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I try not to hold mods to higher standard than anyone else. I am annoyed when I am held to a higher moral standard than others in my own life because of my job, and I think mods are as entitled to snark as I am. The day I can entirely give up being a snarky git is the day I judge anyone else for it.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 Future War Cultist wrote:

And I think the site would be better off without political threads period.

I tried that once. It did not go well. To the degree people were banned for starting them, and DR reached 250 bans a day. We were literally banning more people than were joining to make a relative minority happy. At that point we changed policy to allow it again.

Further, not allowing it turns into a moderation nightmare if we allow any discussion of news or current events at all, because people start spamming the 'report' button if someone even mentions a political figure and someone else does not like that poster..

I'm guessing you're talking about a place that wasn't dakka. I'd say on dakka there's handful of instigators that need to be kept in order after which it'd be fine. There'd be more involved than just those instigators, but with the regular trolls kept locked up it wouldn't be an issue as frequently.

When us politics was banned here it wasn't like it completely stopped political talk, it just gave mods a big rubber stamp they could whack on threads/posters before stuff got too ugly.

With the us politics thread back in swing I think it only acts to bring dakka down as a whole. Sure, you can not go there, but it doesn't stop it existing, like a bad suburb in an otherwise good city.

The US Politics topic, being moderated absurdly?

You don't say.

 An Actual Englishman wrote:
DakkaDakka already has an extremely bad perception in the community at large. Extremely bad. If the mods want to grow the community and the forum (thus increasing their power) they should take the advice of some of their more frequent posters.

To be fair, literally every single complaint I've seen about this place is about the Moderation practices.

 Da Boss wrote:
I try not to hold mods to higher standard than anyone else. I am annoyed when I am held to a higher moral standard than others in my own life because of my job, and I think mods are as entitled to snark as I am. The day I can entirely give up being a snarky git is the day I judge anyone else for it.

You will note I didn't say "I" hold them to a higher standard, I said they should hold "themselves" to a higher standard. If the mods want to be poo slinging gits and the admin want to allow it, so be it, but it absolutely brings down the tone of the forum to that level when someone with a mod tag next to their name is dishing out the thinly veiled insults along with the regular trolls.

At the end of the day it's a forum to talk about little toy soldiers and do we want (and by we I mean the admin decide and then the rest of us either leave or stay) it to be a pleasant place to do so or not, if not then whatever, if yes then mods should realise that having mod written under their name absolutely means they can't ever completely take their mod hats off and what they say and how they act sets the tone for the forum as a whole.

 insaniak wrote:
. . .
Suspending posters isn't a pleasurable activity. It's not a reward. It's frustrating, and at times downright depressing.
. . .
All moderator activity is logged and reviewed where necessary. Mods have been reprimanded or removed in the past where their behaviour falls out of line with what the site's owners expect.

If you're not seeing it as often as you would expect, it's possibly just because your view of appropriate moderator behaviour differs from that of the site's owners.

Does appropriate behavior include inventing reasons to suspend a community member like "stress"? What about having a Moderator follow a poster from thread to thread when no rules have been broken, invent rules that they apply only to one poster, and ignore identical conduct from other members? All of this was defended and those Moderators did not appear to receive sanction and no apology was offered.

I have no issue with being penalized for stepping outside of the rules of the site. I have issue when rules are pulled out of thin air, not shared with the community, and are then applied in a capricious manner,

 Peregrine wrote:
But why is there any cooling off required? The thread was proceeding in a fairly calm manner without any problems over the past few pages (at least) until a moderator dropped a flame bait post in it and then locked it. The problem was 100% from one specific person who should not be moderating threads they're participating in, especially when they're going to post provocative things. Nobody else was doing anything wrong, no major arguments were happening, there just wasn't anything hot that needs to cool down.

I don't recall participating in the US Politics thread since it was re-opened, but looking at that thread the Mod's conduct has me agreeing with Peregrine. At best this looks like a Moderator invented a pre-text to lock the thread, at worst it looks like he was losing an argument and locked the thread out of spite.

Many other sites strongly discourage, if not prohibit, their Moderators from acting in an official capacity in the threads in which they are participating because it causes exactly these problems.

Quick question; how many Dakka staff/Mods now have a financial interest in Maelstrom's Edge?

AllSeeingSkink wrote:


I'm guessing you're talking about a place that wasn't dakka. I'd say on dakka there's handful of instigators that need to be kept in order after which it'd be fine. There'd be more involved than just those instigators, but with the regular trolls kept locked up it wouldn't be an issue as frequently.

No, but many of the same players were involved. You clearly have forgotten the sites that disappeared following the Great GW Cease and Desist Off.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
When us politics was banned here it wasn't like it completely stopped political talk, it just gave mods a big rubber stamp they could whack on threads/posters before stuff got too ugly.

Skink, let me point to the recent School shooting thread as to why this did not work, and really could never work: the mods could not decide what constituted 'US Politics'. In turn, this caused confusion among both posters and mods. When I have to ask Manchu 'What are the rules now?' and his response is 'I don't know' there's a problem.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

With the us politics thread back in swing I think it only acts to bring dakka down as a whole. Sure, you can not go there, but it doesn't stop it existing, like a bad suburb in an otherwise good city.

Conversely it has kept the political debate mostly out of other threads and in it's own little thing.

To clarify regarding where talk RE: gun politics goes there was a simple miscommunication about that single issue that we resolved quickly. It can be frustrating but it is bound to happen from time to time.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Does appropriate behavior include inventing reasons to suspend a community member like "stress"? What about having a Moderator follow a poster from thread to thread when no rules have been broken, invent rules that they apply only to one poster, and ignore identical conduct from other members? All of this was defended and those Moderators did not appear to receive sanction and no apology was offered.

No apology was offered because the moderation actions taken against you were a direct result of your own behaviour.

None of the mods 'follow' posters around. That would be absurd. When you're running into the same mod repeatedly, it's generally just because many of us have specific sections of the site that we tend to frequent more than others.

 insaniak wrote:
No apology was offered because the moderation actions taken against you were a direct result of your own behaviour.

None of the mods 'follow' posters around. That would be absurd. When you're running into the same mod repeatedly, it's generally just because many of us have specific sections of the site that we tend to frequent more than others.

Again, I have owned those times I have been wrong. I was clear on that in my earlier post.

Running into someone makes it sounds innocent. One of your colleagues followed me from thread to thread when I was breaking no rules, so rules were created to enforce only against me. Your colleague would appear in any thread I created within minutes, and was within the five first replies - always making a point of calling me out for not following some unspoken rule no one else was beholden to. If my own behavior was so outside of the rules of the site I would have had action taken against me without using "stress" as an excuse or creating rules. Where is "stress" mentioned in the rules of the site as being a cause for punitive action against a user's account? How do you detect stress online? The only absurdity here is thinking that action against me was justified when no rules were being broken on these occasions.

Your post is indicative of why people are suspicious of the Moderation here. You have members of your team who are agitating and unwilling or incapable of applying the rules of the site in a fair and consistent manner. Now you are covering for them and making excuses for their poor behavior.

So, how many of the Mods/staff have a financial interest in Maelstrom's Edge?

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

Running into someone makes it sounds innocent. One of your colleagues followed me from thread to thread when I was breaking no rules, so rules were created to enforce only against me. Your colleague would appear in any thread I created within minutes, and was within the five first replies - always making a point of calling me out for not following some unspoken rule no one else was beholden to. If my own behavior was so outside of the rules of the site I would have had action taken against me without using "stress" as an excuse or creating rules. Where is "stress" mentioned in the rules of the site as being a cause for punitive action against a user's account? How do you detect stress online? The only absurdity here is thinking that action against me was justified when no rules were being broken on these occasions.

The 'stress' thing that you keep referring to was a direct result of you spamming the mod alert with an ever-increasing string of inane complaints. It was decided that you were clearly not suited to particiption in the off-topic section and appropriate action was taken. Again, that was a direct result of your own behaviour, not the mod team stalking you from the shadows.

So, how many of the Mods/staff have a financial interest in Maelstrom's Edge?

Not sure how that's relevant to anything in this thread, but there is only one moderator (me) involved in Maelstrom's Edge.

I'm left wondering how many people in this thread criticising moderaters have ever been moderators themselves. I understand constructive criticism (and agree with the original point of contention) but keep in mind that moderating is not a fun job. It's not something they do for power, any more than a person runs a 40k league for power. They do it for the community. The few for which a desire for power factors in tend not to be good mods, nor do they stick around very long. But let me emphasize again; moderating a forum is a community service, it isn't something people do for kicks. Calling mods out on misbehavior is one thing, but keep things on the constructive side or risk creating a sentiment that the posters are against the mods. They aren't perfect at the best of times but are still making the best of what is ultimately a tough job that earns them no gratitude.

I don't think it's outside the realms of possibility to conceive that a particular mod might take offense with a particular user and treat them differently from other users. This could be for any reason - perhaps they find the username or avatar picture subconsciously offensive, perhaps they are offended at something that user said in another thread, perhaps they are just having a bad day/week/month/year. It doesn't really matter.

I have both seen this happen to others and experienced it myself.

It wouldn't be so bad if the entire moderation team didn't desperately scramble to defend their colleague and instead admitted that sometimes a moderator needs to be moderated.

Anyway, back to the topic;

On most forums I've frequented, the mods have always been generally silent in discussions, only commenting when they needed to moderate. I always took this to be 'normal' behaviour, because it completely stops the premise of this topic - that a moderator with a vested interest in a topic might abuse their powers to suit their interests in that topic.

I don't see how anyone can be impartial in their moderation when they have strong feelings on a topic that is discussed? I also believe that having a moderator post their opinions on a topic can skew the discussion of said topic as moderators are in a position of power/seniority over other users and often people will follow/submit to the senior opinion.

Perhaps the mods should make a separate account for posting that is disconnected from their mod account? Thinking aloud really, this idea might be garbage but it's the first thing that jumps to my mind when a topic like this pops up. Would that not help?

Sock puppet / secondary accounts are forbidden, to quote the rules:

For disciplinary and site administration purposes, all users are expected to maintain only a single user account on Dakka. Secondary, or 'sockpuppet', accounts are not permitted. Users found with a sockpuppet account (especially those created specifically to break further site rules) will typically have their access permanently suspended.

 BrookM wrote:
Sock puppet / secondary accounts are forbidden, to quote the rules:

For disciplinary and site administration purposes, all users are expected to maintain only a single user account on Dakka. Secondary, or 'sockpuppet', accounts are not permitted. Users found with a sockpuppet account (especially those created specifically to break further site rules) will typically have their access permanently suspended.

Surely if anyone is in a position to change the rules for the good of the community, it's the mods?

 An Actual Englishman wrote:

It wouldn't be so bad if the entire moderation team didn't desperately scramble to defend their colleague and instead admitted that sometimes a moderator needs to be moderated.

I'm fairly sure I already did that earlier in this thread...

On most forums I've frequented, the mods have always been generally silent in discussions, only commenting when they needed to moderate.

The moderators spend time on this forum for the same reason everyone else does. Remove a moderators' ability to participate in discussion, and he has very little reason to keep showing up.

I don't see how anyone can be impartial in their moderation...

This, I think, is the big misconception that fuels a lot of the issues people have with moderation. So I'll point out, once again, that moderators are under no obligation to be impartial. This is not a court of law, and forum moderators are not judges. It's a privately owned site, and we're volunteers whose job is to keep the forum running smoothly, within the bounds set by the site's owners.

 insaniak wrote:
The 'stress' thing that you keep referring to was a direct result of you spamming the mod alert with an ever-increasing string of inane complaints. It was decided that you were clearly not suited to particiption in the off-topic section and appropriate action was taken. Again, that was a direct result of your own behaviour, not the mod team stalking you from the shadows.

No that was a separate Moderator action, which as I recall you yourself took. I have no issue with that as when the ban was implemented I acknowledge that I was not acting appropriately and have accepted my penalty. But thank you for sharing details of punitive action taken against my account with the community as a whole. I trust that you will be doing this with all other members also.

Again, with that ban for "stress" no Moderator was able to tell me which rule was broken or else they would not have had to rely on creating a rule.

As I said earlier, your reply is indicative of why people are expressing concerns with the Moderators. I have raised examples my challenges with some of the Moderation (some, not all) and without even establishing the facts you have gone straight into blindly defending your colleagues, and trying to insinuate that I believe there is a conspiracy against me when I clearly stated that it was the actions of one member of your team.





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 insaniak wrote:
The moderators spend time on this forum for the same reason everyone else does. Remove a moderators' ability to participate in discussion, and he has very little reason to keep showing up.

I would not suggest that a volunteer Moderator be unable to comment. However, commenting in a thread known to be contentious and then locking that same thread when questioned by a community member does not look good. At the very least it should have been locked by another Moderator to give the veneer of impartiality.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
The 'stress' thing that you keep referring to was a direct result of you spamming the mod alert with an ever-increasing string of inane complaints. It was decided that you were clearly not suited to particiption in the off-topic section and appropriate action was taken. Again, that was a direct result of your own behaviour, not the mod team stalking you from the shadows.

No that was a separate Moderator action, which as I recall you yourself took. I have no issue with that as when the ban was implemented I acknowledge that I was not acting appropriately and have accepted my penalty. But thank you for sharing details of punitive action taken against my account with the community as a whole. I trust that you will be doing this with all other members also.

Again, with that ban for "stress" no Moderator was able to tell me which rule was broken or else they would not have had to rely on creating a rule.

As I said earlier, your reply is indicative of why people are expressing concerns with the Moderators. I have raised examples my challenges with some of the Moderation (some, not all) and without even establishing the facts you have gone straight into blindly defending your colleagues, and trying to insinuate that I believe there is a conspiracy against me when I clearly stated that it was the actions of one member of your team.

It seems pretty extreme to suggest a conspiracy against you...

 insaniak wrote:
The moderators spend time on this forum for the same reason everyone else does. Remove a moderators' ability to participate in discussion, and he has very little reason to keep showing up.

As my comment it's literally how mods operate in the majority of forums I've frequented over the years. You'll also note that my suggestion - to have a sockpuppet? (was it?) account will allow them to contribute in a fair and equal manner, rather than from a position of superiority.

 insaniak wrote:
This, I think, is the big misconception that fuels a lot of the issues people have with moderation. So I'll point out, once again, that moderators are under no obligation to be impartial. This is not a court of law, and forum moderators are not judges. It's a privately owned site, and we're volunteers whose job is to keep the forum running smoothly, within the bounds set by the site's owners.

So the mods on here have free reign to treat different users differently and act like complete feth wits to some while others' they allow to bend the rules?

Right, got it. Thanks for the clarification.

 insaniak wrote:
This, I think, is the big misconception that fuels a lot of the issues people have with moderation. So I'll point out, once again, that moderators are under no obligation to be impartial. This is not a court of law, and forum moderators are not judges. It's a privately owned site, and we're volunteers whose job is to keep the forum running smoothly, within the bounds set by the site's owners.

Is applying rules capriciously or unfairly is in the best interests of the community, or might it be harmful to the community? If we are all users here who agree to be bound by the same rules then why should those rules be applied differently? Might that be part of the reason for threads such as this?

If moderators are under no obligation to be impartial, then it means that they can abuse their position. This would explain a lot of what I’ve seen.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
It seems pretty extreme to suggest a conspiracy against you...

What conspiracy? I suggested no such thing. Just because a member of the Moderation team would like to concoct a strawman does not make it the truth.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
It seems pretty extreme to suggest a conspiracy against you...

What conspiracy? I suggested no such thing. Just because a member of the Moderation team would like to concoct a strawman does not make it the truth.

Sorry, it seems pretty extreme that the mods would suggest a conspiracy against you. Like it's strange to suggest anyone is suggesting such an extreme idea.

 An Actual Englishman wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
The moderators spend time on this forum for the same reason everyone else does. Remove a moderators' ability to participate in discussion, and he has very little reason to keep showing up.

As my comment it's literally how mods operate in the majority of forums I've frequented over the years.

You've clearly frequented different forums to me, because on every forum I've spent time on over the last 15 years or so, the moderators have been active community members.

You'll also note that my suggestion - to have a sockpuppet? (was it?) account will allow them to contribute in a fair and equal manner, rather than from a position of superiority.

Except it wouldn't. The only thing that would change is that mods would have to log out and in again in between posting as a user and posting as a moderator. They would still be the same moderators, with the same power to lock threads or suspend posters.

So the mods on here have free reign to treat different users differently and act like complete feth wits to some while others' they allow to bend the rules?.

While the hyperbole doesn't particularly encourage a sensible response, I'll point out that yes, the mods absolutely treat different users differently. Users with a history of running afoul of the site rules tend to get less slack, whereas a new user or someone with a better track record might be given the benefit of the doubt, depending on the situation. That's a part of the process that is supposed to encourage repeat offenders to stop and reconsider how they behave on the site, and for the most part it does exactly what it is intended to do.

That doesn't mean that mods have free reign to do what they want, however. As I said, moderators can be and have been removed when their behaviour fell out of line with what the sites' owners expected.

 An Actual Englishman wrote:

 BrookM wrote:
Sock puppet / secondary accounts are forbidden, to quote the rules:

For disciplinary and site administration purposes, all users are expected to maintain only a single user account on Dakka. Secondary, or 'sockpuppet', accounts are not permitted. Users found with a sockpuppet account (especially those created specifically to break further site rules) will typically have their access permanently suspended.

Surely if anyone is in a position to change the rules for the good of the community, it's the mods?

In actuality this is an idea. Keep your normal account but have a new account ("Mr. Blue" or "moderator #3" tee hee) for mod purposes. It keeps the two separate.

I know when I am a safety officer, I SO everyone but me, and another competitor runs me (including scoring with any close calls on scoring default ing against me by my own personal policy). As that involves serious bragging rights it's about the same level of personal interest (which is low).

It's a thought.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:


Again, with that ban for "stress" no Moderator was able to tell me which rule was broken or else they would not have had to rely on creating a rule.

Forum rules are often, in my experience, like the Pirates Code. It's more guidelines in practice than actual rules.

Which is a jovial way to say that forums are NOT a legal system. They often have only a handful of actual rules (most of which are universal to most site); the remainder is judgement calls by the staff. This is practical because forums are not jobs and moderators are not going to craft and memorize a hundred thousand rules to try and ensure they cover all bases specifically.

Very Rarely (in my experience) this means that mods end up having to tackle a user who is operating outside of the rules, and yet is causing disruption. Often this doesn't require a ne rule and is covered by interpretation of others.

The problems tend to happen more if there's a mod who can't operate with this system. I've seen hard working mods demoted because they were too strict or literal in rule interpretation and who lacked judgement to adapt to situations.

Of course every so often its good to amend/add to the rules to ensure that they reflect actual policy that is adopted (as policy can vary over time, often as a result of lots of small subtle changes in the community).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frazzled wrote:

 An Actual Englishman wrote:

 BrookM wrote:
Sock puppet / secondary accounts are forbidden, to quote the rules:

For disciplinary and site administration purposes, all users are expected to maintain only a single user account on Dakka. Secondary, or 'sockpuppet', accounts are not permitted. Users found with a sockpuppet account (especially those created specifically to break further site rules) will typically have their access permanently suspended.

Surely if anyone is in a position to change the rules for the good of the community, it's the mods?

In actuality this is an idea. Keep your normal account but have a new account ("Mr. Blue" or "moderator #3" tee hee) for mod purposes. It keeps the two separate.

It's a thought.

Problem is that faceless mods don't work on moderate to small communities all that well. Because everyone ends up knowing who the alternate account holder is anyway. Faceless/separate mods accounts tend to work best on huge sites where the community is often a collection of communities - so things like social media sites. You don't befriend a Facebook mod; but at the same time those communities are vastly different.

Dakka is far smaller; it needs active staffers - mods - to help contribute as much as regular members. Indeed a mod contributing with articles, or chatting or just engaging with the membership is a very valuable thing. It helps reinforce that hte mods ARE people and are into the hobby as well. They are not "THE MAN".

Plus, as I said, in a small site a faceless mod would be known as an alt very quickly. It wouldn't actually solve anything and I'd wager most users would end up chatting to the mod on their regular account and the mod would end up using it most of the time anyway (since, as outlined earlier, most mod duties have nothing to do with issuing warnings). Plus its a lot easier to tackle a problem between users when you are a person not a faceless account name.


Much easier to just enforce "no moderating threads you post in" policies.

 Overread wrote:
Forum rules are often, in my experience, like the Pirates Code. It's more guidelines in practice than actual rules.

Which is a jovial way to say that forums are NOT a legal system. They often have only a handful of actual rules (most of which are universal to most site); the remainder is judgement calls by the staff. This is practical because forums are not jobs and moderators are not going to craft and memorize a hundred thousand rules to try and ensure they cover all bases specifically.

Very Rarely (in my experience) this means that mods end up having to tackle a user who is operating outside of the rules, and yet is causing disruption. Often this doesn't require a ne rule and is covered by interpretation of others.

The problems tend to happen more if there's a mod who can't operate with this system. I've seen hard working mods demoted because they were too strict or literal in rule interpretation and who lacked judgement to adapt to situations.

Of course every so often its good to amend/add to the rules to ensure that they reflect actual policy that is adopted (as policy can vary over time, often as a result of lots of small subtle changes in the community).

Judgement calls are to be expected based on the facts and circumstances. But these judgement calls should be heavily informed by the rules of the site. If you have to have such a creative interpretation of the rules that you create new ones then that is cause for concern.

Furthermore there are better ways to deal with a community member you believe is acting outside of the rules. The first and most obvious one is starting a dialogue with that person. Perhaps their intentions are being mis-read, perhaps they are not communicating clearly enough, perhaps you are mis-reading the situation. That way you can establish whether this person is setting out to be deliberately causing strife or whether there is just a gap in communication. That way you can better manage the situation and don't have to create conflict where none exists.

 Future War Cultist wrote:
If moderators are under no obligation to be impartial, then it means that they can abuse their position.

Only if you subscribe to the belief that everyone is doing it for the mind-altering position that is the wielding of power on a toy soldiers forum. Otherwise, any such potential for abuse is generally curtailed by the actual motivation of the Moderator team; namely, to help the community flourish in a positive way. Abusing the position would generally be anathema to that goal.

I repeat, everyone makes a mistake every once in a blue moon, because moderators are human. As Insaniak said above though, the goal is not be impartial or follow an iron clad set of rules, but to create a site which inculcates the values and community spirit that the site owners desire. That is the guiding rule that we all try to work by. We're here doing what we do because we want all of you to have a mature, polite, and friendly place to discuss toy soldiers!

My role is more circumscribed than most, but I see the grindings of the gears. I have seen one user accuse the mod team of an intrinsic left wing bias whilst being suspended, even as another rants about their right wing facist tendencies as he gets an OT ban on the same day. I have seen the endless trouble with people who actively want to contribute to the community and do so in a number of ways; but struggle to contain their tempers and sense of perspective on subjects important to them. I've seen supposed adults, who when receiving a mild warning for insulting someone, be incapable of perceiving their own faults, go on a mission to try and prove how the mods must be a) persecuting them, b)breaking the rules themselves, c) inconsistently applying the rules or d)morons.

I see it all. I have nothing to do with it, but I see it. And in half a decade of that, whilst I haven't necessarily agreed with everything done, I have extremely rarely seen anything I thought was disproportionate or abusive. There's usually a reason for anything done, even if the users aren't able to perceive it. The system works, more or less.

 insaniak wrote:

 An Actual Englishman wrote:
You'll also note that my suggestion - to have a sockpuppet? (was it?) account will allow them to contribute in a fair and equal manner, rather than from a position of superiority.

Except it wouldn't. The only thing that would change is that mods would have to log out and in again in between posting as a user and posting as a moderator. They would still be the same moderators, with the same power to lock threads or suspend posters.

You've tried it before then? You know for definite it won't work?

You might not have noticed, but a lot of the negativity seems to be around perception. My suggestion is a quick and simple (in my mind) fix to this. If mods only do, y'know, their moderator actions and comment as normal hill billies the impartiality of their treatment cannot be called into question. You don't need to get so defensive over a suggestion and I have no idea why you are? It's only an idea.

 insaniak wrote:

 An Actual Englishman wrote:
So the mods on here have free reign to treat different users differently and act like complete feth wits to some while others' they allow to bend the rules?.

While the hyperbole doesn't particularly encourage a sensible response, I'll point out that yes, the mods absolutely treat different users differently. Users with a history of running afoul of the site rules tend to get less slack, whereas a new user or someone with a better track record might be given the benefit of the doubt, depending on the situation. That's a part of the process that is supposed to encourage repeat offenders to stop and reconsider how they behave on the site, and for the most part it does exactly what it is intended to do.

That doesn't mean that mods have free reign to do what they want, however. As I said, moderators can be and have been removed when their behaviour fell out of line with what the sites' owners expected.

I don't think your initial response of "So I'll point out, once again, that moderators are under no obligation to be impartial." is particularly conductive to a sensible discourse either. It's pretty telling of the mentality of the moderation team, to be honest.

Your anecdote regarding mods treatment of different individuals is cute and all but let's be honest it isn't reality. We're discussing topics via the magic of the internet here with only text to convey often complex thoughts, feelings and emotions. Text can easily be misread. It happens all the time, in fact, where a joke will be misinterpreted as an insult, or sarcasm as reality. I'm sure you can at least admit that you mods are all humans who are, like anyone else, prone to favouritism and bias. The problem isn't that this bias and favouritism happens, of course it's going to, it's that there's a complete denial of it happening when it clearly has and subsequently there seems to be no correction process for this.

If by "complete denial" you mean "explicitly stating it exists" then yes.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
If by "complete denial" you mean "explicitly stating it exists" then yes.

I'm on about at the point when the bias/favouritism presents itself. Not a vague "we're only human but your particular accusation is false and wrong", as we're getting in this topic. Also, what happens if a mod is perceived as acting in an unfair way to another user, is there a correction process? What is it? In other words, exactly what I said here;

it's that there's a complete denial of it happening when it clearly has and subsequently there seems to be no correction process for this.

Has any mod actually admitted that the mod in question in this instance acted out of what would be considered "good moderation"? Genuine apologies if so, because I haven't seen it. Nor do I have a vested interest, because I've not been involved in the topic in question nor seen the mod in question do anything out of the ordinary/unfair. But there seem to be a fair few people who aren't happy about the mods' actions in this particular case.