Thnking about this more, this does seem ridiculous. The two threads this covers, imo, are:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/21...tards-1486764/

and

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/21...rsity-1486965/

Interested to see how people feel about them and if they think they should be locked.

The only legit reason we would not permit them is people getting their feelings hurt. Last I checked, only the smallest of infant ****s were given about hurt feelings.

Interesting, though, that this comes up after me selecting likeable posters to exclude as opposed to Paul's which picked on forum misfits.

Yep, the self-proclaimed in-crowd is having power and control issues.

Sort of, but it seems similar to my rule of not allowing attacks against people that don't post in Politics Unchained.

It's kind of cowardly to attack people in threads where you won't let them respond. I didn't really think of it with Paul's thread. Possibly because he actually let most of the people he was attacking post in his thread.

Either way, I personally don't care, but am interested in what other people think.

That thread isn't for attacking people?

Of course they are terrible threads, but as I said in the one I was allowed in, what purpose does this forum serve if not people whining about idiots and the idiots whining right back about the meanie heads? Now you have one thread for the idiots, and one thread for the meanie heads. Do the threads magically get better if you force the idiots and the meanie threads to post their **** in the same thread? No, of course not.

Assuming this is true, so what? Cowardly behavior should not be tolerated? Because let's be honest, this entire sub forum's existence is based on the desire to insult each other, and slinging insults over the internet isn't exactly brave.

Your idea of likable and misfits seems mixed up.

It barely matters as the content in that regard has been so innocuous but you shouldn't allow it anyway. It's inherently a bad idea.

Self modding might be a great idea so treat it with a bit of care and give it a chance.

PU can serve a couple of purposed, one of which is self moded threads trying to minimise abuse and noise.

No offense, but you aren't the one to comment on terrible threads. Regular politics is a slough of boooooooring ass threads which inevitably leads to "u r dumb" responses to negs and others.

To be clear though, my goal isn't to advance/cultivate self-modding threads as a great idea that should be used. My goal is much more generic - how do we create forums that don't rely on little dictators deciding what can be said / who can participate. (Although I make no claims that little dictators aren't the best way to run forums).

If self-modding threads work, great. If not, maybe something else will. But any idea, including self-modding threads, will have to survive on its own merits without a lot of special hand holding from me.

Our view on self modding threads is only slightly different. If they are to flourish then I would bet on it being within a P type forum rather than PU. It's a great way to delegate the work and try a few new approaches within some general framework.

Either way, we have to recognise that just like you can't allow non-PUers to be abused in PU, there's a big problem allowing someone to be attacked while banning them from defending themselves.

Apart from the lack of humility and good natured humour in listing bad posters while not including themselves, its most likely to end with a bang not a whimper that will possibly take PU with it.

It seems the Self-Mod option is coming under attack right now from several different angles. Seriously, my fellow Politards... this is why we can't have nice things.

I hope jjshabado looks at this as a friendly 'stress test' and series of experiments (including what could go wrong)... and doesn't 'pull the plug' in disgust.

I won't 'pull the plug in disgust'. The only time I've been tempted to do that was a few weeks (months?) ago when it felt like there were just a bunch of threads with a bunch of really low personal attacks in them. But I've gotten over that.

I don't mind a thread I'm not allowed to post in where people just complain about my modding. If a serious discussion about how the forum should be modded starts though I'll jump in. I'm cool with that double standard.

In terms of personal attack threads that prohibit people from posting in them - it doesn't seem like there's a clear consensus at this point so I'm going to stick with my default position of not doing anything.

Thumbs up.

I agree with this even though I have made my views on those types of threads clear. Banning them would be contrary to PU being a free and wild place.

If vbulliten made it so people you have on ignore can't post in threads you've started, 2+2 would practically moderate itself.

Question: can I have a sub forum that simply doesn't allow ikes to post? An Ikes-free sub forum?

Pretty much any politics thread would be greatly enhanced by being moved there.

Also, I see JJ is green again. Just what kind of painkillers was Mat on last night, anyway?

Probably should have hit him up for a job. Missed opportunity.

Allowing thread starters to exclude posters and then have them attack and insult those excluded is pretty odious, no? If your going to allow people to exclude those they don't want in the thread, whatever, I think that's stupid, but fine. But they should just be excluded and not be mentioned in the thread. There's no argument for having threads that are basically for ****ting on other posters and not allowing them to respond. If you want someone out of the thread, fine, but they shouldn't be mentioned in the thread.

Perhaps you should call the waaaahhhhh-mbulance?

The main value in keeping ikes around is how he picks off low-hanging fruit from bad liberal posters. So I would support your proposal, on the condition that said posters are also excluded.

Have fun reading the no ikes forum!

Yeah, it's pretty odious.

However... I doubt if it's going to be an ongoing theme after this initial little exploratory flurry of interest. I'd much rather see if my prediction here is correct -vs- seeing new preemptive rules.

If I'm wrong, and it turns out to be a recurring issue, a "no name-calling the excluded" rule might then be in order. A "no mention" rule would be going too far IMO. Actually, as long as the OP can ask for individual posts to be removed, there's not technically a need to exclude at all.

This is where I stand.

My original rules had the OP sending me a PM about starting their own thread precisely to avoid the silly threads we're seeing now. I'm inclined to just see where this goes, but if it seems to stay ridiculous I'll just lock all the stupid threads and go back to having people PMing me asking if they can mod their own thread and explaining the actual issue their thread will discuss.