
The Universal Rules of Civilized Discourse - iamwil
http://blog.discourse.org/2013/03/the-universal-rules-of-civilized-discourse/
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javajosh
Has anyone tried a social killfile? Almost all usenet clients had this
wonderful feature called a killfile which would simply elide known-bad posters
in a newsgroup. The regulars would have a largely (but not exactly) identical
killfile, since the trolls were well known. A good group would often leave
troll posts totally without responses - since no-one had even read it.

I always used to think it would be handy to have well-respected members of the
group share their killfiles with others. Web-hosted forums could go one better
and allow the easy sharing of killfiles between participants.

This kind of solution gives individuals freedom to see what data they want to
see, but it also never takes away an individuals right to say whatever they
want to say however they want to say it, however terrible or useless anyone
thinks it is. There are no "moderators" per se, just people you respect well
enough to copy their killfiles.

This relates to the OP's article because while it seems like a good idea to
write down the rules of discourse, application of the rules will be arbitrary
by nature, and so you have to let the community police itself in a scalable
way.

~~~
eksith
I'm an admin of a forum where we share ignore lists.

I was very concerned about this at first because there's a very real chance
that people will blindly ignore users based on others already ignoring them.
However, for the most part, it seems users will still look at those shared
lists as an "advisory" and still use their own discretion when choosing to
ignore a user.

There's also a feature where frequently ignored users will lose community
standing (it works a bit like karma points except no numeric score is shown).
Users with poor community standing will see an increase in the delay interval
they're allowed to post.

They will also not see new topics until a certain number of users with good
community standing have already replied to those. The idea being that,
perhaps, exposure to good quality posts will dissuade rubbish ones.

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6d0debc071
It's not a bad list, as far as it goes. That said, I've moderated forums
before, some of them for the better part of a decade - That ruleset is way too
wordy to be effectively applied, IME of various sets of rules. Probably not at
any great damage, because I expect people to deal with it the way they do must
such rules, i.e. make a good faith effort while largely ignoring them.

You have, maybe, three or four points that you can really pick out when you're
giving people rules, preferably not in prose but in bullet point form, and the
rest of it's down to how people conduct themselves in the community and how
your moderators interact with people when they go wrong. People are not going
to be constantly checking their posts against a big list of things they barely
remember.

Ideally you want to get it down to one overarching rule, like don't be a dick,
with a handful of examples of what dickish behaviour is; what the tone of your
specific forum would be. You really have to keep this stuff very concise.
Explanations for why each rule is there can, if necessary, be included further
down; underneath the short summary that you want everyone to have read.
Personally I've never found much need for such explanations, that's more
something you'd do in PM if someone was questioning them - by and large people
seem to understand well enough from examples.

------
ams6110
_This is a Civilized Place for Public Discussion_

 _Please treat this discussion forum with the same respect you would a public
park._

I'd hope our standards could be higher than that. I know several public parks
that are best avoided.

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gametheoretic
In their own way, the comments are more interesting than the article. Atwood
lists StormFront as one of the sites they investigated the dynamics of. The
other two object; one claims Atwood was dismissive of his concerns in a
twitter convo. In the end, the posts were civilized and the discourse,
nonexistent. Each is visibly holding back his fuller opinion not b/c it would
be uncivilized to give it but b/c he fears being seen as such. What was
gained?

~~~
mpyne
I actually clicked on the Stormfront link, and felt stupid immediately
afterward; as far as I could tell the only demand was that you were polite to
other _white_ persons. Certainly I didn't get a very strong "be nice to every
poster" vibe.

~~~
derleth
Stormfront is fairly notorious for being a racist forum, which is populated
chiefly by racist whites (and those who wish to act like them) and run solely
for the benefit of racist whites. It is a hateful place and its rules should
be viewed with skepticism on that basis.

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itchitawa
Heh, I find it ironic that the comments on that article quickly degenerated
into a political argument about racism :P

~~~
pessimizer
Yup, completely derailed. The main problem with discourse on the internet is
not a software problem.

------
wissler
Productive conversation is rational and does not mince words.

"Politeness" is nice to have, but sometimes, to be polite is to be uncivil.
Just imagine being polite to someone advocating racism. We don't abolish poor
behavior by treating it like it's civilized. On the contrary, that's an
inversion of true civility.

I don't trust people who elevate politeness above all else.

~~~
pfortuny
I think you are mistaking politeness for 'sweetness'. You can be perfectly
polite and at the same time perfectly clear. Politeness in a conversation is
the art of being clear without being offensive _to the other person_.

In your example, someone advocating racism can be countered by stating clearly
and simply the historical, anthropological and economical reasons why racism
is wrong.

Politeness implies _reasoning_. An internet discussion is not war, it is a
conversation. Whenever you leave politeness aside, you have lost. Always.
(Obviously, this is my way of seeing it).

In your example, _any_ pro-racist argument is _by itself_ both impolite
(because it insults persons straightaway) and wrong (for many reasons). It is
a no-no in any case. If you fall on the same side of the wall (by being
impolite) you are placing yourself at the same level and your "reason" is lost
to the reader.

You can say: "racism and eugenics have lead mankind to the Nazi extermination
camps" and being polite.

To repeat myself: politeness is not lack of clarity. It is just the way to
properly oppose wrong ideas without harming people defending them. At the same
time, it _protects_ your argument.

~~~
wissler
I think you are using the word "polite" to refer to the Christian ethic "don't
judge others". As widespread as it is, that ethic should not get to rule
discourse without justifying itself. And in practice it is almost always
hypocritical: those who violate this dogma are usually castigated, thereby
violating the rule they dogmatically insist upon.

I see no reason why we should refrain from morally evaluating what others say,
whether that evaluation be positive or negative. In fact, I think it leads to
a great deal of evil to _not_ so evaluate.

~~~
pfortuny
We should morally evaluate what others say, certainly: as a matter of fact,
that is what we do to have an opinion in ethical questions. I do not think I
advocated the opposite. What I opposed was attacking the opponent, instead of
the ideas.

~~~
wissler
It's possible my criticism isn't aimed at you, but at those who get angry and
start screaming "be polite" or "be tolerant of others" when their views are
morally evaluated.

In any case, based on my experience they are at least fellow travelers,
cowardly hiding behind "be polite" while suppressing rational dissent.

~~~
pfortuny
I understand now your comment and tend to agree with you. However, as you say,
that is not properly "politeness" but simple fear, as you say.

