1y ago

rules for thee, but not for me

To be clear, not talking about this community, obviously 😛.

What's the point of writing down rules, if mods just do what they want? But I suppose that's the risk you take when you call someone a liar in a small community; they might be a mod.

Edit: I'm not trying to say that mods suck, they perform a useful and often thankless job. Just that it can be difficult for small communities to get a healthy number of good mods, which can become a problem.

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A ttrpg called .dungeon got a remaster recently and I keep coming back to one of the screenshots on the store page, because I'm such a big fan of the rules for community moderation it enumerated:
- 5 is the worst rule there. I've been called that for the most milquetoast of statements. You really have to be more specific. This community sounds like an annoying pain to be a part of tbh, I don't have time to feel like I'm stepping on glass every day
  
  If you have to step on glass to not side with genocide and oppression then that sounds like a you issue.
  
  A prime example of the vitriol he's talking about!
  
  A lot of moderated instances with vague rules like that have quite a bit of nuance. The mods usually arent jerks looking to ban everyone who doesnt agree with them, and if they are then they did you a favor good riddance. One of the issues with the classic "but mah free speech" sea lioning that occurs on reddit is it makes it hard to actually keep things moderated and civil. People get outraged and start going "the rule says that Im not allowed to be an asshole, but I was specifically being a asshat and I think if you really wanted no asshats you should make a rule about it"
  Which does lead to granular rules that actually do remove nuance and discretion from enforcement.
  
  It's true, I have zero chill.
  
  Clearly you have no sense for nuance. Not everything anyone disagrees with is siding with genocide and oppression just because they disagree. It's concerning that that's immediately what you assumed.
  
  Nuance nonces on their way to defend nazi war criminals.
  I really need to make that a bot.
  
  Stop lickin boots then
  
  Nothing says "well-moderated community" quite like vague, easy-to-bend rules!
  
  Nothing says bootlicking by applying the same bad-faith thinking you accuse others of having without caring about the fact that humanity has had to operate on good faith the entire time it's existed.
  
  Define "bootlicking" please.
  
  Antidisestablishmentarianism. That's functionally what it is.
  
  That should be in the rules instead of "bootlicking," then. Well-defined rules make it harder to enforce them unfairly. The fewer questions the community has to ask about guidelines, the easier it is to follow them.
  Thank you for answering in good faith, by the way.
  
  Bootlicking's easier for people to type and say, and most people do have an understanding of what it means. It's just not really officially codified yet.
  And it's all good. There is far too much bad faith bullshit going on on this platform that goes unabated for me to not at least try to speak in good faith. I wish the others would learn to do the same. 🤦
  
  It may be easier to type and say (as are most words in comparison), but "antidisestablishmentarianism" has a well-defined meaning that would make for a less-vague rule. "Bootlicking" means a lot of different things to a lot of people, and not all of those people have common sense, to put it nicely. I've been called a bootlicker for saying I don't want to tear down the entirety of every government everywhere, ever, for instance, which I imagine isn't what that rule is trying to convey.
  There's a reason "legalese" is the language laws are written in. It's very specific, with any potentially ambiguous words given clear definitions before any of the rest of the law is presented (at least that's the intent in the US, anyway). If you were to, say, define "bootlicker" in the beginning of the rules to mean "excessive praise for police violence," then I'd say it's quite safe to use elsewhere in said document. Leaving such a vague word undefined in what amounts to a paralegal document opens up avenues for abusive interpretation, both from moderators and community members.
  TL;DR: Clear definitions of what your rules mean leads to a healthier, easier to moderate community overall.
  
  Or just accept that bootlicking is synonymous and stop quibbling over semantics.
  There is no definition that will be clear enough for bad faith actors and pressing the issue just makes you look sus. Using language requires some effort on your part. It is impossible to just be on us.
  
  I probably should've clarified its the last few that I felt were relevant to this post. I understand it sucks when you feel like anything you say may get you banned due to someone else's interpretations, but in practice I don't think it really becomes an issue.
  Perhaps be a bit more careful when first joining a community as you learn how the community tends to act and behave, and where the lines tend to be drawn, but then after that you should have a general sense of what's allowed, and if you do go over the line the mods are much more likely to just give a warning instead of a ban if you're a regular.
  
  You must absorb and commit to full integration of the hive mind before you can commit!
  
  I mean hey, by all means if you think a community is too hive mind-y or echo chamber-y then by all means don't join. That's the beauty of small highly customized communities - it can be moderated in a way all the members agree with, and anyone who doesn't like it can find or found a different one.
  I don't know what exactly you're imagining such a community would disallow, but I feel like whatever it is, I'd agree with it being disallowed. Disagreeing with someone is typically fine in most communities I've seen, it's just hate speech or any -ism or -phobes that aren't. And that's fine.
- I like that! For more minor infractions that aren't a perma-ban, I hope that they explain to the person THAT they got banned, and WHY.
  It also helps that they said upfront that they're liberal with bans, rather than saying that all bans are forewarned and then simply not giving the warning.

140 comments