I never thought I would say this...

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

... but I think our forum immune system has developed AIDS.

yeah, I know, I'm the last asshole on earth whose place it is to say something about this, and feel free to bitch-slap me for being a hypocrite, but is there any way to scale it down so that we're not completely feeding the lamest of lame troll posts and simultaneously treating all n00bs as if they are assholes? Maybe my trolldar is way off but that Holist guy seems OK, maybe keeping it to gentle suggestions about the punctuation until he gets to 50 posts before ripping him an auxiliary vagina?

There are some good threads out there.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

... but I think our forum immune system has developed AIDS.

yeah, I know, I'm the last asshole on earth whose place it is to say something about this, and feel free to bitch-slap me for being a hypocrite, but is there any way to scale it down so that we're not completely feeding the lamest of lame troll posts and simultaneously treating all n00bs as if they are assholes? Maybe my trolldar is way off but that Holist guy seems OK, maybe keeping it to gentle suggestions about the punctuation until he gets to 50 posts before ripping him an auxiliary vagina?

There are some good threads out there.

See my response to you in his thread.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Also, I'd like to add that the people who show up genuinely interested in conversation, etc, do not get this treatment, at least not to the same degree.  There are numerous examples over the years, but for a recent example, look at Iron Waffle.  He came in a little rough, mostly because he's from the North pole, but he acted like a human talking to other humans, and didn't get shat on.

Contrast that with Holist, who came in explaining that - to him - we are all nothing more than lab rats for his experiments, and "fuck curtusy" (sic).  That's what got me going, not his puerile insistence on fake ass contrived zaniness.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

That guy is the latest and greatest example, but what seems to have gone by the wayside completely is the 50-post suggestion, and also the convention of ignoring lame trolls.

It seems to be mostly a couple of posters who just can't help but display their braggadocio  every time someone new shows up. It doesn't really do the board a whole lot of good to instantly put the enthusiastic new kid on the defensive for no real reason. A hint or a nudge, but all-out chest-pounding monkey challenge before they even get to 50 posts? When they at least didn't come in full-on trolling for a change?

Then the new kid gets defensive and ENGAGES them in the monkey challenge, and pages of screeching ensue, usually resulting in the new kid feeling rejected and leaving.

So really, all I'm asking is, can we COOL IT WITH THE MONKEY CHEST POUNDING every time a troll posts or a new guy has bad punctuation? PHOX I AM LOOKING AT YOU.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

That guy is the latest and greatest example, but what seems to have gone by the wayside completely is the 50-post suggestion, and also the convention of ignoring lame trolls.

To be perfectly honest, we never really honored the 50 post thing.  It was one of these great ideas that always worked in the past, but no matter how far back you go, it's still in the past.

Granted, there has been some over-doing of the pooping, but I have to disagree in this particular case...Though I agree that there are better ways to enjoy hate-shitting a full-page rant than on a polemic to a noob with a dozen or so posts.

I'd LIKE to see that effort go into proper bile-duct blowouts, and I'm on board with the ignoring of dumbfucks...But it seems that the only stimuli that can get anyone to post at all, anymore, is to shit on anyone new who shows up¹, thus ensuring an empty board.





¹  Again, I am making an exception in the case of Holist.  I'm not his fucking lab rat.  Or I am, but the wrong kind of rat entirely.

[LMNO]

holist specifically said he posts like that to see how we would react.  And we told him calmly and rationally what would happen.

That really should have been the end of it.  Instead, he became mildly insulting and pretentious, which is just annoying in its own right.  And off to the races we went.

But really... That thread is nowhere near the level of n00b abuse this board has seen.  At least in this case, there seems to be a reason for the antipathy.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

That guy is the latest and greatest example, but what seems to have gone by the wayside completely is the 50-post suggestion, and also the convention of ignoring lame trolls.

To be perfectly honest, we never really honored the 50 post thing.  It was one of these great ideas that always worked in the past, but no matter how far back you go, it's still in the past.

Granted, there has been some over-doing of the pooping, but I have to disagree in this particular case...Though I agree that there are better ways to enjoy hate-shitting a full-page rant than on a polemic to a noob with a dozen or so posts.

I'd LIKE to see that effort go into proper bile-duct blowouts, and I'm on board with the ignoring of dumbfucks...But it seems that the only stimuli that can get anyone to post at all, anymore, is to shit on anyone new who shows up¹, thus ensuring an empty board.





¹  Again, I am making an exception in the case of Holist.  I'm not his fucking lab rat.  Or I am, but the wrong kind of rat entirely.

The only problem I have with Holist so far is that he used a couple of tried-and-true phrases which are guaranteed to irritate us: "cultural experiment" and "fuck courtesy". But he really didn't get off to a bad start; things didn't start to turn until AFTER he said that he would make a point of using correct punctuation in order to not rub us the wrong way, in post #12 on the first page of that thread: http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,31273.0/msg,1133751.html

But we, myself included, just went right on steamrolling it until he got snappish on page 4.

I don't disagree with gentle (or even over-the-top) trolling of the n00bs to see what they're made of. But I don't think this guy deserves all the blame for digging in and screeching, and in combination with the recent consistent engagement with TOTALLY STUPID TRANSPARENT trolls, it makes it look like our white blood cells have gone rogue and are attacking the organism.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

The only problem I have with Holist so far is that he used a couple of tried-and-true phrases which are guaranteed to irritate us: "cultural experiment" and "fuck courtesy". But he really didn't get off to a bad start; things didn't start to turn until AFTER he said that he would make a point of using correct punctuation in order to not rub us the wrong way, in post #12 on the first page of that thread: http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,31273.0/msg,1133751.html

But we, myself included, just went right on steamrolling it until he got snappish on page 4.

I don't disagree with gentle (or even over-the-top) trolling of the n00bs to see what they're made of. But I don't think this guy deserves all the blame for digging in and screeching, and in combination with the recent consistent engagement with TOTALLY STUPID TRANSPARENT trolls, it makes it look like our white blood cells have gone rogue and are attacking the organism.

The only problem *I* have with Holist is that he came looking for a fight.

He got what he came for.

*shrug*

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

holist specifically said he posts like that to see how we would react.  And we told him calmly and rationally what would happen.

That really should have been the end of it.  Instead, he became mildly insulting and pretentious, which is just annoying in its own right.  And off to the races we went.

But really... That thread is nowhere near the level of n00b abuse this board has seen.  At least in this case, there seems to be a reason for the antipathy.

YOUR behavior was calm and rational, and not pretentious or condescending. Reading some of the other posts I can see why he went the direction he did.

This was not the worst case of n00b abuse, no. Like I said before, I am not just talking about this guy, but about forum autoimmune disorder in general.

Also, perhaps unlike some of the other noobs, I actually was interested in what this guy has to say, as an educated, self-employed longtime-Discordian father of six, and everyone being pissed as fuck about his lack of punctuation isn't making it any more likely that he'll settle down and participate.

[Don Coyote]

Coyote had a long post in which he explained his position and then decided fuck it. holist is a screeching monkey, and so are a few of the other posters  in that thread. And this is why Coyote said fuck it, noob not worth it.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Phox has been very polite to this one nigel.

[AFK]

Despite how weird it feels, I must say I'm with Nigel on this one. 

[Phox]

That guy is the latest and greatest example, but what seems to have gone by the wayside completely is the 50-post suggestion, and also the convention of ignoring lame trolls.

It seems to be mostly a couple of posters who just can't help but display their braggadocio  every time someone new shows up. It doesn't really do the board a whole lot of good to instantly put the enthusiastic new kid on the defensive for no real reason. A hint or a nudge, but all-out chest-pounding monkey challenge before they even get to 50 posts? When they at least didn't come in full-on trolling for a change?

Then the new kid gets defensive and ENGAGES them in the monkey challenge, and pages of screeching ensue, usually resulting in the new kid feeling rejected and leaving.

So really, all I'm asking is, can we COOL IT WITH THE MONKEY CHEST POUNDING every time a troll posts or a new guy has bad punctuation? PHOX I AM LOOKING AT YOU.

Umm. Nigel, I was and am, in fact, in a civil discussion with holist about the culture of this forum in particular and the reasons why that certain things he is doing are likely to garner a bad reaction. I did not insult him for his punctuation or capitalization. So. Why is this directed at me?

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

That guy is the latest and greatest example, but what seems to have gone by the wayside completely is the 50-post suggestion, and also the convention of ignoring lame trolls.

It seems to be mostly a couple of posters who just can't help but display their braggadocio  every time someone new shows up. It doesn't really do the board a whole lot of good to instantly put the enthusiastic new kid on the defensive for no real reason. A hint or a nudge, but all-out chest-pounding monkey challenge before they even get to 50 posts? When they at least didn't come in full-on trolling for a change?

Then the new kid gets defensive and ENGAGES them in the monkey challenge, and pages of screeching ensue, usually resulting in the new kid feeling rejected and leaving.

So really, all I'm asking is, can we COOL IT WITH THE MONKEY CHEST POUNDING every time a troll posts or a new guy has bad punctuation? PHOX I AM LOOKING AT YOU.

Umm. Nigel, I was and am, in fact, in a civil discussion with holist about the culture of this forum in particular and the reasons why that certain things he is doing are likely to garner a bad reaction. I did not insult him for his punctuation or capitalization. So. Why is this directed at me?

My bad; it came across as really condescending to me. Maybe it didn't to him.

The monkey chest-pounding thing largely refers to the way you can't seem to not respond to even really awful trolls... telling off a bad troll isn't really "winning". It's just giving them more reason to keep posting. I'm not saying you're doing it wrong, and we all get sucked into exchanges with trolls sometimes, it's just that man, it's almost a guarantee who will respond to DECI4 posts and it's starting to make me cringe.

[Dildo Argentino]

The only problem *I* have with Holist is that he came looking for a fight.

He got what he came for.

*shrug*

quality company was what i came for (though i didn't really believe i would find it) - so you are wrong there...

but, amazingly, i did find what i came for! (so you are right there)

... Your Highness