Censorship etc... have at it

If there was hope, it must lie in the proles?

A learned man
"If there is hope . . . it lies in the proles" (George Orwell).

Instead we have a Chestnut Tree cyber Café

Every time I or anybody else complain about some censorship by a moderator we get the same response.
"if you think you can do better.... etc etc. and how its a thankless job"
You counter any criticism with a defensive posture and the same refrain " If you can do better..." like a 7 year old!

I know its a thankless job and I didn't force you to take it, but it's an important job.
I don't want to be a moderator, never had , never will, not because I'm lazy or not prepared to put in the time. I know I don't have the temperament for it and wouldn't be good at it.

However as I stated in my post that was deleted,TAY had become the Singapore of skiing websites, a pleasant place to spend some time but very controlled by rules on behaviour that in my opinion, and I accept that probably the majority will feel differently, stifles meaningful discussion on some issues and inhibits creativity and evolution of the website. It also, and I was extremely thankful Lowell made reference to it in his post to Charles ( although we probably disagree on the outcome), creates a lot of hubris within TAYers that the "civility" of their website somehow elevates it and them above others who decide upon a more uncensored approach and live with the messy but dynamic results. TAYers are very quick to make disparaging remarks about other websites , TGR in particular and make it clear that  they think the inhabitants of that website are juvenile gangstas.

There is a lot of dross on TGR but it has far more meaningful discussions about skiing, politics etc than TAY and continually evolves.
Now, people may say , fine TAY is like this ,TGR is like that, you gotta choice! That's true but it's my opinion, and only mine, that TAY's format is stagnant and parochial and deters some meaningful discussion because of it's boy scout, be positive all the time attitude that has been created by the implementation of the behavioral rules..... a bit like Singapore.

FWIW, I'm among those who appreciate the tone set on this site. No, I don't agree with very scrap of policy (e.g. the much-discussed photo posting limit), but I appreciate the fact that vitriol is kept in check. I've seen the liberal allowance for focusing on other posters instead of on the topics at hand (beyond the topic of how stupid, selfish, etc. etc. other members are) lead to some long-term grudge matches elsewhere that don't seem in any way positive. Is something lost to get the civility? Sure. For me, it's a good trade. Clearly there are others who prefer a different balance (including owners and moderators of said other sites), and I don't in any way hold myself as being better than them. I can choose how much or little I frequent those sites, and how I behave there. But I do appreciate the tone Charles and his moderators have managed to set here. And I've seen both substantive discussion and creative posts happening on this site, so I do not buy that moderating for civility leads to pure pablum.

And I think it's quite reasonable for the mods to ask people who demonstrate energy and opinion for how the site is run (through incessant posts about it) to consider using that energy and opinion by stepping up to be a mod themselves.

Being a moderator seems like a pain in the @$$! Sure, the decisions are going to come across as uneven and perhaps even arbitrary. Only a moderation-free site will avoid that phenomenon...

This is one of the best moderated forums I've been on (if not THE best). 

Since this whole thread seems to stem from Z-bo's comment:  This site does seem to allow for a discussion on the state of the average bc skiers skills in a non-personal non-attacking way.  Moving the discussion from a TR thread to random tracks makes sense.  So what's wrong with removing Z-bo's post which could have been interpretted as personal?

Policy and actions by the moderators seem good in this case  IMHO.


PS. what's with the pic limit gripes? doesn't everyone have a pic account somewhere to link to?

There is a lot of dross on TGR but it has far more meaningful discussions about skiing, politics etc than TAY

TGR is a much larger-profile site with more members, so it follows that there would be a greater quantity of posts and topics, but does that hold true of the quality as well?

A social experiment probably could be designed to answer this one.  A new member could try posting the same question about skiing both here and at TGR, and then would see what responses he/she receives.  I'm guessing it would be fairly easy to determine on which site they receive more creative, constructive, and meaningful feedback at.  Maybe this wouldn't be entirely a reflection of the level of moderation, but it surely has an influence.