Maybe you should reconsider the policy on self-bans. Maybe have a PM back and forth confirmation? At absolute least in cases where it isn't a clear cut "please ban me!".
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It's Trans Awareness Week! (Nov 13th -19th)
- Thread starter Kyuuji
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If the team is overloaded, then it is proof that there is something structurally wrong with the way that it is organized. This entire ordeal is proof that these structural flaws have done real damage to real people.
The Mod system should incorporate the fact that individuals can make mistakes. We need to address this or it will continue to happen. "We are sorry and this is hard" can not be the final conclusion of this.
That is certainly something that needs to happen - a more stringent policy of handling self-requested bans. All self-requested bans should, 100% of the time, be verified in private using explicit language that would be idiot proof.
Also, obviously, transparency is a must. Meta commentary on moderation cannot be a taboo subject anymore, as having it be so is explicitly anti-transparency, especially given how many people have been frustrated by how difficult it can be to get information from moderators in private.
Also also, free Ketkat and Brock.
Also, obviously, transparency is a must. Meta commentary on moderation cannot be a taboo subject anymore, as having it be so is explicitly anti-transparency, especially given how many people have been frustrated by how difficult it can be to get information from moderators in private.
Also also, free Ketkat and Brock.
The other part of the requested ban is that, while understandable given the time of day and a lot going on, mods werent speaking up or taking action on anything but took the time to take that post out of context, evaluate it between multiple mods, and determine that was a request for ban.
Others have pointed it out as well but its worth noting that Yukiko's ban happened in this thread at a time where there was absolute radio silence from the mod team while the community here was trying to get some sort of answer. It was the only sort of "communication" from them for a good while it it's something that goes to show how bad this has been handled.
And the only reason I could see for the urgency of that ban is like... "if we don't do it, people are going to start saying we're ignoring the request and that will only cause more trouble".
But it'd been like an hour, right? And nobody was calling for it to happen. Yukiko even went on posting. So...
Concerning self-bans.
Why not just allow users the option to ban themselves in their account settings?
Seems more efficient that way.
Why not just allow users the option to ban themselves in their account settings?
Seems more efficient that way.
I think it doesn't hurt to discuss it as something to correct in the future. If a post like that is actioned without first consulting with the user to confirm if it was a legitimate request you run the risk of totally cutting somebody off from a community.
It's not as big an issue as some of the other issues that have been raised but it's still clearly a flaw in the current process that could be improved.
I'm surprised there's isn't a option for the user to delete their account if they wish to do so.
OP
OP
I appreciate you coming in to say this. Your actions in doing so serve to strengthen your expanded post and it's nice to see that resonate with ace members of the community. If I were to suggest one thing it would be reaching out to Xas as well, who made the original thread and who is ace themselves. Despite creating it out of concern for our community I know the way the final pages played out and abrupt lock left them feeling guilty for having spoken up.
Coming back around to my post this morning responding to SweetNicole
Unelected, unpaid, sure. Mods are not rewarded for their work, nor were they handed their power by the members of this site. Nonetheless, they are leaders. We know who they are when we see them, but they're not cops, not just TOS enforcers. They're supposed to be examples of the best of us. They were chosen to be leaders because of their knowledge of their communities, thoughtful contributions, and considerate actions. What is missing from this place at the moment is leadership.
I know that it's a lot to say that mostly anonymous internet strangers should be moral and ethical leaders, but in a community this large, it's a necessity. There were a lot of bad times on GAF, but there were some genuine shining moments in which mods would step in and decide whether a discussion was appropriate or not, and write an extensive explanation including well-reasoned moral guidance on what kind of discussion was appropriate. It sounds ridiculous now, and there were certainly people who didn't like and times when mods overstepped, but in these moments I learned how to be a better person. I learned to stop judging marijuana users from Gaborn (not a mod, but given the atmosphere, I knew I had to listen carefully. RIP). Devo shook me free of sexist views. I learned what is was to blame victims, and why it was wrong. I'm sure there are plenty more moments, but that place transformed me because people were willing to step up and be leaders.
Of course they were flawed, but they weren't afraid to ban people who actually deserved it, and end disgusting, harmful discussion. On era, I believe I've been banned three times. I don't recall what the first one was about, but I vividly remember the last two. Each of those bans was because I was reacting angrily to another member who had been acting like a massive jerk. The first of those people I was banned for reacting emotionally to attacked me personally on social media and was subsequently banned (and returned, and was banned again, and returned). The second of those two I was banned for reacting to continued trolling into the following week and was eventually banned for pushing anti-vax conspiracies (and this poster will be returning from their ban in 9 days). This place is a breeding ground for devil's advocate inflammatory type characters because it's so easy to work the moderation into banning the ones reacting to their shitty attitudes, baiting us into violating the TOS by getting angry. It's the exact same type of behavior that creates the tensions that are blowing up in threads like this one. It should not be tolerated, but it is. That's because there is so little of a fuck given about what is right and wrong, where we should take a stand, and what our values really ought to be. The repeated controversies in threads about trans issues are indicative of this problem. When I get banned for telling an anti-vaxer to fuck off because he's belittling a low wage worker, but trans people can't comfortably be themselves, it is because there is a void of moral leadership. We don't need enforcers. We need leaders.
Unelected, unpaid, sure. Mods are not rewarded for their work, nor were they handed their power by the members of this site. Nonetheless, they are leaders. We know who they are when we see them, but they're not cops, not just TOS enforcers. They're supposed to be examples of the best of us. They were chosen to be leaders because of their knowledge of their communities, thoughtful contributions, and considerate actions. What is missing from this place at the moment is leadership.
I know that it's a lot to say that mostly anonymous internet strangers should be moral and ethical leaders, but in a community this large, it's a necessity. There were a lot of bad times on GAF, but there were some genuine shining moments in which mods would step in and decide whether a discussion was appropriate or not, and write an extensive explanation including well-reasoned moral guidance on what kind of discussion was appropriate. It sounds ridiculous now, and there were certainly people who didn't like and times when mods overstepped, but in these moments I learned how to be a better person. I learned to stop judging marijuana users from Gaborn (not a mod, but given the atmosphere, I knew I had to listen carefully. RIP). Devo shook me free of sexist views. I learned what is was to blame victims, and why it was wrong. I'm sure there are plenty more moments, but that place transformed me because people were willing to step up and be leaders.
Of course they were flawed, but they weren't afraid to ban people who actually deserved it, and end disgusting, harmful discussion. On era, I believe I've been banned three times. I don't recall what the first one was about, but I vividly remember the last two. Each of those bans was because I was reacting angrily to another member who had been acting like a massive jerk. The first of those people I was banned for reacting emotionally to attacked me personally on social media and was subsequently banned (and returned, and was banned again, and returned). The second of those two I was banned for reacting to continued trolling into the following week and was eventually banned for pushing anti-vax conspiracies (and this poster will be returning from their ban in 9 days). This place is a breeding ground for devil's advocate inflammatory type characters because it's so easy to work the moderation into banning the ones reacting to their shitty attitudes, baiting us into violating the TOS by getting angry. It's the exact same type of behavior that creates the tensions that are blowing up in threads like this one. It should not be tolerated, but it is. That's because there is so little of a fuck given about what is right and wrong, where we should take a stand, and what our values really ought to be. The repeated controversies in threads about trans issues are indicative of this problem. When I get banned for telling an anti-vaxer to fuck off because he's belittling a low wage worker, but trans people can't comfortably be themselves, it is because there is a void of moral leadership. We don't need enforcers. We need leaders.
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Agreed. And what would solve this -- and some other issues -- is a form of appeal for banned members. It's rather baffling that such a thing doesn't exist, years into the forum's life. It needs to be a priority.
But, let's not have both threads lose the thread-pertinent plot:
Ketkat needs to be unbanned at this point. Period. She needs to be able to give her side of the story. The community, trans and cis alike, has spoken overwhelmingly, and if the staff are in service of the community and its betterment -- which I believe they are -- then the community's veto should take effect.
Royalan deserved to express his apology. If Ketkat made a mistake, however egregious, let her make amends as well. This community and its pillars are not to be eschewed so easily.
I see the apology, which seems to be acknowledged by members of this community as good. And that's good and what matters.
When can we expect an update on Ket?
When can we expect an update on Ket?
only freedom.
doubt it. would have happened already cause the staff already have their evidence of extreme wrong doing. however if she is unbanned then the evidence in the first place was probably not reliable
100% agreed that Ketkat being unbanned should be the next course of action.
Any updates on changes to moderation and transparency going forward are hopefully taking a backseat to sorting out Ketkat's situation.
Or a clarification on whether or not she was even talked to. Far as I'm aware she was never spoken to by anymore.
Woke up and caught up. Thanks Royalan for finally talking, I was majorly disappointed at your involvement in this but I don't think your mistakes outweigh the good you do (which I will also say should be took into consideration with Ket even if she actually did do something wrong).
And it also highlights what we lost when SweetNicole stepped down, and not just for our specific community, I too miss the "newsletters" for instance.
But that's just thoughts my real reason for posting today....
....thanks to everyone that reached out to me both here and privately, and I want to take the opportunity this time (neither trust nor disclosure are part of my general nature, and my lived experience has amplified that a hundred fold) to trust and become part of a more involved community off site, don't want to leave here but no matter how things improve or not I just think it's best for now on this particular issue for me to make bonds elsewhere and in more focused places....
...which leads me to my pretty dumb overall point, would anyone be willing to give me a primer on what, how, and to become part of discord because this old person doesn't want to end up talking to themselves like the dog (great post Fat4all).
And it also highlights what we lost when SweetNicole stepped down, and not just for our specific community, I too miss the "newsletters" for instance.
But that's just thoughts my real reason for posting today....
....thanks to everyone that reached out to me both here and privately, and I want to take the opportunity this time (neither trust nor disclosure are part of my general nature, and my lived experience has amplified that a hundred fold) to trust and become part of a more involved community off site, don't want to leave here but no matter how things improve or not I just think it's best for now on this particular issue for me to make bonds elsewhere and in more focused places....
...which leads me to my pretty dumb overall point, would anyone be willing to give me a primer on what, how, and to become part of discord because this old person doesn't want to end up talking to themselves like the dog (great post Fat4all).
No. But the mods have made it clear the bigger issue there is an invasion of privacy and not the root cause for where attention was originally called for.
Unbelievable how this all went down, great timing too. /s
Fyi, just wanted to mention that just because the rest of the forum might be humming along fine, like the gaming forum, doesn't mean people don't care. There's just so much information to take in and it's a sensitive topic on so many levels that a lot of people are just reading and watching what's going, but I can't imagine most of us don't give a shit.
Fyi, just wanted to mention that just because the rest of the forum might be humming along fine, like the gaming forum, doesn't mean people don't care. There's just so much information to take in and it's a sensitive topic on so many levels that a lot of people are just reading and watching what's going, but I can't imagine most of us don't give a shit.
...
Well then
I mean if the staff wants to get better with transparency then revealing who Ket & Robin were referring to might be a good start.
I rely on this place a lot to supplement social interaction, but I'm not willing to overlook the silencing of valuable members when they raise their concerns, nor am I willing to overlook the administrative staff forming a secret insulated clique that can place itself above the members that make this place what it is. I will absolutely deprive myself of whatever services this place offers me if these things don't change, because while these problems may have fringed on my awareness before, now that it has come to a head there is no more denying that this issue has always been present here, and as long as that remains the case, the future of this community will always be uncertain, and for my part I just can't bring myself to participate in something I no longer believe in.
This is an out-fucking-standing post. I'd really like to see an admin comment specifically on this post.
I think the best course of action is have that person speak up like Royalan did. Because the issue itself wont go away unless its addressed properly.
There's a few suggestions that I'm putting forth:
- Unbanning of Ketkat
- Unbanning of anyone who got caught in this crossfire and were banned.
- Revealing which moderator was allowed to continue on staff even after making the comments KetKat alluded to. Have them apologize AND possibly step down.
- General apology towards the community. Specially the trans and ace communities on Era.
- Make an effort to bring them back from the discords into the site.
- Thread outlining steps to what they want to do in the future. And allow people to voice their criticism in that thread.
- Opening a section for Feedback/Suggestions that's easily reachable and that everyone can access easily and discuss things.
Someone else claimed that ketkat said she was never contacted.
I want to point out that this user has a history of posting this kind of rhetoric and was allowed on this forum long enough to post this garbage in this thread. Is the ban permanent?
This is exactly the type of thing I'm referring to in my previous post. Agitators are allowed to go on and on, receiving only light punishments in many cases, only to return and continue.
What's the problem with temporarily unbanning Ketkat so they can say put words to their thoughts? I'd rather have that done now so that person can speak freely without their 'readmission' hanging over their head as a prize to be won for potential deal-making or backroom correspondence. The longer things go without that person having an oppertunity to speak openly and honestly about their experience, the less faith I think we can reasonably have in the process. After all is said and done, if the mods still want Ket's head -- a thing they claim they don't want, but I digress -- then they can have it, and at least that person got to speak.
Probably, dude couldn't even keep from spewing some bullshit between his taking advantage of the situation to whine about his ban one time
I support Ket's complete unbanning. To the admin and mod team right now, a temporary lifting of the ban would be a conflicting mess of optics for them
The problem is theyve claimed on more than one occasion that they have damming evidence of ketkat but can't share it with us. And if thats true maybe temp unaban ketkat to have them confirm if this is true without revealing anything. Then again if ketkat feels this is incongruous with what theyve stated were back to square one. This is why transparency needs to be repurposed and retooled here.
As do I -- it's readily apparant that it was done with haste, and, at worst, it was done with an interest in allegedly protecting individuals who may be destabilizing the very communities they claim to wish to protect. That being the case, nobody who is following this in good faith would or should take issue with allowing that person an opening to speak even if it results in a ban, ultimately. If optics were something mods were worried about, we probably wouldn't be talking about this.
Ketkat's ban was also done in error, fyi. Please fix that one, too.
Unpopular question, but why? The call for undoing the ban seems to be entirely emotional and not because the ban is in anyway unjust if the story is true. The rationale seems to be that she's too popular to ban, which is crazy.
If Ketkat has done what she's alleged to have done regardless or how popular she is, In my opinion she deserves the ban. People have been perm'd for less many, many times over on here and nobody said a word. The explanation given in Morrigan's post makes it entirely justified if the mods believe there is sufficient proof she did what they say she did. I don't have any reason to doubt them because I fail to see why admin would have banned Ketkat for nothing given that she's clearly very popular and highly respected in the community. I'm sure it wasn't a decision taken lightly and they must be pretty confident that what they say happened, happened.
Assuming you are a relatively conservative site admin and you want to take the path of least resistance, do you:
A) Ban a user for a perceived violation your moderation clubhouse on another website, throw a scapegoat out there to resign as a sacrificial lamb.
or
B) Come clean and out the currently-unnamed people or group implicated in this, address systemic issues with new community solutions, and basically do a lot of work
A) Ban a user for a perceived violation your moderation clubhouse on another website, throw a scapegoat out there to resign as a sacrificial lamb.
or
B) Come clean and out the currently-unnamed people or group implicated in this, address systemic issues with new community solutions, and basically do a lot of work
Agreed. While I believe the Era staff should be allowed to have private discussions like anyone else in this community via PMs/Discord/etc... and what Ketkat is said to have done to obtain information on said staff member was a clear violation, the issue Ketkat brought to light needs to be addressed correctly.
They banned her very quickly. That, to me, feels like a decision taken lightly.
Punishing whistleblowers is categorically unjust regardless of the method used to obtain the information.
I actually think the current question of optics is why we have these threads at the moment. Shutting them down would be further gasoline on a fire they want to put out somehow.
If I were in the mod group, this would be a time to come to a consensus on how to address this crisis. The issue of Ket's actions is probably pretty divisive among them.
Their best course of action is to swallow their pride and privileges this time, and let one of our strongest transEra members back, because their actions were aimed at shedding light on an issue within the moderation team
That's...very disheartening to hear. :<
Ah, my bad. Hadn't totally caught up yet. Glad they've at least started talking to her.
Ok, but given the reaction, the ban could quite easily have been either retracted or made fairly short but instead it's been made perm. I dunno. Like the rest of you, I haven't seen the evidence either, but I'm just inclined to believe that the mod team probably had a good idea that their decision to make that ban perm would be extremely unpopular and yet they decided to stand by it which tells me they must have a reasonable belief that Ket did what she's being accused of doing.