Rules update

I'm not sure that is an accurate read of the proposed rules.

Dinner is free to be the bigoted [help desk] he is, he just can't shit up every thread with it. In other words he can make arguments from his position, but going into every thread about the M.E. or immigration and dropping 'filthy animals' and leaving won't be tolerated. It's the actions, not the position that is the problem.

Ah, I see. Still, I expect that such a rule would at least clear the air for most people. Some will still be bigoted, but they can't just drop their shit anywhere.

Works for me.

No. I have already written at length on what I consider the racism rule to be about via PM, which those of you with access to the Shelter have already seen. I have now been informed elsewhere that it's to be watered down considerably and copious amounts of racist and bigoted bile are now permissible as long you don't target another Wordforger. Well, given what I do for work I cannot keep posting at a board that allows the sort of overt, constant hate preaching of the kind that can open people up for prosecution in my country as I cannot afford to be associated with that sort of material. S0 I guess my hand is forced. Shame.

In what way would you be prosecuted especially when you could show you're calling him out left and right every chance you get?

I didn't say I was going to be prosecuted. I said I can't be associated with that sort of material, especially given that my client base is from all countries and walks of life. I have mentioned prosecution because it is already very difficult to view content on this board outside of private devices at home. How would it fare me, whose clients come from all races, cultures and religions, if I were ever found to be associating with hatemongers? It has the potential to put my client base at risk, and therefore my livelihood, irrespective of prosecution. Enough people here already know who I am and how to contact me. I have tried to communicate my concerns repeatedly to the membership and to the mods and it is getting dismissed. This is not about personalities. The fact is that the stuff coming from people like Dinner is very nasty and serious content and it is not being treated with the seriousness it deserves. If gturner can be the subject of a bullshit ban for supposedly spamming, then it's farcical that a spewer of hate is condoned.

The more I see the more I am convinced that initial suspicions were right. That this was never about improving the board and getting out the bad elements. It was only ever about getting rid of personalites the mods themselves found too much to deal with like gturner. Well, I'm sorry but sometimes the issues people raise go beyond that. I can't continue to post at a board that promotes hate through inaction. I've spent too much years working against that sort of nastiness. Funny, that in reality gturner never drove anyone off, but Dinner effectively has.

Yeah you're not associating with hatemongers if you're calling them out every chance you get. But whatever. Run off if you like.

HA! He finally gets it.

This is not about me calling it out, nor is it about me "running off". It's about me continuing to visit a board that openly tolerates hate speech. That is my choice. I have asked for it to be addressed. If the decision is going to be tolerated than I need to think about how it impacts me. Even if the risk of very small, the concern is legitimate, and the fact that you are willing to dismiss what is clearly as legitimate a concern as someone opening their browser at work and seeing porn, then I guess I am not going to get people top understand.

Or am I supposedly "running off" because it's not Gul's content that's driving me away? Seems he's not the only one just about personalities. I bet if I walked away because of him you'd ne jumping on the "see how evil Gul is" bandwagon immediately.

It was. Just not in a way that you want. Work within the rules or leave.

I don't open this board at work. Gee I wonder why?

Well of course. Us trouble-makers have standards. How could we not take this momentous act of self-immolation, figuratively of course, on your part and not use it to bash the Gul who is the uber evil?

Indeed please shut the hell up and leave. Right now. The faster you go the faster we can add your name to list and get on with the bandwagoning. Yes it's not a word but just pretend Bush said it.

Are you leaving?

That would indeed be a great shame.

I would also like to understand it better, because this surprises me.

It seems to me -- perhaps your experience is different? -- that there has always been a measure of the vilest racism on Wordforge. During most of the arguments around the Second Iraq War, for instance, several posters would post racial stereotypes in word and image and argue for extermination as policy, some jokingly, some less so. So while I do find the likes of Dinner disgusting, I have always been faced with that disgust as part of the price I paid for enjoying the greater freedom of speech afforded by this board. To say nothing of the dedicated porn room we had going there for a while, which might also be a difficult association to defend professionally for different reasons. So from that point of view, I am surprised to see you draw consequences now that you didn't consider necessary in the last two decades.

Do you feel, differently from me, that racism on WF has gotten worse?
Or are your personal and professional position so different from what they were then that this constitutes a different threat for your livelihood now?
Or have public opinion and laws in the UK shifted, and so changed the demands on your public appearance?

I'm also asking this because I wonder if this is a concrete result of a still stronger political divide in our shared public spaces than we perhaps realise. On the one hand, racism has become so palatable that almost half of voting Americans were able to stomach enough of it to vote for Trump. On the other hand, WF is debating making stricter rules against it than ever before. Take both together, and you have a situation where some of the American President Elect's public tweets might be considered too radical for a bulletin board that once defined itself by unusually extensive tolerance for controversial speech. That seems a remarkable development. (And perhaps that would also be a topic for the RR, if you don't mind me bringing up your posts on the topic in the Help Room in a thread there?)

So is this the part where that stupid cocksucker @El Chup runs away crying again for the 326th time?

Warned.

Would you mind grabbing the parts from the PM that you can share and post them publicly? This is the thread to discuss rule changes. If you desire changes to a rule, please do what @K. did so we can look at the actual rule (not just the intent) and judge it's pros and cons.

Jesus, it's hard to make everyone happy.

First @El Chup hates Gul for running off @gturner. Now @El Chup hates @gul for not restricting speech more and not banning more posters like @gturner. It's no secret that @El Chup hates @gul but at least practice a bit of consistency when you go about it! This contortionist act reeks of bipolarism.

I highly doubt more than a few people care about the minutiae that you cats are discussing. It's actually quite entertaining though.

Really? You are really going to use work regulations as your excuse? NSFW stuff happens a lot around here if this is your threshold. You are really in need of a heavily moderated discussion board if that is what you are looking for. The red room is not meant to be someplace you want to brag about in a professional environment. It is not meant to be that and wf does warn people about that. If your job is that restrictive you should be discrete about your use of it. However that is your problem, not everyone else's.

^
The U.K. Has much stricter regulations on what constitutes hate speech than the US., as does most of Europe. Back when it first opened, where Aurora was the owner, we couldn't post Nazi images, for example.

Still, I have to ask: why now. The last month aside, Dinner is the only out and out bigot on the board. We've had far more in the past and they've tossed their shit at other WFers including Chup himself by association and he didn't leave.

All that being said, he's got a point about there not being much to justify gturner's permaban on racism if we've let Volpone and Ramen return and let Dinner stay. I pulled the trigger on that over the account sharing thing, but now that I'm more clear headed and know what was going on, I'd be willing to suck it up and let him back, and place him on ignore.

At least the latter isn't a general European thing, and it's not about hate speech. The server was in Germany back then, where Nazi regalia are specifically outlawed, not for their hatred, but because they refer directly to a group that intends to overthrow our government. Even so, the law is a disgrace, of course.

Wait, you're letting Ramen return? Srsly?

I thought they were both banned for two weeks that should expire by tomorrow.

I don't take gturner for a racist per se and none of the proposed rule changes would address the alleged behavior gturner was banned for. I'm not sure how rule 8 helps "clean up" WF.

The ownership is useless and does make terrible decisions but why am I not surprised this eventually boiled down to being about @El Chup and only @El Chup complete with the usual "I'm leaving!!" drama

This guy

What makes you think @gturner is permabanned due to racism?

I don't think she does but it appears the rule revisions that were rolled out had more to do with racism (the odd form of protest that occurred after gturner was banned) and nothing to do with why gturner was banned. (Still a mystery)

Just un ban him already.

We are still waiting for the fucktrds to admit they were wrong and unban him as he never broke any rule. Come on, Himmler, admit you were wrong and stop fucking with the man already.

Didn't he straight-up admit at TK that he just trolling here, and that he didn't even believe the stuff he was posting? Like he'd done the same thing as a lefty spammer elsewhere?

(Sorry but you're the fucktard)

Knock it off.