12-24-2018, 05:44 PM
I know these sorts of suggestions are considered radical and are brushed aside pretty quickly. But considering what happened today, this option cannot be ignored.
I'm sure everyone on staff really genuinely tried to make the Discord a good place to be but there was a huge lack of understanding in how to manage a Discord server, and it felt like many were attempting to manage it like a forum.
Real-time chats pose a significant problem for a moderator, and that is mob mentality and how to handle a platform where people don't think through each and every post. Forums are great because they really self-moderate quite well--a member will often think as they're typing about wording, respect, and whether it's worth even posting at all. This makes it really easy to be reactionary, because there's such a low volume of attention given to rule-breaking posts. In a Discord server, if a staffer doesn't catch it first, someone else will, and then everyone knows about it. Then a moderator is presented with two issues: the original rule-breaking post and all the fallout from it. Without constant activity among the staff, this is a massive problem to handle.
Of course, it goes without saying as well that the #feedback channel also really is a detriment to everyone's mental health. Watching arguments about MFGG play out publicly at least once a week gives everyone a headache, not just staff. And the more arguments we have, the less constructive they become. Slowly but steadily, it's devolved into disrespecting both staff and members, throwing shade, raising hell, and stomping a foot down. We've seen multiple staff members explain how the drama on MFGG has destroyed their mental health, and causes them significant problems in their real lives, and clearly, this has come to a head with five staffers resigning at once.
So now the Discord is left more understaffed than ever, with people ill-equipped to handle it. I think until we heal from this as a community, we should drop the Discord so that we hit the problem at its root--no more unjustified bans, no more spite, no more drama.
Once the staff has everything in order, once things are set in stone and the community has proven that they are ready to try again, then we open a new Discord up.
note: I'm for archiving the Discord, not full deletion--e.g. making every channel read-only.
I'm sure everyone on staff really genuinely tried to make the Discord a good place to be but there was a huge lack of understanding in how to manage a Discord server, and it felt like many were attempting to manage it like a forum.
Real-time chats pose a significant problem for a moderator, and that is mob mentality and how to handle a platform where people don't think through each and every post. Forums are great because they really self-moderate quite well--a member will often think as they're typing about wording, respect, and whether it's worth even posting at all. This makes it really easy to be reactionary, because there's such a low volume of attention given to rule-breaking posts. In a Discord server, if a staffer doesn't catch it first, someone else will, and then everyone knows about it. Then a moderator is presented with two issues: the original rule-breaking post and all the fallout from it. Without constant activity among the staff, this is a massive problem to handle.
Of course, it goes without saying as well that the #feedback channel also really is a detriment to everyone's mental health. Watching arguments about MFGG play out publicly at least once a week gives everyone a headache, not just staff. And the more arguments we have, the less constructive they become. Slowly but steadily, it's devolved into disrespecting both staff and members, throwing shade, raising hell, and stomping a foot down. We've seen multiple staff members explain how the drama on MFGG has destroyed their mental health, and causes them significant problems in their real lives, and clearly, this has come to a head with five staffers resigning at once.
So now the Discord is left more understaffed than ever, with people ill-equipped to handle it. I think until we heal from this as a community, we should drop the Discord so that we hit the problem at its root--no more unjustified bans, no more spite, no more drama.
Once the staff has everything in order, once things are set in stone and the community has proven that they are ready to try again, then we open a new Discord up.
note: I'm for archiving the Discord, not full deletion--e.g. making every channel read-only.