The Purpose of the + in Thread Titles

[Deset Gled]

Following up on my previous post, I believe I have found the words for something that is bothering me about use of the +.

I had originally assumed this it would get edited/changed in some way, or threads would start getting locked and it wouldn't matter. But it's been static for a number of days now. I'm going to repeat the part that's been bugging me:

"Will you sign the petition?"

"If what you want to say is some variation of 'No, this is not a good thing to do' please take that idea to a different discussion."

That combination of sentences, IMNSHO, breaks the simple rule of "Keep it civil". If someone isn't allowed to answer no, the question shouldn't be asked. No matter how politely you phrase it, that is not how civil discussion works.

You should not be able to ask "Will you sign this petition?" when the petition is the topic of a + thread. You should not be able to post news of a petition (or anything else) and make it is a + thread. This question, and this news, are calls for open discussion. Making it a + thread is the opposite of open discussion. + threads have an important purpose, but this is not it.

 

[Irlo]

Following up on my previous post, I believe I have found the words for something that is bothering me about use of the +.

View attachment 276541

I had originally assumed this it would get edited/changed in some way, or threads would start getting locked and it wouldn't matter. But it's been static for a number of days now. I'm going to repeat the part that's been bugging me:

"Will you sign the petition?"

"If what you want to say is some variation of 'No, this is not a good thing to do' please take that idea to a different discussion."

That combination of sentences, IMNSHO, breaks the simple rule of "Keep it civil". If someone isn't allowed to answer no, the question shouldn't be asked. No matter how politely you phrase it, that is not how civil discussion works.

You should not be able to ask "Will you sign this petition?" when the petition is the topic of a + thread. You should not be able to post news of a petition (or anything else) and make it is a + thread. This question, and this news, are calls for open discussion. Making it a + thread is the opposite of open discussion. + threads have an important purpose, but this is not it.

Ah, that makes sense. I read it differently initially. “Will you sign …“ can be a colloquial way of saying “Please sign my petition.” I didn’t think it was a real question intended to open a duscussion. Now I see that it can easily be read very differently.

There were certainly other parts of the petition post that lent themselves to interpretations not intended (I think) by the petitioner.

 

[Morrus]

Following up on my previous post, I believe I have found the words for something that is bothering me about use of the +.

View attachment 276541

I had originally assumed this it would get edited/changed in some way, or threads would start getting locked and it wouldn't matter. But it's been static for a number of days now. I'm going to repeat the part that's been bugging me:

"Will you sign the petition?"

"If what you want to say is some variation of 'No, this is not a good thing to do' please take that idea to a different discussion."

That combination of sentences, IMNSHO, breaks the simple rule of "Keep it civil". If someone isn't allowed to answer no, the question shouldn't be asked. No matter how politely you phrase it, that is not how civil discussion works.

You should not be able to ask "Will you sign this petition?" when the petition is the topic of a + thread. You should not be able to post news of a petition (or anything else) and make it is a + thread. This question, and this news, are calls for open discussion. Making it a + thread is the opposite of open discussion. + threads have an important purpose, but this is not it.

I get it. And I’m seeing a lot of + threads the past few days, and clearly it’s now being weaponised. While we can’t delineate strict rules for social interaction, we’ll talk about this. We certainly don’t want it used as broadly as ‘you can never disagree with anything I say’.

 

[Olrox17]

Yeah. Everything that is like "Let's have a debate on this one topic, but you're all forbidden from saying or arguing in favor of X,Y, and Z" should probably by a violation of the rules.

 

[ReshiIRE]

I've seen + threads used elsewhere in a proper manner, but it may be necessary here to have it be more controlled by mods. Cumbersome, but if people are using it in a naughty word matter this will need resolving.

 

[Cergorach]

I think Morrus/Umbran brought up good points why at this scale it is a good idea to have the ability of '+' threads. But I think there's an issue with the assumption that if asked for an 'argument' (as Umbran said), you don't have to participate. We're constantly accosted by the same argument, in the community topic list (most recently commented thread), in each thread (bottom: similar threads), on the front page (latest posts), and I'm probably missing a couple of locations.

I see this as the equivalent of that salesperson or religious person that keeps sticking it's foot in the door so you have to keep listening to them. Or those angry protestors that even though you try to go around them keep getting in your face. On ENworld I don't see a(n easy) way to hide topics, posts and maybe even tags. We can ignore specific accounts, but I assume that the threads they start are still visible in the aforementioned locations.

Yes, we all should be wise enough to ignore those threads that 'trigger' us, but the reality is, we are not or at least not all the time. Sometimes my wisdom module has not been spun up (tired, grumpy, sick, etc.) and I'll ignore such advice. But Cergorach, you say, then just don't visit ENworld at those times! That's the problem with the wisdom module not being spun up, we tend to ignore such great advice!

Another problem is that even if we have great ideas like functions to ignore topics, posts or tags, you are still limited by technical options. In this case XenForo has had this feature request open since 2010 and it's still not been fulfilled (ignore users has been implemented):

Ignore / Filter System

This is from one of my older posts, but it was several different ideas, and I rather this one be added rather then any of the others. Ignore/Filter System One thing I've noticed that is currently lacking (In the form of user ignore) currently, and that most forums do not extend more then the...

xenforo.com

But there are thirdparty addons for XenForo that allow for this:

Ignore Content

Allow your users to ignore any content in your boards. Current content supported: Forums Threads Tags Conversations Users Content created by ignored user will not show in various locations: Widgets Newsfeeds Find News Forum listing Alerts...

xenforo.com

With an implementation like this some of us might actually ignore certain threads when we have our wisdom module spun up and operating at a 100%. Heck, I would even say that if you expand the tag system a bit you might actually be able to avoid a LOT of the strife I see now on ENworld.

I actually hate ignoring users, because they might have something good to say in a topic I am interested in. Being able to ignore specific threads or topics (via tag ignores) would make my life a whole lot less stressful, and I suspect the mods would also have less work. The question is of course if this gets adopted by enough users, I can totally see (even in this thread) that people just love to argue. Which isn't a problem by itself, but when it eventually devolves from an argument to a brawl is when stuff goes wrong. This might actually avoid some of those brawls (I assume).

 

[Dungeonosophy]

Just so you know, if we feel uncomfortable, we are apt to step in first, and maybe apologize later.

There was one time I did not do that, and I have regretted it for years.

What time was that?