Goonhub
04-18-2020, 05:19 PM
I scrolled back to see this conversation and there are clearly some missing parts so I won't pretend I have the entire context. However, the greater issue to me is quite clear:
Lack of enforcement of the rules
Right from the rules page:
Be respectful of others. You will not be banned from the channel for expressing opinions, so long as you are able to express those opinions in a respectful fashion. Don't use slurs, racial or otherwise, even ironically. Don't attack people for their opinions.
Personal attacks are already against the rules, under other words. And there were plenty in that discussion, but no admin took action. Of course we cannot expect them to be glued to the discord, yet it is egregious when an admin actually goes in and effectively says, "this is fine" when pinged. It enables this kind of behaviour as well as being against the admin guidelines.
Honestly, all the problems stem from admin inaction towards people either admittedly arguing in bad faith, using slurs or generally just trying to bait people. I was going to add more points but this sums up all issues I noticed with political discussion (if you can call hot takes and personal attacks a discussion), but that is all.
Politics, whatever way you define it, are sensitive issue that can often lead into unhealthy dialogue, and if the parties involved cannot or do not to see want when the best option is simply stopping, then higher action is needed. Now, I do not think all discussion should be stopped when it gets heated, but political discussion is a fairly unrelated subject to goon and if people can't discuss it civilly here then they should discuss it elsewhere.
Now, with the admin guidelines and discord rules in mind, there is not a clear "What do I do if someone is being shit". Do I ping the admin I like the most? Or the first one that's online? Creating a separate discord moderator role for admins who actually are willing to enforce discord rules may be a solution.
However, I don't discuss politics in goon due to a mix of my dislike of doing it on discord and it generally being internal US shit, so I can't really say whether this is a common issue but this should be addressed before so it doesn't bottle up.