A move for disciplinary action

[Letonna]

Behavior like this is very unprofessional and frankly counter revolutionary. It's very inappropriate for this to be happening in our domains, especially since we may very well have members who would take high offense to this. Bustos has time and time again made comments that are very inappropriate(same with Rapture). I'm very concerned a day will come where these two members may be a detriment to our member retention.

I acknowledge our IRC is very unregulated, but I think we all know that there are some unspoken rules of decency and respect to other people in the channel. 

[Delfos]

I don't think we can or should punish members regarding the context of their actions for the following reasons:

1 - IRC is unregulated and our permanent members showed no interest to change that last time this issue arose.
2 - If we regulate, we can only punish members for actions posterior to the regulation approval
3 - Maintaining it unregulated and keeping the "gentlemen's agreement" (aka unspoken rules), you may take up the necessary actions when you feel something wrong is happening.
4 - Harsher disproportioned things have happened when Comarc's buttons are pushed, who cares if you mute them?

Anyway, we may want to write about the gentlemen's agreement for IRC conduct if you desire, I'd wish there was no real policing of the IRC channel instead, a collective moderation is more welcome.

Since you have voiced your concerns about this, you may want a Mediator, but I think the Liason or the Delegate may be better suited for a pep talk about this.

[Wast]

The first step when you see offensive or inappropriate conduct in the channel is to directly (but informally) address the commenter to let them know. Sometimes the 'unspoken rules' need to be spoken, if only to make the boundaries clear. This is particularly important for newer members who are not as acquainted with the culture of #taijitu. Formal mediation exists for the situation where someone fails to change their behavior after being asked to do so.

As Delfos suggests, it might be good for a community leader to address the issue with a general statement on IRC etiquette.

[Cormac]

I agree that the comments Bustos made were unacceptable, but I also agree that this should be handled by #taijitu channel operators. A statement by the Citizen-Liaison wouldn't hurt either.

[Khem]

Citizen-Liaison Statement: Freedom of speech is one of our most sacred rights, however I would advise such offensive speech be called as much when it occurs so the one speaking knows they done fucked up socially.

[Myroria]

I'll agree with what was said above. I don't want the IRC to have strict rules, but I also think we can all agree that jokes about violence against women are wrong.

I think the community that frequents IRC trusts everyone to police themselves - that's why we make everyone op and we don't have a hierarchy of op-voice-nothing like the GCR channels. But, as Wast said above, sometimes the unspoken rules have to be spoken. If someone said something that you feel was inappropriate, let them know. To be honest, a simple word with the offending party right after it happens is a lot less embarrassing than their dirty laundry being displayed on the forums for all to see.

I think in the vast majority of situations, a person will stop if they are asked to. It has happened in the past, though, that they don't. If someone doesn't stop being an nuisance, we have typically deopped them, devoiced them, or, in extreme circumstances, kicked them. Actions that the other members of the channel find objectionable are quickly reversed, and I think in a situation like IRC that's the best way to go about it.

If that degenerates into an OP war or some silly thing like that, most of the long-time Taijitu natives are AOPs at this point in the channel and can put a stop to that pretty quickly. For the most part, I'd like to keep things casual in the channel. It's up to everyone to police it if we're going to keep it all-ops, and I would certainly not like to see our channel become like every other big region's IRC channel.

[Bustos]

I wasn't sure if I wanted to even bother chiming in but, a few questions came to mind.

First, exactly what sensibilities were offended?  I ask this because, imho, simply saying "I am offended by this comment" does not educate the offender at all.  Letonna?  Cormac?  Legit Question.

Second, "offensive" comments happen quite often in the channel.  How long have we all been in this channel?

Third, a person with a "punchable face" means it's a person that you dislike/hate so much you wanna punch the person in the face.  Does it mean you're really going to?  Not likely.  So, are you saying you've never seen another channel member comment on violence against a person or group of people before in channel?  Come on, now.  Be real.  Note, I did not make that comment.

Fourth, my last comment in the picture above (I am presuming this is the offending comment) is in reference to my opinion that she's ugly.  Is that why you're offended?  That I called someone ugly?

And fifth, what happened to "no sharing - it's the law!" that's in the channel's intro in reference to sharing/posting chat logs, especially without the other person's permission?  I know you didn't get mine.  Do you have Rapture's?  Or Funk's?

[Eluvatar]

I'll respond to the rest later, but I do have to agree with Bustos' fifth point. I don't think it was right to quote IRC comments here without permission.

[Cormac]

I wasn't sure if I wanted to even bother chiming in but, a few questions came to mind.

First, exactly what sensibilities were offended?  I ask this because, imho, simply saying "I am offended by this comment" does not educate the offender at all.  Letonna?  Cormac?  Legit Question.

Making jokes about violence against women isn't funny and is offensive. The rest of your post is just you rationalizing your bad behavior and I'm not interested in a point by point rebuttal of garbage.

I'll respond to the rest later, but I do have to agree with Bustos' fifth point. I don't think it was right to quote IRC comments here without permission.

This has always been one of the silliest rules. First of all, it isn't practical -- people share IRC logs. It happens. If you don't want people to see something you've said out loud to other people, don't say it out loud to other people. Second, under this rule we can't discuss these matters if the offending party says, "Nope, you can't publish those." That's ridiculous.

[Khem]

I would personally move that logs from #Taijitu should be shareable on the forum, you're already publicly saying these things thus they should be able to be shared with our citizenry.

[Wast]

I agree with Cormac/Khem on the issue of logs on the forum. The 'no sharing logs' rule has always been a guideline, and there's a reason we never made it an explicit rule.

However, I would also like to note that the Ecclesia is public to non-citizens as well; do we also want to allow logs to be shared to the world at large, or just within the forum?

[Myroria]

If the people of the IRC channel wish it to be so, I will support it being so.

[Delfos]

Whatever we choose for Taijitu channel, we'll have to make provisions about the militia channel and general conduct for PM.

It's nice to ask people to quote them anyway...but I think it's unnecessary for most things that are actually shared, like random out-of-context crap for "snide".

[BaseballPlayer]

I don't think this is move for disciplinary action.  He did not say anything too offensive.  If needed, put it to a poll to decide whether disciplinary action is needed.

[Allama]

Fourth, my last comment in the picture above (I am presuming this is the offending comment) is in reference to my opinion that she's ugly.  Is that why you're offended?  That I called someone ugly?

While I'm in agreement with those who've said we should deal with such matters directly in IRC as they occur, I feel the need to point out the obvious: people are not upset by an assertion that Hillary Clinton is unattractive. It's completely irrelevant to a political discussion but irrelevancy has never stopped any of us from saying shit.

People got offended because you joked about a woman being beaten by her husband until it made her ugly. That's a horrific picture to paint, whatever your personal experiences. You can never know whether someone in the channel is a victim/survivor of domestic abuse. It's not okay to bring that up like it's funny.