For all concerned, my advice just let it go. It doesn’t look kindly on either of you.
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I believe that the proper response is to say, “I break with thee, I break with thee, I break with thee,” and throw dog poop on their shoes.
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I was going to PM you about a related matter anyway. As per my above remarks, do you as moderator think that if users demand to be ignored by certain people, that they themselves in turn benefit from ceasing to stir-the-pot with personal asides indirectly-directed at that person? Would it be fair as policy for avoidance to go both ways?
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For the record, Melz works in a secure area, and has one account on mobile (melz2) and her home account (melizmatic). Fairly straightforward.
Me, on the other hand - I am everyone else
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Tom: “Hi.”
Dick: “Don’t engage me.”
Tom: “Okay.”
Dick: “I said don’t engage me!”
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Yeah, I wouldn’t really call it a sockpuppet since there was zero obfuscating about the second account and the reasons for it.
On both BB and in 3D life, when someone says “don’t talk to me”, it stings. Sometimes it even hurts. At that particular moment it doesn’t matter if they are the asshole, or you are. But if you insist on ignoring that, or you try to make HR, the mods,your teacher, whoever TPTB are in that situation say to the other person “you must let so-and-so talk to you”, then you’ve just become the asshole.
And if it seems that women are extra sensitive about this issue, it’s because we have generations of watching (mostly men) push right past everything from polite requests to restraining orders to have what they feel they are entitled to. And shades of that are all over this discussion.
You have the right to speak, even on this heavily modded forum if you stay within the rules, but you don’t have the right to draw special attention to your words from any given individual – that is a privilege that can be revoked. Every time you @ someone, use the quote system or reply to them, you are using the alert function to draw their special attention to your words. This is a known function of the Discourse. So don’t @ name, don’t direct reply, and if you quote, type it out manually, without the code. That’s as simple as it has to be, and you can still air your grievances and state your disagreement to the entire board, without special alerting someone who has asked you not to.
That’s all that’s really being asked.
ETA, sorry to direct reply with an essay, it just started out with agreeing about the accounts, honest. And for everyone: You in said essay is generic. @tinoesroho is awesome.
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Talking ABOUT a person at a party where they have been prohibited from talking back is not in any way acceptable, it’s fucking rude. And when the things they always have to say are accusatory, it becomes unjust. Sorry, but calling people names and always making vague accusations is CONFRONTATIONAL, regardless of whether there are any special symbols or system notifications, which don’t change the substance of what is said. If people expect others to exercise the self-discipline to ignore them, then they have an obligation to do likewise.
@orenwolf has said in many discussions to not go on diatribes about some user or other being disingenuous. Flag it and move on. People are entitled to like or dislike whomever they choose. But dislike does not entitle anyone to make informal accusations in attempts to affect how one is perceived by others. In every workplace I have ever been, that is expressly forbidden as being a form of harassment. If you have a valid complaint, then direct it to those in charge. Otherwise - keep it to yourself, and/or PRIVATE conversations.
Being a very fringe person, this kind of practice follows me everywhere. I don’t abide it elsewhere, and I don’t abide it here.
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@beschizza some folks manage to end conversations in a civil manner, “I think were done talking about X” and thats pretty grown up.
Then theres some folks who when @'d make a stink and to me thats not very grown up. When someone has said and continues to say unpleasant things @ me, even I’ve asked them not to, I can just not read further replies. Its not so difficult.
FWIW I got a doozie of a poison pen message from someone I reply @'d a while back who claimed they’d asked me not to do so. I had no memory of this request and I’m not in the habit of replying to poison pen messages anyway so I just said to myself “OK, that was hurtful but its a sunny day and I’m not gonna let this person live in my head”.
Theres a world of difference between harassment and disagreement.
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It makes me sad we even need this thread. It makes me even more sad that the PTB aren’t willing to add some sort of “mute” feature.
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@popobawa4u if I may talk about you at this particular party, I wanna thank you for making 2017 a bit more joyously fringe!
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Literal @ mentioning is not the issue - I’m not supposed to reply to a post.
E.g. user X, who has asked me not to engage them, post something relevant in a thread on unicorns six months later. Perhaps something that becomes the focus of the discussion. I am not allowed to reply to that post. Not even in a completely factual way that just responds to the idea posted. Or quote from that post. Or any other subsequent posts in the discussion by X. If I want to respond, I have to do it in a way which doesn’t formally alert X about me responding. I.e. I can reply as long as I pretend I’m not replying to them.
This is either a completely pointless charade in which I am pretending not to engage in a discussion I am engaged in or someone demanding that I ignore them effectively bars me from any thread they’ve gotten to first.
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Dude, just walk away. What’s to gain here? Nothing. You’re annoyed. I would be, too. Go pound a pillow and yell into it. It’s the internet. It’s built to be frustrating and get under your skin. There’s nothing you can do about it. Seriously.
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so do people in real life have to call the police to get you to leave them alone, too?
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(To be clear, this is a reply to the thread as well as a quote/reply to user 8080256256)
The aim of a bully is to prove that they can get your attention, and that they can hold it for as long as they like. [1]
As I see it, someone demanding that you ignore them is effectively demanding your continued attention to them and their demand. It’s bullying behavior. It’s not about ending engagement; it’s about continuing engagement, keeping the attention on them, keeping the excitement going.
[1] I can’t find a quote at the moment—Regulars here won’t be surprised that I’m recalling, as best as I can, something I read by the linguist Suzette Haden Elgin, from her work on verbal abuse, in her books on The Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense.
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When is last time you beat up Moose and Squirrel?
I’m not really feeling bullied by the demand, I just consider the non-engagement rule wrong and unworkable.
Certainly, had I been deliberately and persistently targeting someone who doesn’t want to talk to me with messages and replies, that would amount to toxic behavior on my part. But the rule being instituted here is effectively: “I get to exclude anyone from the discussion of any ideas I put forth in a public debate, on a whim, in perpetuity.”
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You could choose to play by your own rules and reply or not reply as you see fit, and nevermind the consequences. Or fugeddaboudit.
The Airing of the Grievances was last week, wasn’t it?
please don’t @reply to people who have asked you not to or otherwise engage them personally.
@beschizza What if I don’t want the mods and admin to reply to me? Checkmate.
For the record, Melz works in a secure area, and has one account on mobile (melz2) and her home account (melizmatic).
@tinoesroho I think expecting a user to know the details… or anything at all for that matter… of an internet stranger’s personal life is not only silly, it’s also indicative of one of those tedious internet clique things happening. While that expectation might be understandable over at the Cafe given how small and insular it is, BB still brings in a wide number of people from all walks of life and them getting ripped on for not knowing something like this is uncool.
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Human interactions are complex and subtle, so guidelines enforced by people are a good way to avoid technical fixes that are doomed to be gamed. Enforcement action always creates moments where one adversary prevails. To the other party and those of similar inclination, this will feel unfair or unreasonable, especially in a forum that has priorites beyond the usual redditarian consensus of lightly-moderated free speech.
The obvious alternative to this would be a twitter-style blocking feature that imposes upon both blockee and blocker, preventing mentions or seeing one another’s content. It would solve this sort of problem stone cold dead, but interfere with the general sense of BBS being a place of people talking rather than … some kind of mechanically-mediated graph of untrusted interactions.
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