While some may point to recent behaviors as the reason I am asking, this question comes from a decade of experience on this website.
More often than not, while anons are effected by comments just as much as anyone else, there are psychological factors that needs to be consided:
1) Anonymity causes confusion of identity:
a) Even if someone create a count exclusively to comment on a particular story it will be easier for those interacting with said 'throw away' account to know when that same account is responding.
2) Anonymous accounts tend to be spammers (in the literal sense, people trying to sell things and not ideas).
3) If someone is passionate enough to provide information on a subject manner they can go through the account making process as it is not too difficult/inconvenient.
These things have always been an issue, and I believe while there are work around such as making multiple accounts, such behavior would be more reality viewable by the user engaged with that user by viewing the profile.
Yes. While I know many news sites have removed comments entirely, I do believe they can provide a valuable function and often provide an opportunity to expand and add new information on a story. Although I think there can be value to anonymous commenting, certainly my experience here is that fully anonymous comments are not so useful. Personally, I have tried for the last several months to no longer reply to comments by people who are not logged in and I would be happy to see Flayrah move to a system of comments only by registered users for all the reasons identified by Sonious.
Furthermore, I would suggest restricting (or, ideally, removing) voting on stories and comments to only be available for registered users with at least 10 comments. It would only seem to make sense to implement such a change if comments will only be for registered users and the 10 comment minimum would just be a way to discourage the creation of many sock puppet accounts. While for many stories/comments this is not a major issue, it is especially important for more controversial discussions where the growing polarization of views, which is hardly restricted to only the furry fandom, makes productive discussion very difficult. The current system of voting by score is not only easily exploited and repeats the many issues with voting for content quality that have been discussed on other sites for years (e.g. SoFurry has had many discussions on the value of voting on submissions and what would be the best system) but votes can be used to suppress unpopular opinions.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
A website that I help mod used to allow guest comments where users can post under an assumed name, without needing to register an account. But we eventually disabled it because of the large number of spam, troll, and impersonation comments that became a tad out of control. And I think Flayrah has reached that point.
Just using this post, or really just its rating to point out why this "collective harmony" and "community integration" or whatever buzzwords people throwing around nowadays are a bunch of horse shit. There's objectively no good reason to waste the time to even click a damn button for this post in the first place, and less reason still to downvote it to oblivion, unless you're just a dick with an axe to grind against the person and not that particular comment. So this folding and fading is just as illusory a reflection of quality as anything else.
At the end of the day content, whether it's an article, a video, or just a simple comment on one of those has to stand on its own merits, or just not stand. And if it truly sucks it probably won't.
Likely not.
But maybe some good moderation. On my blogger, I have an option to default hide comments and I would either approve them or not. There is also an option to default allow anonymous comments until certain days have passed. Added Edit: Actually any comments. Added Edit Done.
Some anonymous users can be useful. If account is required, then a lot of discouragement of good comments will render. Besides, a lot of anonymous people might just make a bunch of accounts, then it might be abandoned. Don't forget multiple accounts.
As for the ratings system. It's already likely abused by irrational people who can't handle a legal healthy debate. If we limit ratings off anonymous, which in some cases are not much different than those with accounts then might as well ditch the whole thing maybe.
I think I use it to be safe. Example maybe: I would likely say "There is nothing wrong with legal sex.". If I didn't use "legal", it would be so broad that it might include illegal sex.
I personally hope it doesn't mean what I fear, but I usually use it these days just in case I think.
Maybe "sex" by definition doesn't have to include the type, but this becomes too blurry to me to see if it does or not.
So just as a hypothetical, if there were a large denomination of an officially recognized religion in a country without much if any age of consent laws, and say this religion excommunicated you on different grounds than condoning pedophilia, would that then make them a Legal Cult?
I would suggest looking into Oath2 as a method of login. A website needing to login just to comment on a article post, like this, may not be worth remembering another password or having the site, and may add security concern having the site storing users passwords. But, logging in with Twitter, Google, or any other Oath2 supported service would help verify and identify users without a password.
I created my account because I wanted people to be able to trace me and to show commitment or accountability on my part.
However, I voted no because I feel it might discourage people—especially newcomers—from engaging. While I do understand Sonious' points, I suggest they can be resolved by fixing what is allowed and some site moderation. As some people mentioned here, we could limit special privileges to registered users such as the ability to rate or vote in places like this poll. Perhaps limit anonymous users from making a certain number of comments in a day to encourage active site users to create an account.
But overall, I'm finding myself leaning on the impartial side about this. A majority of sites I've been to require a login for commenting. The implied reasons for the requirement is obvious. For one, people need to be accountable for their actions.
I was thinking about polls like this. I do think it should be restricted to polls like this.
I can't really agree with the "accountable for their actions" that large though.
I for one mainly respect any right to privacy as the law allows a lot, and for the sake of avoiding identity for the safety of other people including but not limited to: avoiding bad discrimination, and avoiding other inexcusable things (e.g. harassment?).
I remember having to deal with some unnecessary by refusing to identify myself for the safety of my life. Since there wasn't any fair reason to drag me into trash I certainly do not want to deal with anymore. For example, a specific drama that I no longer want to be part of.
Of course if we're talking about the possibility of banning people for bad behavior, I think several websites has the power to ban people's IP, and in one case the law might catch those bypassing such ban anyway (I've heard something about this.). I do think account requirement is more useful but then again, I have a feeling it won't make much of a difference for a specific reason.
I'm aware of the IP avoiding possibility. That might be partly why I was then talking about the subject of certain law. Not sure if there is one but if so, then that would be good to me for those who still want to cause harmful behavior in any legal website.
(I think it should probably be pointed out that you guys are all taking the fun sidebar item seriously again; this poll will not only not effect anything about the comments on this site, the only guy who could actually do this has already commented in the thread with the equivalent of a dismissive "that's cute", so let's not get too excited.)
You're right, the decision to require accounts ultimately lie in his hands. But this site is supported by the community is it not? I just feel it would be respectful for him to at least listen to the community he has gained than dismiss it in an instant.
For a site like this, an account requirement might be unnecessary, but the benefits are still something to consider or be aware of.
I'm listening. I appreciate the feelings. I hope those who've used their freedom of expression to excess recently are also listening and understand that less can be more. That includes those who delight in personal insults to score cheap shots and elicit further angry responses - this is poor form, bad for the site, and I vote accordingly.
I also have to consider the site mission, its history, and how best to preserve the kind of vibrant debate it can foster, which is somewhat endangered elsewhere - in part because it is not treasured, and takes time to moderate, and in part because (within our community) many other large furry forums discourage critical comment, being run (and censored) by individuals or organizations that are either the topic of such criticism, or which does not wish to be seen as supporting it.
Free debate sometimes breaks out into chaotic flame wars - which, for those who remember, was no stranger to alt.fan.furry and the like - but they're relatively rare, and even our resident roo has at times expressed support. My main concern is for what would be lost.
I've seen plenty of good anonymous and account-free comments, and without an open comment form, I suspect many would not have taken the time. The average rating for anon comments is 2.95; below the global average of 3.32, but roughly equal to that of a cross fox or a patchwork rat (and there are many registered users who have attracted far lower averages over the years).
Because of this, I feel the poll kind of misses the point - there are issues with commenting due to a collection of behaviours which are not restricted to anonymous users, and for which registration and accountability does not always prove an effective deterrent. What it would help with the most is spam; but that has a relatively trivial impact, and we have several other mechanisms for dealing with it.
I'm also aware of the huge number of people who just read the article and skip the comments, such as changeofspace below. Not even because they're bad comments - just because they don't have the time. In a way this is not a bad thing (after all, we take more care over stories, and it means that for them all the sound and fury signifies nothing), but what might help engage these users if they do drop by is pulling out some of the better comments in the longer debate - showing off the system at its best, rather than at its worst.
To an extent comment fading and folding already does this (best appreciated after a few days... or years) but it's more intended to decrease visibility of content which doesn't contribute. I had an idea along those lines a while back - basically, a small block with one-line summaries of a few comments above the main list in proportion to the count and vote confidence. Such debates come along irregularly, though, so the utility - and hence my motivation to attempt to code it - has been minimal.
"To an extent comment fading and folding already does this (best appreciated after a few days... or years) but it's more intended to decrease visibility of content which doesn't contribute."
While that may be the intention, I'm not sure that it is the case in practice or, if it is, only for those users that do not engage in debates or anything controversial. That's problematic because then there is only discussion on topics where basically everyone is of one mind or when people use anon accounts. In the cases where there is a need for critical comment, which you say Flayrah is here for, the rating system actually discourages it.
Worse still is that, time and time again, we see that people do not even use voting systems in a way that evaluates quality but in a way that reflects their preferences. This is really clear on art sites like e621 and SoFurry where you can find very positively scored artwork that is technically deficient but contains content that people like and negatively scored artwork which is extremely well done but contains fetishes that most people do not like. The same thing happens on Flayrah where people do not vote on comments in isolation but also based on previous comments by the same person, so the idea that the votes reflect some sort of quality of comment is just not true.
I believe I've pointed it out before but that can also be very clearly seen for some users. If votes truly reflected the quality of comments then we would expect to see a normal distribution of comment scores. If someone makes good or bad comments that should be fairly consistent. That is sometimes true but not for all users. If you look at how my comments (as well as some others) are rated you can see a clear bimodal distribution.
5 stars: 47% (1743)
4 stars: 8% (291)
3 stars: 5% (173)
2 stars: 4% (147)
1 star: 36% (1339)
Either that means that sometimes I write comments which are amazing and well constructed and other times complete rubbish but never anything in between. That seems quite unlikely. The more plausible explanation is that the comments are not rated according to quality but according to who agrees with them. That is far more likely but not what you claim the comment rating is meant to reflect.
There seems to be clear evidence that the rating system is not working as intended, I'm not sure there is any real evidence where it is making a useful contribution and, due to the lack of voting on non-controversial articles and comments, I'm not sure it's ever likely to. So what is the point in keeping that system in place?
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I was thinking more "FA/AC/MFF forum might not be a great place to discuss related issue X, because they can hard-censor you, maybe ban you from the forum." In that case, you'd potentially have a lot of people agreeing, or at least being interested; but those in charge have a vested interest in not letting you saying it - so you can't.
You're talking about something different, where in some cases the majority of people simply don't agree with what you're saying. But I'd note that even in that case, you still get to say it. We're just saying you're wrong - and if you keep saying it, we'll discount everything else you say; some may outright ignore you. Just like real life.
In practice you do see a lot of approval voting; even so, you got 17% of voters to do something different. That's typical; I got 20%. The difference is that you write more rubbish comments (i.e. they repeat something you said that people still disagree with).
Of course, that's where karma comes in. Maybe you're an intelligent person who makes many good points on which most people can agree, most of the time. In this case, it gives you some latitude to take controversial positions from time to time. But if you're generally disagreeable, or never say anything good, it'll work against you; again, like real life. You're up ~0.26 on anon/new users.
I think you're trying to say there's an objective measure of quality, based on the construction of argument, and therefore if you're making well-reasoned, well-constructed arguments, you should be rated highly. But you're way off base. Quality is in the eye of the beholder. If they don't agree with your argument, they'll consider it to be a poor comment, or at best OK; certainly not great.
If essentially everyone disagrees with a comment, it's terrible and doesn't require further consideration except by the masochistic. That's what folding tries to do: eliminate suck. Non-controversial comments don't suck, or at least not enough to deserve folding. Even controversial ones tend not to fold - just fade, to represent the weakness of their support by the community.
"I think you're trying to say there's an objective measure of quality, based on the construction of argument, and therefore if you're making well-reasoned, well-constructed arguments, you should be rated highly."
Indeed, that is what it means for a comment to be a positive, high-quality comment. The structure of the argument is, overall, more important than the conclusion. A comment with a strong argument that comes to the wrong conclusion because of a lack of something unknown is a better comment then one that gets to the correct conclusion through a fallacy. That is because the first one can be followed and will improve if the evidence improves. The second comment is only right by chance but could just as easily be wrong. In the long term that is less reliable.
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. It is an objective measure. You could disagree about what should be measured for quality but it is not subjective. Like if a car has better fuel economy, breaks down less often and has a stronger engine, it is higher quality than a cheap, popular car that only lasts a year.
If you really want the comment rating to reflect how many people agree with a comment then perhaps stop using a 5 star system. That is something that implies quality but you explicitly state that you aren't interested in the quality of the comments but in how many people agree with them. Then you should rather switch to a thumbs up, thumbs down rating system. You'll still have a system which punishes deviation from the majority but at least it will honestly reflect that the rating measures agreement and not quality.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
The structure of the argument is, overall, more important than the conclusion. A comment with a strong argument that comes to the wrong conclusion because of a lack of something unknown is a better comment then one that gets to the correct conclusion through a fallacy.
I've heard of the ends justify the means before, but this is the first time I've heard of the means justify the ends.
Sorry, the universe doesn't care how you reached that wrong answer, it's still wrong.
You seem to have completely misunderstood me there. I never said that a wrong answer wouldn't be wrong but that it's better to reach a wrong answer for the right reason than a right answer for the wrong reason. The only way that you can judge the conclusion and the measure of the reliability of the conclusion is the reasoning behind it.
For example, if someone said, "You are getting blood on the carpet so don't hit the dog with a golf club." You would agree that the conclusion that one should not hit the dog with a golf club is correct but the reasoning behind it is not good. The statement as a whole is bad regardless of the conclusion.
Similarly, let's assume someone said, "Because his fingerprints were found on the knife, that man is responsible for the murder." Let's say that the conclusion is wrong because the fingerprints were there for a different reason. Then the conclusion is bad but the reasoning and comment in general are good. Yes, it reaches an incorrect conclusion but because the reasons follow logically, if we find out that there was a problem with the fingerprints then the conclusion can be amended as the evidence changes. It is also makes it possible for someone identify how the argument is constructed and so to independently verify whether the conclusion is valid or not.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
You would agree that the conclusion that one should not hit the dog with a golf club is correct but the reasoning behind it is not good.
That rather depends on how one feels about dogs, doesn't it? Your species bias is showing . . . ;-p
You can't assume everyone shares your values - and while I get that you were largely talking logic, in the kinds of debates we get into here there are a lot of conclusions that are only seen as "valid" if people share the same values with the same priorities to start with. Often people don't have issues with the logic, but the premises.
[I think this is what Sonious was getting at, but if not perhaps he can clarify.]
It's a conclusion I would imagine most, if not everyone, here would agree with. You're right of course in that more subjective conclusions are not only based on logic but value systems. But we're just talking in comments here, there's no need to go into all the detail. What would be good, is if people have an issue with the premises that a statement is built on then talk about the premises. That could be constructive. There's no constructive value to arguing about conclusions that are based on different premises without addressing the premises. Incidentally, that is something which is impossible with the star rating system.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I was gonna elaborate on a different point, about how people need to stop talking about Web 1.0 era forums like they're a viable alternative to anything or even still "a thing" in any meaningful sense. But there was something that always disturbed me about those and even though I don't really have a problem with ratings system and the like in general, this OBSESSION with "the community" and its illusory collective opinion is at the heart of why it's disturbing. Do you guys not realize it actually CREATES more conflict than it resolves? Now, it's a MASSIVE leap for someone like you-know-who to say that makes it a cult, but to be honest, it IS just slightly "cultish".
"Oh, I'm glad people see this post as only roughly 65% translucent, just like I do!" WHO GIVES A SHIT?!
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. Like critique (maybe), certain arguments are not subjective. If I say the "Earth is round" in a place of debate and many people rated my comment down because they believed the "Earth is flat", that would be abusive to the rating system.
You can actually argue that quality is more objective and that personal feelings are by default not part of it unless it matches something objective sometimes.
And I think it would be completely unfair to the idea of "quality" and "criticism" to completely down rate a perfectly drawn legal art for what it is just because it's a legal "fetish" thing a lot of people don't like.
If quality was subjective, then "critique" was likely never important and was instead a fancy label to consider someone's preference "superior" to everyone else. It might even be worse if we're talking about basic objective arguments such as the earth shape debate.
But a lot of people do consider "critique" and certain debate important. Which in that case, we need to be fair as possible or else it turns to the leaning side of useless.
The idea that it's fair to have a comment be censored from default view because of the majority is terrible too. Same with dictating that a comment "sucks" just because the majority cannot handle it by default: The idea that "popular opinion = good and/or right" is a fallacy. Of course some popular opinion can by default be correct, but that's not because it's popular.
This might be why I'm for ditching the star ratings including the folding. Another thing if another, Legal "Controversial" opinions should not be censored because a lot of people can't handle it with their emotion.
I for one am strongly for ditching the ratings system. I'm sick of good points be censored and/or claimed as "poor" by triggered emotional idiots who likely can't win an argument and/or because they hate me. At this point, it's justified rating some of my comments five stars to avoid CENSORSHIP.
And yes, it's still censorship even if you can still "click" on the comment to see because it's still censored from default view.
And I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees this rating system as flawed.
And BTW, my comment does not "suck" automatically just because my comments get "1-stared" by one or more people.
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REPOSTED
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. Like critique (maybe), certain arguments are not subjective. If I say the "Earth is round" in a place of debate and many people rated my comment down because they believed the "Earth is flat", that would be abusive to the rating system.
You can actually argue that quality is more objective and that personal feelings are by default not part of it unless it matches something objective sometimes.
And I think it would be completely unfair to the idea of "quality" and "criticism" to completely down rate a perfectly drawn legal art for what it is just because it's a legal "fetish" thing a lot of people don't like.
If quality was subjective, then "critique" was likely never important and was instead a fancy label to consider someone's preference "superior" to everyone else. It might even be worse if we're talking about basic objective arguments such as the earth shape debate.
But a lot of people do consider "critique" and certain debate important. Which in that case, we need to be fair as possible or else it turns to the leaning side of useless.
The idea that it's fair to have a comment be censored from default view because of the majority is terrible too. Same with dictating that a comment "sucks" just because the majority cannot handle it by default: The idea that "popular opinion = good and/or right" is a fallacy. Of course some popular opinion can by default be correct, but that's not because it's popular.
This might be why I'm for ditching the star ratings including the folding. Another thing if another, Legal "Controversial" opinions should not be censored because a lot of people can't handle it with their emotion.
This vote really has nothing to do with the 'karma system' nor its implementation, so bringing this up as a discussion is a bit off topic.
But I will say this on it. Just seems ironic for someone who stumped for freedom of expression wishes to remove a tool that users use to express themselves.
And it's also ironic that one who is against the binary polarization of political speech wants us to follow probably the single most harmful implementation taken by large Silicon Valley organizations that allowed us to fall into a more binary expression trap with the like/dislike buttons. Which has trained us that we can either thumbs up, thumbs down, or not vote.
I remember when Youtube had the star system, and I still like it better than the like/dislike system.
(The real reason that Youtube did this, by the way, isn't because they found the system more about people feelings. It's more that it's harder to train an A.I. if people are providing middle of the road answers about the quality of the content they are watching, therefore make the decision binary so the computer can more tailor its recommendations based on the more black/white input. AKA, programmer laziness.)
Removing anonymous comments does not prevent users from expressing themselves. I do not think I have ever advocated the need for fully anonymous commenting systems but am happy with pseudonymous commenting.
I also don't want you to follow thumbs up and thumbs down as an implementation. I said the entire ranking system for comments should be removed entirely.
It would be nice if you read what I write and not what you would like me to have written. In your last two comments, everything you have claimed I said, I did not say. It might actually be interesting to know why you thought that I said those things.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
Indeed it is a form of expression, however there is nothing to the star rating system that can not be expressed by replying to the comments. So there is no loss in user's ability to express themselves on this website. By requiring a reply, a user would have to articulate an opinion rather than just make a potentially mindless click which adds almost no information. Furthermore, a star rating by itself does not tell one why the comment was rated in a specific way so it does not provide any real guidance or opportunity for growth.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
Not so sure about the 'karma system' thing. I need to know a bit about it if slang.
Saying that ratings, including one star ratings which promote censorship to be a form of "expression" is like saying the act of censorship is a form of "expression".
It also dictates labels over other people's speech.
For the sake of comments, it would be equally fair of any legally allowed comments can be the thing any user can do maybe without ratings. Ratings like this over people's comments provides other people's opinions over other people's opinion which damages equal expression in many cases, especially when the effect of rating literally forces the other people's expression to be folded.. I think this is bad for many legally protected speech comments.
So censoring someone's call for censorship is not censorship?
But seriously, Flayrah is not a branch of the United States government, so it's allowed to legally fold comments. Just as Facebook is allowed to remove comments, which is an arguably harder censor that impacts far more people.
Censoring an act of censorship is more of a fair thing for the sake of not having censorship. Only censorship is fine is if it's blocking out illegal stuff.
You can't believe in non-censorship alone and censorship alone at the same time. If you allow something that alone promotes censorship, then you're allowing censorship.
I'm not saying folding comments violates rights, but when I speak "censorship", I mean the main definition of it. The focus here is that it's disrespectful to the practice of free speech to censor any legally protected speech even if it legally can. If Flayrah actually supports censorship to any legally protected speech in favor of other people's personal feelings, then Flayrah is very disrespectful to free speech, and open legal debate.
The main last part of your paragraph avoids the main problem and probably renders a "Censorship is fine here because Facebook can do it." style of comment. Didn't you show that you respect freedom of expression anyway? Why avoid that argument with the last part of your comment?
While I have some different opinions on some speech, I think the ratings should be abolished because it allows censorship itself on good legal comments and also promotes dictation of labels over any comment that is legal and good. Like Rakuen Growlithe said, replying to the comment is still there. And yes, that point is still an interesting point even if gets rated down 1/5.
The ratings system don't allow "equal expression" due to what it allows and that can be a problem toward legal good comments.
This goes for the way too maybe. Just because a comment is rated down, doesn't mean it's automatically bad to put in the comment. And I feel that you're dodging the topic again. Interesting legal points should not be censored and also should not be "dictated" to be bad.
Comment ratings aren't some mythical signifier of objective factuality, quality or legality(?). They're a form of sociality, akin to like...body language, in a way.
Diamond Man, say you work in an office and you lean over to the coworker in the nearest cubicle, get real close in her face, and with a grin, you inform her of the age of consent in whatever territory you're in. That's a perfectly factual, "legal point", so why is she leaning away from you and making a disgusted face?
Ratings force labels on other people promote censorship. Legally protected expression shall not be controlled by popular opinion by default.
You want to express disgust as long as it's legal so bad? You can reply to it.
Ratings do nothing but with little to no expression, allows censorship, and dictates that a comment is "poor" or "not" which can still be debatable, which is not fair to good legally protected comments.
You're like avoiding the argument likely. Comment ratings are not like "showing an expression" with a face, ratings here are usually designed as a judgement here, and worst, promote censorship to good comments for people who are offended. Even if it was an expression, it's likely unfair to the person who showed a good point..
Your comparison stinks. You're defending something that allows censorship and and something that likely forces opinions down the original commenters throat and that is not always good.
No matter what popular opinion thinks on Flayrah, "poor" or "high" ratings do not change the quality of the comment. Nor does it automatically make behavior "bad" or "good".
If many people say "My legally protected opinion sucks", then I have a right to say they are wrong.
If I say "That's not how the law works, and give out a link to the statute proving my point." and it gets rated one star by 100 out of 100 people. Does that make my comment shit? Nope? Does that make my behavior bad? Nope. Nothing changes, and all what really happened is that my freedom of expression is stifled. It's mainly a flawed system, and I'm glad not every website follows this horrible system.
I'm not expecting it to change, and it this might not be a distress to me since there are way better websites out there that doesn't follow it. They are more respectful to legal protected speech.. Flayrah is not supportive to open debate.
You really surprised me with your response. Not only that, you also went out of the way to explain too. Thank you for that.
I like the open atmosphere to write and express yourself, and I agree with what you implied, it comes with a responsibility. It is good to be able speak up without feeling barred. There was a forum I used to frequent to but became sporadic because the moderators were often tyrannical and censored people often—the site had too many rules about what you can or cannot say. There also have been many articles I've enjoyed reading at various websites but I usually never comment on them due to the account requirement wall. Basically, there are the advantages to such system.
I used to be an insane forum junky back in the day and I think I could count on one hand the forums that weren't already like that when I joined... And then those all eventually went that route, if they lasted long enough. I started to seriously entertain the notion that the only reason these things existed was for a handful of relatively lacking, powerless people to try to create the perfect family/circle of friends they always felt like the world owed them. And I don't think a damned one of them ever learned why they can't seem to have what they want and demand of others. And then, there's the rest of us, for whom it's so glaringly obvious that we struggle to articulate it, not unlike knowing exactly why the apple falls from the tree despite not being able to explain a damn thing about Newtonian physics.
Personally I don’t care, I receive Flayrah posts via RSS feed and only see comments when I open movie reviews or what not in browser.
From what I’ve seen most sites that require an account such as any major news sites are trying to prevent bot comments. One of the tech sites I follow, pcper.com, restricted comments to registered users last year due to troll comments. The restriction cut down on troll comments, but it also cut down on site visits and as a byproduct cut down on ad revenue so they rolled back on comment restrictions. Anyone who intends on making a troll, advertising, or inflammatory remark anonymously doesn’t have much barrier as anyone can make a throwaway email and account.
Making comments only available to registered users does cut down on “crap” comments but it also creates a barrier to regular folk wishing to make a comment on a niche site.
Hey, just chiming in to say even though I probably wouldn't bother making an account to comment, it'd be worth me not being able to comment here to stop some people from shitting up every discussion. Mainly DiamondMan lately but there's been others less recently. I couldn't help but read that DA journal about his one-man crusade against Flayrah with the stupid little badge like anyone on DA gives a fuck about Flayrah if they even know it exists. People need to go the fuck to Twitter or some place. That's where all your online bullshit was supposed to go when it was invented and it's why sites in general started doing away with things like comments sections.
I'm starting to understand, accept, and even agree with what the internet has turned into as far as being a mostly one-sided, top-down model where users have little to no means of interacting with each other or the authors and would be perfectly okay with Flayrah getting with the times. The truth is, I feel dirty using some sites, and a lot of the time it's not even the site's fault as much as the other users. When someone calls that site a cult, and you've actually been in a cult, this is that kind of "triggered" the media and a lot of self-styled SJWs don't anticipate and in a lot of cases don't even understand. It makes you not want to use the site, even though there's nothing all that wrong with the site AND YOU KNOW THAT.
So requiring accounts will lead to even less interactivity than there already is, which itself might lead to there just being no comments in practice (I notice nowadays even on relatively well-known, mainstream news sites that still allow comments, those sections sit barren more often than not), and I for one am PERFECTLY HAPPY with that possibility. I'm not overly cynical or pessimistic, because for the longest time I HATED the direction "Web 2.0" was taking us in, but it became harder and harder to maintain my bitterness towards the emerging reality the more I reflected on the old reality; that we had about 2 decades to collectively tell the internet what we had to say, and we pissed the entirety of it away on stupidity. So now, the internet and the companies that create it, rightfully are no longer interested in what we have to say.
THAT BEING SAID, a lot of people who would normally be commenting, should probably be writing or creating content themselves for the amount of effort and thought they put into it.
Hey, just chiming in to say even though I probably wouldn't bother making an account to comment, it'd be worth me not being able to comment here to stop some people from shitting up every discussion. Mainly DiamondMan lately but there's been others less recently. I couldn't help but read that DA journal about his one-man crusade against Flayrah with the stupid little badge like anyone on DA gives a fuck about Flayrah if they even know it exists. People need to go the fuck to Twitter or some place. That's where all your online bullshit was supposed to go when it was invented and it's why sites in general started doing away with things like comments sections.
And the drama now exist here, because of you, Wolf-Bone (visitor) posting what I'm block quoting..
And just because you're so offended by certain debates I've made doesn't mean it's "shitting" up a place.
And yes, this website is more of a cult. So far, the "conspiracy theory" that this is overrun by a lot of emotional assholes causing abuse is still strong likely.
You have no idea what a cult is. Because you've never been in one and lived to tell about it. I'm not personally responsible for the drama that transpires from your own posts. The drama results largely from your extremely warped excuse for logic, and it's reflected here in your insistence that any loosely knit, sporadically (and freely) associating people who happen to agree on a point you don't like must constitute a cult. If you knew anything about real cults, you'd know they're generally not nearly as concerned with keeping people like you out as current members in the dark. But the kinds of shit you can rationalize, like pedophilia, THAT is something cults are VERY good at when they "succeed" at being cults.
Did it ever occur to you that maybe a big part of the reason you piss people off is because you're like a living reminder of shit they've been through that they struggle every day to move on from? Because you're reminding me of some things and Jesus Christ, if you only knew how lucky you are to be separated from me by geography, anonymity, and cable lines...
I intend this reply to be a reply to Wolf-Bone (visitor) and to Sonious
Wolf-Bone (visitor), you have mentioned me talking mainly crap toward me. I think it's fair to say that you're creating drama here.
I don't think Flayrah is a cult very literally, but in large popular sense, it kinda is.
In some cases, being rational on pedophile alone isn't a cult, it's mainly being rational on a topic that is likely emotional toward those who are more on the leaning side toward emotion. Being overly emotional on the topic and suggesting disgusting things by wishing for more legal death penalty for example sounds more of a cult. Not that I'm accusing, just an example.
If being rational alone is a cult, then being smart alone is a cult.
Rationality can sometimes piss assholes off. I do not care about victim's feelings desiring revenge, and/or desiring to dictate where human beings can legally go. Being a victim is no excuse to abuse, and saying this isn't victim blaming. Therefor, my "pissing off" is no more different than pissing those off who hate furry legal sex. Also, being a pedophile does not equal to offending.
Rationality is not needed to respect feelings by default I think.
@Sonious
This is just a poll for whether comments need an account. Despite what I said on the literal thing in the other part.
I don't know why I'm bothering but whatever, here goes, again...
The Drama was already there, bud. The only reason I involve myself is because, duh, I kinda have a personal investment in things I've been personally affected by or have been close with people who have. When you use a platform like a public comments section as a sort of pulpit for extremely controversial opinions, that's likely going to create drama. The question is, is it worth it? To you, it clearly is, as would be expected if it's an issue that important to you. You brought the drama, so if you're right, CONVINCE US it's WORTHY drama; the proverbial hill that's worth dying on. Look, I've created drama of my own on other forums in the past over issues that were personal and important to me, that others couldn't give a rat's ass about if their lives depended on it. I'm adopted, for example, and my experiences and research have given me some pretty controversial opinions that defy the narrative. And I'm not alone in those views, but damn if practically the entire forum isn't against me in those moments, trying to tell me I am alone. But mainly the reason I think I'm justified in my grievances a hell of a lot more than you is because in my case, I'm not about denying adults their rights, just protecting the rights of children as well as the adults those children will become later in life through their experiences, whereas people like you care more about the "right" of people with a serious problem to fulfill their needs at the expense of children, who will become adults irreparably damaged through their experiences.
Your claims of rationality are laughable. But I'm starting to wonder if your problem doesn't partly stem from a problem with language. So, here's a question that's both honest and relevant to the subject that might help answer that: Do you think that to rationalize an idea and to approach that idea rationally are indeed the same thing? I sincerely want to know what you think about that because that could actually say a lot about where you're coming from if I or anyone else is misreading you.
If you think I'm entirely unsympathetic to pedophiles, you'd be quite wrong. I've been well aware for a long time that there's people who claim to be pedophiles who never have and never would bring any actual harm to a child. And I believe at least some of them are probably telling the truth. For whatever the morality of the day or the conventional wisdom might say, it is indeed a sexual orientation as inseparable from that person's being as attraction to one's own gender is to homosexuality. And throughout history homosexuals have struggled to conform to society's ideas of normality, to the point they can not only marry someone of the opposite sex, but spawn and bear their children, which by all rights ought to be impossible (I'll never understand how one can orgasm for someone they're not even attracted to, but obviously, it happens). Of course, there's plenty of cases where a homosexual will essentially settle for abstinence. It seems at least a bit fallacious to assume there's something inherently different about pedophilia here. The problem is, that's where the similarities end. The critical difference is a matter of rights and consent.
I've lived in places where known pedophiles of some kind have lived. Just never at the same time as them. Because a group of well-intentioned but utterly irrational people wanted to be "compassionate". Oh, I've had them CRASH WITH US without me or the other tenants A) knowing they had charges and B) having the resulting ability to make an informed choice in the matter. And that too was out of "compassion". Of course, we found out, and our compassion suddenly vanished. Because this is also a place youth often frequent. What do you think might've happened if a teenager had been around when this guy was lurking about the place? Oh, right, we found out. He GRABBED AND FONDLED ONE. A 17 year old girl.
No go right the fuck ahead and try this argument on me again...
I did not bring the drama. Choosing to be offended, and reacting crap toward me is a choice, thus, in this case, especially since this is a place where no drama was happening at all, you've caused it here. Nobody was fighting until you brought my username, and talked shit toward me.
I do not care if what I said is considered "controversial" to you, nothing changes.
I don't know what you mean.
An example of rationalizing pedophile is probably realizing it's not the same as offending alone, and that we should not mad at someone just because the person is a pedophile alone.
An example of irrational thought of pedophile is probably thinking it's the same thing, and acting as if all pedophiles offend.
I think an example of rationalizing pedophile is opposing the idea by default that look at all pedophiles as "monsters", including those who did offend but changed (though I'm not expecting you to see the same on the change part, but that's my argument) and then comparing them to those who never do change. I also think that a criminal offense makes no difference likely in terms of risk due to mental issues. Another example is believing that crime should fit the punishment.
I also think that child sexual abuse has happened outside of pedophile too.
I'm not sure what you mean on the paragraph mentioning the 17 year old. Though I don't think it's pedophile to be attractive to a 17 year old, I think that would be another name. Plus it's very likely many 19 year olds would be attractive to 17 year old to 25 year olds.
If you do not want to see a stranger like that around you in your own house, I respect that likely. I wouldn't agree it's "the right choice", but I won't say "it's the wrong choice" either. Is it irrational? Maybe, but I think I was mainly focused on something more general.
But if the person's offense was with a 17 year old, I honestly offer my argument that it doesn't feel different than a non-violent offense with a 18 year old in the idea that the offense was non-violent. I think molesting a child that is much younger is way worse however.
"Movie critics don't know what they're talking about unless they agree with me!!!"
"You're all horrible people for condemning pedophiles, but I'm still going to somehow use them as the standard for how bad a person can be so I can say you're all WORSE than pedophiles!!!!"
"Being a misanthrope is perfectly healthy and I can't wait until the day when human life is destroyed by solar flares!!!"
"I DO NOT START DRAMA OR BRING DRAMA WITH ME!!!"
#1
Whenever I usually debate, I try to follow what makes sense. If something is claimed to be a "flaw", we need to know what actually is a flaw. If "critique" (note that might be a different definition) is subjective, then why do we have it then?
#2
If you want a pedophile to suffer for life, then you're worse than those who want to molest children.
Why? Because "to suffer for life" justifies my claim. Two wrongs don't make a right.
#3
Trying to be part of a group that has many flaws, and likely not accept you is harmful. Being a misanthropic seems to offer more happy energy, and isn't a choice to be a misanthropic (or whatever the correct term is if it's not misanthropic?) in this state because I naturally lead to one due to the thing worse than cancer.
#4
I don't start drama most of the time. That name with "wolf" in it in this one did and so did you (assuming you're a different person). I did not say anything in this group toward any individuals. The same goes for assholes reacting like crap to me because of the fact that Toast shouldn't get a ridiculous punishment. Same for merely believing in morality by believing that all humans are human beings and are all equality important to live a legal happy life.
Just because you're offended by me existing and/or some of my comments doesn't mean I'm "starting" drama.
Also, it's hilarious that you claim I "start" drama, yet you comment here starting shit with me. And no, me replying to you isn't "starting it".
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of the argument.===
"===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of the argument.==="
No, it doesn't change the quality of the argument; it REFLECTS the quality of the argument. lol
Wanting all of humanity to die "seems to offer more happy energy"? Yes, CLEARLY you're the authority on morality.
No it doesn't? When someone maybe like you rate my comment one star because you're butthurt, it just means a butthurt idiot is mad, and wants to rate my comment one star likely. The value of my points do not change automatically because of low ratings.
I think it's between the "being part of main society" and "end of the world" that makes me happy. I'm also for the idea that everyone turn into light bodies and reach some heaven. It just so happens that I'm open with space ending Earth likely, but that doesn't mean it's morally "right". I never said it was morally right.
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of this argument.===
And naturally the idiot who has repeated ad nauseam about how wrong it is for people to 1-star him is handing out 1-stars HIMSELF at every opportunity. lmao
I likely don't have any part of that stamp. Especially since it might be outdated.
The only thing I believe in on this topic is that "butthurt" is no auto win and/or lose.
I likely one star when a comment is an attack and/or is very wrong. But if such rating system was abolished, I likely won't care. I hope they have a report button though.
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of this argument.===
Yes, never mind how you do NOTHING to hide that you're wwwwarea or vice-a-versa. What REALLY proves that you didn't write that bullcrap is how "it might be outdated."
Others have suggested this before, and it will never not bear repeating; GET A PROOFREADER.
"A 1-star rating doesn't reflect the quality of a comment."
"I 1-star when a comment is very wrong."
You're TRYING to be this stupid, aren't you?
It doesn't matter if all this time I was "wwwwarea". I'm just saying.
I'm not even saying I'm perfect, but out of assumption that you try to pretend that I "lost" because of a slight off hypocritical mistake you claim, doesn't prove anything else. It just means, if true, that I was hypocritical at that, and in that theory I go like "OK, what now?" because that's really what it likely leads to in such theory.
This goes back to that agenda I theorize maybe: "Call out old mistakes I've done but don't do anymore as an "excuse" to go against me."
Note: Probably more too.
I think I'm trying to say that the ratings do not change the quality of the content. If your comment is by itself poor, it's poor. If I rate a poor comment poor, it would be more of a match. If I rate a poor comment five stars, it wouldn't be right.
Every legal website needs a report button with enough to report anything illegal. If someone said something illegal, it needs to be reported to the police, and removed completely.
Yes, horrible, illegal comments like "Alpha & Omega is a terrible movie for the following reasons..." or "Pedophiles must live with the consequences of their actions" MUST be reported!
I wouldn't report someone just by making a legally protected review I do not like.
But I would likely remove comments on the second quote. It's hate speech, and it's a speech for revenge, and therefor I might consider that something that is hate speech* and something that encourages violence.
*This has nothing to do with orientation. Making a human person suffer is just another form of hate speech.
To be perfectly serious, Diamond Man, we're still a small enough site that GR or mwalimu or the editors can still be counted on to notice if something really bad is going on in the comments and take care of it without an actual "report" button (and there are enough users who have means to contact them if we really think something bad is happening and they've missed it). If we had an actual report button, it would mostly just spam the few people in charge when someone got upset over something.
Also, you probably should actually take all those one-star ratings on your comments personally, to be honest (please remember, I don't think I have ever rated one of your comments one-star), but also realize it's not actually that big a deal. It just happens, especially since people who want to annoy you know it does. Personally, if the ratings effect me at all, it's less I try to avoid one stars than try to accumulate five stars; if I "strike out" on one stars occasionally, well, I was swinging for the "five star" fences, at least.
Maybe just try to have a little more fun, I guess.
I think a report button can also help discover abuse and remove it.
A lot of websites have such a thing. The risk of "spam" might happen but I'll rather take it. Also I think we need an actual solid legal policy. Not having a clear legal policy and leaving where a bunch of rules are invisible instead isn't really a healthy way of having a website.
Maybe I just don't like having forced labels on my comments. Ratings can cause some issues, like for example, if a good YouTube video had most dislikes, it might discourage people to see it just because of the ratings. Kinda like Rotten Tomatoes, it cause a lot of people who would have liked a legal movie to not see it.
And of course, the ratings system here censors comments.
I'm thinking of making a poll for the pure purpose of research. It would be called "Should comments be deleted if it's controversial?" with a "Yes" and "No", and you can probably easily guess where I got part of the idea from. I won't vote because that would probably damage my research. Not sure if I will even bother with it though.
As far as the poll goes, I mean, whatever, it's content, and polls aren't updated much around here as it is, but don't, like, actually think it means anything. I don't think there's a poll on this site that has enough votes to be considered statistically meaningful.
I keep trying to tell people this is supposed to be the "fun" sidebar item, and it's less because I'm trying not to take it seriously and because if you actually take statistical analysis seriously, our polls are in fact worse than useless. In a very real sense, you literally get no usable information from them. Ever.
I think the main reason why I wanted to try a poll was because of what this poll is about, and that it has over 80 votes, which is kinda surprising to me. I don't depend on "polls" as a confirmation. I've had my trouble with "furry polls" when it comes to "what the furry fandom is", especially when we sometimes act as if "less popular" = "non-existence". I really hate the two words "furry science" and "polls" being together like that partly because not everyone uses a poll likely.
Though, if I do make a poll and it gets 80 or more votes, it could be interesting research as something likely substantial. Though I would try to give out some possibilities (e.g. "Note: I do not know who is behind the polls, and there might even be two of the same person behind each vote.").
First, Why would you respond to such a comment? It is a anon comment clearly trying to stir drama. Seconded, why the f would you leave this comment, it is in poor taste for the community to a troll comment.
I never cared much for the comments on this site as I didn't see them but this single post illuminated the fact that this site is not worth following. IDK if you are a mod or the owner but this kind of reply was never appropriate.
Here's a small little bit about a book which might be relevant for this and other discussions on Flayrah. I haven't read the book myself yet but it sounds interesting and will almost definitely give a more authoritative and nuanced approach than you will find on social media. https://www.synapses.co.za/the-tyranny-of-opinion-russell-blackford/
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
Hey Rakuen, interesting title, perhaps you should read it and tell us about it. Maybe it'll convince us to read it too. Even so, while I understand that requiring accounts could reduce improper rating based on opinion, I feel it does little to help the actual problem some people are discussing about here. The main issue is when you talk about controversial topics, you will get opinionated feedback.
Comments
While some may point to recent behaviors as the reason I am asking, this question comes from a decade of experience on this website.
More often than not, while anons are effected by comments just as much as anyone else, there are psychological factors that needs to be consided:
1) Anonymity causes confusion of identity:
a) Even if someone create a count exclusively to comment on a particular story it will be easier for those interacting with said 'throw away' account to know when that same account is responding.
2) Anonymous accounts tend to be spammers (in the literal sense, people trying to sell things and not ideas).
3) If someone is passionate enough to provide information on a subject manner they can go through the account making process as it is not too difficult/inconvenient.
These things have always been an issue, and I believe while there are work around such as making multiple accounts, such behavior would be more reality viewable by the user engaged with that user by viewing the profile.
Interesting poll! But there's only one vote that matters.
Maybe, but rating comments definitely should.
Yes. While I know many news sites have removed comments entirely, I do believe they can provide a valuable function and often provide an opportunity to expand and add new information on a story. Although I think there can be value to anonymous commenting, certainly my experience here is that fully anonymous comments are not so useful. Personally, I have tried for the last several months to no longer reply to comments by people who are not logged in and I would be happy to see Flayrah move to a system of comments only by registered users for all the reasons identified by Sonious.
Furthermore, I would suggest restricting (or, ideally, removing) voting on stories and comments to only be available for registered users with at least 10 comments. It would only seem to make sense to implement such a change if comments will only be for registered users and the 10 comment minimum would just be a way to discourage the creation of many sock puppet accounts. While for many stories/comments this is not a major issue, it is especially important for more controversial discussions where the growing polarization of views, which is hardly restricted to only the furry fandom, makes productive discussion very difficult. The current system of voting by score is not only easily exploited and repeats the many issues with voting for content quality that have been discussed on other sites for years (e.g. SoFurry has had many discussions on the value of voting on submissions and what would be the best system) but votes can be used to suppress unpopular opinions.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I voted yes even though it would 'disenfranchise' me.
Vote for 3rd option. Make comments from anon accounts folded by default with a brown filter on them.
Because comments from people without accounts are poop I'm guessing?
A website that I help mod used to allow guest comments where users can post under an assumed name, without needing to register an account. But we eventually disabled it because of the large number of spam, troll, and impersonation comments that became a tad out of control. And I think Flayrah has reached that point.
As a person with a registered account (two, in fact!), I can say with absolute certainty that I have NEVER posted stupid shit in the comments.
...
...
please guys, no examples
Just using this post, or really just its rating to point out why this "collective harmony" and "community integration" or whatever buzzwords people throwing around nowadays are a bunch of horse shit. There's objectively no good reason to waste the time to even click a damn button for this post in the first place, and less reason still to downvote it to oblivion, unless you're just a dick with an axe to grind against the person and not that particular comment. So this folding and fading is just as illusory a reflection of quality as anything else.
At the end of the day content, whether it's an article, a video, or just a simple comment on one of those has to stand on its own merits, or just not stand. And if it truly sucks it probably won't.
Likely not.
But maybe some good moderation. On my blogger, I have an option to default hide comments and I would either approve them or not. There is also an option to default allow anonymous comments until certain days have passed. Added Edit: Actually any comments. Added Edit Done.
Some anonymous users can be useful. If account is required, then a lot of discouragement of good comments will render. Besides, a lot of anonymous people might just make a bunch of accounts, then it might be abandoned. Don't forget multiple accounts.
As for the ratings system. It's already likely abused by irrational people who can't handle a legal healthy debate. If we limit ratings off anonymous, which in some cases are not much different than those with accounts then might as well ditch the whole thing maybe.
Account abandoned and probably will make a new anonymous account with no trace of evidence of it being me. I think it's justified.
Dude what's your obsession with this word "legal"? I know that's not what that word means and I'm not even Spanish.
I think I use it to be safe. Example maybe: I would likely say "There is nothing wrong with legal sex.". If I didn't use "legal", it would be so broad that it might include illegal sex.
I personally hope it doesn't mean what I fear, but I usually use it these days just in case I think.
Maybe "sex" by definition doesn't have to include the type, but this becomes too blurry to me to see if it does or not.
Account abandoned and probably will make a new anonymous account with no trace of evidence of it being me. I think it's justified.
So just as a hypothetical, if there were a large denomination of an officially recognized religion in a country without much if any age of consent laws, and say this religion excommunicated you on different grounds than condoning pedophilia, would that then make them a Legal Cult?
I would suggest looking into Oath2 as a method of login. A website needing to login just to comment on a article post, like this, may not be worth remembering another password or having the site, and may add security concern having the site storing users passwords. But, logging in with Twitter, Google, or any other Oath2 supported service would help verify and identify users without a password.
Not perfect, but, just a suggestions.
I created my account because I wanted people to be able to trace me and to show commitment or accountability on my part.
However, I voted no because I feel it might discourage people—especially newcomers—from engaging. While I do understand Sonious' points, I suggest they can be resolved by fixing what is allowed and some site moderation. As some people mentioned here, we could limit special privileges to registered users such as the ability to rate or vote in places like this poll. Perhaps limit anonymous users from making a certain number of comments in a day to encourage active site users to create an account.
But overall, I'm finding myself leaning on the impartial side about this. A majority of sites I've been to require a login for commenting. The implied reasons for the requirement is obvious. For one, people need to be accountable for their actions.
Whatever happens, I'll support the decision.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this, and fair points.
I was thinking about polls like this. I do think it should be restricted to polls like this.
I can't really agree with the "accountable for their actions" that large though.
I for one mainly respect any right to privacy as the law allows a lot, and for the sake of avoiding identity for the safety of other people including but not limited to: avoiding bad discrimination, and avoiding other inexcusable things (e.g. harassment?).
I remember having to deal with some unnecessary by refusing to identify myself for the safety of my life. Since there wasn't any fair reason to drag me into trash I certainly do not want to deal with anymore. For example, a specific drama that I no longer want to be part of.
Of course if we're talking about the possibility of banning people for bad behavior, I think several websites has the power to ban people's IP, and in one case the law might catch those bypassing such ban anyway (I've heard something about this.). I do think account requirement is more useful but then again, I have a feeling it won't make much of a difference for a specific reason.
Well, to each their own. I already voted no, so worries there.
Also, with little technical knowledge, anyone can change their IP address at will, anytime. Banning IP addresses might not be an effective tool.
I'm aware of the IP avoiding possibility. That might be partly why I was then talking about the subject of certain law. Not sure if there is one but if so, then that would be good to me for those who still want to cause harmful behavior in any legal website.
Diamond Man, if it were illegal to be annoying online, we'd both be in prison right now.
(I think it should probably be pointed out that you guys are all taking the fun sidebar item seriously again; this poll will not only not effect anything about the comments on this site, the only guy who could actually do this has already commented in the thread with the equivalent of a dismissive "that's cute", so let's not get too excited.)
You're right, the decision to require accounts ultimately lie in his hands. But this site is supported by the community is it not? I just feel it would be respectful for him to at least listen to the community he has gained than dismiss it in an instant.
For a site like this, an account requirement might be unnecessary, but the benefits are still something to consider or be aware of.
I'm listening. I appreciate the feelings. I hope those who've used their freedom of expression to excess recently are also listening and understand that less can be more. That includes those who delight in personal insults to score cheap shots and elicit further angry responses - this is poor form, bad for the site, and I vote accordingly.
I also have to consider the site mission, its history, and how best to preserve the kind of vibrant debate it can foster, which is somewhat endangered elsewhere - in part because it is not treasured, and takes time to moderate, and in part because (within our community) many other large furry forums discourage critical comment, being run (and censored) by individuals or organizations that are either the topic of such criticism, or which does not wish to be seen as supporting it.
Free debate sometimes breaks out into chaotic flame wars - which, for those who remember, was no stranger to alt.fan.furry and the like - but they're relatively rare, and even our resident roo has at times expressed support. My main concern is for what would be lost.
I've seen plenty of good anonymous and account-free comments, and without an open comment form, I suspect many would not have taken the time. The average rating for anon comments is 2.95; below the global average of 3.32, but roughly equal to that of a cross fox or a patchwork rat (and there are many registered users who have attracted far lower averages over the years).
Because of this, I feel the poll kind of misses the point - there are issues with commenting due to a collection of behaviours which are not restricted to anonymous users, and for which registration and accountability does not always prove an effective deterrent. What it would help with the most is spam; but that has a relatively trivial impact, and we have several other mechanisms for dealing with it.
I'm also aware of the huge number of people who just read the article and skip the comments, such as changeofspace below. Not even because they're bad comments - just because they don't have the time. In a way this is not a bad thing (after all, we take more care over stories, and it means that for them all the sound and fury signifies nothing), but what might help engage these users if they do drop by is pulling out some of the better comments in the longer debate - showing off the system at its best, rather than at its worst.
To an extent comment fading and folding already does this (best appreciated after a few days... or years) but it's more intended to decrease visibility of content which doesn't contribute. I had an idea along those lines a while back - basically, a small block with one-line summaries of a few comments above the main list in proportion to the count and vote confidence. Such debates come along irregularly, though, so the utility - and hence my motivation to attempt to code it - has been minimal.
"To an extent comment fading and folding already does this (best appreciated after a few days... or years) but it's more intended to decrease visibility of content which doesn't contribute."
While that may be the intention, I'm not sure that it is the case in practice or, if it is, only for those users that do not engage in debates or anything controversial. That's problematic because then there is only discussion on topics where basically everyone is of one mind or when people use anon accounts. In the cases where there is a need for critical comment, which you say Flayrah is here for, the rating system actually discourages it.
Worse still is that, time and time again, we see that people do not even use voting systems in a way that evaluates quality but in a way that reflects their preferences. This is really clear on art sites like e621 and SoFurry where you can find very positively scored artwork that is technically deficient but contains content that people like and negatively scored artwork which is extremely well done but contains fetishes that most people do not like. The same thing happens on Flayrah where people do not vote on comments in isolation but also based on previous comments by the same person, so the idea that the votes reflect some sort of quality of comment is just not true.
I believe I've pointed it out before but that can also be very clearly seen for some users. If votes truly reflected the quality of comments then we would expect to see a normal distribution of comment scores. If someone makes good or bad comments that should be fairly consistent. That is sometimes true but not for all users. If you look at how my comments (as well as some others) are rated you can see a clear bimodal distribution.
5 stars: 47% (1743)
4 stars: 8% (291)
3 stars: 5% (173)
2 stars: 4% (147)
1 star: 36% (1339)
Either that means that sometimes I write comments which are amazing and well constructed and other times complete rubbish but never anything in between. That seems quite unlikely. The more plausible explanation is that the comments are not rated according to quality but according to who agrees with them. That is far more likely but not what you claim the comment rating is meant to reflect.
There seems to be clear evidence that the rating system is not working as intended, I'm not sure there is any real evidence where it is making a useful contribution and, due to the lack of voting on non-controversial articles and comments, I'm not sure it's ever likely to. So what is the point in keeping that system in place?
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I was thinking more "FA/AC/MFF forum might not be a great place to discuss related issue X, because they can hard-censor you, maybe ban you from the forum." In that case, you'd potentially have a lot of people agreeing, or at least being interested; but those in charge have a vested interest in not letting you saying it - so you can't.
You're talking about something different, where in some cases the majority of people simply don't agree with what you're saying. But I'd note that even in that case, you still get to say it. We're just saying you're wrong - and if you keep saying it, we'll discount everything else you say; some may outright ignore you. Just like real life.
In practice you do see a lot of approval voting; even so, you got 17% of voters to do something different. That's typical; I got 20%. The difference is that you write more rubbish comments (i.e. they repeat something you said that people still disagree with).
Of course, that's where karma comes in. Maybe you're an intelligent person who makes many good points on which most people can agree, most of the time. In this case, it gives you some latitude to take controversial positions from time to time. But if you're generally disagreeable, or never say anything good, it'll work against you; again, like real life. You're up ~0.26 on anon/new users.
I think you're trying to say there's an objective measure of quality, based on the construction of argument, and therefore if you're making well-reasoned, well-constructed arguments, you should be rated highly. But you're way off base. Quality is in the eye of the beholder. If they don't agree with your argument, they'll consider it to be a poor comment, or at best OK; certainly not great.
If essentially everyone disagrees with a comment, it's terrible and doesn't require further consideration except by the masochistic. That's what folding tries to do: eliminate suck. Non-controversial comments don't suck, or at least not enough to deserve folding. Even controversial ones tend not to fold - just fade, to represent the weakness of their support by the community.
"I think you're trying to say there's an objective measure of quality, based on the construction of argument, and therefore if you're making well-reasoned, well-constructed arguments, you should be rated highly."
Indeed, that is what it means for a comment to be a positive, high-quality comment. The structure of the argument is, overall, more important than the conclusion. A comment with a strong argument that comes to the wrong conclusion because of a lack of something unknown is a better comment then one that gets to the correct conclusion through a fallacy. That is because the first one can be followed and will improve if the evidence improves. The second comment is only right by chance but could just as easily be wrong. In the long term that is less reliable.
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. It is an objective measure. You could disagree about what should be measured for quality but it is not subjective. Like if a car has better fuel economy, breaks down less often and has a stronger engine, it is higher quality than a cheap, popular car that only lasts a year.
If you really want the comment rating to reflect how many people agree with a comment then perhaps stop using a 5 star system. That is something that implies quality but you explicitly state that you aren't interested in the quality of the comments but in how many people agree with them. Then you should rather switch to a thumbs up, thumbs down rating system. You'll still have a system which punishes deviation from the majority but at least it will honestly reflect that the rating measures agreement and not quality.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I've heard of the ends justify the means before, but this is the first time I've heard of the means justify the ends.
Sorry, the universe doesn't care how you reached that wrong answer, it's still wrong.
You seem to have completely misunderstood me there. I never said that a wrong answer wouldn't be wrong but that it's better to reach a wrong answer for the right reason than a right answer for the wrong reason. The only way that you can judge the conclusion and the measure of the reliability of the conclusion is the reasoning behind it.
For example, if someone said, "You are getting blood on the carpet so don't hit the dog with a golf club." You would agree that the conclusion that one should not hit the dog with a golf club is correct but the reasoning behind it is not good. The statement as a whole is bad regardless of the conclusion.
Similarly, let's assume someone said, "Because his fingerprints were found on the knife, that man is responsible for the murder." Let's say that the conclusion is wrong because the fingerprints were there for a different reason. Then the conclusion is bad but the reasoning and comment in general are good. Yes, it reaches an incorrect conclusion but because the reasons follow logically, if we find out that there was a problem with the fingerprints then the conclusion can be amended as the evidence changes. It is also makes it possible for someone identify how the argument is constructed and so to independently verify whether the conclusion is valid or not.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
That rather depends on how one feels about dogs, doesn't it? Your species bias is showing . . . ;-p
You can't assume everyone shares your values - and while I get that you were largely talking logic, in the kinds of debates we get into here there are a lot of conclusions that are only seen as "valid" if people share the same values with the same priorities to start with. Often people don't have issues with the logic, but the premises.
[I think this is what Sonious was getting at, but if not perhaps he can clarify.]
It's a conclusion I would imagine most, if not everyone, here would agree with. You're right of course in that more subjective conclusions are not only based on logic but value systems. But we're just talking in comments here, there's no need to go into all the detail. What would be good, is if people have an issue with the premises that a statement is built on then talk about the premises. That could be constructive. There's no constructive value to arguing about conclusions that are based on different premises without addressing the premises. Incidentally, that is something which is impossible with the star rating system.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
I was gonna elaborate on a different point, about how people need to stop talking about Web 1.0 era forums like they're a viable alternative to anything or even still "a thing" in any meaningful sense. But there was something that always disturbed me about those and even though I don't really have a problem with ratings system and the like in general, this OBSESSION with "the community" and its illusory collective opinion is at the heart of why it's disturbing. Do you guys not realize it actually CREATES more conflict than it resolves? Now, it's a MASSIVE leap for someone like you-know-who to say that makes it a cult, but to be honest, it IS just slightly "cultish".
"Oh, I'm glad people see this post as only roughly 65% translucent, just like I do!" WHO GIVES A SHIT?!
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. Like critique (maybe), certain arguments are not subjective. If I say the "Earth is round" in a place of debate and many people rated my comment down because they believed the "Earth is flat", that would be abusive to the rating system.
You can actually argue that quality is more objective and that personal feelings are by default not part of it unless it matches something objective sometimes.
And I think it would be completely unfair to the idea of "quality" and "criticism" to completely down rate a perfectly drawn legal art for what it is just because it's a legal "fetish" thing a lot of people don't like.
If quality was subjective, then "critique" was likely never important and was instead a fancy label to consider someone's preference "superior" to everyone else. It might even be worse if we're talking about basic objective arguments such as the earth shape debate.
But a lot of people do consider "critique" and certain debate important. Which in that case, we need to be fair as possible or else it turns to the leaning side of useless.
The idea that it's fair to have a comment be censored from default view because of the majority is terrible too. Same with dictating that a comment "sucks" just because the majority cannot handle it by default: The idea that "popular opinion = good and/or right" is a fallacy. Of course some popular opinion can by default be correct, but that's not because it's popular.
This might be why I'm for ditching the star ratings including the folding. Another thing if another, Legal "Controversial" opinions should not be censored because a lot of people can't handle it with their emotion.
Account abandoned and probably will make a new anonymous account with no trace of evidence of it being me. I think it's justified.
I for one am strongly for ditching the ratings system. I'm sick of good points be censored and/or claimed as "poor" by triggered emotional idiots who likely can't win an argument and/or because they hate me. At this point, it's justified rating some of my comments five stars to avoid CENSORSHIP.
And yes, it's still censorship even if you can still "click" on the comment to see because it's still censored from default view.
And I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees this rating system as flawed.
And BTW, my comment does not "suck" automatically just because my comments get "1-stared" by one or more people.
________
REPOSTED
Quality is not in the eye of the beholder. Like critique (maybe), certain arguments are not subjective. If I say the "Earth is round" in a place of debate and many people rated my comment down because they believed the "Earth is flat", that would be abusive to the rating system.
You can actually argue that quality is more objective and that personal feelings are by default not part of it unless it matches something objective sometimes.
And I think it would be completely unfair to the idea of "quality" and "criticism" to completely down rate a perfectly drawn legal art for what it is just because it's a legal "fetish" thing a lot of people don't like.
If quality was subjective, then "critique" was likely never important and was instead a fancy label to consider someone's preference "superior" to everyone else. It might even be worse if we're talking about basic objective arguments such as the earth shape debate.
But a lot of people do consider "critique" and certain debate important. Which in that case, we need to be fair as possible or else it turns to the leaning side of useless.
The idea that it's fair to have a comment be censored from default view because of the majority is terrible too. Same with dictating that a comment "sucks" just because the majority cannot handle it by default: The idea that "popular opinion = good and/or right" is a fallacy. Of course some popular opinion can by default be correct, but that's not because it's popular.
This might be why I'm for ditching the star ratings including the folding. Another thing if another, Legal "Controversial" opinions should not be censored because a lot of people can't handle it with their emotion.
This vote really has nothing to do with the 'karma system' nor its implementation, so bringing this up as a discussion is a bit off topic.
But I will say this on it. Just seems ironic for someone who stumped for freedom of expression wishes to remove a tool that users use to express themselves.
And it's also ironic that one who is against the binary polarization of political speech wants us to follow probably the single most harmful implementation taken by large Silicon Valley organizations that allowed us to fall into a more binary expression trap with the like/dislike buttons. Which has trained us that we can either thumbs up, thumbs down, or not vote.
I remember when Youtube had the star system, and I still like it better than the like/dislike system.
(The real reason that Youtube did this, by the way, isn't because they found the system more about people feelings. It's more that it's harder to train an A.I. if people are providing middle of the road answers about the quality of the content they are watching, therefore make the decision binary so the computer can more tailor its recommendations based on the more black/white input. AKA, programmer laziness.)
Removing anonymous comments does not prevent users from expressing themselves. I do not think I have ever advocated the need for fully anonymous commenting systems but am happy with pseudonymous commenting.
I also don't want you to follow thumbs up and thumbs down as an implementation. I said the entire ranking system for comments should be removed entirely.
It would be nice if you read what I write and not what you would like me to have written. In your last two comments, everything you have claimed I said, I did not say. It might actually be interesting to know why you thought that I said those things.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
So present your argument that the star ranking system is not a form of user expression.
Indeed it is a form of expression, however there is nothing to the star rating system that can not be expressed by replying to the comments. So there is no loss in user's ability to express themselves on this website. By requiring a reply, a user would have to articulate an opinion rather than just make a potentially mindless click which adds almost no information. Furthermore, a star rating by itself does not tell one why the comment was rated in a specific way so it does not provide any real guidance or opportunity for growth.
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
Not so sure about the 'karma system' thing. I need to know a bit about it if slang.
Saying that ratings, including one star ratings which promote censorship to be a form of "expression" is like saying the act of censorship is a form of "expression".
It also dictates labels over other people's speech.
For the sake of comments, it would be equally fair of any legally allowed comments can be the thing any user can do maybe without ratings. Ratings like this over people's comments provides other people's opinions over other people's opinion which damages equal expression in many cases, especially when the effect of rating literally forces the other people's expression to be folded.. I think this is bad for many legally protected speech comments.
So censoring someone's call for censorship is not censorship?
But seriously, Flayrah is not a branch of the United States government, so it's allowed to legally fold comments. Just as Facebook is allowed to remove comments, which is an arguably harder censor that impacts far more people.
Censoring an act of censorship is more of a fair thing for the sake of not having censorship. Only censorship is fine is if it's blocking out illegal stuff.
You can't believe in non-censorship alone and censorship alone at the same time. If you allow something that alone promotes censorship, then you're allowing censorship.
I'm not saying folding comments violates rights, but when I speak "censorship", I mean the main definition of it. The focus here is that it's disrespectful to the practice of free speech to censor any legally protected speech even if it legally can. If Flayrah actually supports censorship to any legally protected speech in favor of other people's personal feelings, then Flayrah is very disrespectful to free speech, and open legal debate.
The main last part of your paragraph avoids the main problem and probably renders a "Censorship is fine here because Facebook can do it." style of comment. Didn't you show that you respect freedom of expression anyway? Why avoid that argument with the last part of your comment?
Also here's one definintion of censorship:
https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/censorship
So you're saying that those who wish for censorship should be blocked from being read, heard, or seen?
While I have some different opinions on some speech, I think the ratings should be abolished because it allows censorship itself on good legal comments and also promotes dictation of labels over any comment that is legal and good. Like Rakuen Growlithe said, replying to the comment is still there. And yes, that point is still an interesting point even if gets rated down 1/5.
The ratings system don't allow "equal expression" due to what it allows and that can be a problem toward legal good comments.
Maybe it's not that the arguments are not "not good" but the way in which the arguments are being made are "not good".
Remember what the Swing Kids say: ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it.
This goes for the way too maybe. Just because a comment is rated down, doesn't mean it's automatically bad to put in the comment. And I feel that you're dodging the topic again. Interesting legal points should not be censored and also should not be "dictated" to be bad.
Automatically bad or good. For a legal comment.*
Comment ratings aren't some mythical signifier of objective factuality, quality or legality(?). They're a form of sociality, akin to like...body language, in a way.
Diamond Man, say you work in an office and you lean over to the coworker in the nearest cubicle, get real close in her face, and with a grin, you inform her of the age of consent in whatever territory you're in. That's a perfectly factual, "legal point", so why is she leaning away from you and making a disgusted face?
Ratings are like that.
Ratings force labels on other people promote censorship. Legally protected expression shall not be controlled by popular opinion by default.
You want to express disgust as long as it's legal so bad? You can reply to it.
Ratings do nothing but with little to no expression, allows censorship, and dictates that a comment is "poor" or "not" which can still be debatable, which is not fair to good legally protected comments.
You're like avoiding the argument likely. Comment ratings are not like "showing an expression" with a face, ratings here are usually designed as a judgement here, and worst, promote censorship to good comments for people who are offended. Even if it was an expression, it's likely unfair to the person who showed a good point..
Your comparison stinks. You're defending something that allows censorship and and something that likely forces opinions down the original commenters throat and that is not always good.
No matter what popular opinion thinks on Flayrah, "poor" or "high" ratings do not change the quality of the comment. Nor does it automatically make behavior "bad" or "good".
If many people say "My legally protected opinion sucks", then I have a right to say they are wrong.
If I say "That's not how the law works, and give out a link to the statute proving my point." and it gets rated one star by 100 out of 100 people. Does that make my comment shit? Nope? Does that make my behavior bad? Nope. Nothing changes, and all what really happened is that my freedom of expression is stifled. It's mainly a flawed system, and I'm glad not every website follows this horrible system.
I'm not expecting it to change, and it this might not be a distress to me since there are way better websites out there that doesn't follow it. They are more respectful to legal protected speech.. Flayrah is not supportive to open debate.
open legal debate I meant.*
You really surprised me with your response. Not only that, you also went out of the way to explain too. Thank you for that.
I like the open atmosphere to write and express yourself, and I agree with what you implied, it comes with a responsibility. It is good to be able speak up without feeling barred. There was a forum I used to frequent to but became sporadic because the moderators were often tyrannical and censored people often—the site had too many rules about what you can or cannot say. There also have been many articles I've enjoyed reading at various websites but I usually never comment on them due to the account requirement wall. Basically, there are the advantages to such system.
I used to be an insane forum junky back in the day and I think I could count on one hand the forums that weren't already like that when I joined... And then those all eventually went that route, if they lasted long enough. I started to seriously entertain the notion that the only reason these things existed was for a handful of relatively lacking, powerless people to try to create the perfect family/circle of friends they always felt like the world owed them. And I don't think a damned one of them ever learned why they can't seem to have what they want and demand of others. And then, there's the rest of us, for whom it's so glaringly obvious that we struggle to articulate it, not unlike knowing exactly why the apple falls from the tree despite not being able to explain a damn thing about Newtonian physics.
Personally I don’t care, I receive Flayrah posts via RSS feed and only see comments when I open movie reviews or what not in browser.
From what I’ve seen most sites that require an account such as any major news sites are trying to prevent bot comments. One of the tech sites I follow, pcper.com, restricted comments to registered users last year due to troll comments. The restriction cut down on troll comments, but it also cut down on site visits and as a byproduct cut down on ad revenue so they rolled back on comment restrictions. Anyone who intends on making a troll, advertising, or inflammatory remark anonymously doesn’t have much barrier as anyone can make a throwaway email and account.
Legitimate Comment
Making comments only available to registered users does cut down on “crap” comments but it also creates a barrier to regular folk wishing to make a comment on a niche site.
Should comments require an account? I say no.
Hey, just chiming in to say even though I probably wouldn't bother making an account to comment, it'd be worth me not being able to comment here to stop some people from shitting up every discussion. Mainly DiamondMan lately but there's been others less recently. I couldn't help but read that DA journal about his one-man crusade against Flayrah with the stupid little badge like anyone on DA gives a fuck about Flayrah if they even know it exists. People need to go the fuck to Twitter or some place. That's where all your online bullshit was supposed to go when it was invented and it's why sites in general started doing away with things like comments sections.
I'm starting to understand, accept, and even agree with what the internet has turned into as far as being a mostly one-sided, top-down model where users have little to no means of interacting with each other or the authors and would be perfectly okay with Flayrah getting with the times. The truth is, I feel dirty using some sites, and a lot of the time it's not even the site's fault as much as the other users. When someone calls that site a cult, and you've actually been in a cult, this is that kind of "triggered" the media and a lot of self-styled SJWs don't anticipate and in a lot of cases don't even understand. It makes you not want to use the site, even though there's nothing all that wrong with the site AND YOU KNOW THAT.
So requiring accounts will lead to even less interactivity than there already is, which itself might lead to there just being no comments in practice (I notice nowadays even on relatively well-known, mainstream news sites that still allow comments, those sections sit barren more often than not), and I for one am PERFECTLY HAPPY with that possibility. I'm not overly cynical or pessimistic, because for the longest time I HATED the direction "Web 2.0" was taking us in, but it became harder and harder to maintain my bitterness towards the emerging reality the more I reflected on the old reality; that we had about 2 decades to collectively tell the internet what we had to say, and we pissed the entirety of it away on stupidity. So now, the internet and the companies that create it, rightfully are no longer interested in what we have to say.
THAT BEING SAID, a lot of people who would normally be commenting, should probably be writing or creating content themselves for the amount of effort and thought they put into it.
And the drama now exist here, because of you, Wolf-Bone (visitor) posting what I'm block quoting..
And just because you're so offended by certain debates I've made doesn't mean it's "shitting" up a place.
And yes, this website is more of a cult. So far, the "conspiracy theory" that this is overrun by a lot of emotional assholes causing abuse is still strong likely.
You have no idea what a cult is. Because you've never been in one and lived to tell about it. I'm not personally responsible for the drama that transpires from your own posts. The drama results largely from your extremely warped excuse for logic, and it's reflected here in your insistence that any loosely knit, sporadically (and freely) associating people who happen to agree on a point you don't like must constitute a cult. If you knew anything about real cults, you'd know they're generally not nearly as concerned with keeping people like you out as current members in the dark. But the kinds of shit you can rationalize, like pedophilia, THAT is something cults are VERY good at when they "succeed" at being cults.
Did it ever occur to you that maybe a big part of the reason you piss people off is because you're like a living reminder of shit they've been through that they struggle every day to move on from? Because you're reminding me of some things and Jesus Christ, if you only knew how lucky you are to be separated from me by geography, anonymity, and cable lines...
I intend this reply to be a reply to Wolf-Bone (visitor) and to Sonious
Wolf-Bone (visitor), you have mentioned me talking mainly crap toward me. I think it's fair to say that you're creating drama here.
I don't think Flayrah is a cult very literally, but in large popular sense, it kinda is.
In some cases, being rational on pedophile alone isn't a cult, it's mainly being rational on a topic that is likely emotional toward those who are more on the leaning side toward emotion. Being overly emotional on the topic and suggesting disgusting things by wishing for more legal death penalty for example sounds more of a cult. Not that I'm accusing, just an example.
If being rational alone is a cult, then being smart alone is a cult.
Rationality can sometimes piss assholes off. I do not care about victim's feelings desiring revenge, and/or desiring to dictate where human beings can legally go. Being a victim is no excuse to abuse, and saying this isn't victim blaming. Therefor, my "pissing off" is no more different than pissing those off who hate furry legal sex. Also, being a pedophile does not equal to offending.
Rationality is not needed to respect feelings by default I think.
@Sonious
This is just a poll for whether comments need an account. Despite what I said on the literal thing in the other part.
I don't know why I'm bothering but whatever, here goes, again...
The Drama was already there, bud. The only reason I involve myself is because, duh, I kinda have a personal investment in things I've been personally affected by or have been close with people who have. When you use a platform like a public comments section as a sort of pulpit for extremely controversial opinions, that's likely going to create drama. The question is, is it worth it? To you, it clearly is, as would be expected if it's an issue that important to you. You brought the drama, so if you're right, CONVINCE US it's WORTHY drama; the proverbial hill that's worth dying on. Look, I've created drama of my own on other forums in the past over issues that were personal and important to me, that others couldn't give a rat's ass about if their lives depended on it. I'm adopted, for example, and my experiences and research have given me some pretty controversial opinions that defy the narrative. And I'm not alone in those views, but damn if practically the entire forum isn't against me in those moments, trying to tell me I am alone. But mainly the reason I think I'm justified in my grievances a hell of a lot more than you is because in my case, I'm not about denying adults their rights, just protecting the rights of children as well as the adults those children will become later in life through their experiences, whereas people like you care more about the "right" of people with a serious problem to fulfill their needs at the expense of children, who will become adults irreparably damaged through their experiences.
Your claims of rationality are laughable. But I'm starting to wonder if your problem doesn't partly stem from a problem with language. So, here's a question that's both honest and relevant to the subject that might help answer that: Do you think that to rationalize an idea and to approach that idea rationally are indeed the same thing? I sincerely want to know what you think about that because that could actually say a lot about where you're coming from if I or anyone else is misreading you.
If you think I'm entirely unsympathetic to pedophiles, you'd be quite wrong. I've been well aware for a long time that there's people who claim to be pedophiles who never have and never would bring any actual harm to a child. And I believe at least some of them are probably telling the truth. For whatever the morality of the day or the conventional wisdom might say, it is indeed a sexual orientation as inseparable from that person's being as attraction to one's own gender is to homosexuality. And throughout history homosexuals have struggled to conform to society's ideas of normality, to the point they can not only marry someone of the opposite sex, but spawn and bear their children, which by all rights ought to be impossible (I'll never understand how one can orgasm for someone they're not even attracted to, but obviously, it happens). Of course, there's plenty of cases where a homosexual will essentially settle for abstinence. It seems at least a bit fallacious to assume there's something inherently different about pedophilia here. The problem is, that's where the similarities end. The critical difference is a matter of rights and consent.
I've lived in places where known pedophiles of some kind have lived. Just never at the same time as them. Because a group of well-intentioned but utterly irrational people wanted to be "compassionate". Oh, I've had them CRASH WITH US without me or the other tenants A) knowing they had charges and B) having the resulting ability to make an informed choice in the matter. And that too was out of "compassion". Of course, we found out, and our compassion suddenly vanished. Because this is also a place youth often frequent. What do you think might've happened if a teenager had been around when this guy was lurking about the place? Oh, right, we found out. He GRABBED AND FONDLED ONE. A 17 year old girl.
No go right the fuck ahead and try this argument on me again...
I did not bring the drama. Choosing to be offended, and reacting crap toward me is a choice, thus, in this case, especially since this is a place where no drama was happening at all, you've caused it here. Nobody was fighting until you brought my username, and talked shit toward me.
I do not care if what I said is considered "controversial" to you, nothing changes.
I don't know what you mean.
An example of rationalizing pedophile is probably realizing it's not the same as offending alone, and that we should not mad at someone just because the person is a pedophile alone.
An example of irrational thought of pedophile is probably thinking it's the same thing, and acting as if all pedophiles offend.
I think an example of rationalizing pedophile is opposing the idea by default that look at all pedophiles as "monsters", including those who did offend but changed (though I'm not expecting you to see the same on the change part, but that's my argument) and then comparing them to those who never do change. I also think that a criminal offense makes no difference likely in terms of risk due to mental issues. Another example is believing that crime should fit the punishment.
I also think that child sexual abuse has happened outside of pedophile too.
I'm not sure what you mean on the paragraph mentioning the 17 year old. Though I don't think it's pedophile to be attractive to a 17 year old, I think that would be another name. Plus it's very likely many 19 year olds would be attractive to 17 year old to 25 year olds.
If you do not want to see a stranger like that around you in your own house, I respect that likely. I wouldn't agree it's "the right choice", but I won't say "it's the wrong choice" either. Is it irrational? Maybe, but I think I was mainly focused on something more general.
But if the person's offense was with a 17 year old, I honestly offer my argument that it doesn't feel different than a non-violent offense with a 18 year old in the idea that the offense was non-violent. I think molesting a child that is much younger is way worse however.
"Movie critics don't know what they're talking about unless they agree with me!!!"
"You're all horrible people for condemning pedophiles, but I'm still going to somehow use them as the standard for how bad a person can be so I can say you're all WORSE than pedophiles!!!!"
"Being a misanthrope is perfectly healthy and I can't wait until the day when human life is destroyed by solar flares!!!"
"I DO NOT START DRAMA OR BRING DRAMA WITH ME!!!"
lmao
#1
Whenever I usually debate, I try to follow what makes sense. If something is claimed to be a "flaw", we need to know what actually is a flaw. If "critique" (note that might be a different definition) is subjective, then why do we have it then?
#2
If you want a pedophile to suffer for life, then you're worse than those who want to molest children.
Why? Because "to suffer for life" justifies my claim. Two wrongs don't make a right.
#3
Trying to be part of a group that has many flaws, and likely not accept you is harmful. Being a misanthropic seems to offer more happy energy, and isn't a choice to be a misanthropic (or whatever the correct term is if it's not misanthropic?) in this state because I naturally lead to one due to the thing worse than cancer.
#4
I don't start drama most of the time. That name with "wolf" in it in this one did and so did you (assuming you're a different person). I did not say anything in this group toward any individuals. The same goes for assholes reacting like crap to me because of the fact that Toast shouldn't get a ridiculous punishment. Same for merely believing in morality by believing that all humans are human beings and are all equality important to live a legal happy life.
Just because you're offended by me existing and/or some of my comments doesn't mean I'm "starting" drama.
Also, it's hilarious that you claim I "start" drama, yet you comment here starting shit with me. And no, me replying to you isn't "starting it".
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of the argument.===
Of this argument.*
"===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of the argument.==="
No, it doesn't change the quality of the argument; it REFLECTS the quality of the argument. lol
Wanting all of humanity to die "seems to offer more happy energy"? Yes, CLEARLY you're the authority on morality.
No it doesn't? When someone maybe like you rate my comment one star because you're butthurt, it just means a butthurt idiot is mad, and wants to rate my comment one star likely. The value of my points do not change automatically because of low ratings.
I think it's between the "being part of main society" and "end of the world" that makes me happy. I'm also for the idea that everyone turn into light bodies and reach some heaven. It just so happens that I'm open with space ending Earth likely, but that doesn't mean it's morally "right". I never said it was morally right.
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of this argument.===
Omfg... really? XD
https://www.deviantart.com/wwwarea/art/A-Stupid-Term-498727968
And naturally the idiot who has repeated ad nauseam about how wrong it is for people to 1-star him is handing out 1-stars HIMSELF at every opportunity. lmao
I likely don't have any part of that stamp. Especially since it might be outdated.
The only thing I believe in on this topic is that "butthurt" is no auto win and/or lose.
I likely one star when a comment is an attack and/or is very wrong. But if such rating system was abolished, I likely won't care. I hope they have a report button though.
===Rating this comment one star does not automatically change the quality of this argument.===
Yes, never mind how you do NOTHING to hide that you're wwwwarea or vice-a-versa. What REALLY proves that you didn't write that bullcrap is how "it might be outdated."
Others have suggested this before, and it will never not bear repeating; GET A PROOFREADER.
"A 1-star rating doesn't reflect the quality of a comment."
"I 1-star when a comment is very wrong."
You're TRYING to be this stupid, aren't you?
It doesn't matter if all this time I was "wwwwarea". I'm just saying.
I'm not even saying I'm perfect, but out of assumption that you try to pretend that I "lost" because of a slight off hypocritical mistake you claim, doesn't prove anything else. It just means, if true, that I was hypocritical at that, and in that theory I go like "OK, what now?" because that's really what it likely leads to in such theory.
This goes back to that agenda I theorize maybe: "Call out old mistakes I've done but don't do anymore as an "excuse" to go against me."
Note: Probably more too.
I think I'm trying to say that the ratings do not change the quality of the content. If your comment is by itself poor, it's poor. If I rate a poor comment poor, it would be more of a match. If I rate a poor comment five stars, it wouldn't be right.
Note to Green Reaper: Let's not get a report button.
Every legal website needs a report button with enough to report anything illegal. If someone said something illegal, it needs to be reported to the police, and removed completely.
Yes, horrible, illegal comments like "Alpha & Omega is a terrible movie for the following reasons..." or "Pedophiles must live with the consequences of their actions" MUST be reported!
I wouldn't report someone just by making a legally protected review I do not like.
But I would likely remove comments on the second quote. It's hate speech, and it's a speech for revenge, and therefor I might consider that something that is hate speech* and something that encourages violence.
*This has nothing to do with orientation. Making a human person suffer is just another form of hate speech.
To be perfectly serious, Diamond Man, we're still a small enough site that GR or mwalimu or the editors can still be counted on to notice if something really bad is going on in the comments and take care of it without an actual "report" button (and there are enough users who have means to contact them if we really think something bad is happening and they've missed it). If we had an actual report button, it would mostly just spam the few people in charge when someone got upset over something.
Also, you probably should actually take all those one-star ratings on your comments personally, to be honest (please remember, I don't think I have ever rated one of your comments one-star), but also realize it's not actually that big a deal. It just happens, especially since people who want to annoy you know it does. Personally, if the ratings effect me at all, it's less I try to avoid one stars than try to accumulate five stars; if I "strike out" on one stars occasionally, well, I was swinging for the "five star" fences, at least.
Maybe just try to have a little more fun, I guess.
I think a report button can also help discover abuse and remove it.
A lot of websites have such a thing. The risk of "spam" might happen but I'll rather take it. Also I think we need an actual solid legal policy. Not having a clear legal policy and leaving where a bunch of rules are invisible instead isn't really a healthy way of having a website.
Maybe I just don't like having forced labels on my comments. Ratings can cause some issues, like for example, if a good YouTube video had most dislikes, it might discourage people to see it just because of the ratings. Kinda like Rotten Tomatoes, it cause a lot of people who would have liked a legal movie to not see it.
And of course, the ratings system here censors comments.
I'm thinking of making a poll for the pure purpose of research. It would be called "Should comments be deleted if it's controversial?" with a "Yes" and "No", and you can probably easily guess where I got part of the idea from. I won't vote because that would probably damage my research. Not sure if I will even bother with it though.
As far as the poll goes, I mean, whatever, it's content, and polls aren't updated much around here as it is, but don't, like, actually think it means anything. I don't think there's a poll on this site that has enough votes to be considered statistically meaningful.
I keep trying to tell people this is supposed to be the "fun" sidebar item, and it's less because I'm trying not to take it seriously and because if you actually take statistical analysis seriously, our polls are in fact worse than useless. In a very real sense, you literally get no usable information from them. Ever.
I think the main reason why I wanted to try a poll was because of what this poll is about, and that it has over 80 votes, which is kinda surprising to me. I don't depend on "polls" as a confirmation. I've had my trouble with "furry polls" when it comes to "what the furry fandom is", especially when we sometimes act as if "less popular" = "non-existence". I really hate the two words "furry science" and "polls" being together like that partly because not everyone uses a poll likely.
Though, if I do make a poll and it gets 80 or more votes, it could be interesting research as something likely substantial. Though I would try to give out some possibilities (e.g. "Note: I do not know who is behind the polls, and there might even be two of the same person behind each vote.").
Making an accusation of Flayrah being a hive minded cult under a poll that is split 50/50 is pure DiamondMan.
Uh, Wolf-Bone, honey, you do know Diamond Man has an account, right?
Because he does.
So, uh, making account-only comments would do exactly jack shit all about Diamond Man.
Thanks for riling him up again after he had just about calmed down on his own, though. Really appreciate it.
Oh, I guess I forgot because he seems to mostly use (Not Logged In). And I ain't your honey either, biatch :3
Fun fact: He actually ripped that off me from when I used to post not logged in from my cell phone.
Flayrah. The chan board of furry news sites.
Aw, now I kinda wish it were more like an imageboard.
I mean, yes? I was thinking of Lulz earlier. We don't have as many pictures, though, which is probably too boring for anon.
I would at least hope if it were one, it would be one before Putin stuck the Kremlin's dick in it and it squealed like a doe in heat.
First, Why would you respond to such a comment? It is a anon comment clearly trying to stir drama. Seconded, why the f would you leave this comment, it is in poor taste for the community to a troll comment.
I never cared much for the comments on this site as I didn't see them but this single post illuminated the fact that this site is not worth following. IDK if you are a mod or the owner but this kind of reply was never appropriate.
Just saying, chan boards are pretty easy to politically manipulate.
https://www.reddit.com/r/RussiaLago/comments/875jsx/some_insight_into_the_russia...
I think he's more upset you made an apparent rape joke, there Sonious.
Not really, /4/chan seems to be quite consenting of it.
Pretty much
Here's a small little bit about a book which might be relevant for this and other discussions on Flayrah. I haven't read the book myself yet but it sounds interesting and will almost definitely give a more authoritative and nuanced approach than you will find on social media.
https://www.synapses.co.za/the-tyranny-of-opinion-russell-blackford/
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~
Maybe you can tell us all about its nuance after you've read it? Not much of a glowing review otherwise
Hey Rakuen, interesting title, perhaps you should read it and tell us about it. Maybe it'll convince us to read it too. Even so, while I understand that requiring accounts could reduce improper rating based on opinion, I feel it does little to help the actual problem some people are discussing about here. The main issue is when you talk about controversial topics, you will get opinionated feedback.
You really need to be featured on godhatesfurries.com
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