No Politics or Religion in OOC

[jackfractal]

I think it would reduce some of the interpersonal friction we experience if we decided not to allow these topics to be discussed in OOC.

It never goes well.

[Frances]

Chats where people have toxic arguments about politics/religions are pretty stupid.

Chat where all (or even just random) discussion subjects are banned to create a "welcoming atmosphere" can be pretty stupid too.

In the end, the quality of the chat is by a big part left up to the quality of its moderators. Mods can probably make OOC a decent place while allowing religious and political debates. They can proooobably also make it a decent place while banning religious/politic conversations (though I've never seen it done well), but it seems like a bigger challenge for them. (Because, like, a person getting warned to cease and desist because they just mentioned going to church last Sunday is pretty dumb.)

[jackfractal]

There's a difference between mentioning religion or politics and having a discussion about it. I'm talking about the latter, not the former.

I don't know about you, but I don't play SS13 to talk about politics. I play SS13 to play SS13. There are literally millions of other places to have that kind of conversation.

[LordFowl]

There is already rules against heated arguments in OOC. The long arm of the law has been employed judiciously and ajudiciously multiple times to prevent this. Whether these heated arguments concern politics or religion is irrelevant to their stifling. I don't think outright censoring certain topics is the solution. I personally think people need to suck it up, but there's good reasons I'm not a moderator.

[jackfractal]

This isn't about arguments. This is about people talking about stuff in OOC that is very charged. Politics is charged, whatever is said. Religious stuff is charged, whatever is said.

It brings no value to the point of our community (the playing of SS13 in a high-roleplay community), and it can make people very uncomfortable.

Should the people who feel uncomfortable just 'toughen up' or whatever? It doesn't matter. They won't, and they won't fight in OOC, or argue, they'll just leave and they won't come back.

[LordFowl]

So obviously censor everything and anything that could possibly hurt someone's feelings, because if someone's feelings are hurt then they'll leave?

[jackfractal]

No, that's not what I'm suggesting. What I'm suggesting is that the topics of Religion and Politics be forbidden in OOC. Quite a lot of communities do this, especially ones with diverse audiences. It doesn't really hurt anyone, and it neatly removes a common source of interpersonal conflict.

Interpersonal conflict between characters is good. Interpersonal conflict between players is bad.

[Guest]

Nah.

Moderators/administrators reserve the right to shut down any topic in OOC. There are a lot of things that can be said that will rustle some jimmies, and it's up to the adjudicators to slap the cybershit out of anyone who does.

Within reason.

[jackfractal]

That's putting a lot of burden on moderators to dynamically decide which political discussions are valid and which are over the line. I'm sure that the moderation staff on Aurora are politically active and up to date, but they're also often quite busy dealing with other issues.

It's quite a bit easier, less complicated, and less prone to confusion to simply ask people not to talk about Politics or Religion at all in OOC. It's easier on moderators, and a clear and unambiguous rule makes people who are asked to stop talking about a topic less likely to feel unjustly silenced.

We already forbid a great deal of things in OOC. In character discussion, for example, is verboten, as is the slagging off of other servers. Those topics are universally banned. There is precedent for the kind of thing I'm talking about here.

[Guest]

That's putting a lot of burden on moderators to dynamically decide which political discussions are valid and which are over the line. I'm sure that the moderation staff on Aurora are politically active and up to date, but they're also often quite busy dealing with other issues.

 

Part of the job.

 

It's quite a bit easier, less complicated, and less prone to confusion to simply ask people not to talk about Politics or Religion at all in OOC. It's easier on moderators, and a clear and unambiguous rule makes people who are asked to stop talking about a topic less likely to feel unjustly silenced.

 

Or just moderate it so that certain subjects do not get too heated. There have been perfectly fine political debates that have been discussed in OOC before with the agreement between the participants to not let it get too heated.

 

We already forbid a great deal of things in OOC. In character discussion, for example, is verboten, as is the slagging off of other servers. Those topics are universally banned. There is precedent for the kind of thing I'm talking about here.

 

Character discussion is not officially 'verboten.' There's a difference between discussing a character and plain up raging about it. Slaggin' other servers' rep is not okay because it's pretty easy for one person to go slag on the server's rep back.

Once again, this is part of the responsibility of being a moderator. The rule's going to be broken anyway, so what's the point?

[jackfractal]

Ah sorry. I wasn't clear. When I said "character" I meant "discussing in character events" like "Halp! Bing absorbed in maint!"

[Tenenza]

My experience on this is that you can pick any topic and people will find a way to get pissy about it.

ex:

"I like Icecream"

"I don't like Icecream"

"You are a heretic and Icecreamacus the great will consume your children."

Okay, so politics and religion are statistically more likely to end in flame and death then icecream. But it's not hard to figure out when a discussion has gone too far and everyone needs an OOC timeout. If people are insulting eachother, then it's bad. If people are talking light about murder/rape/genocide/etc then it's bad. If people are being racist, blatently insenstive (AKA, people are seriously telling you they are offended and want you to stop but you continue nevertheless), or otherwise being a dick, then it's bad. It's not really deep philosophy here. Being a dick is bad.

[Guest Marlon Phoenix]

I prefer heavy handed moderation when things get out of hand. It's very easy (at least for me because I see these all the frick frack patty wacking time) to see when a discussion starts to go south into "You're Hitler" territory.

I just mute OOC the moment political or religious conversations get picked up, and experimentally reenable it periodically for a few moments to see if it's died down enough.

[Frances]

A very diverse audience will get offended at very diverse things. Whether we want to coddle OOC or not remains the community's personal preference - it's not highly important either way, and the same arguments as to why it could be heavily moderated apply as to why the people offended could simply mute it and move on (that is, OOC isn't the most important aspect of the game).

I personally think that people should be allowed to discuss whatever they want as long as they're not openly, purposely insulting each other or saying some very offensive or ignorant things (though tumblr would probably like to redefine my definition of "ignorant".) In the end, though, opinions on this are very broad, and the easiest way to settle this debate is to let the administration decide for themselves.

[jackfractal]

This is in not 'coddling' anyone. This is not treating players like infants. This is asking people to be adults about the situation and not insist on talking about potentially inflammatory subjects in a video-game with a diverse audience.

As I previously mentioned, we forbid a variety of topics in OOC as we've decided that including them is detrimental to the goals of our community. If one of the goals of our community were to foster a vigorous debating society, then I would certainly not be suggesting what I am, but it's not. We want, as far as I have been lead to believe, to create a community of people who enjoy playing this particular game on our server in a particular way. Discussions of religion and politics have nothing to do with those goals, and can harm the enjoyment of some players, that's why it makes sense to remove them from OOC.

We lose nothing of value, and it furthers our primary goal.

The idea expressed by "People will argue about anything, therefore preventing them from talking about Religion or Politics is pointless" is not a good one. Very few people have skin in the game in discussions about the value of ice-cream. While people will certainly argue about ice-cream, and may make amusingly hyperbolic statements, those arguments do not materially affect their lives. This is not the same as religion or politics. Consider, for example, how many wars have been fought over ice-cream, or how many people have been locked up or murdered based on their ice-cream preferences.

Saying that people will argue about anything, therefore we shouldn't forbid Politics and Religion is like saying that, because people can be hurt while juggling anything from soft fabric balls to Pomeranian's, it is pointless to discourage people from trying to juggle chainsaws or live hand grenades.

[Frances]

Unless I'm reading you wrong, the crux of your argument rests on two points: that religion and politics are valueless topics of discussion for the community, and that other valueless and potentially harmful topics are already banned, thus these could be as well. Here's why I disagree on both accounts:

Firstly, there's no intrinsic pertinence in religion or politics as far as SS13 is concerned. But is there any in... basically anything not directly related to SS13? The entire off topic boards exist, yet receive nearly as much discussion as the general ones. People discuss a lot of personal topics in OOC, ranging from videogames to cooking or their day-to-day lives. Religion & politics are roughly as relevant as that, yet I wouldn't deem any of the aforementioned topics as "valueless". Healthy communities, imo, should include (or at least allow) off-topic discussions. Sure, not all of them will interest or cater to everybody, but as individuals on here, we're defined by a sum of vast interests, not just our love for the game. It'd be a shame if people were unable to share that.

Secondly, I think it's unfair to compare religion & politics to other banned topics of our chat. I've seen various moderation guidelines for online chats, ranging from "literally anything goes" to "no arguing or controversial topics whatsoever". I'd say the Aurora OOC currently ranges somewhere in the comfortable middle. We've got rules against excessive mentions of sex, drugs, or illegal acts. You can't deny there's a difference between that and religions & politics, though if you want me to try to explain further exactly why I think the latter should be allowed here when the former isn't, let me know and I'll do my best to write another post on that.

One fact I will concede is that people do tend to get riled up more quickly on these subjects than they do discussing, say, ice cream. But I think that's just a symptom of the anger and behavioral issues some people have. I've had some fairly intelligent and satisfying conversations about both religion and politics with members of this community, and I think it'd be a shame if we lost the opportunity for those simply because other people couldn't behave themselves and we chose to install a blanket punishment instead of punishing these specific people.

Are there currently more stupid conversations on this topic than intelligent ones? Maybe. But it'd be a shame to go after the discussion, when we should go after the stupid.

[jackfractal]

Thanks for being so thoughtful Francis. I agree that there should definitely be off topic discussions, and I'm not remotely suggesting that we ban all non-SS13 discussion. That would be unnecessarily stifling, and as you say, we use OOC for many things. That being said, I do think it's important to note that those topics are unrelated to the purpose of this community, which is the playing of SS13.

That's not to say they aren't valuable topics, they are, but they're not necessary for this community, and specifically they are not necessary for the OOC channels used in-game. You'll note that I'm not suggesting we remove the off topic forum, just that we remove the topics of Politics and Religion from the OOC channels.

That's the reason that I pointed out that there are already banned topics in OOC. I was establishing that we have precedent for banning topics entirely, such as in-game discussions of the current round. I was doing this to specifically refute the idea that this was infringing on people's liberty in some unique or unusual way. I was not attempting to establish a some kind of categorical relationship between religion and politics and other banned topics, only that banned topics exist and they do not notably impact people's enjoyment of the game.

I disagree very strongly with your assertion that people who are made uncomfortable by certain topics have behavioral or anger management problems. For many people, political and religious topics are not simply entertaining abstractions to debate with strangers, they are matters of significant importance to their continuing safety, autonomy, and liberty. It is perfectly reasonable for people to be angry or uncomfortable when they hear other people expounding their public support for systems and ideals that directly disenfranchise them.

In addition, being asked not to broadcast ones political or religious views on a public channel should not be viewed as a punishment. It isn't. It is instead an attempt to prioritize the happiness and enjoyment of others over whatever gratification people get from arguing over the internet.

[Frances]

I think I understand your argument better. You're basically suggesting we refrain from political discussions so as to not provoke enmity or conflict between users.

It's not really the issue of people being outright rude or salty as much as the one of sensitive ideas being brought up, yes?

[jackfractal]

Yes! You are correct. That is entirely the point.

[Lady_of_Ravens]

Do we know that people are actually getting their feelings hurt in this manner, or is this purely hypothetical? Because it seems a shame to censor certain topics simply because of a problem that may not even exist. Further, when one thinks about it, there are a wide variety of topics which could be banned because someone might at some point be distressed by them. Ones that come to mind include: economics, celebrity gossip, conspiracy theories, mental illness, spoilers, certain "sensitive" scientific topics like stem cell research or animal testing, the existence of people with non-hetro sexual orientations... I could go on, but I think you get my point. Wouldn't it be better, then, to treat players like reasonably mature people who can survive the occasional non-vitriolic discussion of something they find uncomfortable without having to ruin it for everyone else?

[Guest]

Yes Ravens, people ahelp about it. It's done and probably will keep being done on a case by case basis, if it goes to far we will ask you to stop, if it continues we will mute.

Sometimes it will be stopped when it goes to far, sometimes it's done when staff feel it's going to far.

[Garnascus]

Its quite easy to discuss in mod chat if the discussion gets too heated, i think banning topics just because they are incredibly likely to end in heated arguments is a bit silly. We might as well ban fire because arsonists exist.

[jackfractal]

We uh... we do ban fires. You're not allowed to burn down buildings.

[Garnascus]

Damnit you know what i mean... not ALL fir- never mind.

Its relatively simply to moderate OOC and a stop to it when things get too heated.

[Lady_of_Ravens]

Yes Ravens, people ahelp about it. It's done and probably will keep being done on a case by case basis, if it goes to far we will ask you to stop, if it continues we will mute.

Sometimes it will be stopped when it goes to far, sometimes it's done when staff feel it's going to far.

 

By your phrasing I'm inferring you're referring to discussions which get heated or argumentative, which I'll happily agree has no place in OOC if for no other reason than that it's distracting from the game. I was actually asking about whether people also get upset by civil discussions of religion and politics. I'm sorry for any confusion.