that no religious person could read a post comparing religion to a virus and not be angry about that comparison? That they couldn't read it, think "that's just a stupid comment" and then post in a calm and reasonable manner outlining why they think the comparison is wrong/stupid?

GreeBo

robindch wrote: »

A+A doesn't do "backing", despite you seeming to think so. If posts are not against the forum charter and there's no major backlash from forum users against them, then they're let stand, especially if they're interesting, entertaining or provocative - ideally, all three.

Do try to avoid confusing "not against the forum charter and therefore let be" with "supported by prejudiced moderators".Ooooo, I see what you did there - very witty indeed

Provocative doesn't have to be inflammatory.
The charter states that posts cannot be inflammatory, it appears to me that they indeed can be, as long as they are inflammatory towards those with religious beliefs.
We can see ably demonstrated in this thread that inflammatory remarks against A&A believers are not tolerated.
So why pretend that its any difference. I dont care that its inflammatory, as long as its openly allowed by the charter, or better still, openly allowed in one direction.

GreeBo

SW wrote: »

so you're suggesting that no religious person could read a post comparing religion to a virus and not be angry about that comparison? That they couldn't read it, think "that's just a stupid comment" and then post in a calm and reasonable manner outlining why they think the comparison is wrong/stupid?

Are you suggesting that someone cant make an anti-religion post in a calm and reasonable manner without being inflammatory?
Why does the defense need to follow the charter?

robindch

GreeBo wrote: »

%uspect wrote:

Religion spreads like a virus

I honestly dont see how you think comparing religion to a virus couldn't be inflammatory. You are accusing people with religious beliefs of spreading a disease.

That's as straightforward an example of straw-manning as I've seen on this forum - a poster says one thing, you say it means something else and then get upset at the something else while ignoring what was actually said.

Why don't you reply to what's actually going on rather continually misinterpreting and misrepresenting things - this is the third or fourth time you've done this, btw, and it's becoming somewhat tiresome.

smacl

GreeBo wrote: »

I honestly dont see how you think comparing religion to a virus couldn't be inflammatory. You are accusing people with religious beliefs of spreading a disease.

Would you be ok with me saying "The Irish spread through the world like a disease" or perhaps I should pick Jews, I think some German guy tried that before and it ended badly though. Weirdly the Jewish community took offense.

Your analogy is something of a straw man. Religious belief in an adult is a matter of choice, whereas nationality is not. So for example, rather than comparing the spread of religious belief to Irish migration patterns, you might do better to compare it to the spread of fascism in Nazi Germany (given that is the period you seem keen to draw on and to extend your association fallacy). Being Irish or a Jew is not a matter of choice, being a Catholic or a Nazi to some extent is, although both are heavily influenced by societal values.

GreeBo

robindch wrote: »

That's as straightforward an example of straw-manning as I've seen on this forum - a poster says one thing, you say it means something else and then get upset at the something else while ignoring what was actually said.

So what spreads religion like a disease, does religion spread itself?
Is it alive, does it exist on its own or is it something invented by man that spreads only at the hands of man?
Of course saying it spreads like a disease has negative connotations for both religion itself and for those that spread it.

Unless of course you believe that God spreads religion, but I feel that weakens your stance somewhat.

robindch

GreeBo wrote: »

The charter states that posts cannot be inflammatory

The charter does not say that. The charter does say as follows:

Charter wrote:

Forum moderators reserve the right to take action against posts or posters which they deem to be offensive or intended to inflame.

Which neither bans inflammatory posts or says that anything will be done to stop them - it does say exactly what it says - that "Forum moderators reserve the right to take action etc, etc".

GreeBo wrote: »

We can see ably demonstrated in this thread that inflammatory remarks against A&A believers are not tolerated.

I don't know what an "A&A believer" is; I haven't seen evidence that inflammatory remarks are treated asymmetrically, though as above, I continue to note an unhelpful tendency of yours to to misinterpret what people write.

Turtwig

Mod:

This is no longer quality feedback, it's just going in circles. Both sides of this divide have made their points and I don't see any further resolution to the disagreement. Other than people falling out with one another. So in violation of aumann's theorem let's just put this topic to rest. The mods will have a discussion about what changes, if any, should be made to the forum. Speaking from a preliminary position I don't think there'll be anything significant.

Bannasidhe

GreeBo wrote: »

So what spreads religion like a disease, does religion spread itself?
Is it alive, does it exist on its own or is it something invented by man that spreads only at the hands of man?
Of course saying it spreads like a disease has negative connotations for both religion itself and for those that spread it.

Unless of course you believe that God spreads religion, but I feel that weakens your stance somewhat.

Any chance you could get to the point and tell us what it is you want?

GreeBo

Bannasidhe wrote: »

Any chance you could get to the point and tell us what it is you want?

Go back about 40 pages or to any of the numerous times I have stated it.
The charter should be updated so that it honestly explains that, as an A&A forum that opinion has more credence than the religious viewpoint.

To put it another way, the moderators who are deciding whether or not something is offensive or intended to inflame, will be doing so from an Atheist standpoint. Its an understandable and acceptable bias, but admit and acknowledge it.

/edit posted before I read the Mod update.

Turtwig

Meh I usually allow a time lapse of 5-30 mins depending on subsequent post length before a mod action takes affect.

Nevertheless, Greebo & Bannaisdhe Banned.:pac:

robindch

^^^ Yay - myth...

Bannasidhe

Turtwig wrote: »

Meh I usually allow a time lapse of 5-30 mins depending on subsequent post length before a mod action takes affect.

Nevertheless, Greebo & Bannaisdhe Banned.:pac:

I have access to OH's considerable stockpile of biscuits.

Turtwig

Bribery eh?

Welcome back!

J C

legspin wrote: »

This is our space. If we can't air our honest views of every type of woo imaginable here, what is the point allowing here to exist at all? This space is here because it was asked for and in a sense of balance the admins permitted it. Others of whatever stripe of religion have their talking shops and if all the others exist we have that right also.

Your own charter says that you should challenge the idea rather than the person ... so you shouldn't air 'honest views' that are adhominems or name-calling, for example.

... I can see there are many funny things and indeed erroneous things about all faith positions (and that includes Atheism BTW) ... so I have no issue with you guys having your own space to comment on whatever ye fancy ... and indeed I have had a few 'chuckles' myself at some of the genuinely funny things posted in, for example, your 'hazards of belief' or 'funny side of religion' threads. We all can take a joke ... yes, even Creationists.

However, the general impression that I get when I visit this forum ... or meet Atheists posting on the Christianity thread is one of unrelenting anti-theism i.e. presenting exclusively what you guys think is 'wrong' with Theists and theistic beliefs (without recognizing anything positive about Theists) and indeed without presenting anything positive about Atheism, most of the time, either.

None of your 5 sticky threads, for example, are dedicated to promoting the positives of Atheism and three of them are anti-theist (as distinct from Atheist). Contrast this with, for example the Christianity Thread, where the 5 sticky threads are promoting Christianity and providing positive resources for Christians visiting the forum and none of them are looking at / laughing at the 'deficiencies' of other faiths, including Atheism.
I'm not saying that either approach is 'perfect' and I hold no brief for either forum ... but I think that the Atheist Forum could learn something positive about the general approach of the Christianity forum to accentuating the positive.

Of course, how you run your forum is your own business ... my remarks are merely friendly suggestions to do with as you see fit.

J C

Dades wrote: »

For the last time the charter DOES NOT purport equality between posters and all beliefs - so please stop trotting out this inaccuracy. It's starting to get annoying.

The charter states:
It does NOT require that any belief be respected - only acknowledges that people have the right to hold a belief. It's a common distinction often stated in non-believer communities. Respect the believer, not the beliefs. If the believer gets offended that their beliefs (or those of others) are not respected in the A&A forum, well then that is their problem. The clue is in the name. No idea, concept or dogma should be guaranteed respect or be above criticism. The charter does NOT protect beliefs, or those holding them from being offended.

I have no problem with beliefs not being protected ... indeed I share your view that all beliefs (including my own) can and should be vigorously questioned.
However, this cuts both ways and I find that the questioning of Atheist beliefs can rapidly descend into name-calling (on the part of Atheists) ... such as calling my views 'extreme' and Creationists 'crazy' to name but two recent examples of this type of thing.

Dades wrote: »

J C is not banned, but due to his 9 year history of derailing threads and the fact that everything he posts has been posted a dozen times before (aka soapboxing) he is restricted to a single thread. There is a huge history here you are unaware of. I can't see a lot of mods being as lenient to such a poster - yourself included.

Any 'derailment' of threads has been caused by :-
1. The introduction of an off-topic 'swipe' at Christianity and/or Creationism to which I felt duty bound to respond to with a reasoned reply.
2. Further off-topic responses in return.

If all off-topic 'swipes' at Christianity on threads were deleted or moved to a Christianity/Atheism discussion thread (where they properly belong), then I venture to suggest that no derailment of threads would occur.

I don't soapbox ... I respond directly and succinctly to other posts and any repetition, has been responses to repetitive ideas posted by you guys.

... all I have ever done is to civilly present reasoned argument about whatever topic happened to be under discussion at the time.

Turtwig

Mod:

This is really quite simple. Any posts that aren't feedback don't happen here. Given the recent topic of the feedback thread JC you really ought to have known better.

Several posts deleted. I don't want to have to delete any more.

Bannasidhe

Turtwig wrote: »

Mod:

This is really quite simple. Any posts that aren't feedback don't happen here. Given the recent topic of the feedback thread JC you really ought to have known better.

Several posts deleted. I don't want to have to delete any more.

Apologies.

Lucy8080

Turtwig wrote: »

Firstly, I feel I should point out that a former mod of the Christianity forum was a staunch secularist. Many devout Christians I know are also secularists. Secularism should never be considered something driven by Atheism. Secularism is much much more and far more important than that. It's the idea that any law or action enforced by the state must be justified by reasoning universal to all humans not just one particular ideology or group of ideologies be those religious or non religious.

Secondly, JC and Lucy have gotten the ultimate hand of leniency a forum can offer. There isn't really much else to say beyond that.

Thirdly, I don't feel that Greebo's "gets" the spirit of this forum. The posts s/he believes to be in breach of the charter really aren't. Even the Christianity forum isn't as a sensitive as they're expecting A&A to be.

Regarding "proselytising". Remarks like "Jesus Loves you". Most of the time these aren't acceptable, there are like everything exceptions. In general any form of soapboxing is frowned upon.

Finally, the mods don't read every post on this forum. Heck, I haven't read the Origin of Specious Nonsense thread in almost a year! Most of the time we just skim stuff. If you feel a discussion is immature or poorly progressing then report the posts. Only this way is there a possibility for threads that feel like chewing glass through a barbed wire to be dealt with. Reported posts draw attention, lack of reported posts leads us to assume most things are functioning adequately and we continue to nibble on our biscuits.

" Reported posts draw attention."

I've never reported a poster here!

Never will.

The hoo - haa here is that folks want to give both barrels to religion in general/religious posters...and also have the mods do the policing on their behalf (whilst not policing themselves).

I would suggest they are putting you between a rock and a hard place.

I'm sorry to hear of the bother they cause you!

Lingua Franca

You're expected to report posts that break the forum charter. I myself have reported posts for spam, for being obvious re-regs of banned posters, for viciously attacking posters, and even just to query what breaks the forums rules. Never once have I been made to feel that I was being a bother - indeed, I got the impression that I was being helpful.

I would suggest you're just seeking to get a dig in at atheists, and inventing a strawman to do so.

robindch

Mod:

Lucy8080 wrote: »

The hoo - haa here is that folks want to give both barrels to religion in general/religious posters...and also have the mods do the policing on their behalf (whilst not policing themselves).

Honestly, Lucy, do you have anything to offer in terms of interest, humor or wisdom?

All three would be nice, but at this point, even one would be good.

pH

Just wanted to clarify one thing, it's not OK to call posters here a racist or a bigot, but it's fine to say them about a named person? If say Sam Harris made just one post on boards.ie, then posts calling him a racist would be removed but because he hasn't those posts are fine?

If that's the actual position what's the position on nyms used here? If I want to call a named individual a bigoted racist how can I possibly know if any of the pseudonym used here are actually that person? As long as that person doesn't post here with an explicit link between their username and their real name I can call anyone I want a bigoted racist?

Turtwig

It's something that confuses me a little too.

Throughout boards in general publicly identified people are called scumbags, pricks, racists, sexists, etc. The same could potentially occur here (though thankfully when it does it's to a much lesser degree and we try to dissuade posters from doing so.).

Where the line get's murky is if one of those people joined boards all the remarks made about them would now be deemed unacceptable. In short, it goes like this:
You can't say anything any personal about a poster. You can however make personal comments about real people who aren't posters - even though posters are anonymous! If they become posters then you must cease and desist. The only other reason you must cease and desist is if the powers that be think the remarks you made are potentially defamatory and leave the site open to being sued.

That last bit is somewhat subjective. For example, in the case of A&A we're rather paranoid about remarks made against certain common representative for Catholicism. Remarks made about Ben Goldacre or Sam Harris we're less concerned about. It's a grey area and a bit of a tightrope to walk.

The bottom line is that we prefer if emotional posts and slurs are avoided unless there's excessively good cause for doing so. Even then we'd still prefer the tone is restrained.

PopePalpatine

By any chance, were these "certain common representatives for Catholicism" not averse to suing Trinity College's student newspaper?

Shrap

PopePalpatine wrote: »

By any chance, were these "certain common representatives for Catholicism" not averse to suing Trinity College's student newspaper?

I reckon it's a case of "if the person you wish to slur is known to be litigious, please think of the family (boards) before creating history".

Brown Bomber

pH wrote: »

Just wanted to clarify one thing, it's not OK to call posters here a racist or a bigot, but it's fine to say them about a named person? If say Sam Harris made just one post on boards.ie, then posts calling him a racist would be removed but because he hasn't those posts are fine?

Not actually true is it? I can personally attest to this. In the very same thread an anti-semitism slur was made against me and nothing was done.

Robin, the mod, I remember stated the reasonable grounds to label someone a homophobe - If they want gays to have lesser rights to everyone else. Sam Harris wants non-whites to have less rights than whites so judging by the same standards he is racist.

Can you tell me why these fraction of similar posts (some from mods) towards both boards users and public figures are okay and Sam Harris should be protected through censorship.

US-based homophobic outfit issues an homophobic ad containing a wedding-day photo used without the consent of the two gay guys pictured.

Turns out that the Bishop Williamson is a virulent anti-semite who's endorsed the fraudulent Czarist "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" as well as 9/11 denialism and no doubt much else. More from the Catholic Herald here:

Don't worry, I'm sure the nonsense and anti-semitic conspiracies you've posted has turned at least one person toward atheism.

Ah, it's nice to have visitors, even if they are anti-Semitic misogynists.

Mother of god... Anti-Semitism, anti-GMO, pro-quack medicine, Illuminati... This post has it all!

Lucy8080

Lingua Franca wrote: »

You're expected to report posts that break the forum charter. I myself have reported posts for spam, for being obvious re-regs of banned posters, for viciously attacking posters, and even just to query what breaks the forums rules. Never once have I been made to feel that I was being a bother - indeed, I got the impression that I was being helpful.

I would suggest you're just seeking to get a dig in at atheists, and inventing a strawman to do so.

There is no strawman here!

I agree with you re-.. spam and re-regs or querys...i guess i should have qualified my post.

If you want to report posts which "viciously attack posters"...read J.C.s threads.

In fairness J.C. generally just refers to ad -homenims and moves on.

But ,by all means , keep to the letter of the law if you wish...the mods will be working over time and the rest of us will be banned.

J,c, complained about a generalisation of Christians...which started the hoo-haa.

If it was a poster complaining about a generalisation of atheists....i would support that poster.

No dig at Atheists here. I think it would be fair comment from an Atheist to complain about being generalised.

Lingua Franca

The strawman was your somewhat insincere sympathy for the "bother" caused by "folks", presumably atheists because you say they want to give both barrels to religion and the religious.

The moderators here, not just on A&A but forumwide, frequently request that people report posts they have a problem with. I get the impression it's less hassle for them to handle it off thread than to try to clean up a big old mess of back and forth sniping. If it is a bother to someone to moderate then they can step down. It is a voluntary position and I doubt anyone is expected to continue moderating if it causes them as much stress and uses up as much of their time as you're suggesting.

By the way, I would expect that none of us "want to report posts". Petty bickering is not conducive to healthy debate. I'll only report posts that break the rules when I see them and think they're disruptive and don't actively go seeking them out, which why you won't find me in one of JC's threads looking for posts to report. If they are as full of vicious personal attacks as you claim then it's a shame you won't report them.