Just a reminder of the new comments policy that I instituted a couple of weeks ago.
That policy laid out certain rules that I expect commenters here to follow. I want to make it perfectly clear that I have zero tolerance for people who try to find ways to skirt the rules, such as, for example, skirting the three comment limit by continuing it on another thread.
Readers may have noticed that there are no ads on any of the blogs on this network. Nobody is making any money at all. In fact, it is a money sink and PZ Myers pays for the costs of the servers out of his own pocket. The bloggers here blog because they want to create spaces for conversations on issues that they care about. ‘Clicks’ have no monetary value. That means that I do not care how many people come to the site.
For me, and I suspect for the other bloggers on this network, the rewards of blogging lie in creating space for a community of people to exchange ideas and views on a variety of topics. But that is pleasurable only if people post comments that are polite and respectful towards others, even while disagreeing. Some time ago, I wrote a post that a good philosophy of life is “Don’t be a jerk”. That would be a good rule to keep in mind when posting comments as well. There is absolutely no call for anyone to be rude or sneering or condescending towards others.
Almost all the commenters on this blog contribute positively and it is a pleasure to read their contributions and interact with them. It is a very few who think that a sneering, condescending, or abrasively argumentative tone is appropriate. My patience has been worn thin by some of their comments in the past. If I think, for any reason whatsoever, that someone is behaving like a jerk, I will ban them. I am in no mood to argue about this. I will not make any public announcement about who is banned. They will simply find that they can no longer post comments. If you are not sure if a comment that you are thinking of posting violates any of these rules, that is a good indication not to post it.
I also reserve the right to make exceptions to the rules at any time, if I feel it is warranted.
These decisions will be solely mine and will be final. There will be no discussion, debate, or appeal. If anyone objects because they think that I am being arbitrary, they are of course free to leave and never return.
I, for one, welcome our new overlord (whom, I remind people, is a genteel retired professor of physics who gets no reward for writing this blog we all like whatsoever, and who has, in the past, demonstrated prodigious patience). 😉
I’m reminded that back in the day an FtB blogger tried to introduce a “civility pledge” to curb the vituperation on the blog, only to be fairly roundly mocked on the network for pompousness.
That made me sad as I thought it was a move in the right direction. The original is still worth reading today, I think, and people who take it to heart are very unlikely to experience Mano’s ire by my reckoning.
related to comment moderation if not quite on topic, im a sock puppet of great american satan because im spam-until-proven-otherwise on wordpress and never had a comment cleared from spam trap by mano. hi. 😀
I’ve been enjoying the change in temperature since your last announcement Mano, I read all the comments now without skipping some names and people are on topic and grudgeless. Zero downside so far.
(Purrs contentedly, waves tail)
Absolutely agree with badland @3. I want to read what Mano has to say, and the comments of the wise and thoughtful people who come here. It’s your blog, Mano, and your rules are quite reasonable -- we have no obligation to be here if we don’t like them. You are nothing like a certain professor of evolutionary biology (and PZ’s nemesis) whose blog (sorry, “website”) bans people who hurt his feelings with well-reasoned arguments….
Thank you for taking these steps, Mano. For me, just like for many others, it makes reading the comments a good experience. I agree about community -- it is one of the cool things about these blogs, getting to “know” the various commenters. I think such an environment encourages people who might not otherwise comment, to go ahead and say something.
I approve of this policy (not that it matters to anyone else).
#1 Sbob
Didn’t Chris Clarke leave FTB more or less thanks to the tone of the place? I thought it a shame at the time, he struck a good balance of tone and criticism.
There may be a number of personality factors that lead people to be arrogant and nasty in comments but one seems to me to be an unjustified feeling of superiority, including the belief that one’s opinions are always correct. Personally, there are only a very very few topics on which I can claim any expertise so I always step lightly and politely. And when I encounter a clueless MAGA cultist I simply keep my mouth shut. After all, what is the probability that I, being the 400th person to point out that the 2020 election was not stolen, could say anything to change anyone’s mind?
As someone who was (for better or worse) associated with the discourse around the civility pledges, I’d like to point out that my objections to the first pledge mentioned in Silentbob’s post #1 were that besides the sins of extreme verbosity and legalistic construction, it was clearly not based on the actual practicality of dealing with persons debating in bad faith. The criticism was not merely about pompousness, though no doubt its author was generously supplied with that. Tone policing comments to an appearance of civility rather than engaging with the substance of matters is just another means of derailing discourse. It’s not the only method of derailment; recently over on PZ’s I stated that I found what was being done most routinely (and offensively) was repetitive avoidance of the crux of the argument, to nitpick or bloviate about superficialities. There are many roads that lead to Rome (and an exact number that also lead away from it, too).
As for the author of the post and comment which I’ve linked to in the paragraph just above – I find it personally very sad that he willingly abandoned those principles (e.g. “I pledge to keep a sense of perspective … I pledge to be as kind as possible”) just a couple of years later, like a number of people in a similar position who found that it had become too difficult to treat commenters on FreeThought Blogs with any kindness, compassion, decency, or just some plain human dignity, if they happened to be transgender. Keeping a sense of perspective on where you are presently, and where you find others are at, is a good touchstone for being able to take part in a dialogue, rather than a monotonous fulminating rant. And on this blog, if you can’t engage with the subject matter to your satisfaction in less than or equal to three posts, then it seems doubtful that further leeway would benefit anyone.
@ ^
Yes, I linked to Libby Anne’s reproduction because the original appears lost, but she herself makes criticisms in that post including that Fincke assumes good faith when that assumption often is unjustifiable. I agree with all her criticisms, and recommend reading them.
@mano
Im not sure what happened in which comment thread now but it sounds like you are angry about it- Nonetheless I’d state that the latter part of your post (that effectively you can be as consistent or as fair as you please isnt inline with the dont be a jerk philosophy even if its completely your prerogative on your blog. I get the sense of your post ,m Im just surprised with the wording -- It sounds unlike you.
@Deepak #12:
Maybe someone got banned and emailed Mano about it, and this is his response. Total speculation on my part but that’s what I thought when I read it.
Why speculate? Mano got fed up with the various kinds of toxic nonsense that were clogging up comments, and put his foot down. An eminently reasonable response from a preeminently reasonable man.