Selecting a Despot for the Autism Thunderdome

[Kermit Jizz]

HHH needs to be a mod because it would force the worst offenders off the site.

New mods need to permaban everyone whining about not having stickers.

HHH getting modded but playing a completely neutral role would be the best outcome. The paranoia would drive half the users crazy over nothing and we'd get all sorts of zany gay-ops over a man just doing his job.

 

[Blobby's Murder Knife]

New AN posters tend to be the ones who think they are in an exclusively male space. They come to chat sometimes. It's...enlightening. They don't understand the jokes and then they get incel mad when they find out there's actual estrogen posting.

Not for grrl power reasons or anything, but the area might benefit from visible female leadership. Having all male mods reinforces the sausage party atmosphere...which isn't the broader KF culture.

Well, it does skew male, but there are plenty of female posters if anyone bothers to lurk for more than five seconds. Mods should be appointed based on merit and not being fucking troons only. Diversity quotas are gay.

 

[Lurker]

Well, it does skew male, but there are plenty of female posters if anyone bothers to lurk for more than five seconds. Mods should be appointed based on merit and not being fucking troons only. Diversity quotas are gay.

diversity quotas are cool and fine as long as they benefit me and only me.

 

[Blobby's Murder Knife]

HHH getting modded but playing a completely neutral role would be the best outcome. The paranoia would drive half the users crazy over nothing and we'd get all sorts of zany gay-ops over a man just doing his job.

I'd rather not go through that retarded shit again.

 

[murdered meat bag]

I'd rather not go through that retarded shit again.

we'd only go through it the one time because the retards would be perma banned.

 

[Sithis]

we'd only go through it the one time because the retards would be perma banned.

Are people around here really that confident that no one else knows how to use VPN or just Tor lol

 

[whatever I feel like]

My proposals would be as such (all surely way too late and discussed already, since I made the mistake of being a weekend warrior):

1. Rework Autistic Thunderdome subforums slightly:

Reform "Happenings" into a slightly broader focus on serious topics. Happenings is currently smaller than A&N but the goal would be to make it the bigger of the two. As such, in order to encourage use from people scrolling down, it should also get billing above the other two AT subforums. The new general standard for making a topic here is that it will need a well-written OP, be that in the form of someone writing something about a topic or posting a "good" news article. Does not have to be lengthy, just has to not be shit. Last I checked people weren't really following the "someone has to be at risk of dying" rule anyway so I feel it is time for that to go away.

Reform A&N into a newer version of Pulitzer Prize Winning Journalism, the now closed subforum specifically for mocking trashy clickbait. Call it "Bad News" or whatever. This is where all of the Cat Party articles can go and, honestly, is what a lot of A&N is already, just without the veneer of innocence. The minimal standard here would be that it has to contain an article (linked and archived, at least) from a journalist that was paid to write that article, or be a megathread dedicated to articles written by paid journalists ("the Kotaku thread", etc.) My hope, based on the fact that PPWJ never really took off itself, is that use of this bad forum is comparatively low. The other alternative here is to ban this type of thread, because its never not going to be decisive. The articles are left-wing trash and the responses are usually no better, just being directed from the other side. If you want the site to "all be on one side" you can't base that on articles like these because they aren't about knowledge or information, they are about bashing the other side.

2.Crack down on calls to violence:

This is one of the only things that can really hurt Kiwifarms to come out of A&N and never actually contributes to discussion anyway. Just to be clear here, I am not excepting "in Minecraft" or "nonces don't count as human" qualifiers here. Its not hard to not post about wanting to kill people.

3. Give people access to slightly more post ratings:

Specifically thunkful and horrifying but maybe optimistic, too, as only a shill bitch would get offended by that one.

4. Merge more non-threadworthy topics into megathreads:

Look at the current page 1 of A&N and ask yourself how many of the topics are actually news, and how many of them were actually posted in order to foster discussion instead of get rage clicks. Most of them can stay in "Bad News" but this helps them take up less space, even there. Indeed, we already have a megathread on "non-thread worthy articles" that mods used to merge particularly useless topics into, though I've seen less of that recently.

Create a megathread for stories related solely to Twitter or Tiktok and merge new "something happened on Twitter/Tiktok" threads into it. Those threads are all garbage, even compared to other A&N ragebait threads, and you lose nothing by axing them and still have a place to discuss it (the megathread) if you really want to.

Alternately, if the "articles" in question aren't from news sources (paid journalist as opposed to blog posts) they can be deleted. I bring that up specifically because Cat Party's RSS feeds sometimes picks up Daily Kos userblogs (randos writing down their fee fees) and he occasionally reposts them in A&N even though they are literally a random nobody talking about his political opinions on another forum.

5. Let AT mods petition to site-ban users who ONLY post in AT and post badly:

It sounds like the previous mod tried to do this, but my recommendation would be to standardize the process with the standards for it being high but not publicly known (something like having 200 posts, none or under ten in on topic forums.) The mod would then have to take the onus upon himself to a) prove that the member does not or only rarely contributes to lolcow threads, b) that his posts, though numerous, do not contribute to off-topic areas either and that c) he actually makes the site worse with his presence.

An example would read something like-

User A has been here for five months and has 800 posts (holy shit.) However, only 20 of those are in on topic forums, and 15 of those are about Star Wars griefing. I've had to warn him about purposely shitting up threads twice now (his response was to call me a nigger) and, having gone through the the last five pages of his posts, none of them are over three lines long. Please ban User A.

 

[murdered meat bag]

Are people around here really that confident that no one else knows how to use VPN or just Tor lol

Changing their ip is easy, changing their behavior is impossible. They post the same shit for the same reasons and be banned.

and if they manage to change their attitudes it'll lead to less trashposting.
a win for A and H. either way.

 

[Matt Damon]

I am not excepting "in Minecraft" or "nonces don't count as human" qualifiers here.

I dunno if I can support a site with the official position that nonces count as human.

 

[Cardef1121]

If I'm not mistaken, you have to be logged in to look at the Thunderdome and A&H in particular. As someone who reads A&H a lot, I find that I need time to regain perspective after a while, so I ban myself from it-- and politics in general-- if I get too caught up in it. So, I recommend adding the ability to time out people who are getting MATI or misbehaving in the Dome; allowing them to use the rest of the site normally but suspending them from there for a while.

It also helps to be reminded that many of the most outrageous stories are essentially from no-name blogs that no one reads and have no clout.

 

[Kuritan Deplorable]

It also helps to be reminded that many of the most outrageous stories are essentially from no-name blogs that no one reads and have no clout.

The problems caused by people seething at articles, or the topics of ridicule are minimal. Its the people seething at each other when they comment 'the wrong thing' about the events. Trying to read the Ukraine war megathread is a nightmare when it descends into four pages of posters bitching at each other and taking flagrant bait instead of just seeing someone being stupid, leaving a sticker and moving on. Trying to change minds in the farms is like trying to get a welding certification in a chinese chemical plant - You're just asking to get blasted for no good reason.

Half of A&H is determined to be fucking right about shit, me included just by posting this, and that rapidly degrades into trying to prove others wrong and internet slapfighting. Its like when someone shows up in a true cow thread and tries to defend the cow and everyone goes nuts, except there's far more defenders in news and politics.

 

[Matt Damon]

So, I recommend adding the ability to time out people who are getting MATI or misbehaving in the Dome; allowing them to use the rest of the site normally but suspending them from there for a while.

I think this is precisely what everyone doesn't want, with the assumption being that if you're too MATI and autistic to even get along in the Dome, you're ipso facto not fit for the rest of the site.

 

[Cardef1121]

The problems caused by people seething at articles, or the topics of ridicule are minimal. Its the people seething at each other when they comment 'the wrong thing' about the events. Trying to read the Ukraine war megathread is a nightmare when it descends into four pages of posters bitching at each other and taking flagrant bait instead of just seeing someone being stupid, leaving a sticker and moving on. Trying to change minds in the farms is like trying to get a welding certification in a chinese chemical plant - You're just asking to get blasted for no good reason.

Half of A&H is determined to be fucking right about shit, me included just by posting this, and that rapidly degrades into trying to prove others wrong and internet slapfighting. Its like when someone shows up in a true cow thread and tries to defend the cow and everyone goes nuts, except there's far more defenders in news and politics.

Ah, I've never looked at the megathreads... I guess that's why I don't see it as big a problem as everyone else other than some of the posters being annoying. I generally use it to gauge the current lunacy level of society...

Speaking of which-- If there's one place that should have access to the lunacy rating, it's A&H.

How about not allowing access to the Thunderdome to new accounts, then? In his OP, Null says a big problem with the posters there is that they don't integrate with the culture of the site and treat it as an offshoot of one of the other sperg sites. Forcing new accounts to have a little bit of interaction with the rest of the site before allowing access to the political zone might help that.

 

[whatever I feel like]

The problems caused by people seething at articles, or the topics of ridicule are minimal. Its the people seething at each other when they comment 'the wrong thing' about the events.

If you are trying to get people to not care about politics in a politics subforum, then you are asking them to go against human nature. And sadly, the only way to remove people who just can't have a civil discussion about a big issue is to, well, remove them.

As to the Ukraine thread... I don't want to get political but Kiwifarms as a website would be 100 percent unable to exist in Russia, and not just because of the ho-ho-holocaust image. It amazes me that so many Turkiyes would vote for Christmas.

 

[Dracula's Spirit Animal]

I've jumped around this thread so haven't seen 3/4 of it, so apologies if this sort of thing has been mentioned 20 times.

Rather than having half a dozen dedicated mods, how about a rolling list who volunteer/are chosen/are forced (a la Slashdot's meta-moderation system)? Have a couple of official mods who are basically there just to moderate the batch of daily moderators themselves.

The rolling listees would see flagged threads for moderation (only threads they are not commenting in), and only moderation complaints would be accepted by the full time mods. Habitual shitty modding by the daily thread moderators would end up netting temp bans. Complaining to the "global" moderators about anything other than the rolling daily moderator for a thread would net a thread ban.

It seems to me that the autism is so high everywhere that the problem with finding moderators is burn out. Shunting this off to regular users on a volunteer list (or by force of their status and activity) and then having their moderation be the only issue the full time moderators need to deal with might make the process of dealing with things easier and more sustainable.

Imagine opening A & H and you see 5 threads in red you've never posted in. That means you have to read them past the posting time of the previous moderator and actually try to clean up nonsense. Have some clear rules or reasons that can be selected, like "fedposting" or "derailing" (different from off-topic discussion as the reason for interfering with a poster to help with some of the inevitable moderation abuse which the full time A & H moderators would then be responsible for banhammering the moderator for bad-faith moderators.

Other than that, megathreading and cleanup would be a "global" moderator job. I bet there were 30 Depp/Heard threads, and they should have all been a single thread. It was a single trial about two celebrities, after all.

Just some thoughts. Don't know how feasible that is, but if so, once in place, it strikes me as one of the most low energy options and one to prevent mod burn out.

Edit:
Even just the daily mods having the ability to turn a post into an invisible "This post may grind your gears [ fedposting]. Click to read anyways." sort of thing might help a great deal.

 

[Secret Asshole]

Would there be a list or just an editorial decision? I consider pretty much any "games journalism" site a "bullshit site." Then there are the personal blogs some sites like the Grauniad have that aren't really news, but are full of absolutely nutty bullshit that wouldn't even pass muster in a printed fish wrapper.

It's probably my fault. I'm pretty sure I started that meme.

I mean, websites that are clearly parody would get that tag. Like Hardrive or the Babylon Bee or the Onion.

A satire article by the guardian for example, could get the tag or not, it doesn't matter. As long as they are clearly writing satire or being sarcastic.

The other tag would be for smaller websites and publications that are batshit. A batshit article on MSNBC or Fox wouldn't qualify. Because then everyone would use it for every article.

So that would be the difference.

 

[Bloitzhole]

I do really think myself, @SSj_Ness and @Cpl. Long Dong Silver make a good team.

We represent the general range and sentiment of the “A&N” posters,

I genuinely think you might very well be right on this one - and it is exactly why I think that joyless cesspool ought to be nuked from orbit (no offense).

Every other part of the forum, be it lolcow, off-topic or a random shitposting board will usually elevate my mood or leave me more informed than before, with users working together to improve threads, provide updates on cows and/or make others laugh. Sometimes I stumble upon a thread that hasn't seen activity in ages and yet it remains interesting and I'm glad it's still around for posterity. The overall sentiment is one of collaboration.

I've never had that experience on "A&N" - it's just dour, unpleasant and filled with users getting angry at either whatever article was posted to incite just those sentiments (because it boosts engagement) or other users, with a handful of onlookers laughing at both sides (probably the best course of action). It never feels like there's anything worth preserving there. In contrast to other parts of the site it feels non-collaborative.

I have no answer to the A&N question.
The ideal candidate for head janny would be someone with no great political convictions, no tendency to sperg on LGBT issues in any way (because some of the guys getting autistically angry remind me of the exact screeching trannies that trigger them), no incel tendencies and a stable day-to-day that keeps them from getting mad at the idiocy.

The ideal janny is, therefore, the exact person who has no interest whatsoever in moderating that subforum.

To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people A&N are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.

 

[A_Callow_Youth]

As a site-wide rule:

a) If you want to talk about politics and lolcows, it sticks in A&H in a separate forum. It doesn't bleed into anything else, so people who don't want to deal with it don't have to. Another forum would be good for this.

I'll voice my dissent for this one. Outside of the Thunderdome, one of my major stomping grounds has been the Jerry Peet thread, which I think stands as a prime example of how things can work well. For context, Jerry is a horsefucker turned stereotypical Twitter transbian, and his thread is notable in that it contains a near-even split of outwardly left- and right-wing posters. Despite this, the thread has moved along smoothly for 6 years and 1300 pages, in large part because the thread has developed an unspoken code of conduct, which largely boils down to

Mock the Cow's politics, not the other posters'; we're here to laugh at retards, not pick fights over why we laugh at retards.

Thus, when Jerry says something stupid like "All conservatives are Nazis, kill them before they kill you", the thread will essentially run two conversations in paralell: the righties making fun of the derranged lefty, and the lefties making fun of the terrible example of a lefty, with both groups usually spoilering the sperging for courtesy's sake.

My point is that political discussion in cow threads can be kept in line without outright disallowing it, and to do so would be directly harmful to the quality of at least one thread out there.

 

[Matt Damon]

I've never had that experience on "A&N" - it's just dour, unpleasant and filled with users getting angry

Is this just a "you" problem? Maybe I'm nuts, but I typically come away entertained and at least slightly more informed.

You just have to let the sperging and slapfighting roll off your back and have no expectation that investing emotionally in an argument on Kiwi fuckin' Farms is a worthwhile use of your time.

 

[Blobby's Murder Knife]

Is this just a "you" problem? Maybe I'm nuts, but I typically come away entertained and at least slightly more informed.

You just have to let the sperging and slapfighting roll off your back and have no expectation that investing emotionally in an argument on Kiwi fuckin' Farms is a worthwhile use of your time.

I personally learned a lot from A&N posters simply because they challenged my beliefs and made me think critically about them and why I held them. Why I think this place is invaluable. You can change your mind or not, but at least it is not the echo chamber the rest of the internet and IRL is.