h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Re post 1895/6:

"to what extent does one's moral obligation"

That is of course up to the individual. It is quite clear that a lot of people here (and everywhere) put selfish and petty interests above any moral consideration such as truth and justice - even when there isn't any serious threat. I've also been told to kill myself as part of being flamed, though that seemed to be a random and misdirected attack. Mostly people are told in varying degrees of unpoliteness that they can leave - as I.V. has been several times in this thread by various people. I would say that the abusive mobbing here has been relatively low compared with other threads.

"how can I help now"

That's a tricky one. It isn't like we have any official power or a revolution or anything. "Man the barricades!" Perhaps not.

Naming and shaming isn't allowed because the offenders and their colleagues use their protected pet status to get points and evidence yikesed despite not really being in breach of the house rules. Though the points can allegedly be repeated and repeated. I would say it is fairly important to stand up against the evil as and when it happens. After the event you get all the excuses and calls for bygones and people saying they didn't see it (eg "la-la-la. I've been on site for 5 minutes and never go off this one chat page but if I haven't seen it happen to me then it doesn't exist. All these people are soooo superficially nice because they put lots of cake smileys in their posts when saying nasty things. I can't be bothered to read anything much or properly not even your last post but my opinion is still just as valid.").

Re post 1898:

I don't think it was a case of fooling Rho (or at least not specifically). I belive Rho is likely to be right in saying that there was no announcement in official places on or off site. What he, and more importantly the others who arrived first, then failed to do was complain that the transgressions procedure wasn't being followed. You see I didn't see any unofficial community announcement either.

I told one group of people who weren't directly involved but might be interested. I was a little cowardly myself in not posting an announcement on the official page - though you could view it as strategy since I already knew they were just looking for any excuse they could dishonestly twist into a banning offence.

What is significant is that none of those supposedly knowledgable, law-abiding ACEs or long-standing members saw fit to correct the staff's (deliberate?) omission. Either they didn't care, didn't think or knew that if they had gone against the staff they would have lost their precious underline status.

When it comes to what was actually the cause of the AWOL ban - that still has not been made explicit. In the absence of clear evidence against him that anyone (not just pets) would regard as bannable, it does look like a "fit up" as he keeps saying. However I don't know this to be true. I merely can't rule it out. Most people round here don't seem to be that honest about what they don't and can't know. They are all too keen to side with those in charge (and whomever has offered them fake cake! - despite the barely concealed knife).

Thank you, SEF. I appreciate the fact that you see fit to address other people in the courteous manner that you've done me. There was a time when one could count on that kind of interaction here on a consistent basis. Perhaps that will happen again someday soon.

Flaming isn't something I generally have the time or concern to pay any attention to. The personal attack I experienced was very personal, however, and from someone I'd had no previous contact with on the topic. Of course, that researcher was far too crafty to respond publicly, but sent a particularly vicious and unwarranted email, which I actually chose to ignore, and deleted without reading in its entirety. Due to the nature of the discussion it was sent in respone to, and basically going against my own desire to "let it go", it was brought to the attention of the italics by another user I know very well. The concern was not so much my own "selfish and petty" interests, but that were this person to address other researchers who might be clinically depressed and feeling vulnerable in a similar fashion, it might effect them more adversely. When someone expresses suicidal feelings, sentiments such as "do us all a favor and go kill yourself, then" are best kept to one's self, I think. But this is just my opinion, and I never claimed to be right all, or even any of, the time.

Of course, the italics responded, in a most polite and condescending manner, that they could not and would not keep an eye on this person's behavior on site, because personal email is beyond their jurisdiction. I think they completely missed the point. The researcher's behavior here speaks for itself.

Back to the point of moral responsibility, and I apologise for getting off on such a long-winded tangent... As one who is already predisposed to feeling a strong moral responsibility for others, often at my own expense, I did in fact contact the italics in regards to the conversation I was involved in which was felt to be "unsuitable"- one involving the effects of sexual assault and abuse on its victims. I definitely took issue with the fact that discussion which is intended to be beneficial and supportive was driven offsite, because someone felt the subject matter is "inappropriate". It's fine to carry on arguments as to who is friends with whom, who is a "nice" person, and would "ne1 fancy a chat?", but not to engage in serious discussion? Fine. Myself and the others involved in that thread have taken it elsewhere. But if that's the case, remove the underlining from my user name and don't ask me to moderate the people I have chosen to befriend and support in a matter which is far more serious and important to me than possessing ACE status.

Anyway, I guess I've probably said more than enough here. Obviously the puerile and asinine kind of behavior which often goes on around here isn't ever going to stop, but it is nice to know that I can still carry on a intelligent discussion with some people (and not just the ones I know well), even if we disagree. Thank you for restoring some of my faith, SEF.

Maybe not a case of fooling "everybody" - wrong to say "everybody" anyway.

More a case of how possibly there was intent to fool enough people, regarding this or any TGP?

From <./>HouseRules-Transgressions</.>:

"The Editors may also make an announcement on the Community Soapbox, if appropriate."

The way that I understand this is that there is no obligation for the Staff to announce that the Transgressions Procedure has been started, but they may, if they wish. Thus, I believed then, and still believe now, that the Transgression Procedure was followed to the letter.

Rho

Yes, I had seen that. The "if appropriate" there is actually a very dangerous (and deliberate?) loophole. Consider just when might it not be appropriate to inform the community - whether on that page or on some other?

One occasion might be if the staff and underlines wanted to fit someone up. On the surface, a less contentious occasion could be when the account is that of an already banned user. However, that would be to ignore the fact that there have been witch-hunts and there have been people falsely accused of being other people.

The only safe/fair way to use that "if appropriate" clause would then seem to be when a repeat offender *does* admit to being the originally banned person - fair cop and no need to bother everyone else. But note that you could still have someone pretending to be the banned person, bringing them into further disrepute and then falsely admitting they were that person. It would seem that they are only harming themselves but it would actually be held against the real banned person were there ever to be a re-consideration of a ban.

So if the procedure was followed to the letter (depending on your definition of "appropriate"), then it certainly wasn't followed in spirit. Also there is the little matter of a complete lack of evidence. Not very fair and extremely unconvincing. You'd think if they had any they would point to it. It's not as if the staff don't have control over yikesing. Abuse of that power is part of what this thread is about.

localised girl dear? was asking about awol's situation in reference to this thread .and how it might help if i knew how the aces have acted when dealing with him .

SEF, Rho...

Surley the only reason for not informing the community, is when a second procedure against an individual is in progeress. "not to give them the attention they seek" - Was something I read about the process.

Otherwise what is to stop future "fit-ups" if any have happened.

Possibly 'mobs' won't cease to exist on this site. But what about when the mob is part of the site stucture ie. ACEs. Good ACEs hand in thier badge, leaving what behind?

If the italics are as they say looking into it, could they consider short term support of any ACEs is blinkered, and detremental to all.

If the "in house staff" have no time.. How about a system of 'Prefects'. People that have been on site as an ACE for at least three years? Make ACEs more accountable?

"People that have been on site as an ACE for at least three years"

You are assuming that the people who have been onsite longer are better. It doesn't work that way. Doesn't the staff situation with underlines tell you anything about that! Perhaps newcomers are seen by some people to be the problem and maybe the ones I.V. was complaining about are newcomers but that hardly constitutes evidence that it is always new ones rather than old ones or just specific ones.

The backlog shows the problem goes a long way back and isn't about new underlines. Some of the bad ones and/or those who don't do the supposed volunteer job are still there while the good ones may leave in disgust/disappointment. That would lead to the long-term underlines actually ending up worse on average.

Re post 1906:

> So if the procedure was followed to the letter (depending on your definition of "appropriate"), then it certainly wasn't followed in spirit.

In that case, perhaps we should make a suggestion that the Transgressions Procedure is modified, so that, on its initiation, it *must* be announced in a new thread in the Community Soapbox? Nevertheless, the Transgressions Procedure, as it stood at the time of AWOL's lifetime ban, was, I believe, followed.

Rho

Sure, add it to the list of bad rules along with all the others I've pointed out. However, so far there's been no evidence that the staff are even remotely interested in improving things. They sometimes say they are and then everything else they say and do belies that. There has been a general absence of worthwhile feedback (from staff and researchers) on the other pages/rules I'd taken the trouble to go through and point out. All that happens is the staff make feeble excuses, cast aspersions (eg the "issues" thing as if to imply they were not valid issues) and even make threats.

Oh and in this case of course it could well be that the staff don't want to specify what made it not "appropriate" - just as there was a lot of secrecy about the deleted articles.

Rho post 1843:
"The full Transgressions Procedure was carried out."
and [about ACEs as a group rather than individuals]
"This includes not being notified onsite or offsite that the Transgressions Procedure was taking place."

Rho post 1852: [on unofficial selective notification]
"it would be entirely against the spirit of the Transgressions Procedure"

Rho post 1905:
"the Transgression Procedure was followed to the letter."

No longer "full" now that we've noted the absence of the notification part of the procedure. So to the "letter" perhaps, but not in the spirit.

Re post 1913:

I agree entirely that compulsory official notification would be in the spirit of the Transgressions Procedure, just as much as selective unofficial notification would be against this spirit. However, neither not having official notification, nor having selective notification, would be against the rules as written[1], and so, because there was no official notification, it cannot be said that the Transgressions Procedure was not carried out according to the procedure set out.

[1] I'm not suggesting at all that these rules could not be improved.

Rho

Rho
re: post 1847

'i 'am' only speaking for myself'

'i am an ace, and i 'assure' you that the aces were not involved'

surely its not just me that finds this amusing?

'nowhere here do i speak for other aces'

ok hands up anyone else who can spot the contradiction?

hand points to the sky

Vamps... you go lady lol

SEF
re: post 1849

'i came across the page by accident when it was already days old (and i do get get around quite a bit) but others had been there almost immediately(?)'

but you wasnt looking for it..interestingly the same could be said for a lot of threads...

***looks back to the 1st page of this thread*** hmmm interesting!

Rho
re: post 1852

heres a thought, at least 2 im aware of including myself, (no doubt countless others), researchers WERE being discussed in the aces forum alerting people who had never come across these researchers before and they saw a biased and 1 sided view of them from other aces/pals with a dislike or grudge..their conclusions in another thread was judged not on facts because the majority in that thread had no idea who the researcher was but on what had been previously discussed, incidently i was made aware that it wasnt just the aces involved but im not sure what the title of the others is..much like a trial that gets press coverage and taints a jury's opinions only this wasnt a trial it was a stitch up and 'SOME' aces should stick to their job
instead of inventing new 1's..but contrary to the belief of some this thread is NOT specifically about Awol, there are a whole lot more issues that some people keep (deliberately) steering away from!

...Sometimes clicking on <./>info</.> helps...

loup.dargent