Posted: Sat 13 Oct 2007 13:48 Post subject: Anonymouse concerns over topic-splitting
The following exchange has, so far, been conducted via private messages. Wth the approval of both parties, it is now posted it here for public view and discussion. It deals with when and why discussion threads are split.
Here is the background: Site rule 3.5 reads: “Stay on Topic. — Personal announcements in moderation are okay, as are occasional tangential remarks that address U.S. racialism. But try to stick to whatever topic was presented by the first message in each thread. Do not change the subject. If a message inspires you to change the subject, just start a new thread. Moderators will split subject-changing messages into new threads whenever members fail to do so.” Following this rule, on Friday, 12 Oct 2007 01:07 UCT, site administration (me) split a thread from the Issues for Biracial Americans forum to the Improving U.S. Society forum. The following PM exchange ensued:
anonymouse Fri 12 Oct 01:43 wrote:
(Subject: I see I am not going to last long here.)
fwsweet wrote:
The topic was whether police officers involuntarily assign mixed people to the Black "racial" category. The above response switches the subject to generalized police suspicion of or mistreatment of African-Americans. Hence, I have split this to a new thread.
That was not the topic. I should know since I am the one who brought it up and used myself as an example. And if I recall other than stating that I am a 1st generation American from the West Indies I never stated whether or not I come from a mixed or biracial background. Additionally when I noted that any police officer would quickly remind Barak that he was black and Hanzou stated:
Hanzou wrote:
"I've never had a police officer "set me straight" about my "blackness". In all seriousness, scare tactics such as these need to stop."
No scare tactics at all, that is reality of life in the US whether you identify as black, brown or somewhere in between. Now tell me again who changed topics?
fwsweet Fri 12 Oct 2007 12:55 wrote:
Please feel to continue in the original thread discussing whether police mis-categorize mixed people as Black. The only message I moved was where you wrote, "Law enforcement's negative attitudes and actions against black men and/or people of colour has been heavily documented over the years by numerous organizations. It has become so common the colloquial term is referred to as DWB (Driving While Black)." This is an excellent topic and, since you brought it up, I thought that you wanted to discuss it. So I started a new thread with it, separate from the thread about police mis-categorizing mixed people as Black. On the other hand, if you really think that mis-categorizing mixed people as Black is the same thing as having "negative attitudes and actions against black men and/or people of colour," then I must reluctantly agree--you will not last long here.
anonymouse Fri 12 Oct 14:18 wrote:
But that too was not the topic. The thread had moved into Barack Obama and his identification as a black man
This discussion is now open for public participation.
Joined: 02 Feb 2007 {Posts: 255 } Location: California
Posted: Sun 14 Oct 2007 06:47 Post subject:
anonymouse’s concerns highlight what I often notice is the arbitrariness with which topic splitting occurs. A moderator, usually the Administrator, will impose his or her interpretation of what the original topic was about onto the discussion, thereby signaling a prima facie rationale for the split.
In the present case, it seems to me that any attempt to vindicate one’s interpretation of the topic must begin with MP’s assertion that “A person who has another option based upon phenotype or born in another country would have to be a little crazy to labeled themselves voluntarily black in America.”
First off, not only is it a mystery to me why that statement wasn’t flagged for being off topic, but it should have been flagged for being in violation of 2.6. There is no meaningful difference between calling someone crazy for self-identifying one way or the other and calling someone self-hating for not self-identifying one way or the other. Be that as it may . . .
The topic to which anonymous was responding, as I see it, was whether or not Barak Obama self-identification was rational or crazy. To me, MP’s and Powell’s remarks imply the latter, while anonymous’ implies the former. If any topic-splitting was going to take place it should’ve been the moment MP’s thinly veiled ad hominem against blacks, and “whites” who self-identify as black, hit this website.
... A moderator, usually the Administrator, will impose his or her interpretation ...
This is off-topic. Whether the administrator acts more often than other moderators is irrelevant. In a previous post I asked yout to write something down. Apparently you failed to do so. Please do so now.
High School Teacher wrote:
... it should have been flagged for being in violation of 2.6...
This is off-topic. Whether a moderator failed to catch a sentence in the middle of a long paragraph written over a week ago should have been brought up at the time.
Look, HST, you misunderstand why I made this thread public.
We all already know that some members are incapable of sticking to the topic, but feel compelled to inject off-topic material whenever they write. There was no need to for you to personally demonstrate this phenomenon by going off-topic at least twice in the space of four paragraphs. I did not make this thread public to ask for a demonstration.
I made this thread public because I want feedback on the site policy of sticking to the subject, especially in the two flame-wars forums. Let me explain the basics of my concern:
1. As you have often pointed out (but mysteriously seem to forget every ten days), I make the rules here.
2. I intensely dislike flame-wars because they detract from the site mission (to inform and become informed about U.S. racialism).
3. The corollary of (1) and (2) is that I will do whatever it takes to prevent flame-wars. This includes suspending members, banning them permanently, prohibiting political advocacy everywhere in the site, or simply shutting down the two flame-wars forums once and for all. I am always on the lookout for less drastic measures that prevent flame-wars.
4. Prohibiting topic-changes in the two political advocacy forums has proven to be effective in preventing flame-wars. Whether you (or I for that matter) grasp why topic-splitting stifles flame-wars is unimportant. The fact is that it does. Because of this, the policy will continue.
5. What I am looking for here is feedback on how to make the policy more effective (flame-wars still erupt now and then), less subjective (once a flame-war erupts, any act by any moderator always spawns accusations of bias--it comes with the territory), and less labor-intensive (you have no idea how much concentration it would take for moderators to catch every trivial topic-change).
With that in mind, any ideas you might have that might help advance the above goal will be appreciated. Any further demonstrations of your ability to post off-topic will be deleted without comment.
Joined: 02 Feb 2007 {Posts: 255 } Location: California
Posted: Sun 14 Oct 2007 14:15 Post subject:
Frank--
Quote:
I made this thread public because I want feedback on the site policy of sticking to the subject, especially in the two flame-wars forums. Let me explain the basics of my concern
. . .
Perhaps you should have been explicit about why you were making the discussion public in the first place.
Still, the obvious policy prescription that flows from my comments is that the moderators should be a little more conservative when it comes to splitting off topics. Why just the other day you were ready to start a new thread on the faulty assumption that I veered off topic and wanted to discuss something about the term SSA. Well you were clearly wrong on both counts. A little more conservative approach would have averted that mishap.
In the interest of staying on topic, I will not indulge your predilection for exerting power and authority.
This is why I recommended an advocacy fray type forum, these situations that veer off topic and erupt into flame wars should be sent to the advocacy fray forum. This will help tremendously in stopping these things. I really recommend giving it a shot meaning a test period for this new advocacy forum. All off topic subjects that start flame wars should be sent there (advocacy fray forum). It will help stop accusations of biasness. I recommended the fray forum to avoid disputes like the one taking place now. It will also keep people from getting suspended and banned. If posters see people being suspended all the time they possibly will become scared to post out of fear of saying something that will get them suspended.
I say open up a fray forum, and place it at the bottom below the meet the authors forum. I say we have nothing to loose by at least trying it out for a month or two, and if it is not working out then Mr. F. Sweet can close the advocacy fray forum dowm. You don't even have to call it fray forum you call call it the topic splitting forum, and this forum will be for topic splitting and advocacy. We have nothing to loose why not try it out. All topic that are split because they erupt into flame wars should be sent to this topic splitting forum (advocacy and intellectual debates). Let us try it out we have nothing to loose. If it don't work close it down.
Still, the obvious policy prescription that flows from my comments is that the moderators should be a little more conservative when it comes to splitting off topics. Why just the other day you were ready to start a new thread on the faulty assumption that I veered off topic and wanted to discuss something about the term SSA. Well you were clearly wrong on both counts. A little more conservative approach would have averted that mishap.
Your example illustrates the policy's working as planned.
Recall that the issue was about Menelik II's rejecting a "Negro" label in 1930. Those familiar with the United States vernacular of the 1930s know that "Negro" was a term of dignity and respect back then, while "black" was an insult. The African-American delegation wanted to honor the man. He rejected them, not because he disliked the term. It was because, as a well-educated man, he did not consider himself to be of the same "race" as African-Americans. To educated people of the time, African-Americans were of the "Negro," "Negroid," or "Congoid" "race," while Ethiopians were of the "Caucasian," "White," or "Caucasoid" "race."
Then, in the middle of this discussion over whether the people of Ethiopia then or now see themselves akin to African-Americans, a member (obviously ignorant of the changes to the U.S. vernacular since 1930) wrote "I agree with him because I do not and will not ever accept that term [Negro] either." This was not exactly change of topic, merely an appalling display of ignorance of the U.S. vernacular of 1930s.
But you then contributed, "One of the reasons why I don't like the term SSA is that it strikes me as just another euphemism for "Negro". This was a deliberate change of topic. Your motives are irrelevant (although I believe that I know what they were), but your implication was that this term, which is widely used in the technical and scholarly forums to designate one of the three population streams that replenished the New World after the pandemics of the 1500s and 1600s, is somehow offensive.
The technical and scholarly participants would then have responded to your suggestion by explaining the demographic history of the New World to you. Since you are clearly uninterested in the subject, your political-advocacy response (allowed in that forum) would have flared into a flame-war. By pointing out that you had changed the subject, I got you to publicly admit that you had no interest in the subject at hand, but were "Simply nodding in agreement with Sankofa's dislike of the term Negro (and its euphemistic varieties)." This made you back off the tangent, stopped those who were going to respond to you, and nipped in the bud your attempt to sidetrack the discussion.
In short, your example shows the policy working.
Last edited by fwsweet on Sun 14 Oct 2007 16:32; edited 1 time in total
This is why I recommended an advocacy fray type forum ...
But this solution violates goals 2 and 3, as stated above. My objective is not to encourage flame-wars by isolating them. It is to prevent them entirely. I do not want flame-wars on this site.
Maybe we could somehow send such people to mulato.org. Mulatto.org already has something along those lines. They can handle it because they are primarily a support group focused on self-identity (this site is primarily informative). In fact, I belive that LSGH is now hammering away there since his suspension from here.
What if we adopted your suggestion but, instead of sending such discussions to a forum within onedroprule.org, we somehow sent them to mulatto.org? Obviously, there are technical challenges regarding user-ids, passwords, etc. But I am sure we could solve them if it was a sound idea in principle.
For example (and this is just off the top of my head), if nothing else we could redirect the domain-name servers to point "fray.mulatto.org" (or some such subdomain) to a phpbb host with open participation. It could be physically hosted at the mulatto.org site or at the onedroprule.org site--it would make no difference. The point is that it would carry the mulatto.org URL but would accept threads transferred from here. There are other possible approaches.
I guess all I am saying is that I have no objection to there being a forum where we could send zealots to hammer out their differences. I just do not want the names onedroprule.org, Backintyme Publishing, or Frank W. Sweet associated with it.
Joined: 02 Feb 2007 {Posts: 255 } Location: California
Posted: Wed 17 Oct 2007 01:27 Post subject:
Frank writes,
Quote:
By pointing out that you had changed the subject, I got you to publicly admit that you had no interest in the subject at hand, but were "Simply nodding in agreement with Sankofa's dislike of the term Negro (and its euphemistic varieties)."
This seems to be the nub of your contention that “the policy [is] working”.
Because I stated I didn’t want to erect a new thread to discuss what I consider to be the pejorative and eurocentric conception of “SSA” doesn’t mean I find issues around Ethiopian identity formation uninteresting. (That is what you meant by “the subject at hand”, no?) Nor does it mean that "the policy is working". And it certainly doesn't mean I changed the subject!
My contention was not that the policy was not working. It works just fine when moderators are allowed to exercise their own discretion. But when "God Almighty" must intervene into the minutia of day-to-day goings-on of us mortal beings then it becomes problematic on several levels, not the least of which is what constitutes a "change of subject".
The bottom line is a new thread was not started, but not for a lack of effort.
Last edited by High School Teacher on Wed 17 Oct 2007 02:07; edited 1 time in total
If Sankofa and HST want to write about Ethiopia, please do so in the "International Stories" forum. This forum is for site policy discussions and this thread is for discussion of policy regarding splitting off-topic posts.
Joined: 02 Feb 2007 {Posts: 255 } Location: California
Posted: Wed 17 Oct 2007 02:28 Post subject:
fwsweet wrote:
If Sankofa and HST want to write about Ethiopia, please do so in the "International Stories" forum. This forum is for site policy discussions and this thread is for discussion of policy regarding splitting off-topic posts.
Fair enough. But since you directed some rather harsh ad hominen attacks in Sankofa's direction that he addressed, not editing or deleting those portions of your post only makes a mockery of your decision to delete his.
Joined: 04 Oct 2006 {Posts: 228 } Location: CT/U.S.A.
Posted: Wed 17 Oct 2007 12:32 Post subject:
Quote:
If Sankofa and HST want to write about Ethiopia, please do so in the "International Stories" forum. This forum is for site policy discussions and this thread is for discussion of policy regarding splitting off-topic posts.
Why would you delete what I wrote instead of doing what you always do, which is create a thread in that person's name and move the "off-topic" post into that thread? I must have struck a nerve or something. That is very unfair and not very scholarly, Frank. There were no attacks or false information written in my post whatesoever.
This was just another example of your micromanagement of this site when you do not agree with someone but the evidence presented can't be denied or debated. I put a lot of time and thought (as well as research) into that last post and you calously deleted it, which can be likened to the actions of a "dictator". Why am I not surprised?
You made some ad hominem remarks directed at me and I addressed those ad hominem remarks in my post, complete with links to substantiate my claims. You did this on purpose because this isn't the first time you've done this. You could have at least respected me as a forum member by not deliberately deleting my post just because you wanted to do so.
HST, there was no reason for him to delete my post. From now on I will be saving every post I write to Word format. That way if he does delete it under one of his "special" micromanagement judgement calls, I will be able to have the visual evidence to dispute the deletion. Unbelieveable!
Why would you delete what I wrote instead of doing what you always do, which is create a thread in that person's name and move the "off-topic" post into that thread?
Because, even in a thread about people posting off-topic, you and HST flout the rules and deliberately posted off-topic, not just once but repeatedly. I have grown weary of having to split off your off-topic posts, only to have you post off-topic again after the split, and then having to contend with your complaining about it, as if you had never read the rules. The only choices that I seriously considered were whether to delete your deliberately off-topic posts or to just go ahead and expel both of you from this site once and for all. I will no longer listen to your and HST's complaints. Read and follow the rules or go away. I have lost patience with you both.
Joined: 04 Oct 2006 {Posts: 228 } Location: CT/U.S.A.
Posted: Wed 17 Oct 2007 15:14 Post subject:
Quote:
Because, even in a thread about people posting off-topic, you and HST flout the rules and deliberately posted off-topic, not just once but repeatedly. I have grown weary of having to split off your off-topic posts, only to have you post off-topic again after the split, and then having to contend with your complaining about it, as if you had never read the rules. The only choices that I seriously considered were whether to delete your deliberately off-topic posts or to just go ahead and expel both of you from this site once and for all. I will no longer listen to your and HST's complaints. Read and follow the rules or go away. I have lost patience with you both.
Okay, fine. The only reason I even responded in this thread was in defence of the ad hominem attack on my intelligence made by you in a response you made to HST regarding Menelik II. That's what I responded to in my post in this thread. It dealt with your comments regarding my comments about the term "Negro" and it's relation to Menelik II's alleged rejection of "it" and the award as well.
That's what my post was addressing and you know it. The other members of this forum will never know that now because you chose to delete it, which makes it impossible to ever know for sure. So the other forum members can only guess and/or go by what you have said about it.
You are growing weary of me and HST and you have made it clear you don't want our contributions here on ODR. It's good to see you finally "show your hand" and let it be known that you really want "us" to leave. Meanwhile, you allow other members to consistently break your rules when they get to blaiming "Black" people for everything from ODR to self-identity issues within the "mixed" community.
By any chance, do you have a copy of the post you deleted or is it lost in the wind now? If you do have it, I'd like to have a copy of it so I can contribute to the original thread, please. Thank you.
By any chance, do you have a copy of the post you deleted or is it lost in the wind now? If you do have it, I'd like to have a copy of it so I can contribute to the original thread, please. Thank you.
Sorry, no. We make backups twice a day, but the most recent one captures the situation after I deleted it, and the one before that is from before you posted it. I would urge you to assemble it again. From glancing through it, I was very favorably impressed with your research. Having done it once, you should be able to reconstruct it. In future, you should always make a Word version first, and then post by copying and pasting. Except for one-liners, it is not a good idea to type lengthy material directly into any online bulletin board because any communications glitch causes everything to be lost. See, for example, the complaint at http://onedroprule.org/viewtopic.php?p=13477#13477 and my reply at http://onedroprule.org/viewtopic.php?p=13489#13489.
Joined: 02 Feb 2007 {Posts: 255 } Location: California
Posted: Thu 18 Oct 2007 00:59 Post subject:
Quote:
“Stay on Topic. — Personal announcements in moderation are okay, as are occasional tangential remarks that address U.S. racialism. But try to stick to whatever topic was presented by the first message in each thread. Do not change the subject. If a message inspires you to change the subject, just start a new thread. Moderators will split subject-changing messages into new threads whenever members fail to do so.”
If there are any moderators out there paying attention I'd like to know how they distinguish, in a particular thread, between the "occasional tangential remark" and "changing the subject".
I am also confused about how the moderators decide to split topics. For example my topic was on how people determine what ethnicity a person is by looking. So I put it in the ethnicity section. I used Sanaa Lathan as an example because it's easier to explain exactly who I was thinking of but I stil meant the general question. Couldn't a moderator also say it's about Sanaa and move it to pop culture?
So my thread was moved to Molecular anthropology and genetics. When talking about how a person can tell how someone looks I decided to talk about the fact that there are Africans who have features that people associate with other races. How can you discuss what people look like ethnically without talking about genetics in some way?
Then couldn't it also be put in the History of the US color line since my point is also that we've been blurred so much we can't know what someone is mixed with.
What about The history of the one-drop rule? Which could be the topic if someone accused me of suggesting that just because she is mostly black that made her black. And then we started discussing that.
Aren't a lot of topics part of eachother and don't they flow into eachother automatically at some point. Isn't it a little pointless to try and fully argue a point without including another topic in some way?
It just seems like there is a lot of musical threads going on here and I can't understand why.
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Meanwhile, you allow other members to consistently break your rules when they get to blaiming "Black" people for everything from ODR to self-identity issues within the "mixed" community.