Does Uncle Dale Receive Special Protection Here?

[_Ray A]

Since everyone else here has spouted their opinion, and this thread refuses to die, here is my two cents:

Do I think that Marg's bias regarding the Book of Mormon Authorship Thread issues affected her moderation decisions? No! I saw nothing in her moderation technique that indicated that.

Then why did she miss ad homs from Byron and NorthboundZax?

Do I think that Marg's dislike of ad hom's in general affected her moderation decisions? Yes! She has been very vocal about the fact that she does not like ad hom's thrown at anyone during a thread which she considers a serious discussion. It's obvious that she considers the Book of Mormon Authorship Thread a serious discussion thread. It was this dislike of ad hom's in general which caused her over-zealous move of removing the "Danny Boy" remark. If Marg was moderating with a bias of the issue in mind, she certainly would have let an ad hom toward DCP slide, since DCP is clearly in opposition to her issue bias.

He was not making a serious contribution to the discussion. MOST of his comments were removed! Brent was making a serious contribution! And a threatening one! What did Brent do wrong????

Do I think that Marg was slightly over protective of Dale? Yes....However, I think her heart was in the right place, and this was not necessarily a bad thing. She's new at moderating. None of us are entitled to a learning curve?

"Heart" has nothing to do with this, Liz. The truth is her "heart" was with the Spalding advocates!

Do I think that this whole mess has been blown WAY out of proportion? Hell, yes!!!!

Then you could have ended it with a less contentious note.

Also, another thing I would like to note..which goes to the whole learning curve issue.....every single time Marg made any type of split, she prefaced her splits with the fact that if any poster felt she had been overzealous, they were free to re-post their comments back in the thread in question!!!

And was Brent given that option? As Brent noted, it was an asinine suggestion to begin with. WHY on earth should he have to plead with a bloody moderator to get his innocent comments back on the thread? Brent was shafted. Mikwut was shafted. And both posed the most significant threat to Spalding.

You just don't "get it".

Can we PLEASE give this a rest?

Not considering your biased comments.

[_marg]

I haven't been following the discussion here tonight ..just took a quick look. Thanks liz for your post.

Briefly I have no regrets not moderating. If that negatively were to affect the Spalding theory I would regret that. But I prefer to not be tied to the board.

In essence to sum up Dale did not get preferential treatment of any significance. My remark to Ray created the problem, and that left Shades with a problem. I replied to Ray quickly at a time I was exasperated with him and without thinking of the consequences I replied that I used preferential treatment but in fact the little amount of moderating was minor with the intent to keep things focused on topic. No one noticed I had removed "Danny Boy" I did it so, so that in the future anyone reading wouldn't be reading condescending or derogatory terms of others and although I dislike the things DCP posts I think he's deserving of respect. I don't think Bryon noticed nor DCP what I'd done, my point for bringing it up was simply to illustrate that I wasn't out to harass critics. I was also asked to move or think about moving a few posts of DCP's & I didn't.

I have my own speculation of Ray's motives in this which I have voiced in this thread already I beleive.

The important thing is that the Spalding thread progresses well, and it's the people in it for the most part who are making sure that's happening.

Edit: Sorry I should also mention a thanks to Vicki for sticking up for me and Liz in your recent post thanks. Both these women have had terrible run ins with me but they don't hold grudges despite that.

[_Ray A]

I have my own speculation of Ray's motives in this which I have voiced in this thread already I beleive.

Well I can tell you upfront what my motives are, marg. I consider the Spalding theory to be as dead as a doornail (until concrete connections are made). But that doesn't mean I'm not reading what Spalding advocates have to say. You know as well as I do how tedious it is to read some of it.

The real problem here is that you should not have been assigned to moderate this thread, because every man and his dog knows how you feel about the Spalding Theory. Nor should anyone against the Spalding Theory be assigned.

More thought should have gone into this. Harmony would not have qualified either, because it's obvious where her biases lie. Do referees call in favour of their teams? You can count on it. It is better to have no moderation on that thread, than bad moderation.

Seems to me like it has been doing okay with minimal, or no moderation.

[_Jason Bourne]

Jason,

I read your recent exchanges with marg here and chose to just highlight the above instead of going comment for comment.

In the above, you advise marg to "Let it go". Jason, maybe you should have spent almost two months keeping up with a thread to see that it stay on topic and removing off topic derailments. When you spend two months doing so and then look at yourself being accused multiple times of bias without the person accusing you, demonstrating bias, then I'd like to see how easily you would "let it go".

Ray's comments on this thread give the appearance that marg's "bias" was pervasive on the Book of Mormon Authorship thread. Not one poster, excepting myself, has asked that those accusations be demonstrated.

If marg's bias were pervasive on the thread (which has been up for nearly two months to the tune of 1,000+ posts and perhaps 10K views by now) don't you think that another poster would have noticed it? Other moderators? Shades?

marg and I share an online history of 10 years. Most of that history is laced with animosity toward eachother. Anyone on this board who knows the history of those interactions is well aware of that. However, I will not fail to comment when I see that a group of posters on a discussion board falls gullibly for the unsubstantiated tactics of another who is merely out to smear a person because they couldn't cut it or were annoyed with them in a separate thread.

Given the fact that accusations are accepted without evidence other than hyperbole and a sensationalized thread title, I see little incentive for people to volunteer to moderate this board.

Would you like to try?

What you've been a part of here, Jason, is wrong. The M.O. on this board appears to be "aggravate the hell out of the moderator until they throw up their hands in disgust and quit".

marg devoted herself for nearly two months to trying to keep a lengthy thread on topic and she completely succeeded in doing so. The thread is over 1,000 posts now and still on topic.

Jersey,

This is just rather hilarious. I made one comment to Marg for pulling my name into one little name into a slam of a comment about a post I made her. Her observations were flat out wrong about my motive. As noted, if you read my comments, all I said was I did not think anyone should get preferential treatment and that was in response to her very own comments. I did not say she did a bad job moderating. I made a passing comment to her very own comment.

Further, my comment about letting it go was not about her defense of her moderation but in direct response to her seeming need to declare my post a hit and run to attack her because of run ins she and I have had in the past. It was no such thing. She continued to insist it was. My exchange with her here had to do with that. That is it.

So, frankly your scolding of me over this it in my opinion, out of line and does not even address what my slight exchange with marg on this now 12 page thread was about. Next time you feel a need to scold me or anyone else you might want to get the context of the exchange correct.

[_Yoda]

Then why did she miss ad homs from Byron and NorthboundZax?

It's a 40+ page thread, Ray. We all missed them. YOU were the only one who CAUGHT them, but chose not to report it. Once the ad homs were reported, they were fixed....by ME.

"Heart" has nothing to do with this, Liz. The truth is her "heart" was with the Spalding advocates!

Oh, please. Her heart was with a poster who is in poor health, is having a life-threatening operation in a few weeks, and, in spite of all of that, has volunteered his time to make a substantial contribution to the board.

Also, another thing I would like to note..which goes to the whole learning curve issue.....every single time Marg made any type of split, she prefaced her splits with the fact that if any poster felt she had been overzealous, they were free to re-post their comments back in the thread in question!!!

And was Brent given that option? As Brent noted, it was an asinine suggestion to begin with. WHY on earth should he have to plead with a bloody moderator to get his innocent comments back on the thread? Brent was shafted. Mikwut was shafted. And both posed the most significant threat to Spalding.

You just don't "get it".

No, Ray, YOU don't "get it". NO ONE had to PLEAD with a MODERATOR about ANYTHING! All they had to do was copy/paste their comments back in the thread in question.....NO QUESTIONS ASKED! If you don't know how to copy/paste something, what are you doing posting on a computer message board to begin with?

Somehow, I get the impression that both Brent and Mikwut are more than capable of copy/paste.

My point is....Marg recognized that she was on a learning curve, and put out there that if her moving was over-zealous, posters with a concern were more than welcome to:

a)Move their own comments back via copy/paste...NO QUESTIONS ASKED,
b)Contact ANY of the Moderators to help them move their comments back, if they didn't have time to do it, or were concerned with the process of how to do it.

Not considering your biased comments.

For the record, Ray, I am NOT biased toward the Spalding Theory. I don't know enough about it to be for or against it. I have been fascinated with the information that Dale has presented. I have equally been fascinated with the information Brent has presented. For me, the thread is a great educational tool, which is why I do more lurking than participating.

Then you could have ended it with a less contentious note.

You're right, Ray. I let my frustration get the best of me. You know that I like you. Although we haven't agreed on every issue, we have always managed to remain civil to one another.

I just don't think that Marg deserves to be "dog-piled" upon, particularly when she has voluntarily given up her Moderator status.

Also, Shades has put updated Moderation Rules in place here, which I think will be very helpful:

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=8466

[_Jersey Girl]

He was not making a serious contribution to the discussion. MOST of his comments were removed! Brent was making a serious contribution! And a threatening one! What did Brent do wrong????

No, in the beginning (when his remarks were split) Brent wasn't making a serious contribution as he is now. His first three posts were to ask Dale to explain a casual remark he'd made regarding the treatment of his belief (which could have led to a derail and started to once Dale replied), greet mikwut and state that he didn't think he would participate on the thread.

He hadn't begun to make a serious contribution. His remarks were not unlike DCP's when he posts and claims he isn't interested in the topic.

I know that thread like I know a map of my home town. When you make an assertion such as that you've made above, it would be best for you to demonstrate your position by posting the posts in question instead of expecting people to take what you've written as gospel.

Same thing with your saying that marg was assigned to moderate the thread. That is simply false.

[_Jersey Girl]

The real problem here is that you should not have been assigned to moderate this thread, because every man and his dog knows how you feel about the Spalding Theory. Nor should anyone against the Spalding Theory be assigned.

She was NOT ASSIGNED to moderate the Book of Mormon Authorship thread. Shades has already addressed that directly to you and while you use Shades as a vehicle to flaunt your baseless claims, you fail to acknowledge that he told you directly the circumstances of her involvement as well did I, and you continue to repeat falsehoods.

Your one and only goal here, Ray, has been to smear via innuendo, the reputation of a moderator who succeeded in keeping the Book of Mormon Authorship thread on topic because you can't cut it with her in unrelated discussion.

You have yet to supply evidence in her work as moderator of your claims of bias.

[_skippy the dead]

No one noticed I had removed "Danny Boy" I did it so, so that in the future anyone reading wouldn't be reading condescending or derogatory terms of others and although I dislike the things DCP posts I think he's deserving of respect. I don't think Bryon noticed nor DCP what I'd done, my point for bringing it up was simply to illustrate that I wasn't out to harass critics.

Just a quick note on this, so it doesn't slip past: as far as I can tell, nobody noticed this because the change was made without any mention by a mod in the post that such change was made. The changes were made within the post, with no edit stamp and no explanation of what was done. I went and read all of Byron's posts in the thread, and there is no red ink in them. I had thought it was a policy that if a mod touched a post, the mod should say so. Behind the scene edits are a real problem for me, and I had thought that Shades had disavowed them.

If we cannot trust the posts that are made are as the poster intended, this board becomes more and more useless. We apparently have no way of knowing when a mod changes content, and this is troublesome.

[_Jersey Girl]

I noticed that "Danny Boy" was removed.

[_skippy the dead]

I noticed that "Danny Boy" was removed.

Well bully for you. But it wasn't because the edit was acknowledged by a mod.