Christian Forums Under New Management

[Debi1967]

Actually, I think we're all rather unbalanced. :o

Yes but this is besides the point and we put the "fun" is dysfunctional

 

[MeekOne]

Hi everyone,

Thank you for your patience. In the past 18 days, I have had a lot of PMs from people sharing their concerns and hopes. I want you to know that I have listened, and in the next 5 days we will be addressing many of those concerns, including:

1. Overwhelming support to return to the christianforums.com site.
2. Concern about efficacy of Wiki Policy
3. Rules
4. Desire for unbiased and fair staff action
5. Fear that changes will adversely affect groups on the forum

In order to make sure that we can make the forum a better place for everyone, I am going to:

1. Gather a small group of advisory members
2. Create private staff forums to discuss staff structure and policy going forward.
3. Return the site to a more inreach focus as contrasted with outreach. This will not affect access for non-Christians.
4. Work with Christian and non-Christian staff to determine where non-Christian staff may mod.
5. Create a new policy for staff. Staff serve at my pleasure, they will no longer be elected or subject to member recall.
6. Instate a reconciliation team to handle appeals, mediate member-member conflict, staff-member conflict, oversee staff, and make recommendations to my designee as concerns staff discipline, and or staff removal.
7. Provide a wiki formatted forum for members to discuss a rule or provide solutions to a problem.
8. Turn on the infraction system with some modifications.

New Staff Structure
Moderation:
Mods -Admins (team leaders) - Advisors

Staff conflict/discipline:
Mods -Admins (team leaders) - Advisors/HR Assistant

Staff Action Mediation:
(members) - Reconciliation team - Advisors/HR Assistant

Technical support:
Superadmins

Temporary rules:

• The names or titles of God, including Jesus Christ and the Persons of the Trinity (Father, Son, or Holy Spirit), in any language, are not to be used as expletives or interjections or in an abusive, mocking, or insulting way.

• Sharing of information about one's beliefs, for instance by quoting Bible verses or witnessing, is encouraged. Honest debate and discussion regarding the existence and nature of God is allowed and welcome. Mockery of Christians, Christians beliefs, and the Christian God are not.

• Promotion of the religion or rituals of Satanism is strictly prohibited. Promotion is defined as the active attempt to sway others to Satanic beliefs and/or practices.

• Flaming, baiting, trolling, or feeding trolls is not allowed. This also applies to groups. In other words, play nice, don't hurt others, nor call them names.

• If you think you are being flamed, choose *not* to be offended, but instead take a break, and communicate, rather than escalating or accusing others.

• Defamation is not allowed.

• Harassment of another member is not allowed.

• Threads which are off topic for the individual forums are not allowed, and substantial derails ot threads are not looked upon in a favorable fashion.

• Congregational Forums wishing to remain safe havens may choose to limit debate to members of their own denomination, insist that all posts conform to their creed etc.

• Age and or gender restrictions are to be respected.

• Reasonable confidentiality will be respected by Staff and Members, alike.

• Issues with staff decisions should be taken to the staff member, then the reconciliation team, period. Don't post them, don't PM them to others, don't take them to Lee.

• Do not say racist or sexist things. If the swear filter is activated, edit your post, don't try to bypass it. Don't post graphics or text you would not be comfortable sharing with someone's grandmother.

• Don't break the law, don't violate copyright, threaten others, or do or promote anything illegal.

• Don't spam in threads or sigs, don't promote get rich quick schemes anywhere on the site.

• Use the brain God gave you. Think before you post. Think about how your post may affect someone else.

OH HAPPY DAY!!!

 

[BelindaP]

Where is this list?

See post #210 of this thread.

 

[drstevej]

Actually, I think we're all rather unbalanced. :o

Is this reconciliation?
http://foru.ms/showpost.php?p=40241307&postcount=27

Shall I go out and get some people who were hurt by drstevej to come here and testify.

FTR, I'm one of them.

 

[BelindaP]

Aww, Steve. I can set us up with somebody if you'd like to try reconciliation.

 

[KarrieTex]

I have reservations of the list of people who are involved.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

The teens area is quite unique, and specific solutions are already in the works, including the appointment of cat_goes_meow as a admin over that forum exclusively.


Reports will return to being private.


Hopefully I'll get the rule uploaded in the faq in the next 24 hours. I will add numbers as well.

Private reports = bad idea.

I support bringing back the warning system. We really need that to track various things.

But you couple that with private reports and you have yourself a recipe for disaster.

I move that members and staff get together and hash this one out seperately. This is a big issue!


I've only been on staff a short time, but I can see open reports giving members a chance to be part of the discussion and smooth things over much quicker and with greater communication effectiveness.

I recall being on the receiving end of reports/warnings and I must say I had some awful experiences ONLY conducting business via PM. Awful.

Going right along with that...private staff forums. If these are created, they need to be for limited purposes. The old private staff forum was a breeding ground for many unpleasant things.


I'm generally hopeful about the rest of the changes and look forward to seeing what unfolds.

 

[Joykins]

Actually, I think we're all rather unbalanced. :o

Maybe you all balance each other's imbalance out a little bit. Yeah, that's it

 

[I'ddie4him2]

Unfortunately, it sounds like we're returning to the old system that gave moderators virtually unlimited power and led to the Gestapo like tactics they use now.

Sorry but I disagree. Policon went this route as soon as it was reopened under a new name. I have seen far less of this behaviour displayed by the majority of staff.
This is by far the best way to do this per the OP.

Originally Posted by LeeD
Hi everyone,

Thank you for your patience. In the past 18 days, I have had a lot of PMs from people sharing their concerns and hopes. I want you to know that I have listened, and in the next 5 days we will be addressing many of those concerns, including:

1. Overwhelming support to return to the christianforums.com site.
2. Concern about efficacy of Wiki Policy
3. Rules
4. Desire for unbiased and fair staff action
5. Fear that changes will adversely affect groups on the forum

In order to make sure that we can make the forum a better place for everyone, I am going to:

1. Gather a small group of advisory members
2. Create private staff forums to discuss staff structure and policy going forward.
3. Return the site to a more inreach focus as contrasted with outreach. This will not affect access for non-Christians.
4. Work with Christian and non-Christian staff to determine where non-Christian staff may mod.
5. Create a new policy for staff. Staff serve at my pleasure, they will no longer be elected or subject to member recall.
6. Instate a reconciliation team to handle appeals, mediate member-member conflict, staff-member conflict, oversee staff, and make recommendations to my designee as concerns staff discipline, and or staff removal.
7. Provide a wiki formatted forum for members to discuss a rule or provide solutions to a problem.
8. Turn on the infraction system with some modifications.

New Staff Structure
Moderation:
Mods -Admins (team leaders) - Advisors

Staff conflict/discipline:
Mods -Admins (team leaders) - Advisors/HR Assistant

Staff Action Mediation:
(members) - Reconciliation team - Advisors/HR Assistant

Technical support:
Superadmins

Temporary rules:

• The names or titles of God, including Jesus Christ and the Persons of the Trinity (Father, Son, or Holy Spirit), in any language, are not to be used as expletives or interjections or in an abusive, mocking, or insulting way.

• Sharing of information about one's beliefs, for instance by quoting Bible verses or witnessing, is encouraged. Honest debate and discussion regarding the existence and nature of God is allowed and welcome. Mockery of Christians, Christians beliefs, and the Christian God are not.

• Promotion of the religion or rituals of Satanism is strictly prohibited. Promotion is defined as the active attempt to sway others to Satanic beliefs and/or practices.

• Flaming, baiting, trolling, or feeding trolls is not allowed. This also applies to groups. In other words, play nice, don't hurt others, nor call them names.

• If you think you are being flamed, choose *not* to be offended, but instead take a break, and communicate, rather than escalating or accusing others.

• Defamation is not allowed.

• Harassment of another member is not allowed.

• Threads which are off topic for the individual forums are not allowed, and substantial derails ot threads are not looked upon in a favorable fashion.

• Congregational Forums wishing to remain safe havens may choose to limit debate to members of their own denomination, insist that all posts conform to their creed etc.

• Age and or gender restrictions are to be respected.

• Reasonable confidentiality will be respected by Staff and Members, alike.

• Issues with staff decisions should be taken to the staff member, then the reconciliation team, period. Don't post them, don't PM them to others, don't take them to Lee.

• Do not say racist or sexist things. If the swear filter is activated, edit your post, don't try to bypass it. Don't post graphics or text you would not be comfortable sharing with someone's grandmother.

• Don't break the law, don't violate copyright, threaten others, or do or promote anything illegal.

• Don't spam in threads or sigs, don't promote get rich quick schemes anywhere on the site.

• Use the brain God gave you. Think before you post. Think about how your post may affect someone else.

 

[tulc]

It does not mean being luke warm in order to be balanced, You can have a balanced board that is still extremely Christian in nature. And that does not give into false doctrine. (emph. added)

So who gets to decide what a false doctrine is?
tulc(just curious)

 

[KarrieTex]

Private reports = bad idea.

I support bringing back the warning system. We really need that to track various things.

But you couple that with private reports and you have yourself a recipe for disaster.

I move that members and staff get together and hash this one out seperately. This is a big issue!


I've only been on staff a short time, but I can see open reports giving members a chance to be part of the discussion and smooth things over much quicker and wilt greater communication effectiveness.

I recall being on the receiving end of reports/warnings and I must say I had some awful experiences ONLY conducting business via PM. Awful.

Going right along with that...private staff forums. If these are created, they need to be for limited purposes. The old private staff forum was a breeding ground for many unpleasant things.


I'm generally hopeful about the rest of the changes and look forward to seeing what unfolds.

Walks,

I agree with you.

I was on the fence with this issue. However, your point is valid and you are correct in how it can resolve itself.

I would also like to add to this that if the reports stay open there needs to be strict guidelines on who is allowed to post in these threads and who are not.

I have seen friends of the reported person rush the thread to defend their friend, which leads to problems.

 

[I'ddie4him2]

Walks,

I agree with you.

I was on the fence with this issue. However, your point is valid and you are correct in how it can resolve itself.

I would also like to add to this that if the reports stay open there needs to be strict guidelines on who is allowed to post in these threads and who are not.

I have seen friends of the reported person rush the thread to defend their friend, which leads to problems.

AND the rules equally applied to ALL POSTING. Including staff.
Something rarely done to date.

 

[tulc]

I like the open reports threads, in fact the only thing I'd change would be that they not be anonymous anymore, which would also (I think) cut down on a lot of the spite reports.
tulc(just a suggestion)

 

[catofhope]

Woo Hoo

I could never call this place anything but CF!!!!!

Thanks for listening, Lee.

Always willing to help if it needed.

 

[KarrieTex]

AND the rules equally applied to ALL POSTING. Including staff.
Something rarely done to date.

However, it is and has happened. Thus I see there is a need to apply stricter guidelines on it if they are to remain public.

Suffice it to say this may not be the thread to "debate" this issue. Expressing a view and/or concern is not an open invitation for debate. With that being said, I am not going to post more on this topic at hand.

 

[HisKid1973]

I like the open reports threads, in fact the only thing I'd change would be that they not be anonymous anymore, which would also (I think) cut down on a lot of the spite reports.
tulc(just a suggestion)

I like them too..I just interjected scripture guidance as an alternative the pettiness, backbiting and immaturity.

 

[ContentInHim]

I have reservations of the list of people who are involved.

I do also, now that I see it.

Praying that this works out.

 

[Debi1967]

So who gets to decide what a false doctrine is?
tulc(just curious)

I guess the owner of this board

 

[ParsonJefferson]

I'm cautiously hopeful that some good will come from these changes.

But honestly, before I'm willing to so much as think about resuming any activity here, I'll have to see some long-term evidence that this forum is no longer the horrible (borderline abusive) site it has become.

I guess time will tell if too much damage has been done, over too long a period of time, for this forum to recover.

-pj

 

[.Sabre.]

I had my reservations from the word "go", no-one listened. Now look what happens. Pre-777. It ain't good.