Introducing the Current Affairs/IMHO forum

Timberrrrrrrr

end of the road wrote: »

they tried that with politics cafe and it killed the forum, also it would be unfair to keep out someone with a small few posts, or who has even just joined, who actually may genuinely want to contribute. we were all newbies at one stage after all.
if people really want rid of trolls then the best thing is really just to ignore them, trolls are always going to be a thing on here and people just need to get used to that unfortunately, they will always exist while forums exist.
the systems in place will do what they can but i think on this people are expecting to much if i'm honest.

If only people would take this advice:rolleyes:

Make the site a nightmare to use and they'll come less. There's some vbulletin thing called Miserable Users that can cause all sorts of issues for certain users, basically banning them without them realising.

I assume it's things like forms not submitting or random 404s, log outs etc.

KyussB

While the thread is active again:
Can a mod/admin of CA reiterate please, that normal posters telling people "get back on topic", "that's off topic" repeatedly etc., to try and limit posters from talking about specific things - especially when a poster disagrees and points out how it's on topic - is backseat modding?

I prefer things being dealt with without posts being reported - so if a CA mod reiterates that here, I can just link to it in-thread when it happens (presumably linking like that wouldn't be backseat modding) - then it's sorted without mods ever having to know/bother with it.

nkl12xtw5goz70

Raconteuse wrote: »

Beasty, misogyny has become grim again on Boards. I mean there are enough of those women hating kips around the internet. Boards is supposed to be a welcoming place for men and women.

I currently have a female poster following me around asking questions like "Why do you hate women so much?" because I argued on a thread that a nonviolent mentally ill internet troll should not have received a three-year custodial sentence for relatively mild harassment of some female journalists — especially when another man who issued highly explicit online death threats against a senator received a six-month suspended sentence last year.

The same poster is also irked because I pointed out on a different thread that research by a professor of education at UCD (who also happens to be a woman) reveals systematic bias by Ireland's overwhelmingly female primary teachers, who tend to label boys as boisterous, disruptive show-offs while praising girls for being calm, mature, and focused. This encourages educational underachievement in boys that begins around the age of 4 or 5 and continues through secondary school.

But it seems that going against the grain of what some female posters want to hear will lead to inevitable accusations of misogyny and "hating women" — even if one backs up one's arguments by citing legal precedent or published academic research.

If I believe someone was unfairly sentenced, it doesn't mean that I hate women (I would have said the same thing if his targets had been men). If I believe that female teachers are capable of systematic sexism, it doesn't mean I hate women (men are capable of systematic sexism too).

The Current Affairs forum charter states: "You are free to express your views in a forceful manner provided you remain civil." This means that the forum may not necessarily be a welcoming place for anyone who doesn't respond well to having her viewpoints forcefully questioned. And yet the "you disagree with me so you must hate women" line of argument is so overused that I think mods should start carding posters who groundlessly accuse others of hatred, on the basis that that rhetoric itself crosses the line into incivility.

The Ladies' Lounge is dead now - thanks to people just giving up on it because of it being crashed by people telling them they're being irrational women and whatabouting.

The Ladies' Lounge died because of too much drama and cliquish infighting, largely generated by female posters themselves. It's simply untrue to state that the Ladies' Lounge died because of the actions of men.

Professor Genius

Adeline Dead Firefly wrote: »

I currently have a female poster following me around asking questions like "Why do you hate women so much?" because I argued on a thread that a nonviolent mentally ill internet troll should not have received a three-year custodial sentence for relatively mild harassment of some female journalists — especially when another man who issued highly explicit online death threats against a senator received a six-month suspended sentence last year.

The same poster is also irked because I pointed out on a different thread that research by a professor of education at UCD (who also happens to be a woman) reveals systematic bias by Ireland's overwhelmingly female primary teachers, who tend to label boys as boisterous, disruptive show-offs while praising girls for being calm, mature, and focused. This encourages educational underachievement in boys that begins around the age of 4 or 5 and continues through secondary school.

But it seems that going against the grain of what some female posters want to hear will lead to inevitable accusations of misogyny and "hating women" — even if one backs up one's arguments by citing legal precedent or published academic research.

If I believe someone was unfairly sentenced, it doesn't mean that I hate women (I would have said the same thing if his targets had been men). If I believe that female teachers are capable of systematic sexism, it doesn't mean I hate women (men are capable of systematic sexism too).

The Current Affairs forum charter states: "You are free to express your views in a forceful manner provided you remain civil." This means that the forum may not necessarily be a welcoming place for anyone who doesn't respond well to having her viewpoints forcefully questioned. And yet the "you disagree with me so you must hate women" line of argument is so overused that I think mods should start carding posters who groundlessly accuse others of hatred, on the basis that that rhetoric itself crosses the line into incivility.



The Ladies' Lounge died because of too much drama and cliquish infighting, largely generated by female posters themselves. It's simply untrue to state that the Ladies' Lounge died because of the actions of men.

Indeed. Any time a male asked a question or started a thread in the Ladies Lounge there was shrieking ‘Women are not if a hive mind, women are not of a hive mind’ and lockings/bannings/deletions/infractions ensued. It’s no surprise it ended up flushing itself down the toilet.

KyussB

KyussB wrote: »

While the thread is active again:
Can a mod/admin of CA reiterate please, that normal posters telling people "get back on topic", "that's off topic" repeatedly etc., to try and limit posters from talking about specific things - especially when a poster disagrees and points out how it's on topic - is backseat modding?

I prefer things being dealt with without posts being reported - so if a CA mod reiterates that here, I can just link to it in-thread when it happens (presumably linking like that wouldn't be backseat modding) - then it's sorted without mods ever having to know/bother with it.

yep, also ban posters for going off topic

thks mods

Beasty

KyussB wrote: »

While the thread is active again:
Can a mod/admin of CA reiterate please, that normal posters telling people "get back on topic", "that's off topic" repeatedly etc., to try and limit posters from talking about specific things - especially when a poster disagrees and points out how it's on topic - is backseat modding?

I prefer things being dealt with without posts being reported - so if a CA mod reiterates that here, I can just link to it in-thread when it happens (presumably linking like that wouldn't be backseat modding) - then it's sorted without mods ever having to know/bother with it.

Of course it would be backseat modding. What happens when someone tells you to get back on topic, but you genuinely believe you have not strayed off topic? The mods are there to deal with such issues, so please report, and do not take on the role of moderator yourself. If we allowed that sort of stuff some threads would turn into a discussion of where the boundary between on and off topic lies, which of course is itself off topic.

KyussB

Ya the latter, discussion of what's on/off topic, is usually where it leads. I don't think it's a big enough deal to report - I'll prolly just link your reply here when it happens (I'm assuming doing that is not backseat modding itself) - as that would pretty much settle it - cheers!

Beasty

KyussB wrote: »

Ya the latter, discussion of what's on/off topic, is usually where it leads. I don't think it's a big enough deal to report - I'll prolly just link your reply here when it happens (I'm assuming doing that is not backseat modding itself) - as that would pretty much settle it - cheers!

I've already said it would be considered backseat modding

KyussB

Ah, didn't realize you were stating both situations (labelling stuff off topic, as well as citing your reply here in response to that) would be backseat modding - fair enough.

EmmetSpiceland

Adeline Dead Firefly wrote: »

I currently have a female poster following me around asking questions like "Why do you hate women so much?" because I argued on a thread that a nonviolent mentally ill internet troll should not have received a three-year custodial sentence for relatively mild harassment of some female journalists — especially when another man who issued highly explicit online death threats against a senator received a six-month suspended sentence last year.

The same poster is also irked because I pointed out on a different thread that research by a professor of education at UCD (who also happens to be a woman) reveals systematic bias by Ireland's overwhelmingly female primary teachers, who tend to label boys as boisterous, disruptive show-offs while praising girls for being calm, mature, and focused. This encourages educational underachievement in boys that begins around the age of 4 or 5 and continues through secondary school.

But it seems that going against the grain of what some female posters want to hear will lead to inevitable accusations of misogyny and "hating women" — even if one backs up one's arguments by citing legal precedent or published academic research.

If I believe someone was unfairly sentenced, it doesn't mean that I hate women (I would have said the same thing if his targets had been men). If I believe that female teachers are capable of systematic sexism, it doesn't mean I hate women (men are capable of systematic sexism too).

Ah, come on now, buddy. Since you’ve come on the “scene”, two things I, personally, have noticed about you is that you don’t like Travellers and you don’t like women.

Now, I’ve heard talk that you used to be around the site before in a more “colourful” capacity but I’m only talking about the last few months.

You portray yourself as a, sort of, “yellow pack” Jordan Peterson fishing for acolytes. You can hide behind all the references, journals or “studies” you want but you, clearly, don’t like women, with regards to their place in the modern world.

I’m just waiting for you to start banging the climate change denier “drum”.

Raconteuse

Ah I don't think Permabear hates women at all, but PB you're falling into that same trap of "it's not misogyny if it's just robust disagreement" in response to me. Of course it's not misogyny when someone just robustly disagrees with me. It's misogyny when women are condemned as a group, when awful behaviour from some women is deemed typical of all women, when women are bitches for not fancying people, when spoken of like they're a flipping hole.

And then the same few always get fierce concerned about the treatment of muslim and traveller women.

Hotblack Desiato

blanch152 wrote: »

Many posters cannot cope with this point. For some, there is only one orthodox view of the world. For others, they cannot cope with their views and opinions being challenged, particularly when those views are based on a misrepresentation of the facts.

Outright mysogyny is just as unacceptable as racism, but there is a fcukton of it on boards.

end of the road wrote: »

if people really want rid of trolls then the best thing is really just to ignore them

Sorry but that is just completely naive.

Obvious Desperate Breakfasts

I don’t recall the supposed in-fighting that killed the Ladies Lounge. It just started to slow down as a forum but fighting, I do not recall. I’d imagine no good examples of that could be provided if sought. To me, it just seems like a lazy “LOL, women are the worst to other women” smear. There used to be great discussions on that forum and, yes, by the far the biggest problem was fly-by posters parachuting in with trolling posts and then running away.

osarusan

Current Affairs is supposed to be a place for frank debate on contentious issues (or whatever it says).

One of the standards that was going to separate CA from Politics is that posters wouldn't be in trouble for not backing up a claim, but it just leads to stuff like this. Is there anything that can be done about posting like this?

Poster A wrote:

the vast majority of prostitutes don’t have a huge online presence because they don’t have access to social media or lobby groups to tell anyone how shìt it is.

Poster B wrote:

Back this up

Poster A wrote:

Bother me arse tbh, better things to be doing on a Sunday morning than entertaining nonsense

Beasty

And readers are perfectly capable of drawing their own conclusions based on such exchanges. The best thing, in my view, is to agree to disagree and move on rather that continuing to draw attention to the issue

WishUWereHere

Pardon my ignorance Beasty but........

Really liked your last avatar. But who is the broke currently occupying your avatar now?

Beasty

In the words of Pete Townsend:

He's known as the Speaker....

Sir Lindsay Hoyle - MP for Chorley with a proper northern accent to rule over the HoC

One eyed Jack

osarusan wrote: »

Current Affairs is supposed to be a place for frank debate on contentious issues (or whatever it says).

One of the standards that was going to separate CA from Politics is that posters wouldn't be in trouble for not backing up a claim, but it just leads to stuff like this. Is there anything that can be done about posting like this?

I appreciate that you were using my posts as an example, but one of the easiest things you could have done about it is asked me yourself, and I would have had no problem providing mountains of evidence to back up my claim, and the critical factor is that I’ve always taken the time to do so for anyone who I thought was genuinely interested in the discussion.

A fly-by “back this up” comment wasn’t IMHO any sort of an attempt to engage in the discussion, so I made as much effort with my reply as I felt the post deserved. As it happened I was heading out to mass at the time, so I really did have better things to be doing than entertaining that sort of nonsense. You’ll see I later engaged in the thread with posters who I figured had at least done their homework, even if it wasn’t an entirely accurate characterisation -

To put in context, If memory serves, One Eyed Jack is proud of his very conservative religious beliefs. Might be why he defends a religious organisation.

I didn’t ask them to back up their claims, but rather I chose to correct them by providing evidence to show their claims were, well, nonsense (they were posting from memory though, to be fair to them). The forum allows for this though as it’s not just called Current Affairs, also in the forum name is “IMHO”, which is why it’s the perfect place for frank discussion. Debates don’t interest me tbh, which is why I don’t bother with the Politics forum.

CA/IMHO offers a perfect balance between the standards expected in AH and the standards offered in Politics. It allows for frank exchanges of opinion on contentious issues, as opposed to Politics or AH where completely different standards apply.

WishUWereHere

Beasty wrote: »

In the words of Pete Townsend:

He's known as the Speaker....

Sir Lindsay Hoyle - MP for Chorley with a proper northern accent to rule over the HoC

Hah, nice choice. Now I do recognize him.

Good choice

Hotblack Desiato

How is it there are open threads in the Politics Cafe 2.0 forum? Last post on one was in December. The New Thread button isn't greyed out, either.

Boards.ie: Mark

Thanks for the heads up. Looks like it wasn't closed off properly. Will sort that now.

How's this forum working out?

I think it's great that it's separated from AH as AH has now become a lot more relaxed- only feedback is that this new forum, during elections, can be a bit too political i.e. more like Politics forum- I can understand throughout elections, but after, I'd be inclined to tell people to get over to Politics?

Only MHO,

Blueshoe

[Deleted User] wrote: »

How's this forum working out?

I think it's great that it's separated from AH as AH has now become a lot more relaxed- only feedback is that this new forum, during elections, can be a bit too political i.e. more like Politics forum- I can understand throughout elections, but after, I'd be inclined to tell people to get over to Politics?

Only MHO,

Do you think AH is boring now or better? I never really view it anymore

Blueshoe

Blueshoe wrote: »

Do you think AH is boring now or better? I never really view it anymore

I mean, you’re going to have people here saying any forum, AH included, was much better “back in the day” - and it probably was many years ago.

But there’s a clear distinction now in terms of AH and Current Affairs - to paraphrase Full Metal Jacket, “one is for fighting and one is for fun”

You don’t really see people having to justify their irreverence in AH anymore, because the only threads that should be there are the trivial fun and irreverent ones- everything else goes into Current Affairs- I think that’s a good thing

- if you think about it, AH was never really a place for something like an “RIP” thread of some famous person. And it was proven time and time again, that a “serious discussion” just wasn’t worth the effort in AH , because the forum charter was just too broad to maintain one.

There’s probably less people now viewing AH simply because current affairs stuff like viruses, elections etc are actually very popular and where people want to spend their time- I tend to jump into both but yeah, Current Affairs probably gets more of my attention theses days.

I’d be interested to hear from AH mods - I’d bet the workload on that forum has greatly reduced

EmmetSpiceland

To be honest, the whole point of the “Current Affairs” forum has been failing of late. Threads just aren’t being moved fast enough.

The “Jordan Peterson” thread has caused a lot of CA “types” to hang around and then post their hatred, and bile, in other AH threads.

Could really do with a “move thread” button as the “report” button isn’t really applicable in that case and, let’s face it, it probably won’t even be looked at.

If the CA oddballs continue to stream into AH and posting that “brand” of bigotry and viciousness there really is no point in having two, separate, forums.

Blueshoe

EmmetSpiceland wrote: »

To be honest, the whole point of the “Current Affairs” forum has been failing of late. Threads just aren’t being moved fast enough.

The “Jordan Peterson” thread has caused a lot of CA “types” to hang around and then post their hatred, and bile, in other AH threads.

Could really do with a “move thread” button as the “report” button isn’t really applicable in that case and, let’s face it, it probably won’t even be looked at.

If the CA oddballs continue to stream into AH and posting that “brand” of bigotry and viciousness there really is no point in having two, separate, forums.

I don't see the sense of posting in an echo chamber either though. Everyone has the same or close to opinion. Sounds bland.
Obviously extreme posting is no benefit either. I'm a week back from a 3 month ban and a one month ban before that. I had a real issue with some posters having ridiculous opinions. I couldn't help myself I had to react. Now I just realize that some people are mental and there is no point in engaging with them.

EmmetSpiceland

Blueshoe wrote: »

Now I just realize that some people are mental and there is no point in engaging with them.

I want to “engage” with them as little as possible, B. That’s why I wish they’d stay in CA.

The fact that threads, like the “Peterson” one, are left open to descend into some pretty vicious “attacks” on trans people just invites these weirdos, and creeps, to hang around and then they start seep into other threads.

It’s just a shame, that’s all.

Arghus

It's gone predictably batshit in there with all of the Coronavirus hysteria.

Blueshoe

EmmetSpiceland wrote: »

I want to “engage” with them as little as possible, B. That’s why I wish they’d stay in CA.

The fact that threads, like the “Peterson” one, are left open to descend into some pretty vicious “attacks” on trans people just invites these weirdos, and creeps, to hang around and then they start seep into other threads.

It’s just a shame, that’s all.

I believe he is in hospital in Russia after nearly dying several times due to a sedative addiction. There's a lesson in there somewhere. Nobody is physically or mentally bulletproof. I see the be nice because of what happened with Caroline flack lasted about 10 mins on twitter.