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Thread: Political Discussions

  1. #61
    Box of Frogs edabbs44's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Plus Plus View Post
    But why go to a Cincinnati Reds Baseball forum to discuss tsunamis, circumcision, or the economy?
    Maybe because the posters here aren't really "strangers", in the cyberworld sense. This is definitely the only place I post and only because of the Reds. I am much more likely to post here on random topics than anywhere else.

    Not that I have any interest in political views on here but I think this translates to other subjects as well.


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  3. #62
    Et tu, Brutus? Brutus's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Sea Ray View Post
    ...dunno

    Why go to a Reds board to discuss Wonder Woman or American Idol?

    With the workload of the MODs in mind, my suggestion would be to accept that a non sports chatter section will be everything under the sun and make it less restrictive rather than more so. If you're going to further limit subject matter then you'll only give MODs more to look out for and you'll end up with more locked threads. Put another way, most sites' non sports sections are not a burden on the MODs because they don't stretchout the definition of politics to extremes. They let a lot of that stuff go. The more limits you impose, the more work you make for the MODs
    The only concern I have, and this is just really from my own personal experience, is that less moderation in controversial subjects leads to more hostility and more aggression. Sometimes that hostility carries over into the actual relevant discussions, as posters have more vendettas because of political issues. It makes it for a less pleasant forum when that happens, even if moderators enforce the rules as they normally would.
    "No matter how good you are, you're going to lose one-third of your games. No matter how bad you are you're going to win one-third of your games. It's the other third that makes the difference." ~Tommy Lasorda

  4. #63
    Administrator Boss-Hog's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    That's a correct assumption. I'm certainly not questioning why there's interest in it - of course I know why people would want to discuss a devastating natural disaster that just took place. What I am questioning is this: why should we (the administrative staff here) just accept that these type of threads, that on the surface appear to be perfectly free from any type of political discussion that's been taboo here for six years, be given such priority on a baseball-themed site? Over the past two weeks, our moderating staff has spent far more time addressing this issue and the type of problems some (not all) of these threads have caused and I don't think that's fair for GIK and I to ask that the moderators spend the majority of the free time that they can offer the site moderating threads that have absolutely nothing to do with the purpose of the site. There are thousands or probably millions of other places you can go to have these discussions and in many of those places, you can say and do nearly anything you want without worrying about breaking any rules. It just so happens that we have such a place linked on RedsZone's forum home page.

    Quote Originally Posted by Plus Plus View Post
    I don't mean to speak for Boss-Hog, but it seems that his question is more "why is Redszone the location of choice to discuss the Japan tsunamis?" and less "is the Japan situation/discussion political in nature?"

  5. #64
    Member Kingspoint's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    I just find it sad that there wasn't enough maturity around to discuss the dangers of the Japan disaster and what effect they might pose to people living in the United States.

    I certainly understand how moderators don't have the time to read through the baseball-related posts, let alone the non-baseball-related posts. That's a lot of time that could be spent doing any number of other things in their lives.

  6. #65
    Administrator Boss-Hog's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Brutus the Pimp View Post
    The only concern I have, and this is just really from my own personal experience, is that less moderation in controversial subjects leads to more hostility and more aggression. Sometimes that hostility carries over into the actual relevant discussions, as posters have more vendettas because of political issues. It makes it for a less pleasant forum when that happens, even if moderators enforce the rules as they normally would.
    I would agree with this and can personally vouch for the fact that it happened when we did allow political/religion-based discussions.

  7. #66
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by edabbs44 View Post
    Maybe because the posters here aren't really "strangers", in the cyberworld sense. This is definitely the only place I post and only because of the Reds. I am much more likely to post here on random topics than anywhere else.
    This. Plus: I'm on a lot of political sites but most of them fall one way or another. I like that this site isn't an echo chamber.

    Conflict is the soundtrack of the human experience - embrace it.

  8. #67
    Maple SERP savafan's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    This

    Quote Originally Posted by Sea Ray View Post
    ...dunno

    Why go to a Reds board to discuss Wonder Woman or American Idol?

    With the workload of the MODs in mind, my suggestion would be to accept that a non sports chatter section will be everything under the sun and make it less restrictive rather than more so. If you're going to further limit subject matter then you'll only give MODs more to look out for and you'll end up with more locked threads. Put another way, most sites' non sports sections are not a burden on the MODs because they don't stretchout the definition of politics to extremes. They let a lot of that stuff go. The more limits you impose, the more work you make for the MODs
    Plus this

    Quote Originally Posted by Rojo View Post
    This. Plus: I'm on a lot of political sites but most of them fall one way or another. I like that this site isn't an echo chamber.

    Conflict is the soundtrack of the human experience - embrace it.

    There's only so much people can argue about VORP and WAR, and it's gotten pretty stale.
    My dad got to enjoy 3 Reds World Championships by the time he was my age. So far, I've only gotten to enjoy one. Step it up Redlegs!

  9. #68
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Boss-Hog View Post
    That's a correct assumption. I'm certainly not questioning why there's interest in it - of course I know why people would want to discuss a devastating natural disaster that just took place. What I am questioning is this: why should we (the administrative staff here) just accept that these type of threads, that on the surface appear to be perfectly free from any type of political discussion that's been taboo here for six years, be given such priority on a baseball-themed site? Over the past two weeks, our moderating staff has spent far more time addressing this issue and the type of problems some (not all) of these threads have caused and I don't think that's fair for GIK and I to ask that the moderators spend the majority of the free time that they can offer the site moderating threads that have absolutely nothing to do with the purpose of the site. There are thousands or probably millions of other places you can go to have these discussions and in many of those places, you can say and do nearly anything you want without worrying about breaking any rules. It just so happens that we have such a place linked on RedsZone's forum home page.

    I think this problem stems from just how good of a message board this site really is. I know for me personally when I first started posting here probably 80% or more of my posts were strictly about baseball. Over time it has sort of evolved and the site has sort of grown up in some ways and now I probably only post about baseball maybe once or twice a year and the majority of my posts go in other forums. Another poster referenced it, but I think that comes for me from the community sense you have here.

    It's like if you were able to listen to every conversation that took place in a sports bar or a tailgate party. Many of those conversations would be about the game or the team, but eventually you would have side conversations.

    I actually like that there are some rules and restrictions on what the conversation in the other forums can be since I believe it keeps a level of civility that didn't exist before the rules were put in place. I do think that some mods can get a little over sensitive to things, but I'm not going to criticize since they are putting their free time into it and I haven't ever seen anything totally crazy blocked or deleted.

  10. #69
    Member 757690's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Kingspoint View Post
    I just find it sad that there wasn't enough maturity around to discuss the dangers of the Japan disaster and what effect they might pose to people living in the United States.

    I certainly understand how moderators don't have the time to read through the baseball-related posts, let alone the non-baseball-related posts. That's a lot of time that could be spent doing any number of other things in their lives.
    I can't imagine a discussion about anything involving the word "nuclear" that isn't highly political and decisive. it's right up there with "guns" and "religion."
    Hoping to change my username to 75769023

  11. #70
    Five Tool Fool jojo's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Plus Plus View Post
    But why go to a Cincinnati Reds Baseball forum to discuss tsunamis, circumcision, or the economy?
    The answer is pretty simple IMHO...redszone has a critical mass of members and it's a moderated forum.

    That's a different question than why should content that falls outside of the mission of redszone be allowed to eat up resources.

    The answer to that one IMHO is that it shouldn't in a perfect world (then again there should never be a need for moderation in the ORG in a perfect world either). But my hunch is that if the non-sports chatter and Tavern forums were closed down, it would decrease the traffic to the baseball-related forums.
    "This isn’t stats vs scouts - this is stats and scouts working together, building an organization that blends the best of both worlds. This is the blueprint for how a baseball organization should be run. And, whether the baseball men of the 20th century like it or not, this is where baseball is going."---Dave Cameron, U.S.S. Mariner

  12. #71
    Administrator Boss-Hog's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Even though this is, has always been and will always be a Reds themed site, I get that over the past 11 years, we've long past grown to where people want to discuss non-baseball related topics with other members and honestly, I think that's a cool thing. What I don't agree with, though, is the expectation some have that we should devote so much of our fairly limited moderating resources to a topic (politics) that is inherently controversial and historically, has led to unnecessary work for admins and moderators and spawned arguments that bled into the baseball-related threads.

    By the way, I'm not in any way suggesting we shut down the Non-Baseball Chatter or Tavern forums because even with the problems we've encountered with the political discussions over the past couple of weeks, the vast majority of the threads in those forums require no moderation and are healthy for the betterment of the board. That being said, based on what I've seen on this very site in the past, there's no way I can honestly say the same about political discussions.

  13. #72
    Member Sea Ray's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    If nothing else I think we'll have less non-baseball talk after the season gets going next week. Opening Day is just about here!

  14. #73
    Member top6's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    Quote Originally Posted by Sea Ray View Post
    If nothing else I think we'll have less non-baseball talk after the season gets going next week. Opening Day is just about here!
    Good call, we are probably all just going a little crazy without baseball. Espeically with the last season being so great, but ending so terribly and suddenly. LET'S START BASEBALL ALREADY.

  15. #74
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    Re: Political Discussions

    I guess I just don't understand why you need the moderation. Despite what the mainstream media says, moderate is over-rated. Let a thousand flowers bloom....and shake off those Sunday shoes.

    Last edited by Rojo; 03-23-2011 at 03:00 AM.

  16. #75
    Member Redsfaithful's Avatar
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    Re: Political Discussions

    If it bleeds over to the baseball side you could take a hard line stance and temporarily or permanently ban people, the same way I think you normally would handle someone being a jerk on that side of the board.

    Political discussion on this board was at one point pretty interesting, because as Rojo says, the board is a melting pot. You actually don't get that in most areas of the internet. Most places for political discussion are either extremely left wing or right wing, and the places that aren't are more vicious because of a lack of common tie like we have here.

    The peanut gallery isn't bad, but obviously it gets diminished traffic because many members here I don't think know it exists, and even a small hurdle like having to register for a different site will turn people off.

    I understand the change, but Boss asked why political discussion was worth having here, and that's why I believe it is.
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