I noticed earlier that a thread was locked with the justification of, "Well as discussion of banned users is not permitted I'm going to go ahead and close this one."

I looked over the rules and saw none that could be applied for this. Or have banned NAM users become now like "Fight Club" insofar and you can't even talk about them without getting a thread locked?

link to thread

link to site guidelines

 

From the site guidelines you linked to (#10)...
Does that clear things up?

 

But it was a discussion about the person, not about him being banned. Yes, they mentioned that he was banned but didn't discuss why he was banned. All it says was

 

My .02. It was a discussion about ones behaviour and general road etiquette. It was taken down because it involved a banned member.
The discussion was about an event, not the person or the politics behind his banning. Reasons for his ban weren't even brought up.
Were misinterpreting written rules here to facilitate thread closings.
Again, just my ignorant .02

 

"off with his head!"

 

It was discussion of a banned user, illegal driving and included personal attacks. All three of which are not allowed.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.com/guidelines

 

Not really, no. What is "discussion of banning?" Is it referring to person that has been banned for whatever reason (which apparently it is...), does it include someone saying "man, this guy should be banned, or even a post that contains the letters "b", "a", and "n" in sequence preceded and followed by spaces? The wording of the rule is very nebulous and makes knowing exactly what it's trying to say difficult to discern.




If the thread was deleted for these three reasons, why were they not stated? The illegal driving and personal attacks are specifically mentioned in the site guidelines vice the vague "people we shall not speak of" guideline.

In addition, the illegal driving mentioned in the OP wasn't of the "hey, I got my car up to 130 mph on the highway, how fast have you gone?" kind, it was a "hey listen to what I saw this d-bag do" kind. And looking through the "OT: Autos" section of the site you can find hundreds of posts of this type going back since the creation of this site that have not been banned/locked/ or had the posters peepee smacked. There's simply no consistency.

And don't think I've got any kind of love for Autoxcooper either, he's well known across the MINI community as being an unsavory person. I probably would have given him the trailer hitch too.

 

The word by itself is generally not considered a discussion.

And if you read the site guidelines that you linked to then you should have noticed under the Discipline section the following wording....
Which means that the moderators will evaluate the individual situation and interpret the guidelines accordingly.

First the thread was not deleted, it was locked.

Second, I did not feel the need, unlike others here, to keep beating a dead horse, and if you go back over the years you'll find many unproductive threads, that were closed for just that and not including violations of multiple guidelines.

 

Yeah I did; it seem vaguely worded to the point where, to the outside observer, it looks like the mods can lock threads/delete posts on a whim, which I'd like to think isn't happening.
Whoops sorry, I accidentally said deleted; I mentioned in the OP it was locked. I'm not talking about "unproductive" threads that got locked for no legitimate reason, I'm talking about threads that have content that violate the site guideline that you specifically mentioned as a reason for locking the thread that are still active.

If the mod-hammer is being brandished as aggressively and frequently as it has been in the past couple of years, at least let it be consistently too. You owe it to the members of this board and especially to the paying members of this board.

 

There are 5 active moderators for a membership of over 80k. Do the math - it's impossible for moderation to cover all ground. The intention is for NAM to be largely self-moderated by the membership, which means helping new members understand the lay of the land, the rules of the site, and reporting things that are out-of-bounds.

If you see something that is out-of-bounds that isn't being addressed, then it is far more helpful for you to report it using the button located at the top right of the post, than to bicker about it here. It is simply impossible for the moderation team to lay eyes on every single post made every single day.

 

If these are active threads, then you should use the button to report them. As not doing so is a disservice to the entire the NAM membership.

One such post today, I got a response from a user that they hadn't even read the guidelines yet when they got a warning. And the thread that is lock that you linked to, I did PM the OP and explain why it was locked.

Education and reminders are hardly what I'd call "the mod-hammer is being brandished as aggressively and frequently" And it's not that the moderators are locking threads on a whim, the thread that you're so displeased about getting locked was reported twice within 5 minutes and a third time as it was being locked; so it being found was by no means an accident nor coincidence, and as the guideline above stated the situation was evaluated and the thread locked, and the primary reason given; no need to berate people as to why it was closed, and after sending a PM to the OP I did not even feel it was worth giving an infraction. How aggressive of me.

 

The OP and I finished our discussion via PM, and got our points across to each other in an amicable and respectful manner.

I also felt the thread should not have been closed at that point, FWIW....

 

This is exactly why there should there should be a **** talking section so people can just dook it out and call people out for innane reasons.

 

I'm sorry, but I do not think there should be a place on any forum where people can just "duke it out" and say whatever they want. It's easy to be a loudmouth jerk behind the anonimity of a keyboard, and people often say things they would not say in person. I believe message boards should require people to be respectful and behave like adults and adhere to a standard of decorum at all times.

As to this thread topic, I understand that the admins/mods have a difficult job when folks don't act like adults, but they also can be quick on the trigger sometimes - but it's their judgement call and while I might not agree, I do respect their position, that's why the OP and I continued our discussion privately.

 

Might I suggest you check out this SoCal based MINI club.
http://www.mininuts.com/forum/index.php?a=forum&f=2

On NAM, however, all the guidelines will continue to apply on all the forums.

 

I followed your link. What a vile and childish group. They would lend credence to having internet censorship.

 

I don't know it's been kind of quiet lately, almost like they're all out sewing or something.

 

Probably out driving over the speed limit. On public streets. Cretans.

 

In school zones.............

 

Oh my goodness Pimp, dahlink where have you been my love we miss you. Of course you wouldn't know that now would you?

Lest I remind you of your less than polite behavior during your prior visits to the site we shan't speak of. Homosexual innuendo is so uncouth these days.

Missed you at AMVIV, my love, pray tell how, is your rolling MINI BOOMBOX ?

You haven't posted any updates?

 

My box is good. How is your box?

 

i hear they kick puppies.

 

The Nuts are all coming here to the sewing site, who would of ever figured that would happen.

Mark

 

I though links to other MINI sites got your pee pee smacked on this site

Mark

 

Well as I've explained to you personally multiple times, spamming members with competing knock-off websites that have been expressly prohibited due to the actions of their members and leadership are prohibited as per....
Not to mention spamming new members with links to other forums is widely considered poor netiquette.

However members are encouraged to seek out their local clubs, many of which are listed on the main forums page. And many other forums, including MINI2, MotoringUnderground, minicooperforum, miniforum are frequently linked to when doing so is of benefit to the community.