My authoritie

[muckefuck]

Sooner or later, I'm going to get banned from the language forum I'm most active on these days. It's not that I'm trying to, it's just that they have one of the most insanely restrictive moderation regimes I've ever seen. It's forbidden to make any open reference to moderator actions, so it's not even possible to discuss the issue with other forum members. My latest run in with a mod came from simply suggesting to another poster that we move our discussion of Ferguson to a more appropriate thread; for this I was publicly censured for "backseat modding" and told I should've reported the comments as off-topic instead.

I'm beginning to wonder if there's a basic underlying cultural conflict. Most all of the mods are Western Europeans (although the one I've had the most trouble with is Francophone Canadian), which might help explain why what seems insultingly paternalistic to me strikes them as perfectly reasonable. (Why on earth would I "report" someone for a minor issue we're capable of working out civilly on our own?) I'm not disputing that, at the end of the day, it's their sandbox to run as they please, but still I'm used to mods (and I am one, on LJ and elsewhere) acting more like primi inter pares and less like tinpot dictators. Strange how little authority it takes to bring out the authoritarian in all of us.

Comments

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

Some people's cultural distinctiveness amounts to nothing more than being perpetually offended. And if there's nothing to be offended at, fights will be picked until something suitable comes along.

[mollyc-q.livejournal.com]

Yup, pretty much....

[danthered.livejournal.com]

I've been on both sides of this one. Moderating a web forum is mostly like being a janitor cleaning up the shit, piss, vomit, cum, and wads of chewing gum forum users fling (and the spoilt yogurt they hide) with glee all over the place. Meanwhile, to the participants, the moderator—no matter how quietly E does the job; no matter how high E's tolerance—is perceived by the users as a traffic cop with a bad attitude and short-man syndrome and a lifetime membership in the Nazi party. Things can grow heated quickly and easily stay that way, especially on forums where the subject is arcane and abstruse enough to attract high-level geeks and boffins and the attendant high-level pedants, trolls, and troublemakers.

That said, the moderation protocol you describe at the language board doesn't sound thoughtful or productive. "No discussion of moderator action" is several large notches too draconian. A rule that says "No complaining about the rules or their enforcement", is a much more reasonable tack to take. It sets a boundary the sharp cutoff of which is left (as it should be) to moderator discretion on a casewise basis, and it allows space for discussion which as a result is occasional and brief.

I have cut way back on my web forum participation, and I don't moderate any forums any more. The reasons run the gamut from overly authoritarian behavioural tendencies I didn't like in myself, to being sick to goddamn death of cleaning up other people's thoughtless-to-deliberate messes.

(update: Also what Bill said.)

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

The rule isn't actually stated that way, which makes it all the worse. I'm just inferring it from the way people have been threatened with banning for such innocuous activities as asking publicly whether a particular user has been banned or not.

I find fora vary enormously in how much effluent they attract. This one really strikes as one of the more self-regulating. It's less stemming flamewars or banning trolls and more just deleting spam and splitting threads. There could be a lot of nastiness going on that I never see, but I'm very active there so I doubt it.

[anicca-anicca2.livejournal.com]

Strange how little authority it takes to bring out the authoritarian in all of us.

Definitely. I speak from 1st person experience ( in RL). There are extra pitfalls for being in a position that is primus (prima) inter pares as well as "if in doubt, you'll have to make the decision"..., and there's no kind of formal training for any of it, so fly by the seat of your pants and have the occasional overreaction is what I see, and do...

[mallorys-camera.livejournal.com]

I think web moderators are zealots for the same reason airport security personnel are often creeps -- They're doing something that's essentially low level that gives them an inflated sense of their own power and importance.

[wiped.livejournal.com]

if this is the same forum i'm thinking of (you seem to have avoided naming it so i'll do the same), they really do have a bizarre approach to moderation - almost nothing seems to be off-limits other than spam, personal attacks, and... discussing moderation. i've posted there since 2007 (and have been a moderator myself there for the last few years) and have never seen them really deal with the subject productively. i think they are a small inner clique that just sort of uncritically takes for granted the fact that they are moderators and don't really have a foundational set of principles that guides their moderation. in that sense your 'tinpot dictators' description is all too apt.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I find it even more bizarre in light of the energy they invested into producing a highly-structured approach to warnings and bannings, classifying (and colour-coding!) various offences according to severity and then creating this elabourate flowchart governing their application. The last time I communicated with one of them directly about the lack of "transparency" in how they operate, they told me they were working on exactly that--and this is what they produced.

It seems like some form of nerdview is at work here, but I'm having trouble identifying exactly what it is.