Moderation concerns

[SHaines]

I can ask the Admins to come and give some sort of explanation, but until them, I am firefighting: please don't make it harder than it already is.

Hey folks,

I'm posting separately from this thread about the ongoing race, so as to avoid derailing it.

Cycling has always been more than just a sport — it intersects with culture, history, and yes, sometimes politics. We recognize that certain races or events may naturally touch on political issues, and it’s not wrong to acknowledge that overlap. That said, protests about a lingering, bloody conflict are far outside the purpose for which this forum was created.

I was the person who went through the previous discussion thread to remove the political posts and it seems folks believe I went overboard. I removed the posts that discussed the protests specifically because there isn't a way to have a discussion about protests without having a full and open discussion on the entire context.

If we only allow posts that are upset that the race was interrupted by the protests, or that show very specific images of the damage reported, that's absolutely taking a stance, as the only thing anyone would see when they visited is a singular opinion repeated, which is about as far from the reality of what is happening as you can imagine. Rather than shape a false narrative that allows very specific people to have their voices heard over others, I removed it all.

If you’d like to talk about politics, please use other platforms better suited for that purpose.

Thank you for your cooperation and understanding.

 

[Izzyeviel]

Folks, this is what fear looks like.

(Just want to point out, I appreciate what the mods & admins do here, its a thankless task with no reward, this remark ain't aimed at you folks, but at your superiors)

 

[Netserk]

I was the person who went through the previous discussion thread to remove the political posts and it seems folks believe I went overboard. I removed the posts that discussed the protests specifically because there isn't a way to have a discussion about protests without having a full and open discussion on the entire context.

If we only allow posts that are upset that the race was interrupted by the protests, or that show very specific images of the damage reported, that's absolutely taking a stance, as the only thing anyone would see when they visited is a singular opinion repeated, which is about as far from the reality of what is happening as you can imagine. Rather than shape a false narrative that allows very specific people to have their voices heard over others, I removed it all.

I don't believe such a stance has ever been applied to any other protest. Am I mistaken?

 

[SHaines]

Folks, this is what fear looks like.

(Just want to point out, I appreciate what the mods & admins do here, its a thankless task with no reward, this remark ain't aimed at you folks, but at your superiors)

Can you provide additional context?

 

[Izzyeviel]

Without getting all political... you lot have either done an absolutely terrible job of moderating the forum for years, or someone has told you to be utterly ruthless when dealing with recent events.

I'm pretty sure its not the former.

 

[SHaines]

I don't believe such a stance has ever been applied to any other protest. Am I mistaken?

Have we seen previous protests of this type in recent years? This one is the first to flood my inbox with notifications.

The policy to keep political discussions off this forum isn't new, so this isn't a policy change. If I've missed something specific, please let me know.

 

[SHaines]

Without getting all political... you lot have either done an absolutely terrible job of moderating the forum for years, or someone has told you to be utterly ruthless when dealing with recent events.

I'm pretty sure its not the former.

I absolutely love forums and have for decades. That said, one major drawback is that we cannot convey tone well. I will just say plainly that there's no intention here to be ruthless, but this current situation does feel very different, based on the amount of posts coming in all at once on an extremely complex topic.

Since our policy has been to keep politics off the forum for six years, if this is coming as a surprise, then I apologize that I didn't do a better job of making sure folks were clear on the rule. The protests were not something I anticipated and didn't realize there would be confusion about the policy after the fact.

 

[Netserk]

Have we seen previous protests of this type in recent years? This one is the first to flood my inbox with notifications.

The policy to keep political discussions off this forum isn't new, so this isn't a policy change. If I've missed something specific, please let me know.

Yes, we've seen many climate related protests and also protests by farmers that were political.

The part I quoted went beyond removing any political content, but took the highly unusual stance that a politically neutral condemnation of race sabotage is not allowed in this particular case only.

 

[Izzyeviel]

I'm pretty sure you didn't ban dozens of people & cause people to be upset & delete hundreds of posts en masse for all the times politics has been discussed on here or affected races. You've always used common sense before.

 

[SHaines]

I'm pretty sure you didn't ban dozens of people & cause people to be upset & delete hundreds of posts en masse for all the times politics has been discussed on here or affected races. You've always used common sense before.

There's definitely confusion. None of the posts I removed had any other action of any kind taken. Not a single ban or even suspension was put in place by me. Armchair had specific cases where further action was needed, but those were individual circumstances.

I went further than folks were anticipating and that has resulted in increased anxiety. I am genuinely very sorry for that. It was absolutely not my intention to lead to additional concerns.

I'll be sure to make things more clear when taking actions, so as to avoid giving folks any reason to assume something more is taking place.

Yes, we've seen many climate related protests and also protests by farmers that were political.

The part I quoted went beyond removing any political content, but took the highly unusual stance that a politically neutral condemnation of race sabotage is not allowed in this particular case only.

I'd say the context of climate protests is entirely different. My OP mentions that we want to be a place where you can have those discussions of where politics and cycling intersect, which could include climate protests.

These current protests are about an active military conflict. There aren't any other active military conflicts that can be discussed on this forum either.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

If we only allow posts that are upset that the race was interrupted by the protests, or that show very specific images of the damage reported, that's absolutely taking a stance, as the only thing anyone would see when they visited is a singular opinion repeated, which is about as far from the reality of what is happening as you can imagine.

This is simply not an accurate reflection of the collective posts that had been allowed to stand in the stage 11 thread prior to your intervention - otherwise a) I would have had far more posts deleted on the day itself than I actually had, and b) I would have taken issue with such a policy.

At the end of the day, the event that had the single biggest impact on both Wednesday's and today's stage was a protest. If any and all reference to said protest is not allowed - and it seems to be, going by the phrasing below - then it is no longer possible to have anything more than a partial discussion of the day's cycling. In my view, having a full discussion of the day's cycling is the very raison d'être of this forum. So it makes me question the point of coming here in the future, and judging by the comments in a variety of threads I'm not the only one. In addition, it is questionable to say the least whether these protests are going to go away soon, so it's also debatable whether the issue will resolve itself.

I removed it all.

In conclusion, I think the current (interpretation of) moderation policy you/your superiors are pushing is already eating away at the forum and will only eat away further if things stay the way they are. If you/your superiors don't mind the community slowly bleeding to death, or care about it less than you/they do about the current moderation policy, then please admit so, so that people can draw their conclusions. On the other hand, if you/your superiors do actually care, then I don't see any option other than to at least somewhat change course.

 

[Netserk]

I'd say the context of climate protests is entirely different. My OP mentions that we want to be a place where you can have those discussions of where politics and cycling intersect, which could include climate protests.

These current protests are about an active military conflict. There aren't any other active military conflicts that can be discussed on this forum either.

Nominally, the protests here are about the participation of a team in the race, not the war itself. That is equivalent to the 2023 WC protest of oil sponsors.

The following logic has never been applied before:

"If we only allow posts that are upset that the race was interrupted by the protests, or that show very specific images of the damage reported, that's absolutely taking a stance, as the only thing anyone would see when they visited is a singular opinion repeated, which is about as far from the reality of what is happening as you can imagine."

 

[AmRacer]

Nominally, the protests here are about the participation of a team in the race, not the war itself. That is equivalent to the 2023 WC protest of oil sponsors.

Then you can ask why they are protesting against that team....and on we go.

 

[Netserk]

Then you can ask why they are protesting against that team....and on we go.

Yes, and you could ask the same about oil companies.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

I'm pretty sure you didn't ban dozens of people & cause people to be upset & delete hundreds of posts en masse for all the times politics has been discussed on here or affected races. You've always used common sense before.

There's definitely confusion. None of the posts I removed had any other action of any kind taken. Not a single ban or even suspension was found.

I went further than folks were anticipating and that has resulted in increased anxiety. I am genuinely very sorry for that. It was absolutely not my intention to lead to additional concerns.

OK: there is confusion (I had hoped to remain an observer on this thread, and still mainly wish to)
There were a number of warnings which triggered suspensions, mainly in the stage 11 thread, and two further ones today. As already explained, I would not normally apply a ban, or even a formal warning, without agreement of the other moderator, but the situation last Wednesday was running out of hand. I alerted SHaines, specifically asking him to check those I had applied warnings to. Those would not now be obvious to him, unless Admins have some kind of bans database that is certainly not among the moderator tools.

I am confident that all the cases that did receive a ban were sufficiently egregious for that to have been justified: if anyone returned from a ban wants to raise the case with me as to why they do not agree, by all means PM me. I begrudge nobodt the right to strong opinions over political issues, national or global, I just try to keep this tiny corned=r of the internet free of them.

 

[SHaines]

This is simply not an accurate reflection of the collective posts that had been allowed to stand in the stage 11 thread prior to your intervention - otherwise a) I would have had far more posts deleted on the day itself than I actually had, and b) I would have taken issue with such a policy.

I went through the thread and identified posts that were discussing the protests and removed them all at once. It's possible that some of the posts I removed should not have been, which is certainly a possibility. As with everyone else here, I am a person and capable of making mistakes.

Fortunately, Armchair was able to go through and take another look through the posts. If there are additional posts of yours that you feel should be restored, just let me know and we can discuss that separately.

In conclusion, I think the current (interpretation of) moderation policy you/your superiors are pushing is already eating away at the forum and will only eat away further if things stay the way they are. If you/your superiors don't mind the community slowly bleeding to death, or care about it less than you/they do about the current moderation policy, then please admit so, so that people can draw their conclusions. On the other hand, if you/your superiors do actually care, then I don't see any option other than to at least somewhat change course.

The policy removing political discussions was six years ago. This is not a change of policy, but it is probably the first time an Admin has gone through and removed posts in a big group, so I absolutely should have posted in the thread to explain my thinking at the time, but I just wasn't aware that there would be confusion about the political discussion policy.

I'm learning and adapting as I go.

 

[Izzyeviel]

Then you can ask why they are protesting against that team....and on we go.

indeed. instead of pussyfooting around it, just say what it is. We're all supposed to be adults.

We should be able to say 'the french farmers are protesting against Macrons rural policies' without fear of being banned. (& Indeed that has been the case since 2011)

 

[Netserk]

The policy removing political discussions was six years ago. This is not a change of policy, but it is probably the first time an Admin has gone through and removed posts in a big group, so I absolutely should have posted in the thread to explain my thinking at the time, but I just wasn't aware that there would be confusion about the political discussion policy.

I'm learning and adapting as I go.

The broader interpretation of the written rules and how to enforce them has changed substantially over the past two years. It is not about how the rules are written.

 

[hayneplane]

There's definitely confusion. None of the posts I removed had any other action of any kind taken. Not a single ban or even suspension was put in place.

I went further than folks were anticipating and that has resulted in increased anxiety. I am genuinely very sorry for that. It was absolutely not my intention to lead to additional concerns.

I'll be sure to make things more clear when taking actions, so as to avoid giving folks any reason to assume something more is taking place.


I'd say the context of climate protests is entirely different. My OP mentions that we want to be a place where you can have those discussions of where politics and cycling intersect, which could include climate protests.

These current protests are about an active military conflict. There aren't any other active military conflicts that can be discussed on this forum either.

I think this assertion wilfully ignores that there is a clear cycling context to the protests being in this location given the IPT team competing.

A lot of those protesters will be taking the actions they have to disrupt the Vuelta specifically because of the presence of that team and I firmly believe if they were absent then the protests would be limited to signs, flags and chanting without seeking to stop the progress of the race on the road.

The farmers protests were very different as the sport was simply a well televised and publicised canvas on which the protestors could get their issues heard despite those issues having zero relation to cycling.

Edit - I do want to make clear that I was quibbling a point made by you as if it as any regular member of the forum and was not intended to be a political point about the merits or otherwise of protests.

 

[SHaines]

indeed. instead of pussyfooting around it, just say what it is. We're all supposed to be adults.

We should be able to say 'the french farmers are protesting against Macrons rural policies' without fear of being banned. (& Indeed that has been the case since 2011)

We're going to enforce the policies that are in place for the forums. We're not able to go through all the various hypothetical scenarios of what might or might not be allowed in a given thread. We'll handle things as they come on a case by case basis.

There is an active military conflict that is taking place in the world and our cycling forum isn't the place to discuss it.

The broader interpretation of the written rules and how to enforce them has changed substantially over the past two years. It is not about how the rules are written.

There was a decent period of time there where we didn't have active volunteer moderators, so things would have changed since Armchair volunteered, since he was our only moderator at the time.

A lot of those protesters will be taking the actions they have to disrupt the Vuelta specifically because of the presence of that team and I firmly believe if they were absent then the protests would be limited to signs, flags and chanting without seeking to stop the progress of the race on the road.

Protestors protest where they will have an impact and this is a major sporting event, so they were going to be there in any case.

I understand that you feel that things might have been different if they'd simply banned IPT, but others won't agree with the idea that there's a simple solution to an incredibly complex issue that has impacted geopolitical relations for over a thousand years. Things aren't every that easily resolved, even if it feels like they should be.

My point is, that since these things require more than simple solutions, our cycling forum isn't the place to have those types of debates.

 

[aphronesis]

As someone who left the forum when the changed politics policy was instated, I came back out of free time and more Vuelta coverage (thank you Devils Elbow for the great reads.

Given that a substantial amount of my previous posts were on political and controversial issues, there were marked differences to me in today’s race thread (and more generally the past few days) between posts that were stating objective facts, veering into polemical statements, and likely in some cases, unconsciously reflexive to varying degrees. These differences are obviously hard to explain with absolute consistency , let alone moderate as a voluntary service of time and energy (although the mods have done this admirably.) And it seems that they are important to recognize and negotiate in any civil context (even mixed use public/private ones).

But as some have noted, it seems at least likely that various contested aspects of cycling are increasingly a norm and maybe raises the question whether a zero tolerance policy of quasi censorship is more reflective of cycling and its discussion, or reflective of more troubling aspects of much of the world and therefore still a political position.

 

[Izzyeviel]

There is an active military conflict that is taking place in the world and our cycling forum isn't the place to discuss it.

As I said, you've always used common sense in the past & understood when to give folks a bit of leeway.

 

[Netserk]

There was a decent period of time there where we didn't have active volunteer moderators, so things would have changed since Armchair volunteered, since he was our only moderator at the time.

That was a very brief period and not what I would compare recent practices to. When RR and KB operated with the same written rules, they were enforced very differently.

And I do not think that is only about who the volunteers are, but also the decisions of those who guide them.

 

[red_flanders]

If we only allow posts that are upset that the race was interrupted by the protests, or that show very specific images of the damage reported, that's absolutely taking a stance, as the only thing anyone would see when they visited is a singular opinion repeated, which is about as far from the reality of what is happening as you can imagine. Rather than shape a false narrative that allows very specific people to have their voices heard over others, I removed it all.

I was not in the discussion today, so no dog in that very particular hunt. But the last leaves me wondering...does this indicate a stance that no discussion of protests is allowed moving forward?

This forum is about cycling and the race. If a protest affects the race, that seems relevant, particularly when it affects...the finish line, or whether there's a stage. Getting into the why behind the protest seems an obvious line not to cross. But it would seem that not discussing the fact that there IS a protest and it HAS meaningfully affected the event seems a very strange place to draw the line.

But I'm not sure that's what you're saying so if you could clarify that would be great.

I don't think it's the job of this forum to think about what opinion is being presented or "shaping a narrative" by omitting the politics. I think the job is to omit the politics and discuss cycling. Or maybe I'm misunderstanding, so excuse me if that's the case. Thank you.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

The policy removing political discussions was six years ago. This is not a change of policy, but it is probably the first time an Admin has gone through and removed posts in a big group, so I absolutely should have posted in the thread to explain my thinking at the time, but I just wasn't aware that there would be confusion about the political discussion policy.

I'm sorry, but you are moving the goalposts here. My comment was quite obviously not on the ban on political discussions, but the decision that any mention of protests (or at least the current ones) now seems to be deemed political. That policy has very much not been in place at any point in the past six years.