Making it Better: The future of WP

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Somebody's "Truth" may not be a True reflection of reality.
It is wrong to ignore this possibility.



I can recommend a good psychiatrist, for you, if you want.

There are people who embrace their emotions, rather than their rationality, yes.

Yes ~ less visceral involving more the intestinal gut-brain axis when it comes to attacks, and more rational involving not only the intestinal gut-brain but also the cardial heart-brain and cerebral head-brain as the trinity of axial brains when it comes to critiques.

Otherwise with just the intestinal gut-brain activity being more the case involving attacks ~ only the sensational, reproductional and imaginal sensibilities are directly active or even overactive, whilst the emotional, communicational, sentimental and rational sensibilities are indirectly active, or 'latent' (in standby mode).

Thus it is that groupthought involving quasi-rational and foe-rational sensibilities come to the fore, with tribal battles taking place between the most upset and the most angry ~ with individual departures and collective exoduses resulting.


When someone goes from attacking one or more peoples comments to attacking them as an individual or group ~ it is more serious in law than would be the case of criticism. Attacks are for example more dangerous because they facilitate to a greater extent the aggressive Id, as involves more regret and apologies after which, and critiques are safer as they facilitate the rational self and involves more learning and self moderation during and after which.

So for example that was a critique of your statement, where as an attack would be "In not being proficient in English, and thinking that the line is too blurred to make a distinction between attacks and critiques for the sake of law, there is little point in taking part in this discussion, because defining the differences between critiques is the whole point of which." as being sarcastically polite, or more simply as rude "If you can't understand English get out of here!" At which point a report to a moderator who has not posted on this thread would be appropriate, by way of either the report tab at the bottom left of that post ~ selecting "[Personal attack >> this message contains a personal attack]" because no one has the right to discriminate against you because English is not your first language, and dismissing you is hardly going to be supportive in terms of better understanding English. If of course you feel particularly upset by the personal attack and feel that an immediate response is necessary (such as the thread is getting increasing hostile) send a Private Message to one of the moderators who has not posted on this or the thread in question, via the "MODERATOR ATTENTION: How To Get Help When You Need It" thread, or else leave a post reporting the issue and the thread title and or a link to the thread.

So very simply attacks aim to incapacitate or knock out, and critiques aim to educate or inform, sort of thing.


Addressing people personally when expressing disagreement is definitely worth discouraging, especially when it comes to imaginatively assumed and dismissively projected states of mind:


What with an awful lot of which having gone on earlier in this thread.


That "calm and eloquent mannerisms being expected of every one at every time" is rather an argumentum ad hominem and a straw-man state of affairs ~ being that as you state we cant accept it even though having introduced it, whilst the point I was making is about replacing attacks with critiques so that they can be increasingly differentiated from one another in more peaceful times, as would provide a scale of self moderation and developmental learning where attacks can be identified and rectified earlier (rather than later) ~ making the first scale into the second scale involving domineering argumentation, and the second scale into the third scale involving membership departures and exoduses.

As such critiques as facilitating discussion become then the first scale of acceptable behaviour, attacks as domineering argumentation become then the second scale of unacceptable behaviour, and departures and exoduses as membership terminations or exclusions become then the third scale of undesirable outcomes.

Thus during the primary scale of interactions involving rational critiques ~ there are much lower levels of stress or fear for members when thinking about posting, just before posting or until responded to, because even when disagreements are on the go they would be more informative discussions ~ as is generally the case with support websites for vulnerable individuals, with of course the Wrong Planet website of forums having been the exception to the rule as it has been first and foremost a social website. If though this website was as much a support website as well as a social website, it would be absolutely amazing without so many membership departures or even any exoduses.

A respectful supportive mannerism is achieved elsewhere and can therefore be achieved here also!

Otherwise as previously stated:

While I completely agree that this is the main problem, I doubt it can be effectively adressed by proposed changes in the rules. Making the rules more open to interpretation gives more space to gut reactions of the moderators, which makes the described problem worse instead of better.

That's absolutely right.
I'm adressing the problem from more practical point of view, imagining users engaging in endless exchanges like "That was an attack" - "No, that was a critique" - "No, that was an attack" - repeat.

That's why introducing some tolerance in the grey area may be beneficial. If it was directed at the views (say, "atheism is lawless") - tolerated despite being in a bad tone; if at persons ("atheists are lawless") - against the rules. If at a poster personally ("you're an atheist so you're lawless") - not tolerated.
Best etiquette has to be encouraged and promoted but not enforced or we will get drawn into never ending circles of reinterpretations.

If you interpreted my answer as ad hominem and straw man, then it was a clear misunderstanding. My point was, we need some tolerance or otherwise moderation tools can be easily abused against users that for any reason got agitated and lost their calm.

Well as long as attacks are permitted as far as comments go, this will keep on leading to people making comments such as those Alex reported as being “really hurtful”, as therefore perpetuates the problem of membership departures and exoduses.

The only other suggestion is to change TallyMan’s statement that “This site is first and foremost a support site” to “This site is first and foremost a social site, and second most a support site” so that the social right to attack precedes the personal right to support, with people then being free to seek other websites if they need or expect a supportive environment first and foremost.


An attack is here contextually a negation of the written commentary so as to dominate or disqualify the writer. This should not be permitted on account of being unacceptable ‘antisocial’ (harmful) conduct.

A critique is by contrast an evaluation of the written commentary so as to facilitate or qualify the writer. This should be permitted on account of being acceptable ‘prosocial’ (helpful) conduct.

Just repeating that an attack is an attack without explanation is an attempt to dominate and disqualify the previous comment as not having relevance, and is therefore ‘antisocial’ (harmful) conduct which should not be permitted.


Yet the permitted attacks and the toleration of which involves worse etiquette being promoted and worse conduct being enforced as ‘repeating cycles’ of normalised abuse ~ with the moderation team and membership number departures and exoduses demonstrating that the problem is repetitive. And the whole point of suggesting the change was to get feedback on what could be clearly defined ~ not just to leave it and have more of the same.


This seems to be more about tolerating the abuse that leads to membership departures and exoduses, rather than doing much or anything about the cause, just as was the case with the unrealistic concept introduced about being ‘calm and eloquent when posting every time by ever user’ which was also itself dismissed as being unrealistic in the same sentence, and dishonest as a consideration in the next sentence as follows:


The thing is though it is both realistic and honest to expect changes to be made in the codes of conduct in order to reduce the prevalence of abuse, on account of it priming those who end up emotionally detonating and mentally exploding, and hence all the upset and anger that causes the membership departures and exoduses that are a repetitive problem here.

Other support sites do not have anything close to the scale of problems that we have here, as they deal with these issues in their codes of conduct and by way of members self moderating and official moderation when required ~ accordingly ~ with issues not being as here tolerated but prohibited in Aspie Central’s codes of conduct as follows:

1.Insulting or personal attacks on other members is prohibited.
Insults, whether on a personal, cultural, or national level are not tolerated here.

2. Do not attempt to "flame", "troll" or bait other members into arguments.

3. Racial, gender (sexist), neurological, and religious hatred/discrimination will not be tolerated.

And also as follows with the National Autistic Society in the UK:

1. Content must not be obscene, defamatory or libellous, vulgar, sexually orientated, hateful, threatening, or in violation of any laws.
2. Content must not be sexist, homophobic, racist, intolerant of religious beliefs, or otherwise discriminatory. This includes links to porn or hate sites.

Hence for discussion my suggestion that negating attacks as being antisocial and harmful get replaced by affirming critiques as being prosocial and helpful, recalling that that involves the logic of “Once you have met one autistic person; you have met one autistic person” regarding tolerance up to a point for each individual being a foregone conclusion.

Oh and congratulations Magz and Feyokien on having become moderators!

Conservatives seem to want more rules with stricter interpretations and tougher enforcement.

Liberals seem to want fewer rules with wider interpretations and more lenient enforcement.

I just want my ice-cream!

And don't skimp on the choc chips.

caramel sauce with mine, please!

If we're here to make wishes, I would like 9 hours of high quality sleep, please!