Remove ads

2025-AT-01: Staff and ChineseDrone Upheld

Mmm, I don't like this one. What ChineseDrone said this time is just the mildest of snark, and that in response to some real flame being thrown his way. CD isn't even wrong: mothematics really is being incredibly dehumanizing, and that really is a right-wing thing to do. Provocation is not an excuse for returning fire, but all CD is doing is describing the provocation. That should absolutely be safe.

I can see from CD's other tribunal why people might want to uphold, but this is a clear case of infracting the username and not the post.

Hologram Killer said:
Seriously. I've definitely seen multiple examples of people becoming very obviously upset and agitated, asking for a specific user to drop the topic, then getting badgered over it anyway. If someone says "This is upsetting me and I'd like you to stop talking to me." you know exactly what kind of feelings your response is going to evoke. I've personally had to change my alert settings because I know if I ask people to drop something the request is almost never respected 🤷‍♀️
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I think that, in the general case, this is a reasonable take. However, what happened here is that mothematics brutally, scathingly insulted CD, really gave them both barrels, and then included a flounce at the end to try and claim the last word. That's very different, and I don't think we should respect that.

Like, if you post "I don't want to talk about this any more, please stop," that's reasonable. If you post "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries! Now I don't want to talk about this any more, please stop," that's very different. If you want the conversation to stop, you have to stop first. You shouldn't be able to demand the last word, especially not when you're being gratuitously nasty about it.
 
BeaconHill said:
You shouldn't be able to demand the last word, especially not when you're being gratuitously nasty about it.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I agree that the tone in the conversation was already hilariously uncivil, but I think the last word isn't something that matters, really. You don't get free rein to act in uncivil ways because people were uncivil first? I understand why someone might be compelled to get a last dig in and I definitely empathize with the feeling, but I think it's bad for the forum as a whole if we say you can get one hit back if the other person didn't disengage gracefully enough. Every other time people use the "they were mean first" the advice is to report the uncivil post, I don't see why this should be an exception.

And if you want to keep talking about the topic then just don't quote or ping the person who made it clear they don't wanna talk to you.
 
BeaconHill said:
Mmm, I don't like this one. What ChineseDrone said this time is just the mildest of snark, and that in response to some real flame being thrown his way. CD isn't even wrong: mothematics really is being incredibly dehumanizing, and that really is a right-wing thing to do. Provocation is not an excuse for returning fire, but all CD is doing is describing the provocation. That should absolutely be safe.

I can see from CD's other tribunal why people might want to uphold, but this is a clear case of infracting the username and not the post.


I think that, in the general case, this is a reasonable take. However, what happened here is that mothematics brutally, scathingly insulted CD, really gave them both barrels, and then included a flounce at the end to try and claim the last word. That's very different, and I don't think we should respect that.

Like, if you post "I don't want to talk about this any more, please stop," that's reasonable. If you post "Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries! Now I don't want to talk about this any more, please stop," that's very different. If you want the conversation to stop, you have to stop first. You shouldn't be able to demand the last word, especially not when you're being gratuitously nasty about it.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Also, a reminder: mothematics literally was infracted? They both were infracted, ultimately.
 
BeaconHill said:
Mmm, I don't like this one. What ChineseDrone said this time is just the mildest of snark, and that in response to some real flame being thrown his way. CD isn't even wrong: mothematics really is being incredibly dehumanizing, and that really is a right-wing thing to do.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

CD brings up an ongoing argument from a completely different thread to pursue it further against mothematics in the Umineko thread, an argument about how modern criticism is wrong and we should take out all sincerity and replace it with being ruthless, that cruelty shouldn't be shunned and the whole thing needs to go back to skepticism.

But mothematics is the one who is "right wing" for saying piss off?

Bruh.
 
Hologram Killer said:
I agree that the tone in the conversation was already hilariously uncivil, but I think the last word isn't something that matters, really. You don't get free rein to act in uncivil ways because people were uncivil first? I understand why someone might be compelled to get a last dig in and I definitely empathize with the feeling, but I think it's bad for the forum as a whole if we say you can get one hit back if the other person didn't disengage gracefully enough. Every other time people use the "they were mean first" the advice is to report the uncivil post, I don't see why this should be an exception.

And if you want to keep talking about the topic then just don't quote or ping the person who made it clear they don't wanna talk to you.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I would agree with you if CD's post weren't so mild. I just don't see it really qualifying as return fire.

The Laurent said:
Also, a reminder: mothematics literally was infracted? They both were infracted, ultimately.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I got that. I just don't think this particular post deserves the hit.

Skyllian Blitz said:
CD brings up an ongoing argument from a completely different thread to pursue it further against mothematics in the Umineko thread, an argument about how modern criticism is wrong and we should take out all sincerity and replace it with being ruthless, that cruelty shouldn't be shunned and the whole thing needs to go back to skepticism.

But mothematics is the one who is "right wing" for saying piss off?

Bruh.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Mothematics' post definitely didn't just say "piss off." I'd be 100% on board with them if it did. But there's a degree of flaming that's always vile no matter how awful the other guy is being. "You are not enough of a human being" is never OK.

It's hard for me to really get a sense of the context of the argument, since it was all deleted. But it sounds like I would be more sympathetic to infracting the first post of the argument, instead of the last.
 
Last edited:
BeaconHill said:
I would agree with you if CD's post weren't so mild. I just don't see it really qualifying as return fire.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
My argument is that replying at all when someone asks you not to is uncivil, and replying with what you intend to be an insult and you know the other person thinks is an insult is uncivil, and doing all this after picking a fight unprompted is uncivil, and when the insult is saying someone belongs in a group of people you've previously advocated eradicating it's definitely uncivil. I see no reason to view the reply in isolation when I have context that tells me it was out of line.
 
BeaconHill said:
I would agree with you if CD's post weren't so mild. I just don't see it really qualifying as return fire.


I got that. I just don't think this particular post deserves the hit.


Mothematics' post definitely didn't just say "piss off." I'd be 100% on board with them if it did. But there's a degree of flaming that's always vile no matter how awful the other guy is being. "You are not enough of a human being" is never OK.

It's hard for me to really get a sense of the context of the argument, since it was all deleted. But it sounds like I would be more sympathetic to infracting the first post of the argument, instead of the last.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The sum total of the exchange as I recall it is as follows.

1) I made this post, my only real contribution to the let's play thread but in agreement with what other users had been arguing - that there was something fundamentally disagreeable to us about the approach taken to discussing the text. That post, along with a post from another user I don't recall, were quoted when
2) ChineseDrone made this post quoted within, containing (to my knowledge) most or all of what he had to say to me.
3) CD asked me a question about my hostile response.
4) I told him to not talk to me, again, and some other things besides.

I did not say the things I did because of "mild snark". That's wrong. You can't actually read the posts in question and conclude otherwise, so I must simply conclude that you didn't. I said what I did in response to someone coming at me a year later, about something they'd never read, in a thread they'd never posted in, to fervently articulate a vision of the nature of criticism that I found inhumane (as in, literally, rejecting what I think is important about being human - as well as, frankly, bespeaking a disquieting worldview) with theatrical disdain and mischaracterization for the position I had articulated previously, calling me "chauvinistic, self-obsessed," and that this "conceit puts one in the lowest of company--of strongmen persecuting journalists, of preening conceited idiots with tenure deploying half-baked Latourianism to deflect from shoddy scholarship, of empty-headed venture capitalists whining that the NYT's technology coverage is oh so hostile". Not to mention doubling down on calling me a conservative - telling me he thinks I should die or be disenfranchised, in context of his other posts which are public record.

I am a professional artist and published critic, an anarchist, a caretaker, a lover of humanity. I am none of those things above and if you tell me that I am and then drag that same argument out elsewhere, I don't care if rules technically allow you to, I'm going to swing back. I earned the infraction I got, because I felt I had to say these things. And if you still don't like what I said, that's fine - genuinely, I get it. But that's why it played out this way.

edit: Do with this what you will, I have no desire to engage further. Be well, everyone.
 
Last edited:
Hologram Killer said:
My argument is that replying at all when someone asks you not to is uncivil, and replying with what you intend to be an insult and you know the other person thinks is an insult is uncivil, and doing all this after picking a fight unprompted is uncivil, and when the insult is saying someone belongs in a group of people you've previously advocated eradicating it's definitely uncivil. I see no reason to view the reply in isolation when I have context that tells me it was out of line.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I'd agree that replying after you are asked not to is uncivil, but I'm hard pressed to actually see that post as "asking to be left alone". Sure, there's a "Leave me alone" in that post, but it comes after basically decrying CD as inhuman scum, too stupid to bother with*. And that's just so beyond the pale as a personal attack, that I don't find pointing out that blatant, outright dehumanization is, indeed, a right wing tactic to be particularly egregious. Sure that feeling might've been changed with more context, but that got completely nuked.

I'm not sure if I'm supposed to ask, but for how much was mothematics hit for her post? Because it's all nice and good to say that both were hit, but the "quality" of both posts is different and I'm wondering if the punishment was as well.

*the full quote is
You are not enough of a human being to have a conversation about art with, lacking the requisite empathy, emotional intelligence, or interiority, and I will not waste my time on you. I hope nobody else wastes their time with you and that you cease to inflict your presence on these discussions until such time that you have healed yourself. I wish you hadn't quoted me at all, much less with such a deranged and inhumane screed. I will not respond again.

Leave me alone.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
 
Y'all, I'm keeping it outta the Fancy Boxes (TM, Pat. Pend.) currently, but...

I am begging people to keep it civil in here and not restart the argument that resulted in several infractions and a Tribunal already. Nobody wants to see the "A STAFF POST HAS BEEN MADE" alert. ;.;
 
Carrington said:
I'd agree that replying after you are asked not to is uncivil, but I'm hard pressed to actually see that post as "asking to be left alone". Sure, there's a "Leave me alone" in that post, but it comes after basically decrying CD as inhuman scum, too stupid to bother with*. And that's just so beyond the pale as a personal attack, that I don't find pointing out that blatant, outright dehumanization is, indeed, a right wing tactic to be particularly egregious. Sure that feeling might've been changed with more context, but that got completely nuked.

I'm not sure if I'm supposed to ask, but for how much was mothematics hit for her post? Because it's all nice and good to say that both were hit, but the "quality" of both posts is different and I'm wondering if the punishment was as well.

*the full quote is
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
To me it's irrelevant honestly. I believe if you play stupid games, you are going to win stupid prizes. If someone is politely asking or vilely screaming on the street at you to stop something and you continue, you made a choice to keep engaging with someone who clearly doesn't want to engage with you. Obviously good things will not spring from such a discussion.

I don't care how much the other person is breaking the rules because I think it makes SV a worse place to encourage people to snipe at each other because debate brain dictates you go out with a zinger. A reasonable person would disengage. We should encourage people to disengage. If the rules are broken, report and move on. You don't get to dodge rule 3, and rule 4 violations just because the other person really was wrong or annoying or even a giant asshole.

Otherwise we end up in a situation where otherwise rule breaking behavior is left to slide because someone else started it. I don't think SV should operate on playground rules. It's not the job of the poster to punish other posters for poor behavior.
 
I think that puts it really well, Hologram Killer.

In a completely different vein of commentary, I'm glad no councilors were forced to get spoiled on Umineko due to this Tribunal. That would have been tragic.
 
Hm. Y'know I'd very much like to rescind my 'straightforward' comment.

I still think that it holds up as a infractable post under the rules of SV because it's at least somewhat about the person and not the, well, I hestiate to call it an argument but that's about it, and a poster with less ah... uncomfortable ? Let's call it uncomfortable opinions than CD might not have even seen that were it not for the whole 'quoting from a year prior'. It's a pretty mild response to a seriously out of line personal attack on CD; explicitly calling someone less than human for their approach to art critique is utterly beyond the pale, so I think I'll leave it at 'breaks the rules of SV'.

Also, protip, the feature that makes it impossible for specific people to engage with you without your choice is called 'ignore this user ? Yes'. You can just use it, not say anything about it, and that way we don't have to talk about whether someone should be able to make a moral claim on having the last word.

Which they shouldn't, especially if it's used to prevent someone from responding to 'you are less than human', Jesus Christ what the fuck why would anyone think that's okay to say to anyone ever, especially about art critique.
 
Last edited:
hghwolf said:
Which they shouldn't, especially if it's used to prevent someone from responding to 'you are less than human',
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
What is the point of responding to something like that though? It's the most free report of all time.

I don't get what the point of responding is other then "fighting back", which I don't think is a constructive impulse. You don't have to defend your honor against people you barely know on the internet, sometimes the best thing to do is let them walk on the rake and log off. And I think SV's rules should reflect that.

I agree that ignoring users is ultimately the step you should take if this is a problem you're dealing with, but I disagree with the principle that uncivil actions become civil if the person you're wronging has wronged you first.
 
hghwolf said:
Well, it may be a unusual concept, but not all communication occurs on SV.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Ok. I've been specifically talking about the rules on SV because that's the entire point of these threads, and if you ctrl+f you'll see me mention SV repeatedly. But you're right, on places that aren't SV you can ignore the rules and culture of SV.
 
I will mention, also, that if you don't want the other user to have "the last word", you can just say something else. Talk about something thread-topical. Maybe this is my experience in a call center where I would respond to horrible abuse with a cheery "Thank you for your time, have a nice day." and hanging-up, but there's a satisfaction to be had there. "Okay. Anyways," is a powerful signal. If somebody mischaracterizes your arguments or your character, you can write a better characterization. But you should write something which is, one, addressed to the thread, and two, not quoting or directly mentioning or addressing the person who has asked you to back off.

If someone is mad at you talking about X and responds angrily to that, then tells you to stop talking to them, you don't need to stop talking about X; but you do need to stop talking to them. Is that a general moral imperative? I dunno, your moral precepts may vary. Is that what an explicitly civility-requiring forum environment's imperative is? I certainly thought so.

Civility is and must be context-dependent; what environment you're in has impact on whether an interaction is civil, at least for many interactions. I wouldn't read people talking about what is or isn't civil on SV as making a grand moral proclamation about what is or isn't okay to do in conversation ever at all; of course it'll be disagreeable if you read it that way, you can't one size fits all that. Plus you can think something is morally justified but uncivil, or civil but evil. Discussing what is civil on this website is distinct from discussing what's morally right, as well as distinct from discussing what is civil anywhere else. And it's just plain not constructive to read things in that maximalist way even when it's not explicitly scoped into civility-on-SV because the context overwhelmingly has set the scope to that.
 
Last edited:
I just requested people not do this.
BeaconHill said:
It's hard for me to really get a sense of the context of the argument, since it was all deleted. But it sounds like I would be more sympathetic to infracting the first post of the argument, instead of the last.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Deleted by Administration.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Alert: I literally just requested people not do this. New
  • Staff Post
    • It took less than ten posts....

    *sigh* Fancy Box deployment it is.

    i literally just requested people not do this.

    @ChineseDrone has been removed from the thread for 24 hours, but no points levied.

    I understand that trying to discuss the Tribunal without discussing/rehashing the now deleted posts that caused it is a very fine line, but... when Staff deletes posts, we have a reason and we expect those posts to stay deleted.
     
  • New
  • Staff Post
    • mothematics said:
    The sum total of the exchange as I recall it is as follows.

    1) I made this post, my only real contribution to the let's play thread but in agreement with what other users had been arguing - that there was something fundamentally disagreeable to us about the approach taken to discussing the text. That post, along with a post from another user I don't recall, were quoted when
    2) ChineseDrone made this post quoted within, containing (to my knowledge) most or all of what he had to say to me.
    3) CD asked me a question about my hostile response.
    4) I told him to not talk to me, again, and some other things besides.

    I did not say the things I did because of "mild snark". That's wrong. You can't actually read the posts in question and conclude otherwise, so I must simply conclude that you didn't. I said what I did in response to someone coming at me a year later, about something they'd never read, in a thread they'd never posted in, to fervently articulate a vision of the nature of criticism that I found inhumane (as in, literally, rejecting what I think is important about being human - as well as, frankly, bespeaking a disquieting worldview) with theatrical disdain and mischaracterization for the position I had articulated previously, calling me "chauvinistic, self-obsessed," and that this "conceit puts one in the lowest of company--of strongmen persecuting journalists, of preening conceited idiots with tenure deploying half-baked Latourianism to deflect from shoddy scholarship, of empty-headed venture capitalists whining that the NYT's technology coverage is oh so hostile". Not to mention doubling down on calling me a conservative - telling me he thinks I should die or be disenfranchised, in context of his other posts which are public record.

    I am a professional artist and published critic, an anarchist, a caretaker, a lover of humanity. I am none of those things above and if you tell me that I am and then drag that same argument out elsewhere, I don't care if rules technically allow you to, I'm going to swing back. I earned the infraction I got, because I felt I had to say these things. And if you still don't like what I said, that's fine - genuinely, I get it. But that's why it played out this way.

    edit: Do with this what you will, I have no desire to engage further. Be well, everyone.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Thank you for the clarification, and I am sorry you have a starring role in this fiasco.

    I'm also sorry I didn't express myself clearly: I think CD's initial posts are definitely trolling, especially after the clarifications. I don't think you should have fed the troll, especially not the way you did (really some Michelin star troll-feeding there), but it's understandable – who among us has never ever said something we shouldn't to a troll? It's just CD's final, infracted post, after your responses, that I think is pretty mild.
     
    BeaconHill said:
    Thank you for the clarification, and I am sorry you have a starring role in this fiasco.

    I'm also sorry I didn't express myself clearly: I think CD's initial posts are definitely trolling, especially after the clarifications. I don't think you should have fed the troll, especially not the way you did (really some Michelin star troll-feeding there), but it's understandable – who among us has never ever said something we shouldn't to a troll? It's just CD's final, infracted post, after your responses, that I think is pretty mild.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Sometimes the exact post infracted doesn't matter, as the moderator is acting more on a series of posts instead of one specific post.
     
    I don't think the infracted post can be taken by itself (mild or not) since it seemed to be referencing previously expressed views of right wing stuff.
     
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top