EVERYONE:
I have some basic philosophies regarding this board. Rather than list them all, here are the four that are relevant to this thread:
1. If someone comes here and insists on building a monument to his/her own inanity, why should I stop or prevent him/her from doing so?
2. What good is a Libertarian utopia if no one wants to live there?
Those two guiding principles can be mutually contradictory, so proper moderation is always a delicate balancing act.
3. Entertainment is the ultimate goal of this message board--even for new people, so as to avoid the formation of cliques.
4. When one person's entertainment degrades others' entertainment, we must play "Jeremy Bentham" and moderate according to what the greatest good is for the greatest number.
That, too, is a delicate balancing act.
But REGARDING THE ISSUES BROUGHT UP IN THIS THREAD, your voices have been heard. When I've been able to think straight, I have weighed and strongly considered the points you have made here. Here are my tentative conclusions, but before I start a new thread announcing my executive decisions, I'd like to see if any of you object or have compelling reasons why I shouldn't go ahead with this.
UPCOMING SHIFTS / RULE CHANGES:
- HARASSMENT: Everyone naturally considers being called out as "harassment." If we prevent newcomers from calling out old-timers, then FAIRness demands that we prevent old-timers from calling out old-timers, too. As I said before, if you want moderators to clamp down on what Atlanticmike and Cultellus dish out to us, are you willing to allow moderators to clamp down on what you dish out to Ajax18? Or do you want the freedom of speech to carry on as you have been? If the latter, then you must grant the two of them the same privilege, because it is IMPERATIVE that newcomers enjoy all the same rights and privileges that old-timers have so as to avoid the creation of an elite class such as what exists at the Mormon Dialogue & Discussion board or Recovery from Mormonism.
NEVERTHELESS, we can safely curtail the sexual harassment that's been seen here of late. Therefore, from this point forward, any criticism or "calling out" that expressly identifies a poster's gender will be either moved to the Telestial or Spirit Prison forums or deleted from within the post, whatever the moderator feels is best to preserve context. "Pussy hats" are fair game, since those are physical objects that people wore whilst protesting, but comments such as "Your husband must be sick of you" or "Are you on your period?" will be moved or deleted because, like I said, they identify a person's gender (well, maybe not the "husband" thing anymore, but you get the idea). To summarize, NO MORE SEXUAL HARASSMENT WHATSOEVER in the Terrestrial or Spirit Paradise fora.
.
- SOCK PUPPETS: I am now convinced that sock puppet accounts are far too often created for trolling purposes, mild or otherwise. Plus, they invite their creator to break or circumvent the rules, because a throwaway identity has no "dog in the fight." Therefore, NO MORE SOCK PUPPET CREATION FROM THIS POINT FORWARD. It wouldn't be FAIR to go ex-post-facto, so you may keep the sock puppets you already have, but as a gesture of good faith I respectfully request that you voluntarily relinquish your sock puppet accounts if at all possible. Please send me a private message telling me the sock-puppet accounts you're willing to relinquish and have me delete, as a good faith gesture, but this is NOT a rule and you are NOT required to comply. It's simply a respectful request is all. But all new sock puppet accounts beginning now, as of this posting, will be deleted.
Sometimes people may need to create a new account because they mistakenly signed up under their real name or something. Therefore, should I set the board software to allow people to just change their username the same way they change avatars or signatures? Up until now I've had that option turned off, but perhaps that restriction encouraged sock puppet creations.
.
- A CELESTIAL-STYLE OFF-TOPIC FORUM: You have persuaded me that we need a celestial-style "Spirit _____" forum. The problem is, such a place doesn't exist in the LDS pantheon, so there wouldn't be a snappy name for it. I'll create it, but what should we call it? I'm thinking something like [Super Spirit Paradise Forum], yes, with the brackets because it was invented by fiat.
So, what does everyone think of this? Will these changes meet our needs or make the board better for you? The first two items--No sexual harassment and no new sock puppets--are effective immediately and will be rescinded if everyone convinces me they should be. The last item--a celestial style off-topic forum--will be implemented when someone comes up with a good name for it.
