2 dismissals Shifting the Connotation: Staff Complaints

[Caelphon]

Throughout my time as a Lore Writer, I've seen several people comment on the Staff Complaints Section that exists on the forum. It seems to generally be rather negative, with some people sometimes being dissuaded from using it because they see it as some kind of attack against Staff, when that isn't what it is in reality. 

I think a name change would help curb these connotations, and instead emphasize what the aims and goals of the section is instead: Staff Review, or something along those lines. I think it conveys a more accurate idea as opposed to Staff Complaints, because in reality it is merely a review process as opposed to complaining about an individual. 

[Gem]

i don't personally see how using a euphemism would encourage people to use staff complaints more. i think its fine as is, since it's quite literally a staff complaint.

voting for dismissal.

Edited January 3, 2023 by Gem

[niennab]

If the name has that much weight, then who is to say the punishment against any agregious staff wouldn't be lessened? Since it's only a review and not a complaint.

Moreover we run into the unfair bias that a player can have a complaint lodged again them but staff are only 'reviewed'.

[yeehawguvnah]

You can complain about staff in Player Complaints, in the same situations that you'd be able to make a complaint against anyone else.

"Staff Complaint" doesn't properly describe the Staff Complaints board, because half its purpose is to dispute a decision - AKA to review it.

[Carver]

Putting a different name tag on it wouldn't really make me any less averse to using it. You can give it as flowery wording as you'd like, but my hesitation to make complaints because I'll assume it will generate a strong personal dislike from the subject of the complaint (and their friends) is not going to be lessened. The closest thing to addressing this is the confidential complaints section, and to my knowledge there are some very strict requirements to even post one of those.

[Scheveningen]

They are staff complaints. They are used to lodge direct challenges to individual or team-based staff decisions. That is all they are there for. Seeking to do anything else with a staff complaint, by definition, would get the thread closed, because it wouldn't fulfill the usual purpose for a staff complaint.

Rewording it isn't going to help anything. There is already a sentiment that those on the moderation/administration staff hold more immediate power, authority and presence than most anyone else in the community, on account of their affiliations with the rest of staff. In most cases, staff do not make actions counter to the general consensus of their other staffmembers, as that is what they are there for. They commonly give advisement to each other on what would be the best way to resolve a particular situation. Meanwhile you also have senior staff that have been around for awhile and thus have dealt with almost every type of different situation, and are therefore more difficult to challenge because they can far more easily argue their case through experience than someone who has only been punished once but wishes to dispute whether they should have been disciplined by staff at all. It's not easy to overturn most staff decisions without being incredibly and annoyingly persistent, as well as lucky enough to have enough sympathy for something to be overturned.

I get this implicit reading from not only this thread but occasionally from other people that there should be more staff complaints in our current age in terms of an on-average rate. You do not want that. That was a thing back in the mid to late 2010s, and it was absolutely horrible both on the staff side and player side. It was just one cabal against another and it would be a different one every other occasion. That we have less staff complaints overall is more of a good thing than a bad thing.

A major thing that would resolve people's problems with specific staffmembers would be just to talk to them, mano-a-mano (or some other inclusive language of your choice). Discuss the issue rationally with them and remove your feelings from it, and you'll both come away with a better understanding of the problem -- the player especially, so they can understand how better to avoid being disciplined again by staff.

Staff in many ways are already hamstrung by the existence of their peers as well as an ever-observant community. But this is a good thing, since unfair permabans do not just come flying out like they would from staff on other servers where there exists little oversight or accountability for them.

[MattAtlas]

Voting for dismissal. Not really needed or wanted -- the term is clear as is. You are always contesting a decision (thus making a complaint about it). Anything else is semantics.

Also, moving this to the appropriate subforum, which is policy suggestions.

[Arrow768]

Seconding the vote for dismissal for the above stated reason.

And moving it to the rejected policy forum.