Continuing the discussion from Hey, how can I get Discourse to do X?:
I’d like to have a dedicated topic for this, because there is considerable nuance here.
For the record I’m not categorically against an ignore feature like I used to be, but I do think it’s often used to sweep larger, deeper problems under the rug and that concerns me.
I don’t want to be dismissive, so I really am asking. I know the issue is that we’ve got a couple of newer members that are stirring the pot in P&R. I’ve seen the multiple flags, but I haven’t seen any violations. Yet.
I get that they make people uncomfortable, but I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing in P&R heavy topics, including the Battlefield V topic that has some folks riled up.
relevant pull quote is
First we’ll reframe the problem: the real issue is not Problem Child’s opinions – he can have whatever opinions he wants. The issue is that he’s doing zero emotional labor – he’s not thinking about his audience or his effect on people at all. (Possibly, he’s just really bad at modeling other people’s responses – the outcome is the same whether he lacks the will or lacks the skill.) But to be a good community member, he needs to consider his audience.
…
The problem with not feeding the troll is that, first of all, it’s a lot harder to control fifteen thousand users than one. That’s just logistics. But when you look at it in terms of emotional labor, the disadvantage becomes clearer. What you’re asking is that everyone else take a debuff whenever your Problem Child opens his mouth. They have to recognize the bait, remember that this is “that guy”, and control their reaction. At the same time, you’re letting the problem child operate with only his natural disadvantages. This isn’t fair in a general sense, but to hell with fairness. What it does, in the end, is increase the burden for the good actors in your community. Which is obviously not ideal. So instead, let’s talk about solution #2, the emotional-labor-savvy way to handle it.
I think it’s unwise to assume that every case where ignore is used in the dozens of other internet contexts where it is a standard feature is one where moderation should be invoked instead. I also don’t think muting notifications, “just scroll past” or “use a browser-level user script that doesn’t have universal compatibility” are adequate substitutes. Especially when there does not currently appear to be a way to block private messages.
I do acknowledge that sometimes a user is being broadly disruptive and people might use ignore in a way that enables that behavior instead of the more appropriate flagging function, but I don’t think that’s a good reason to stop the other valid use cases of an ignore function.
I don’t get uncomfortable, I get annoyed when I have to scroll through a hundred posts of BS when I want to get news about NK in the NK thread.
I read that link, and I re-read a couple of parts I found really interesting. Thanks! I’m going to have to think about some of it.
I vote yes for adding ignore features. I can’t find the vote button though. Was the thread made wrong?
Adding a user to your list of blocked users in Discourse does indeed stop them from messaging you.
Only somewhat related note: my user script utilizes that list so when you mute them using my script it automatically adds them to your Discourse list of blocked people in your settings (and vice versa).
I would prefer more active moderation. Polite does not equal good faith engagement. In the absence of moderation, give me an ignore feature, please. That will at least keep the spam down a little bit.
That is a really nice way to put it. Trolls can be as elaborate as they are stupid. It’s too bad if good grammar gives them a pass.
There should be an option to ignore some avatars.
That gdc article brought up some interesting points.
I think my preference would be to try and find a middle ground, perhaps by making ignore very narrow. Ignore posts from x user in current thread. With some kind of expiration date, perhaps weeks.
It solves the common annoyance where there might be 100 posts in a thread every single day and you have to scroll scroll scroll to find the small percentage you want to keep up with, when this happens because of some people in particular. But if you stop renewing it the ignore fades away with either time or by creating new threads.
I’d also note this sort of thing is symptomatic of a problem:
The bigger the disproportion in the “leaderboard”, the worse the problem.
A new user could come in and just reply over and over and over and over to absolutely dominate the conversation, polite or not. Bonus points if the replies are xxtra long or reply in extreme detail to every sentence of other posts, point by excruciating point. It’s harder to see on longer topics where there are already 2k - 3k replies, because it wouldn’t show up in the all time stats on that topic. But people participating would feel the pain.
“Bury them in replies” is a thing, if you have the time on your hands, and … some people do.
Exactly. There were several threads in P&R that I used to look forward to reading and I found them full of interesting opinion and information. Yes, I know, threads in P&R…
Now I can’t read them due to the swamping of them by a particular user and the replies to said user. I spend more time scrolling past those posts than reading. I keep hoping that the problem will go away, so I check into those topics, but it’s ongoing. I honestly don’t even know how muting would help at this point, since the topics are now largely about responding to that user. I’m with Wumpus in that in this type of situation, more.activist moderation is required. There are ways to violate the spirit of a forum without breaking the rules, as any rules lawyer knows. That’s what I see happening in P&R, where I know additional leeway is given, so I haven’t hit “flag” on any posts yet. I honestly don’t know what to do in situations like this.
All I know is that I used to read P&R regularly, and now I can’t do that without fear of stumbling into threads dominated by a certain poster. Going back to the old living room analogy, there’s a loud, talker who’s jumping into every conversation to voice his opinion. He’s not swearing, or hitting anyone, but he won’t be quiet and outraged people are confronting him and it’s raising the volume level even more. My ears hurt, so I’m leaving.
It is very funny that you would mention that cc @telefrog
My feeling is, this is primarily a gaming forum. If 99% of your posts are in P&R (and feel free to do the math on said poster, I have, all the data is public and I encourage you too as well), I don’t think that’s good faith participation in terms of community norms on a gaming forum.
So with all due respect, either balance your posting so that you’re not yelling at people about politics 99% of the time, or … basically gtfo.
As soon as I see a P&R thread which has balooned with replies, I call it dead and move on. A certain poster has pretty well ruined a board category, simply by gumming it up with constant disingenuous replies.
Whilst an ‘ignore’ feature would be nice, it won’t actually make the threads legible.
I know this forum is not an exclusive club by any means but God I wish there was some way to blackball people who do not contribute positively to the overall health of the forum.
I’m on the record as having not only merely muted P&R but erased it from existence in every browser that lets me provide custom CSS, so I don’t really know who everyone’s talking about, and I’m not going to go looking for further information, but I have two comments anyway.
Haha, I had to go see what was happening and I couldn’t help laughing. You guys have a fun one on your hands.
On the bright side, he is very polite, and thanks people, and uses the @ symbol to build connections, so that when pressed, he can point out that he is polite and thankful.
I don’t mind people who disagree, I do mind people who turn discourse into a quagmire. In some other media perhaps his techniques may be tolerable but this is kinda ruining a forum-reading experience.
I think it would be helpful if the person who is ignored is notified. That in itself may help to stop someone from continuing to speak if they know no one is listening.