What should the board look like

[Mr Poppy]

Jan 5, 2023 14:15:07 GMT Mark said:

*** ADMIN ***

So, the first (and hopefully last) major cock-up in admin duties has occured since setting up this place.

As some of you may have noticed, I have been absent from here over the festive season.

This was not planned. It was planned that I would not physically be here as I was away for the holidays, but, I would always be online with the aid of a laptop that I took with me.

The one thing I neglected to do in the pre-Chrstmas rush was to copy my password file from my Firefox profile...so, I was effectively locked out, not only of here, but, my email, my social media, everything.

DOH!!!!

I am aware that as a result, I left serveral of you hanging. I cannot apologise enough for this.

Now that I'm back, I'm going to spend my online time today making sure I'm caught up with what's been posted (I've been able to read the forums as a guest in my absence, so, shouldn't take that long).

Those waiting for my replies will be the next target and will be dealt with by tomorrow aftrnoon, hopefully much sooner.

I will be putting a failsafe in place so that this does not happen again and can only apologise again to those I have kept waiting.

Finally, a belated Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all that sail in the good ship UKPR2.

I hope you enjoyed your holiday. I'm assuming you've been very busy in the Real World the last two days? Could you provide an update on the timing of clearing your UKPR2a 'inbox' and then what measures you have decided to take (or not take).

Thank you

[Mark]

Hi, Trevor - I have indeed been busy, both on here, catching up after my absence - almost there - and away from here.

I'm aware that I've kept you waiting, for which I once again apologise, and that others are waiting for me to get back to them.

I should be totally caught up by the end of tomorrow.

[Mr Poppy]

Jan 8, 2023 2:10:05 GMT Mark said:

Hi, Trevor - I have indeed been busy, both on here, catching up after my absence - almost there - and away from here.

I'm aware that I've kept you waiting, for which I once again apologise, and that others are waiting for me to get back to them.

I should be totally caught up by the end of tomorrow.

Still waiting...

[Mr Poppy]

Feb 3, 2023 12:56:19 GMT Mr Poppy said:

Jan 8, 2023 2:10:05 GMT Mark said:

Hi, Trevor - I have indeed been busy, both on here, catching up after my absence - almost there - and away from here.

I'm aware that I've kept you waiting, for which I once again apologise, and that others are waiting for me to get back to them.

I should be totally caught up by the end of tomorrow.

Still waiting...

A tune while we wait... should probably edit some of the words (eg 'world' to 'site') in case it is misrepresented though...

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjRb7PYu_Pk

[Mr Poppy]

Apr 7, 2023 8:20:10 GMT Mark said:

*** ADDMIN ***
...
Also, the local elections are less than 4 weeks away. While I think that polling should be kept on the main thread - after all, that is what it is for*, when the local eections happen, do members want a separate thread for results and discussion, or should this be kept on the main thread?

Given LEs are temporary and polling related then I'd say keep them on the main board - noting that whilst Issue Specific threads do exist then some people apparently continue to insist on using the main thread for low interest, non polling related stuff. 

[Mr Poppy]

Apr 8, 2023 13:16:03 GMT Mark said:

*** ADMIN ***

Last night, a member asked me, on this board, how to block another member. That is fine, they were asking for technical advice.

There have, in the interim, been several posts ith members stating that they have/have not blocked another member.

Please be aware that this is still abuse towards another member, even if indirectly.

If anyone really feels the need to block someone else, then, fine, the mechanism is in place to do so, but, please just do it silently rather than announcing it to the whole board.

I have also noticed something of an uptick in low level flaming, eg. calling another member stupid or similar. I have let this go for a while, while I shouldn't have, I will ask anyone that has done this to desist. Members can make the exact same arguments without this appendage. As stated in the rules, when debating, play the ball, not the man.

You did also say you'd get back to me and do something about the 'fake gotchas' (from before Xmas but see your Jan 8 on this thread). I note there was another effort from the 'usual suspect' today (possibly others that no one has replied to?)

Also, just to be clear. Are all politicians 'fair game' - noting that LAB have decided to use personal attacks in their campaigning. I'd prefer some limitations are applied even to politicians given that many of them have had death threats or similar. I just want to make sure the rules are consistently applied given I'm pretty sure that Rishi was already considered 'fair game'.

[Mark]

*** ADMIN ***

It's not the first time I've been asked about what is called 'banter, and you are not the first person to raise it.

Personally, I would like to see inter-member banter, that is banter between members and banter referencing other members kept to an absolute minimum.

But, what is being asked is, more importantly, what, if any banter is within the rules, especially when it comes to flaming other members.

What I would say to all members is to think before you post. While I can admin the most obvious examples of rule breaching, I have to take this on a case by case basis.

I say that because of what I call the 'pub rule'.

What I mean is that two or more friends can, in jest, say things to each other and use terms towards each other that they wouldn't use to a stranger at the bar.....well, not unless they fancied getting a punch for their troubles.

On here, many of us know at least the online versions of each other....and I'm aware that a few of us have actually met in real life.

That brings with it a familiarity with it, plus UKPR2 is much more 'chatty' than it's predecessor, from which a fair few of us came.

While I have a fair idea of which members are friends with which others...and indeed which members dislike which others, it would be impossible for me to know this in full. I cannot, even if I wanted to, read PMs between members and I cannot see any communication, if any, between members off-site.

So, regarding 'banter', I ask that it is kept to a minimum, that members think before posting and if you are in anyway unsure if banter would be unacceptable, or mis-interpreted, please err on the side of caution and don't post it.

In terms of what gets posted, I have to deal with it on a case by case basis.

[Mr Poppy]

Aug 11, 2023 21:09:14 GMT Mark said:

*** ADMIN ***

It's not the first time I've been asked about what is called 'banter, and you are not the first person to raise it.

Personally, I would like to see inter-member banter, that is banter between members and banter referencing other members kept to an absolute minimum.

But, what is being asked is, more importantly, what, if any banter is within the rules, especially when it comes to flaming other members.

What I would say to all members is to think before you post. While I can admin the most obvious examples of rule breaching, I have to take this on a case by case basis.

I say that because of what I call the 'pub rule'.

What I mean is that two or more friends can, in jest, say things to each other and use terms towards each other that they wouldn't use to a stranger at the bar.....well, not unless they fancied getting a punch for their troubles.

On here, many of us know at least the online versions of each other....and I'm aware that a few of us have actually met in real life.

That brings with it a familiarity with it, plus UKPR2 is much more 'chatty' than it's predecessor, from which a fair few of us came.

While I have a fair idea of which members are friends with which others...and indeed which members dislike which others, it would be impossible for me to know this in full. I cannot, even if I wanted to, read PMs between members and I cannot see any communication, if any, between members off-site.

So, regarding 'banter', I ask that it is kept to a minimum, that members think before posting and if you are in anyway unsure if banter would be unacceptable, or mis-interpreted, please err on the side of caution and don't post it.

In terms of what gets posted, I have to deal with it on a case by case basis.

Thank you. Since you have started a new general thread then I'll honour my promise of a 'reset' and will try again to engage with almost all members if they 'play the policy'. I'll also delete the examples I have shown and let the matter of 'clarification' WRT to 'banter' drop. I've no idea if any of those received a 'yellow card' but a new general thread is like reaching the play-offs and a chance for a reset.

PS I've even changed my avatar as that seemed to upset some people for some reason. Like a capybara I'll try to get on with everyone  

[Mr Poppy]

Aug 13, 2023 19:44:54 GMT oldnat said:

Aug 13, 2023 16:39:39 GMT jib said:

Good afternoon, just returned from my summer holidays in the south of Spain. Very comfortable and as enjoyable as ever.

I've been studying the news (and this site) and was greatly amused by my dear friend steve 's short, comical exile from the site. He was never going to be able to stay away.

I was most upset by the demise of the Crooked House pub. An absolute disgrace and why the he** was it not listed and protected as soon as it was under any kind of threat? Another casualty of Osborne and Alexander most probably.

Welcome back. Like you, I prefer not to advertise on social media my absence from home.

I wonder if Mr Poppy 's absence from his castle has been noted by the criminal fraternity, who may have scaled the walls and stolen his priceless[1] collection of Thatcher memorabilia?

[1] £0.00 is literally priceless.

Mark has said "banter referencing other members kept to an absolute minimum"* and it is still unclear where the boundary between 'flaming/trolling' (for which their are specific rules**) and 'banter' is

I don't know why anyone would collect any political leader memorabilia, perhaps oldnat has a collection of former SNP leaders memorabilia and has assumed others would have similar collections for different leaders? He can explain his reasoning if he so wishes. 

It's not even factually correct as 2sec on eBay and you can find all kinds of memorabilia for those so inclined to collect or use such items. EG

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/374874149887?
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/175050063737?

For jib then why do you think someone was exiled recently? Apparently the minimum 'ban' is 48hrs and you can check if you want but Mark did state: "Nobody has been banned from here." (which I assume is meant to be recently) and I'm pretty sure you won't find a concurrent 48hr period of absence from the person you mention (but by all means check if you want to)

ukpollingreport2.proboards.com/post/95791/thread

It would be nice if this site didn't descend into the 'cesspit' of UKPR but if the level of moderation is so low as to be invisible then perhaps I should test the threshold of what is considered 'banter' or make totally pointless and inaccurate "banter referencing other members"? I'd rather not and hence why I've posted this away from the main thread and will happily delete this post if Mark gives further 'clarity' on what is/isn't allowed. 


* ukpollingreport2.proboards.com/post/96530/thread
** See #2 in ukpollingreport2.proboards.com/post/5/thread

[Mr Poppy]

To avoid clogging up the main thread I'll repost Mark 's *** ADMIN *** intervention on the cunningly named 'What should the board look like' thread offering my 2c below

Oct 3, 2023 12:20:27 GMT Mark said:

*** ADMIN ***

Regarding the recent issues re-new polling threads.

Firstly, Mr Poppy was completely within the rules starting a new polling thread. Not only that, he followed the advice on doing so re-thread title to the letter.

All but two of the main polling threads on UKPR2 were started by me.

When setting this place up, I did not envisage that would be the case but, that is how it panned out.

There is currently nothing in the board rules stopping any member from doing so.

Whether members want that to continue to be the case is up to all of you. If you only want the main polling threads to be started by me, that is fine - if that is what most members want, I shall instigate a rule change.

If most members want things to stay as they are, that is also fine.

As to the 'new polling threads' followinng the one Trevor started, while not against the rules, this was just silly and petty. There ca be no sanctions as no rules were actually broken, but, I expect better from members.

Regarding frequency of new threads, I rejected the idea of a set timescale (eg, once a month) when suggested a long time ago as it doesn't allow for events (for example, there will be a new polling thread jut before or just after the by-elections on the 19th).

If you choose to keep things as they are, allowing members to start new polling threads, all I ask is that it is kept sensible, kept to the format, and no more pettyness.

The formatting of the thread name and semi-regular polling threads also give an easy snapshot over time, which I think is useful.

In this case, a new polling thread was overdue (my bad), so the first one started by Trevor was welcome.

Any and all thought on this are welcome.

IIRC this is at least the 4th* time you've been called upon to intervene on a matter when I haven't broken any site rules (specifically rule #3 in this case). Might I once again request you do provide some clarity on what constitutes someone breaking your rule #2 and when (if ever) you intend to actually sanction anyone for repeatedly breaking rule #2? IMO that is fair request given this is the 4th time you've clarified that I didn't actually break any rules but the matter of what constitutes 'flaming' (aka 'trolling') is 'vague'

I've commented on why I started a new thread (the old one venturing towards a UKPR style 'cesspit') and don't see any problem with the rules as they are (other than lack of enforcement when someone does actually break them).

However, I am aware a lot of people of UKPR2 don't like me and as a gesture of good will then I will give my word that I won't start a new 'main' thread in the future. I certainly won't be so petty as to avoid posting on a new thread that anyone else decides to start up.

'Conference season' can bring out the most partisan nature in some people so I'd suggest you/someone starts a new thread once LAB conf is over and might I politely suggest, once again, that you request people then 'leave the past in the past' (ie leave their petty personal vendettas on 'old' threads and don't continue them onto 'new' threads). People can obviously choose to 'hide' my posts if they don't want to read them - something I strongly encourage a number of people to do!

* This being the second time for when I followed the rules and started a new thread in the correct format. Once for when instead of reposting a 'tweet' I summarised it (in order to prevent the main thread being clogged up with repeated full quotes) and once when I changed my avatar (which seemed to have caught a few people out 'liking' my comments before they realised it was someone they don't 'like')

[leftieliberal]

Mark I was having a look at the administrator options for Proboards and noticed that there was an "Enable Falling" option which doesn't bump threads up to the top of the listing when replied to. If we added this thread and "Polling Archive" to the sticky threads then it might be a good idea to enable the "Enable Falling" option for all other threads in the General Discussion as we should then end up with threads in chronological order with the most recently opened thread at the top. As there are already two pages of threads under Specific Issues, I would leave that as it is.

[athena]

Without wanting to make a mountain out of a mole hill, I'm a uncomfortable with links to comment pieces on party political or party-affiliated sites being posted on here without the party affiliation being flagged. The rules say it's not supposed to be a venue for politics and to my mind these sort of links stray over that line, especially when they're posted without the party affiliation being flagged. Linking to a party political site to illustrate what party X's line on such-and-such is (which I'm sure has been done before) seems rather different from posting links to comment pieces on party-affiliated sites.

I realise the line I'd like to draw may seem rather pedantic, after all we certainly get more than enough links to Guardian articles by authors with a known political affiliation. Whether that bothers me less because newspapers can still be considered to influence VI or because the authors are so well known that I assume readers of this site are aware of their political affiliation and interpret accordingly I'm not sure, but to me there seems to be a difference between linking to an article in Liberal England, Left Foot Forward or Conservative Home and linking to a columnist in the Guardian, Mirror, Times or Daily Mail.

[Rafwan]

I don’t read all of Danny’s posts and I may have missed some things. But from what I have seen, I would not wish to see him sanctioned on this site. As grandfather of two young girls, I recoil from discussion about child abuse but I believe this site should be able to contain such discussion (within its existing rules). This may put me at odds with my very good friend Crofty, but on the other hand his outraged responses are an equally important contribution.

[mandolinist]

I am of the view that Danny has strayed way beyond the bounds of what is acceptable. I am afraid I don't know how you police this boundary, but agree with crofty that sometimes it is a question of taste.

[neilj]

I stopped reading his posts a while back because I found that many were frankly disgusting in the views he put forward
Only see them now when others quote him
He is suggesting that adults should be able to have sex with children because it's human nature
Whether or not it's human nature for some, it literally doesn't give people a get out of gaol card
Same as if your a psychopathic killer, it doesn't make it right to murder
Some things are just wrong and beyond the pale, the posts in question sicken me

[peterbell]

I agree with Paul's original comment about Danny's posts. Not only are some of Danny's comments disgusting from my perspective, but as Paul says, it is almost certainly turning potential members away from the site. In fact I often wonder how several of our female members continue to follow the site. For some time I have tried to skip most of Danny's posts (it certainly speeds up the reading of the site) but now intend blocking him.

While I accept that it is difficult to formulate rules that stop objectionable comments while allowing a wide ranging discussion, if someone is constantly upsetting people then action should be taken. It would be interesting to know how many members block Danny.

One of my main concerns is that if people are driven away from the site then the site will eventually close, thus stopping a useful scource of polling and political info. I felt the same way with Trevor but it now seems that Danny has taken up the mantle of upsetting the majority of members.

[alec]

Two points:
1) We're playing Danny's game for him. This is what he wants. We really shouldn't be discussing his trivial, obnoxious posts, but he only posts the for reaction, so he'll enjoying this. We should ignore him, which I know will sound odd, coming from me, but this leads me to the second point.
2) Deliberately obnoxious opinions should just be ignored by other posters, but where a poster lies about a point of fact, and particularly where they lie and deliberately misrepresent another poster, especially on a consistent basis, then I think that is something that needs to be addressed through moderation. Danny does this all the time, with me and with others, and he only continues to do so because he is allowed to get away with it by Mark. If that behaviour was sanctioned, we'd remove the need for myself (and some others) to tackle him and set the record straight.

My proposals would be two new rules:
a) A new rule saying that writing things about another poster that are untrue or deliberately misleading should be subject to potential sanctions, at Mark's discretion, dependent on the level, frequency and intent.
b) Any post deemed by Mark to be likely to cause offence is liable to be deleted and the poster subject to potential sanctions, at Mark's discretion.

Danny wasn't the first poster to make stuff up about someone else, and it's one of the most damaging tactics if you are aiming for a civilised debate. The other stuff is just being obnoxious for the sake of it, and should be stopped.

[mercian]

I hesitate to voice my opinion on this, because I know that my intended witticisms sometimes go too far, and judging from reaction on the main board probably generate some complaints, and I have been sanctioned.
I do think that Mark's light-touch moderation is a good thing on the whole because we have few enough contributors as it is and a lot of interesting discussions exist within the dross.
In the recent case which has caused a furore, although the attitude expressed is very distasteful if you read it carefully it has been carefully phrased and seems to stop just short of advocating active paedophilia. Unless I've missed something of course. In other words as alec says, it's designed to provoke.
One thing that I think should receive a mild warning are death threats or wishing people dead which I have been on the receiving end of a few times, though I wouldn't want the perpetrator banned.

[Danny]

Mar 30, 2024 14:28:17 GMT neilj said:

I stopped reading his posts a while back because I found that many were frankly disgusting in the views he put forward. Only see them now when others quote him
He is suggesting that adults should be able to have sex with children because it's human nature

I think you need to read my posts rather more carefully, which you say you do not do - only reading sections cherrypicked by people who do not agree with my arguments.

I will reply here again, but of course if you have blocked my posts then you will still not know what I really said.

I did not suggest adults should be allowed to have sex with children. I said adults WANT to have sex with children, that is if you define children as young people who have attained the physical attributes of adults. I quoted a stat from the internet that adult males find women at their most attractive in the age range 14-18. There seems some agreement this was the case, though when Steve posted something pretty much to this effect, he then immediately denied it when I pointed out what he had said. This is a matter of fact which is either true or untrue and presumably we could hunt out more research on the issue. Thats what I did but not in depth.

Reading up a little on wikipedia I also noted there seems at least a minority view that eg paedophilia is not a psychological disorder so much as a selective adaptation to get in first and have children. Natural selection is all about changes which increase your chances of having offspring. Once again, whether thats good or bad is besides the point, my point is about whether this tendency exists and what proportion of people might be affected. Because the more it does apply to, and the more people are self aware they might have these tendencies, then the less likely they are to choose to become teachers because of societal opposition.

This burst of outrage started because I suggested that recent laws outlawing paedophile teachers has reduced the pool of people willing to become teachers. i did not say this was a bad thing in terms of protecting children, but its obvious it reduced the number of potential applicants to become teachers. That was the purpose! Whether this was a significant number I dont know, hence the need for more information. A cursory hunt for further relevant information, ie that adults are indeed NORMALLY attracted to teens would suggest that this might in fact affect a significant number of potential applicants. a sub issue arose as to the definition of paedophilia, which apparently specifically means attraction to pre-pubescent humans. Which definition is another problem, because it may colloquially be being used to mean an adult having sex with an 18 year old! Some plainly think this should also be illegal, for example the recent case splashed all over the news concerning Philip Scholfield who lost his job despite breaking no laws at all and the parties concerned having been perfectly happy with their arrangements before they were sensationalised.

Even where teachers are fully aware of rules and do not break them in the slightest, they will be subject to false allegations that they have. Education has the highest rate of false allegations against staff of any industry. And the reason is obvious, because making such an allegation will result in a member of staff being suspended and quite possibly sacked. Its essentially unprovable as one persons word against another, which is why teachers are nowadays advised to always travel in pairs in any circumstance where they might end up alone with a child. When a school receives a complaint its quite possible its reaction will be to ask the teacher concerned to leave. Thats again understandable, because from their perspective the complaint cannot be proven false so it might be true. And if they allow that person to continue, then should something happen in the future they could be held liable. And so we end up with musical chairs of staff being asked to move on with glowing references. Which of course if they really did do what was complained about isnt in the greater interest either.

However, the point is anyone becoming a teacher needs to realise part of the job is a good chance they will be accused of something like this during their career and may as a result lose their job. Schools even pay staff to leave, issuing gagging contracts forbidding them to talk about what happened, because they may very well know they did nothing wrong and feel victimised for being asked to leave. But who wants to choose a career where this is a significant probability?

This is a side effect of how the regime in schools has changed. I mentioned my personal experience at about age ten where there was a teacher who obviously (obvious in retrospect) liked seeing naked ten year olds. Evidently he could get away with that at the time. It seems likely the wave of sexual complaints reported decades later is to a large extend happening because society values have changed today from back then, so that what was acceptable behaviour then, no longer is. But because it was acceptable then, or at least slipped through the cracks, it used to happen. Hence abuses in priesthoods, childrens homes, offices. Schools today have moved to the opposite end of the scale, where kids are never naked. Communal showers are out. Its too risky for creating an opportunity for false allegations, never mind real ones.

Whether or not it's human nature for some, it literally doesn't give people a get out of gaol card
Same as if your a psychopathic killer, it doesn't make it right to murder
Some things are just wrong and beyond the pale, the posts in question sicken me

People who do not read what someone has posted should not comment at all. Im not advocating anyone having a right to abuse anyone else. There are plenty of laws banning that. I did discuss the age of consent which states anyone is committing a serious crime if they have sex with someone below it. Another poster raised the organisation PIE, and again I expect you read their post but not my reply. Very disturbing you would condemn someone without hearing what they actually have to say. The history of PIE is a very good example for my argument.

Id suggest reading my reply on the main thread, but briefly while core members of PIE might indeed have had a goal to legalise sex with 5 year olds, the organisation gained both mianstream political support and national popular support for its campaign to reduce the age of consent for gay male sex from 21 to 16. I pointed out both political parties and the great majority of the nation agreed with this eventually. Also, the popular meaning of the word paedophile has evidently changed since the time this organisation was created, because who would call their organisation paedophile anything nowadays? PIE used the absurdity of the existing law to push their agenda for unlimited rights to  have sex with juveniles. It does not help those who want to protect children to push their case beyond human reality about the age at which people become physiological adults.

The great majority of people commiting the serious crime of under age sex are people also under age themselves. Exactly what happens in such cases is at the whim of the authorities. Schools are under a legal duty to report such things to police, but in reality I suspect they do their very best to turn a blind eye unless they believe there was some sort of coercion or abuse. Because its utterly absurd to criminalise a couple of young adults for behaving as nature intended. This is a stupid law. The justification for it is presumably because its very hard to prove such cases and so this law avoids the need to prove coercion or abuse took place in non consensual circumstances. But this then becomes reliant upon the aporoach of authorities, and whether they believe people should be allowed to grow up naturally or banned from having sex.

It should also be noted that in many circumstances the nominal age of consent has already been increased again from 16 to 18, for any situation involving electronic communication which without going into it would seem to include using a phone to ask someone round. For persons held to be in positions of authority, I dont have a problem with that, it seems fair enough to expect higher standards of behaviour eg from teachers. BUT...combining that with the fact, if thats what it is, that people tend to fall in love with those they work with, if you become a teacher you risk ending up lusting after a student. Why then would you choose to become a teacher, rather than some other occupation where the people you come into contact with are all fair game?

Id also perhaps add that its my experience people are all different in what they look for in love. Some kids will be falling for their teachers and seeking to have relations with them. Thats also a fact, an ex of mine told me he fancied the french master and that was why he joined the scouts, so he could go camping wih him.  Its not at all the case this is only staff exploiting pupils.

[alec]

Danny - " I said adults WANT to have sex with children.."

By omitting the words 'some' or 'a tiny minority' you were being deliberately offensive. Everything else you've written on this is excuses.

Please stop it, and try to grow up. You know what you're doing and why.

[Danny]

Mar 30, 2024 20:11:22 GMT alec said:

he only posts the for reaction, so he'll enjoying this.

I certainly do enjoy posting here, presumably so does Alec or he would not. Presumably he enjoys raising the subject of covid on the main thread every few days, which he does, and then complains I respond to his posts, after which he usually replies again calling me a liar. I think alec imputes his own motivation to myself.

I supect his real goal is to eliminate my own divergent political views from the board, leaving it to be dominated only by supporters of the mainstream parties, who agree on far more than they disagree on. he managed to chase away Trevor and other by creating big arguments with them. Trevor was horribly long winded, but came up with a lot of pertinent information. if you cannot defeat the argument, attack the person. And here we are.

I never post here to shock. I post (in response) because i disagree with something which has been said. I generally do not respond about others posts I agree with, what would be the point?

Deliberately obnoxious opinions should just be ignored by other posters, but where a poster lies about a point of fact, and particularly where they lie and deliberately misrepresent another poster, especially on a consistent basis, then I think that is something that needs to be addressed through moderation. Danny does this all the time, with me and with others,

I reported to moderation a couple of recent posts from Alec where first he called me a liar, then in the second post retracted it and said he believed I was ignorant. Bith these were in reality personal insults not permitted here. However, he agree...it was un true to call me a liar, he just said that despite not believing it. why did he do that?

I never lie about facts. Its possible i'm simply worng, but I never post anything I know to be untrue. Im not necessarily intersted in proving my position, and on some of our main points of disagreement there is little point in my responding at length. This has already been done in the past. Alec disagrees with my interpretation of the same facts and I disagree with his. Neither of us is lying (Im not, anyway, I am presuming nor is he). I have many times listed what I believe is a cast iron case beyond reasonable doubt why covid arrived in the Uk in 2019 and could have been managed without lockdown with an outcome little worse or maybe even better (Sweden had a better outcome with no lockdown). And yet alec persist in calling me a liar when I say this.

I have also in past sometimes made posts pointing out the logical contradictions in Alecs own posts, which show two things he posted cannot both be true. He likes to call me a liar for this.

a) A new rule saying that writing things about another poster that are untrue or deliberately misleading should be subject to potential sanctions, at Mark 's discretion, dependent on the level, frequency and intent.

Stikes me this would lead to:
1) very much longer posts including necessary supporting evidence each time.
2) Alec falling foul of this rather more than myself.
3) A huge amount of admin time to asses the cases. Reading scientific papers to assess their content is a slow business. would you want all past references which are relevant carried forward in each new post, or would you yourself read back over years of threads to where a subject originally came up and see how the debate ended?
4) and ultimately all that would be pointless if the issue was being DELIBERATELY misleading, because how would you prove that? The whole history of my and alecs posting falls on this point, because I have never been deliberately misleading.

I think Alec is far, far too touchy about this. He refuses to leave this at the level of people here posting their personal opinions honestly held. This is not wikipedia where every statement should require a reference. In the past he has never responded where I have responded to his allegations of my lying by critiquing his arguments and explaining in detail why he was wrong. Fell free to hunt through all the past posts to assess which of us has this right (!!!)

Danny wasn't the first poster to make stuff up about someone else,

what stuff? Seriously, lets get specific shall we?

[Danny]

Mar 30, 2024 23:18:31 GMT mercian said:

In the recent case which has caused a furore, although the attitude expressed is very distasteful if you read it carefully it has been carefully phrased and seems to stop just short of advocating active paedophilia. Unless I've missed something of course. In other words as alec says, it's designed to provoke.

I never write anything designed to provoke. I do write to make the strongest arguments I can when I feel an issue is important. Again, why do you make some of the strong post you do? I must admit I am sometimes bemused  how extremely some react to certain things. There seem to be huge rows between contributors, which end in personal attacks. I much prefer making a strong argument.

In this case, as a gay man I have been persecuted my entire life principally because of laws banning consensual sex. Coupled with a belief by those in power dating back to victorian times that they knew better how I should be allowed to live my life than did I. I see this issue is exactly the same when it comes to 17 years olds being allowed to choose who they have sex with. Or for that matter 14 year olds. Society is currently seeking to push up ages of consent once again, things like banning under 18s accessing sexual material on the internet. How is this different to real life? The internet IS real life today. The upshot of these attempts has been these rules being widely flouted by real youngster, with or without the connivance of their parents. And so those who believe sex is bad continue trying to tighten the rules, to put the genii back in the bottle as it was 50 years ago. Well today people have more sex, consume vastly more porn, gays in particular have happier lives, people are able to meet those of similar mind on the internet and arguably the traditional nation state begins to dissolve because we have direct contact with people from all over the world.

I consider the right for people to have consenusal sex is evidently under constant attack.  I also think the problems caused by banning things, which automatically pushes people onto the wrong side of the law,  often exceed problems they were seeking to solve.  Making things secret instead of open helps those with malign intent.

[Danny]

Mar 31, 2024 6:47:26 GMT alec said:

Danny - " I said adults WANT to have sex with children.."

By omitting the words 'some' or 'a tiny minority' you were being deliberately offensive. Everything else you've written on this is excuses.

Please stop it, and try to grow up. You know what you're doing and why.

Well...I looked for evidence it was a tiny minority but I didnt find it. i actually found a stat saying women are deemed by men at their most attractive at the age 14-18, and i mention this above.

That doesnt mean those men intend to have sex with them, but it very likely means they would like to. Anything else is kind of to deny the definition of what being sexually attractive means. There are likely to be many reasons why they actually would choose not to, that isnt the point.

Do you have some alternative studies and statistics we could look at?


In the main thread I brought up the interesting stat that among youngest adults today 8% admit to being not straight. Whereas amongst oldest adults its 1%. That pretty much has to mean 7% of older adults are lying. Or more precisely, they are probably making a statement based not upon inclination but upon action. The great majority of adults choose not to have any kind of sexual experience with anyone who might be considered under age. Totally not the point, its about whether they might like to and whether therefore they might deliberately choose to steer clear of a job which involves everyday close contact with teenagers. Once upon a time you might get away with 'innocently' indulging youself by being surrounded by teenagers. Now its more dangerous. So fewer people will do it.

You do not seem to be providing any facts elucidating the debate on whether this is significant or not in reducing numbers becoming teachers. what originally seemed to be a slightly amusing side effect of all this attention to morality in schools that it must exacerbate the shortage of teachers, seems to have been blown up into a wave of overdone outrage.

I watched the the TV series 'Masters and Johnson' recently, based upon the real life academics who researched human sexual behavours back in maybe the 1960s. They seems to have suffered from exactly the same sort of reaction you are showing now. They had to resort to using prosititutes as study subjects. Got thrown out of several hospitals who couldnt withstand the public outrage against investigating sexual behaviour. Nor indeed that they were producing findings flately contradicting what was popularly believed.

One of the reasons why there was public opinion against homosexuality was a massive propaganda campaign by authorities that it was wrong. If we take the current figure of 8% (though its on a rising trend in successive surveys), and consider that a victorian family size might be 10 children, then every family is statistically likely to contain one member with such an inclination. Everyones personal experience must have been telling them this was actually normal, but state propaganda was suppressing anyone admitting to it themselves and therefore masking that it was widespread and wholly normal for humans (other animals too). More recently, opinion surveys did NOT ask people if they had homosexual leanings, but instead only asked if they ever had homosexual EXPERIENCES. The latter will obviously be a subset of the former. The same reasoning is obviously going to apply to adults having sex with teenagers. The number of people actually prosecuted for paedopilia has to be a significant subset of people who fancy the idea. And thats a much more extreme issue than sex with older teens, which is not technically paedophilia at all.

[Danny]

Ok, I have responded at length as I usualy do on specific topics. Now what I think more generally.

I think I am unusual amongst posters here in that I am not affiliated to one party. On the whole I think lab lib and con have more in common than divides them, are none of them willing to be honest with voters and have great interest in sticking up for each other where they are all guilty of the same faults. I think this is actually a growing view amongst voters. That as per above, opinion polling asks people who they might vote for, not really whether they trully approve of a party. Its all very much best of a bad bunch.

I get the impression this makes me the enemy of many posters who not only want to steer this board to approval of their party, they also want to gloss over the faults shared by all parties. They see me as a political threat.

This is curious, because just how many people actually read this site? Surely its a ship in a bottle. Us few squabbling, but what real difference is it making? I always felt that a lot of genuine politicians accessed UKPR1 and used it to inform their views, but its unclear how many of these have carried forward. Its nature has changed, its much less analytical about polling, far far more random irrelvances and fillibustering, but also goes into certain topics which are obviously still very important politically. Such as brexit and covid.

If this site has no external influence, then some of the squabbling is truly insane. Is it because a number of people posting here are actually professional political employees paid to push a particualar line, so thats what they do? The vehemence and time devoted to this is hard to credit unless being here is actually their employment. If they arent professionals, then I still do not understand the vehemence, as a little site of no consequence why not just say your piece and accept that others also have honestly held beliefs which are however utterly different to your own. Many seem to get annoyed simply because others do not agree with them. Whereas its impossible to debate something if everyone is in total agreement. What point is there in that? Is that whats wanted, a site everyone agrees over everything? (I suspect not)

Which obviously brings us to handling of the covid epidemic, where I believe there is good evidence this all went horribly wrong. From my perspective, no politician is yet willing to admit this was the case and so I am in constant conflict with just about everyone. Alec in particular keeps raising the subject of covid, presumably expecting that I will reply if I see posts I believe to be erroneous. I notice though that if I happen to be absent, others do pick up instead on various aspects of Alec's obsession. They would just rather I do it. Many seem to want me to reply so they can complain because I replied.

To me far more objectionable is the main thread being taken over by pages of posts about films, or sport, whatever, which has not the least thing to do with politics or governance. Right now we are living with the £500 billion spent pointlessly on covid and lockdown. Schools are in a state of collapse not least because there are nowhere near enough good teachers. Whats going to happen about that? Again, no party seems willing to come forward and sat, 'yep, state schools are crap'. (they arent all, but some very much are)

Its obvious that certain posters have sought to get into big rows with other posters whose views they dont like and so chase them away from the site. This has been allowed to happen, and continues. That doesnt work with me, and so Alec seems to have given up trying to get me angry. Instead he seeks to impugn my integrity.ttack the man, not the issue. Here, a nice sex scandal, always good to see off a politician.

i am totally bemused by those who claim they dont like my posts and so have blocked them. And then still keep complaining about my posts! Like...how does that even make sense if you arent reading what i actually wrote? This campaign urging others to block my posts...as they say they have done... has been ongoing for years. How can there be anyone left not even seeing my posts to keep urging others to boycot them? How does that make sense? How can anyone be bothered by what they say they arent reading?

[alec]

Danny - Wow! What a fevered imagination you have. You actually believe what you've just written?

I think you are the least self aware poster we have on here.

[mercian]

Even this thread's now dominated by Danny's essays.

[Mark]

I have read the feedback so far and am considering what, if any, rules need changing.

Thank you for the feeback so far.

With regards to things that don't specifically break the rules as set out, but, are in bad taste, that poses more of a quanary for me.

I have, before now, been accused of giving out harsher or more lenient sanctions dependent on how close the politics of the members concerned are to my own. This is soething that I steadfastly dispute. (Indeed, I have the power to outright ban those I disagree with on a mere technicality, but, I don't - and never will do so).

This also raises the issue of what is deemed bad taste - and is someone's political persuasion a factor in this?

I am also aware of the fact that some things posted recently may put off potential future members from joining and participating.

I will be weiging up these things over the net day or two...in the meantime, any further feedback from members is welcome.

[athena]

I block Danny and don't read the responses to his posts, so I've got only the vaguest idea what he's said to prompt calls for more rules, but I'd be concerned about a ban on 'promoting an illegal activity' for a couple of reasons.

The UK now has rather draconian laws on protesting, for example, so if members aren't allowed to 'promote' or at least 'support' illegal activity I'd presumably be in contravention of the potential new UKPR2 rule if I were to comment approvingly on any proposed or actual defiance or subversion of them. There has also been some to-ing and fro-ing on the merits of 20mph speed limits - do we want members to be able to advocate, support or at least condone the flouting of road safety laws - e.g.* 'If my council brings in a ridiculous 20mph limit on my road I'm going to ignore it and I hope everyone else does too, otherwise it's going to take me twice as long to get to work'? Would this hypothetical comment be acceptable in its entirety, acceptable without the 'and I hope everyone else does too...' bit or simply not acceptable at all? I'd like UKPR2 to tolerate advocacy of principled civil disobedience and I'm worried that under the sort of new rule proposed, it wouldn't.

There's also the problem that there are plenty of issues where the legality or otherwise of an activity or behaviour is controversial and contestable. The UKPR2 moderator is not a court of law and I think we should avoid rules which implicitly require him to judge what is or is not 'illegal' activity.

Maybe we could have a rule against advocating, supporting or threatening violence, including sexual violence, against the person (so that it's still permissible to call for military action) if we don't have one already? I don't think many/any members would have problems with our moderator adjucating that.

As for bad taste, it should definitely remain permissible. I'd suggest that readers of UKPR2 don't have a right not to be offended. We all have the option of blocking contributors we find offensive. (Maybe signpost people to the place to do that on the intro page?)

*For the avoidance of doubt, the example does not in any way represent my personal opinion of 20mph speed limits and their impact.

[athena]

Re whether the forum generally is welcoming or off-putting
For me the biggest turn-off is easily the biologically illiterate posting about Covid. As a biologist I found it literally unbearable to read - I don't think I got through the entirety of any of the Covid posts by the two main culprits before before blocking them, because what I did read was so riddled with nonsense and basic misunderstandings. I think that allowing it is irresponsible. I've asked myself whether I should be reading and contributing to a site that tolerates so much misinformation on this subject, given that at least some of it is potentially damaging to health and I did debate whether I had a duty to try to get it taken down - if I'd been reading during the earlier days I probably would have felt obliged. In the end I decided that because the site's readership is so small and few people seem to heed the mountain of Covid rubbish, I could simply ignore it. If I had to see it I wouldn't be so sanguine - the periodic outbreaks of people responding to it or quoting chunks of it always irritate me, because realistically there is nothing I can do.

What made me pause before deciding to contribute to the forum though, was the amount of personal criticism, sometimes descending into insult or mockery. I concluded that there was a way to reduce my risk of being subjected to it, but I do think a thick skin is helpful and the forum would be a less intimidating place without the personal judgements. However presumably there are other contributors who regard these - along with the friendlier chit-chat and the irrelevant football stuff (would it really kill the football fans to use the sports thread?) - as part of UKPR2's idiosyncratic charm and in the end the forum's tone is the product of the collective membership's contributions.

[mercian]

athena
Wise words as usual.
-----------------------------------
Re the ongoing Covid debate, I wonder whether there could be a rule that any non-polling related subject could only have say 7 consecutive days before posts have to go on their own thread? I'm just trying to think of something that doesn't restrict subjects too much, but reduces the ability of one or two posters to bore everyone else to death on a single subject without piling a load of effort on Mark. Better ideas welcome.