GateWorld's Vision Statement .Suggestions welcome

[ShadowMaat]

Negativity isn't being outlawed, you simply have to justify your reasons for being negative because anything less than a fully positive statement is "hurtful" to other fans, TPTB, and all the wonderful people who make the show possible.

Positive statements, no matter how... unhelpful are not at issue because they're POSITIVE and thus promote a sense of peace and camaraderie amongst all who bask in its shallow warmth.

This isn't about making things "fair." That much has been made abundantly clear.

[FallenAngelII]

What about if people only ever say that they hate hate hate, and elaborate plenty? Would you think someone a troll if they never ever praised the show at all but dissed it with reasons? What do you suppose that such a person might be doing in the forum? If that is legitimate, what is so much worse about the person (who you define as a troll) who is equally negative but less wordy?I'm interested.

Because people who come to fan forums only to post short negative attention-seeking posts are obvious trolls.

Those you describe aren't obvious trolls. Some might be, some might not be.

I, for instance, rarely walk into an episode just to say "I loved the way X did Y this episode". Why? Because by the time I will have watched the episode, at least 50 people will already have said it. I feel no need to spam the thread up with more of the same things.

And there's no discussion to generate from that, either. "I loved X." "Oh I did too!" "Yay!".

So I go for more analytical posts and threads. And often-times, those threads and posts are "negative". Why create a thread to say "I loved how the wormhole physics were handled this episode. They are spot on!"? What's the point of such a thread.

"They handled the science all wrong this episode. That's not how wormhole physics work!" allows for more discussion.

"Oh, it so does! Have you read X or Y? And if you think of it this way, it works out." - "Oh, but you see, if you look at Z and factor in B12, I95 fails." - "Oh I see...".

At least this kind of negativity generates and opens up for discussion and debate. Simply stating "I hated this." over and over again without elaboration is just trolling. The other way is debating/discussing.

But if the new rules require me to actually express positive views once in a while in order to not get banned, I will gladly do it. I still like a lot of the things about the show. One can assume that if I don't criticize something, then I had no problems with it or liked it.

However, if I do it this, I want the right to, once in a while, go "This episode was just so bad." or something without elaboration without getting moderated, if "This episode was just so good!" without elaboration is allowed.

[Madeleine]

Then the question becomes:
Since when does being a fan mean you must love everything about the show and not criticize?

I think you've missed my posts to Laura. No one ever said that you 'must love everything about the show and not criticize'.

I instead choose to inject some balance into it by posting about the less perfect parts of the show.

Don't try to balance the forum. That way lies madness. Just keep yourself balanced.

If everyone else is posting exactly what they think for goods or bad, but you are posting only the bad stuff because you worry that there are too many people liking the show, then you are the one unbalancing the place!

If you like stuff, why should you keep from saying so just because other people liked it? If you never ever ever post anything positive, then when you post your brimming negative posts, everyone'll think "oh, FAII never likes anything, no point in engaging with that discussion" and they'll certainly never understand you.

[FallenAngelII]

Gasp! The mods don't all have the exact same opinions! You mean Denise does worship Daniel Jackson as a diety and that I do see Sam and Jack in lurve 4eva?!

My point was just that you replied to a post I was directing at another mod, one who was not in agreement with us (you and I). You and I agree, yay. Then we can fight together for our common vision.

There are many who do not share our vision feel that negativity should be limited because it "hurts people and GW".

[Reefgirl]

Blimey possibly longest post ever!

You're lucky I only read the first couple of pages

As long as they're not going to just bash, make negative personal comments, or simply attack other posters, I would hope.

As long as everyone on both sides gets the same treatment when being dealt with

Yes, this is an issue, and is one of the reasons behind the whole Vision statement thing. Personally I feel this is something that needs to be talked about as well.

But it does stop short of actually saying this kind of intimidation will not be tolerated

welll what about it? This is a discussion thread on the way we'd like GW to go in the future. Personally I say we get rid of the reds. What do you think?

I say get rid of it too, the red rep system is grossly abused by both sides of the debate, is there a limit to the amount of red points you can give like there is when giving positive points?

I think that the negativity has been a noticeable problem that simply has to be addressed. But that doesn't mean that belittling and personal attacks by anyone is being ignored. We need to build a forum where it doesn't matter what kind of fan you are, your viewpoint is respected even if it isn't agreed with. What do you think? What would you suggest to promote that?

As has been pointed out Negativity and disappointment are entirly different. If someone dives into a thread and posts "SGA sucks" "Stargate is Rubbish" "The acting Sucks, the writing sucks, the show runners suck" "You should get out more" then yes that's negetivity bordering on trolling. But if someone says "That wasn't exactly the best episode of the series" "Is it me or has the writing standard gone downhill" "SGA isn't as good as it used to be" do their posts deserve to be treated the in the same way as someone who is just out to cause trouble. The so called 'Antis' are not out to make trouble (The majority of us anyway, there maybe one or two who are out to cause trouble) we are fans of the show that are disappointed with the way the show has gone and the general quality of the last 2 or 3 series, in their opinion anyway, we have a right to express disappointment without being 'Jackbooted' all over and told "If you don't like the show, you have no place here" or have the feeling you're are being overly policed.

What would you suggest to promote that?

I think having the Complaints and Misgivings thread worked ok, if you are going to have a 'Complaints' thread for the future it needs a bigger premis than just 'Series whatever', a general complaints thread where all complaints can be regestered, also, please can there be a little give and take, topic drift and Off topic is like S**t, it happens, if there is no blatent breaking of the house rules let the topic drift a little, stop ruling with a rod of iron, use your nouse when dealing with something, come down hard when it's warrented otherwise just let the folks have their fun, as long as it's within the house rules.

That is up to you - it is up to you to be the sort of poster you want other posters to be (ie respectful of other points of view, willing to tolerate opinions that you disagree with - that is, disagreeing with opinions, but not in an 'that opinion shouldn't exist' kind of way).

Right

Well that's what this is all about. We don't want intolerance anymore! We want a way of combating intolerance! This thread is your chance to help us do that.

That will be the day Satan ski's to work

People will always be intolerent of people who don't see the world the way they think it should be seen,

[FallenAngelII]

Don't try to balance the forum. That way lies madness. Just keep yourself balanced.

If everyone else is posting exactly what they think for goods or bad, but you are posting only the bad stuff because you worry that there are too many people liking the show, then you are the one unbalancing the place!

If you like stuff, why should you keep from saying so just because other people liked it? If you never ever ever post anything positive, then when you post your brimming negative posts, everyone'll think "oh, FAII never likes anything, no point in engaging with that discussion" and they'll certainly never understand you.

What I meant by that is that I do not feel like posting the same things 1 jillion people have already posted before. Especially not if it's not going to open up for discussion. I feel no need to post "I hated/I loved this episode." (I still want that option open, though).

Which is why I don't wander into the overly spammy episode discussion threads to expound on what I liked and didn't like. I instead bring up "issues" that the episodes opened up.

If people don't feel like engaging me in discussion/debate just because they have this skewed view of me as being someone overly negative, no matter how valid the issues I bring up may be, then I say "Meh, like I care".

If the issues I bring up and the discussions I keep are valid, relevant and important, why does it matter if I'm a "Negative Nancy" or not? Engage me in debate if you want to, don't if you don't.

Why must I "balance" myself in order to appease others' need for positivity? Why must I post things I don't feel like posting just so people won't get the wrong impression of me? I mean, it'd probably be a good thing for me to do, if I felt like it, but I shouldn't have to.

[GateGipsy]

But if the new rules require me to actually express positive views once in a while in order to not get banned, I will gladly do it. I still like a lot of the things about the show. One can assume that if I don't criticize something, then I had no problems with it or liked it.

However, if I do it this, I want the right to, once in a while, go "This episode was just so bad." or something without elaboration without getting moderated, if "This episode was just so good!" without elaboration is allowed.

I'm curious about something. What you're saying is that you tend to post when you're not happy, but not when you are happy. That if you had no problems with something or liked it, you wouldn't post this?

Do a lot of people do this? It would explain a lot I guess. It is something that has never occured to me. I post here because I love and am passionate about Stargate, and I want to talk about the good stuff as much as the bad stuff. In fact, I want to talk about the good stuff a lot more than I want to talk about the bad stuff. It never occured to me that people would be the other way around.

[Madeleine]

Of course, if you only wish to instate a limit on "Worst episode evar" (and alternate spellings and wordings for it) specifically, then I'd be OK with it if the limit was pretty high and not 5 or something.

Could you perhaps try to focus on the spirit of the thing and not on the minutae?

We've never rationed particular sorts of comments, nor will we.

We want the SGU forum to be a friendly place for FANS of the show. Not a 'balanced' place for a measured amount of negativity to match the positivity; we would rather that fans post their own actual opinions about the show rather than reading to see which opinions predominate and then posting the opposite. (I define 'fans' as people who watch for enjoyment.)

We will not be inviting people who hate the show before it's aired to joint in. Or people who want it to fail.

Does that sound rational to you?

[ShadowMaat]

As long as everyone on both sides gets the same treatment when being dealt with

From what I gather, this isn't strictly true. The people with negative viewpoints will get a closer scrutiny than those who post glowing comments. Nastiness and personal attacks will be curtailed regardless of which "side" they're on, yes, but proponents won't be required to justify themselves and will not be punished for making "overly positive" comments (which some would say is impossible, anyway) or posting unhelpful things like "this ep rocked!!11" without explaining why.

Apparently there are a lot of sensitive people out there who can't tolerate hearing nothing more than "this ep sucked." Although frankly I should think that folks who are THAT sensitive would be MORE upset to hear someone say "This ep sucked because of A, B, and C" since there'd be twice as much negativity in a post like that.

[TameFarrar]

That is saying that it's perfectly fine to not elaborate with "positive" posts (what if no one asks you to elaborate? You then have absolutely no obligation to elaborate), yet if it's a "negative" post, then elaboration is required and that the mods will step in and ask you to elaborate.

Sometimes, people don't feel like elaborating. If they're expressing their "negative opinion" respectfully, why must they elaborate when the people on the opposite end of the spectrum do not?

Why should "I hated this episode a lot" (which is only saying that the poster personally disliked the episode) require elaboration and moderation when "I loved everything there was about the episode!" does not? Why not leave the cries for elaboration in the hands of the users in both cases instead of saying "Hey, if you're posting a negative impression like that, maybe the mods will step in and interpret it as against the rules".


But what if I word it respectfully?

"In my opinion, this episode was one of the worst this season."

.

We already answered this or I thought so.....
Darren said he had no problem with a member stating .........."I really didn't like this episode and I have no idea why"
and thats it...no further elaboration........It really is all about stating your opinion respectfully and not just making random negative statements for the sake of making negative comments.

The thing is that you guys (the mods) do not seem to be in agreement about this. A few of them have expressed a support for moderating posts that just say "I disliked/hated this episode.", no matter how respectfully worded, while letting "I loved this episode" slide with no problems.

Your vision for the Vision Statement is just fine, IMO. I could get behind that. However, I cannot get behind the idea that "I hated this." requires more moderation than "I loved it.", a notion that many moderators seem to support.

I think you are misinterpreting different posting styles and such as different POVs...this is not the case.... all of us Moderators are on the same page with this and are trying to answer many different questions and points of questions.

some of our answers are being pulled from other posts and being used in other questions from what I am reading and this can be somewhat confusing...however none of us are differing on the overall Vision statement and the mission behind it

Edit: reading back...i think you may have been meaning something specific and I was answering this in a more general way or answering this for something you may not have even intended.

[Reefgirl]

From what I gather, this isn't strictly true. The people with negative viewpoints will get a closer scrutiny than those who post glowing comments. Nastiness and personal attacks will be curtailed regardless of which "side" they're on, yes, but proponents won't be required to justify themselves and will not be punished for making "overly positive" comments (which some would say is impossible, anyway) or posting unhelpful things like "this ep rocked!!11" without explaining why.

Apparently there are a lot of sensitive people out there who can't tolerate hearing nothing more than "this ep sucked." Although frankly I should think that folks who are THAT sensitive would be MORE upset to hear someone say "This ep sucked because of A, B, and C" since there'd be twice as much negativity in a post like that.

Let's face it, GW is going to be no place for anyone who is disappointed with any element of the show, we are the Smokers of GW, the lepers, the illigitimate child that is acknowledged but never spoken of in polite society.

[ShadowMaat]

Darren said he had no problem with a member stating .........."I really didn't like this episode and I have no idea why"
and thats it...no further elaboration........It really is all about stating your opinion respectfully and not just making random negative statements for the sake of making negative comments.

But even that is technically justified since the person is at least admitting that they don't know why they hated something.

[FallenAngelII]

We already answered this or I thought so.....
Darren said he had no problem with a member stating .........."I really didn't like this episode and I have no idea why"
and thats it...no further elaboration........It really is all about stating your opinion respectfully and not just making random negative statements for the sake of making negative comments.

The two posts I've seen quoting him seem to paint the picture that this isn't the case, that you would need elaboration for such a post. Madeleine_W and possibly others mods seem to think so, too, which is just confusing.

Is it just their personal opinions or are they trying to enter it into the Vision Statement? Does the Vision Statement say (not in so many words) "It's ok not to elaborate on your negative views, as long as they're stated respectfully" and while some moderators seem to disagree with this and argue against it, this has no bearing on what the mission statement says and what will be acceptable?

Will I be allowed to just say "I really hated this episode." (or is "hate" a disrespectful word?) once in a while without elaboration as long as I usually elaborate?

Could you perhaps try to focus on the spirit of the thing and not on the minutae?

We've never rationed particular sorts of comments, nor will we.

You were the one who suggested you might wish to employ such a limit. If this was in jest, just say so. But don't act like I was the one who came up with the idea.

We want the SGU forum to be a friendly place for FANS of the show. Not a 'balanced' place for a measured amount of negativity to match the positivity; we would rather that fans post their own actual opinions about the show rather than reading to see which opinions predominate and then posting the opposite. (I define 'fans' as people who watch for enjoyment.)

I'm not requesting a place with a "balance" of positivity and negativity. I'm asking for a forum where all kinds of fans can express their opinions and views, whatever they might be, as long as they are expressed respectfully.

You seem to not actually be reading my posts, neither all of them nor in their entirety. You got hung up on the word "balance" and are now just inventing things you think I said.

I elaborated on what I meant with "balance". It has nothing to do with what you just talked about. I might have expressed myself clumsily to start out with, but I did elaborate on it in later posts. I suggest you go read them for a clearer picture of what I meant.

We will not be inviting people who hate the show before it's aired to joint in. Or people who want it to fail.

This has nothing to do with what I'm arguing. I have specifically stated that I do not, in any way, support that kind of behavior and that what I'm arguing has nothing to do with "those" people.

[TameFarrar]

From what I gather, this isn't strictly true. The people with negative viewpoints will get a closer scrutiny than those who post glowing comments. Nastiness and personal attacks will be curtailed regardless of which "side" they're on, yes, but proponents won't be required to justify themselves and will not be punished for making "overly positive" comments (which some would say is impossible, anyway) or posting unhelpful things like "this ep rocked!!11" without explaining why.

Apparently there are a lot of sensitive people out there who can't tolerate hearing nothing more than "this ep sucked." Although frankly I should think that folks who are THAT sensitive would be MORE upset to hear someone say "This ep sucked because of A, B, and C" since there'd be twice as much negativity in a post like that.

actually people with *extreme views* from either viewpoint and show no tolerance for either view point will get scrutiny as they have in the past.

Intolerance is intolerance regardless of your like or dislike of anything.

The fact that we are asking folks to elaborate a bit more past *this show sucks* isn't a bad thing nor should it be viewed as such when you place in context with the direction we would like to see the Forum as a whole take.

Asking the community to help make the Forum a more positive environment with more well-rounded discussions isn't a bad thing either.

What folks are having an issue here with is that we have laid out some things that we are planning to do in order to help things along in that general direction. If you have other suggestions we truly do want to hear them. We understand that this is new and it is somewhat baffling and it can be unnerving and even angering.

So if you have other solutions please share them we really want to hear other options.

[TameFarrar]

The two posts I've seen quoting him seem to paint the picture that this isn't the case, that you would need elaboration for such a post. Madeleine_W and possibly others mods seem to think so, too, which is just confusing.

Is it just their personal opinions or are they trying to enter it into the Vision Statement? Does the Vision Statement say (not in so many words) "It's ok not to elaborate on your negative views, as long as they're stated respectfully" and while some moderators seem to disagree with this and argue against it, this has no bearing on what the mission statement says and what will be acceptable?

Will I be allowed to just say "I really hated this episode." (or is "hate" a disrespectful word?) once in a while without elaboration as long as I usually elaborate?


You were the one who suggested you might wish to employ such a limit. If this was in jest, just say so. But don't act like I was the one who came up with the idea.


I'm not requesting a place with a "balance" of positivity and negativity. I'm asking for a forum where all kinds of fans can express their opinions and views, whatever they might be, as long as they are expressed respectfully.

You seem to not actually be reading my posts, neither all of them nor in their entirety. You got hung up on the word "balance" and are now just inventing things you think I said.

I elaborated on what I meant with "balance". It has nothing to do with what you just talked about.


This has nothing to do with what I'm arguing. I have specifically stated that I do not, in any way, support that kind of behavior and that what I'm arguing has nothing to do with "those" people.

here is the post Darren made that statement in

I thought it was in Gipsy's signature

That would depend on whether you understand the term "criticism" to mean negative comments or evaluation, as the term is commonly used, or the dictionary definition, which is more neutral (more like we might use the word "critique").

Do you have an example in mind?

I'd say that we should be OK with all forms of criticism, positive and negative. If a post is well-reasoned and respectful, no one should need to give it a "Positive / Negative" litmus test. There shouldn't be a need to start classifying posts (or members) as positive or negative.

One thing I do want to make clear: We're not banning negativity. It's OK to say, "I didn't really like that, and I'm not sure I can tell you why." Just be respectful of your fellow members, and the people who made the episode. Everyone has opinions and tastes, and part of our community life is to share those with each other. Just don't fight with someone who holds a different opinion.