Members banned from this thread: jet57 |
Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire. ― Gustav Mahler
Any time you give a man something he doesn't earn, you cheapen him. Our kids earn what they get, and that includes respect. -- Woody Hayes
Devotion to the truth is the hallmark of morality; there is no greater, nobler, more heroic form of devotion than the act of a man who assumes the responsibility of thinking.”
― Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
Chris (12-29-2021),Collateral Damage (12-29-2021)
“Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue.” - Barry Goldwater
I am thoroughly enjoying this.
Looks like this thread just got deKarened...
carolina73 (12-29-2021),Mister D (12-29-2021)
If and when the Moderators are given the power to refuse an OP author's request to ban someone - and assuming that the Mods, as they normally do, act in concert rather than as individuals in considering those requests - the problem will be pretty much eliminated. Some thread starters will be butthurt when their attempts to silence criticism and/or disagreement are thwarted, but the forum will be better (and less of an obvious echo chamber) for the change.
The tPF threadban feature has been abused in the past, and we all know it. The only real bone of contention arises when individuals are called out by name as having been the abusers; then they and their ideological allies bristle and insist that "No no, it's those other guys!" A few years ago I was threadbanned for repeatedly criticizing the OP author's logical failures and for no other reason. Is there any way to find and post a link to that thread? Of course not. So it's a waste of time even making the accusation.
Put bluntly, some people are simply not to be trusted in the matter of judging whether a post represents an instance of "trolling" or whether it is "off topic". In their minds, disagreement is trolling, and someone's failure to accept their definition or interpretation, or the citation of a totally analogous situation they find inconvenient, is off topic. I've seen the attitude reflected in the tPF threadban requests of at least one individual who has participated in this thread. So have you.
“Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard
"Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry
Well the aggrieved always feel righteous in their plaints but the original intent and enforcement was as the tpf rule as written to this day: "Threads marked tPF allow the thread creator to thread ban members for what they feel are violations of any of the above listed forum rules, and only for those reasons." IOW, mods were not to simply blindly follow requests but to assess whether the request fit the rule with some leeway toward acceding and doing so quickly. Challenges presented reasonably could reverse it. Sometime in the last year or so the rule was extended to most forum areas and made to apply to any request without question. It would be good to return to verifying actual rule violation. It shouldn't add too much time to moderation for mods, as I recall, catch on quick to the abusers.
Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire. ― Gustav Mahler
Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire. ― Gustav Mahler