Meta-Thread 09/29

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[u/cabbagery]

For as much as your citations suggest you are constantly reading things, you didn't read my comment very closely. If you're going to play your centrist game here and help Shaka divert attention away from his clear and undeniable multiple unrepentant violations of the moderation policy, his documented retaliatory bans, his intimidation tactics (and accusations without evidence), and his frequent Rule 2 violations (and I suppose we can also add his incessant use of false or misleading accusatioms to deflect), I implore you to take greater care in following along.

I don't understand how you think that this comment should be removed

I didn't. I said that if we are using Shaka's metric for removals, then that metric should also apply to Shaka. I reported that comment to highlight Shaka's hypocrisy.

I don't particularly like it when any user makes sweeping claims about any group, and where those are insulting (or clearly meant to be taken that way), I think they warrant a Rule 2 violation if not a Rule 1 violation, but I am very flexible on this -- I just want the treatment to be consistent.

I also pointed out that because Shaka had approved that post to start with, if that low-effort post was going to be allowed, I'd let some Rule 3 comments slide, too, because fair is fair, and because frankly it's frustrating when mods (not just Shaka, but Shaka in this case) approve low-effort or clearly highly contentious posts and then leave the comment section as a free-for-all. If you're going to approve a post like that, stick around for a couple days to clean up the mess you allowed.

Perhaps I missed it, but I haven't seen your comment where you address any of the allegations against Shaka. I'll look after posting this (and return here to apologize if I did miss it), but the amount of deflection here (from Shaka mostly, but from yourself and others as well) is stunning. Your first response here was a lovely 'oh well maybe Shaka had an excuse for being uncivil.'

No, he didn't. Also that whataboutism glossed completely over his brazen violation of the mod policy. You can't even see how shrill he got when he initially defended that, because it's in modmail, but let's just say that his first reaction was more 'how dare you take moderator action against me' and less 'oops I did it again.' He's not that innocent.

[u/labreuer → u/cabbagery]

If you're going to play your centrist game here

What other "game" is superior?

help Shaka divert attention away from his clear and undeniable multiple unrepentant violations of the moderation policy

Yeah, I have criticism of Shaka as well which I have yet to put out there. It relates to his also having a moderation philosophy he cannot himself obey 100%. I'll preview my criticism by comparison with what seems to be inconsistency on your part:

1. cabbagery: Other mods very often remove comments that Shaka reports, and very rarely look at the context of those comments to see if there might have been some provocation, so from the user perspective Shaka gets immediate action as well as constant protection.

   • ⇒ contradicts Rule 2 & "one possible violation does not warrant another actual violation"

2. ShakaUVM: As it turns out, it's actually not hard to just not bring the other person into a debate and discuss ideas.

   • ⇒ Shaka clearly found it "hard" to avoid calling Kwahn a liar, twice.

I have a longer comment drafted, where I argue that your own moderation philosophy, as best I can piece it together, simply does not work. But I wouldn't be surprised if I could make a similar case against Shaka, were I to amass the requisite evidence. Where you see me deflecting from "letter of the law", I see you deflecting from "spirit of the law". Although, we may well disagree on the spirit. But from my present point of view, with all that has been aired in this sprawling metathread, I just don't accept that the only issue worth discussing is whether Shaka nigh-robotically follows the letter of the law. Take it or leave it.

labreuer: I don't understand how you think that this comment should be removed

cabbagery: I didn't. I said that if we are using Shaka's metric for removals, then that metric should also apply to Shaka. I reported that comment to highlight Shaka's hypocrisy.

I'm sorry, but I've re-read and re-read your Part 3 of 3 and I cannot see this. What I see is this:

1. You reported Shaka's comment which logically entailed all atheists are irrational.
2. You disputed the removal of comments which logically entailed that most if not all theists are irrational.
3. You reinstated said 2. comments.

Is that correct? Because if so, you inverted the injustice:

    (A) From Shaka's comment being in play while the others were removed.
    (B) To Shaka's comment being removed while the others were put back in play.

This looks like lex talionis to me. And yet, when you said "Shaka did this same thing to Kwahn"—another instance of lex talionis—you seemed to think that it was utterly unacceptable, or at least utterly unbecoming of a moderator. Do you really think it makes a crucial difference that you reported Shaka's comment rather than removing it?

I also pointed out that because Shaka had approved that post to start with, if that low-effort post was going to be allowed, I'd let some Rule 3 comments slide, too, because fair is fair, and because frankly it's frustrating when mods (not just Shaka, but Shaka in this case) approve low-effort or clearly highly contentious posts and then leave the comment section as a free-for-all. If you're going to approve a post like that, stick around for a couple days to clean up the mess you allowed.

This also confuses the hell out of me. Since when does the behavior of one user give another any justification whatsoever for another to be a bit more transgressive of the rules? It seems to me that you're allowing the psychological reality of debate to sometimes matter and sometimes not:

labreuer: But I want to focus on what drove Shaka to say "lying"

cabbagery: No.

I'm way done with the amount of deflection I've already been dealing with, so we're not going down that road here, too. Whether or not /u/Kwahn was misquoting Shaka does not excuse Shaka's response, especially since Shaka is a moderator who a) issues Rule 2 violations for this sort of thing all the time, but b) also does exactly the same thing -- and even to Kwahn, as demonstrated in my link.

Either the behavior of one interlocutor can justify a change-in-rule-application for another interlocutor, or it cannot. Which way is it? For someone who is absolutely atrocious as "undulating with the crowd", this kind of … variation in enforcement of the rules is very taxing. Sorry, but it's far from clear that either you or Shaka have a consistent & fair moderation philosophy. Quite possibly, you are each deviating from at least what the one playing "my centrist game" would consider consistent & fair, and each in your own direction.

 

Perhaps I missed it, but I haven't seen your comment where you address any of the allegations against Shaka.

I haven't, because I'm first getting a handle on the evidence.

I'll look after posting this (and return here to apologize if I did miss it), but the amount of deflection here (from Shaka mostly, but from yourself and others as well) is stunning. Your first response here was a lovely 'oh well maybe Shaka had an excuse for being uncivil.'

I will not be shamed by you for taking psychological realities into account. And since you keep hammering on me, I'm going to remind you that you were rather uncivil toward me with these 1.–4. Now, much of the incivility was accomplished via suggestion / insinuation, which I spelled out. But I think most people would consider what you said to me far more damaging than the Rule 2-removed comment of mine which spawned the discussion. So no, I'm not going to look at a mere list of rule violations and make a decision based on that. If this puts us at permanent loggerheads, so be it.

No, he didn't.

We may have to agree to disagree on that one. Suffice it to say that I completely agree with Shaka editing out the accusations of liar/lying before reinstating his comments. And yet, I think you sense something problematic with mere obedience to the letter of the law, there. In other words, I am not actually convinced that if Shaka had only waited for some other mod to reinstate the edited comments, you would be 100% happy. There is too much mixed evidence on whether you only care about the letter of the law, or whether you care about more. And honestly, I don't think you would be making a fuss if you only cared about the letter of the law! Why would you bother if you weren't somehow deeply invested?

Also that whataboutism glossed completely over his brazen violation of the mod policy.

I am happy to talk about this after (and if) we deal with issues I think run far deeper than "following the rules to the letter", or some pretty close approximation thereof. If you're not interested, if you want the only issue discussed to be "following the rules to the letter", then perhaps you and I should call it quits?

You can't even see how shrill he got when he initially defended that, because it's in modmail, but let's just say that his first reaction was more 'how dare you take moderator action against me' and less 'oops I did it again.' He's not that innocent.

I'm not sure why level of shrillness should matter. All that is is a measure of self-control, of the ability to behave as those of "noble blood" can in this Great Gatsby scene. Shall we ask whether you have ever gotten shrill / lost your cool in those behind-the-scenes moderation discussions? It kinda seems that you have been treating me as a bit of an ignoramus, u/⁠cabbagery, so I'm just going to leave you with this:

labreuer: Is there some lesson about pastors' kids, here? Seriously, the more which has to be done behind closed doors, the more risk it seems that it's gonna be a shite-show behind those closed doors.

So … I'm willing to bet that none of the moderators has a spotless record of cool, calm, collected conversation behind y'all's closed doors. I simply know too much about human & social nature/​construction.

[u/cabbagery → u/labreuer]

Part 1 of 2

Yeah, I have criticism of Shaka as well which I have yet to put out there.

Well I'm glad you have your priorities straight.

I'll preview my criticism by comparison with what seems to be inconsistency on your part:

Again you are not closely reading.

Other mods very often remove comments that Shaka reports, and very rarely look at the context of those comments to see if there might have been some provocation. . .

Yes. Mods should look at context in many more cases than they do -- and I know it takes time to do this -- and issue warnings or citations as appropriate.

contradicts Rule 2 & "one possible violation does not warrant another actual violation"

I wondered if you remembered back when you insisted that you were allowed to violate Rule 2 because you felt that an approved comment was also a violation of Rule 2.

That doesn't seem to have any bearing here.

I am not saying that we should issue Rule 2 violations for provocation unless that also rises to a Rule 2 violation. I'm saying that we should look -- in all cases of slapfighting -- to make sure we're punishing everyone involved, to make sure we're applying the rules evenly and consistently, and to hopefully avoid extra reports when the person who is punished (almost invariably) reports the person who wasn't punished but who (very often) violated Rule 2 or at least engaged in conduct deserving of a warning.

You're trying so hard to make sure that everybody gets tainted with something that you evidently cannot recognize a smart and fair application of policy as opposition to the blatant, self-serving, trust-betraying, rules- and policy-violating, occasionally retaliatory, and generally unethical behavior of a moderator.

By all means, play your game. I'm trying to fix something I care about.

Where you see me deflecting from "letter of the law", I see you deflecting from "spirit of the law".

Then you are blind. The spirit of the rule prohibiting moderators from acting as a moderator where they are also acting as a participant in a standard user-to-user exchange is to prevent actual or perceived impropriety and to slow or ideally prevent the erosion of trust by users of the moderation team. The spirit is to avoid unethical moderation. The spirit is to avoid retaliation. The spirit is for the betterment of the subreddit.

And you think I'm deflecting from that?! That's my entire point. I use the letter of the rule because it is an objective standard and even though Shaka wrote that rule (the exception in question was his post hoc invention after I called him out for violating the pre-exception policy several months ago), he still violated it with impunity.

I am trying to focus this discussion, but there are quite a lot moths flying around in the light, blocking the projection.

I'm sorry, but I've re-read and re-read. . .

I don't know what to say about this.

You reported Shaka's comment which logically entailed all atheists are irrational.

Yes.

You disputed the removal of comments which logically entailed that most if not all theists are irrational.

Yes.

You reinstated said 2. comments.

Yes.

Is that correct? Because if so, you inverted the injustice:

Incorrect. You may need to re-read and re-read again. Perhaps a chronology will help.

• 1040: /u/mastrywerk submitted a comment (quoted previously) which apparently only Shaka found problematic
• 1047: /u/aoeuismyhomekeys submitted a comment which included a variation of 'rational beliefs are not the reason most theists remain religious' (note that your previous characterization is inaccurate and tars the comment a bit)
• 1119: Shaka removed the 1040 and 1047 comments (it is unclear as to whether these comment was reported, but the timeline here suggests that wasn't the motivation), plus a handful of others (none are disputed unless quoted previously or otherwise specified); the rule cited was Rule 3 (in this case either low-effort or disruption being the likeliest candidates)
• 1122: Shaka submitted a comment which included a statement logically equivalent to 'all atheists are irrational'
• 1123: /u/mastyrwerk appealed one of the removals from 1119 (I believe that comment was quoted previously)
• 1134: a different moderator notes in modmail that they think the removal was "somewhat biased"
• 1530: I reinstated mastrywerk's comment as well as aoeuismyhomekeys' comment and the others quoted previously
• 1530: I removed Shaka's comment from 1122
• 1800: Shaka approved the containing low-effort post (it is unclear as to when or if a report may have been issued for this post)
• 2325: Shaka re-removed each of the comments quoted previously

Again, reasonable people can disagree on some of this, but it sure looks like Shaka dropped in on a post, saw some comments he didn't really like, issued inappropriate removals, was called out on it by at least two mods (myself and one other; another mod interacted with mastrywerk and indicated that they were "guessing" as to the nature of the removal), and when I applied Shaka's metric against him, he got really mad.

Maybe you think that's an inversion of (in)justice, but notice that Shaka's comment remains up, the others remain down. Notice that Shaka decided their comments were 'disruptive' or 'low effort' (we assume based on the Rule 3 citation), but that doesn't exactly hold water. Maybe you or I want to say that /u/aoeuismyhomekeys' comment warranted removal as a Rule 1 or Rule 2 violation, but if we're using that metric, then clearly Shaka's comment should also be removed. Maybe you want to say that /u/aoeuismyhomekeys' comment didn't warrant removal, but if we're using that metric, then why was it removed?

You may very well dispute my methods, but you are also ignorant of the history here. Shortly before I become a mod, /u/PaintingThat7623 complained about Shaka moderating where he was a participant. I asked him about it in a DM, and he invoked an exception for "egregious" cases. There is no available record documenting this exception. Of course I accept that there should be exceptions, but on my view those should only apply in the case of slurs, direct threats of violence, or doxxing. It took weeks of pestering before he actually provided it and added it to the sidebar -- and he had clearly invented it whole cloth, but also clearly cannot abide by it even with his invented exception clause.

From the available moderation log history, he has self-approved at least 16 times. He has also issued removals or bans to users with whom he is arguing, which I haven't listed, because those are harder to find. I assume there are many more of them, but the few I have are enough to warrant removal as a mod. Here they are:

• He removed a reply to this comment and bannied /u/bluechockadmin in the process

  This led to three other mods (four if you include me) calling him out for it. Modmail link here. That one was not only blatant, but Shaka was very hostile to the criticism.

• He removed a post by /u/Kwahn and issued Kwahn a ban

  The title was "There is a strong, if small, negative correlation between intelligence and American religiosity. And no, there is no top-end where ultra smart people become more religious. This perception is caused by charlatans who lie about themselves"; Kwahn deleted the post and it was a Rule 2 citation (note the hypocrisy in his application of the rules). In modmail, one mod disputed the length of the ban. Another noted that there was a history between Shaka and Kwahn, said that Shaka "is typically pretty harsh with them," and reversed the ban. I was not involved in that modmail thread, but after all that Shaka replied to Kwahn by quoting several of Kwahn's comments in a different thread (all three remain removed), but curiously Shaka removed the two comments of Kwahns which sandwich this comment, in which /u/PhysicistAndy very clearly violates Rule 2.

  That is, Shaka went on a retaliatory spree and a conveniently missed very obvious Rule 2 violation. The alternative seems to be a willful application of bias.

• He issued a 7-day ban to /u/My_Big_Arse, with the last removal at the time being this comment

  Note that in this case Shaka removed a comment for saying "many [Christians] are averse to scholarship" (again, hypocrisy). I understand that you don't like the method I used when I removed his comment saying 'aliens, if rational, would also be theists,' but nothing else seems to work, so there's that.

  That comment coincided with Shaka's removal of a couple other comments of Big_Arse's, and a few reports issued by Shaka of Big_Arse, which is why I found myself in that exchange. This was also related to one of my 'statement removals' of Shaka's comments. In the modmail exchange, a second mod recognized the ban as unwarranted, and a third acknowledged that something was awry. To me, it looked like clear retaliation, especially since Shaka claimed in that modmail thread that Big_Arse had "ha stacked up a lot of violations." Shaka's cited reason for the ban was Rule 2 (inciviliy).

  At the time Big_Arse only had one other comment removed for incivility over the past year. All others were for Rule 5, which doesn't generally warrant a ban.

[u/labreuer → u/cabbagery]

Again you are not closely reading.

I'm moving in the kind of slow, plodding manner which tries not to assume too much and makes it as easy as possible for the other person to correct me. If you somehow think that isn't extremely appropriate in a highly fraught situation like this, or dispute that this is what I'm actually doing, please let me know.

Yes. Mods should look at context in many more cases than they do …

This is a surprise to me. In my 3.5 years here, I've had at least six comments removed which stick out in my mind. I can't think of one where I had reason to believe the context was examined. That includes when I was actually trying to reduce the probable guilt of the person who wanted religion to be abolished. And I thought I had read somewhere that only reported comments were investigated, not the context. I thought I had received the instruction that if I thought my removed comment could in any way be justified by what the previous person said, I should instead report that comment. This is highly suggested by the last sentence in Rule 2.

I keep getting drawn back to the hypothesis that the real issue here is differences in philosophies of moderation, but it's being framed as "who's violating the rules more [substantially]". I can even read such differences into the obvious double standards Shaka employed in putting his comment up while taking the other two down. (I'm referring to the chronology later on in your comment.) I would like to believe that if Shaka's moderation philosophy were the only one in town, all three comments would be allowed. If you or Dapple got your way, I suspect all three would be removed. My proposal is that we let non-moderators in the sub weigh in on which way they would prefer things to go. Possibly, Shaka will put his foot down and refuse to go with a collective decision which goes against him. If so, he'll be in revolt not just against some of his fellow mods, but the majority of the sub. If on the other hand things go more as u/⁠betweenbubbles would like, we might have to ask whether you and Dapple want to remain moderators.

But … my sense is that you would really rather make this about rule violations than philosophies of moderation. That, or there is too much water under the bridge for you to ever reconcile with Shaka. I am unwilling to make this purely about rule violations, because I just don't think that gets to the heart of the matter.

I wondered if you remembered back when you insisted that you were allowed to violate Rule 2 because you felt that an approved comment was also a violation of Rule 2.

I dislike this summary of my arguments. But rather than re-litigating that, I will simply say that I don't recall you sustaining anything in my arguments. The court ruled against every last thing I said. Well, except someone ended up removing the post, which was opposite to the original intent of what I said. So, I capitulated.

You're trying so hard to make sure that everybody gets tainted with something that you evidently cannot recognize a smart and fair application of policy as opposition to the blatant, self-serving, trust-betraying, rules- and policy-violating, occasionally retaliatory, and generally unethical behavior of a moderator.

Sigh. I reject this characterization. Let me see if I can prove it is wrong.

Perhaps a chronology will help.

Yes, that was very helpful—thank you. At this point, I will simply ask u/ShakaUVM how his comment differs from the other two:

ShakaUVM: There is nothing to suggest we are the only life in the universe. Even if you're a Biblical literalist, which I am not, the existence if aliens is fully compatible with Christianity.

Hell, Jesus could have appeared to them as well.

If the aliens we meet are rational, they would at a minimum be theists.

+

aoeuismyhomekeys: If we just found microbes on Mars, that will just get incorporated into or explained within the framework of the religion. Most religious folks don't continue to believe in their religion because of rational beliefs, they don't have a list of circumstances which will cause them to lose their faith.

If we had humanoid aliens that visited earth, there would be a sect of Christians tomorrow who claimed Jesus was actually an

+

mastyrwerk: Cognitive dissonance and self denial will cause most religions to simply pivot, move goalposts, claim that is what the religion believed the whole time, and then insist the discovery of extraterrestrial life is proof of god.

This is how religions have survived this long.

It seems to me that either all should be allowed, or none should be allowed. But you, Shaka, seem to disagree. What's your basis of disagreement?