«

On 10/14/2012 03:58 PM, Ben Finney wrote:> Zero Piraeus <>writes:
>[...]
> What's needed, IMO, is a difficult balance: there needs to be calm,
> low-volume, but firm response to instances of hostile behaviour, making
> clear by demonstration – especially to the people only observing the
> discussion – that such hostility is unwanted and not to be tolerated in
> our community.
>[...]

The problem with this is that while there may sometimes be a
weak consensus, different people have different ideas about
what is "wrong". Thus when a member of this esteemed group
was recently attacked as racist, for punning another member's
name when responding somewhat heatedly, I, according to your
view, should have jumped in to point out unfair accusations
of racism are not only wrong, but hurt the cause of anti-racism
by devaluing such charges when they are legitimate.

No, what you propose will only reduce the signal to noise ratio
and increase the amount of off-topic arguments.

The old tried-and-true advise is still the best: don't feed the
trolls. Experience with three decades of mailing lists and usenet
has shown that most of them give up and go somewhere else when
they don't get a response.

Of course this does not apply when you are the one attacked (or
perceive you are) -- in that case your advice for a low-key
factual response is quite appropriate. (And then drop it.)

> To those who feel the need to “fight” the trolls: thank you for caring
> enough about the Python community to try to defend it. But I'm concerned
> that you tend to pour fuel on the flames yourself, and I hope you can
> work to avoid becoming the monster you fight.
>
>> And, yes, I know bringing it up could be construed as stoking the
>> flames ... but, well, "silence = acquiescence" and all that.
>
> Agreed. Thanks again.

No. Silence != acquiescence as a few minutes of thought will
show. The fact that it is often repeated does not make it
true.

On Oct 15, 1:22*pm, ru...@yahoo.com wrote:
> Thus when a member of this esteemed group
> was recently attacked as racist, for punning another member's
> name when responding somewhat heatedly,

Again, there is a difference between "attacking" someone "as racist"
and *criticising* their *comments* as *possibly* racist. When the
person whose name was being punned said that they themselves were
unsure whether it was intended as a racial attack, then the behaviour
was worth commenting on.

If anything, I initially *joked* about it as a means of trying to
point out the issue in a non-offensive way. If there was any
"attacking" going on, it was in the criticised party's responses.

> hurt the cause of anti-racism

My response had nothing to do with "agendas" and "causes" and
everything to do with wanting to keep specific forms of discourse off
this list. I had identical issues with the same person's use of
"bitch" and "whore"; I cannot begin to fathom how stating that they're
unacceptable to use here is in any way damaging to the anti-sexism
position, or an attack on the person saying them.

On 10/14/2012 10:36 PM, alex23 wrote:> On Oct 15, 1:22 pm, ru...@yahoo.com wrote:
>> Thus when a member of this esteemed group
>> was recently attacked as racist, for punning another member's
>> name when responding somewhat heatedly,
>
> Again, there is a difference between "attacking" someone "as racist"
> and *criticising* their *comments* as *possibly* racist. When the
> person whose name was being punned said that they themselves were
> unsure whether it was intended as a racial attack, then the behaviour
> was worth commenting on.

I just went back and reread what you and some others wrote
to make sure I was not misremembering and am comfortable
sticking with my description. (FTR, your initial response
was "Please, don't be a dick.")

My intent was not to reargue that issue but to point out
that different people have differing ideas on what is
"acceptable" and "unacceptable" here and that if Ben
Finney's advice to respond (in moderation) whenever one
reads an "unacceptable" opinion is taken, one will create
an environment in which troll's will flourish.

The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage
others to do the same.

On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:27:48 -0700, rurpy wrote about trolls and dicks:

> The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage others to do the
> same.

If you ignore such posts, how will the poster know they are unacceptable?

How should somebody distinguish between "I am being shunned for acting
like a dick", and "I have not received any responses because nobody has
anything to add"?

If I believe that your behaviour ("giving lousy advice") is causing great
harm to this community, and *I don't say anything*, how will you know to
change your behaviour? How will others know that I do not agree with your
advice?


--
Steven

Steven D'Aprano wrote:

> On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:27:48 -0700, rurpy wrote about trolls and dicks:
>

> > The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage others to do the
> > same.

>
> If you ignore such posts, how will the poster know they are unacceptable?
>
> How should somebody distinguish between "I am being shunned for acting
> like a dick", and "I have not received any responses because nobody has
> anything to add"?
>
> If I believe that yourbehaviour ("giving lousy advice") is causing great
> harm to this community, and *I don't say anything*, how will you know to
> change yourbehaviour? How will others know that I do not agree with your
> advice?
>
>


I agree completely. I was about to say thatI was fine with meeting
known trolls with silence, but what happens when new or infrequent
readers see the troll's writing with no one objecting? Are they to
ignore the troll or assume that the list condones the troll's words?

~Ramit


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On 10/16/2012 10:49 AM, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> > On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:27:48 -0700, rurpy wrote about trolls and dicks:

No, I wrote about trolls. "dicks" is a highly emotive and
almost totally subjective word that I would not use in a
rational discussion. Perhaps you were trying to be amusing?

>> >> The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage others to do the
>> >> same.
> >
> > If you ignore such posts, how will the poster know they are unacceptable?

Do you really think that in the vast majority of cases that
the poster is blithely unaware of the inflammatory nature
of their post? The whole point of trolling is to generate
responses by posting something inflammatory. It sounds to
me like your view is that most such posts are made by people
who are simply brand new to the internet (or at least the
civilized parts of it) and thus, when their error is pointed
out, will say thanks and change their ways.

> > How should somebody distinguish between "I am being shunned for acting
> > like a dick", and "I have not received any responses because nobody has
> > anything to add"?

Because you sent them private email telling them that? (And
if you can't do that, maybe you should take it as a hint that
they're not particularly interested in your "help"?)

> > If I believe that your behaviour ("giving lousy advice") is causing great
> > harm to this community, and *I don't say anything*, how will you know to
> > change your behaviour?

If that was how you thought, then you would be someone I hope
would follow my advice. Because you would clearly seem to be
unable to distinguish between difference of opinion on a
subject relevant to the newsgroup, and inflammatory trolling.
Further you see the situation in extreme terms ("*great
harm*") and one in which only a single point of view (your's)
is acceptable. You would be bordering on delusional by
thinking your post would somehow change my "behavior".

But even if you had a more rational response and saved
that reaction for actual trolling and not someone who
simply disagreed with you, I ask again, what makes you
think your response will change that troll's behavior,
when in actuality, your kind of response is exactly what
most trolls hope to elicit? Did it help in the case I
mentioned?

> > How will others know that I do not agree with your
> > advice?

Why is it so important to you that I and others know what
you think? Since you are (usually) a reasonable person I
don't need to read your explicit pronouncement to assume
that you disagree with some repugnant post.

If it were possible to somehow have a single, reasonable
response generated to an offensive post, that would be great.
But I don't think that is possible. Multiple people will
feel the need to take on that duty. Others will feel the
response is not strong enough or doesn't represent their
personal take and post their responses. Some will respond
righteously to non-offensive posts. (The use of "troll"
as a synonym for "I/we don't agree with you" is quite
noticeable in this group.) The perp will inevitably
followup with more offensive posts in response. This
is how things have worked since the invention of mailing
lists and why "don't feed the trolls" has served fairly
well for three decades.

On 10/16/2012 02:17 PM, Prasad, Ramit wrote:> Steven D'Aprano wrote:
>> On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:27:48 -0700, rurpy wrote about trolls and dicks:
>>
>> > The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage others to do the
>> > same.
>>
>> If you ignore such posts, how will the poster know they are unacceptable?
>>
>> How should somebody distinguish between "I am being shunned for acting
>> like a dick", and "I have not received any responses because nobody has
>> anything to add"?
>>
>> If I believe that your behaviour ("giving lousy advice") is causing great
>> harm to this community, and *I don't say anything*, how will you know to
>> change your behaviour? How will others know that I do not agree with your
>> advice?
>
> I agree completely. I was about to say that I was fine with meeting
> known trolls with silence, but what happens when new or infrequent
> readers see the troll's writing with no one objecting? Are they to
> ignore the troll or assume that the list condones the troll's words?

You do not give enough credit to people. The vast majority
of people are capable of recognizing offensive posts and
recognizing that non-response to them is intentional. I
think it is absurd to think that most normal people will
see such posts and conclude that all Python programmers
agree with them. (No time to look it up but I vaguely
recall a long series of anti-semitic posts here that were
largely ignored. I've seen no evidence that there are
people who brand the Python community as anti-semitic.)

On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 14:10:17 -0700, rurpy wrote:

> On 10/16/2012 10:49 AM, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
>> > On Tue, 16 Oct 2012 09:27:48 -0700, rurpy wrote about trolls and
>> > dicks:
>
> No, I wrote about trolls. "dicks" is a highly emotive and almost
> totally subjective word

As opposed to "troll", which is unemotional and objective? Not.


> that I would not use in a rational discussion.

I would. If someone is acting like a dick, why not call them by the word
that most accurately describes their behaviour?

I see nothing troll like in Dwight "call me David, but I can't be
bothered changing my signature" Hutto's behaviour. He doesn't seem to be
trolling, in either sense: he doesn't appear to be making provocative
statements for the purpose of making people think, nor does he seem to be
making inflammatory statements to get a rise out of people. He seems to
genuinely want to help people, in a clumsy, aggressive, and I believe
often intoxicated way.

So it seems to me that you are wrongly applying the term "troll" as a
meaningless pejorative to anyone who behaves badly.


> Perhaps you were trying to be amusing?

Certainly not.


>>> >> The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage others to do
>>> >> the same.
[...]
>> > How should somebody distinguish between "I am being shunned for
>> > acting like a dick", and "I have not received any responses because
>> > nobody has anything to add"?
>
> Because you sent them private email telling them that?

My, what a ... unique ... concept of "ignore such posts" you have.

So far, this has been the best advice you have given so far. My opinion
is that there is a graduated response to dickish behaviour:

* send a message telling the person they are acting unacceptably,
preferably privately on a first offence to avoid public shaming
(when possible -- lots of people aren't privately contactable
for many reasons other than that they are trolls);

* if the behaviour continues, make a public comment condemning
that behaviour generally without engaging directly in a debate
or "tit-for-tat" argument with the person.


And for those who value their own peace and quiet over the community
benefit:

* block or killfile posts from that person so they don't
have to be seen, preferably publicly.

When I killfile someone, I tend to make it expire after a month or three,
just in case they mend their ways. Call me Mr Softy if you like.


[...]
>> > If I believe that your behaviour ("giving lousy advice") is causing
>> > great harm to this community, and *I don't say anything*, how will
>> > you know to change your behaviour?
>
> If that was how you thought, then you would be someone I hope would
> follow my advice. Because you would clearly seem to be unable to
> distinguish between difference of opinion on a subject relevant to the
> newsgroup, and inflammatory trolling. Further you see the situation in
> extreme terms ("*great harm*") and one in which only a single point of
> view (your's) is acceptable.

As opposed to only your opinion being acceptable? Why on earth should I
follow your advice if I think it is bad advice?

We can't both be right[1]. We can't simultaneously confront bad
behaviour, and ignore bad behaviour. I think your advice is bad, and has
the potential to kill this community. You think my advice is bad, and has
the potential to kill this community. Except that you've made a 180-
degree turn from your advice to "ignore" bad behaviour, but apparently
didn't notice that *sending private emails* is not by any definition
"ignoring". So apparently you don't actually agree with your own advice.


> You would be bordering on delusional by
> thinking your post would somehow change my "behavior".

It's not necessarily about changing your behaviour. (Well, in this case,
it's less about you than about Dwight Hutto specifically and badly-
behaved posters in general.) It's about sending a message that the
behaviour is unacceptable.

The primary purpose of that message is to discourage *others* from
following in the same behaviour. Nothing will kill a forum faster than
trolls and dicks feeding off each other, until there is nothing left but
trolls and dicks. A single troll doesn't do much harm -- few of them have
the energy to spam a news group for long periods, drowning out useful
posts.


> But even if you had a more rational response

*raises eyebrow*

> and saved that reaction for
> actual trolling and not someone who simply disagreed with you, I ask
> again, what makes you think your response will change that troll's
> behavior, when in actuality, your kind of response is exactly what most
> trolls hope to elicit? Did it help in the case I mentioned?

As I said, I do not believe that Dwight Hutto is a troll. I believe he is
merely badly behaved. And yes, I do believe that confronting him has
changed his behaviour, at least for now.

Not immediately, of course. His immediate response was to retaliate and
defend himself. Naturally -- very few people are self-honest enough to
admit, even to themselves, when they are behaving badly.

But in the intervening weeks, we, this community, has done anything but
ignore him. We're still talking about him *right now*. We're just not
necessarily talking *to* him. And the few times that people do respond
directly to Dwight, they make it very clear that their response is
guarded and on sufferance.

And there have been no further outbursts from Dwight, at least not so
far. So, yes, I think we've gotten the message across.


>> > How will others know that I do not agree with your advice?
>
> Why is it so important to you that I and others know what you think?
> Since you are (usually) a reasonable person I don't need to read your
> explicit pronouncement to assume that you disagree with some repugnant
> post.

You are assuming we all agree on what is repugnant. That pretty much
demonstrates that you have missed my point. Without drawing explicit
boundaries, how do people know what we consider beyond the boundary of
acceptable behaviour?

The people in this forum come from all over the world. We're not all
white, middle-class[2], Australian, educated, progressive/liberals like
me. We're black, Chinese, German, conservative, Muslim, Christian,
atheist, socialist, anarchist, fascist, etc. We come from all sorts of
cultures, where families are run like democracies, or where they are run
like dictatorships where the father is the head of the household even of
his adult children; cultures that consider euthanasia beyond the pale and
those that believe that there are fates worse than death; cultures where
smacking children is an abomination and cultures where it is simply
common sense; cultures that condone honour-killings and those that don't;
cultures where blowing yourself up to kill the enemy is thought to be an
act of bravery, and cultures where pushing a button to kill strangers a
thousand miles away is thought to be an honourable act of military
service.

What on earth makes you think we would possibly agree on what posts are
repugnant without talking about it?

I'm sure that there are some people here -- and you might be one of them
-- that consider my use of the word "dick" unacceptable. And others who
consider dick a mild word and far less offensive than the euphemisms
others might prefer.

Your opinion that we should all, somehow, agree on acceptable behaviour
is culturally self-centred and rather naive. I'm far more offended by
Dwight's habit of posting incoherently while ****ed[3] than I am by his
possibly-or-possibly-not racist punning. But I don't expect everyone to
agree with me.




[1] However, we can both be wrong. There's no reason to think that there
is *any* strategy to respond to bad behaviour that will work all the
time, against all people.

[2] Nearly everybody thinks they're middle-class, except the filthy rich
and the filthy poor.

[3] I don't give a damn what mind-altering chemicals Dwight wishes to
indulge in, so long as he does it in private.


--
Steven

On Wed, 17 Oct 2012 02:45:04 +0000, Steven D'Aprano wrote:

> Dwight "call me David, but I can't be bothered changing my signature"
> Hutto's behaviour.

I withdraw this dig at David Hutto. It was unnecessary, and it turns out,
wrong as he has now changed his signature.


--
Steven

On Oct 16, 9:27*pm, ru...@yahoo.com wrote:
> On 10/14/2012 10:36 PM, alex23 wrote:> On Oct 15, 1:22 pm, ru...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> >> Thus when a member of this esteemed group
> >> was recently attacked as racist, for punning another member's
> >> name when responding somewhat heatedly,
>
> > Again, there is a difference between "attacking" someone "as racist"
> > and *criticising* their *comments* as *possibly* racist. When the
> > person whose name was being punned said that they themselves were
> > unsure whether it was intended as a racial attack, then the behaviour
> > was worth commenting on.
>
> I just went back and reread what you and some others wrote
> to make sure I was not misremembering and am comfortable
> sticking with my description. *(FTR, your initial response
> was "Please, don't be a dick.")
>
> My intent was not to reargue that issue but to point out
> that different people have differing ideas on what is
> "acceptable" and "unacceptable" here and that if Ben
> Finney's advice to respond (in moderation) whenever one
> reads an "unacceptable" opinion is taken, one will create
> an environment in which troll's will flourish.
>
> The best advise is to ignore such posts and encourage
> others to do the same.

Trolling posts certainly exist. And when 'troll' becomes a short-form
for 'one-who-regularly-trolls' its fine as long as we remember that
its a metonymy.

When we forget
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FMEe7JqBgvg
should help by:
1. Showing how to deal with trolling
2. Reminding that such beings dont actually exist except as caricature

Coming to current misbehavior on the list -- specifically Etienne's
outburst against Steven,
I am reminded of a similar situation a year ago

Long thread -- Relevant starting is here
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...ay/604893.html

Abusive post
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/pyt...ay/604914.html

Maybe easier to read
http://groups.google.com/group/comp....3102a45da19386

The last thing that John Bokma posted (to the best of my knowledge)
was:

> Ben Finney <ben at benfinney.id.au> writes:
>
>>> Get a life. Or better, just **** off and die. It will improve both the
>>> world and the Python community, of which you are nothing but a little,
>>> smelly shitstain.
>>
>> That abuse is entirely unwelcome in this community, against any person.
>> Please desist.

> You should have spoken up sooner, especially as the spokes person of
> "this" community. But every bully has is fan club.
>
> --
> John Bokma

If we think/feel that John Bokma was trolling then driving him off the
list was a good thing.
If not we need to question whether those actions were collectively
sound.

Specifically Steven's post that triggered Etienne's misbehavior is
this:

On Oct 5, 5:22 am, Steven D'Aprano <steve
+comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info> wrote:
> On Thu, 04 Oct 2012 14:10:46 -0400, Etienne Robillard wrote:
> > Dear list,
>
> > Due to lack of energy and resources i'm really sad to announce the
> > removal ofnotmmfrom pypi and bitbucket.
>
> Well that's just rude. Even if you don't intend to maintain the software
> any more, why are you removing it from pypi? Since you say you are a fan
> of Open Source software, just flag it as unmaintained and leave it for
> somebody else to pick up.
>
> If you are going to abandon the project, release it on PyPI with a dual
> MIT and GPL licence, and let it be taken over by somebody else.
>
> If you were looking for sympathy here, starting off by removing your
> project from free hosting, then complaining that you can't pay for the
> non-free hosting, was NOT the right way to do so.
:

> Steven

I read Etienne as saying: 'I need money (or at least some sympathy)'
Steven is unequivocally saying 'You are not getting it from here'

Technically he is correct; humanly I am not so sure.

[I have a personal regret that I did not rebut Steven's rudeness with
a '... that is not necessarily the view of the whole group...'
I hesitated to do so because I am not adept at giving sympathy without
giving false hope and keeping the post at reasonable length.
Anyhow this (too long) post is an attempt at correcting that.]

In the earlier (Quora-thread) Terry Reedy's voice was most balanced
and sane; unfortunately covered in the 'dog-pile' of all the rest.

Hopefully he will put in his word here as well.
[And Zero thank you for starting this thread]

Rusi

- http://blog.languager.org