Thanks to thrice-bedamned places like /r/TheoryofReddit, the favored opinion is that moderators are supposed to explicitly decide and enforce "quality" on forums where they moderate. Doing that to /r/atheism caused a major split, and is when I started looking for possible reddit alternatives. I'm sad that it took me two years to find this place.
In my one major foray into moderation I took special care to engage with the users and follow their wishes rather than impose my own. Oh, I admitted to having my own agenda but I clearly spelled out what I was aiming for and that I would abide by consensus rather than moderate by fiat. Which I did. We discussed what was and wasn't going to be done, and even people who didn't win the votes acknowledged that at least they got heard.
Moderation can go from anywhere between a nightmare to a wonderful experience depending on whether the rules are properly layed out and everyone is in it together. The best way to avoid a community from going toxic is just to bring in an influx of users against toxic behaviour. /r/Atheism became the new atheism plus. just like /r/anarchism turned crap (and banned me when I questioned it) they hired a new mod who said "Anarchism is a social movement that seeks liberation from oppressive systems of control including but not limited to the state, capitalism, racism, sexism, speciesism, and religion." Which is not what I see as the definition of anarchism at all. Then they began banning people for questioning the mods. This is simple to me- if people start questioning the mods, figure it out, don't ignore them.
Everybody complains about /r/atheism (the i goes after the e), but I just don't see what they're complaining about. I see a much different community there. Maybe it's because I'm an atheist.
Anyway, I have to disagree with you. /r/atheism is not the new Atheism+. In fact, Atheism+ has their own sub-reddit, thankyouverymuch. A+ has always been a niche. They have so many speech codes and ideologies that it's difficult to become accepted by them. As a result, they have a very small community. They're like the PeTA of liberal atheism. Even people who in principle agree with them want to stay far away, because they're crazy. I think it's an interesting case study in how a community can go wrong. They turned so toxic so quickly that even their founder wanted nothing to do with them.
I guess we agree to disagree. I only was there for a little amount of time, in which I didn't like what I saw so maybe I was there on a bad day? I've got to admit most of that point was hear-say from what my friends told me. "Atheism+ has their own sub-reddit, thankyouverymuch" Yeah but that really doesn't say much. Just because there already is a sub-reddit for a thing doesn't mean there can't be another sub-reddit about the same thing. Also, no need to be rude. I'm not going to comment on the rest of what you say, because I think we agree about Atheism plus. I think for sake of the point it's best to say I'm an Agnostic (or Atheist-Agnostic if you are one of the people that shout at me for saying I'm an Agnostic).
No worries. I don't know why people would shout at you for calling yourself an "agnostic". The irritating thing is when people say "I'm an agnostic, not an atheist." (As if the two were incompatible, which they aren't.)
Thanks. Some people tell me that there is no such thing as Agnostic and it is all just Atheist. Most of them religious people who like to instill the "your with us or against us, and if your against us your going to hell!", luckily that's not all religious people and instead just a very, very vocal minority.
Thanks to thrice-bedamned places like /r/TheoryofReddit, the favored opinion is that moderators are supposed to explicitly decide and enforce "quality" on forums where they moderate. Doing that to /r/atheism caused a major split, and is when I started looking for possible reddit alternatives. I'm sad that it took me two years to find this place.
In my one major foray into moderation I took special care to engage with the users and follow their wishes rather than impose my own. Oh, I admitted to having my own agenda but I clearly spelled out what I was aiming for and that I would abide by consensus rather than moderate by fiat. Which I did. We discussed what was and wasn't going to be done, and even people who didn't win the votes acknowledged that at least they got heard.
It's a hell of a lot of work.
Moderation can go from anywhere between a nightmare to a wonderful experience depending on whether the rules are properly layed out and everyone is in it together. The best way to avoid a community from going toxic is just to bring in an influx of users against toxic behaviour. /r/Atheism became the new atheism plus. just like /r/anarchism turned crap (and banned me when I questioned it) they hired a new mod who said "Anarchism is a social movement that seeks liberation from oppressive systems of control including but not limited to the state, capitalism, racism, sexism, speciesism, and religion." Which is not what I see as the definition of anarchism at all. Then they began banning people for questioning the mods. This is simple to me- if people start questioning the mods, figure it out, don't ignore them.
Everybody complains about /r/atheism (the i goes after the e), but I just don't see what they're complaining about. I see a much different community there. Maybe it's because I'm an atheist.
Anyway, I have to disagree with you. /r/atheism is not the new Atheism+. In fact, Atheism+ has their own sub-reddit, thankyouverymuch. A+ has always been a niche. They have so many speech codes and ideologies that it's difficult to become accepted by them. As a result, they have a very small community. They're like the PeTA of liberal atheism. Even people who in principle agree with them want to stay far away, because they're crazy. I think it's an interesting case study in how a community can go wrong. They turned so toxic so quickly that even their founder wanted nothing to do with them.
Thanks, I fixed the late night spelling error.
I guess we agree to disagree. I only was there for a little amount of time, in which I didn't like what I saw so maybe I was there on a bad day? I've got to admit most of that point was hear-say from what my friends told me. "Atheism+ has their own sub-reddit, thankyouverymuch" Yeah but that really doesn't say much. Just because there already is a sub-reddit for a thing doesn't mean there can't be another sub-reddit about the same thing. Also, no need to be rude. I'm not going to comment on the rest of what you say, because I think we agree about Atheism plus. I think for sake of the point it's best to say I'm an Agnostic (or Atheist-Agnostic if you are one of the people that shout at me for saying I'm an Agnostic).
No worries. I don't know why people would shout at you for calling yourself an "agnostic". The irritating thing is when people say "I'm an agnostic, not an atheist." (As if the two were incompatible, which they aren't.)
Thanks. Some people tell me that there is no such thing as Agnostic and it is all just Atheist. Most of them religious people who like to instill the "your with us or against us, and if your against us your going to hell!", luckily that's not all religious people and instead just a very, very vocal minority.