I need to know

[The Germanian states]

I have been on some forums previously and met some abusive as hell moderators who ban people for a small argument over logic. So do we need to fear the moderators here or treat them like our friends.

I have trust issues...

[Enfaru]

Neither. Moderators are not there to be your friends nor are they there to molly-coddle you or anyone else. There are there to keep the forums clean and tidy of rule breaking to the best of their abilities. With that said, moderators are users of NationStates who volunteer for their job so treat them as such. With the same level of respect that you afford every other user of NationStates.

The mods are friendly enough provided you're more constructive than destructive for the community. Never had a problem with them myself.

[The Germanian states]

The way I treat them would be a slight overreaction because we would bend our knees and kneel to them.

[Enfaru]

The way I treat them would be a slight overreaction because we would bend our knees and kneel to them.

The custom here is to leave cookies or other small bribes rather than kneeling as a mark of thanks (surprisingly common).

[In Gentem Et De Libris Scientiam]

Some of the mods are awesome, like mall.

[The Germanian states]

The way I treat them would be a slight overreaction because we would bend our knees and kneel to them.

The custom here is to leave cookies or other small bribes rather than kneeling as a mark of thanks (surprisingly common).

Wow I never knew we could do that. The mods back where I used to go are so very rude and stand off-ish

[Kryozerkia]

If there is an issue, please cite posts/evidence, otherwise it's just hearsay and you blowin' a whole lot of hot air. Because we've heard cries of "mod abuse" to the point that it's white noise if there's an absence of evidence. However, if you provide links, they will be reviewed by uninvolved moderators and escalated to the administrators if a need arises.

[Reploid Productions]

We would very quickly lose our mod badges if we banned people willy nilly, and especially for no valid reason such as a rules violation. The site rules apply to the mods just as much as the players and all of our actions are logged for admin review. In addition, we have an appeals process (also in the above linked thread,) for instances where you may feel you've been dinged in error. We also try to avoid conflict-of-interest in moderating. For instance, if I'm an active participant in a debate thread on NSG, I don't get to make any rulings involving that thread- at best I can make unofficial "Guys, can we get back on topic?" type posts, or if a thread is REALLY going off the rails, lock it and flag down an uninvolved moderator to handle it. (If it's something completely blatant such as porn spam though, then I could clean that up, because there is no subjective judgment call to be made.)

While there are grey areas and considerable room for individual discretion given the case-by-case nature of most rulings, the general advice of "Don't be a dick" pretty much sums up how to avoid having any unpleasant run-ins with Moderation. It's usually pretty clear when one of us is posting in an official capacity, you'll see bold, red text like this for unofficial "pay attention to this, it's important!" notices and warnings, and the *** eye-blindingly garish warning text *** when official warnings/bans are being handed out on the forum. Plus, several of us have little "mod sig" bits we tack on to "official" type posts that aren't warnings such as the stuff at the bottom of my post here.

Players have got to do something pretty serious to jump straight to a ban or an account deletion without a prior warning history. We prefer to try and give people a chance to clean up their act before resorting to such drastic measures, so the general progression for rules violations goes unofficial warning > official warning > 1-day forumban > 3-day forumban > 7-day forumban > account deletion. This is not a hard limit, though; we do take the severity of the individual offense into consideration as well as how rapid a user accumulates warnings, so steps on the progression may be skipped if an offense is especially severe, or repeated instead of escalated if it's minor or if the user's been well-behaved for awhile since the previous offense. As an example, take two users who each have one warning for flaming on their record: one user breaks the rules again several months later, and walks away with only an unofficial warning for it owing to good behavior the majority of the time; meanwhile, the second user breaks the rules again the very next day, and gets smacked with a 1-day ban for failing to heed the prior warning.

And as Kryo already mentioned, mod abuse is something that is taken extremely seriously. While vague and generic "mods are meeean!" type complaints will generally be dismissed by the admins, if a report comes in with actual evidence, that gets taken seriously and investigated by the rest of the team and by [violet]. It might not necessarily seem like it out in public, but the boss lady is reviewing what we're getting up to pretty regularly. [V] can and has stood mods down in the past when actual evidence has been present, and if necessary will permanently kick them off the team if the charges are serious enough.

Hope that clarifies things some.


~Evil Forum Empress Rep Prod the Ninja Mod
~She who wields the Banhammer; master of the mighty moderation no-dachi Kiritateru Teikoku

[The Germanian states]

If there is an issue, please cite posts/evidence, otherwise it's just hearsay and you blowin' a whole lot of hot air. Because we've heard cries of "mod abuse" to the point that it's white noise if there's an absence of evidence. However, if you provide links, they will be reviewed by uninvolved moderators and escalated to the administrators if a need arises.

No not here but on different forums like another website.

What I usually do when I encounter a mod is either wave a white flag or sieg heil them.

[Frisbeeteria]

The custom here is to leave cookies or other small bribes

Yeah, some of the mods like that sort of thing. Not so much me. I like to do the job and move on. Thank you posts are just an unnecessary click in my opinion.

Then again, I'm well known as the Curmudgeon Mod, so pretty much everything bugs me. Gift what you want if you want. And stay the hell off my lawn!

No not here but on different forums like another website.

We're not necessarily like other sites. Still, some people like us. Some hate us. The vast majority of players never encounter us at all.

[Shazbotdom]

The custom here is to leave cookies or other small bribes

Yeah, some of the mods like that sort of thing. Not so much me. I like to do the job and move on. Thank you posts are just an unnecessary click in my opinion.

Then again, I'm well known as the Curmudgeon Mod, so pretty much everything bugs me. Gift what you want if you want. And stay the hell off my lawn!

No not here but on different forums like another website.

We're not necessarily like other sites. Still, some people like us. Some hate us. The vast majority of players never encounter us at all.

Fris has kicked me in my ass a few times for accidentally stepping foot on his lawn.

Trust me. That jackboot hurts like hell.

[The Germanian states]

Well now I can relax not having to worry that a mod will hit me with a ban hammer from behind.

[Ikania]

The mods here make controversial decisions sometimes, especially with actions that many see as unnecessary, though in the end, most of their actions are warranted. We have them to thank for not having to deal with constant spam and malicious trolling, and we still have to deal with it sometimes. If you took one look at the moderation forum you'd see what the mods have to deal with daily, and keep in mind that some of them have been here for over a decade and still dedicate themselves to their job. That takes a lot of commitment. God save our gracious mods!

[The Germanian states]

The mods here make controversial decisions sometimes, especially with actions that many see as unnecessary, though in the end, most of their actions are warranted. We have them to thank for not having to deal with constant spam and malicious trolling, and we still have to deal with it sometimes. If you took one look at the moderation forum you'd see what the mods have to deal with daily, and keep in mind that some of them have been here for over a decade and still dedicate themselves to their job. That takes a lot of commitment. God save our gracious mods!

Amen to that. Now to abolish Democracy in my country.

[Page]

Since this is a discussion thread I take it I can throw in my two cents without fear of reprisal? I think there are no objective moderators on this forum anymore, and I think they generally rule based on what mood they're in at any given time and how they may feel about one remark or another personally. Almost weekly you can find two near exact instances of two posts, one which ends up being actionable and one not.

I think NationStates desperately needs codified rules and transparency.

[Frisbeeteria]

I think NationStates desperately needs codified rules and transparency.

So write up a draft and post a thread on it. I think you'll find that defining codified rules is much much harder than you think. There are 25 of us, and we don't think in lockstep. Do we allow "this word", and not "that one"? Does the context matter? Does the nation's prior posting history matter? If we allowed "this word" and some obnoxious git found a way to make it offensive, do we have to change the rules? Should the rules change every day / week / month?

Max Barry wanted the rules to consist of 6 forbidden actions, and that was it.

> What can't I post?
Any content that is:

• obscene
  
• illegal
  
• threatening
  
• malicious
  
• defamatory
  
• spam

Because people didn't always play nice, and because (surprise!) there are assholes on the Internet, those 6 actions have expanded into a massively expanded FAQ, the entire OSRS. and 12 years of precedent. If the rules were any longer, no one would ever read them. No mod would be able to keep track of them, much less the necessary daily changes.

So again, I challenge you: write up some better rules. When the other players tear them apart and the mods point out the inherent inconsistencies, don't say I didn't warn you.

[Naushantiya]

I know the moderators have answered this but I feel that this does not completely answer the question so I am going to budge in

The moderators have a strong biased towards the west and a deeply strong bias, so yeah it happens here. If a player from the west is committing griefing, trolling, baiting against a player who has views hostile against the west than the moderators would most likely ignore that infractions so in such cases one needs to be cool and refrain from retaliation as the moderators would get after you depending on your views and not them. There two reasons for that, the moderators would not like to give a whole lot of warnings to a lot of people since pro western bias is a norm over here and secondly all these moderators hail from the west thus are biased to that area.

I think I have given the op some information that was necessary and missed out

[Shazbotdom]

I know the moderators have answered this but I feel that this does not completely answer the question so I am going to budge in

The moderators have a strong biased towards the west and a deeply strong bias, so yeah it happens here. If a player from the west is committing griefing, trolling, baiting against a player who has views hostile against the west than the moderators would most likely ignore that infractions so in such cases one needs to be cool and refrain from retaliation as the moderators would get after you depending on your views and not them. There two reasons for that, the moderators would not like to give a whole lot of warnings to a lot of people since pro western bias is a norm over here and secondly all these moderators hail from the west thus are biased to that area.

I think I have given the op some information that was necessary and missed out

I'm sorry but no. I have seen people "from the west" who have done something against people from the rest of the world and they get pegged for it. Just because you don't see it happen doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

[Naushantiya]

I know the moderators have answered this but I feel that this does not completely answer the question so I am going to budge in

The moderators have a strong biased towards the west and a deeply strong bias, so yeah it happens here. If a player from the west is committing griefing, trolling, baiting against a player who has views hostile against the west than the moderators would most likely ignore that infractions so in such cases one needs to be cool and refrain from retaliation as the moderators would get after you depending on your views and not them. There two reasons for that, the moderators would not like to give a whole lot of warnings to a lot of people since pro western bias is a norm over here and secondly all these moderators hail from the west thus are biased to that area.

I think I have given the op some information that was necessary and missed out

I'm sorry but no. I have seen people "from the west" who have done something against people from the rest of the world and they get pegged for it. Just because you don't see it happen doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Not that it completely does not happen, somethings even the moderators have to do and cannot justify not stepping in but generally a person from the west will be given more leeway against a person who is against the west

[Shazbotdom]

I'm sorry but no. I have seen people "from the west" who have done something against people from the rest of the world and they get pegged for it. Just because you don't see it happen doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Not that it completely does not happen, somethings even the moderators have to do and cannot justify not stepping in but generally a person from the west will be given more leeway against a person who is against the west

Still not true. Everyone gets nearly the same treatment.

[Naushantiya]

Not that it completely does not happen, somethings even the moderators have to do and cannot justify not stepping in but generally a person from the west will be given more leeway against a person who is against the west

Still not true. Everyone gets nearly the same treatment.

Not true, some rules are enforced that specifically pro west like the word j*p is illegal here but a person whose native language is not english will never even know that the word j*p a is discriminatory but the word scot. Czech, brit, pole is not racist, there in fact some laws that are specifically tailored and catered to the western audiences and everybody gets the same treatment that is tailored to the west but in the case of views that are a little anti-west the moderators would crack down upon the person whose anti-west and leave the pro-west people, so my suggestion is that one should show excesssive restraint over here, when your talking against the west and not give into the flaming or retaliate

[Laanvia]

I agree. Although not abusive, some mods, notably Frisbeeteria and Crazy Girl are pretty smug when they ban, warn or answer polite questions. It's annoying...

[Enfaru]

Still not true. Everyone gets nearly the same treatment.

Not true, some rules are enforced that specifically pro west like the word j*p is illegal here but a person whose native language is not english will never even know that the word j*p a is discriminatory but the word scot. Czech, brit, pole is not racist, there in fact some laws that are specifically tailored and catered to the western audiences and everybody gets the same treatment that is tailored to the west but in the case of views that are a little anti-west the moderators would crack down upon the person whose anti-west and leave the pro-west people, so my suggestion is that one should show excesssive restraint over here, when your talking against the west and not give into the flaming or retaliate

Evidence or it didn't happen. If you're going to accuse mods of bias then you're going to need a strong case with lots of evidence.

Jap is well known as "offensive" in the english language Oxford English Dictionary - Definition of Jap the word Scot however is not considered offensive Oxford English Dictionary - Definition of Scot this is not Moderator bias this is called acceptable standards throughout the English speaking world (and this is predominantly an English speaking site).

Having the Oxford English Dictionary arguing against you are you sure you want to continuing arguing that mods are biased on this point?

[Wirbanskia]

I know the moderators have answered this but I feel that this does not completely answer the question so I am going to budge in

The moderators have a strong biased towards the west and a deeply strong bias, so yeah it happens here. If a player from the west is committing griefing, trolling, baiting against a player who has views hostile against the west than the moderators would most likely ignore that infractions so in such cases one needs to be cool and refrain from retaliation as the moderators would get after you depending on your views and not them. There two reasons for that, the moderators would not like to give a whole lot of warnings to a lot of people since pro western bias is a norm over here and secondly all these moderators hail from the west thus are biased to that area.

I think I have given the op some information that was necessary and missed out

I'm sorry, but that is not even close to how this site is run. I'll have you know that our mods and admins are spread across the globe, and could care less where any of of us are from, if they see us breaking the rules, well guess what, we get warned/banned/deleted, like everyone else. I have not seen one instance where people from "the west" were treated any better the rest of the world.

[Cerillium]

Still not true. Everyone gets nearly the same treatment.

Not true, some rules are enforced that specifically pro west like the word j*p is illegal here but a person whose native language is not english will never even know that the word j*p a is discriminatory but the word scot. Czech, brit, pole is not racist, there in fact some laws that are specifically tailored and catered to the western audiences and everybody gets the same treatment that is tailored to the west but in the case of views that are a little anti-west the moderators would crack down upon the person whose anti-west and leave the pro-west people, so my suggestion is that one should show excesssive restraint over here, when your talking against the west and not give into the flaming or retaliate

Many young Western people aren't aware that "Jap/Jappy" is a slur. Likewise, not many North Americans are aware that "kaffir" is now considered a racial slur - they aren't intentionally attacking people by writing it in their factbooks or posts. Sometimes all it takes is a polite telegram or post to alert the transgressor to their social blunder. I've done so in the past and, with the exception of one extremely rude individual, the young Westerners were very understanding and altered their posts/etc to reflect "Japan" or "Japanese" or "South African".

Enfaru is correct; Mods look at acceptable standards. Also, this is a Western forum and it tends to make rulings based upon Western thought. We can not insist that people conform to our specific Eastern cultures when we are participants in a Western setting. Should you encounter something you believe to be racist or a flame post, report it to Moderation. It is helpful if you do more than post "this is racist!"; provide details in your report that explain or support your belief.