Welcome to Gaia! :: View User's Journal | Gaia Journals

On the subject of the moderation system's transparency:

Lately in SF I've seen people complaining that the moderator/user relationship is not transparent enough, and more specifically that the admin account is a major problem with this. Some people think we should do away with it because it only impedes communication and gets abused by staff not wanting to do what they signed on to do.

I call bullshit.

First, it is not and never has been a secret that you can PM any mod, at any time, at any level of responsibility to ask for information regarding a warning, ban, deletion, thread move, or profile section disable. The only thing that we will not tell you is who did it, because the issue is not personal. The issue is someone violating (or, in some cases, not violating) the Terms of Service and therefore being reprimanded. Bringing names into it is irrelevant and petty, so we're not allowed to do it. Second, the problems with the admin account are largely user-end. Users feel it is okay to treat us badly and show blatant disrespect, and that has not changed; I strongly doubt it ever will, because no one likes being scolded and the internet is really consequence-free. If it were not certain that some users would respond in an excessively negative manner (because they've done it before on old accounts, because they're trolling, because we have no reason to believe they are ever rational), then I guarantee the admin option would be used a lot less. Which brings me to the third and-- I feel-- most important point here: the things people say to us are appalling, and I do not care if you think I signed on for it when I accepted the job. If a customer asked me to suck his d**k at any real job I have ever had, I would be within my rights to have him removed from the establishment. If a customer threatened my life, I would be within my rights to call the police. If a customer did nothing but sit there and berate me at the top of his lungs, repeatedly, I would be within my rights to transfer him to another employee if not have him ejected from the building. People do things on Gaia that are not at all appropriate in the working world, and I see no reason to stand for them here when I shouldn't anywhere else. The lack of ability to follow through is sort of immaterial here-- users actively harass us and act in wildly inappropriate ways, and just because we took the volunteer job does not mean we should be forced to put up with unconscionable abuse. Anyone saying so is out of their ******** tree, and I suggest they get a job making cold calls before they say another word. A certain amount of flak and whining is one thing, but people harass us frequently enough that it is an issue. I've had PMs full of shota/horse hentai and threats to beat the living s**t out of me, and that's not the worst I've heard of.

So if you want the admin account to be used less, give us less reason to use it. I don't care how special and deserving you think you are, I am not going to surrender my dignity and submit to things that aren't allowed in any workplace. Cry about it if you want, but I'm not going to lose any sleep about it.