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

[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.