Here come the blogging police

Consistency, fairness and making people learn to deal with hurt feelings like grown ups. These are not values for the bloggers that follow Tim O'Reilly's guidelines:

We define unacceptable content as anything included or linked to that:

• is being used to abuse, harass, stalk, or threaten others
• is libelous, knowingly false, ad-hominem, or misrepresents another person,
• infringes upon a copyright or trademark
• violates an obligation of confidentiality
• violates the privacy of others

We define and determine what is "unacceptable content" on a case-by-case basis, and our definitions are not limited to this list. If we delete a comment or link, we will say so and explain why. [We reserve the right to change these standards at any time with no notice.]

Not all of those bulletted points sound that bad, do they? Who could be against a blanket ban on abuse, harassment, misrepresentation, violating confidentiality, violating intellectual property rights and the privacy of others? Only a certifable cad, that's who, right? That's the way it would seem on paper, until it actually is time to implement such a comment policy. Some of these things are in fact highly subjective. Many a female blogger has complained that pointed criticism is obscenely abusive. If you need a reference point, check this one out (her comment about readers from Vox Popoli). Whether or not this is a function of the increasingly thin skin of the average person, is a matter I leave up to others to ponder, but it serves an illustrative point nonetheless. I think the greatest danger that stems from the people that hide behind moderation policies and other rubbish like that, is that society is conditioned today to not say "shut up, and deal with it" when the "offensive behavior" does not rise to the level of dangerous or uncontrolled vitriol. Our schools and business environments even teach most people to cater to the most thin-skinned and those quickest to complain of even perceived slights, and then to make like Chamberlain and seek peace, no matter how dishonorable it may be. Such policies, as encouraged here, would simply enable such people to hold conversations hostage and provide legitimacy to such bloggers, who probably shouldn't be blogging in the first place if they are that lacking in intestinal fortitude. Then there's the whole issue about the case-by-case basis and the changing the rules as we go. That's really a nice way to say that we'll provide you with a basic guideline, but reserve the right to arbitrarily shut you down. And yes, I am arrogant enough to say that my comment policy is vastly superior to this proposal! Here's one for self-aggrandizement!

4. When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.

When someone who is publishing comments or blog postings that are offensive, we'll tell them so (privately, if possible--see above) and ask them to publicly make amends.

Which is to say that if we take offense for any reason, we'll tell you that you should change what you say, how you feel, etc. to conform to our arbitrary standards of what is acceptable and what is not. Nevermind the fact that people frequently find opinions that disagree with them to be highly offensive. To a lot of people the personal is the political, and to a large extent, the opposite of that is true as well. You cannot make sociological, political or religious observations without deeply offending the sensibilities of some people, and in general, the more you question the "prevailing wisdom," the more people you will find who take personal offense at comments or posts that in and of themselves are not at all offensive or attacking anyone personally. One might call this the Sacred Cow Rule of Public Discourse. You fail to genuflect at your own risk; you barbeque at your own imminent peril. There's also the fact that many bloggers are, quite frankly, tone deaf when it comes to reading blog posts written by others who have cynical and sarcastic writing styles. Here's one for the record that involves my blog. Cathy Young linked to an arbitrary blog post of mine, which was largely tongue-in-cheek, and then proceeded to semi-evicerate it as though it were written with all of the seriouness of the sort of recycled drivel that dominates the conservative commentariat about the same subject. She missed the facts that a)I'm a libertarian, b)my libertarian is often more radical than most regulars at Reason, c)that the post was lampooning left-wing behavior and d)the Nazi quip was a jab at them, using one of their preferred attacks against them. As with all things along these lines, this rule will end up being used to protect the mainstream, the average, and not protect the views of others. The moment that someone finds another's views to be offensive, they'll cry foul and the badged blog police will go to work.

6. We ignore the trolls.

We prefer not to respond to nasty comments about us or our blog, as long as they don't veer into abuse or libel. We believe that feeding the trolls only encourages them--"Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, but the pig likes it." Ignoring public attacks is often the best way to contain them.

It would be nice if the mainstream definition of troll, but it's not. As point number four goes, to many people a troll is also someone who passionately disagrees with them, holds the "wrong views" or who get them into a corner in an argument. *************** Now then, I think the rules of blogging could be made a lot simpler if the following rules and expectations were rigorously enforced:

• You have a right to not be subjected to slanderous and libelous behavior, but you have no right to be shielded from comments and postings that might offend your sensibilities.
• If you criticize someone on your blog, you have an obligation to provide them with a reasonable platform on your blog to engage in a right of response. This can be a comment section or a prominently-placed trackback listing. Corollary: technical ignorance on your part is no excuse to not provide this; you opened your big mouth, now let them defend themselves.
• Most of us are adults, and there shall be no histrionics over juvenile sexual talk and threatening behavior by trolls. If such threats are brought offline into a blogger's life, we will actively encourage them to actually defend themselves rather than piss and moan about the unfairness of it all.
• Any on-topic comment, that is not filled with expletives and ad hominems shall enjoy a right to remain on the blog post because censorship is last resort, not a method for winning an argument.
• Comments will only be deleted as a last resort, and as a general rule, only to protect the blogger hosting the blog or a commenter who has revealed enough information about themselves that their life may be threatened.
• Thin-skinned individuals who cannot stomach criticism will be actively encouraged to stop blogging, stop commenting and in general, stop holding opinions.

This post inspired by ArsTechnica.