It is time to look at an ongoing issue in these forums. We must look past the banhammer and past the names with the pretty blue script and acknowledge that the Mods are Users in themselves. They are nothing more than regular posters like you and I, asked by those who power this site to attempt to keep our forums clean. Nothing more; nothing less.
As I have looked into our Forums more and more; I see that we have a more negative view of these Users. An image of a dictator, or a power abusing ass hole have been thrown about as more appropriate views of the Mods. I have come to feel that perhaps it is time to look at the Mods in a different light, perhaps at least let the Mods know what we would like from them. Whether or not they listen is up to them, but at least we can make our views known to them and the User base in general.
First we will need to look at the Mods job at a deeper level. The Mods deal with hundreds of User reports every day. This is on top of any classes, jobs, personal schedules and events that they may attend at any time. You must realize that on top of the 10 seconds it takes us to read a post and report it, translates to them spending 10-20 minutes searching that User?s post history, establishing a worthy cause for action, a history of any Mod wrath they?ve previously had, warnings, post guidelines and why they were cited for Mod action. This ends up being hours of work, everyday for them and this goes, for the most part, thankless from the primary User base.
In fact, the User base sometimes has been seen to go even farther than simple ignoring said Mod?s actions on the community?s behalf. Instead the Mods are met with contempt and hostility and more than one occasion. It is funny that even on the Internet we mock our janitors, for that is what the Mods are. They are in a thankless job, cleaning the trash that spews from the Forums. Why do we act in such hostility when we see, what appears to be a ban for no reason. The reason is we don?t get the context of the situation. Has this User had a past with the Mods? How many times has he been warned by the Mods? Is this the same guy who said that ?All the Christian Fags should just fuckin? die??
Now we come to the point that we call the Mods out on their actions. We make a thread about their evils, or even slip it into an existing thread. Should we first inform them personally of our ire? Instead of posting about ?teh evil Mod Dictators? could we instead PM to ask them why they did said action? Have you ever gone out of your way to PM a mod about said action and been shot down for no reason? Can?t we assume that we are indeed innocent until the Mod proves us guilty?
It is times like these I feel that we need to take a step back and examine the fact that Mods are no different than you or I. They are Users on a site they enjoy frequenting. They have powers, no one denies that, but they are still members of the site. They will still make a mistake, they will perhaps get mad at a post that they dislike immensely, and in rare instances, are perhaps more lenient on friends and family then they should be. This isn?t always the case, much like it isn?t the case that all Mods are dictators hungry for power. Is this fair? I don?t believe so, but I do understand that the Mods are only human. I have seen bans lifted because of a PM to the Mods. Yet, when the Mods do make mistakes that we often forgive ourselves for making, we cannot look past it. We must know that Mods aren?t perfect, much like ourselves. They are simple Users, just like you and me.
The fact remains that we aren?t always easy to please. Every post we report is something we took to heart and were offended by. This then translates to a Mod que that grows by hundreds, if not thousands daily and the Mods are tasked with sifting through these to find something that may not be immediately clear to them. How long can this take? Minutes? Hours? Days? Yet they know they have been tasked to doing it and they continue to, time after time.
There are mistakes on both ends as well, there has been more than one time a User has clicked on a report button by accident. Mods may not see this right away unless we let them know. How many times have we let them know that we, the User base have made a mistake? We take this good they bring and ask for more.
Now we come to the discussion side of this thread. Let pretend that you are a mod. What would you change with that power? What would you do different? What would you keep the same? The final question would be, what question would you ask a mod, if you had the ability to have their undivided attention?
And of course we can?t leave the Mods out of the discussion, so if you are reading this let me ask you a couple questions. Why do you do it? Do you ever find yourself unable to do something for the forums or communities that you would love to do? How would you change the way Moderation is done?
As I have looked into our Forums more and more; I see that we have a more negative view of these Users. An image of a dictator, or a power abusing ass hole have been thrown about as more appropriate views of the Mods. I have come to feel that perhaps it is time to look at the Mods in a different light, perhaps at least let the Mods know what we would like from them. Whether or not they listen is up to them, but at least we can make our views known to them and the User base in general.
First we will need to look at the Mods job at a deeper level. The Mods deal with hundreds of User reports every day. This is on top of any classes, jobs, personal schedules and events that they may attend at any time. You must realize that on top of the 10 seconds it takes us to read a post and report it, translates to them spending 10-20 minutes searching that User?s post history, establishing a worthy cause for action, a history of any Mod wrath they?ve previously had, warnings, post guidelines and why they were cited for Mod action. This ends up being hours of work, everyday for them and this goes, for the most part, thankless from the primary User base.
In fact, the User base sometimes has been seen to go even farther than simple ignoring said Mod?s actions on the community?s behalf. Instead the Mods are met with contempt and hostility and more than one occasion. It is funny that even on the Internet we mock our janitors, for that is what the Mods are. They are in a thankless job, cleaning the trash that spews from the Forums. Why do we act in such hostility when we see, what appears to be a ban for no reason. The reason is we don?t get the context of the situation. Has this User had a past with the Mods? How many times has he been warned by the Mods? Is this the same guy who said that ?All the Christian Fags should just fuckin? die??
Now we come to the point that we call the Mods out on their actions. We make a thread about their evils, or even slip it into an existing thread. Should we first inform them personally of our ire? Instead of posting about ?teh evil Mod Dictators? could we instead PM to ask them why they did said action? Have you ever gone out of your way to PM a mod about said action and been shot down for no reason? Can?t we assume that we are indeed innocent until the Mod proves us guilty?
It is times like these I feel that we need to take a step back and examine the fact that Mods are no different than you or I. They are Users on a site they enjoy frequenting. They have powers, no one denies that, but they are still members of the site. They will still make a mistake, they will perhaps get mad at a post that they dislike immensely, and in rare instances, are perhaps more lenient on friends and family then they should be. This isn?t always the case, much like it isn?t the case that all Mods are dictators hungry for power. Is this fair? I don?t believe so, but I do understand that the Mods are only human. I have seen bans lifted because of a PM to the Mods. Yet, when the Mods do make mistakes that we often forgive ourselves for making, we cannot look past it. We must know that Mods aren?t perfect, much like ourselves. They are simple Users, just like you and me.
The fact remains that we aren?t always easy to please. Every post we report is something we took to heart and were offended by. This then translates to a Mod que that grows by hundreds, if not thousands daily and the Mods are tasked with sifting through these to find something that may not be immediately clear to them. How long can this take? Minutes? Hours? Days? Yet they know they have been tasked to doing it and they continue to, time after time.
There are mistakes on both ends as well, there has been more than one time a User has clicked on a report button by accident. Mods may not see this right away unless we let them know. How many times have we let them know that we, the User base have made a mistake? We take this good they bring and ask for more.
Now we come to the discussion side of this thread. Let pretend that you are a mod. What would you change with that power? What would you do different? What would you keep the same? The final question would be, what question would you ask a mod, if you had the ability to have their undivided attention?
And of course we can?t leave the Mods out of the discussion, so if you are reading this let me ask you a couple questions. Why do you do it? Do you ever find yourself unable to do something for the forums or communities that you would love to do? How would you change the way Moderation is done?
