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Imperial Forum → Politics → Poll: Should IC Politics trolls, flamers, and hijackers be banned?
I don't think Xeno is an idiot. He's more intelligent than most of you. But he is a sad case of communist brainwashing. His intellect has become divorced from reality in the service of the ideals pounded in to him from birth by his authorities.
Lol.
Here comes the flame festival ~!~!~! yipee Interesting how trolls travel in packs, eh?
I've been called an idiot, a brainwashed commie, personal attacks directed entirely off-topic. Instead of discussing what should be done with flamers and trolls, the flamers and trolls have hijacked the thread to discuss my questionable intelligence and my so called brainwashed condition.
Would these personal attacks in the two posts above be enough to ban them?
Also, according to Zarf, I can't just ignore them? I have to defend against their points that 1. I am an idiot, and 2. that I am brainwashed, as by ignoring them I risk conceding their points that I am an idiot and brainwashed commie.
Yet, by responding to them at all, don't I just stoke the fire, and aid them in hijacking the thread?
Something must be done.
This is supposed to be a poll, so let's poll:
Should Justinian and Serenity receive a temporary 1 week ban for the above posts? Yes or No?
Yes
Fine, I won't defend you next time.
@xeno
1: I also believe I stated that rule-based ignores take precedence over what I said.
2: There's a definite difference between:
A: Responding to people hurling personal attacks on you, and
B: Responding to legitimate points about issues
You can, and should, ignore the former, just as you said. What I stated only assumes a situation in which two people are actually discussing issues, not people.
This forum would be dead within a week if there were no more trolls, flamers and hijackers.
Hey if the Prime Minister over there in UK can call a little old lady a Bigot, I really don't see why we have to have legislation in the forum. It's far better now, than what it used to be when Imperial Conflict's first started so many many years ago.
You are a troll, xeno syndicated, and should be banned.
There's something about threads about fluffy bunnies bribing the Czech government into poisoning the wheat supply of the underground Gnomes of Poland that just begs for hijacking. And you make such threads. Who can take such psychosis seriously? Nobody who deserves not to get trolled!
That said, [seriously... though that was all serious] this forum has always been a magnet for trolls and generally immature and uneducated [*cough*] posters. There's nothing that can be done about the demographics of the IC community. So the forum remains as it always has been (except with more of the bad parts, less of the good ones)... whatever that is. 
> Blind Guardian wrote:
> You are a troll, xeno syndicated, and should be banned.
There's something about threads about fluffy bunnies bribing the Czech government into poisoning the wheat supply of the underground Gnomes of Poland that just begs for hijacking. And you make such threads. Who can take such psychosis seriously? Nobody who deserves not to get trolled!
How is that trolling? Because he made a thread about a concept you view as outlandish?
If Xeno did it only for the idea of inciting a flame war then yes, however I doubt that Xeno did that...
In any event, if we as a community don't try and change then of course nothing will change. And if we make a positive change how will the mods interfere?
I don't think intent matters if it's intellectual garbage spewing from a base mind. One base mind produces "flaming" because he cannot have a conversation. Another makes absolutely inane posts and doesn't respond to polite requests that the poster address reality. I do not support discriminating. Mock them all!
Mockery with a purpose is not flaming. It's just called flaming by the mocked when he cannot support his position. Ah ha!
Interesting. So far, this thread is still discussing flaming and such, but with personal attacks.
basically, it is ok on this forum to flame, troll, hijack, - anything, as the rules against such activity (if they exist in writing I do not know) are not enforced.
Because this conduct is acceptable on IC, there can't be in depth political discussion.
Thanks all for clearing things up.
Bye. It's been a nice few years.
I was merely pointing out that to not mock that which one finds to be inane and absolutely ridiculous would be dishonest and harmful to open discussion.
If I really made a post about those Czech bunnies and Polish gnomes I would expect you to mock me. It would be the right thing to do--my posting on such garbage would be a waste of everyone's time, worthy of mocking. Yet you expect a double-standard when I perceive your posts about OGLUs-for-all and government conspiracies as a little out of touch with reality. And I even agreed with you about corporate and government interests preventing proven advancements, voicing concerns about the costs of such measures and our technology not being as advanced as you envisioned. But instead of having a discussion about how we could begin to overcome the enormous costs of OGLUs-for-all or having a discussion about the technology and where it's at now, you just continued posting as if those weren't issues, as if we had technology and wealth that we do not. Which I called you on. It'd have been dishonest not to. I would have been embarrassed to pretend we had technology we didn't or wealth to produce these things that we don't. And nobody (including us) would benefit from a discussion of pretend-technology. Actually believing something you make up and pretend is pretty ignorant. And ignorance doesn't do anybody any good.
I've had periods of many months where I didn't post or read this forum since I played IC and first posted here some years ago. Life happens (sometimes more than other times!) and IC is what it is, is where it is low on the priorities list. And not all of the community particularly impresses me. But I have the manners (usually... it's your fault I posted that statement here!) to leave that unspoken. I'm not going to storm off angry 'cause I'm better than everyone and nobody understands me! [/whiny tone]. I'm a human being capable of talking about it. And if I had particular concerns I could voice them. Generally my concerns are just the inane nature of some posters' posts. I'm always offended by people, whose positions I can respect, when I perceive them as buying any lie it takes to maintain their position. I maintain the positions I do despite the points I must concede which aren't entirely in my positions' favor. And I can explain why those points do not change my position (instead of ignoring them repeatedly). I can discuss how much they mean to my position, or how much they're being misused to attack my position.
The point is I can talk about it. If you can't, you probably weren't looking for a discussion board.
euhm what has this thread to do with politics? NOTHING!!! troll....
Blind Guardian. I've been ignoring you for months since you insulted me / flamed me - that's why the discussion on OGLUs ended.
Oh, and consider ignoring you now resumed.
Narrutto,
This thread is about politics. Read the first post. You're the troll and flamer here by falsly accusing the topic as trolling. Granted, the discssion hasn't yet ventured into discussing the broader real world applications of the freedom of the individual to free speech and the benefits to a community an atmosphere conducive to debate might bring.
hmm, thats a matter of opinion, i consider under "politics" more the situations like in belgium where our government has fallen once more.
but over the topic... trolling and flaming should be considered as critics, just like in real life there are different political groups with different points of view, and guess what some of those groups are talking stupid things, but thats their choice.
Politics is a wide-ranging subject, but here its focusing on the political issue individual rights vs. the rights of the community in the context of the individual right to troll and flame vs the our IC Politics community's right to have an atmosphere conducive to authentic political debate. This is certainly a political issue.
@Blind Guardian
So by your own logic, you have to first win that xeno's argument is stupid before you can mock him for it. That puts you in this problem:
1: Before you even get a right to mock him, you have to prove his post is idiotic, which means you are required by your own standard to engage him legitimately.
2: If you win that the argument is ridiculous, then there's no reason to mock him anymore.
3: Your argument creates infinite regression of what's considered "stupid." A good portion of people on this forum might say many of Flint's stuff is stupid. Hell, any new idea is automatically considered "stupid." In fact, I considered xeno's arguments to be nothing near utterly ridiculous... (I disagreed, but it doesn't mean they're dismissible). There's no set standard for what is "stupid," and thus it's best to allow argument to be discussed.
@narrutto
In addition, discussions of the way in which we debate are inherently part of the political process. If anything, this is one of the most important politics debates in this forum, as effective communication of ideas is a prerequisite to effective implementation.
"that's why the discussion on OGLUs ended."
It never started. I made fun of you living in fairytale land and you continued rambling as if you were making sense. Your holier than thou attitude now doesn't make your ramblings any less ridiculous. Sorry, it doesn't work that way. And now because I had fun at your expense when you rambled, you're whining now... You are the cause of your own complaints.
I don't have to "prove" anything, Zarf BeebleBrix. If I did, he would obviously disagree, regardless that he was wrong. So it wouldn't be acknowledged anyway.
I did engage him legitimately. I generally do, unless something is SO absurd I go straight to mockery--in which case I start relatively light, and I am of course always open to "legitimate" engagement, but xeno just ignored those attemps over, and over, and over again. And rambled on, and on, and on. He wasn't interested in any discussion, so he got mocked. He can cry about it now all he wants. I only have to make fun of him once--he has to repeat his ramblings over and over because he cannot respond to content in a "discussion." My last post was very clear. It's no surprise to anyone that he didn't respond to the content in what is the longest post on this page. Go ahead and reread it. You'll see content where I explain myself frankly. You won't find him responding to that content or any content in any of his posts. Anywhere. Ever. And that's my point.
I think the problem with trolls, flamers, and hijackers, is a more general problem with posters posting as a form of virtual masturbation. Rather than posting as taking part in a discussion, it's posting as some weird form of self-gratification. That's why instead of demonstrating this high-road intellectual prowess being asked for by this thread in its creator's posts, he created a whiny thread on the forum instead.
> Blind Guardian wrote:
> I don't have to "prove" anything, Zarf BeebleBrix. If I did, he would obviously disagree, regardless that he was wrong. So it wouldn't be acknowledged anyway.
1: How do you know he's wrong without winning over his disagreements?
2: If there's no standard for proof, then you justify endless mockery of people just because they think the other side is wrong.
> I did engage him legitimately. I generally do, unless something is SO absurd I go straight to mockery--in which case I start relatively light, and I am of course always open to "legitimate" engagement, but xeno just ignored those attemps over, and over, and over again. And rambled on, and on, and on. He wasn't interested in any discussion, so he got mocked. He can cry about it now all he wants. I only have to make fun of him once--he has to repeat his ramblings over and over because he cannot respond to content in a "discussion." My last post was very clear. It's no surprise to anyone that he didn't respond to the content in what is the longest post on this page. Go ahead and reread it. You'll see content where I explain myself frankly. You won't find him responding to that content or any content in any of his posts. Anywhere. Ever. And that's my point.
Then what's the purpose of the mockery? Give one reason why it is GOOD to mock other people.
"How do you know he's wrong without winning over his disagreements?"
When he does not respond to a single line of content, he declines to give any input and my best reasoning is all I have to work with.
"If there's no standard for proof, then you justify endless mockery of people just because they think the other side is wrong."
The goal is a discussion: But if someone repeatedly spams the forum with the same repeated ramblings without responding to a single line of content, what better to do than mock them while they repeatedly spam the same ramblings? Sure it can get boring, but I only have to mock as much as I feel like logging in and posting.
"Give one reason why it is GOOD to mock other people."
If someone else had just told him he was embarrassing himself when he did in life, we wouldn't be having this mundane and embarrassing discussion. And he would be a better person for it, able to have more fruitful exchanges and less apt to have "exchanges" that would cost him things like jobs and raises and valuable personal relationships later in life. I think that's a good, in the holistic Greek sense, and one reason.
1: Give me at least 2 empirical examples of people in the Politics forum deciding "hey, I used to think I was right, but when this person called me an idiot... boy, that changed my perspective on life!"
2: More often than not, your mockery only does the exact opposite: You place people in a position where defending an idea is much more important. An idea can be discarded at will. Rather, you are forcing people like xeno to defend their identity. When a person is placed in that defensive position, they are much more likely to do two things:
A: Hold onto their position, even if they think it's wrong. You've framed the debate as an ego contest through your mockery... if he admits he is wrong in this context, it is simply surrendering to bullying, as opposed to gaining enlightenment.
B: Retaliate with his own mockery. Let the flame-fest begin!
This thread is about discussing whether or not flamers and hijackers should be banned.
Will that topic ever be discussed?
Perhaps we should look at these recent posts as evidence of the effect not banning flamers and hijackers has on discourse?
Um... we kind of are discussing that very issue:
1: The question of whether or not trolling itself is good (BG's argument) is a prerequisite issue to the question of whether trolls should be banned.
2: I've brought up the issue of moderator vs. player retaliation against trolls.
There's a couple discussions that are distracting, but there very much is engagement in your topic (plus some trolling of you, but that's a side issue).
I'm sorry, Zarf BeebleBrix, but I didn't mean anything neeeeeeeeeeeearly that involved when I referenced mockery. I don't call into question his identity. I just point out what I find to be absolutely absurd and move on.
I'm not a man of religious faith, but I choose to believe that who we are matters. I can't give you 2 empirical examples of that being beneficial to men's lives, but I still believe it is honorable and good anyway.
I asked why you discriminate between people of base intellect, xeno syndicated, and the ignorant spam they post. The same ignorance and ill-will that results in flaming results in other spam posts as well. Both are the result of the same childishness and spam the forum. I won't hold my breath for your response.
I made no claim that "trolling" is good, Mr. Zarf BeebleBrix. I've been very clear and posted frank comments contributing to the discussion. Is that "trolling"? Where is your response to my content regarding the proper mode of discussion? Where is your agreement/disagreement with what? I presume from your posts that you encourage ignoring the most ignorant and offensive posters entirely as a better response than an honest response?
It seems that my posts have been lost on you and you are, in fact, trolling me.
Imperial Forum → Politics → Poll: Should IC Politics trolls, flamers, and hijackers be banned?
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