FrogReaver
As long as i get to be the frog
For a long time after I started regularly posting here I never used the ignore/block feature. What I found from doing that is that others would become rude and abrasive - I would act in kind - and then after some back and forth they would ignore me. If I had ignored them first then it's extremely likely that they wouldn't have ignored me.
For this reason I believe that those least likely to ignore others tend to be the most likely to be ignored and so I don’t put much stock into number of ignores being a meaningful indicator about who is more abrasive. It’s instead more of an indicator of who has the thickest skin as it's quite common for 2 people on forums to strongly disagree with each other to end up being abrasive and rude toward each other and the one with the 'thinnest skin' is going to be the one to first reach for the ignore/block button.
More recently I have started to use the ignore feature more often (note: I have configured my settings to not two-way block, and to show me an alert showing there's ignored content so I can gather context - though if someone has me 2-way blocked their content still doesn't come through). I find this does help reduce the amount of 'counter escalations' I participate in - which in turn makes my time here more enjoyable. So I do see wisdom in utilizing a one-way ignore function despite starting out in a place where I previously would never have used it.
The one direct value I see in 2-way ignore is the idea that: 'if you don't want to talk to me then I don't really want to waste my time replying to you'. Meaning in a 1-way ignore environment I could reply to someone that is never going to see my post and wasting my time doing that isn't something I value - so it's not like 1-way ignore is fault free either.
I've seen it mentioned that it helps prevent stalking which is a commendable endeavor - but we already had one way blocking and moderators for issues like that - which to me makes that justification ring a little hollow. Instead 2-way blocking has been typically presented as providing 2 things:
1. A way to help deal with posters being more abrasive than they like but not necessarily rising to the level of rule breaking (one way ignore accomplishes this as well)
2. A punitive measure that other users can inflict on posters they feel are too abrasive (and that moderaters apparently agree are too abrasive simply because another user blocked them...). IMO The true benefit here is that 2-way blocking causes more users to solve their problems with it as they are more likely to use a punitive tool than they were a one-way ignore feature that only affected them - thus leading to less moderation needing to be actively done by the moderators.
If I'm right then 2 makes for a very good practical justification for 2-way blocking to exist. However, philosophically, I have to remain opposed to other users being given the power to 'punish' other users. Which is why I and others oppose 2-way blocking (or at least this implementation of it). That said I understand the practical benefit of increasing usage of ignore/block functions and how that lowers the need for moderatoin as to why it won't be changed.
For this reason I believe that those least likely to ignore others tend to be the most likely to be ignored and so I don’t put much stock into number of ignores being a meaningful indicator about who is more abrasive. It’s instead more of an indicator of who has the thickest skin as it's quite common for 2 people on forums to strongly disagree with each other to end up being abrasive and rude toward each other and the one with the 'thinnest skin' is going to be the one to first reach for the ignore/block button.
More recently I have started to use the ignore feature more often (note: I have configured my settings to not two-way block, and to show me an alert showing there's ignored content so I can gather context - though if someone has me 2-way blocked their content still doesn't come through). I find this does help reduce the amount of 'counter escalations' I participate in - which in turn makes my time here more enjoyable. So I do see wisdom in utilizing a one-way ignore function despite starting out in a place where I previously would never have used it.
The one direct value I see in 2-way ignore is the idea that: 'if you don't want to talk to me then I don't really want to waste my time replying to you'. Meaning in a 1-way ignore environment I could reply to someone that is never going to see my post and wasting my time doing that isn't something I value - so it's not like 1-way ignore is fault free either.
I've seen it mentioned that it helps prevent stalking which is a commendable endeavor - but we already had one way blocking and moderators for issues like that - which to me makes that justification ring a little hollow. Instead 2-way blocking has been typically presented as providing 2 things:
1. A way to help deal with posters being more abrasive than they like but not necessarily rising to the level of rule breaking (one way ignore accomplishes this as well)
2. A punitive measure that other users can inflict on posters they feel are too abrasive (and that moderaters apparently agree are too abrasive simply because another user blocked them...). IMO The true benefit here is that 2-way blocking causes more users to solve their problems with it as they are more likely to use a punitive tool than they were a one-way ignore feature that only affected them - thus leading to less moderation needing to be actively done by the moderators.
If I'm right then 2 makes for a very good practical justification for 2-way blocking to exist. However, philosophically, I have to remain opposed to other users being given the power to 'punish' other users. Which is why I and others oppose 2-way blocking (or at least this implementation of it). That said I understand the practical benefit of increasing usage of ignore/block functions and how that lowers the need for moderatoin as to why it won't be changed.
