Death Threats On DP

Hi guys, I'll try to keep this short and to the point.

I guess a brief summary would be;
- Standard heated discussion in P&R
- One poster states multiple times that he supports wife beating. (Yes, really.)
- I express my disgust, and yes, I do call him a vulgar name.
- He says people of his religion have a right to murder those not of his religion.
- I, and others, tell him this is sick and insane and he is giving his religion a terrible name.

It ends with him discussing fatwas and making death threats against more than one of us, although more focused on myself.

I have almost never reported a post in that category as it is normal and I think healthy to get worked up over one's beliefs - however it seems entirely unacceptable to me that despite making death threats this user is not banned.

Is there some kind of hard and fast rule regarding the number of infraction points for a threat of physical/actual harm? Or is it more up to the MODs discretion?

Please let me know as I tend to enjoy debating in P & R - however I find this kind of behavior completely ridiculous.

Thanks,
Alexis.

 

Shaun I reported the first two occasions that wMaster99 threatened us with Fatva's (fatwa's) in the thread.

The first time I reported that he was threatening to act like a Mufti and issue a Fatwa, which can be misconstrued, but the second time he openly made death threats and then compounded it by doing it a third time and then did so a further fourth time by implication towards alexispetrov.

Prior to this myself and member "Roman" tried to make light of the whole thread and tone of the conversation by taking the Mick a bit and adding a bit of wacky humor but that didn't work in regards to lightening things up.

You might want to take a read as mine and Romans posts at least might give you a giggle and you may see how seriously wMaster99 was getting in regards to his aggressiveness and threats to.

 

I just realized that posting this when about to go to bed was ridiculous - I didn't even include the thread link. Sorry.

I actually reported the posts regarding "fatvas" (Fatwa) too - and the last two more specific threatening posts.

 

A brief update, I just got a PM from wMaster99 on the subject;

I'm reporting the message - but is there a way to have MODs take a look at this guy? He's still here after being reported on a number of his threatening posts (I know of at least 2 other people who've reported him) and now he's sending silly little messages.

It isn't being called "Satan Bitch" that bothers me - it's the fact someone who is clearly an extremist is allowed to be a part of DP.

 

Mods can no longer do anything to take action against threats other than a 1pt infraction (I know, that's beyond ridiculous), despite what the P&R section says about such things leading to permanent bans. If the thread does include sweeping threats and hate speech, you'll have to take it up with Shawn personally to have it held to the terms posted publicly there.

 

Thanks jhmattern; very informative reply. I'll have a think on it when I wake up, it's well past the time I should be asleep ^-^;

It's hard to believe that a person only gets one point for actual threats of harm; correct me if I'm wrong but isn't that LESS than spam or the like? :S Meh.

Alexis.

 

I actually meant that I wondered why he wasn't banned based on his death threats, not on his beliefs - sorry if I wasn't really clear, I was very tired (and currently have the flu) at the time of posting.

Thanks for explaining that this isn't a ban-able offense; I made the mistake of just simply assuming it was - I have read the rules but I don't recall anything on this specific thing. (I'm aware of harassment, etc. - just nothing quite this specific.)

I wont post in this thread again.
Cheers,
Alexis.

 

Shawn -- You're absolutely right on one point -- it is a 2-pt infraction. My mistake. As for the so-called arbitrary bans, you already know I think that argument is complete and utter bs and you've ignored the issue of threats every time it's come up on the mod board.

These kinds of issues used to be discussed amongst mods, and there were always records and reviews when there were potential issues. Now people come in and threaten members not only in P&R, but threaten staff to try to get out of infractions, and threaten other members to influence their posting on the site. We used to not tolerate that. I'm beyond uncomfortable with your stance on that being acceptable and tolerated here now -- putting more trust in scammers and abusive members than you do in the forum staff. (And as for you saying it's a bannable offense above, you've repeatedly said otherwise on the mod board when threats have been made against mods and other members.)

And as I've said before on the mod board, I'll say it again publicly -- I'm not willing to have my name associated with that kind of policy, so if that's the way you intend to keep it, demote my account. Ban it if you want to. It's your site. But I'm not interested in staying associated w/ DP on a staff level when policies are in place to protect this kind of bs and not the members simply trying to contribute.

 

I suddenly feel most out of place in this thread.

Thanks for the clarification and info, I'm relieved he is gone now.

 

I understand both Shaun and JHMattern's views here.

I am an administrator on 3 boards. 2 I am owner of and 1 I help out with admin status on.

I have a partner who is also a super moderator on my/our own main board and an administrator on the board we help others out on where I am also one of the admin's with full privildedges, as well as which she/my partner is a mod on our other board.

I would like to offer a suggestion.

Have a number of people who have "Super Moderator" status who normal mods can pass things up to if they are not allowed to administer/mod things or are not sure what action would/should be best taken in a particular instance.

My next suggestion would be to have another group added that would be somewhere between a super moderator and an admin who have near admin status and who can be referred to by super moderators and/or mods in some circumstances and who have more say and priveledges in certain ways.

Heck I will throw my hat in to the mix and even suggest a name "Super AdModins" or some such name (perhaps even - Super Admins).

I will even go as far as saying we could start a trend in this respect by having this forum and some others follow suit on the adoption of some agreeable name for such a status so it becomes something well known and accepted as a person between "super mod and admin status".

What do you all think?

It might even be possible with enough boards joining in to influence the likes of VB to include such a between "super mod and admin" status as standard in future versions if enough people take up such a thing.

PS there is another member here on DP at the same IP address as me who is my partner Anna (member name MissTVWorlds - she has only made 1 post!) and we are a UK Ltd Company with a Reg TM (Double T Ted's) so thought it may be a good idea to make this known to mods and admins at this juncture.

 

That's interesting Shaun, I didn't know VB had plans to change/update the mod/admin panel in such a way.

Although not set in stone the priviledges that are set do take some additional setting that can be very time consuming presently.

I have changed various settings for different levels, so it is not totally inflexible, just a darned pain in the backside to have to go through and work out the best settings that suit.

This is why I said about adding another mod/admin status in the meantime b4 that new admin/mod panel comes into being might be worth considering - saying which - any dea what version VB are aiming that change to be implemented or any other onfo or links referencing that by any chance?

 

Awesome quote.

Great move to help curb moderate abuse. I've done something similar on my site too. They can't just make up infractions/warnings.

What a struggle this can be. You never know who to give power to and you can never quite figure out how much trust you can give. Software can make it worse of course by not giving you the needed tools to figure that out.

 

so the dog with the big bark has been put down eh?

 

Probably to his own advantage too. He was tossing out stuff that'd probably get him arrested in a few countries.
In ours "free speech" doesn't exactly extend to death threats.

 

I can't believe the idiot thinks Alla gave muslims the right to kill others just because it is written in some man made book written ages after their prohpet lived using second/third hand info that anyone could have made up.

Good riddance to bad rubbish anyway LOL.